Unlocking Why Smart Leaders Feel Stuck With Ryan Watts

* Website
* LinkedIn
* YouTube Ryan Watts Coaching
* YouTube The Personal Success Podcast

Timestamps:
00:00:00 – Cold Start & Intro
00:03:20 – The Leadership Tension Nobody Sees
00:06:09 – Why Skills Are Not Always the Problem
00:07:52 – Confidence, Conviction, and Authority
00:09:18 – The Fatigue Behind Success
00:16:51 – The Hidden Negotiation
00:18:55 – Can You Be Too Self-Aware
00:24:12 – Healthy Authority vs Unhealthy Force
00:36:08 – Name the Tension
00:40:00 – Leadership Gets More Human

Ryan Watts (00:02.00)
The cost of that is really you realize that there’s so much energy going into that sort of management of that rumination or internal tension that you’re able to clearly lead, and you find on the other side of that, that momentum doesn’t have to require force.

People want the leadership. They want that direction in a lot of ways, and it doesn’t have to be, you know, authoritarian.

Skot Waldron (00:33.00)
When I’m not hosting Unlocked, I’m speaking at events all over the world. I’m helping leaders and I’m helping teams communicate better. I’m helping them build trust faster and actually enjoy working together. I’ve spoken for companies like The Home Depot. I’ve spoken at national architectural firms. I’ve spoken for pharmaceutical company offsites. I’ve spoken at associations, you name it.

With 99% of attendees of all those events, over 1800 people have reviewed me at this point. 99% of them saying they got some value. That’s pretty awesome. Even the caterers have thanked me. And if they are thanking me and they’ve heard a lot of talks and they’re busy doing their jobs, that’s saying something. If you’re an event planner looking for a speaker who’s really easy to work with, trust me, I want to be the last thing you’re worried about on event day. I’m going to take care of you. And who actually delivers value for your audience that they are going to use on Monday morning when they return to the office, then let’s talk.

Do you ever find yourself negotiating with yourself, this inner tension of understanding how to lead and what to lead and how to do this, and do I outsource this authority because I don’t want to deal with the fallout or the tension that I had the discomfort of what’s going on? And there’s a lot of that that happens, I think, in a lot of leaders. I work with a lot of them. And my guest today, Ryan Watts, also works with a lot of them. And he is coming on to talk about the internal stuff that we deal with as leaders. And I think that’s why I had him on the show. Actually, I know, that’s why I had him on the show. So here we go.
Ryan Watts is a Leadership Coach, podcast host, and the founder of Ryan Watts Coaching. He helps leaders and high performers restore internal agreement so they can make cleaner decisions, lead with calm authority, and create momentum without force. We use all those words in this podcast. You’re going to hear them. Through private coaching and his podcasts, The Personal Success Podcast and The Private Leadership Reset Podcast, Ryan helps people reconnect with clarity, purpose, and sustainable success.

So, we’re going to talk a lot about all these things today, the negotiation idea, the calm authority, the momentum without force. A lot of us try to force things. We don’t have to. Okay. We don’t, it doesn’t need to be that way. So here we come, Ryan.

Ryan, welcome to the show, man. It’s good to see you.

Ryan Watts (03:09.00)
Honored to be here, Skot. Thanks.

Skot Waldron (03:12.00)
We’re going to talk, you know, leadership, because that’s what we do. But I wanted you on the show because of your emphasis on how they lead themselves and maybe inner tension that they often feel with themselves or they enter a conflict or whatever you call it, trying to come to terms with who they are and what they are. That’s just really fascinating to me. Like, how did you start to like hone in, really, on that space?

Ryan Watts (03:45.00)
Well, in my corporate career, you know, like twenty some years ago, I was thrusted into this leadership position, and I had no idea how to lead. You know, so what do you do? I reached for John Maxwell, I read Good to Great, you know, Napoli all the classics, everything that every leader knows. And I think that was necessary. But I got to a certain point where leadership felt like a weight. It felt like, you know, I was more and more going home and thinking about things and replaying conversations. And I was like, what is this thing? You know, it felt like something was wrong with me.

And honestly the words didn’t come to me then, but through an exercise with my friend who owns a marketing company, you know, we spent like 6 hours trying to hash out how to market a coaching business. And he’s like, what you do is you help people resolve this internal negotiation. And the result of that is to have calm authority, right? It doesn’t feel as pressured. It’s something that you can wear and kind of move freely. You can get momentum without force. And I think this is illustrated in words like clarity and things like that, but I was like, yeah, that’s the thing. That’s already the people I’m working with and that’s what it is. And that is what transformed my leadership and my experience of it.

Skot Waldron (05:24.00)
I think that there’s a lot of leaders, and I’ll say this, you know, you go read all the books and you go read all the things and you listen to the podcasts and you go to the conferences and attend workshops and all kinds of stuff. And I mean, you do this like probably I do this. We’ll teach different skills, right? Different things about listening tactics and different ways to communicate to different people. We’ll give them different tools to utilize in a coaching environment for them, with their, you know, direct reports or whatnot.

But I feel like honestly, leaders still feel stuck. They still feel like this thing, and you talk about it often in the sense that most of the problems they face aren’t really skill problems. The things like I just need to know the skill for this thing. But they’re like internal tension problems. So, what’s the difference? What do you mean by that?

Ryan Watts (06:24.00)
I think what the signal is there is that, you know, some leaders might find themselves in that position and be like, wow, I’m not failing, but I feel stuck. And I think what you find that you’re paying is you’re not paying in failure, you’re paying in fatigue, right? You find yourself more tired, right? And I think that the difference between the skills is that the skills, in order to sort of inhabit leadership and use those skills you really have to be, sort of, have a certain alignment with who you are and be able to what I say embody your authority, right? You can’t outsource your authority by thinking, is the team going to like this? Will they follow this? Is this PC enough or whatever? There’s literally hundreds of different negotiations you can have. But if you know who you are and where you’re and what you’re attempting to do, you can resolve that negotiation, right? And then you can inhabit those skills. Then those skills really are empowered.

Skot Waldron (07:31.00)
Okay. Going off of that one, I’m curious, do you think that a stronger leadership skill set is the confidence or conviction? Like if you could pick one of those about what you were just talking about. I mean, is it, you know, leading with that authority, whatnot, is it the confidence in their ability to lead or is it conviction in the decisions and the way that they’re moving forward?

Ryan Watts (07:59.00)
I think they’re definitely related. And I don’t know that there’s a one size fits all for it. But I do think that, you know, for me, if I think about my experience, I had the conviction, right? And it was sort of the confidence. But the reason why the confidence wasn’t there is, define confidence is certainty of self, right? And it just I was outsourcing my authority. I was saying, yeah, if I word the email that way, maybe it’s going to come across X. And I’m not saying that’s not useful to be considerate in emails. I’m not saying that. I’m saying that when you’re spending all your time thinking about all these different tensions that are coming up, the people who are following, they can tell.

And so, I think that for me, conviction was first. I knew what I wanted to create. And as soon as I was able to sort of acknowledge that in myself, the confidence was just naturally there.

Skot Waldron (08:59.00)
Okay. It’s almost like chicken or the egg thing, right? It’s like, yeah, which one do you lead with coming into this thing? I think that’s an interesting perspective. When we talk about, you know, the cost of leadership and what that looks like and being drained and fatigued, like you mentioned earlier. I want to know how it shows up. Like, how have you seen that show up and with your clients where they may be “successful externally.” They may be building something. They may be doing some stuff, but they’re not on board with like really what’s going on internally. Like they feel like this fatigue, or this drain or what’s happening. How do you think that shows up in real life?

Ryan Watts (09:44.00)
The way that it shows up, and this is almost this is a pattern, right? Is that they’re sort of going through this rumination where they’re tending to this internal negotiation. A lot of their energy is going there, but then they look outside themselves and they’re like, okay, but everything’s okay, I must just learn how to ignore this, right? And so, what happens is they get to a point where they actually can resolve that tension that’s inside or move towards it, right?

I worked with a coach. I don’t know if that’s ever going to be fully resolved in me or anybody. It’s just a fact of human existence in my view. But what that looks like is all of a sudden, they’re able to sort of wear the cloak of leadership more lightly, and you can tell when there’s sort of a flow that’s going through this. This is who I am. Like you said, coming from conviction, confidence is there. This is the way it needs to look like. And it’s very clear and it’s very simple. It doesn’t have a certain weight to it.

And I think that, like I said before, the cost of that is really you realize that there’s so much energy going into that sort of management of that rumination or internal tension that you’re able to clearly lead, and you find on the other side of that, that momentum doesn’t have to require force, and I think that was the magical thing for me that was like, I see what’s happening here. Things are moving along quicker than they ever have. Not that anything was necessarily broken, but it really like I said, it enabled me to really embody my leadership instead of outsource that leadership authority.

Skot Waldron (11:29.00)
So, building momentum without force, do you find that people try to force it, like force that momentum?

Ryan Watts (11:38.00)
I think sometimes when there’s that negotiation happening, it feels like force. Right?

Skot Waldron (11:46.00)
They’re forcing themselves to resolve it or get out of this things?

Ryan Watts (11:51.00)
If you have a thought like this, you’re a leader and you’re like, ok, I remember this conversation and this is almost like embarrassing to admit now, but I was early in my career, this is sort of one of those milestones where it was like, click. I was out on a date with this woman, and I was sort of commiserating about the managers that I was having issues with. And she said the simplest thing she goes, “hmm, aren’t you their boss? Why don’t you just tell them this?” And I realized that looking back now, I don’t think I had this. It was like, yeah. But it was sort of, I kept like the tension was I don’t want to tell them that the way they’re personally doing things, it’s not creating results, right? It was whatever.

I thought it was too personal. And it’s just like, no, tell them, hey, this is the result you have to have. I don’t see a clear plan about how you’re getting it based on what you’re doing. And you can say that, you know, in a way that is empathetic, is straight to the point, and is sort of light, right? You’re not sort of taking it on. I noted that point because at first I was sort of offended. I was like, hey, I’m just, you know, we’re talking about work here. But then I was like, wait, there’s a point here to this that I need to see is that what is causing me to not have the conversation I need to have? But looking back, hindsight’s always twenty-twenty. But maybe I thought they would quit. Maybe I thought that they would say, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Either way, that’s outsourcing the authority that I really already had.

Skot Waldron (13:38.00)
Ok. So, you talk about the cost of that thing, right? I often talk about self-preservation on the show that we feel that self-preservation. I’m afraid that this person’s going to quit. I’m afraid they’re not going to like me. I’m afraid there’s going to be some kind of riff because I’m a good guy and I like them and they like me, you know, and I don’t want to jeopardize that relationship. You could have been trying to hide something, maybe some insecurity about something you felt or and low confidence or hiding your feelings about that person and or trying to prove that something, some direction was right or their direction was wrong, or you didn’t want them to feel that way.

I often talk about this also, and I was talking with a client yesterday about this very thing because she was having a hard time with one of her direct reports. She’s a president of this company and she was having a hard time with one of these direct reports. And she was talking about like, why do they keep doing this thing? Why do they keep enabling their team members and keep covering up for these certain things? I said, well, it might not have been about the cost of not doing it rather than, what is she getting out of it by doing that thing.

Going back to your story, it could have been almost what you were getting out of it, how was it serving you to not have that conversation? Different perspective too on the cost of it also, but how is it how is it serving you? And so sometimes we exist in this tension, and it almost serves us to be in that tension or to like we feel yeah, like the cost of doing something different is too much. So, we rather just stay in the tension, and it almost serves us sometimes in that tension. Do you ever find any of that with your clients?

Ryan Watts (15:26.00)
Oh Yeah. Absolutely and there is something because what the tension is you’re scared you’re going to open up Pandora’s box, right? By having whatever conversation, like you said. Maybe they’re going to quit. Maybe they’re going to start a revolt in the company, you know. A lot of times what I’ve found though, and you know, this is my experience, and it aligns with a lot of my clients, is that there’s sort of a blank spot in the leader. They’re waiting to be led there. When you sit down, you have the conversation with them, you say, this is what I see. I see this repeated behavior of; I can’t remember the world you use Skot. You’re creating this behavior in your team by doing X and Y. What should we do about it? Because I feel there needs to be some urgency now about this.

You know, and at that point, you’ve just removed all the tension, the person behind it, and you’ve gone right at it, and they’ll be like, I felt that too a lot of times, you know. Now sometimes they might be like, you know what, you’re a jerk, I quit, whatever. That’s not the person you want on your team, perhaps. But, to sit down with them and say, you know, they might say, you’re right. And I have not been able to put my finger on that, but this is what it is. That’s leadership.

Skot Waldron (16:46.00)
It totally is. Let’s talk about this idea you bring up, this hidden negotiation topic. I think that’s interesting. I think we’re always negotiating with ourselves in some way about whether we should do this thing or not do this thing, or how can I get myself to do this thing that I don’t want to do? And I think there’s a lot of types of internal negotiation. But what is the one that you hone in on that’s happening inside most leaders that really nobody else sees. That’s just there all the time.

Ryan Watts (17:20.00)
I think it really just comes down to you know, is it within my authority? Which is kind of funny because if you look at companies, you know, the way their corporate world works, you’re assigned a role, you’re assigned sort of authority, right? But it’s sort of this question, who am I to, you know, direct them in this way? And I’m talking like there’s been CEOs, presidents, regional, you know, who am I to sort of direct them in this way? And again, the thing that I find is that people want the leadership. They want that direction in a lot of ways, and it doesn’t have to be, you know, authoritarian.

But, you know, this idea that I want the culture to be like X, you know, and yet you keep allowing, you know, your authority to sort of be outsourced and be like, well, they don’t seem like they’d be receptive to that. Or I sent an email out and you know, that’s where you start watering down your impact. And I really see that everywhere. And people know it. Leaders know it because, you know, typically leaders are self-aware to a certain degree. And the self-awareness really feels heavy and becomes this place where they’re constantly processing this. Should I do this? Should I do that? How did that land? And a lot of that is, like I said, the outsourcing or the watering down of their authority that they already possess.

Skot Waldron (18:56.00)
Do you think you can be too self-aware? Does being too self-aware create too many problems?

Ryan Watts (19:01.00)
Well, it depends on what you do with the self-awareness, right? I mean, if you’re constantly aware of three hundred variables, you know, we just don’t have the bandwidth for that. So, my answer to that question would be I don’t think that most leaders that I’ve found are really hyperaware in one area and they sort of have a blind spot. We’re sort of 360 degrees, you know, individuals and human beings. And so, you can’t have your eye on everything all the time.

But I think being able to be aware of who you are and just kind of resolve that tension because most of us get into leadership because we want to make an impact. We want to do something positive. And these sort of internal tensions and negotiations that a lot of times we’re talking about awareness here. A lot of times leaders aren’t aware of. And we’re talking about really self-aware people, they’re just not aware of this.

So, you know, in my program, the first really session that we spend is really just uncovering what’s actually there. So, they might come in, I need to work on this. But they’re two levels down, there’s some kind of thing they haven’t worked out with themselves yet, something they haven’t come to an agreement on. And once you see that and you become aware of that, there’s sort of this, okay. And it just everything shows up differently. And that’s a powerful transformation.

Skot Waldron (20:27.00)
A lot of leaders they try to just put a band-aid on the stuff. They see a top-level symptom and they just want to treat it, right? Treat the symptom. There’s a little bit of bleeding going on, they need to stop the bleeding. Sure. And we stop the bleeding; we focus too much on stopping the bleeding. Yeah, we got to stop the bleeding, but then we got to dig deeper. But they there’s so many cuts and scrapes and things that they’re addressing in their life and at business that they just put a band-aid on that, put a band-aid on that, put a band-aid on that, put a band-aid on that.

And I know that people listening right now know exactly what I’m talking about because I hear it all the time from my clients of Skot, I just got to fix this thing. I got to fix this thing. You know what happens, Ryan? I’ll ask them three weeks later, “hey, whatever happened to that conversation that we were talking about three weeks ago that you were really worried about?” And they’re like, “which one?” I’m like, “you know, the one that you were like freaking out about three weeks ago?” And they’re like, “oh that’s fine. We don’t need to talk about that.” And I’m just like, okay. That’s what I’m talking about. It’s like we get so hyped up on that band-aid we need to put on the thing that we don’t understand the real problem underneath at all. And I think we really need to figure out what’s happening there.

Ryan Watts (21:44.00)
Well, I think you always say, you know, love yourself, right? And I love that because that’s what this is. And it’s not like something fluffy. It’s like, what’s actually happening in here? Because, you know, I came into this. I’m the type of person I always love the beginning of everything, right? Because you’re motivated, you’re focused, and then stuff happens and that’s where the negotiation starts happening, right? You start being like, well, maybe I’m going to have to change the deadline, or you know, whatever happens. Okay, shut that down because that’s taking energy.

And just you know, there’s a new agreement that needs to happen with yourself, right? And that is reconnect with what you’re trying to do and get people on board who are going to do it and be very clear and repeat the message over and over again. That to me, it sounds simple, but I don’t know that much more needs to be said about leaders. It just is that process of really learning how to resolve that negotiation.

Skot Waldron (22:45.00)
Can we talk a little bit about this? I want to talk back. I want to go lean back to this authority thing. Cause I want to make sure I’m super clear on what you mean by authority. I mean, when we’re talking about this, is it this idea of like, hey, you now have the authority to make this decision and do this with your people, or is it versus you don’t have authority, you need to run that by me. Are we talking that level of authority? Or when you talk about authority, what do you mean?

Ryan Watts (23:17.00)
So, what I mean when I’m talking about authority is the first thing that you said, right? So, you’re in a position where you’re given a title and certain authority comes with that. But if you’re having this experience where you’re like, okay, I got to send this email out, how’s everybody going to receive it or whatnot, and you’re outsourcing your authority towards getting it validated somewhere else instead of just inhabiting that authority. Does that make sense?

Skot Waldron (23:48.00)
That makes sense. That leads me to my next question. When we’re doing this with our authority and we’re outsourcing it for whatever reason that may be and we talked a little bit about the momentum without the force and negotiating what that looks like and whatnot. I’m interested in your perspective on using that authority to exercise healthy discipline in the workplace versus using that authority to exercise unhealthy force, like forcing something in an unhealthy way. What’s the difference, do you think, between that healthy discipline aspect versus the unhealthy force aspect and using my authority in a healthy way?

Ryan Watts (24:42.00)
Well, the word that shows up for me there is force. If there’s something that needs to be forced, it’s probably not coming from authority. It’s coming from that negotiation. If there is a healthy discipline, you know, for example, you’ve already got something set up. It’s sort of an external tool where if you need to access that, you know, then you do. And you don’t need to force that. It just is what it is, right? Now you want to be clear, but you can also be empathetic and open to their feedback to that and not see that as a reflection on you.

Skot Waldron (25:23.00)
Have you ever worked with somebody where that was going on, that inner tension was happening, where it was where they thought they had it all. I mean, they thought they had achieved stuff, they thought that they were doing things the right way, but they still felt disconnected. They still felt like that inner tension and couldn’t come to terms with who they were and what they were doing.

Ryan Watts (25:46.00)
I mean I would say most people that I work with are exactly that.

Skot Waldron (25:50.00)
What is that? What happens on the other end of it? Like, what’s the aha moment or that trigger that helps them? I know it’s kind of different for everybody, but I mean, with you know, any instances in the past where you’ve experienced that with somebody?

Ryan Watts (26:07.00)
Well, I think, you know I have a theory, and I’ve read like, for example, Chase Hughes’ book comes to mind where you start talking about authority and our biology. We’re programmed to sort to see the negative before the positive. And I think that’s what’s happening. As a leader, this is a skill, you know, a lot of people don’t have the skill developed to be able to create this negotiation. It serves you really well to a certain degree. But that’s where when you get to a certain point, you have to learn how to resolve that. We’re so overwhelmed with information that anytime there’s a space in our life, it’s sort of taken up by something, whether it be, you know, social media or headlines or politics or whatever. And there’s a skill there, especially with, you know, in authority leadership positions of creating that space, right?

So, where you’re not necessarily you being reactive to everything, instead you’re engaged and what I always say is this is a simplification of the principle I’m trying to get across here is that you can perform leadership or you can sort of embody leadership. And there’s a nuanced distinction there. And I think that the nuance there is to try to resolve that negotiation. Like I said, it’s not like that that it goes away. I mean, I think the definition of that would be like a psychopath, right? That’s not what we’re trying to do. But resolving that to a certain degree because of they’re huge huge, there are people who are in charge of a lot of people making a lot of big decisions that are very impactful, who are really in this place of constant deliberation, negotiation, tension, stuckness.

But I really think it comes down to that internal tension that shows up as a, should I, shouldn’t I, do I have authority to do this? And if you ask any leader, do I have authority to do this? They’ll understand they know. And that helps to kind of clear it up. So, it starts with being able to identify that this is something that takes place in all of us, and it’s especially impactful for leaders.

Skot Waldron (28:30.00)
Okay. What about those leaders? Well, let me ask you this, your opinion about this one. Do you think leaders can be highly effective while being misaligned internally?

Ryan Watts (28:44.00)
Yes. Very much so. It doesn’t feel good. I think that’s where force is used and things like that. You can get things done that way, but the toll on the leader is it was something that I got to a point where, which is why I even considered this idea. It wasn’t working for me anymore. My blood pressure was going up, my health was declining, right? I thought, what is actually stressing me out? It was a lot of this unnecessary rumination, I guess, you know, and I just decided that all these things, you know, that’s the cure for it. What’s the decision you’re going to make here? Okay. So, if I have this idea that I have to roll out something new in the company, there’s going to be force or resistance with it. We’ll accept that and maybe we’ll come up with a plan to be able to deal with that. But we’re not going to build that into the communication. We’re not going to, you know, build that into our emotional expectation.

So, I do think you can get things done, not being aligned inside, but I think it’s difficult. I think it certainly provides more resistance. It certainly is not a fun or enjoyable experience in leadership, it’s a privilege. It should be something that we’re fully able to embody and realize the impact that we’re having for the positive.

Skot Waldron (30:16.00)
Yeah, I guess I kind of think about it as you know, can I be effective in pushing a car through mud? Like I guess I could. You know? It’s not going to be fun. It’ll take a toll on me eventually. I think at some point it’ll drag me down and I won’t be able to move forward anymore. I think eventually it’s just going to come. I think people can fake it for a while. I think people can do the job and crash through it. And I’ve worked with leaders as well that are doing the same thing. I mean, successful companies building things, doing things, but there’s just so much inner turmoil. There’s just something going on inside that’s just not clicking. It’s not working right, you know?

Ryan Watts (31:00.00)
Skot, the metaphor I’ve used before is that, you know, if you take a leader, they’re like a high performing luxury car, right? And they’ve got this, you know, powerful engine. If you’re dealing with a lot of internal tension, then you’ve got your foot all the way down on the gas and the brake. Now, is the car going to go? Probably, right? It’s not going to be good for your engine or your brakes. But what if you’re able to let up on the brake a little bit, that tension? Something happens to the leadership there and I think that’s just like your sort of analogy about the mud there, I think that’s important to consider it that way.

Skot Waldron (31:38.00)
Let me ask you some quick questions, ready? I don’t call these lightning round anymore because I tried to do that and they’re never quite lightning enough. So, I guess I always get intrigued. Try to be lightning, man.

What’s a sure tell sign that someone is out of alignment?

Ryan Watts (32:08.00)
I think the team just has an instinct that they know. There’s something, they’re saying one thing, their body language is telling a different story. There’s ways that we can tell that. But they seem distant, disconnected, unclear.

Skot Waldron (32:24.00)
What’s one thing that you think leaders force unnecessarily? But something you see over and over again.

Ryan Watts (32:35.00)
I’m trying to narrow it down to one thing. I think that there’s a lot of things. I think I think, you know, my initial view of leadership was, it was the guy standing on the hill saying charge, right? I mean, that’s force. But leadership is sort of all the things that happen before you get to the hill. I think that there’s a lot of leaders who are using force where we talk about culture and the workplace and all that stuff, and it’s about really empowering people. Right. I think that force is probably, you know, it just sort of in our Western culture is something that’s used far too often for too many things.

Skot Waldron (33:15.00)
What is something that looks like success but really isn’t?

Ryan Watts (33:22.00)
Oh man. There’s so many leaders that I talked to now. Doing this work has fundamentally changed the way I think about things because there’s someone who comes to mind, I’ve worked with who is the CEO of like a hospital chain, right? Just seeing the gears were totally locked up, right? Nobody knew. And it got to the point where they were locked up before this person would do anything. So, it is something that people need to sort of, they experience themselves. It can’t be concealed but it’s everywhere.

So, I think usually you start seeing behaviors that are sort of not aligned with people. I think eventually that’s sort of, the gears are locked up, type thing. But you can see it in their demeanor and the way that their family relationships are, and the way that you know, sometimes in the results. But oftentimes that’s the thing that they’re focusing all their energy on. That’s the thing that’s going well.

Skot Waldron (34:22.00)
We’re such a results driven culture. I mean, we need results, right? Don’t get me wrong. Results have to be there or else we all don’t have jobs and yeah, our business goes under. but I think to our detriment, we focus a little too much on them, to win-lose culture, it’s harsh. It can put a lot of pressure on us internally and externally, and it doesn’t do us or our people very much good. I just see cultures get destroyed and turnovers crazy and just cause of that pressure. So, it can be too much, man.

Ryan Watts (35:02.00)
I think especially with successful leaders, because successful leaders, they’re like, wow, I pushed, we got results, you know, using that force there. So, I’m going to push more and push more.

One of the most common pieces of feedback I got in my leadership career was, hey, is there ever going to not be a goal that’s down the road? You know, which told me that I wasn’t sharing with them that, of course, that’s the reality, but I wasn’t sharing with them how important or what the meaning was of that goal and their effort. And that was, they don’t care about the number. You know, it’s like what is meaningful about the work that I’m doing? What is impactful? What is it doing? And I think that that is, especially with successful leaders, that’s why that happens is because you get some of that success. You’re like, okay, I push the red button and we get success. And you just keep hitting the button, right?

Skot Waldron (35:58.00)
I want to sum this up. I want to wrap this thing up with this question for you. And this is where the action hits. I always make sure there’s some action with this one too, because we’ve talked, we’ve dug into the problem a lot. And I think that you know, oftentimes we’ll call it punching them in the bruise. They know it’s there and it’s kind of like they feel it now. Because I think we’ve gotten a lot of head nods out of this conversation but if someone feels that tension, they feel, you know, between who they are and what they’re doing and how they’re leading, what do you think is the action they need to take? What’s the conversation they need to have with themselves, with somebody else, or what needs to happen next?

Ryan Watts (36:44.00)
I think it starts with the conversation with yourself. What is the thing I’m negotiating? Right. And a lot of times you got to take it down a couple of levels. If it’s an email that you’re rewriting or a conversation you were playing in your head, what is it about the conversation that’s problematic? What is that going to make you vulnerable to? What are you fearful is going to happen? What are you trying to control? And then once you get to whatever that is, you have to sort of got to release it and you can be strategic about directing the conversation or whatnot, but the tension, the emotional negotiation, the overplaying, the just focus on what’s happening internally, you’ll sort of notice a lightness and that is the first thing that needs to happen. Have the conversation with yourself, name the tension.

Skot Waldron (37:37.00)
Really good, man. The tension will always exist. That’s what we’re here for, right? I often say it’s not a problem to be fixed. It’s like, you know, a hole in my roof is a problem. I fix it and it’s done, hopefully. This is a tension that’s always just going to be managed. And you know, Andy Stanley mentions that a lot in his leadership work that he does. But I think that’s something interesting that we need to all understand that this isn’t something you just fix and it goes away. It’s kind of like it’s going to come up again. You’re going to wrestle with this again. And that makes you human and that’s awesome. You know? So, learning to manage that well is where, you know, in this case the win will happen. You’ll feel that peace and that gratitude.

So, man, thanks for shedding some light on this conversation. I think the internal aspect of leadership is so critical. I don’t focus on it a lot on the show. I focus a lot on strategies and how to build good conversation and communication aspects with team members. And so, I think this is really insightful. Hopefully a little bit therapeutic for some people in a good way.

Ryan Watts (36:44.00)
Thank you, Skot. Thank you so much. I appreciate your time.

Skot Waldron (38:57.00)
Yeah. And if there’s a, you know, do the do, like how do people get in touch with you? They want to find out more of what you do, have you speak, do a workshop, like really want to hear more about what you do? Where do they go? You got your podcasts. I mean, tell us all those.

Ryan Watts (39:11.00)
So, you can find everything at www.ryanwattscoaching.com and then I have a podcast, it’s a newer podcast called The Private Leadership Reset, where we just talk about this tension and sort of, you know, I think leaders and finding the feedback is that they’re able to like help identify what this tension is all about, right? In sort of a private way. And it’s just my discussion of it. I’ve started having guests on there and those episodes are to come, but that’s ryanwattscoaching.com/leadershippodcast. You can find that podcast there.

Skot Waldron (39:44.00)
Very cool, man. Thank you. All the luck to you, man. Keep doing the good work. We’re fighting a war, all of us. So, let’s do it together. It’s better that way.

Ryan Watts (39:55.00)
It’s good work. That is. Thanks, Skot.

Skot Waldron (40:00.00)
How was that, y’all? You feel a little bit like, ahh that’s me. Oh, yeah, I do that. Am I getting some confirmations out of that conversation? I felt like I have these conversations with a lot of my clients. And I feel like a lot of the things Ryan was saying resonated with me in the sense of, yes, that happens all the time with my clients. I can hear it. I can see it. And it’s so interesting in this day and age we live in. I think it’s really cool how leadership is becoming more introspective. I think it needs to. I think that that is a good movement that is happening.

30 years ago, no, we’re not going to do that. It’s a little bit woo-woo. It’s a little bit, you know, mushrooms and meditation circles. We’re not doing that. But now it’s a whole different way of thinking about leadership, of taking care of the self, of managing your mental mind, understanding what’s going on with that tension and how it’s maybe leading you instead of you leading it. And I think that there is something that we need to take and run with when it comes to all those things.

This negotiation that’s happening, this internal negotiation, is something that is going to exist forever in different ways in different capacities. And how do we get better at, you know, managing that? Well, we listen to Ryan. That’s what we do. So, thanks everybody for being on the show.

If you want to find out more information about me or check out the show notes where there’s going to be more information and links to the things referenced in this episode, visit skotwaldron.com. And lastly, I’m asking for a little bit of love, just a little bit. So please take a moment, follow, rate the show. The algorithm is like that; it helps me get the word out. I really appreciate it.

Thank you. And until next time, stay Unlocked.