Hi everyone, my name is Patrick akhil and for today's episode,
we cover the right way to facilitate as a manager.
And today's guest is really willing to walk through fire for
his people. He empowers them and enables
them to do whatever they need to to get the job done.
He's an IT manager security and continuity at the social
insurance Bank, make for Mater. I'll put all his links to
socials in the description below.
Check him out. And with that being said, enjoy
the Absurd. That's interesting because I
mean you and I met on a training in Rome, correct.
And one of the things that really stuck with me is that
your real people person? I don't know if you would
describe yourself that way, but that's kind of the impact, the
impression you gave on me, okay? And I had the feeling you would
go through fire for your people. The people that I remember
judging, or for your team either, I will.
Why where does that come from? Because I love that in the
people, I'm working with, in my manager, the people that are
responsible or accountable for me, and, and the team, but Not
everyone has that. Well one, I'm a people person
because it's just me. It's just, it's just who I am.
I'm not, maybe not the most sociable person, but I'm
definitely not the most introverted persons.
I'm somewhere in the middle, I would say.
Yeah. And coming from, let's say the
work floor area, before I moved into management positions, it
was always very clear to me that that if a manager doesn't stand
for his or her previous, you know, people in there tear in
his, or her team's that these people will not feel comfortable
and therefore will never Create the best that they can or have
this fish and take a chance, take a risk.
Make a mistake. What's wrong with a mistake?
Yeah, it's just a learning process.
And therefore, I always felt that and I had managers that did
that as well, and I have the opposite.
So that was a very nice comparison.
The the fact that I kind of needed to Shield them so that
they could be the best that they could.
And that also comes with a certain internal motivation and
therefore I will never publicly, you know, attack any of my my
people or let them be attacked. Yeah, and I've had several
instances where that did happen and I will always stand for my
people even if they make mistakes, we're human, if you
don't want mistakes, take robots.
I love this. It's a simple as that.
Yeah, and if you're going to try something, you chances are
you're going to make mistakes, you learn from those mistakes
and then you move on to something new and you take a
different approach. If you can't facilitate that
space of making mistakes, and assuming that everybody is going
to be perfect all the time, don't expect anything new, don't
expect, you know, A New Perspective, a new invention,
new innovation, because it's not going to come.
Yeah, like Fully there with you but that realization for me
personally, took time it took time to be in that position.
Be in the workforce, be managed in such a way where I thought it
was on a micro level and then I'm not happy the person.
That's probably micromanaging. Me is not happy and I'm like,
there's no innovation. I can't do anything new.
I can't make any mistakes because everything is like
finger pointed and and right on there.
But on the opposite side, where I had the freedom and the option
to make mistakes to learn from that.
And the environment was safe enough to do so.
So, and for me to grow there. Yeah.
Those were the best environments.
That's where I grew the most. Absolutely.
I had the most responsibility, and it could take that
accountability right yet. Not a lot of people give that
freedom to a lot of people to make mistakes.
Like, there's there should be a balance maybe, but I think it's
very hard to do. You also have to make sure that
you have people that feel comfortable with that space,
with that responsibility. And that's something I learned
when I switched to my current employer being a semi
government. Shannon.
There was a lot of people management going around.
Yeah. And the fact that I was, let's
say, perhaps, you know, the new generation of some people really
did not feel comfortable, you're the manager tell me what to do.
Okay, so even in this very complex World, there are people
that love that freedom and love that that's space to innovate
and to create and to make something new.
And there are the people that Really do not feel comfortable
with it, right. It actually makes them
incredibly insecure. So I actually had to find a new
balance in that, where where certain people really want me to
tell them what to do and certain people, you can tell that they
love it or if you give them a little push, a little maneuver a
little space every time a little more.
Yeah, that they will grow into it.
And but you have to be careful because some people will feel
that responsibility as almost like a like a like a huge weight
and will not want to come back to you.
You as manager and say I can't do this or I need help.
They you have to be you have to keep the balance where certain
people do need a certain facilitation or do need somebody
to too. 22. Yeah.
What's the how would you say that in English?
I mean holding their hand is not a nice way of saying it.
Now it's not holding that it's not holding a hand, it's
facilitating, you can't it's baby basically a baby starts
starts learning how to walk. Yeah, well great, he's going to
fall is going to grab your. She's going to grab the coffee
table and then finally, they're going to learn to walk.
Yeah, once they go out on the street, you can't just let them
go. Exactly.
You have to teach him. How do you cross the road?
Look at to the left, look to the right.
Is there any other traffic coming note then?
You can cross the cross the road so it's not help.
It's not holding somebody's hand.
Yeah. It's creating and safe
environment where they can learn things and also figure out how
they click and how they take. Yeah, and that's so I call it
all. I always call it facilitating, I
don't call it holding somebody's hand because that would that It
would make me feel that that person is incompetent which they
are not exactly. Yeah, I like that a lot, but you
had to you as a manager first need to have that Insight,
right? That not everyone is the same.
Not Everyone likes that responsibility and
accountability, some people thrive in it.
And for some people, it's like a shackle or holds them down or
they get anxiety from it. Correct.
And they crash, right? The wreck that's not their
environment. That's not safe for them.
So you have to be able to First figure out what people want
right, where they are, and where they can grow.
And then Adapt accordingly. Because I think you as a
facilitator, you should facilitate properly for the
people that you are facilitating for managing director, right?
How do you get that inside? Like, is it, is it by having a
conversation is it doesn't come natural to you.
Let me start with that. It comes natural to me and I'm
human so yes I do make mistakes. Yeah so I've had situations
where people thought that they were doing a good job and and
then the pressure was on. Yeah.
In this case it was a certain project and the pressure was on
and a certain point, they felt they couldn't come back.
This person could knock didn't feel comfortable coming back to
me and saying, Nick, this is not working for me.
Okay, and eventually he cracked. So I got a kayak telephone call
from the from the project manager at the time.
Yeah. And he said this person of yours
is a complete failure. This that and Etc.
Etc. We have these deadlines etc,
etc. And none of them came.
True. Yeah.
And I said, okay, I haven't heard anything about this.
Let me talk to him. I'll come back to you.
So I looked up this this person this was pre covert so we were
still on the office. Yeah.
And I we went to the till to the company cafeteria and the moment
I started the conversation. I could see him tearing up.
I said, okay, let's go into a meeting room because you don't
want to do this. In the public space.
Yeah. So we went to a meeting room and
this person person completely cracked, okay?
Crying red eyes, completely in tears and felt like a complete
failure. Okay, and I was so extremely
pissed off. So I said to this person, I
said, listen and this, this state you're not going to do
anything. Yeah, so you're taking the day
off, you're going to go home, you're going to it was a Friday,
you're going to have a long week.
And do stuff that you like relax.
Now enjoy your weekend and we'll talk on Monday when you come
down and you said no, no, I can't do that.
I have to work after work. I said, no, you're not going to
work. You're not going to produce
anything today exactly. So just go home and relax and I
simply called the that project manager and I said to him.
Listen, if you do this, to one of my people again, I'm going to
take my take my knowledge out of your project and then you can
stuff it. Yeah.
This is not how we treat people. If something goes wrong, then I
want to know about it ahead of time, but you have kept putting
on the pressure up to the point that this person is cracked, and
that is totally unacceptable. Yeah, since then, that project
manager was extremely nice to me because he knew he had a
problem. If I would take the resources
out of his project and eventually I put some a senior
person next to the guy that I had sent home for the weekend
and eventually worked out. And he grew and he found his
trust. He knew that he could trust me
and that I trusted him and that he could come to me if the
situation wasn't going the way that he thought it should be
going or if he had questions and then we could just talk about it
and just you know, evaluate what was going on and what should be
changed, or what we could do differently or whatever.
But in that sense, I will never crack down on any of my, my, I
don't like to send my people but the people that work that work
in my teams, Because that's not productive.
This person made a mistake, he had this huge with a sense of
responsibility, which is something to praise.
Yeah. But he felt that, he was the
only one that could that needed to deal with this was with this,
this responsibility. That's not the case.
Yeah, he should have just come over to me and said, you know,
this is too much. I can't do this alone and then
we're going to see what we can do about this, but he didn't
feel that that space to Back to me.
Now he does exactly. I'm so I completely mismanaged
that I never saw that he was under pressure.
If I had conversations with them, everything was going good
good, everything was going great which it wasn't at the end of
the day, so yes, I'd make mistakes myself.
Of course I did, I can I blame myself that I hadn't seen that
earlier. No, because that person also has
a responsibility to come to me and say, Nick.
This is not working for me. He didn't.
And perhaps I should have been more prudent with the asking
questions. Which I didn't eventually, no
fun, no harm, no foul. He learned a lesson.
I learned the lesson and we're doing great.
Yeah, you move onward. I think those that have a high
sense of responsibility and accountability, also, have a
tendency to put a lot of weight on their own on their own
shoulders resolutely. And even though it should never
be, I don't think it should ever be on an individual level like
it can be for tasks or things or sure.
But in the end of the day who is responsible, is the team and the
like the whole Raishin organization, that is behind
that the team that you're doing it with and that you're doing it
for as well. That is responsible at the end
and I love that you highlight that you're not finger-pointing,
right? The worst thing you can do in
that moment is finger point at others and also at yourself
you're like okay I could have done things differently but also
fault is usually somewhere in the middle, right?
If you said, it's 100% my fault, then you're going to spiral,
you're going to have that pressure, you're going to be
that. Individual that says, this is
all my responsibility. Yeah, but still, it's somewhere
in the middle. Somewhere is a miscommunication.
And when there is a mishkan MC miscommunication, it's usually
from both sides. Correct.
I think that's really cool that you understood that.
It is also not solely your fault.
No. So that's why I don't like to
call it finger-pointing. I like to call it a valid way of
evaluating and drawing lessons from that for a next time.
Yeah. And that's, like I said, I'm
human. I learn from a day-to-day basis,
new things meeting up with new people, and no two people are
identical. So what works with for with
person, a may not work with person, be, exactly.
So, that's, that's one of the things that makes my job so
interesting. Yeah, I love hearing that.
When we, when we zoom into what went wrong with regard to the
project management and the pressure that was put on there,
I think that's something. Usually got that goes wrong but
I don't know either where it comes from.
No more. It mostly where it comes from,
what I see how it goes and it's not good for the people, but
there's a lot of deadlines being thrown out.
Some are very unreasonable. I don't know where they come
from. I don't know how they originated
but sometimes somehow they're there.
Maybe for a project manager from their responsibility or
perspective. They want to make sure people
move so they put deadlines and it's not really discussed on
what's feasible, or even when things are feasible, it's not
evaluated or re-evaluate it often enough to move.
Because once the deadline is set somehow, it's set in stone and
it never actually moves. Until it's not met and then
somehow we managed to move it. That's pretty bad project
management. Exactly in the projects that I'm
either in the project board or in the steering committees, I
will always and discuss deadlines content assignments
with the resources that I actually put in the team.
I'm I can, you know, make it up as I go along.
But I'd rather have a Fundamentally supported
deadline, then something that's basically a sandcastle.
Yeah. And so if something is not
feasible, then I'll be the first one to cuz I mean, I like I said
I'm their representative in a project board or steering
committee. Yeah.
So if I don't talk to them actually and take their
information to a steering committee or project board.
I'm not doing my job and I'm not Ting.
Yeah, I'm not actually doing the work, they're doing the work and
I need need to make sure that they are facilitated with
everything. They need to be able to do the
work, which means time-space money.
The requirements architectural drawings, information, security,
and privacy requirements, etc, etc.
If they don't have all of that they can't do their work.
Exactly. Yeah.
But do you think it's realistic to then put a lot of deadlines
on them with? It's the future because I like
the like the idea of short deadlines, right to weekly
deadlines. Therefore all agile comes in
where scrum conversion, right? Short deadlines that you can see
and evaluate in a shorter time span, right?
Because long deadline doesn't it don't make sense.
If your world around you changes that much you don't reevaluate
them often enough depending on where it comes from then I
totally agree with that. I'm more from from from an
infrastructure standpoint and infiltrate infrastructure is
usually we We always call our call, it the utilities
department. So we make sure that everybody
has electricity water and gas. So that's really a relatively
fundamental and those are usually quite big and
substantial projects. So two-week realizations, or
maybe even three weeks is not always feasible.
But a network for application, a b or c doesn't really make a
difference depending on what kind of application it is.
If it's just your average, a Asian with your standard codes,
then it's fine. Now if it's going to be
something, which generates a lot of traffic then, yes, it's going
to have an impact on your network.
So if it's something that you can actually demonstrate within
a couple of weeks and that's great for the infrastructure,
it's usually much more fundamental, you know, upgrades
from from certain Network components, or Hardware
components. That's usually much more
fundamental much. Bigger in that sense.
But even in infrastructure, we use a big room kind of planning
according to to Agile and where we actually asked our
Specialists to help us make the decision.
What are we going to do now? What's most important and we do
that based on continuity, we do that based on the information
security and privacy yeah those are the two primary targets that
we have. And we just had a big room
planning, which we call a Marketplace, think it was about
a month ago and for the last quarter of the year and all the
big projects from databases Hardware infrastructure
information security projects hardening you name it everything
within managed Services which is the department that I'm part of.
We've planned what we're going to do in quarter for yeah,
involving the right people at the right time, right?
At the start. When information is so
fundamental, you don't make those decisions for them.
I think is so empowering for the people that are in your team,
right? To have a seat at the table.
Have a voice in the in the reasons why things are created
or the the discussions. Why things are made, right?
And really understand why we're doing this in the first place.
And to have a voice in that I think is very empowering.
That's where to add your own scrum, are based on.
Exactly, I don't really look at how its organized I look.
The psychology behind it. Mmm, I'm a manager.
And so and the whole point is we're taking responsibility and
we have a voice and we're going to inform you.
What is and isn't possible. Yeah, there's a reason why a
product owner is the owner of the product backlog, but the
Sprint backlog is of the development team.
Why? Because they're taking
ownership, if somebody basically for instance, a product owner
would just shove that work into a certain Sprint.
Yeah, you're basically Lee taking away their empowerment.
So from a psychological standpoint, it's not theirs.
It's no longer there's and therefore, you can't accept them
to give their 100 or 110 percent.
If you feel ownership of something, you're going to make
sure within limit certain limitations, yeah, that you're
going to do the job and make sure that what you do that you
do really, really well but you have to have that ownership and
that can only be done. If you have that voice because I
don't have that voice, it's it's basically a robot.
Yeah, you're shoving work in and work is being done, and it's
going to be average work, because that's what, you're
expecting of that person, because you're taking ownership
of their responsibilities. Yeah.
Was it was that realization already there?
When you started out being responsible for people, or
winded, that realization sinking was it in your current
organization where things already in place for it too.
That would allow for that or that was the further my, in my
previous with my previous employer.
Yeah. I was one of the first things
back. In those days that implemented
agile within my team, yeah, up to a point where I was no longer
needed, that's why I moved into infrastructure.
I got a new job because I simply wasn't needed for for the other
job because the product owner was doing everything.
So I basically faced Self out. Yeah, it's a good thing.
In this case, it was a really good thing because it was we
were one of the most productive teams of the entire department
and that was several hundred people.
And we were doing the work of on average 12 people with just
four. That's crazy.
But they felt ownership, they felt responsibility.
It was their thing. If it didn't work, they felt
terrible and they were going to do anything and In everything
and move Heaven and Earth to make sure that the customers
could use whatever service was provided.
Yeah, and that was with a bank and and the statement of the
bank for it was, the customer must be able to use our services
anywhere. And at any time, that was the
statement. And from that perspective, even
big choices and project boards and steering committees were
made. Because that's the question we
would ask, okay? We're going to do an upgrade
here but this would mean a downtime of so so much but we
can actually shorten that down time but we have an extra risk
here and here and here which Choice are we going to make?
Well, the customer needs to be able to use our services anytime
anywhere. So that means along down time is
unacceptable. We're going to go for the
shorter one, okay? And so that was basically the
motto, the vision that the bank had and we used it and
eventually we could implement it to in such a way with a Agile
that I was basically no longer in French.
I had a function. I was being paid every month but
I wasn't really doing that much. Yeah.
And so I did some some extra projects here and there and then
act eventually I switch to infrastructure and started
managing six teams there. Yeah, but you were one of the
first people, one of the first teams to implement that and them
to see the kind of the fruits of your labor as well.
Correct. Yeah.
And the front, the funniest joke.
I remember from that remark that I got from Of my one of the
people in my team was there's no need to talk to Nick because you
ask him questions in. The only thing you're going to
get back is questions. Why?
Because I can give him the answer but then I'm taking away
their, were his responsibility and his vision and his think
process. Yeah.
If I start asking questions instead of giving answers, I'm
going to make him think and eventually he's going to come up
with a solution that he's the specialist who sews always going
to come up with a better solution than I'm going to give.
Yeah. So I I give a certain.
Is like space? Yeah, well space, but it's more
a framework. Okay, this is now these are the
goals. That's the the, the end of the
tunnel, this is where we're heading as the organization.
What's your best option based on those those requirements?
And those goals to get there and let them come up with the
answer, they're going to make. Like I said they're going to
come up with the best better answer than I'm going to come
up. I'm just a manager.
Yeah I do. I know.
I love that leaning on the collective intelligence of more
people, right? It'd be, it'd be very, I don't
know if it's vain or it's, I don't know.
But if you said, like, I have all the answers, right?
I'm The Mastermind here, that's never going to work.
That's Never Gonna Fly. That's not how you get people
motivated and not at all inspired to do the best.
They can not at all. Usually, when I come into a
meeting for the first time especially with a group of
Specialists items, I always start out with I'm the manager
so I know nothing. Yeah and everybody laughs there
is a relaxed environment and then we get to work.
I love that because I'm not the specialist and I'm never going
to be the specialist, That's Not my goal.
I love that I can talk to them and that I can relatively easily
easily understand what they're talking about show.
You know, I'm not the manager. That doesn't know anything.
Yeah, I know enough so that when they come to me I can help them
sort as short things out. You know, so that if there were
basically just drowning Information.
I can help them organize and compartmentalize that but
they're good. The ones they're going to have
to come up with the answer. Yeah, not me exactly.
I want to zoom into because you have a role and kind of
responsibility to allow people to grow as well when they come
to you with personal goals or when they come to you and they
don't have goals when they come to you and they don't really see
the reason why they should grow and I think it's still your
responsibility to allow them to grow and to kind of cave.
Dave, how do you say that Define a path for them to move forward
but there's already like there's people that want to grow as
people that don't want to grow. And then there's people that
want to grow know what they want to do, and people that want to
grow and have no clue where to start.
How do you usually figure out where to start with people just
on a base level? In that way, I'm somebody who
likes to grow myself. So, I always kind of have this
internal conflict if I bump. Two people that don't want to do
that. Yeah, it like you're allergic
that they're just very comfortable where they are, they
just do their thing, they do it well and they really do not want
to grow. I've bumped into those in the
last couple of years and I thought, okay, what am I going
to do with this? Well, that's not up to me.
That's up to them. Okay, so if I'll challenge them.
Yeah. But if they don't pick up the
challenge then that's their responsibility when it comes to
people that want to grow. But don't Nowhere to go.
It's just a question of talking. It's a question of having
conversations. You know, what do you like in
your work? What do you not like in your
work? Where do you think if there are
certain aspects in your work that you want to evolve in?
Where do we see that space? And I had that recently with
somebody in the Security operation sensor who had been
doing this for what? A decade or show.
Yeah. And he was calm.
Fleet the flame was out that frightened him when I said that
to him in his face to his face because he thought, oh, I'm
going to lose my job. Now, we're not talking about
losing a job or whatever. We're talking about, you're not
your heart is not going to beat faster with this kind of work.
You've been doing this for so long.
This is just basically, you could be doing this in your
sleep. Exactly.
So, where are you going to go next?
And then in this case, Case it was somebody that definitely had
a certain fear. And I said, okay well let's talk
about that. It took months.
I'm talking maybe five to eight months before certain things
opened up and eventually he didn't internal internship
within the organization's from no contracts for change.
That was kind of his his thing. Yeah.
And he's now a security architect well, and he was just
hired about two weeks to months ago, so he did that.
For a period of six months and the architect said, we want you
nice time so he made that switch and since auger August 1st
that's Now official. Yeah, that really makes me feel
great because also now even when I talk to him right now, his way
of communicating with me is completely different, you can
just see the energy surging. Again, you can see the.
Now, if I talk to him, I can see basically light bulbs going on
and off with all kinds of new ideas, Ideas that he's thinking
of it's just a completely different person right now.
Just because he found his his most new Mojo, that he's now
living his life with fantastic. I have another one who's been
doing a certain job for over eight years and is now doing an
internship on product owner. So, he's a technical specialist
and he wanted to see if product ownership would be something for
him. He's doing it.
Now, just to try it out, but he also wants to see if maybe the
Security operation sends her analysts would be something that
he would be interested in. So we're probably going to start
that internship in January, let people figure it out.
Yeah. And give him that space.
And if people are no longer happy within the organization
because it's not always the job, it could also be the
organization, that's fine. Then you know in this in this
market right now it's not great if people leave you but if
that's better for them then that's then that's what it
should be because if you keep them inside and they're not
happy they're not going to thrive.
So the organization is useless for the employee and the
employee is useless for the organization.
Yeah. Very black and white.
They're not going to go are going to thrive, to not going to
do be able to do their best. Not not doing their best, but
not be able to because they just don't feel it.
So for me, An employee an employee, or a resource, or a
certain specialist needs to be in their place.
And if they're not in their place, then we need to talk
about that. Yeah, I love that you highlight
its people first, right? Yeah, absolutely.
Something in an organization and
we have things that we do, but if you're not happy, if you want
to do something else, then why, why would you and your position,
or me and my position with hold other people from doing that,
when it makes them more, Or happy, right?
It's people first. All the way all the way because
that's that's the the that's a diamond in the rough.
That's that's the bonus is the the person the individual that
comes up with the new ideas that comes with The Innovation if you
basically put them in a box and and turn out the lights, that's
not going to come out, come out because the energy isn't there.
So if the energy isn't there, then why is there a person
working there? Anyway.
Yeah, then There's no use you might as well.
Just automated them. Yeah we go back to robots.
Yeah. Yeah but that but that's it we
kind of in the olden days we would we would see the person as
just doing a job. Yeah but we're not seeing the
extra added benefits and qualities and and Innovation and
ideas and artistic side of the of humans.
Yeah. That's basically Why we're
better in certain things, then certain automation, exactly.
So, if you want to, Fully cash on the human.
You're going to have to make sure that the human is In his
element. Yeah and is in the right place.
Can do human things and can do human things.
Exactly, exactly. Yeah, yeah.
I like that a lot. We touched on like
responsibility and accountability in the first
place and I love that you gave the example that within a team
that you implemented agile with they were doing the work of
many, many people. More than they actually had
like, they were flying, right? They were a credibly productive
correct. But what can also happen is they
take on too much, they take on too much accountability.
To my troops responsibility and it really eats it them.
Uh-huh. How do you prevent that from
happening? Prevent people from crashing or
even reaching to the point where it's a burnout?
Like, even, even though that might be years ahead or months
ahead? It's still, I think the
responsibility within the team other.
But within the people involved, that make sure people also take
a step back. Also, take a break.
Also take a holiday when they need to.
Yeah, that's also a balanced by everything is about balance.
I'm sorry if I see for instance, as a manager, basically, very
black-and-white somebody. Not finishing their vacation
days. Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna
remind them, especially during Corona.
That was the case because people thought why I'm going to write,
why should I take vacation to go and I can't go anywhere.
Anyway, that's not the point. The point is and I do recognize
it because I had a surplus on vacation days myself but there
is a balance between work and private life.
If that balances out of place, then chances of burnouts are
going to be much much higher. With the responsibility of
actually producing work, also comes the responsibility.
What can I do? And where are my limits?
And the moments that a manager is no longer responsible
eventually. They're accountable but they're
no longer responsible because the team is taking that
responsibility, that responsibility also includes.
What can I am? Can we not do?
Yeah, that's still an open conversation between, let's say
the manager. And the team or the individual,
but that's part of the responsibility and the manager
will try to, you know, have those conversations and kind of
you know pushing here and there to see if it really is worth of
shame because the first response is how are you doing?
I'm doing great. Always.
Always with certain people that's actually the case with
certain people you kind of have to kind of push.
Yeah and and see if that's actually true or not.
But within the team I also So love it, when team members come
to me and say that person is not doing very well.
Yeah. And I'll start out with start a
conversation with them, bilateral session or whatever.
And they'll say, oh I'm doing well.
Oh, really, because I hear this in this in this Niche and
usually that cracks them. Yeah and then it actually the
floodgates open certain things come on.
Yeah. During Corona that happened and
that was very logical because we didn't see each other.
We only saw each other in video conference meetings and And
especially certain parents, you know, Specialists that are also
parents were all of a sudden teachers.
They were full-time parents, they had a full-time job and
they had to run the entire household by themselves, for
instance. Yeah, too much.
That was just too much and but they thought they needed.
They felt the responsibility. They needed to keep up the same
quality and quantity of work. I said that's that's not
possible. You can't do three jobs and
think you're going to you know, xB.
Excel at all. Three of them family comes
first. We're going to see where we can
do something with the work so sure.
And work was divided under other colleagues, whatnot.
And these people, these people these individuals were able to
just continue, but that's something you're going to have
to. Again find the balance in and
this was Corona. This was very eccentric in a way
but a normal day life that's no different.
Yeah. So if there are private private
issues, I don't need to need to know the details because I'm
just the manager. But I do want to know that
something's going on. So we do the certain check-ins,
you know, my smile is yellow today.
Why is that? Well don't give the details that
they want to give but you know this person is not X excelling
right now. So we're going to have to take
that in consideration when we're let's say determining what we're
going to do this print and how many story points are t-shirt
sizes or whatever they're going to do?
In this print, if they're not, you know, not in there at their
Optimum. Then we're just going to have to
calculate that in and make sure that they don't overdo it.
Yeah, yeah, I love that. I mean, even even the example,
when people are all of a sudden teachers, I mean, their parents
first always right, still people, first group kind of
comes second always, but people don't realize it, and there's a
lot of stuff that can adapt around that, right?
If it's too much on your plate right now, correct usually work
is the easiest to adapt, correct, but especially these
two Extra Specialists, always feel that responsibility to have
to perform. Yeah and I feel that for me as a
manager as a facilitator. It for me to also make them
understand your human you have limitations.
Yeah and if this now if a certain private situation is
going on or whatever you can't expect yourself to excel at that
moment, you're going to have to tone it down for a while.
Yeah. And that's not a problem.
Oblem. It's not it doesn't mean you're
not doing your work. And Yea, like I said, like you
said people first and without people there, there is no work
to be done. Anyway, so if you, if you make
sure that the people are at the right energy levels, get the
right incentives. You know, you see him.
You see I'm bursting you seem flaming, you see him.
Go trust me, the works going to come and results are going to
come exactly. It'll come at the end.
That's the absolutely. That's absolutely the meant.
Absolutely. And stop controlling.
And that's also something that many managers have had to learn
during Corona because they didn't see their people anymore.
Yeah. And they didn't walk onto our
work floor and saw two tables of their Specialists and couldn't
control them. And I basically said you
couldn't control me in the office, you're not going to be
able to control them at home which there is no question of
controlling. There's a question of waiting
and looking at output and not looking at input.
Exactly is trust, right? And exactly people get trust by
default with you, or does it take time?
Or what's your take on that? That depends on the individual.
But per definition, I get there. The trust from from, from the
start. Yeah, I forgot his name, but
there's a certain size teacher and a conservatory, I think it's
chic Chicago, and he, he also This Psychological Resource
thing, a research thing, where he said, everybody that came
into his class got an A okay, and your quit.
Your job is to keep the a exactly.
And that in the whole book, it basically shows that people will
run harder to keep an a then to actually one time, just get an A
exactly and it's not about tricking somebody it's about.
Facilitating. Okay, let's take the pressure
off. You already have the a now it's
just a question of maintaining it and that apparently is easier
to do with less effort for yours from yourself.
It's easier to do than actually having to go for that a every
time, every time having to climb that mountain.
Yeah, instead of just have you're already on top of the
mountain. The only thing you need to do is
stay there. So yes, I give them the trust
and obviously it's up to them to maintain that.
And nine or ten times. That's fine.
Yeah. I mean it's fully in line with
starting out already trusted. Right?
So empowering, of course, are you don't need to perform self
youyou. Already are there.
You just need to maintain it. But it's psychologically.
As you said, it's the best state to be invested to starting.
Yeah, and therefore, I don't position myself obviously
hierarchically. I do, I am but I don't position
myself as the manager I kind of position myself as the
facilitator. Yeah.
Therefore, I hope to have open conversations with my
Specialists on multiple fronts and and topics but I don't want
to be that person that they have to look up to because that sorry
that's total. That's not you either.
Yeah, that's totally. Yes.
Yeah. And that's its it doesn't do
anything. There is no added bonus to it
and if it's there's no added bonus on just don't do it
exactly. Yeah.
Nichols. That I really enjoyed this
conversation. I really appreciate you coming
on. We talked about a lot of stuff,
man, but we fully aligned on a lot of things.
Well, I got loved your perspective.
I love your stories. Is there anything you still want
to share with the audience? Something that missed I'm going
to put you on the spot there. Yeah, you did.
You are but no I put the only thing I would say is give that
trust and have open conversations with people.
Yeah, no matter where in the organization they are they are
everybody in general wants to do the best that they can do and do
the best for the organization that they can do.
So just facilitate that and stay stay in an active.
Active form of communication. That's it, that's it.
Things will fall into place for exactly.
Yeah, I love. It's no rocket science.
Also, very, thank you so much once.
More for coming on, you're welcome, you're welcome.
I'm gonna run it up here, Nick, from a that everyone, I'm gonna
put all his socials in the description below.
Check him out. And thanks for listening.
We'll see you on the next one.