Welcome to the new manager podcast.
I'm your host, Kim nickel. Hi, and welcome.
I want to kick off today's episode by giving a shout-out,
to one of my students, her name is Francis, and she actually was
first a student of mine in the yoga studio.
And then she became a student of mine in my management skills
program. And so we've known each other
through these two different ways.
And anyway, Francis is a senior product manager She just
launched a podcast called Product remixed and She
interviewed me to talk about leadership and mindfulness and
some of the things that come up in the course of working with
humans. And what I think is really
interesting is that, especially with the product manager role
where a lot of the work requires you to lead by influence rather
than through having, you know, a direct line of authority over a
person. So they're not your direct
report but you are still responsible for getting work
done through the collaborative efforts of all of these
different stakeholders. So, listen to our episode, it's
on product remixed and you'll hear more thoughts and more
conversation about that. So for today, for our topic, I
wanted to share my thinking around this topic of Whether
it's something I teach a lot on. And essentially the idea is this
each one of us has our own inner whether you can think of it as
the emotion or the energy or sort of like the attitude that
you bring into any situation and one of the things that happens
with people and that happens with organizations is that there
are micro climates that get created around people generally
and then especially In organizations.
And what I mean by that is you might have an organization with
an overarching culture, that is really pretty toxic, like, not a
great place to work. However, you can have a manager
who had creates a microclimate around them so that their
particular team is not just functioning and performing at a
really high level but that it actually creates psychological
safety for people. People people feel supported,
people feel encouraged. People are doing their best work
because of the microclimate that one person is creating.
This is also true on the flip side.
So you can have a corporate culture or a company.
That is generally overarching, really, positive, really
supportive, really encouraging. But within that space, you can
have a mic Cool climate on one team around one manager, or one
liter, that Fosters hostility that undermines trust where
people are not doing their best work together because of the
microclimate of, of what of what is happening.
Just with that person, that's what I think about.
When, if you've ever heard this, this quote, or the saying people
don't leave companies, they leave Jurors because the
relationship that we have at work with the person that is
directly. Overseeing us is so significant
and when it's not good, when it doesn't feel right, when people
are not skillful at that role, it can have a lot of adverse
outcomes either in forms of attrition, or interpersonal,
conflict, or confusion low, morale.
All of these, these qualities and characteristics can show up
Just because of one person. What is also interesting?
I'm going to flip this again. Is that you can have a situation
where one person really can change.
The feeling and the functionality of how people are
working together. They can shift that microclimate
just through their own inner weather and the way that they
communicate and listen and show up for other people and this
becomes really important because it's always happening anyways,
whether you're aware of it or not.
Influence and especially influencing those around us
through our inner weather and what is the the microclimate
that we're a part of it's always going to be inflow, it's always
going to be responsive and one of the ways to think about this
is because as humans, we are so wired to perceive the emotion
and the energy of others. We are just built, we are Your
to be able to perceive a very subtle level.
Even if we can't articulate, even if we can't put words on
it, we can kind of sense the presence in the quality of the
attention in the room and what is expected of us.
And if we're being judged, or if we're being welcomed, we learn
to do this as children. It's kind of just built into us
as being social, mammals. And so, when you become aware
that this is something that happens.
Then it creates the opportunity to be intentional about it and
there's a lot of power available to you through the perspective
of how can I influence the space?
You know, I tell my students often that you can't change
people and you can't control people.
Both of those things are really hard and I don't recommend it,
but you have the ability to exert tremendous influence.
In a very positive and productive and highly functional
way. You might already be doing this
in ways that you don't fully appreciate that are creating
positive outcomes in your world. So one thing I would ask of you
after this episode is as you think about how am I relating
with my team? How am I communicating, how am I
listening as you start to, you know, tune into your own
Self-awareness and you start to notice.
What is it that I am doing that is creating this highly
functional situation or if you are dealing with conflict or if
something is just, you know, kind of off.
And right now, it's really easy to fall into conflict or
confusion or, you know, unhappiness just because there's
so much that's going on right now that none of us had planned
to deal with but, you know, life unfolds in the way it Does then
also beginning to ask yourself the question through the lens of
influence through this. I microclimate in our weather
idea, asking yourself like what is the inner whether that I am
bringing into the situation? Am I showing up?
Inpatient frazzled? Am I being, you know, unclear am
I showing up with a feeling of irritability because that will
affect how those around you. Respond.
Are you showing up from a place of patience?
Kindness feeling, relaxed, feeling called believing in the
best of people. Are you showing up with a
generosity of spirit? Are you showing up with an
intent to support and facilitate, you know, one of the
things I love about the word facilitate and about the work I
do as a facilitator. Is that the job is literally?
How can I make things easier here?
And as a really fun thing to do is to help things be easier.
Whether you're helping a conversation, be easier, whether
you are helping to facilitate a project to completion, whether
you are helping to facilitate understanding between different
people. So bringing this question about
noticing like what is your inner?
Whether what is it that you are feeling and thinking, right now,
Again, these are invisible skills so it might take some
practice to develop this ability to pause and notice as you're
going real time through your day, but it's totally available
to you. You already have the, the
foundation of it built into you as a human.
I believe that all humans do and that it is something we can
learn and develop as a skill. What's also nice about this
idea? of inner weather is that if you
are, then in a situation with somebody and especially if you
are in a like a managing up, Situation where you're thinking
about. Okay?
Like my boss, every time we have these one-on-ones, you know,
something about this doesn't feel good.
They're being impatient or they're being unclear, or
they're being not very supportive or they're being
micromanage e. Start to slink think about this
from the perspective of like, what is the inner?
Whether that they're bringing into the room?
What is the inner? Whether that they're bringing
into this call? Like what is it that I'm sensing
and just be curious. You know, you don't have to name
the emotion or assume an emotion, you don't have to
assume an intent but I want to encourage you to activate your
curiosity because it will start to let your brain like gather
this this new level. This kind of new granular level
of information that is currently there, but might be overlooked.
And I had a student that I worked with before.
Who said? Yeah, my You know, I have a sort
of a hard time with my boss and I'm trying to figure out like
what can I do to change things? Because my boss is always really
stressed really anxious and then I feel really stressed and
really anxious and I don't want to cut but I don't know what to
do about it and so we talked about it in terms of.
Okay? So your boss comes in with this
really strong, inner weather of high stress, high anxiety, High
urgency, that might come with some a feeling of it.
Patients or a feeling of pressure or this, underlying
feeling of fear, which is creating the stress and the
anxiety. So number one, just know that,
okay? When I am in conversation with
this person, they're probably going to bring this inner
whether that has this quality, right?
And so knowing that, I will likely encounter that with them.
What can I do for me to make sure that I stay really?
Added really calm, so I can be in the presence of it without
absorbing it deeply so that it kind of carries me along with
them. It's kind of like, you know,
before you especially in San Francisco, where we have so many
of microclimates. So many different kinds of
weather in the city you might say.
Okay so if I'm going to go out towards the beach I just want to
check and see will it be foggy and cold or will it be sunny?
And warm. And if you know what the weather
is likely to be, then you can equip yourself to enjoy being
there. You will know whether to bring a
sweater whether you want to have open toed shoes or closed toed
shoes. It just helps to be more
equipped to have the experience that will be of greatest use to
you and greatest enjoyment to you.
Depending on the relationship that you have with your manager
or with other people, another strategy is to name the weather
and it might sound like saying I noticed.
It seems like you're very anxious right now.
You know, and sometimes this is not going to work.
So this isn't this is not prescriptive.
Like if you've been listening to me, I hope you understand that,
a lot of what I share is not prescriptive, like, do this
thing, it's much more. This I want to offer
perspective, and I want to encourage you to try things
like, I trust you to take what you need from this podcast and
use it in the most useful way for your relationships, your
personality style, your organization, and your people.
But What can happen is you name the weather?
It seems like, you know, things are a little anxious right now.
It seems like things are a lot urgent right now and sometimes
just naming it can start to lessen the intensity of it, not
always but sometimes and so I want you to know that that is
available to you. Being mindful of your inner
weather. Can also mean that this is
another way you can use it in meetings and I want to say,
especially right now because so many of our meetings are
happening online where people are calling in from home.
And you know, depending on what people's lives are Beyond work,
there can be so much intensity or challenge or frustration or
even just Jen happening in their lives.
And so when you get everyone on a call, sometimes even just
saying, hey everyone, as we get started, I just want to do a
check-in as a human. How are you doing today?
Like, in three words or less, you know, put it in the chat or
would you like, you know, just to say out loud just just as a
check in like how are you doing today?
And sometimes just giving people this space to name and put words
around just how they are. Like what their inner weather
is, can also sort of help to clarify where people are at.
We're not always going to be in a good mood.
Sometimes, we're going to be frustrated or irritable or
grieving, or just tired. And then, when we show up to our
online call, we're feeling that emotion.
That inner weather is in that virtual room and it can create
either confusion like the thought of, oh my gosh, are you
mad at me? Like, This person mad at me
because what I'm seeing on their face and the way that they're
communicating suggest frustration or fatigue, which I,
you know, feels like are you are you do have some kind of bad
feeling about me because also as a human we take things really
personally. So by being able to give the
space for people to name, what is happening with them right now
in their inner weather without getting into all the details, it
can really help to kind of clear the space and then let people
feel Welcomed as whole humans and then you can have a more
productive connection and conversation.
I have one friend of mine who's also been a student of mine in
the past and she said, yeah, you know, I went into this meeting
and I opened the meeting by saying everyone.
I just need to tell you. I am really grumpy right now.
So if I seem impatient or grumpy or in a bad attitude, Yeah.
Like that's true and it has nothing to do with you.
So now let's move on. And what happened was people
were like, oh my gosh, I'm so glad.
You said that, I feel that way too, sometimes.
It's totally okay. It became a way to connect and
it also demystified kind of what was going on.
So I hope this has been helpful. Pay attention to your inner,
whether notice the inner weather of others, And be like, sort of
tune into a notice, the different microclimates that
emerge within your organization and the different people that
you work. With one of the things that
Francis and I, my former student who has her podcast product,
remixed is, we talked about the idea that the skills that you
learn and how to manage people. Well, It's not like you go away
and learn them and then come back, you're constantly like
continuous learning and one of the reasons why I think it's
important and we wanted too much deeper conversation around.
This is I believe that we do do our best work when we have great
relationships with people, when we communicate, well, when we
feel heard and seen and respected as humans, when we
have our own self, Awareness. So we're not being careless with
others, so that we are being clear when we are feeling
frustrated or impatient or urgent or sad so that we can
communicate in a much more productive way, all of these
things build trust and when we're careless it breaks trust
really easily. So it's not a thing that is ever
sort of complete and finished one, you know, and are aware
that this is a thing that Can learn and develop and I want to
get better at it because it makes my life better and it
improves the lives and the productive creativity of the
people I work with, that's when some really magical things can
happen, which is pretty cool. So, it's not an either/or.
It really is a simultaneity of being a Human Being Alive,
working with humans and asking yourself, how can I create
something great here? Which I believe all humans
really want to be a part of something great.
And they want to believe that others.
See the greatness in them. It's easy to overlook and
forget. But the good news is that it's
always available to come back to.
So thank you so much for listening.
It was wonderful to have you here.
I know sometimes with podcasts, it can be weird, like, but I've
been checking my And I know that you're listening and it really,
really is an awesome thing to know.
So take this, I hope it is useful to you.
Do let me know if there are other ways that this topic plays
out in your own life, I love hearing from my listeners and
thanks so much. Do you want personal
confidential help with your situation at work?
I offer one-on-one coaching and can help you overcome challenges
reach your goals and become a more effective leader to
schedule a consult. Go to my website, Kim nickel.com
coaching and we'll schedule time to talk about what's going on
with you and how I can help talk to you soon.