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is proudly sponsored by the rising tide Mastermind the rising tide Mastermind is
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foreign welcome to scaling up H2O the podcast where we scale up on knowledge so we
don’t scale up our systems I’m Trace Blackmore your host for the scaling up H2O podcast and Nation if there is a
message that I try to bring to you each and every week is that we are always
learning we’re always getting better and it is difficult to take the first step
in that learning but when we do take that first step watch out because what
happens next is an explosion for an opportunity so Nation think about
something that you want to do and maybe it’s intimidating because you don’t know
all the howls around whatever it is that you want to do and that is a paralyzing
thought and that thought will not allow you to ever get to the next step and I
know there are all sorts of personality and temperament types out there and some
temperaments are more engaged to taking that challenge to go to the next step
and others are a little bit more apprehensive but just think you can’t go
any further without taking that first step and you haven’t done it anyway so
what do you have to lose so it’s my hope that you are inspired on whatever it is
that you want to do what you want to try that you decide to take that first step
today because that first step is the hardest and I promised each and every
step after that become a little bit easier but they’ll never come if that
first step doesn’t come first first after all that’s why they call it the
first step and Nation if you need any sort of encouragement and I’m not saying
that I am the best podcast host out there but I can tell you I am the best
podcast host that Trace Blackmore has ever been right now at this very moment
because I took that first step and I think this podcast is such a great
example of what I’m talking about here because when somebody told me I needed
to start a podcast I stalled for years
several years and it wasn’t until I decided that I was going to break
through the fear of what I didn’t know and as you’ve heard me say on this show
many times all the things I didn’t know I didn’t know I just decided to start
and that allowed me to learn so much because now I changed my point of view
as a spectator to somebody that was immersed in that
topic and that changed everything and for all of you that started with episode
one you heard the incremental changes
you’ve seen the things that we do to connect with the scaling up Nation with
all the listeners of this podcast that we didn’t even know to do in the beginning you saw it was just me in the
beginning and now we we have a staff of four that help us put on this podcast
each and every week we are going to conventions about podcast we are taking
courses about podcasts we are trying things that are working very well and we
are trying things that aren’t working well and we know we either need to redefine them or stop them all together
and put our actions towards something that is working all of this is possible
because we took the first step because I got over my fear because I didn’t even
know what a podcast was not too terribly long ago and because I decided to take
that first step we have discovered I have discovered that I love doing this
podcast imagine that one of my favorite thing things to do out of everything
that I do is to bring this podcast to you and it wasn’t that long ago that I
didn’t even know what a podcast was it wasn’t that long ago that I had no idea
how to put on a podcast and it wasn’t that long ago that I took that first
step but it was the hardest step and the Second Step was a little bit easier
third step even easier than that and I don’t know what thousand ten thousand
million step we’re on now but we’re always taking the next step to make
things better and I hope you use this podcast to inspire you to take the first
step on whatever it is that you need to step on
scale nomination as you know we can only pack so much within a podcast and
there’s always so much more for us to explore when we sign off on each podcast
well today we are bringing a guest back to explore a topic that has been so
beneficial to me my team and all the teams that I work with here’s today’s
interview [Music] my lab partner is returning guest Tim
Cooper where we are going to talk even more on the six types of working genius
Tim welcome back thanks for having me again Trace I know you and I get to connect regularly and
talk about working genius but it’s fun to do it again on the podcast can you believe it was July of last year that we
first talked about this that’s crazy and I mean I was super excited about it then
but now it’s more informed I guess you would say where it’s like I’ve seen what
this tool can do for teams over and over again so I’m excited to reconnect and
talk about it I can’t believe it’s been that long though I know it’s unreal and in that almost year I have now had so
much first-hand experience with the six types of working genius and we’re going to talk a little bit about how you even
helped me solidify that and and how I’ve learned so much more so but before we
get there uh what have you been up to since our last air date last July I was
kind of newer into my Consulting and you know I I had I had been Consulting for a
little bit and now it feels like a year and a half in there’s a lot more stories right there’s a lot more experiences of
getting to work with teams and and helping teams I I’ve been saying this a lot recently I feel like the work I do
has helped teams kind of get over the invisible walls that they bump into and don’t realize they’re doing so because
those invisible walls are the things that are hardest to identify so working genius is one of those things that makes
those walls visible and helps us to understand how to work better with each other which just makes for a better work
environment all the way around so just been doing that as much as I can well in case somebody did not hear
episode 259 can we just talk generally about what the six types of working
genius is are how do you say that I don’t know don’t I was told there’d be
no math or grammar test so well there we go we’ll just go yeah um so table group is a consulting firm
that put out the six types of working genius and I told you this before but like my eyes rolled when I was sent
another assessment I was like oh no I don’t want another assessment like please don’t give me another assessment
I don’t need to hear that I’m an extrovert I get it you know I can be a lot um and I don’t want to hear that again
so what I didn’t know that I needed was an assessment to help me understand why
I gravitate towards certain kinds of work and why I am resistant to other
kinds of work why some kinds of work gives me energy gives me joy helps me feel fulfilled and why other kinds of
work drains me and really can drain me at a much quicker Pace than just about anything else and that’s exactly what
the working genius assessment is it’s about the six types of work that people
need to do on a regular basis to get productive work done and when you take
the assessment as you know you’re given two top your two top ones are called your working Geniuses your two middle
are called your working competencies and your two bottom ones your two lowest scoring ones are called your working
frustrations and this doesn’t mean that we can’t all do all of the six types but what it does
mean is that we’re going to gravitate towards some and they’re going to come more naturally to us and give us more energy and there’s going to be some that
we avoid more and that drain us quicker so just a very obviously brief overview of
them but do you want me to go through each of the six I think that would be great yes okay great so the first one at
the very top level if you think about elevation this is always helpful to Think Through the people that maybe get
accused of being up in the clouds we call the Wonders the W the The Genius of Wonder and they’re the ones that love to
tap into the potential of what’s out there they love to ask the big picture questions on a team uh they can be a
little misunderstood because they’re constantly asking the hey why are we doing this again and what what is it
about this are we on track is this the best thing for us to be doing they’re asking that big picture question and if
the rest of the team is focused on movement they can feel like they’re trying to slow everything down which they’re not they’re just trying to help
get work done to the best of its potential that’s the genius of Wonder the next is the genius of invention and
they are the people that love their blank page and they love to ideate they’ve got ideas for everything right
they don’t even know where their ideas come from but they love to generate brand new novel ideas to solve just
about any kind of problem they work really well hopefully with the next one which is the genius of discernment and
the genius of discernment are the people that love to test the workability of an idea so they love to ask the questions
not the why big picture questions like the wonder they like to ask the next level down questions like hey have you
considered this or have you thought about maybe changing this or adding this you know what about this could we change
to make it a little more adaptable to what I think the people need all of those questions they’re a little
different than the questions a Wonder ass but those are the genius of discernment the next you’re very familiar with the genius of galvanizing
um they’re the ones that love to get the crowd moving so they know when to
inspire or when to push and they get energy from this they love to get a response from people and to get people
going they’re the best at knowing hey these people need to hear you know an inspirational message or these you know
these this group of people needs to really be uh pushed and and motivated at this point so we’re going to get them
going the next is the genius of enablement and those are our people that love to ask how can I help I mean they
they love to ask questions too like the Wonder and the discerners but their questions are a little more closer to
the ground when we’re thinking of the elevation they’re like how can I help this project what can I do to help get
us going or get us over the Finish Line they love to Think Through the impact on
relationships so while all of this is about getting work done the people with the genius of enablement they really
think about the impact on people so on a team when the galvanizer is like we need
to get moving the enabler is going to respond with either how can I help or have we considered how this is going to
impact so and so or this group of people uh very relationally oriented in that
sense and then the final one is the genius of City and these are the people that love to get the project over the
finish line to the standard that was agreed upon right so they’re not just getting stuff finished for the sake of
it they want to cross it off their to-do list but they want to do it to the level that had been agreed upon so they can
get a lot of stuff done but they also can get burnt out because they want to get stuff done to that really high
standard so those are the six types I know you know them but hopefully for listeners that’s just a brief overview I
think it’s a great overview and it gives us a lot of things to unpack in this conversation but before we start doing
that I’m betting there’s somebody that’s driving around right now listening to this podcast and they’re thinking all
that sounds great but I’ve got to go to this customer site I’ve got to get my test kit out I’ve got to do my work so
what does it matter that’s so good well this is you know we say every job’s a six-letter job so to
understand the working genius assessment to apply it you almost have to
unlearn a little bit of what you’ve learned from other assessments so when I go into a room and do a training one of
my first questions I’ll ask is how many of you this is the first assessment you’ve ever taken I’ve yet to have a hand to go up because they’re they’re
like no of course I’ve taken assessments I’ve taken too many assessments but this is about productivity not about
personality yes there’s a little bit of Personality baked into it we say it’s an 80 productivity tool 20 personality tool
this is about getting work done so when when somebody’s showing up to their
their client and they’re they’ve got to get their work done really this is about awareness right this is about
understanding what kind of work is going to drain you what kind of work is going to help you feel more fulfilled but
every job is a six letter job every person is a six letter person so all of
us have to do all of these different functions and tasks you know as a consultant I show up to a client and
I’ll have to do any one of the six at any given moment but what I know about myself is that discernment and
enablement are the things that I love to do the most and hopefully they’re the things that benefit my client the most
so if there’s a situation that needs a lot of invention yeah I can invent on the spot but I also know that’s not my
strong suit I’m either going to pull somebody else in that can do that better or I’m going to try to tap into somebody
else’s invention on the team that I’m serving to try to help solve that problem so a lot of it really is about
awareness yes we still have to do the job you know tenacity is my lowest I still have to check email I still have
to knock things off a to-do list I don’t get a pass at that just because it’s my lowest but it does help me be more aware
about when I’m gonna have to tap into my frustrations how long I’m going to spend doing that and and even my expectations
of what I’m going to get out of that you know when something’s a frustration for us we tend to shortcut or really
shortchange how much work is required to get that stuff done and so I know that about myself and I surround myself with
people that are great at that so I don’t pull those shortcuts often and sacrifice
the quality of work well tell them I’m going to agree with you because tenacity is also my deepest
frustration and I I would either not do it or I would get it done as quickly as
possible which means I was sacrificing qualities so knowing just having this language and and knowing what the six
types of working genius are I’ve now given myself permission that it’s okay that I don’t enjoy this I Now understand
that it’s okay that other people do I don’t understand why but I I give them permission to like something that I
don’t like and now maybe I can delegate or if I can’t I now know that it’s going
to suck energy from me so let’s not do it when I don’t have any energy to give
and when can I schedule these tasks when I am just jazzed up and normally that’s after I’m galvanizing that’s after a
podcast interview or something so after this Tim I will be going in and doing tenacious work after our interview just
so you know that’s so good and you’ve earned it right like you’re doing the thing that fills you up so it’s like you can go in
and do a little bit of that tenacity work and hopefully it doesn’t yeah it doesn’t drain you too much after this hopefully you’re still fired up a couple
hours later but this implies low ego right like if if I have a really high
ego and think well I’m just great at everything and I can do everything for the team yeah you’re probably not going
to get a ton out of a tool that helps you focus on what it is that brings you the most energy and joy but you know the
people that I work with on a regular basis really aren’t trying to be the superhero they’re just trying to figure
out what’s the healthiest most sustainable way to work for the Long Haul yeah we can do anything in the
short term I mean I could have a day full of tenacity work and I’m gonna be okay I’m an adult I’m gonna get through
it I might be grumpy when I get home but I’m gonna get through it but I would not want to set up my career to where that’s
what I’m relying on more and more and I think we talked about this last time but burnout is something that is so common
but also so mysterious people don’t understand why they’re burning out and
when we’re talking about the working genius the phrase that I always come back to is burnout is not the result of
too much work burnout is the result of too much of the wrong kind of work so if
you stepped into a role I mean you’ve got all this awareness now but if you were to you know go join a a team in
Corporate America and it was this great job super high paying and all this stuff but it was a bunch of tenacity work you
might be great for the first week or two or a month and it doesn’t mean you’re not high capacity it’s just you would
burn out so much faster than somebody that loves that kind of work where they’re going to get energy and Joy from
it you need to be stepping into a role that allows you to Galvanize as much as
possible so that you can bring the best to your team and somebody else can bring their best to the team doing that other
kind of work that frustrates you I used to be one of these people and we have a lot of business owners that
listen to this podcast you think you’ve got to be everything to that team and to
say that you’re not able to bring everything translates in our own heads
that we’re poor leaders so the difference there is to me the
word is willingness I’m willing to do anything for the team right I’m willing to help serve being the leader is not
mean that all of my needs are met first or cared for it’s like no if I’m gonna be the leader of the team I’m willing to
do anything but me doing things that drain me fastest is not what’s best for
the team in the long run so yeah I’m willing to serve I’m willing to do what’s required I’ll clean the floors or
clean the windows or do whatever I have to do for the team to be successful but that’s not what’s best for the team in
the long run if I’m playing that role it’s just not what’s going to be best so I I think there’s obviously an implied
humility in there of saying I wish I could be everything to everybody because I want to help serve that way but I’m
not I’m I’m a human being I I want to do what’s best for the business and what
what’s best over the Long Haul is what’s healthiest and that’s me tapping into my Geniuses and really I like the word you
said delegating but delegating to me has always carried a negative connotation
like oh I hate this I’m going to give it to you and I’m sorry you’ll probably hate it too but it’s it’s actually
tapping into other people’s Geniuses right I mean I know some of the people you work with they love the things that
drive you nuts and instead of being like hey we should all get well-rounded at everything it’s like no let me let let’s
have Trace focus on the galvanizing and let’s hand off the other stuff that they actually love doing like that’s a that’s
a wonderful thing to have happen so it delegation is not a negative thing it
gets a negative context but it’s actually just tapping into other people’s Geniuses is what you’re describing and that’s where everybody
wants to be anyway they want to be in a place where they’re tapping into their geniuses then everybody’s feeling like
they’re coming alive and feeling their best at work what you just alluded to was probably the biggest Revelation that
we’ve had here at our company I am without a doubt a galvanizer I’ve known
that forever but I didn’t have a language a word to tie to it and I love
doing that and I figured everybody loved doing that and when I would ask other
people to Galvanize normally it wasn’t done at the level that I would do it I would be disappointed and they felt that
they disappointed me didn’t know what to do about it couldn’t talk about it didn’t know how to talk about it now
we’ve implemented working genius we now have a language around it and do you
know that my hi you know this my highest is galvanizing but every one of the
people that sit on my leadership team their worst frustration is all
galvanizing and I felt I was giving them a gift when I said hey go oh Galvanize
this you’ll love it right and they’re like just please do it right like just you do it we don’t want to do it well
that that’s one of the things that’s helped me with the most is the more successful we are in our career the more
we think good leadership is aligned to our preferences but really good
leadership is understanding how to build the team around you to tap into what they prefer and their Geniuses so
galvanizing’s third for me so I like it I can do it I don’t love it and I really
don’t love to have to do it on a regular basis I can do it in spurts but Discerning and enabling for me is
something that I can do all day every day so I set up my tasks to be more as
much discernment and enablement as possible so even you know if you’re saying you know we’ve got Business Leaders and different people listening
to the to the podcast the one of the things that I had an executive coach years back one of the things that he put
in really clear language for me is he said the further you move along in your career the more that you realize your
output is judgment and influence so the thing that started you off in your career your output was you know
depending on the industry your output is actually a physical contribution right I’m creating spreadsheets I’m creating
trainings I’m showing up to clients I’m doing all those things the further you progress into your career your output is
less tangible and it’s more influence it’s judgment and influence it’s like as the leader of your company you could
influence any area at any point but really good judgment would be to know
when to influence and when to let others lead so I think this tool is super
helpful in knowing for you it’s like okay your output is going to be influence and probably galvanizing like
that’s something you should be doing every day because no one else is going to and the business needs it right so
knowing that coming in you don’t have to feel guilty like man I’m galvanizing again I should let somebody else do it
they’re like please don’t right you’re like no this is my role I can step into it with confidence and do it every day
and here’s the best part that we started with it brings you Joy it brings you energy like
on a repeating fashion that is such a good thing for you to get to tap into your Genius over and over and over again
I mean that’s best when you come home right we don’t just take a paycheck home with us right we take we take everything
home with us from our job when you enter back into you know your family or your loved ones or anything like that it’s
like you want to have spent as much time as possible in your Geniuses when you go back to them and they want you to have
spent as much time in your Geniuses as possible and so all that you know is
required of us is to have that awareness well what are the things that bring me energy and joy and then hopefully how
can I move you know what would it look like to spend 10 more of my day in my Geniuses 20 more of the next month you
know 30 more in the next quarter in my Geniuses and less in my frustrations
as we’ve been working here with the working Geniuses and we also brought it to the rising tide Mastermind we had all
of our members take that and you of course came and and helped us unpack that even more and I’ve also had the
pleasure of working with a couple of companies with their discovery of the working genius and I want to unpack the
two words that you said it brings me joy and energy because that’s not how most
people take the assessment normally people say these are the things I’m good at and these are the things I stink at
right so one of the things you’ve heard me say this over and over and over what
you learn when you take this assessment is this is a ranking not a rating right this is a ranking of the tasks that
bring you the most joint energy down to the ones that bring you the least joined energy so you could be I mean I work
with some very successful Executives on big big companies they’ve learned to be
good at everything but that doesn’t mean that they’re going to get as much energy and Joy from everything right they’re
they’re going to still get energy and Joy from their Geniuses and their frustrations even if they’ve learned to
be good at them are still going to drain them quicker than the other things will so it doesn’t mean you can’t do them we
say this all the time at the table group the best leader is a self-aware leader it’s not any one of the letters paired
with another one that makes you a great leader the self-awareness of what you bring to the team and what you hold back
from the team or what to withhold the team from being able to accomplish is also good so I would rather a self-aware
leader than any leader pairing if I’m going to have somebody leading a team I I just want to know what do you bring to
the table so you bring galvanizing great now that you’re aware of that you know what you can bring and how to tap into
others when other things are required something else you taught me was whatever the leader is multiply that by
two and I find that that multiplier is two at least yeah sometimes it’s more
right like sometimes it’s at least because if we put all of your team on a
map and we saw only one galvanizer and a bunch of frustration we might you know we might think oh we need to add a few
more galvanizers but you’re galvanizing and being the leader is plenty for that
team right just because there’s a disproportionate weight doesn’t mean we
have to go fill it up right because you’re the leader and because it’s something that you love and it’s it’s
something that keeps you going you’ve got enough galvanizing for that whole team so you’re right the leader it’s
like multiplied by two maybe four maybe ten you know I I found that invention
and galvanizing are the ones that have the highest multiplier interesting yeah
so if the leader has invention um like Pat at the table group is he’s
an inventor he has plenty of invention for that whole company he has plenty of ideas to keep that whole company running
so he might be at times 10 and you in the galvanizing might be at times 10 but I’ve worked with leaders where they’ve
got wonder and I’d say it’s at times two it’s not a times ten it’s like yeah they Wonder but we still need to have other
people lean in and wonder and especially discernment yes yes I would say the leader does multiply it but you you
don’t just want the leader being the only one that’s carrying the discernment for the team
you know that’s one where if I saw as the leader you were the only one I’d be like hey we might want to look to add to
that yeah and I should have mentioned this earlier but a couple of months ago you helped certify me as a working
genius coach so thank you for that absolutely officially too not like out
of my garage I didn’t just like you know be like hey come over I’ll certify it no we went to the you went through the
certification process through the table group I’m just one of the instructors and it was fantastic and I want to say
there were about 40 other people that were with us and uh I truly appreciated
how you put that together because a lot of things you’ll go to especially when
they’re remote we were on a zoom call it’s it’s the same thing you’re
listening to somebody speak and then maybe you do some group work and they’re thinking great I’m probably going to have to do all the work for these people
and then they’re not going to want to present so since I’m a galvanizer I’m going to step up and I’m going to do
that and it wasn’t that at all you guys arranged it so that couldn’t happen you
had other coaches come in and Mentor US during these breakouts so you know I
have actually changed some of the ways I do my zoom call because I I was so
impressed with how you guys did yours yeah well we have we’ve been able to put I think it’s 1500 people have gone
through the certification process and we have refined it refined it refined it
based on the feedback so the more feedback we get the more we adapt it and update it and I went through I won’t
mention which one but I got certified through a whole nother assessment recently and it really impacted I was
like I don’t want our participants to feel the way that I’m feeling in this certification process right now and and
that was it so it was like we’ve designed it to be like you know we’re four hours one day and
four hours the next day on a zoom our hope is at the end everybody gets off and it’s like oh that flew by yeah
that’s our hope not oh my gosh there’s three hours to go you know so it’s a lot of it’s It’s the longest I think we
teach might be five to seven minutes otherwise we are you know interacting
with everybody or putting you in a breakout room with new and different people or giving you a challenge and you
have to figure it out and respond and back and forth and back and forth and it’s like we want it to be as fast-paced
as possible but also rich with content right like we don’t want it to be like oh what was that for we really want you
to feel like you’re getting something because you’re certified to go out and now lead other people through it so my
two Geniuses are galvanizing and discernment actually I want to unpack that a little bit later with you but
that being said I was only in another breakout session with another
galvanizing and discerner it seemed like every breakout session there was a good mix of all the Geniuses that hadn’t have
been a coincidence you had to have arranged that we we try to when we can
fill out the whole widget so it spells widget right and so we try to keep
everybody and and then that’s some of the feedback it’s not just the challenge we gave you it’s like hey what was it
like working together did you notice oh yeah Trace once we decided Trace was galvanizing us and you know somebody
else was inventing or oh I stepped out on my genius and did this it’s like we want to unpack that as well so we try to
disperse everybody in there can’t always do it I will say that and you actually
spoke on this but uh there was another lady that was a GD like I am and we kind
of waited for each other so we okay she’s got it uh I’m not gonna have it
okay I’m gonna take it and she took a back seat and and I’ve noticed that even before I had this language that I won’t
step up if somebody else is doing that if I feel they’re doing a good job and and if there’s nobody there I will
always step up can you speak a little on that yeah I well and some of that is so
for the for the listeners one of the things that I think helps make sense of
the working genius is something we call the responsive and disruptive so the the
W the D and the E the Wonder the discernment and the enablement we call the responsive Geniuses The Invention
the galvanizing and the tenacity we call the disruptive Geniuses and those are neutral terms those aren’t like you know
passive and aggressive those are that’s not what we mean it’s just the responsive ones like something to
respond to and they like to kind of wait and see how things are going or they like to ask questions the disruptive
Geniuses you know I always say we put a little exclamation point next to him because they primarily lead with passion
energy and excitement well you have one of each you have a responsive
discernment and a disruptive galvanizing so I think you kind of sway to whatever
is required in the moment so you’re you’re using your discernment to go okay they’re stepping up they’re galvanizing
I can sit back whereas if you were Galvanizing in tenacity to disruptive
ones that might be something that would have to be more of a learned behavior over time whereas for you I think it’s
more of a natural behavior that you’ve seen yourself adapt into but you’ll
disrupt if that’s what the situation needs but you’ll also respond and ask question if that’s what the situation
needs I love the punctuation that you use with that the question mark and the
Excellence I can’t say the term X say it for me thank you
well and that’s what I’ll do when I’m with teams you know I’m super low Tech I use paper and I’m drawing things out and
when I’m drawing out the widget next to the WD and E I will write a question
mark and I will say because their primary tool for getting stuff done is to ask questions and next to the ignt I
will write the exclamation point uh because that’s their primary tool for
helping get work done it doesn’t mean that they can’t ask questions they obviously do but it’s just the primary
tool that people use so Wonder questions kind of like I said before are different than enablement questions and they’re
different than discernment questions and the more familiar you get with the tool the more you can hear those questions
and I call that out when I’m with teams I’ll be like oh that’s a great Wonder question or oh that’s great tenacity to
help us get this over the finish line or hey Trace way to Galvanize this we were we didn’t know where we were going and you totally galvanized us to go to the
next place because this is not inventing something uh Pat will say he didn’t invent this tool he feels more like an
archaeologist that uncovered this tool you’ve said this a couple times already today you were like I already had this I
just didn’t have the language around it you know it’s like you’ve been a galvanizer your whole life we just
didn’t have the language to put it together in the six types like we do now that language has helped my team so much
as you know any team has issues and issues can come in all shapes all colors
all sizes and what we have started doing now is we do an issue solving track and
we’ve added the working genius to it and we will say why is this an issue okay well why is that an issue why is that an
issue and then finally when we get down to the point where we feel we’ve got the core issue not just talking about a
symptom we’ll say where is that issue in the six processes of work and I tell you
that question when we answer that almost immediately we can see what the problem
is and normally it’s we’ve skipped one of the previous steps it has been a game
changer this to me I love that so much I get chills just thinking about that because I’ve seen you know I’ve seen
teams uh draw on the Whiteboard the way and they’ll be like okay let’s talk about whatever project we’re on
okay we’re a little stuck on this well how did we do and wonder how did we do here how did we oh I think we skipped
the discernment stage because we are so excited to get going that we really didn’t test the workability of this idea
before we move forward and you’ve heard me say this but when you skip a stage you skip people and the more you skip
people at work the more they feel skipped at work right and nobody wants
to feel skipped over at work and people don’t leave jobs right because the strategy is off or the tech isn’t as
good as it is somewhere else like they leave jobs for those emotional reasons of I feel skipped over you know I feel
like the workplace is too confusing or I don’t know what my role is or I don’t
know how to feel successful and well-mit meaning people and teams can skip over people just because they don’t
understand where they are in relation to the six types of working genius so it’s not even like oh we’re skipping them
because we don’t like them or their contribution it’s like oh I didn’t realize enablement wasn’t necessary
every step in this process I didn’t mean to be skipping over you and they left and were surprised they left but this
helps like I said very at the very beginning this helps make the invisible walls more visible that we’re running
into or we’re skipping over or we’re neglecting and not giving the appropriate amount of time to
well the funny thing when we first started this was almost every single issue we uncovered we were skipping
galvanizing and I thought that if I galvanized I was micromanaging because
that was something that I love to do and this again gave us a language it gave me
permission that my team wants me to Galvanize but I also knew I didn’t need
to turn every meeting into a galvanizing meeting yes so there’s a couple misconceptions with I think with
invention and with galvanizing but the one with galvanizing that you just stated is huge is just because I’m
inspiring and pushing you know doesn’t mean I now want to take it and run with it the rest of the way
but that’s the misconception is like oh he’s micromanaging he must want to do it all on his own he’s like no I’m just I’m
trying to push like in in the nicest way I’m trying to push or I’m trying to inspire that doesn’t mean I want to take
it and run with it and it’s the same thing with invention sometimes it’ll be like I want to borrow your invention but
that doesn’t mean just because you had the idea that you want to run with it all the way down over the Finish Line I’ve been in the room when somebody with
you know a great Genius of discernment is I don’t like this expression but it can feel like it poking holes in the
idea I like test the workability of you know I think of it more like the engineer testing the thing than it is
tearing it down or destroying it but I’ve seen the inventor look at the discerner and be like okay if you don’t
like it well what’s your idea and they’re like that’s not what I have you know like for me invention in tenester
my lowest so I love to test the workability idea I rarely if ever have a
brand new idea on my own so there’s some misconceptions sometimes like uh but really this is about working well
together as a team in a repeatable fashion and doing it over and over and over again in that healthy way
what’s some advice you have as a discerner to make sure you’re Discerning
respectfully and you don’t get that automatic reply well you don’t like my
idea right just because you like to test the workability of an idea doesn’t mean
we’re always at the place of the work where we need to be testing the idea
nothing can kill a brainstorm like testing an idea too early so sometimes
it’s like hey let’s just be honest about calling out where we are and I like to say this all the time because
galvanizing is my third it can come out and how I discern so
I’ll be doing something with a team and I work very closely with other principal Consultants
um and so I’ll be working with another consultant and we’ll be trying to figure out what to do next and I will see from
their face that they think I’m trying to Galvanize them and I will stop and say hey I’m not galvanizing you I’m really
just trying to discern this and they’re like oh great well now they feel the freedom to just go back and forth with
me but I can tell because my energy you know you think about that exclamation point my Energy’s Rising my excitement
is rising it feels like I’m inspiring you but I’m like yeah that’s just how I discern I I’m really not trying to
Galvanize you you’ll know when I’m trying to Galvanize you but I think calling out what you’re doing is so
helpful so even if I have to you know like even with my wife or with the team
that I work with I’ll be like hey I’ve got to do some tenacity now just let me get through it right like let me just do
it let me just get through it you know you’re not gonna get the best out of me I’m probably gonna be grumpy after afterwards but let me just do it just
announcing what we’re doing allows us to know how to respond to people better at all six not just discernment the
discernment one I think that’s super helpful because if you’re delivering an inspiring message or pushing us we kind
of know you’re galvanizing if you’re coming up with new ideas we know you’re inventing but I think it’s helpful to
call out hey I’m just wondering right now I’m I’m really just wondering or I’m just Discerning I’m just I’m not trying
to decide I’m not I’m not certain this is the way to go I’m just Discerning right now
you just mentioned the third genius and I know you’ve coached me quite a bit on this because on our team we have two
Wonder inventions and they come at issues very differently they have
discussions very differently they ask questions very differently and I was telling you about that I was wondering
maybe the assessment was wrong and you said well wait a second what is their third genius one is a galvanizer one is
an enabler and you can definitely see that’s where everything’s pulling through yeah the the difference between
a w-i-e and a w-i-g is so different because you know you would think back to
our simple expression of question marks and exclamation points one of them has two exclamation points in their top
three and one of them has two question marks in their top three so it it very much changes how they show up how they
try to get the work done even though their pairings match but that that speaks more what we were talking about
before is it’s a ranking not a rating so you know like for me I’m a d e g is my
third I would show up very differently if any of those other ones were my third I’ve been around some dets some people
were tenacity is their third I mean they we couldn’t be more different right you know I always say tenacity is my lowest
and if we created six more working Geniuses tenacity would still be my lowest so I think I’m right there with
you yeah there’s no assessment there’s no function where that gets moved up in the rankings at all so a det where
that’s their third they’re going to be so different than me where I’m a d e g that third’s a really big deal so my
three galvanizing discernment invention however I’ve taken the assessment a
couple of times and depending on how I think I answer one question I either
move from a d or an i and I was very confused until you all
came out with the pairing so I was hoping we could talk a little bit about that when I read the descriptions of the pairings I was like okay one of these
sounds a lot more like me than the other but the real Telltale was when I read
them to my team and they started laughing at me and they’re like are you kidding you are without a doubt the
pairing GD that is so good I use the pairings because this one everybody and
I’m sure you’ve seen this but everybody wants to talk about their Geniuses right
I mean that is it’s just the thing that most people love they’re like I want to
talk about my parents like my Geniuses and that that’s the thing that they focus in on there is just as much
goodness I guess you would say in talking about your frustrations for the
team as there is the Geniuses like talking about those so what are your bottom
the intuitive activator which is absolutely you and what are your bottom
two so uh T is my my lowest my biggest frustration followed by W okay so that’s
what we call the careful implementer so the exact same activity that you did for your Geniuses to get the teammates
laughing and all that stuff I do the same thing with the frustrations so I’d ask your team we’d read the careful
implementer so that’s a thorough practical and careful contributor a
unique combination of steady reliability and quiet depth and it’s like okay I
don’t think anybody’s ever described you as that right like that that’s the joke because like okay you know here’s what I
bring it’s like you bring that combo of galvanizing and discernment but this is
the same thing for me my two frustrations are int which is the methodical architect and I was like
nobody has accused me of either of those ever and I’ve never been methodical or nobody’s ever called me to be like hey
let’s have Tim structure that thing for us that’s never happened in all my life so and probably never will
um but I use the pairings to help me lock in my Geniuses but I also use the pairings to help me lock in my
frustrations because the team needs to know these are the areas that you’re most
likely going to shortcut or short Change it’s just going to happen doesn’t make you a bad leader doesn’t make you a bad
teammate it just helps the team know how to best look out for your blind spots and you know under stress we’re going to
do this more and more so it’s such helpful language to be able to know that you know everybody wants to talk about
their Geniuses I encourage teams to talk about their frustrations and that really helps the team get vulnerable with each
other which helps us build the best kind of trust that’s great advice let’s talk about the competencies for a second so
we talked about the Geniuses we talked about the frustrations the stealth Joy killer
there we go stealth Joy killer I mean that’s a great setup because there are so many people that are out there and
they’ve become not just good but skilled at their competencies and they’re in
Burnout every day but now they’re thinking this is my job I’ve created this cage that I’m in so oh great I now
know it’s a competency but what do I do yeah so one I have a lot of empathy and
sympathy for that because I have worked with some people that have gotten emotional when they’re like it is a
shame that I have gotten so good at my competencies because they aren’t the things that bring me joy and I thought
with the next promotion and the next promotion I would experience Joy or I would experience fulfillment and they’re
like I’m just burnt out as what I am and so one I don’t think any rash decisions
or really good decisions but I I would rather at the end of my career
have done what I need to do to be putting myself in a place where I’m experiencing the most joy and the most
fulfillment possible not looking back at my career making sure that I climbed the
ladder and I got to this level and I got this job and sacrificed all the things
that were most important to my family and to me I would rather look back at my career and know I spent the most time in
that area of joint fulfillment so while that can be really tough if your resume is built around your working
competencies you could have built up the perfect resume to get a job that you
will not enjoy um that can be a hard place to be but I would start taking baby steps I always
say you know we have to take baby steps towards what’s healthy we health is a is
a condition not a destination so we’re never going to get there but we can be moving in the direction of it starting
now so if you find yourself in a place where your career is built around your competencies maybe you know I I didn’t
have this language but I went through the same process and it was a two-year journey to change my career to be more
adaptive to what my working Geniuses are and now I’m in a place that I’m so glad
a couple years ago that I started down that path I had no idea where I was headed but I started down that path of
committing to working more in my Geniuses which led to the career that I’m in now I had no idea where I was
going when I started on that path but I didn’t I didn’t completely change jobs overnight right I just took baby steps
towards this and slowly but surely the more I was operating in my genius the
more opportunities came within for me to operate my genius this podcast executive producer Corrine
Drury who you know very well I was really really fascinated with something
she recently said we’re redoing some of our systems how we’re reporting metrics
making sure that the podcast can be all that it can be and I know that uh
tenacity is not one of the things that that she enjoys well she’s got in her competency but I mean she was just
knocking this stuff out and enjoying it and I asked her that question and she
said really you see that as tenacious I I’m inventing right now so let’s speak
to that for a second can you redefine the work that you’re doing so it fits your Genius yes so I have a silly story
about this um but my wife has tenacity and thank goodness because our bills are
paid the lights stay on the internet’s working right now for us to do this otherwise we’d be in trouble thankfully
she’s got tenacity so some we ends we will have a list of things that we need
to get through and recently we she was like hey we got a new ceiling fan for my
daughter’s room now this is a combination of all sorts of tenacity right this is electrical
this is hardware I mean this is this is everything I’m bad at so we’re doing
this project together and I get extra frustrated when I’m working in my frustrations and I experience a speed
bump you know I experience a setback I mean this is like doubly awful whereas
in my Geniuses I experience a setback and we just keep going it doesn’t it’s fine so we finally get the ceiling fan done
and you know my daughter I have three sons one daughter my daughter comes into the room and she loves it she’s like Dad
thank you so much for that and all of a sudden this tenacity project my wife felt great she had checked it off the
list she was like this is great let’s keep moving I was like dreading in I didn’t wanted to move to what’s next but
my daughter came in and loved it and it moved to an enablement project and three hours later she was like Dad I love the
one you picked out I’m so grateful like thank you for doing this for me and I was like it was great I loved it I’m so
happy to help because it tapped into my genius now in the moment it felt like tenacity work but I wished at the
beginning I had reframed it into this enablement work like I’m doing this for my daughter I could have pushed through
anything because it would have felt like enablement work not tenacity work so I’ve actually used that more and more so
when I have a list of tenacity work I can stop and think about who am I doing this for and it reframes the whole thing
for me well let’s talk about that was we’ve been talking about teams for business
how do we use this better with our families I mean that’s a that’s a great question
and I would venture to say that I mean I changed careers using some of this
language and have changed jobs and I would still say this has probably impacted my family more than it has my
work again back to my wife my wife said WT which are your frustrations but that is
her Geniuses and I’m the de right in the middle and we’ve been married 22 years
and I would say for a large part of that we were trying to make each other develop skills within our Geniuses we
thought if we became more like each other that would be better but now what we do is try to tap into each other’s
Geniuses instead of trying to make us more like the other person so my wife thankfully at times will say hey is
there anything you need my tenacity on and there is always a yes there is always a list of things that I’m not
doing that I should be doing and she can help me with that and she can come to me and be like hey with our kids I need you
to really you know lean in and discern and ask them some questions about this you’re so much better at this part than
I am and it’s like great I’m happy to help I want to lean in and be used in that area but because there’s only two
of us we naturally have we both both are really like galvanizing the frustration
for her for me it’s only a competency and it’s really hard to Galvanize the kids and we have four kids we need to do
a lot of galvanizing but the thing that’s happened is we are so much kinder to each other when one of us has to
Galvanize so it’ll be like hey she’ll say I mean we’ll just use that language like hey thanks for galvanizing them to
get them to do their chores and I was like no problem I’m exhausted you know like it wiped me out having to do it but
I’m happy to do it we’re so much Kinder when we have to tap into those instead of just expecting her to go do the
things I hate it’s like I’m so much more thankful when she does the thing that I don’t like doing because she doesn’t
like doing it either so we lean into each other for our Geniuses but I feel like we’re kinder to each other and our
competencies and frustrations that’s so huge the divorce rate in this country is
so high and people say well we had nothing in common right that’s that’s a
great start you know like that’s a great start you could you could actually get a lot of work done but you know we got
into some negative habits of well she feels like she’s doing all the work and
it’s like oh I’m happy to help I’ll do anything I’m just never gonna create the list I’m never gonna operate with the
genius of tenacity so it’s like great I’m willing to help the enablement genius is like how can I help I want to
help but there were times where she was really frustrated because I’m not coming up with the list and knocking that stuff
off the list the more we’ve leaned into this it’s like oh I’m I’m gonna do these
things and I’m gonna carry this stuff and then she’s going to do this we’ve been able to basically fill out our team
without adding people we filled out our team of two and been able to tap into
each other much better and just feel like this has helped our marriage immensely you and I both know Kathleen Edelman and
I said this you heard that she’s been on the podcast numerous times she’s taught
me so much about my language how I hear language how I speak language making
sure that I am making my words a gift that I’m giving to the other person and
having that tool on how to speak with people together with how we get work
done that has been such an amazing pairing and it has changed so many
relationships for the better in my life that’s so good well and especially I mean if you’re leading with an
exclamation point right and that’s you you’re leading with that that can be misinterpreted right that can you’re
speaking that language but then the humility and the low ego to be like I want to lead with an exclamation point because that’s how I’m wired that’s how
I’m designed that’s great but now I want to do it in a way that they can hear it and receive it I mean
that’s that’s like influence at its highest right being able to tap into how you’re wired but speak it in a way that
other people can hear it effectively is is is a really really great thing to do
yeah and then if I can tie some other tools that I think are fantastic of course uh Pat Souther book the five
dysfunctions of a team and the third one that I think just goes so well with this
is hungry humble smart what’s that book so that’s that’s the ideal team player
ideal team player I I just think that those those four are books that every team needs to read
they need to use that language it helps them understand each other it helps the team come together it allows them to
know how to find new team members and how to talk to them once they find them so I’m just curious what do you think
about lump in those four books together so I take the three books that you
mentioned and I I haven’t used Kathleen’s um not out of not thinking it’s great
just the the way that I combine all these things we call the teamwork Trifecta okay so we start with the ideal
team player like getting people getting getting the right people on the bus based on the values of our company now
ours are humble hungry and people smart like you said so we start there then we
want to figure out how to get them on the right seat on the bus that’s where working genius comes in so if the best
if they’ve got our values they’re aligned to our corporate values now we want to figure out what brings them the
most joy and fulfillment over the long term so let’s get them in a seat where that’s their primary function then the
last kind of the third part of that triangle is the five dysfunctions of a team so the five dysfunctions of a team
it’s kind of the fuel to get the bus moving so if we get the right people on the bus get them in the right seat and
then work to overcome the 5 dysfunctions vulnerability-based trust healthy conflict team commitments peer-to-peer
accountability and Collective results those are the five if we can get a team operating in those it feels like that’s
the best way to get a team to the healthiest Place possible Tim if somebody wants to take the
assessment and get the most out of it what do you recommend I think the book is great the working
genius book is great it’s a fast read but you can go to workinggenius.com and
take the assessment and and we’ve updated the profile we’re on kind of the profile report we’re on version two or
three now and it’s it’s really full I mean there’s always going to be next steps of being able to bring in
certified facilitators or bringing Consultants or there’s always going to be ways to do that but for 25 you can
get a lot out of the assessment by just taking the assessment and you don’t need to buy the book to do that you know the book is great and Pat unpacks a lot of
stuff but just the assessment on its own will give you a really good Head Start and then obviously the people are
listening your podcast listeners already a great podcast is the working genius podcast they put out regular content uh
and they’re pretty quick really really good so you had mentioned you’re on at least
the second revision of the assessment I took the very first one and one of the differences that I noticed was uh no
longer are there qualitative and quantitative questions that are in there do you mind speaking on what those are
and I’m just kind of curious why you decided to remove those from the current assessment yeah so we I mean thankfully
there are much smarter people handling a lot of that than me but when you get into validity testing you want to make
sure that your your assessment is valid and it’s almost like a better word that people understand is resilient like that
this test is resilient and can be and can withstand all sorts of different things once you pass that there’s only
so much that you want to change and tweak because you don’t want to mess with the resiliency of it so there’s a
whole team that goes into that I I’m more of the Polish at the end I’m like oh I like this word better they’re like
oh boy you know um but I like it to not change the ethos of what we’re trying to
do which is joy and fulfillment and anything in the questions that get in the way of people taking it through that
lens we want to adapt and change I mean we’ve had I think it’s 300 000 people
now maybe take the assessment it’s growing rapidly so I don’t remember what the last number was but we’ve had lots
and lots and lots of people that have taken the assessment and it’s we’re getting better and more feedback as we
go so we’ll keep updating it we keep releasing tools we keep coming up with stuff you know we’re uh the pairings
looks fantastic all the tools you have well and the pairings didn’t even make it into the book we released the book
and the pairings didn’t even make it into the book because that was a tool we hadn’t quite finished yet I’ve told you this but I’ll tell the
scaling up Nation this when you came out with the pairings I was like are you kidding how how much can we stretch this
thing and it wasn’t until I had that experience that I shared earlier that I was like Wow there there’s really
something to this this is an amazing tool absolutely yeah I’ve and again we we are working we just released
something for people to take I think it’s don’t quote me I think it’s 250 like if you want to take your team
through it but don’t want to fully get certified or don’t have don’t want to hire a facilitator you can buy this
little team assessment to help your team take it so it’s like we’re constantly working on it innovating it and uh
really want to continue to adapt it to make it better without changing the core
of what it is so that that’s a fine it’s not just innovate innovate innovate it’s innovate and refine in that process
I’m waiting to see this I have not seen it yet but if I saw a resume come across
my desks that were they listed the Geniuses that brought them Joy I just
think that that would be amazing I know it’s coming I haven’t seen it yet yeah but my question is the reverse of that
obviously we want to hire the right person for the job
as somebody that hires people for this team what advice can you give me to make
sure that we’re aligning the qualities that we need and assessing without them
knowing the language that they’re in the right working genius it’s such a good question and honestly it does vary by
state there are states and I can’t even rattle them off but there are states that say you may not take an assessment
as a part of an interview process so always I would check with state
regulations to know what you can and can’t do but what everyone can do if
you’re the hiring person and you can’t let’s just say you’re you can’t give the assessment out fine well what you can do
is you can be strategic about how the interviewers ask questions so one of the
tools that’s not out yet that we are coming up with is a hiring guide with the working genius and the answer isn’t
going to be take the working genius assessment the tool is going to be well how do we ask questions that highlight
if somebody likes tenacity hey do you have you found yourself in the past loving working through a checklist
making sure that projects are getting done to the standard that’s been agreed upon oh do you make a checklist for your
personal life do you like those kind of questions are gonna hit that tenacity do
you love rallying a group of people do you love getting in front and being the inspiration that gets people excited
about a new project and getting them moving without having to ask them did you score high in galvanizing so just
asking questions around each of the six types I think is a really helpful way
that can do it whether or not you’re hamstrung by hey we can’t offer you this assessment and then if you can offer the
assessment and that and you’ve got the Greenland on that there’s so much there to take it just tell them hey we want you to take this based off join
fulfillment the other side of that question is how do we accurately identify what working
genius goes with all the different jobs that we have in our company yeah that to me is a little more art than science
like you’re gonna because every job’s a six letter job so there’s not going to be a job that doesn’t require all of
them but if you can really unpack you know sometimes it’s I I I think back to
working with a woman that was super talented super super talented and she
was an ET and I kept sending her to brainstorming meetings because I liked her so much and
I thought she was so great at her job and I thought oh look at this I’m going to give you this opportunity to go to
this brainstorming meeting and she hated it and we took the working genius and laughed like oh my gosh I’ve been trying
to push her for this promotion that this is I would be I would have been promoting her into a job that she would
have hated and she knew it I didn’t know it but she was smart enough to know it and once we took this assessment we were
able to unpack that language so really it’s about understanding the people that you have but also what the team needs
and so understanding what you’ve already got and then designing a role around them I think is probably a lot of wisdom
like hey what what are we lacking on this team you know what is it this team needs to be able to operate the
healthiest way possible and then how do we interview around that Tim if you could only get one point
across about the six types of working genius what would you want that point to be
I think there is too much at stake even outside of our work for us to not be
aware of what our frustrations and competencies and Geniuses are and I feel like we owe it to the people that we
care about most to at least have the awareness of what brings us joy energy and fulfillment because part of that is
our choice we can choose to spend more time in the things that bring us joy and
fulfillment and until you get this framework or understand the language it’s it’s a foreign concept a little bit
like well yeah of course I want joy well the the fact that we have a little bit of control over that or we can kind of
step towards that in baby steps I think is worth doing so I don’t like selling
the assessment or trying to get more people to sign up but for 25 I think you
can do yourself and the people that you care about a lot of good by understanding what it is that brings you
Joy and fulfillment it has definitely helped out with myself my team and my family so thank you to
all the people at the table group that has given us a new language that allows
us not only to communicate better about work but understand work better well it’s a joy for me to get to
represent it because it’s done the same for me um I’ve I’ve Loved what I’ve gotten to
get from this tool so I love going out and helping teams have those same light bulb moments well Tim a year ago you
made it through round one of the lightning round so now you are back for
round two are you ready I’m ready all right so uh what would you say your
superpower is I would say it’s being aware of how
people are feeling around me no matter how many people are in the room I would agree to that I have seen that
that is amazing yes that is that is a correct answer I will confirm that glad I’m nervous it’s the lightning I get
nervous what would you describe as your biggest accomplishment I I don’t know
the first thing that popped in my head is marriage to my wife for 22 years has been it hasn’t been an accomplishment
like it’s been hard work but marriage is hard and it’s hard because you’re constantly in a really healthy marriage
you’re putting the other person first which is not always instinctual and being married I mean she’s amazing and
uh is easy to be married to for so many reasons but I think being married for 22
years and really committing to that isn’t the way that culture pushes you sometimes and having four kids and not
letting our kids be the most important thing in our life but really prioritizing our marriage has been I’d
say my biggest accomplishment a friend of mine told me he told his kids we love you we’re glad you’re here
but remember you moved in with us I love that and you’re gonna move out
so now you have a magic wand you can change anything in the world that you
want with this magic wand what would you change I wish people treated each other the way
that they wish they were treated I know that’s kind of simple
and maybe a better answer would be more specific but at the end of the day life
is about relationships and I don’t care what we accomplish versus how we treat people
and I just wish people were out there looking to treat other people the way that they wish they were treated
there’s no doubt someday in Downtown Atlanta a statue will be erected out of
the image of Tim Cooper what do you want the statue to read well I don’t know you
as a liar but now you’re lying um so when I got my masters I wrote my
thesis and I tried to think of what do I want the title to be and all this stuff and really I if there was a statue I
would have it be the title of what my thesis was for my masters was it’s not about me I would be mortified if there
was a statue because that would go against that notion of the fact that it’s not about me but if someone decides
to put up a statue if I can at least control what they’re gonna say I would just say it’s not about me Tim thank you for once again coming on
the scaling up Podcast I always learned so much when you come to visit so so thank you once again I love it I love
being here and really excited to see what the working genius can do for you again and all your listeners
[Music] Tim once again thank you for coming back
to the podcast and Nation whenever I go to an event and people are telling me
about this podcast there’s always at least one person that tells me that they
wish all I did was stay on the technical information and I hear you I know all
the technical things we do as an industrial water treater that is important but I want to bring you all
the things that I feel have helped me as a person as a water treatment company
owner as a leader be successful within this industry and today was an example
of an episode just like that now Tim works for a company called the table
group and the table group is owned by a gentleman named Patrick Lencioni and I
have been a fan of his for years years he has written a ton of books that I use
as Core Curriculum as how I lead people and if you’ve never heard of Pat you’ve
probably heard of some of the books that we mentioned on today’s podcast most likely the five dysfunctions of a team
so he describes in his book what not to do as a team and he has a fable about a
team that are doing all the wrong things and he then educates you on how you can
make your team more healthy and that’s what I want to talk about that’s who I
want to speak to today for all the people that wonder how am I ever going to use this information to become a
better water treater I will urge you to think a little differently that as you
become a better more rounded water treater you become better yourself and
all the the things that you need to become a better you allow you to become
a better water treater now one of the things that Pat lucioni talks about is
organizational health and he talks about how you are smart and how you are
healthy and I wanted to find Smart how he defines it and you’re instantly going
to say our company does this these are things that I’m responsible for so these
are things like the strategy of where the company’s going the marketing the
finance all the technology around that all of the metrics all of the reporting
all of the things that allow us to know where we are all of the tools this
allows us to be very smart with where our company is now some of us including
me transfer that over to my personal life how am I gauging how much I’m
learning how am I gauging my relationships how am I gauging my
finances how am I gauging how I’m doing community work within my community how
am I giving back all of these things I actually take measure of so imagine if
we had a dashboard for all of these things we can very easily see if we’re
driving around and our engine light comes on we don’t know what the problem is with that but
we know that there is a problem that we need to investigate or maybe be our RPMs
are a lot higher than what they should be maybe that’s telling us we’re working harder than we need to
maybe we’re getting ready to run out of gas maybe we are not going to drive very
much longer and you can apply that to however you like in either your personal
or your business and you can just see that all of these smart tools allow us
to navigate our business and our lives a lot easier but the other part is
something that just doesn’t get done as well at least with most of the companies
that I’m familiar with and that is Health how do we Define health and Pat
lindsione says that 95 of companies put
all of their attention on smart and that means five percent only put it
on health or maybe healthy and smart and that’s what I want to talk to you about
today so let’s define what health is I love his definition about this so he
says healthy companies have minimal politics now I love how he defines
politics and you might say oh we don’t talk politics in the office so we’re good with that well that’s not really
what he means how he defines politics is when you talk differently depending on
who’s in the room wow that’s an amazing definition and I urge you whenever
you’re at home whenever you’re in the office see if your language changes or
others language change depending on who’s in the room healthy teams that
should not happen also they have very low confusion they have Clarity around
everything they know the why behind what they’re doing healthy companies have high morale
they love working there they feel like they are a member of that team and they
are proud to be there and that makes productivity high so healthy teams have
high productivity and with all of this that leads to very low turnover people
feel engaged in a team like this and they don’t want to leave it so this is
how he defines a healthy company so I want you just to think how healthy is
your company what are some of the things that you can do and spoiler alert the
working genius is one of those things that you can do all the things that Tim and I were talking about earlier that
drives directly towards the health of a team so if you’re thinking how is this
helping me become a better water Trader just think if you engage some of the
things that we talked about today and now your company becomes more healthy
and I know you’re already doing smart things but now you’re combining healthy
and smart and that’s not only going to help you and everything that you do
that’s going to help everybody on your team that’s what it’s all about folks
a few things that I would like to mention today for you to put on your
calendar is the storm water Summit 2023 taking place June 27th through 29th this
is going to happen in Kansas City Missouri and the conference is held by the water environmental Federation storm
water Institute to learn more about this we’ll have everything on our show events
page the American Society for healthcare engineering is having their annual conference on August 6th through 9th in
San Antonio Texas Ash’s annual convention brings together thousands of
Health Care Professionals to learn about new developments in the field network
with others and find solutions to their challenges we’ll have all the information you’ll need about this on
our show events page and finally the association of water Technology’s annual
convention taking place in Grand Rapids Michigan October 4 through six we’ll
have all of this information to learn about these and more on our show notes
page and you can go there by going to scaling up h2o.com Nation as always here is a brand new
installment of periodic water table with James hello and welcome to the periodic water
table with James where we think and learn about water chemistry drop by drop please use your week to search online
ask your colleagues or even pick up a book to learn more about each week’s
periodic water table topic if you do at the end of the year you’ll be 52 water
chemistry smarter so let’s raise the water table of knowledge together and get started
today’s topic is polyaluminum chloride or pack
okay I almost always ask this but what is polyleum chloride used for
what is its chemical formula does polyaluminum chloride come in a solid or
liquid form what does it remove how does it compare to other aluminum
compounds what dosages or ratios are recommended what could happen if you overfeed poly
aluminum chloride what could be the impact Downstream how does it compare to other aluminum
compounds remember knowledge is power and taking the time to learn more about water
chemistry each week will help make you a force to be reckoned with be sure to post what you learn to social
media and tag it with hashtag watertable23 and hashtag scalingup H2O I
look forward to learning more from you thank you James Nation my call to action for you is to
think of what is the first step that you need to take on whatever it is that you
want to start doing that’s action step number one action step number two is I
want you to think about your team and think about all the smart things you do
and what are the things that you can do what are the tools you can use like the
six types of working genius to make your team more healthy and of course the third thing is tune in
next week for a brand new episode of scaling up H2O
do you wish you had your own private tutor to help you study for the certified water technologist examination
well now you do so many of you have asked me to help you with the mock cwt
examination and I’ve done that very thing if you go to scalinguph2o.com forward slash cwt prep
again that’s scalingup h2o.com forward slash cwt prep you will see that I’ve created
a course and I tell you everything I know about each one of those mock
questions it’s my hope that that helps give you the confidence you need to sign
up to get certified today