Coaching for Leaders

Nate Zinsser: The Confident Mind

Nate Zinsser is an expert in the psychology of human performance. He has been at the forefront of applied sport psychology for over thirty years. He has been a regular consultant to the Philadelphia Flyers and New York Giants as well as a consultant for the FBI Academy, the U.S. Army World Class Athlete Program, the U.S. Army Recruiting Command, and the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit.

Since 1992 he has directed a cutting edge applied sport psychology program at the United States Military Academy’s Center for Enhanced Performance, personally conducting over seventeen thousand individual training sessions and seven hundred team training sessions for cadets seeking the mental edge for athletic, academic, and military performance. His most recent book is titled The Confident Mind: A Battle-Tested Guide for Unshakable Performance*.

In this conversation, Nate and I explore the reality that almost every leader faces: continual challenges to our own confidence. We examine some of the misconceptions around confidence and how those misperceptions tend to limit us. Then, we discuss the most effective practices you can use to maintain — and improve — the confidence that you’ve already built.

Key Points

It’s a misconception that once you become confident, you’ll stay that way forever.

Confidence has little to do with what happens to you and tons to do with how you think about what happens to you.

For a more constructive attitude when bad things happen, use these three elements: decide that it’s temporary, limited, and non-representative.

To win the battle with your own negative thinking, acknowledge the negativity, silence it, and then replace it with something better to get the last word.

Protecting your confidence is an ongoing practice. You’ll never stop doing it — but the good news is that it will give you an edge if you can develop this practice.

Resources Mentioned

The Confident Mind: A Battle-Tested Guide for Unshakable Performance* by Nate Zinsser

Interview Notes

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Related Episodes

The Way to Make Sense to Others, with Tom Henschel (episode 518)

How to Build Confidence, with Katy Milkman (episode 533)

How to Speak Up, with Connson Locke (episode 546)

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Keith Ferrazzi: Competing in the New World of Work

Keith Ferrazzi is the founder and chairman of Ferrazzi Greenlight, a management consulting and coaching company that works to transform many of the largest organizations and governments in the world. A graduate of Harvard Business School, Keith rose to become the youngest chief marketing officer of a Fortune 500 company during his career at Deloitte and later became CMO and head of sales at Starwood Hotels.

He has contributed to Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Fortune, and The Wall Street Journal and is The New York Times number one bestselling author of Who’s Got Your Back, Never Eat Alone, and Leading Without Authority. He is the co-author with Kian Gohar and Noel Weyrich of Competing in the New World of Work: How Radical Adaptability Separates the Best from the Rest*.

In this conversation, Keith and I discuss what his team and him have learned from the most resilient teams they’ve supported. We explore some of the most useful strategies to build a more resilient team and highlight key actions that will help leaders and teams through challenging times.

Key Points

Resilient teams have compassion and empathy for each other. They show care through both success and failure.

Humility is the ability to ask for help. Resilient teams have a culture that supports and encourages this.

Many leaders espouse candor for their teams, but far less actually have teams with candor. Resilient teams speak truth — and it’s up to leaders to show them the way.

Resourceful teams develop solutions at a higher velocity. They use systems and structures to move past challenges and doubts more quickly.

Resources Mentioned

Competing in the New World of Work* by Keith Ferrazzi, Kian Gohar, and Noel Weyrich

7 Strategies to Build a More Resilient Team*

Interview Notes

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Related Episodes

How Great Teams Find Purpose, with David Burkus (episode 481)

Leadership Means You Go First, with Keith Ferrazzi (episode 488)

How to Engage Remote Teams, with Tsedal Neeley (episode 537)

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Lesson 4: How to Avoid Micromanaging

We’ve all had a manager we didn’t like — and often they did some form of micromanagement. In this lesson, you’ll discover how expectations can help you avoid being a micromanager.

Academy Applications Close Friday, March 18th

The Academy is a year-long cohort of participant leaders who work personally with me to create movement in their leadership development and organizational results. Discover more and submit your application by Friday, March 18th.

Related Episodes

Effective Delegation of Authority, with Hassan Osman (episode 413)

How to Balance Care and Accountability When Leading Remotely, with Jonathan Raymond (episode 464)

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Lesson 3: Begin With Small, Noticeable Improvements

We often feel like the only way to make meaningful change is to tackle a big challenge. However, many sustainable initiatives start with small changes that get noticed.

Academy Applications Close Friday, March 18th

The Academy is a year-long cohort of participant leaders who work personally with me to create movement in their leadership development and organizational results. Discover more and submit your application by Friday, March 18th.

Related Episodes

The Way to Conduct One-on-Ones, with Zvi Band (episode 246)

How to Generate Quick Wins, with Andy Kaufman (episode 496)

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Lesson 2: Get People Talking With These Questions

Open-ended questions will help you gain clarity where ambiguity has taken over. Use the four questions in this lesson to open up dialogue that moves everybody forward.

Academy Applications Close Friday, March 18th

The Academy is a year-long cohort of participant leaders who work personally with me to create movement in their leadership development and organizational results. Discover more and submit your application by Friday, March 18th.

Related Episodes

These Coaching Questions Get Results, with Michael Bungay Stanier (episode 237)

How to Ask Better Questions, with David Marquet (episode 454)

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Lesson 1: Your First Steps When Inheriting a Bad Situation

Almost every leader has been put into a less than ideal situation. When that’s you, use the three steps in this lesson to get moving.

Academy Applications Close Friday, March 18th

The Academy is a year-long cohort of participant leaders who work personally with me to create movement in their leadership development and organizational results. Discover more and submit your application by Friday, March 18th.

Related Episodes

How to Start Managing Up, with Tom Henschel (episode 433)

The Way to Influence Executives, with Nancy Duarte (episode 450)

How to Sell Your Vision, with Michael Hyatt (episode 482)

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Cassandra Worthy: Change Enthusiasm

Cassandra Worthy enables organizations and individuals to grow through major change and significant shift by harnessing the power of emotion. Whether undergoing a merger, acquisition, start-up, explosive growth, or significant contraction, the strategies and tools of Change Enthusiasm are motivating and energizing workforces worldwide. Her consulting firm was birthed from the pain and challenges she overcame as a corporate executive.

Cassandra’s client base spans the Fortune 500, including Procter & Gamble, Allstate, Jones Lang LaSalle, Centene Corporation, ConferenceDirect, and WeWork. She's a chemical engineer by training and also brings over a decade of M&A experience distilled down into the critical leadership traits required to lead with exception during times of change and trans-formation. She's the author of Change Enthusiasm: How to Harness the Power of Emotion for Leadership and Success*.

In this conversation Cassandra and I explore the critical importance of emotion in the change process. We detail some of the key places where leaders often miss opportunities to prioritize employee well-being. Then, Cassandra shares some practical steps leaders can take that will help employees better recognize signal emotions so they can eventually find opportunity and choice during the change process.

Key Points

Many leaders tend to diminish or ignore negative emotions during change. Actively doing that may prevent employees in getting to a place where they see opportunity — and eventually choice.

Beware focusing too much attention on vision, roles, and responsibilities — and not enough on employee well-being and fulfillment.

The change process is like driving in a car. The structure of the process is the vehicle itself and the people are their fuel.

Have discussion about handling change a regular item in 1:1 agendas and team meetings.

Leaders can enter into the opportunity that change provides by sharing their own emotions. One way to do this is to be explicit in conversation about what is genuinely inspiring you about the change.

Resources Mentioned

Change Enthusiasm: How to Harness the Power of Emotion for Leadership and Success* by Cassandra Worthy

Interview Notes

Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required).

Related Episodes

How to Build Psychological Safety, with Amy Edmondson (episode 404)

The Way Innovators Get Traction, with Tendayi Viki (episode 512)

Overcome Resistance to New Ideas, with David Schonthal (episode 557)

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Hassan Osman: Hybrid Work Management

Hassan Osman is a director at Cisco Systems (his views are his own) where he leads a team of project and program managers on delivering complex projects across the world. He’s also served as a management consultant at EY, where he led projects and programs for the largest enterprises.

Hassan the author of several Amazon bestselling books about team management, including his most recent book, Hybrid Work Management: How to Manage a Hybrid Team in the New Workplace*.

In this conversation, Hassan and I examine the new reality and popularity of the hybrid workforce. Many leaders are now managing teams that are both co-located and remote, with individual team members regularly migrating between the two. We explore useful practices that will help you support effective teamwork and progress, regardless of physical location.

Key Points

Recent statistics from many sources are indicating that a majority of employees desire (and are beginning to expect) some kind of hybrid work arrangement.

Lead with a remote first culture so that there isn’t a two-tier class of employees in your organization.

Conduct all meetings online, regardless of the location of attendees. Use technology to provide a seamless experience whether somebody is co-located or remote.

Batch meetings together and, if possible, align work days to allow from in person interactions, when ideal.

Be cognizant of offline decisions. Involve remote employees in conversation that start offline and inform them about updates and decisions that might have occurred outside virtual interactions.

Resources Mentioned

Hybrid Work Management: How to Manage a Hybrid Team in the New Workplace* by Hassan Osman

Hybrid Work Management: How to Manage a Hybrid Team (Udemy course)

The Couch Manager (Hassan's site)

Interview Notes

Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required).

Related Episodes

Effective Delegation of Authority, with Hassan Osman (episode 413)

Transitioning to Remote Leadership, with Tammy Bjelland (episode 509)

How to Engage Remote Teams, with Tsedal Neeley (episode 537)

Hyflex Learning (Teaching in Higher Ed podcast)

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Sarah Stein Greenberg: Creative Acts for Curious People

Sarah Stein Greenberg is the Executive Director of the Stanford d.school. She leads a community of designers, faculty, and other innovative thinkers who help people unlock their creative abilities and apply them to the world. She speaks regularly at universities and global conferences on design, business, and education.

Sarah holds an MBA from Stanford's Graduate School of Business and also serves as a trustee for global conservation organization Rare. She is the author of the book Creative Acts for Curious People: How to Think, Create, and Lead in Unconventional Ways*.

In this conversation, Sarah and I discuss the reality that all of us face with real learning: uncomfortable struggle. We detail some of the typical pattens that occur with struggle and how we can almost predict it at certain points. Plus, we discussed what Sarah and her colleagues have discovered about we can do to make the most of the struggles we regularly face.

Key Points

Part of the process of creativity almost always feels terrible. The “trough of despair” is hard, but also essential.

Struggle helps us learn better. There’s a sweet spot between what you already know well and what seems impossible. That middle zone is productive struggle.

It’s helpful to set expectations in advance when innovating or creating that discomfort is an indicator that you’re moving forward.

When people are in the midst of struggle, shifting the focus from thinking and talking to actually doing can often illuminate the best, next step.

Productive struggle often comes at predictable moments. When it does, scaffolding and models can help move us along to get to where we need to go.

Resources Mentioned

Creative Acts for Curious People: How to Think, Create, and Lead in Unconventional Ways* by Sarah Stein Greenberg

Interview Notes

Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required).

Related Episodes

Growth Mindset Helps You Rise From the Ashes, with Jeff Hittenberger (episode 326)

Help People Learn Through Powerful Teaching, with Pooja Agarwal (episode 421)

The Value of Being Uncomfortable, with Neil Pasricha (episode 448)

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Michael F. Schein: The Hype Handbook

Michael F. Schein is the founder and president of MicroFame Media, a marketing agency that specializes in making ideabased companies famous in their industries. His writing has appeared in Fortune, Forbes, Inc., Psychology Today, and Huffington Post, and he is a speaker for international audiences spanning from the US to China. He is also the creator of the popular Hype Book Club, which provides regular recommendations of books about hype artists and hype strategies.

Michael is the author of The Hype Handbook: 12 Indispensable Success Secrets From the World's Greatest Propagandists, Self-Promoters, Cult Leaders, Mischief Makers, and Boundary Breakers*.

In this conversation, Michael and I explore his research on hype and how we can benefit from lessons throughout the history of human influence. We examine what we can learn from both positive and negative examples to discover how to brand ourselves better. Michael then invites us to frame the messaging about our own work to align with these human tendencies though a lens of genuine care and authenticity.

Key Points

We've evolved through history to seek guidance from those who appear miraculous.

Surprise and worthiness are two indicators of what people perceive as miraculous vs. simply chance.

The elements of your narrative are faders on a mixing board. Raise and lower different elements of the story to get the right mix.

Make a list of strengths and weaknesses and don’t mention your weaknesses for a week.

Reframe how some of your weakness might be strengths.

Develop your story using the elements of theatre.

Interview Notes

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Related Episodes

The Four Critical Stories Leaders Need For Influence, with David Hutchens (episode 148)

Get Noticed Without Selling Out, with Laura Huang (episode 480)

How to Actually Get Traction From Leadership Books, with Nicol Verheem (episode 549)

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