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00:00

Hello and welcome back to the tech to Business Show comm best place for actionable advice for entrepreneurs. This is Ted, your friend and host speaking. Now if you’re listening to the podcast, then you’re probably an entrepreneur. And that means you’re somebody leaders.

 

Well, now today we’re talking about crafting effective leadership teams. Here’s my question for you. When you think about leadership development, do you see it as an individual endeavor? If you said yes, then there’s no surprise because it seems like the idea of the heroic soloist has always been at the forefront of our history, stories and culture.

 

But as they say, it can get lonely at the top. So let’s talk about a house in wise of doing an effective leadership team. Joining us today we have my friend Dan Norberg, who is the Executive strategic leadership team advisor, coach and author of the book executive ownership, creating highly effective leadership teams, Dan is known for his top down approach for leadership teams to dramatically improve their performance. As a trusted advisor, consultant and professional speaker.

 

 Dan’s mission is to enable executive teams and organizations to play at their best in today’s episode, the issue is how one can spot if their leadership issues in the company, why it is important to provide a good system of communication for leaders as well, and the benefits of a top down leadership approach. So guys, if you ever received any value from the show, I’d love to get your support,

 

I would greatly appreciate it if you could share the show with maybe just one friend. And I’d love for you to subscribe to the show and to leave a review on Apple podcasts. And now without further ado, let’s dive right in. Hey, Dan, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s such a pleasure to have you here.

 

01:23

Ted, it’s a pleasure to join you. Thank you for inviting me.

 

01:25

So then let’s start with a very simple icebreaker. So we can all get to know you a bit better, who is Dan Norenberg? When isn’t working?

 

01:33

Dan Norberg, when he’s not working, he’s going to be moving and somewhere outside. So I’m really an active guy. I was actively involved in sports growing up actually the collegiate level, my wife is extremely active, very sports oriented.

 

So we’re either walking, swimming, hiking, playing tennis, just something we don’t do any of those things remarkably well. But we have a remarkably, we have a remarkably good time doing it.

 

01:59

Well, that’s okay. As long as you enjoy yourself. So then it sounds like you’re a very active person. What sports do you play in school?

 

02:05

Well, in high school, I was a track and field. And then I played American football and play baseball for a while, and and play and I love basketball. But I wasn’t the tallest guy. That was really my aspiration. And then I had, I guess, a bit of talent. And I was fortunate enough to play collegiate football. So in high school, I was a quarterback, which is sort of the playmaker. I don’t know if that’s maybe the reason I ended up in leadership.

 

But so that was the, the position I played from the age I was eight until I finished high school. And then when I went to the University, which was quite a high level of competition, these guys were, you know, as big as fire stations. And so I moved to defense, and I played defensive back,

 

maybe we’ll come back to the sports piece and what happened in the collegiate football, because that’s one of the reasons that I’m in Europe today. But that’s perhaps something that we’ll pick up a little bit later.

 

02:54

Right. So then you’re very active person and just shed you’re always moving when you’re not working. Right. So you actually moved from California all the way to Germany. Could you share with us the story of how that happened?

 

03:04

Yeah, well, really interesting. Because it was never my intention to end up in Europe. I mean, I grew up in the Midwest, studied psychology and criminology wanted to become a lawyer thought, perhaps a little bit of business wouldn’t be a bad thing. And went west to California, edited an area, which is now called Silicon Valley,

 

and gotten involved in some technology companies that were growing very fast. And although I was an engineer, I found that I fit very nicely into marketing and sales positions. And because the companies were growing quickly, I moved up to management quite quickly. And like many technology companies that are before their time, the one that I was with, went out of business. And, and I would have been with that company, the rest of my life.

 

We were making photovoltaics, generating electricity from sunlight changing the world. So it was very mission based work, and I just love the company. But it was just before its time, it went out of business. And I sold my house in Palo Alto, a girlfriend I had broken up and I said, you know,

 

I’m gonna go to Europe for nine days. Just refresh myself up and think, what’s my next big thing and come back to California and go after it. I sort of forgot about law school at that time. And I tell I’ll tell you, I came to Europe, and I’d never been to Europe. And it just it just knocked my socks off. You know, it was I flew into to Paris and went to Geneva and what through Switzerland came up through Germany and then I came to this sort of sleepy village of Munich,

 

and Munich was for me a little bit like Iowa. It’s kind of like very country, you know, it’s not like a big metropolitan city like Singapore or New York or Chicago or something like that. But it also had an international flair to it. You had Siemens, you have BMW, you have a lot of tech companies, you have biotech companies and just left me with a good feeling and, and I went back to Paris for my last week of holiday where I was sort of reflecting and this is where the football thing came in.

 

Because my football career and ended a little bit prematurely. I I sort of quit in protest because I wasn’t didn’t feel the coaches were playing me enough. And it was a decision that I regretted for many, many years. And I couldn’t go back and change that decision. But I became very sensitive to the feeling of regret and, and not wanting to live a life with regret.

 

And to make a long story short, during that last week in Paris, I had a dream that I was eight years old back in the US, pushing the lawn more with two and a half kids to have cars. But I thought, you know, Dan, what would your life be like, if you spent a little bit more time in Europe, and I felt that that smell of regret once again, and I thought I don’t want to have a second regret in my life.

 

And on the day that I was supposed to fly back to Los Angeles, I just got on a train, I came back to Munich, I didn’t know one person. I didn’t speak a word of German. And I didn’t have any work papers. And so it was truly a green field. Or maybe let me say it was a dirt field. But maybe there’s maybe there’s some lessons I learned there that might also be valuable for some of your listeners who I know are really aspiring entrepreneurs and business people.

 

05:55

Yes, for sure. Now, Dan, I would really love for you to share what sparked your interest in leadership coaching, what sparked it fire in you that made you realize this is the business that you wanted to work on?

 

06:05

I’ve been very fortunate Ted, and perhaps more fortunate than others, because throughout my life, I don’t know if it was growing up in the Midwest, but the teachers that I had, the coaches that I had, even people in the church, I just was always surrounded by men and women who were in leadership roles, and who took a real interest in helping me grow.

 

So I was sort of imprinted with this very positive impression. Yes, as I got into professional life, I had a few leaders who weren’t necessarily that inspiring, or were more interested in in their interest in mind. But for the large for the most part, I just saw how much I could do and what I could, what I could really achieve for both myself and the business when I was surrounded by leaders that supported me.

 

And so that was always sort of a passion of mine, I was attracted to strong leaders when I was working. And then you know, coming to you’re in this force,

 

obviously, I was involved in leadership as a quarterback and callin things like that. But then when I came to Europe, and I had that I didn’t have the ability to just go out and get a normal job, I had to do something. And I learned that the window was if I became an independent consultant, I could set up my own shop and and not be a burden on the German government.

 

And that then took me into my passion of supporting people and coaching and leadership, which has been a may say, a long and winding road to borrow the often use phrase.

 

07:30

Yeah, he seems like you connected the dots really well, from the time when you were a young executive in California, and all the way to developing your business in Germany. Now. In fact, I understand that you’ve built the business in a way that you’re able to coach leaders from around the world. And it’s not jurisdiction specific.

 

07:46

Yes, yes. Well, when I set up here in Europe, that that was one thing that I noticed, as I was looking at the marketplace here, you know, when you don’t speak the language, you don’t have the work papers, you don’t know anybody. So how do we how do I get my feet on the ground, what I noticed was, I always had a passion for learning and development, and I was going to set myself up as an independent coach.

 

And what I saw, at least in the German marketplace that this was many, many years ago, is that they had very talented professors and sort of business schools that taught leadership and business on a very high academic theoretical level. I see then at the other end of the spectrum they had, they had sort of language schools that you were helping German business people speak English, but they didn’t really have anything in the middle of the CIC.

 

And I found a niche that was basically doing coaching, training and advising in English in a very action driven way. So how to create a powerful presentation in English, how to negotiate in English, how to set up a strategic selling environment, how to set up teams, how to lead effective projects, and how to lead people in international groups.

 

So that kind of became the basis and foundation and I’ve been working on that for, let’s say over 25 years and build a company around that called Envision learning, which I led for many, many decades,

 

09:10

oh, you really carved a niche out for yourself. Good for you. Then now then I’d like to drill down a little bit more about your views on leadership. So I know you’ve been very vocal about the fact that most organizations and mainstream consultants tend to see leadership as more of an individual endeavor.

 

And it’s not always the most effective approach from your point of view, because the company’s success actually depends more on effective teamwork and collaboration between these leaders, as opposed to the individual talents. So please share with us worship your view of leadership.

 

09:39

Well, that’s that’s spot on. Ted, you you just you described really the essence of it. And I would say that, that that that whole shift for me about seeing leadership as a team collective as opposed to an individual goes back to my undergraduate work. I studied psychology and criminology. I had an opportunity to work with a couple of my patients festers to actually take young criminals into prisons, in maximum security prisons.

 

And there, they were, like, we take six or seven, let me say young criminals 2025, they were stealing cars, robbing stores, threatening, nothing really serious small crimes. Yasi Yeah, and we, and they were in a room with six or seven people, convicted murderers, bank robbers, rapist, and who were in there for life. And the idea of the program is called Scared Straight.

 

The idea was to bring these young criminals in a situation where they could be confronted with what life would be like if they continue their behavior in this way, it was hugely powerful for me, you know, and also for everybody involved. And what we saw were two things. Number one, as powerful as the program was, when those young criminals went back into the environment that hadn’t changed, that is their mother was maybe on the streets, the father was maybe gone,

 

and they were right back into the gang. Even with that powerful intervention of hearing what life was like in prison, they easily and quickly returned to those

 

11:05

habits, because there was no support system exactly. And the system

 

11:09

hadn’t changed. And yet, when, when we in some cases, some of these young criminals were able to be after their sort of the therapy of the Scared Straight dialogues, which was several encounters, they were able to placed in different homes in different neighborhoods away from that hood, or the gangs and things like that. And there, we saw a remarkable success factor.

 

And what that is, it didn’t really strike me until I started getting and seeing how these leaders were going off and doing individual training, and then going back into their team, which were not trained.

 

And, and as a result, if you know, if you don’t change the environment, if you take somebody out, and you do some coaching with them, but the environment doesn’t change, the environment can be very, very strong and prevent that person from utilizing all those skills and talents and changes that they learn. So I think that we’re spending far too much time coaching players, when we should be coaching teams, and the majority of the majority of let’s say, mainstream leadership, and I mean, there’s, there’s some good stuff in the individual coach, and don’t get me wrong, it’s really, really important. But we need to be, we can we can create game changers, by focusing leadership development around leadership teams, or around work streams of people.

 

So people who are working in customer service at the lowest level, even with the senior vice president VP are working together, that team construct is transformational. And I’ve seen it for the last 10 years working with over 100 leadership teams.

 

12:35

Now then, before we dive in a little bit deeper into your thoughts and tips on team leadership. Let’s take a step back. Well, you think that leadership these days has been based so heavily on the individual as opposed to the team itself? It seems like from society’s perspective, and from the way things have developed systemically, the focus is always on the individuals you said, Why do you think this is the case?

 

12:57

That’s a great question. That’s that’s a great question when I think about quite often, and I think it has to do with both the, you know, if we look back at sort of, you know, military history of leaders, or we look at this, you know, even Hollywood or stories of leaders, we’re sort of often surrounded by these mythology figures of great leadership, you know, which, which were to a degree true,

 

you know, and so, and even as we moved into leadership, 40 years ago, and 50, you know, and moving up to an analogy, it’s always been built around this sort of construct of this heroic soloist, which, you know, the George Washington’s the Abraham Lincoln’s name a few. And you’ve got some wonderful examples in Singapore as well, which were very true.

 

They were they were transformational men and women. And yet today, as we continue to move, the complexity of the workforces, and the marketplace and the speed of change, is it’s just from my point of view, it’s too much to ask money, one man or woman to make all the big calls and have everybody else simply implement. So I think that utilizing the, the the energy, power, insight and intellect of the leadership team, as an attack team, as intact organizational unit has profound benefits for organizations today.

 

14:16

Yeah, that could be true, it could really be the way that stories have always been taught to us the way media portrays information to us has really shaped the idea that leadership is an individual task, then your leadership expert, so please share with us what are some signs that a company will display when he has issues with leadership?

 

I think this could be very helpful for the listeners, because if these signs are present, then you know Okay, let’s take a step back. Maybe the real issue is with the leadership that we need to solve rather than maybe the sales pipeline or marketing. Yes, as

 

14:44

you as you listen to the organization as you as you listen to conversations at the at the water fountain, which is now Thank goodness finally returning or even on Zoom calls, and we we can listen to the quality of the conversation the dialogue or If people are expressing maybe some uncertainty or confusion about the strategic direction or the priorities of the business number one,

 

that could be a sign that there’s hasn’t been a unified approach around really forming the, the clear future direction of the business, and what are the few key priorities that we’re going to work on?

 

For me, when I’m asked to sort of look at a client as a possible candidate that might lead to the leadership team, one of the first things I asked to do is to sit in on two or three different types of meetings in the business, because sitting in a meeting, and all of us are in meeting so even your clients who are in meetings, they could sit and think, what’s what’s really happening in the meeting right now? What’s the quality of the meeting? To what degree is this meeting starting on time?

 

Is it really focused on business outcomes, while balancing the needs of the individual let people feel a part of something bigger and better? And at the conclusion of the meeting, are we doing feedback about the meeting, looking at how we can improve the next meeting, in one way or another? So the the meeting is really sort of a microcosm. So one could be strategy.

 

Two, could be looking at the meeting culture, and and three might be just listening to the way that people talk to each other, you know, do people in the organization feel free and encouraged to give feedback to others about how they can improve? And when I say that, sometimes some classes say like, well, I don’t get any feedback. I mean, why should I who’s supposed to give me feedback, but that’s part of something that’s driven from the very top.

 

So my work with top of the leadership teams is about helping them craft what I call a sensible strategy, one that people can understand embrace and really understand what their contribution is to run really taught meetings, then cascade down, that really drives effectiveness. And And three, build a culture of feedback, which leads to developing more ownership and engagement, the organization. Okay, then

 

16:53

I would love to drill a little bit further down into the points to just share, could you share with us the services that you provide to your clients? What is it like when they first engaged you? And what is it like after you’ve had a chance to work with them? What would the results like?

 

17:05

There were a couple questions, there’s, there’s a lot to unpack in what you just asked me, let me see if I can focus on part of that. And then you circle back around if I don’t hit the whole thing. But I would say we’re I’m often asked to come in and support so that could be a CEO and her executive team, or it could be a strategic leadership, team, supply chain management, the global sales, Team marketing, something like that those teams that are driving functions.

 

And the situations where I’m often asked to come in would be a there’s a new leader who’s taken a new senior role, and he or she is looking for some, let’s say insurance policy to ensure that she gets a good Fast Start with her team.

 

That’s number one, a second situation we’re able to come in as maybe a business has been successful for quite a long time and their particular market segment. And, and what they realized they sort of lost ground.

 

 And, and they don’t really know why. And they’re seeing, you know, smaller what they said less capable competitors that are starting to pass them. So that’s the second situation. And a third situation would be where a leader and his or her team is sort of either they either been hit by a huge tsunami, number one, or number two,

 

they’re being presented with an opportunity of a lifetime. So so it’s either maybe a new leader situation, or maybe we were good in the past, but we recognize that we’re dropping from the pack, or number three, there’s opportunity lifetime.

 

And just a couple of examples. You know, in that third case, now tomorrow, I’m going to be working with an executive team. That’s that’s, I won’t mention their name. However, they are very well known in the automotive area. And they provide components and solutions to some of the finest cars built in the world. I mean, they they supply to different top brands, German brands, so you can begin to imagine who I’m who I’m talking about.

 

 And what’s happened is because their business has been largely based around supporting expertise and technology in the internal combustion engine, that that market obviously is in a huge disruption, we’re seeing more of a move to electric vehicles. And so that sort of that sort of leaves them in a tough spot. So the part of the work that we’re doing is about, let’s say, looking at scenario planning alternatives, exploring options in different Mark markets, that they can sort of reset their organizational capabilities. For example,

 

19:37

Dan, I understand it, when you first come in, one of the things that you really try to help your clients do is do we open up communication to make sure that the different leaders from the different teams can work together better. So there’s a lot of observation that is required and you’re incorrect. You have to sit in you watch the leaders how they work, and then you can actually give them a report or some feedback on how they can work together better, right?

 

19:57

At times, there’s an observation I’d say that the Two things that I’m looking at number one is that I’m, when I’m asked to work with the leadership team. There are really two worlds they’re working in one is what I call the material reality, that are the sales figures, the strategy, the marketing plan, the project roadmaps and all that.

 

That’s what we call the top of the iceberg, right? That’s the material reality. That’s what we usually focus our activities on. But every group of people, and every leadership team also has a second reality. That’s the piece that’s under the water, how do we talk to each other?

 

How do we show respect? How do we How is power balanced in this team, really. And that’s the part that’s under the iceberg. And most leadership teams don’t talk about what’s under the iceberg. So what I’m doing in my observations or analysis, in my interviews with people is trying to understand what are the issues that are above the iceberg, the tangible pieces they need to move?

 

 And how could possibly the non material reality be impacting that, and one of the tools that I use is I use an activity, which is called a perception consolidation.

 

So before I work with any team, I will speak to all members of that leadership team, it’s not really an interview, it’s more like a conversation. They have confidentiality with me. And they’re able to ask them about their role in the business, their contributions to the team, how they see the businesses running, and how they see the team is running, and what are their aspirations for future success. And their people are very willing to share the let me say, the good and the bad, and the ugly.

 

And I speak to everybody in the team. And then I put that into consolidation, which I call a perception consolidation, which contains both, you know, objective facts, but it’s more about perceptions about how they see things. And then I present that back to the group, that becomes a huge, let me say, pivot point or lever, because all the things that people have been thinking and talking about for weeks or months, or sometimes in the year, are finally put on paper.

 

And it’s all anonymized. So I don’t I don’t reveal who said, What, that’s not what’s important. But the real topics that everybody’s been thinking about, are really on the table. And then I work with the group to help them identify which of these topics if we put energy and time into, could we create improvement that would not only improve the quality of working in the leadership team, but also send signals and, and cascade down throughout the organization.

 

I’m, I’m today, you know, I work on my own. So I don’t bring in, you know, 20 or 30 consultants, because I believe that leadership teams are capable of creating their own transformations, I don’t think we should rob leaders have created their own breakthroughs. And with all due respect, there’s a lot of good consultancies out there, but many of them bring in just almost like armies of consultants, they crunch all the data, and they come back with a report and they say to the CEO, this is what you should be doing. And even if the team takes it on, it’s not something they created themselves.

 

So I really believe that the work that I do is about creating a deeper ownership by the leadership team, which comes to this owner shift process of working with leadership teams wanting to

 

23:04

really strikes me, Dan is the idea of covering your blind spots as well, when you have a good support system and you’re able to communicate with your peers on an effective level, then they can actually help you identify your blind spots and help you correct them in time to make sure that you’re not going maybe in the wrong direction, you know what they say it’s lonely at the top. So the higher you go, the smaller your pool of friends and peers will shrink. So I can really see the value of opening such communication lines and having an external consultant like you come in to help an organization to make sure that this is set in place.

 

23:35

Yeah, very good way to look at it. And you know, not only do we open up those channels, but we sort of we sort of legitimize those channels, because I will say, based on the feedback that I’ve gotten from my clients, I’d say I’m a good coach and advisor at the executive and strategic level. But I’m not looking at creating a codependent relationship where they need me for seven years, I want to get in do the work that’s needed, but I want to get out and let them self sustain.

 

So if I’m a leader, and and you know, maybe I maybe I’ve noticed that this particular leader interrupts in meetings, it’s something that can happen, you know, you’re overeager, you’ve got good ideas, you’re the senior person in the room. And you might interrupt people in your team, you know, and people might not say anything to you. And I might call somebody out on that, and say, Hey, I noticed, Charles, that you’re interrupting, you know, members of your team. And I don’t know if you were aware of that. And he said,

 

No, I wasn’t, you know, I but they’re really thank you for telling me that. I might say that to him in private, or if I have his permission to give feedback live during a session, I might say either for the team and say, Well, how can we, you know, how can we help, you know, help you modify that behavior Charles might use might even some of the things I’ve done, he might put 20 $20 or 20 euros,

 

you know, in the pot every time he interrupts somebody, or he might give the team permission to say, Hey, guys, if you see me interrupt me, if you see me interrupt, you just push a little yellow card in the middle of the room. It’ll be a signal and I can promise you Within three sessions, Charles won’t be interrupting people anymore.

 

So the this example, the bottom line is is that is that teams can help each other you know, a team can help each other improve long after I’ve gone there’s, there’s there’s no resource that can help us no MBA, no business school, no coach, that can help any of us improve more than the environment around us.

 

And that can be a team that could be a group of friends that are committed to supporting each other. And so I just think it’s a it’s quite inexpensive to have the people are together anyway.

 

25:32

Yeah, true. And I love the fact they used to legitimize because it brings the whole idea of the fact that really empowering them. And I guess, creating that support system, you know, when we are talking about the program for the young criminals, that you’re helping them, you know, you don’t want them to slide back to what they were before.

 

Because ultimately, you need a support system to change that environment to make sure that the organization or so changes in terms of the way the leadership runs, correct?

 

25:55

Yeah. And how inspiring is this? You know, how inspiring is this, when you see, you know, senior leaders who are very, very smart, very, very experienced, very committed to the business, when you see them saying, you know, we have things to work on too.

 

And we started development process so that we can continue to get better, so that we can lead as a leadership team better for you guys. If I’m in that organization, how do I feel I am like, this is really cool. I want to work with people like that. And I want to do what they’re doing.

 

 I want to get feedback too, so that I can continue to improve. So it has a cascading effect.

 

26:29

So guys, Dan, and I have spoken quite extensively from the standard interview about the effects of team leadership, and more importantly, the cascading effects when the leadership on the top actually sends the right signals to everyone else in your organization. So why not have a think about the tone of leadership that you have set for your organization so far?

 

Are there rules for improvement? Is there a culture of communication and feedback, and are individuals actually able to share their views and speak openly about what they think is best for the company itself? If it is not something that has been inculcated yet in your company, maybe now is a good time to start thinking about how you want to grow your leadership team, and how you want to grow your company for Iran. Now, back to you,

 

Dan, let’s talk a little bit about the book that you wrote executive ownership. In that book, you actually shared that your approach to leadership is also a top down approach, as opposed to a bottom up approach. Can you explain your own words, the differences between these two, so we can understand this better?

 

27:22

Yeah, if we look at, you know, to world class organizations, whether they’re a three person team or whether they’re 30,000, team, human developments, very important personnel developed is very important. So we need that at the bottom, we needed the middle.

 

But traditionally speaking, that there comes a certain point in leadership development, where it’s, it’s generally focused on first time leader, the project leader, bottom up approach, and and what I saw in my work over 20 years is also often the organizational unit that’s at the top of the business that has more access to resource and decision making an impact on the on the organizational culture,

 

didn’t really have any resource to reflect back to them how they were performing, you know, because people were all reporting to them. And so that’s where this whole idea came about, about, you know, working with teams, I was,

 

I was working in the middle, and I was working at the entry level leadership for many, many years. And then because of I don’t know, it was my age or my experience, or perhaps some of the successes I had, from time to time, somebody from the executive office, or from a senior person from HR would come and say,

 

Hey, Dan, we’ve seen the work you’re doing with our middle management level, you know, our senior leadership, team and CEO are sort of having some struggles, and we wonder if you would be willing to take a look at how they’re working and, and check them out.

 

 And that was sort of my entry into the C suite. So I’d say I’m really happy to I’d be happy to talk to them and see if I can help them. And then they’ll always be they’d always kind of put their hand on my arm on my elbow and say, Yeah, dammit, don’t get your hopes up too high. They’ve already had three consultants so far this year. But that was my entry into the sea level.

 

And there, what I simply recognized is that giving those men and women an opportunity to reflect back to them about how they meet, how they communicate, how they develop and implement strategy. If they can improve only three or 4%, which is a very low, low percentage, it can have huge compounding effects positive in a positive way for the business,

 

29:27

because it cascades down to the whole organization itself. Correct? Yeah,

 

29:31

yeah. And the second thing, if I could say one more point on that you were asking about, about tools and what to do is, you know, we often think about strategy is a very cognitive, you know, intellectual activity, which to a degree it is we have the big business schools have put all these things out about strategy. And I’ve always believed that strategy is not only an intellectual exercise, it’s also an emotional one.

 

And so, for example, when we’re having if I’m doing a strategic review with a leadership team, and somebody has just presented a new a new initiative or perhaps a new direction for the business, I’ll actually take two ropes and and put them down on the ground, one running like a vertical and the other one buddy perpendicular, so it looks like a cross.

 

And then I say, Look, just imagine that this initiative that just heard that we’re going to evaluate that there’s no right or wrong or good or bad. But on the vertical axis here, this is at the high end here, this one into this at the robots like intellectual clarity. So this, this initiative is for me, absolutely crystal clear about what we’re trying to achieve. And at the other end of the row, it’s not really clear about what we’re trying to achieve. That’s an important thing to know.

 

And the second perpendicular rope that runs across ways is about how emotionally connected Am I am to this initiative? Am I excited? Am I possibly engaged? And I’m gonna stand on the right side, or unless I see you have this kind of matrix. And then you ask people leadership team to go stand there. Now, if you make around in a conference room and say, Now what do you guys think about that initiative? Everybody kind of nods their head or says something, but nobody wants to? Nobody wants to stand up. So like, am I going to lose my job over this initiative? Or am I going to have to let some some people go over to to Linda there. But when you ask people to take a stand, to make a personal stand about what they think and how they feel about the strategy, and you’ve already set the boundary, so it’s not about criticisms, or good or bad or right or wrong, you just want to understand where people are at. And then you follow that with a conversation. So these are some of the very basic tools that I use that are absolutely revolutionary, they they create a whole new level of conversation for a leadership team. And in in three to six months, a leadership team can make, I mean, absolutely huge project progress.

 

31:43

That is such a powerful tool, they just share it when you put people on a spot in a conference room, and you take a round robin approach, you know, people tend to freeze up and they may not actually have the comfort level, they need to really share what they’re thinking about to verbalize it in a way that makes sense to both themselves and to whoever’s in the room from the technique they just share with us. It gives everyone in the room the ability to maybe gauge where they stand in terms of a certain issue without actually verbalizing it in words, and more importantly, really allows everyone to see where they stand relative from each other. And that’s when you can actually open communication lines. Yeah, absolutely.

 

32:18

And even you could take that a step further. And if you even if you see people who are this was a great revolution, I was I was doing a project, it was a German, American, Singaporean Malaysian leadership team, and they were in the production of, let’s say, medical devices, let’s say that. And, and, and they were also you know, struggling with that.

 

And, and we did the strategy piece about the initiative. And we had people at another end at the lower end where they weren’t, they weren’t, they didn’t really understand. And they were they were really engaged. Now, in an old school thinking and a classic thinking you might be putting in those people say like, what’s wrong with you? Why don’t you guys get it? Why aren’t you really on the boat?

 

Or you’re off the boat? You know, this kind of like, very masculine? Toka language? Right? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And then people, people, don’t people then shrink back, right? They don’t like that kind of threat. So I simply suggested, well, here’s what I’d like you to do. There are some people in this matrix that have said, it’s very clear for them or, or they can even perhaps, feel very connected to this initiative. And we can see there’s some other people that are very difficult. So what I’d like you to do, is to go down and find a partner who’s at the other end of the matrix who either doesn’t feel connected to it, or they don’t feel they understand it, find a partner, go off for a half hour for a walk.

 

And, and, and see if you can understand why the person has chose to stand where they do, don’t try to convince them. Don’t try to you know, move them into different directions. Just see if you can understand why they are where they are, and come back and report to us. So what happened was, we came back and the people that were just listening, you know, they came back and said,

 

Well, here’s why. Harold in, for example, I was standing down there and to say it without judgment to just give his opinion. And he’s a scientist, he doesn’t feel there’s enough data to be able to move. And it was really, really interesting. And what’s happened, just simply by having that kind of dialogue, and allowing people to say what they think, and to have people to listen to them can create a huge shift, and help people move to more to a higher end of the matrix, if you will. I’ve seen that happen numerous times,

 

34:22

guys, then just share a very important tool and how you can really engage with different individuals in your team, if you find it hard for different individuals in the team to work together because you think that maybe the views and concerns are not really being highlighted, even though you give them the time to

 

speak about it, then maybe adopting one of these techniques could be very helpful for your team and yourself in terms of getting that communication and to start developing that leadership and unity between the leaders itself. Now then I’d love to talk to you a little bit about your leadership growth that program that I saw on your website. How is this different from the executive ownership program?

 

34:56

There are some similarities, but there are some situations where it In my work, it’s really important that the senior leader of a particular team says the man or woman says, I really want you to work with us for two weeks, two months, six months, in an intact team process where we can use the executive ownership technologies and frameworks for growth. However, there are other situations where a leader might come to me and say, you know, my, I’m not the senior leader in the team. But I have a team below me.

 

And I really want I really believe in, in what you’ve written in your book, I really believe that leadership is a team construct, is there any other way that you can work with me, if I’m not able to bring my team on board, for example, there, you could join a leadership growth lab. It’s like a situation where you have six to eight people from different companies. And they meet for a course of a year, they can do six months,

 

if they want to, they usually meet for a year, they have either three face to face meetings are three intensive virtual meetings, where people from different companies get to not only develop strong external networks, which is really important, other perspectives, they get to share their own problems, I serve as the mentor coach for that. And I’m also able to then feed in particular aspects and tools of executive ownership that they can take back into their business, and to experiment and try with a prototype. And then come back in the next session, say,

 

Hey, here’s what I do with my team in this work. So it’s an opportunity for individual say, Hey, I’d like to be in a growth lab. Because I’m not in a situation right now where I can bring the whole team in.

 

36:33

Yeah. And so gives them that additional support system, I’ll say from the company as well, and probably gives them an additional exposure disagree way for them to actually take a step forward, if the organization is not ready to maybe embark on a whole team effort with the executive ownership program itself, right.

 

36:48

Yeah, the end the benefits there, too. You have people from six different companies. So you might be different industries, they might be see they have similar problems, but they look at them a different way. And they’re also picking up from their, from their other colleagues in the leadership growth labs, similar ideas. So it’s a huge, it’s a huge value proposition, my book. No,

 

37:06

Dan, let’s take some time to talk about your YouTube channel. I noticed you started one recently, and you’re sharing leadership lessons inside as well. Could you share a little bit more about this?

 

37:16

Well, this is a new venture. So I you know, I’m perhaps in an age where I’m a little bit older. So coming into the whole digital piece is relatively new. And, and during the COVID, I thought to myself, I’m not doing the face to face stuff, how could I add value to people that want to learn but can’t come to one of the workshops, or perhaps join a growth lab for whatever reason.

 

And so I started doing a series of short videos that would describe very clear and real situations that I’ve encountered over the last couple years, and then to share in a very condensed way, about 90 seconds, the solutions or ideas that we discussed.

 

And so I’ve just started that, I think mid year, and uploaded, I think 20 sort of really, I believe high quality, high yield, you know, learning spirits that are all under a couple minutes long.

 

And I sort of parked them on YouTube, I haven’t really done any marketing yet. But if you’ve got listeners that are interested in continuous learning or short clips, they could go to my YouTube channel and anybody that that signs up to my YouTube channel, you know, and sends me a mail just says, Hey, I heard about you. Through Ted through Ted’s podcast, I’ll send him a complimentary chapter of my book, electronic copy.

 

38:33

Dan, thank you so much for the generous offer. I’ll definitely inform my listeners. And I’ll leave the details in the episode page when the episode goes live. Now then, if the listeners only remember one thing from today’s conversation, what would you like it to be?

 

38:46

If there’s, as I look back over my life, and a piece of advice that I wish I’d perhaps implemented a little bit sooner, I would say, to recognize and act on the difference between knowing something and doing something, right. Sometimes, you know, something, you want to do something, but you don’t do it, you know, and that there’s a gap there. And that gap between knowing something and doing something is really called discipline.

 

It’s about starting something, it’s about doing it long enough to get some feedback, and perhaps asking someone to hold you accountable. I’ve been very blessed, very fortunate to create a very, very successful business and career in Europe, I wouldn’t have been able to do without a lot of wonderful people around me and my wife and my children have been very supportive. And yet looking back, I could have even done that in a better way and in a quicker way.

 

If I had closed the gap between Oh, I know this is what a and then and then doing it out here. So this close that gap and, and and move on your things. Most of the things that we choose to do, are not going to put us at fiscal risk in danger or life in any way. But we’re often more concerned about what people might think, or, Oh, could I really be successful? But close that gap between knowing something and doing something and just just go for it would be my

 

40:10

my advice. Oh, who was of advice, then? Now how can listeners get in contact to view you, they need your

 

40:15

help, they can contact me through my website, that’s Dan dornburg, all one word.com or through LinkedIn, I really appreciate sharing and exchanging with people on LinkedIn. I’ve met some really wonderful people on that forum so they can find me on LinkedIn. And my contact details are both on the website or LinkedIn, they can reach out via email or, or phone if they wish

 

40:35

you have been all these details also be provided on the website for the episode page attached to.com. Now, Dan, thank you so much for joining us today and sharing with us your expertise on leadership.

 

 It’s been such a pleasure having you here. Ted, you’re wonderful host and it was a pleasure. Thank you. Guys, thank you so much for joining Dan and I on today’s episode, so I hope you’ve learned a little bit more about what it takes to craft a highly effective leadership team,

 

Dan is a great resource will help so don’t be shy to reach out to him. Now all tools and resources are available on tatio.com. That’s tdto.com. And if you ever want to get in contact with me, then just reach out to me over LinkedIn. And as before, I really appreciate it if you could share the show with just one friend. And if you could subscribe to the show and leave a review on Apple podcasts. That’s all for me today. I’ll see you guys next time.

[This transcript has been automatically generated by a digital software and will therefore  contain errors and typos. Please kindly take note of this and only rely on the digital transcript for reference.]

00:00

Hello and welcome back to the tech to Business Show comm best place for actionable advice for entrepreneurs. This is Ted, your friend and host speaking. Now if you’re listening to the podcast, then you’re probably an entrepreneur. And that means you’re somebody leaders.

 

Well, now today we’re talking about crafting effective leadership teams. Here’s my question for you. When you think about leadership development, do you see it as an individual endeavor? If you said yes, then there’s no surprise because it seems like the idea of the heroic soloist has always been at the forefront of our history, stories and culture.

 

But as they say, it can get lonely at the top. So let’s talk about a house in wise of doing an effective leadership team. Joining us today we have my friend Dan Norberg, who is the Executive strategic leadership team advisor, coach and author of the book executive ownership, creating highly effective leadership teams, Dan is known for his top down approach for leadership teams to dramatically improve their performance. As a trusted advisor, consultant and professional speaker.

 

 Dan’s mission is to enable executive teams and organizations to play at their best in today’s episode, the issue is how one can spot if their leadership issues in the company, why it is important to provide a good system of communication for leaders as well, and the benefits of a top down leadership approach. So guys, if you ever received any value from the show, I’d love to get your support,

 

I would greatly appreciate it if you could share the show with maybe just one friend. And I’d love for you to subscribe to the show and to leave a review on Apple podcasts. And now without further ado, let’s dive right in. Hey, Dan, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s such a pleasure to have you here.

 

01:23

Ted, it’s a pleasure to join you. Thank you for inviting me.

 

01:25

So then let’s start with a very simple icebreaker. So we can all get to know you a bit better, who is Dan Norenberg? When isn’t working?

 

01:33

Dan Norberg, when he’s not working, he’s going to be moving and somewhere outside. So I’m really an active guy. I was actively involved in sports growing up actually the collegiate level, my wife is extremely active, very sports oriented.

 

So we’re either walking, swimming, hiking, playing tennis, just something we don’t do any of those things remarkably well. But we have a remarkably, we have a remarkably good time doing it.

 

01:59

Well, that’s okay. As long as you enjoy yourself. So then it sounds like you’re a very active person. What sports do you play in school?

 

02:05

Well, in high school, I was a track and field. And then I played American football and play baseball for a while, and and play and I love basketball. But I wasn’t the tallest guy. That was really my aspiration. And then I had, I guess, a bit of talent. And I was fortunate enough to play collegiate football. So in high school, I was a quarterback, which is sort of the playmaker. I don’t know if that’s maybe the reason I ended up in leadership.

 

But so that was the, the position I played from the age I was eight until I finished high school. And then when I went to the University, which was quite a high level of competition, these guys were, you know, as big as fire stations. And so I moved to defense, and I played defensive back,

 

maybe we’ll come back to the sports piece and what happened in the collegiate football, because that’s one of the reasons that I’m in Europe today. But that’s perhaps something that we’ll pick up a little bit later.

 

02:54

Right. So then you’re very active person and just shed you’re always moving when you’re not working. Right. So you actually moved from California all the way to Germany. Could you share with us the story of how that happened?

 

03:04

Yeah, well, really interesting. Because it was never my intention to end up in Europe. I mean, I grew up in the Midwest, studied psychology and criminology wanted to become a lawyer thought, perhaps a little bit of business wouldn’t be a bad thing. And went west to California, edited an area, which is now called Silicon Valley,

 

and gotten involved in some technology companies that were growing very fast. And although I was an engineer, I found that I fit very nicely into marketing and sales positions. And because the companies were growing quickly, I moved up to management quite quickly. And like many technology companies that are before their time, the one that I was with, went out of business. And, and I would have been with that company, the rest of my life.

 

We were making photovoltaics, generating electricity from sunlight changing the world. So it was very mission based work, and I just love the company. But it was just before its time, it went out of business. And I sold my house in Palo Alto, a girlfriend I had broken up and I said, you know,

 

I’m gonna go to Europe for nine days. Just refresh myself up and think, what’s my next big thing and come back to California and go after it. I sort of forgot about law school at that time. And I tell I’ll tell you, I came to Europe, and I’d never been to Europe. And it just it just knocked my socks off. You know, it was I flew into to Paris and went to Geneva and what through Switzerland came up through Germany and then I came to this sort of sleepy village of Munich,

 

and Munich was for me a little bit like Iowa. It’s kind of like very country, you know, it’s not like a big metropolitan city like Singapore or New York or Chicago or something like that. But it also had an international flair to it. You had Siemens, you have BMW, you have a lot of tech companies, you have biotech companies and just left me with a good feeling and, and I went back to Paris for my last week of holiday where I was sort of reflecting and this is where the football thing came in.

 

Because my football career and ended a little bit prematurely. I I sort of quit in protest because I wasn’t didn’t feel the coaches were playing me enough. And it was a decision that I regretted for many, many years. And I couldn’t go back and change that decision. But I became very sensitive to the feeling of regret and, and not wanting to live a life with regret.

 

And to make a long story short, during that last week in Paris, I had a dream that I was eight years old back in the US, pushing the lawn more with two and a half kids to have cars. But I thought, you know, Dan, what would your life be like, if you spent a little bit more time in Europe, and I felt that that smell of regret once again, and I thought I don’t want to have a second regret in my life.

 

And on the day that I was supposed to fly back to Los Angeles, I just got on a train, I came back to Munich, I didn’t know one person. I didn’t speak a word of German. And I didn’t have any work papers. And so it was truly a green field. Or maybe let me say it was a dirt field. But maybe there’s maybe there’s some lessons I learned there that might also be valuable for some of your listeners who I know are really aspiring entrepreneurs and business people.

 

05:55

Yes, for sure. Now, Dan, I would really love for you to share what sparked your interest in leadership coaching, what sparked it fire in you that made you realize this is the business that you wanted to work on?

 

06:05

I’ve been very fortunate Ted, and perhaps more fortunate than others, because throughout my life, I don’t know if it was growing up in the Midwest, but the teachers that I had, the coaches that I had, even people in the church, I just was always surrounded by men and women who were in leadership roles, and who took a real interest in helping me grow.

 

So I was sort of imprinted with this very positive impression. Yes, as I got into professional life, I had a few leaders who weren’t necessarily that inspiring, or were more interested in in their interest in mind. But for the large for the most part, I just saw how much I could do and what I could, what I could really achieve for both myself and the business when I was surrounded by leaders that supported me.

 

And so that was always sort of a passion of mine, I was attracted to strong leaders when I was working. And then you know, coming to you’re in this force,

 

obviously, I was involved in leadership as a quarterback and callin things like that. But then when I came to Europe, and I had that I didn’t have the ability to just go out and get a normal job, I had to do something. And I learned that the window was if I became an independent consultant, I could set up my own shop and and not be a burden on the German government.

 

And that then took me into my passion of supporting people and coaching and leadership, which has been a may say, a long and winding road to borrow the often use phrase.

 

07:30

Yeah, he seems like you connected the dots really well, from the time when you were a young executive in California, and all the way to developing your business in Germany. Now. In fact, I understand that you’ve built the business in a way that you’re able to coach leaders from around the world. And it’s not jurisdiction specific.

 

07:46

Yes, yes. Well, when I set up here in Europe, that that was one thing that I noticed, as I was looking at the marketplace here, you know, when you don’t speak the language, you don’t have the work papers, you don’t know anybody. So how do we how do I get my feet on the ground, what I noticed was, I always had a passion for learning and development, and I was going to set myself up as an independent coach.

 

And what I saw, at least in the German marketplace that this was many, many years ago, is that they had very talented professors and sort of business schools that taught leadership and business on a very high academic theoretical level. I see then at the other end of the spectrum they had, they had sort of language schools that you were helping German business people speak English, but they didn’t really have anything in the middle of the CIC.

 

And I found a niche that was basically doing coaching, training and advising in English in a very action driven way. So how to create a powerful presentation in English, how to negotiate in English, how to set up a strategic selling environment, how to set up teams, how to lead effective projects, and how to lead people in international groups.

 

So that kind of became the basis and foundation and I’ve been working on that for, let’s say over 25 years and build a company around that called Envision learning, which I led for many, many decades,

 

09:10

oh, you really carved a niche out for yourself. Good for you. Then now then I’d like to drill down a little bit more about your views on leadership. So I know you’ve been very vocal about the fact that most organizations and mainstream consultants tend to see leadership as more of an individual endeavor.

 

And it’s not always the most effective approach from your point of view, because the company’s success actually depends more on effective teamwork and collaboration between these leaders, as opposed to the individual talents. So please share with us worship your view of leadership.

 

09:39

Well, that’s that’s spot on. Ted, you you just you described really the essence of it. And I would say that, that that that whole shift for me about seeing leadership as a team collective as opposed to an individual goes back to my undergraduate work. I studied psychology and criminology. I had an opportunity to work with a couple of my patients festers to actually take young criminals into prisons, in maximum security prisons.

 

And there, they were, like, we take six or seven, let me say young criminals 2025, they were stealing cars, robbing stores, threatening, nothing really serious small crimes. Yasi Yeah, and we, and they were in a room with six or seven people, convicted murderers, bank robbers, rapist, and who were in there for life. And the idea of the program is called Scared Straight.

 

The idea was to bring these young criminals in a situation where they could be confronted with what life would be like if they continue their behavior in this way, it was hugely powerful for me, you know, and also for everybody involved. And what we saw were two things. Number one, as powerful as the program was, when those young criminals went back into the environment that hadn’t changed, that is their mother was maybe on the streets, the father was maybe gone,

 

and they were right back into the gang. Even with that powerful intervention of hearing what life was like in prison, they easily and quickly returned to those

 

11:05

habits, because there was no support system exactly. And the system

 

11:09

hadn’t changed. And yet, when, when we in some cases, some of these young criminals were able to be after their sort of the therapy of the Scared Straight dialogues, which was several encounters, they were able to placed in different homes in different neighborhoods away from that hood, or the gangs and things like that. And there, we saw a remarkable success factor.

 

And what that is, it didn’t really strike me until I started getting and seeing how these leaders were going off and doing individual training, and then going back into their team, which were not trained.

 

And, and as a result, if you know, if you don’t change the environment, if you take somebody out, and you do some coaching with them, but the environment doesn’t change, the environment can be very, very strong and prevent that person from utilizing all those skills and talents and changes that they learn. So I think that we’re spending far too much time coaching players, when we should be coaching teams, and the majority of the majority of let’s say, mainstream leadership, and I mean, there’s, there’s some good stuff in the individual coach, and don’t get me wrong, it’s really, really important. But we need to be, we can we can create game changers, by focusing leadership development around leadership teams, or around work streams of people.

 

So people who are working in customer service at the lowest level, even with the senior vice president VP are working together, that team construct is transformational. And I’ve seen it for the last 10 years working with over 100 leadership teams.

 

12:35

Now then, before we dive in a little bit deeper into your thoughts and tips on team leadership. Let’s take a step back. Well, you think that leadership these days has been based so heavily on the individual as opposed to the team itself? It seems like from society’s perspective, and from the way things have developed systemically, the focus is always on the individuals you said, Why do you think this is the case?

 

12:57

That’s a great question. That’s that’s a great question when I think about quite often, and I think it has to do with both the, you know, if we look back at sort of, you know, military history of leaders, or we look at this, you know, even Hollywood or stories of leaders, we’re sort of often surrounded by these mythology figures of great leadership, you know, which, which were to a degree true,

 

you know, and so, and even as we moved into leadership, 40 years ago, and 50, you know, and moving up to an analogy, it’s always been built around this sort of construct of this heroic soloist, which, you know, the George Washington’s the Abraham Lincoln’s name a few. And you’ve got some wonderful examples in Singapore as well, which were very true.

 

They were they were transformational men and women. And yet today, as we continue to move, the complexity of the workforces, and the marketplace and the speed of change, is it’s just from my point of view, it’s too much to ask money, one man or woman to make all the big calls and have everybody else simply implement. So I think that utilizing the, the the energy, power, insight and intellect of the leadership team, as an attack team, as intact organizational unit has profound benefits for organizations today.

 

14:16

Yeah, that could be true, it could really be the way that stories have always been taught to us the way media portrays information to us has really shaped the idea that leadership is an individual task, then your leadership expert, so please share with us what are some signs that a company will display when he has issues with leadership?

 

I think this could be very helpful for the listeners, because if these signs are present, then you know Okay, let’s take a step back. Maybe the real issue is with the leadership that we need to solve rather than maybe the sales pipeline or marketing. Yes, as

 

14:44

you as you listen to the organization as you as you listen to conversations at the at the water fountain, which is now Thank goodness finally returning or even on Zoom calls, and we we can listen to the quality of the conversation the dialogue or If people are expressing maybe some uncertainty or confusion about the strategic direction or the priorities of the business number one,

 

that could be a sign that there’s hasn’t been a unified approach around really forming the, the clear future direction of the business, and what are the few key priorities that we’re going to work on?

 

For me, when I’m asked to sort of look at a client as a possible candidate that might lead to the leadership team, one of the first things I asked to do is to sit in on two or three different types of meetings in the business, because sitting in a meeting, and all of us are in meeting so even your clients who are in meetings, they could sit and think, what’s what’s really happening in the meeting right now? What’s the quality of the meeting? To what degree is this meeting starting on time?

 

Is it really focused on business outcomes, while balancing the needs of the individual let people feel a part of something bigger and better? And at the conclusion of the meeting, are we doing feedback about the meeting, looking at how we can improve the next meeting, in one way or another? So the the meeting is really sort of a microcosm. So one could be strategy.

 

Two, could be looking at the meeting culture, and and three might be just listening to the way that people talk to each other, you know, do people in the organization feel free and encouraged to give feedback to others about how they can improve? And when I say that, sometimes some classes say like, well, I don’t get any feedback. I mean, why should I who’s supposed to give me feedback, but that’s part of something that’s driven from the very top.

 

So my work with top of the leadership teams is about helping them craft what I call a sensible strategy, one that people can understand embrace and really understand what their contribution is to run really taught meetings, then cascade down, that really drives effectiveness. And And three, build a culture of feedback, which leads to developing more ownership and engagement, the organization. Okay, then

 

16:53

I would love to drill a little bit further down into the points to just share, could you share with us the services that you provide to your clients? What is it like when they first engaged you? And what is it like after you’ve had a chance to work with them? What would the results like?

 

17:05

There were a couple questions, there’s, there’s a lot to unpack in what you just asked me, let me see if I can focus on part of that. And then you circle back around if I don’t hit the whole thing. But I would say we’re I’m often asked to come in and support so that could be a CEO and her executive team, or it could be a strategic leadership, team, supply chain management, the global sales, Team marketing, something like that those teams that are driving functions.

 

And the situations where I’m often asked to come in would be a there’s a new leader who’s taken a new senior role, and he or she is looking for some, let’s say insurance policy to ensure that she gets a good Fast Start with her team.

 

That’s number one, a second situation we’re able to come in as maybe a business has been successful for quite a long time and their particular market segment. And, and what they realized they sort of lost ground.

 

 And, and they don’t really know why. And they’re seeing, you know, smaller what they said less capable competitors that are starting to pass them. So that’s the second situation. And a third situation would be where a leader and his or her team is sort of either they either been hit by a huge tsunami, number one, or number two,

 

they’re being presented with an opportunity of a lifetime. So so it’s either maybe a new leader situation, or maybe we were good in the past, but we recognize that we’re dropping from the pack, or number three, there’s opportunity lifetime.

 

And just a couple of examples. You know, in that third case, now tomorrow, I’m going to be working with an executive team. That’s that’s, I won’t mention their name. However, they are very well known in the automotive area. And they provide components and solutions to some of the finest cars built in the world. I mean, they they supply to different top brands, German brands, so you can begin to imagine who I’m who I’m talking about.

 

 And what’s happened is because their business has been largely based around supporting expertise and technology in the internal combustion engine, that that market obviously is in a huge disruption, we’re seeing more of a move to electric vehicles. And so that sort of that sort of leaves them in a tough spot. So the part of the work that we’re doing is about, let’s say, looking at scenario planning alternatives, exploring options in different Mark markets, that they can sort of reset their organizational capabilities. For example,

 

19:37

Dan, I understand it, when you first come in, one of the things that you really try to help your clients do is do we open up communication to make sure that the different leaders from the different teams can work together better. So there’s a lot of observation that is required and you’re incorrect. You have to sit in you watch the leaders how they work, and then you can actually give them a report or some feedback on how they can work together better, right?

 

19:57

At times, there’s an observation I’d say that the Two things that I’m looking at number one is that I’m, when I’m asked to work with the leadership team. There are really two worlds they’re working in one is what I call the material reality, that are the sales figures, the strategy, the marketing plan, the project roadmaps and all that.

 

That’s what we call the top of the iceberg, right? That’s the material reality. That’s what we usually focus our activities on. But every group of people, and every leadership team also has a second reality. That’s the piece that’s under the water, how do we talk to each other?

 

How do we show respect? How do we How is power balanced in this team, really. And that’s the part that’s under the iceberg. And most leadership teams don’t talk about what’s under the iceberg. So what I’m doing in my observations or analysis, in my interviews with people is trying to understand what are the issues that are above the iceberg, the tangible pieces they need to move?

 

 And how could possibly the non material reality be impacting that, and one of the tools that I use is I use an activity, which is called a perception consolidation.

 

So before I work with any team, I will speak to all members of that leadership team, it’s not really an interview, it’s more like a conversation. They have confidentiality with me. And they’re able to ask them about their role in the business, their contributions to the team, how they see the businesses running, and how they see the team is running, and what are their aspirations for future success. And their people are very willing to share the let me say, the good and the bad, and the ugly.

 

And I speak to everybody in the team. And then I put that into consolidation, which I call a perception consolidation, which contains both, you know, objective facts, but it’s more about perceptions about how they see things. And then I present that back to the group, that becomes a huge, let me say, pivot point or lever, because all the things that people have been thinking and talking about for weeks or months, or sometimes in the year, are finally put on paper.

 

And it’s all anonymized. So I don’t I don’t reveal who said, What, that’s not what’s important. But the real topics that everybody’s been thinking about, are really on the table. And then I work with the group to help them identify which of these topics if we put energy and time into, could we create improvement that would not only improve the quality of working in the leadership team, but also send signals and, and cascade down throughout the organization.

 

I’m, I’m today, you know, I work on my own. So I don’t bring in, you know, 20 or 30 consultants, because I believe that leadership teams are capable of creating their own transformations, I don’t think we should rob leaders have created their own breakthroughs. And with all due respect, there’s a lot of good consultancies out there, but many of them bring in just almost like armies of consultants, they crunch all the data, and they come back with a report and they say to the CEO, this is what you should be doing. And even if the team takes it on, it’s not something they created themselves.

 

So I really believe that the work that I do is about creating a deeper ownership by the leadership team, which comes to this owner shift process of working with leadership teams wanting to

 

23:04

really strikes me, Dan is the idea of covering your blind spots as well, when you have a good support system and you’re able to communicate with your peers on an effective level, then they can actually help you identify your blind spots and help you correct them in time to make sure that you’re not going maybe in the wrong direction, you know what they say it’s lonely at the top. So the higher you go, the smaller your pool of friends and peers will shrink. So I can really see the value of opening such communication lines and having an external consultant like you come in to help an organization to make sure that this is set in place.

 

23:35

Yeah, very good way to look at it. And you know, not only do we open up those channels, but we sort of we sort of legitimize those channels, because I will say, based on the feedback that I’ve gotten from my clients, I’d say I’m a good coach and advisor at the executive and strategic level. But I’m not looking at creating a codependent relationship where they need me for seven years, I want to get in do the work that’s needed, but I want to get out and let them self sustain.

 

So if I’m a leader, and and you know, maybe I maybe I’ve noticed that this particular leader interrupts in meetings, it’s something that can happen, you know, you’re overeager, you’ve got good ideas, you’re the senior person in the room. And you might interrupt people in your team, you know, and people might not say anything to you. And I might call somebody out on that, and say, Hey, I noticed, Charles, that you’re interrupting, you know, members of your team. And I don’t know if you were aware of that. And he said,

 

No, I wasn’t, you know, I but they’re really thank you for telling me that. I might say that to him in private, or if I have his permission to give feedback live during a session, I might say either for the team and say, Well, how can we, you know, how can we help, you know, help you modify that behavior Charles might use might even some of the things I’ve done, he might put 20 $20 or 20 euros,

 

you know, in the pot every time he interrupts somebody, or he might give the team permission to say, Hey, guys, if you see me interrupt me, if you see me interrupt, you just push a little yellow card in the middle of the room. It’ll be a signal and I can promise you Within three sessions, Charles won’t be interrupting people anymore.

 

So the this example, the bottom line is is that is that teams can help each other you know, a team can help each other improve long after I’ve gone there’s, there’s there’s no resource that can help us no MBA, no business school, no coach, that can help any of us improve more than the environment around us.

 

And that can be a team that could be a group of friends that are committed to supporting each other. And so I just think it’s a it’s quite inexpensive to have the people are together anyway.

 

25:32

Yeah, true. And I love the fact they used to legitimize because it brings the whole idea of the fact that really empowering them. And I guess, creating that support system, you know, when we are talking about the program for the young criminals, that you’re helping them, you know, you don’t want them to slide back to what they were before.

 

Because ultimately, you need a support system to change that environment to make sure that the organization or so changes in terms of the way the leadership runs, correct?

 

25:55

Yeah. And how inspiring is this? You know, how inspiring is this, when you see, you know, senior leaders who are very, very smart, very, very experienced, very committed to the business, when you see them saying, you know, we have things to work on too.

 

And we started development process so that we can continue to get better, so that we can lead as a leadership team better for you guys. If I’m in that organization, how do I feel I am like, this is really cool. I want to work with people like that. And I want to do what they’re doing.

 

 I want to get feedback too, so that I can continue to improve. So it has a cascading effect.

 

26:29

So guys, Dan, and I have spoken quite extensively from the standard interview about the effects of team leadership, and more importantly, the cascading effects when the leadership on the top actually sends the right signals to everyone else in your organization. So why not have a think about the tone of leadership that you have set for your organization so far?

 

Are there rules for improvement? Is there a culture of communication and feedback, and are individuals actually able to share their views and speak openly about what they think is best for the company itself? If it is not something that has been inculcated yet in your company, maybe now is a good time to start thinking about how you want to grow your leadership team, and how you want to grow your company for Iran. Now, back to you,

 

Dan, let’s talk a little bit about the book that you wrote executive ownership. In that book, you actually shared that your approach to leadership is also a top down approach, as opposed to a bottom up approach. Can you explain your own words, the differences between these two, so we can understand this better?

 

27:22

Yeah, if we look at, you know, to world class organizations, whether they’re a three person team or whether they’re 30,000, team, human developments, very important personnel developed is very important. So we need that at the bottom, we needed the middle.

 

But traditionally speaking, that there comes a certain point in leadership development, where it’s, it’s generally focused on first time leader, the project leader, bottom up approach, and and what I saw in my work over 20 years is also often the organizational unit that’s at the top of the business that has more access to resource and decision making an impact on the on the organizational culture,

 

didn’t really have any resource to reflect back to them how they were performing, you know, because people were all reporting to them. And so that’s where this whole idea came about, about, you know, working with teams, I was,

 

I was working in the middle, and I was working at the entry level leadership for many, many years. And then because of I don’t know, it was my age or my experience, or perhaps some of the successes I had, from time to time, somebody from the executive office, or from a senior person from HR would come and say,

 

Hey, Dan, we’ve seen the work you’re doing with our middle management level, you know, our senior leadership, team and CEO are sort of having some struggles, and we wonder if you would be willing to take a look at how they’re working and, and check them out.

 

 And that was sort of my entry into the C suite. So I’d say I’m really happy to I’d be happy to talk to them and see if I can help them. And then they’ll always be they’d always kind of put their hand on my arm on my elbow and say, Yeah, dammit, don’t get your hopes up too high. They’ve already had three consultants so far this year. But that was my entry into the sea level.

 

And there, what I simply recognized is that giving those men and women an opportunity to reflect back to them about how they meet, how they communicate, how they develop and implement strategy. If they can improve only three or 4%, which is a very low, low percentage, it can have huge compounding effects positive in a positive way for the business,

 

29:27

because it cascades down to the whole organization itself. Correct? Yeah,

 

29:31

yeah. And the second thing, if I could say one more point on that you were asking about, about tools and what to do is, you know, we often think about strategy is a very cognitive, you know, intellectual activity, which to a degree it is we have the big business schools have put all these things out about strategy. And I’ve always believed that strategy is not only an intellectual exercise, it’s also an emotional one.

 

And so, for example, when we’re having if I’m doing a strategic review with a leadership team, and somebody has just presented a new a new initiative or perhaps a new direction for the business, I’ll actually take two ropes and and put them down on the ground, one running like a vertical and the other one buddy perpendicular, so it looks like a cross.

 

And then I say, Look, just imagine that this initiative that just heard that we’re going to evaluate that there’s no right or wrong or good or bad. But on the vertical axis here, this is at the high end here, this one into this at the robots like intellectual clarity. So this, this initiative is for me, absolutely crystal clear about what we’re trying to achieve. And at the other end of the row, it’s not really clear about what we’re trying to achieve. That’s an important thing to know.

 

And the second perpendicular rope that runs across ways is about how emotionally connected Am I am to this initiative? Am I excited? Am I possibly engaged? And I’m gonna stand on the right side, or unless I see you have this kind of matrix. And then you ask people leadership team to go stand there. Now, if you make around in a conference room and say, Now what do you guys think about that initiative? Everybody kind of nods their head or says something, but nobody wants to? Nobody wants to stand up. So like, am I going to lose my job over this initiative? Or am I going to have to let some some people go over to to Linda there. But when you ask people to take a stand, to make a personal stand about what they think and how they feel about the strategy, and you’ve already set the boundary, so it’s not about criticisms, or good or bad or right or wrong, you just want to understand where people are at. And then you follow that with a conversation. So these are some of the very basic tools that I use that are absolutely revolutionary, they they create a whole new level of conversation for a leadership team. And in in three to six months, a leadership team can make, I mean, absolutely huge project progress.

 

31:43

That is such a powerful tool, they just share it when you put people on a spot in a conference room, and you take a round robin approach, you know, people tend to freeze up and they may not actually have the comfort level, they need to really share what they’re thinking about to verbalize it in a way that makes sense to both themselves and to whoever’s in the room from the technique they just share with us. It gives everyone in the room the ability to maybe gauge where they stand in terms of a certain issue without actually verbalizing it in words, and more importantly, really allows everyone to see where they stand relative from each other. And that’s when you can actually open communication lines. Yeah, absolutely.

 

32:18

And even you could take that a step further. And if you even if you see people who are this was a great revolution, I was I was doing a project, it was a German, American, Singaporean Malaysian leadership team, and they were in the production of, let’s say, medical devices, let’s say that. And, and, and they were also you know, struggling with that.

 

And, and we did the strategy piece about the initiative. And we had people at another end at the lower end where they weren’t, they weren’t, they didn’t really understand. And they were they were really engaged. Now, in an old school thinking and a classic thinking you might be putting in those people say like, what’s wrong with you? Why don’t you guys get it? Why aren’t you really on the boat?

 

Or you’re off the boat? You know, this kind of like, very masculine? Toka language? Right? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And then people, people, don’t people then shrink back, right? They don’t like that kind of threat. So I simply suggested, well, here’s what I’d like you to do. There are some people in this matrix that have said, it’s very clear for them or, or they can even perhaps, feel very connected to this initiative. And we can see there’s some other people that are very difficult. So what I’d like you to do, is to go down and find a partner who’s at the other end of the matrix who either doesn’t feel connected to it, or they don’t feel they understand it, find a partner, go off for a half hour for a walk.

 

And, and, and see if you can understand why the person has chose to stand where they do, don’t try to convince them. Don’t try to you know, move them into different directions. Just see if you can understand why they are where they are, and come back and report to us. So what happened was, we came back and the people that were just listening, you know, they came back and said,

 

Well, here’s why. Harold in, for example, I was standing down there and to say it without judgment to just give his opinion. And he’s a scientist, he doesn’t feel there’s enough data to be able to move. And it was really, really interesting. And what’s happened, just simply by having that kind of dialogue, and allowing people to say what they think, and to have people to listen to them can create a huge shift, and help people move to more to a higher end of the matrix, if you will. I’ve seen that happen numerous times,

 

34:22

guys, then just share a very important tool and how you can really engage with different individuals in your team, if you find it hard for different individuals in the team to work together because you think that maybe the views and concerns are not really being highlighted, even though you give them the time to

 

speak about it, then maybe adopting one of these techniques could be very helpful for your team and yourself in terms of getting that communication and to start developing that leadership and unity between the leaders itself. Now then I’d love to talk to you a little bit about your leadership growth that program that I saw on your website. How is this different from the executive ownership program?

 

34:56

There are some similarities, but there are some situations where it In my work, it’s really important that the senior leader of a particular team says the man or woman says, I really want you to work with us for two weeks, two months, six months, in an intact team process where we can use the executive ownership technologies and frameworks for growth. However, there are other situations where a leader might come to me and say, you know, my, I’m not the senior leader in the team. But I have a team below me.

 

And I really want I really believe in, in what you’ve written in your book, I really believe that leadership is a team construct, is there any other way that you can work with me, if I’m not able to bring my team on board, for example, there, you could join a leadership growth lab. It’s like a situation where you have six to eight people from different companies. And they meet for a course of a year, they can do six months,

 

if they want to, they usually meet for a year, they have either three face to face meetings are three intensive virtual meetings, where people from different companies get to not only develop strong external networks, which is really important, other perspectives, they get to share their own problems, I serve as the mentor coach for that. And I’m also able to then feed in particular aspects and tools of executive ownership that they can take back into their business, and to experiment and try with a prototype. And then come back in the next session, say,

 

Hey, here’s what I do with my team in this work. So it’s an opportunity for individual say, Hey, I’d like to be in a growth lab. Because I’m not in a situation right now where I can bring the whole team in.

 

36:33

Yeah. And so gives them that additional support system, I’ll say from the company as well, and probably gives them an additional exposure disagree way for them to actually take a step forward, if the organization is not ready to maybe embark on a whole team effort with the executive ownership program itself, right.

 

36:48

Yeah, the end the benefits there, too. You have people from six different companies. So you might be different industries, they might be see they have similar problems, but they look at them a different way. And they’re also picking up from their, from their other colleagues in the leadership growth labs, similar ideas. So it’s a huge, it’s a huge value proposition, my book. No,

 

37:06

Dan, let’s take some time to talk about your YouTube channel. I noticed you started one recently, and you’re sharing leadership lessons inside as well. Could you share a little bit more about this?

 

37:16

Well, this is a new venture. So I you know, I’m perhaps in an age where I’m a little bit older. So coming into the whole digital piece is relatively new. And, and during the COVID, I thought to myself, I’m not doing the face to face stuff, how could I add value to people that want to learn but can’t come to one of the workshops, or perhaps join a growth lab for whatever reason.

 

And so I started doing a series of short videos that would describe very clear and real situations that I’ve encountered over the last couple years, and then to share in a very condensed way, about 90 seconds, the solutions or ideas that we discussed.

 

And so I’ve just started that, I think mid year, and uploaded, I think 20 sort of really, I believe high quality, high yield, you know, learning spirits that are all under a couple minutes long.

 

And I sort of parked them on YouTube, I haven’t really done any marketing yet. But if you’ve got listeners that are interested in continuous learning or short clips, they could go to my YouTube channel and anybody that that signs up to my YouTube channel, you know, and sends me a mail just says, Hey, I heard about you. Through Ted through Ted’s podcast, I’ll send him a complimentary chapter of my book, electronic copy.

 

38:33

Dan, thank you so much for the generous offer. I’ll definitely inform my listeners. And I’ll leave the details in the episode page when the episode goes live. Now then, if the listeners only remember one thing from today’s conversation, what would you like it to be?

 

38:46

If there’s, as I look back over my life, and a piece of advice that I wish I’d perhaps implemented a little bit sooner, I would say, to recognize and act on the difference between knowing something and doing something, right. Sometimes, you know, something, you want to do something, but you don’t do it, you know, and that there’s a gap there. And that gap between knowing something and doing something is really called discipline.

 

It’s about starting something, it’s about doing it long enough to get some feedback, and perhaps asking someone to hold you accountable. I’ve been very blessed, very fortunate to create a very, very successful business and career in Europe, I wouldn’t have been able to do without a lot of wonderful people around me and my wife and my children have been very supportive. And yet looking back, I could have even done that in a better way and in a quicker way.

 

If I had closed the gap between Oh, I know this is what a and then and then doing it out here. So this close that gap and, and and move on your things. Most of the things that we choose to do, are not going to put us at fiscal risk in danger or life in any way. But we’re often more concerned about what people might think, or, Oh, could I really be successful? But close that gap between knowing something and doing something and just just go for it would be my

 

40:10

my advice. Oh, who was of advice, then? Now how can listeners get in contact to view you, they need your

 

40:15

help, they can contact me through my website, that’s Dan dornburg, all one word.com or through LinkedIn, I really appreciate sharing and exchanging with people on LinkedIn. I’ve met some really wonderful people on that forum so they can find me on LinkedIn. And my contact details are both on the website or LinkedIn, they can reach out via email or, or phone if they wish

 

40:35

you have been all these details also be provided on the website for the episode page attached to.com. Now, Dan, thank you so much for joining us today and sharing with us your expertise on leadership.

 

 It’s been such a pleasure having you here. Ted, you’re wonderful host and it was a pleasure. Thank you. Guys, thank you so much for joining Dan and I on today’s episode, so I hope you’ve learned a little bit more about what it takes to craft a highly effective leadership team,

 

Dan is a great resource will help so don’t be shy to reach out to him. Now all tools and resources are available on tatio.com. That’s tdto.com. And if you ever want to get in contact with me, then just reach out to me over LinkedIn. And as before, I really appreciate it if you could share the show with just one friend. And if you could subscribe to the show and leave a review on Apple podcasts. That’s all for me today. I’ll see you guys next time.