Leadership Book Club: The Advice Trap by Michael Bungay Stanier

Kristen: Welcome to Love and Leadership, the podcast that helps you lead with both your head and your heart, plus a bit of humor. I'm Kristen Brun Sharkey, a leadership coach and facilitator.

Mike: And I'm Mike Sharkey, a senior living and hospitality executive. We're a couple of leadership nerds who also happen to be a couple.

Kristen: Join us each week as we share our unfiltered opinions, break down influential books, and interview inspiring guests.

Mike: Whether you're a seasoned executive or a rising star, we're here to help you level up your leadership game and amplify your impact.

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Kristen: Hello and welcome back to Love and Leadership. I'm Kristen.

Mike: I'm Mike.

Kristen: And it's been a minute.

Mike: It's been a while. We're sorry.

Kristen: We're very sorry,

Mike: We're having a child.

Kristen: Yeah,

Mike: we're probably going to take some type of hiatus this summer, you know, for the whole childbirth 

Kristen: Yeah. I mean, we are, we are taking a

Mike: Like I was saying, we are taking a hiatus, of indeterminate length.

I think we can be back sometimes this summer. Yeah. Uh, but you have a lot of course material, so, uh, there's should be something you can listen to at this point. We will 100% be back. We love doing this. Spotify call us. We're waiting.

Kristen: Yeah, We will do it once we figure out what our life looks like with an infant.

Pure chaos.

Pure

Mike: Pure chaos. Pure chaos. But it's gonna be great fun. Yeah. We've got the cutest like baby stuff. The swing is amazing. The stroller is so cute. It's just like. He's coming. A little leader.

Kristen: Yep. He is. A little sooner than we planned is what we haven't gotten an episode out for the past few weeks, but we wanted, we wanted to at least, get one good episode out before he arrives.

Um, yeah. And then we'll be back

Mike: Well, and I, I worked pretty hard to get The Advice Trap ready, so Yeah. I'm glad we're doing this. Yes, I, it's, it's fair warning. It's been a couple weeks. I do the best when I just read it, or when I've read it 16 times and already really, you know, internalized everything.

This, I am not good at any of this. I, what I do know is notice myself doing it all the time now. So I don't know if that's progress, but I guess it is.This is high level leadership stuff. It's very subtle, it's very profound and it is not something that's quick. When you go into like a turnaround situation, you very much have to go in and like boss everybody and, just lead, you know, General Patent.

Like longer term, is, how you grow people in it's not, um, it's not a quick fix for anything. So. Fair warning. I'm not even a novice. I don't think I've actually begun. I'm trying hard not to give advice but, or too much advice. 

Kristen: We're, it's 

Mike: a, journey.

Kristen: We're all learning together, right?

Mike: I'm not learning. It's so hard. I just, I, I think I, my advice is the best thing on earth. Let's get into it. Yes,

Kristen: Let's do it. Okay. L-B-C-L-B-C. The Advice Trap by Michael Bungay Stanier, who is also our first author to appear twice

he is leadership book clubs

Mike: rightfully so.

Yeah, I love this guy. He is our first repeat author. Of course, a bestselling author and leadership coach, best known for this book, the Coaching Habit, which we love. Uh, he founded Box of Crayons. Still the best name for an organization 

Kristen: I know. 

Mike: i know. It's so good. It's so good.

Helping organization shift from giving advice to Staying Curious. He is a Rhodes Scholar and a TEDx speaker. He lives in Toronto. but, okay. 

Kristen: Wow. 

Mike: it's so cold. 

Kristen: Okay. I was like, way to offend

Mike: It's Well, it's media listener. No, Canadian. It's

Kristen: beautiful actually. Toronto. I love Toronto. It's a great city, but yes, it is very

Mike: cold. It's so cool. In the summer, you know, it's a great state,

Kristen: the summer. It's amazing. It's amazing.

Mike: And like, you know, there's a music festival up in, in Banff right? And it's like the prettiest place on earth, but

Kristen: I mean, that's nowhere near Toronto,

Mike: No, I know, but it's

Kristen: but yeah,

Mike: Farther north in Canada, but it's like, it's so cold.

Kristen: It's, very cold. It's like paradise. It's like crystal, everything, but, Yeah. I mean, we, we live in California and Mike thinks it's still too cold, so.

Mike: Well, it's a, I mean, Mark Twain said the coldest, or the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.

Kristen: in. Okay. We live in a warmer spot

Mike: We do. We're we're much happier now.

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Anyway,

anyw, who he is of course, globally recognized for his work in coaching and leadership development. Okay, Let's get into it. Introduction. Uh, The Advice Trap is a follow up to The Coaching Habit. By saying less and asking more, you can work less hard and have more impact. Uh, Building a coaching habit is staying curious a little longer and rushing to advice, giving a littlemore slowly. 

Kristen: Yeah, a 

Mike: This is harder than we think because as humans, we love to give advice. Uh, we are probably following what he calls in The Advice Trap the default management style. Tell, tell, tell, tell, tell. Ask, tell, tell, tell, tell, tell. Ask, tell, tell, tell. Um, so it's a lot of telling. Here's the truth, and your advice is not as good as you think it is. Okay. Dun, dun, dun, It's really true. You perceive your advice working because, one, you're solving the wrong problem.

You've been suckered into believing that the first challenge that is mentioned is the real challenge. It rarely is. People in your organization right now are working very hard on noncritical issues because leaders have not stayed curious longer. Number two, you're proposing mediocre solutions. There are reasons that your solutions are not as good as you think, including you don't have the full picture.

You might have a few facts in an ocean of assumption. Your brain is designed to make connections and solve problems and reassure you that you know what's going on. Oh my God, that is so true. It is, one part truth and six parts conjecture and you know, I think there's some neuroscience to like back that up, your brain is like wired to look for solutions to like problems of like, how do I hunt this wooly mammoth and like survive? And you know, things are very complex and we don't always dig deep enough to find that. So number three, uh, self-serving bias.What it is called, when you are over inclined to believe that your ideas are excellent. Of course, we are happy to offer up solutions. We think every solution is a gold nugget. First idea-itis, time pressure, idea anxiety and the comfort of making a safe choice. yeah. I know that we do this and we know people that, you know, do all, all of these things, right? Like it's very, very confident to rush in, solve problems point the way and, and you're like, I don't know if that's right, but you just, he's the boss, so you go with it.

Okay? So leaders who default to giving advice are also less likely to be open to feedback and are less likable. Interesting. Liz Wiseman found that intellectual curiosity, asking questions and being more coach-like is the delineating factor in leaders who create more impact. Compared to those who don't.

So advice as a management style damages organizations in the following ways. It demotivates the advice receivers. That's definitely true. Autonomy, drive and purpose are the biggest motivators. Uh, I think we've, referenced many studies that, that talk about that. Yeah. You know, people want autonomy.

They want to be contributors. They want to have a say. Uh, when you give advice, you're signaling that the advice receiver is not there for their ability to think. You might as well get a robot. Nobody likes that. It overwhelms the advice givers your willingness to default to advice giving means you are adding unnecessary work to your own busy schedule.

Yeah. You'll become the bottleneck. Oh, that's the worst.

Kristen: Like, this is one of the reasons I commonly give, especially when I'm working with like senior executives on having a coaching style of leadership. I'm like, no, this actually will free up a lot of your time. Yeah. If you, take this approach.

Mike: You want people who bring you solutions, think for themselves, solve problems. Yeah. and take ownership. This is part of, it's like taking ownership. I remember when we did The First 90 Days and you talked about, you know, when you're high enough executive in a big enough company, you're delegating product lines or even smaller companies.

And that kind of blew my mind because I haven't managed a company with like 10,000 people you know? But it's like, what is that like to be like, Hey, I need you to launch, the Home Goods line of Proctor and Gamble and bring it back to me when you've got it going. You know, like

Kristen: It's very different.

Mike: it's very different.

It's very different,but that's,

I, 

Kristen: But also like the foundations of it are,

Mike: I just feel like it's very aspirational and as humans, it's what we should aspire to, Otherwise, I mean, a robot is always gonna be better at doing things than you are.Physical mechanical things.

Maybe not yet in all regards. Soon.

Kristen: I mean, we're, we're working on

Mike: Very, we're, worse,

In our lifetime, we will see a robot that can play the Tchaikovsky violin and concerto better than, Joshua Bell or something like, it's a, that's a ways off, but it's not that far

Kristen: technically.

Yeah.

Mike: It's not a hundred years off. But, can a robot have the idea to like, create, Microsoft or something? I don't know. You know, like you're valuable for your, your creativity and your humanity and your heart, not just your physical work. Uh, it also compromises team effectiveness.

Uh, the advice trap prevents teams from being more than the sum of their parts.Further, it limits change. Senior leaders need to be champions of the ambitions and the strategic focus of the organization. And nowadays, organizations are going through change all the time. 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: He, Michael, MBS, we will call him MBS.

Yes.

Kristen: Yes. Uh, we will,

Mike: Michael Bungay Stainer.. God, I'd love to hang out with this guy. I feel like this of all the, there's a,

Kristen: Like wanna have him over for dinner.

Mike: have him over for dinner. Like, there's a couple people of course I'd like to meet, you know, I'd love to meet Jocko for sure. I get it. Captain Abershoff would be pretty cool, but I, I really want to hang out with this guy, you know.

Okay. So he refers to it as AGH, the Advice Giving Habit, and MBS has a good sense of humor about himself. He does call out the irony of writing a book full of advice on how to give less advice.

Kristen: Yes. So, yeah. I, I, I I appreciate that.

Yeah.

he 

Mike: has a good, I that's probably one coffee with.

I, I would say have a beer, but I, I don't drink, so we're not having a beer, but coffee. Yeah. Uh, part one, tame your advice. Monster.So I'm, to be fair, like I don't organize these notes super well, and I blame Michael Bungay Stanier for that. I, and I will say this in the end, I have trouble with the way he organizes his stuff.

It's a little less like organiz, it's like part one and then there's like different parts of that. It's like, is it part one? Is it chapter one?

Kristen: Yeah. Well he does these like masterclass things. I think this, I think a lot of this is 'cause you do the audio book too.

Oh, you actually read it like

Mike: read this. Huh? I read this because I just, the audiobook takes like eight times as long. I have listened to the audiobook.

Kristen: I do think his, the structure of his books is like better for like visual learning versus like audio

Mike: I mean maybe it's like a master. I think it is like a masterclass.

It's almost like a live presentation, in which case it would be very useful. But anyway, uh, so part one, Tame Your Advice Monster, section one. Easy change versus Hard change, or how it's easy to figure out your new phone, but it's hard to keep your New Year's resolution. So this section is actually very fascinating.

I think we are all very familiar with things that we can learn easily and things that we have struggled with maybe all our life. We have all had experience with easy change. We've learned a new job, a new route to drive to work, or how to stream Netflix. You've learned how to stream Netflix on your phone, on your tv, on your computer.

Uh, hard change is New Year's resolutions, which you come keep coming back to year after year. That's hard change. Hard change, you keep coming back to without being able to make progress. Uh, I think this is very individual. You know, there's not a, a rubric of what's hard and easy. For instance, my wife can learn a new language easier than she can learn twofold laundry.

Ah, I, I love you, but it's true. I mean, right? Like,

Kristen: I can't fold a fitted she to save my life.

Mike: It's not just that like, you know, like, like if you make a resolution like, Hey, I'm gonna do the laundry every week and fold it every week, you cannot do that, but you can absolutely decide that you want to learn ancient Greek.

Kristen: I mean, I can, but it will take like five times the effort.

Mike: But it's hard change for you. Yeah, definitely

It's hard change for you. Yeah.

Yeah. But But learning is not, learning is not, you know, so, it's just, and I'm, I'm just saying everyone's brain works differently, I dunno. Everyone has different hard changes.

So, uh, easy changes like downloading a new app to your iPhone, easy to do, hard change can look like you keep downloading the app after app and you can't make progress. Right. What you actually need is a new operating system. Taming the advice monster can be hard change for many people because it's a battle between present you and future.

You and I, I love the this. 

Kristen: Uh, this is the adult equivalent of the children's marshmallow test, which we will find out soon. Give a child one marshmallow and tell them if they can resist eating it for 15 minutes, they get another one. Future you wins from self, self-imposed delay of gratification.

Mike: Uh, my thinking about that though is like how many marshmallows are required to get you to discipline yourself. If it was 20, if I said, can you wait 15 minutes and I will give you 20 marshmallows, would you then be able to discipline yourself? So these are very like, fluid concepts, but yeah, the idea is you have to, in some way, give something up now to get something better later.

Kristen: Yeah. I haven't like, looked at that study in a while, in like quite a while, but I think that it's associated like the ability to impose, delayed gratification on yourself as associated with many positive outcomes later in life.

Mike: Yeah. I don't remember which book it was, but we, they found that the most like, representative characteristic of successful people was the ability to impose the delay of gratification.

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Which it is, So hard change in this context means saying no now to at least some of what has worked for present you. Being committed to change is not enough to tame the advice monster. We must really dig into why we like being bad because the behavior is not all downside.

Small wins for present. You, uh, so Michael Bungay Stanier calls this, #winsnotwins, which I think the best hashtag ever. Wins, not wins. Uh, one of my favorite. It is one of my favorite takeawaysSo he talks about the Cartman Drama Triangle. Stephen Cartman MD describes a pattern of three everyday roles that we fall into, the victim, the persecutor, and the rescuer.

We all play these roles at times and get short-term, limited upside. #winsnotwins. Uh, when we play the victim role, we are stuck, powerless, whiny, angry. And hashtag wins, not wins looks like,the meaning, the, the short term benefit you get from playing the victim. You are able to blame others for the situation.

You avoid responsibility and you become the center of attention to people who love to play The rescuer role I. The persecutor role, you'll be frustrated, angry, shouting, exhausted, and overwhelmed. #winsnotwins look like, you can blame others. Uh, you feel superior. Oh, I love that. Uh, you, it's so nice, right?

Like you just feel like I'm better than, uh, maintain the illusion of control and you can be righteously angry. Hello Catholic church. Okay. Uh, sorry. Uh, if the slipper fits, uh, Rescuer role, you're exhausted and on an endless treadmill of fixing everyone else's work. #winsnotwins look like a sense of noble suffering.

Oh, I love that. It's so good. It's so satisfying. Okay. And the pleasure of meddling in other people's business. The,

Oh, it's so satisfying. 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Oh, okay. With wins, not wins. You are seeing, uh, and I love this too, he calls it prizes and punishments of every choice you make, there's always a benefit.

And always a cost. Present you gets some benefit from not changing, but future you misses out on future gains. When you take on hard change, you declare, you are choosing future you and a better way of doing things. You know, the, the easy analogy of is of course, going to the gym and being, being healthier, right?

You know, like it's short term, I enjoy it, but a lot of people don't. So it's like, running, I wouldn't enjoy, but it's like short term suffering from long term gains. And can you make yourself do that?So a practice from the coaching habit MBS brings back,in this book, at the end of every section, he says, what was most valuable for of this for you?

And it's a powerful coaching question that helps retention and also frames your value when you're saying this to someone else. And as I read through this book, I found myself involuntarily doing this exercise. So in the, in the audiobook, he actually has some business leader come in and do a, a short blurb of like what was most valuable for them.

So it's pretty interesting.

Uh, for me here, wins, not wins is a powerful takeaway. Uh, I have to make short term sacrifices for long term gains.And as you get into this, you'll see like the short term sacrifices can be like not feeling as important as you want to. 

Kristen: Mm-hmm. 

Mike: know, or not like positioning yourself as the guy who has all the answers or being okay with like, maybe I'm not the one that needs to add value

Kristen: here.

Yeah.

Mike: Yeah. These are all like ego things that I struggle

Kristen: It goes really well with like Marshall Goldsmith and What Got You Here Won't Get You There. And like the, so many of them coming back to adding too much value, which is all about like winning. Right.

Mike: And I, you know, in my current role too, like I've, you know, I've established and people like look to me for solutions and it's like, I don't want to give you the solution.

I want be one, I'm too busy. Two, it's like, I want you to grow and do it. And some of it is like people don't feel, you know, and especially in the West, we've taught people that they are not there for their brains. And we've become a service economy where it's like just, just customer service.

But customer service is actually a lot of problem solving, and when I have a, like a front desk team member who, who solves problems and does service recovery, that's so large. When they come to you like, this person has a clogged toilet, can you fix it? I'm like, I'm the general manager trying to like, manage the budget of a $30 million revenue hotel.

Like, go fix it. I don't know, figure it out. Like, but they don't, you know, we haven't trained people that way. Or we haven't, not just trained, but like, let them feel, valuable enough to, or, or like that they can do these things. Okay. Chapter two, How to Tame Your Advice Monster. So your advice monster likes to inha, inhabit three different personas.

Tell it, save it, control it. Tell it the loudest. Here I am to convince you that I have the answer. If you don't have the answer, you have no value. Having the answer is the only way to add value. Tell it loves the spotlight. 

Dresses in the plumage of authority and wisdom. And whenever time feels short and things feel urgent, which is always, uh, it's always right. Like I'm gonna run in there and tell everybody what's okay. It wants you to think that you know best.

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: Pause for everyone to,

Kristen: to 

Mike: let that,

I don't know about everybody else, but you know, this stuff rings very close to home.

It's very painful. Okay.

Kristen: Oh, yeah. Me too. Absolutely. Yeah. Like, like, I mean, getting trained as a coach helps in that. Like, at least when you're in a coaching state, it's really, it pulls you out of this. Yeah. But like, it's so tempting to give advice. 

Mike: Hey, I can So tempting. Hey, I can fix all your problems.

And I think about like, therapists, you know, like.

I had a really great therapist in New York and he, you know, in the beginning they were like, so why are you here? I was like, well, you I'm depressed and I need advice. He's like, well, I don't give advice.

That's not what I'm here for. And I'm like, what are you talking about, sir? Like, I need, I'm here for you to solve my problems. And, and, and he's, and he didn't say this, but he's like, no, I'm here to help you figure out how to solve your problems because you already know nobody else can actually solve your problems for you. 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Save it. It's a little more sub subdued, but just as pervasive, Save It takes you aside and explains things earnestly. If it wasn't for you, holding everything together, the endeavor would fail. Every situation, every outcome. When in doubt, take it on yourself. When not in doubt, take it on yourself.

What save it looks like on stage, uh, the faint odor of burning martyr, which is particularly prevalent when confronted with someone in the victim role. You are the most responsible person here always. Know, you care the most. No one cares as much as Okay.

Kristen: Yeah. You're like willing to make the sacrifice of working late to take on the work to make sure it gets done. I'm like, yeah, that doesn't help

Mike: Faint odor of burning

The faint odor of Burning Martyr Such a good sense of humor.

Kristen: Is amazing.

Mike: He's like funny without being sarcastic.

Kristen: Mm-hmm.

Mike: You knowvery like positive person. Very like high minded,

Okay,

fangirling.

I'm fangirling for Michael Michael Bungay Stanier, if you hear this, please come on our show.

Kristen: Yes, that'd be 

Mike: That'd be amazing. That would be amazing, right? Maybe. We'll, we can tweet at him or something.Control it is the most tricky of the three it looks like a backroom operator's tone of gentle authority.

It will tell you that you, the only way to succeed at all is to stay in control at all times.Convinces you that everything is controllable as long as you are in charge. Don't share power if you let control slip disaster is eminent for everyone. Control it is ever present, but in the background, discreet and manipulative. Delusions of grandeur with the grip strength of Hercules.

I do like that. Can't let go. Won't let go. No empowerment. You are the only one stopping chaos. You might recognize all three in the, in yourself, but probably one dominates and can be situational. MBS has a free questionnaire at theadvicetrap.com to figure out your type. I think mostly I'm Tell It, now I think before I was Save it.

Kristen: Yeah. I, I'm, I'm heavy on Tell

Mike: I'm heavy on Tell It also, I have some control it, but like,

it

I have some control it for sure and save it, but I, I think I've, I think I've made progress on the Save it because you get tired. All these make you tired. Mm-hmm. You know, because you're like, the main thing is you are the most involved person.

You're the only one like, keeping back the darkness in the void, you know, like,

Kristen: Yeah. It's exhausting.

Mike: No matter which advice Monster is your particular brand, they share one DNA:. You are better than the other person.Mic drop. Mic drop. MBS challenges us to confront ourselves with that statement. Later he talks about one of his core values being this kind of challenging confrontation.

Like he's got guts to do that with people. Like, I don't know that I do that with everybody. I want them to like me too much.But it's true. Like all of these make you think like, I'm better than everybody else. 

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: I, I really love to think that I don't know about every, like, that is very on point for me.

It's very painful.

Kristen: part, yeah. That's part of being human. I think

We all have that part of our ego, right? Yeah. 

Mike: The belief behind all these reactions is I'm better than them. You're also saying that the other person is not enough, not smart enough, not wise enough, not good enough, not confident enough, not efficient enough, not capable enough, not resilient enough.

And my favorite one. Not moral enough. Sit with that and feel how uncomfortable and unsustainable that is. He picked the mic back up and he dropped it again. Okay. Uh, exhausting for you and disempowering for them. When you're more coach-like you unlock their potential, you don't diminish it. This is hard change.

You can't get rid of your advice monster. It's part of being human, but you can tame it. You have, I have like a vision of like, something for Monsters Inc on a leash. You know, like, uh, you have to understand the combination of factors that set off your advice. Monster. I definitely think that I'm smarter than our people, and I feel like it gives me more intrinsic value, and I, I don't think it does.

You know? Like, I know it doesn't, but I don't behave that way. Okay, so MBS breaks this, introspection down into four steps. Oh my God. He loves steps. 

Kristen: I love that he loves steps. 'cause I also love steps.

Mike: You do. Okay.

Kristen: Step one, who let the dogs out? You have to know what sets it off. Some people have a gift for bringing out, Tell It, Save It, et cetera.

Mike: Sometimes it's a specific situation that'll bring it out and not a person. Sometimes a certain type of behavior on the drama triangle. Like if somebody acts like a victim, maybe you get into the rescuer and you get into your save it. Or a situation like, maybe it's very chaotic at work and you, you jump in and you're like, I'm gonna control it, you know?

Kristen: Step two confessions. Once you know the trigger, you can elaborate on what your advice monster looks like. Step three, prizes and punishments. Articulate both the benefits and costs you find of the behavior in step two. Step four, future you for the win. Here's where we get clear on why it's worthwhile to tame your advice monster. If you don't see the future benefit, it's hard to tame the behavior. The benefit will need to feel aspirational emotionally and not just intellectually.Yeah.

Mike: You say you loved the chart?

Kristen: Yeah. There's a really good chart in this section where he, he talks about like when you're interacting with this type of person in this type of situation, and it's like common situations where that are often triggers for the advice monster.

So yeah, like, so like when you're interacting with someone who's more senior than you and you know what's going on, like that's a common one. Or someone who's more junior than you and you don't know what's going on. Still like a common, so I think it's, it's really, 

good looking through these kind of things and just like really being honest with yourself.

Like about when, what triggers this for you, which a lot of this book does.

Mike: It's a lot of inner work you have to do to get good at this. Okay. Common behaviors of the three types of advice monsters. Tell it. I stop listening to what's being said. As soon as the suggestion shows up in my head. I blurt out my idea. I give the solution I know is best for them. My god this is so painful. Yeah. Uh, save it, take on responsibility of solving the problem even when it's not my problem. Hi mom. Uh, I don't ask them what they think the answer is. Uh, I fill any awkward silences. She's not listening to this, so she won't hear that.

Kristen: Okay.

Mike: Yeah. Ouch.

Kristen: Snap. 

Mike: Control it. I take control of a meeting or situation right at the beginning and wrap at the I have a little problem with that. Like if I, I find that if I don't do that, a lot of my meetings just go off the rails. Like there, there does have to be some responsibility of somebody that like, keeps things.

It doesn't have to be me.

Kristen: Yeah. It doesn't, I think that's like part of it too is it doesn't have to be you.

Mike: So if we remember that really crazy narcissistic boss I had for a minute, the one thing she did really well was like, she let everybody run the meeting. Yeah. You know, and she wanted them to run the meeting and keep it going, you know?

And I, I kind of actually liked that,

Kristen: Yeah. I, I really liked delegating that.

Mike: I like delegating that. I

Back to control it. I get anxious when I don't know where the situation is going. Oh, Beezus really wants to come in. I'm gonna let her in. Hold on.

Kristen: Oh my goodness. Update.

Mike: Cats. Cats. Cats, cats.

Kristen: Beezus, despite just standing at the back door, longingly looking, trying to, to get in when we open the door just doesn't come in.

Mike: Yeah. Cats.

Kristen: Cats.

Mike: Cats. Cats. Cats. Cats. Okay. step three, prizes and punishments. You have to zoom out and identify what you get from acting in this way instead of just trying to stop the behavior.

You have to really dig in and find the root. What are the #winsnotwins. Yeah. I mean, he's really teaching you how to introspect yourself and all. It does. It's not just about the advice monster. This is how you like, make improvement in any like, deep area of your life. 

Kristen: Like what is driving it? 

Mike: is, what is driving it?

What is the root of the weed?

Kristen: Yeah. Because we're getting something by doing like even very like self-destructive actions. You're getting some kind of short-term benefit from it. Yep.

Mike: Okay. So tell it. 

Kristen: Prize. I'm always seen as adding value. Punishment. I believe my only way of adding value is having the answer and I crowd out others' ideas. this. Like, it's so hard to change to do this. Like, Yeah, he talks about like the habit formula and all that and a little bit too, but yes, it is hard.

It takes, yeah,

it takes a lot of work. It's hard. 

Mike: Prize.

I'm seen as the smartest person in the room. Punishment. I don't let anyone be smarter than me and I limit the potential of my team.I mean, this makes me uncomfortable and it's supposed to, right? Like, prize. I keep things moving fast.

Punishment. We don't spend time figuring out the real challenge. Save it. Prize. I believe I'm the person that knows what's right. Punishment.

I won't let anyone else have the responsibility of figuring it out. I always have to shoulder it.

Yeah. Thank you. Hello. Christianity. Okay. Prize. I believe I'm the most responsible person here. Punishment. I believe no one else is as committed as I am. And I prove my commitment by being in a constant state of overwhelm.

Uh, control it. Prize. I hold the reins because I believe I'm the safest pair of hands. Punishment, I believe no one else can control the situation. Prize. I keep us away from unknowns. Punishments. I keep us away from unknowns and, and think they're dangerous.Prize. I protect us against chaos. Punishment. I pay the price for constant vigilance and I don't let others manage their own lives. This is all good in parenthood too I bet. 

Right. Well, yeah.So at its heart, this book is about introspecting yourself learning to be humble and allowing yourself to believe that other people have the agency and ability to grow, learn, and prosper.

Our job is to ask questions and to guide not to tell. The key to all of this is understanding the prizes and

Kristen: punishments. Yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's a really helpful way to look at it. Yeah. So it's more specific than just like, why do you do this? It's like, what are the prizes?

Mike: You are getting something.

Kristen: Yeah. You're getting something

Mike: Even like, I, I thought about this in terms of like making your bed. In the mor, it's not enough to just force yourself to make your bed. It, you have to find out why you're not doing it because you're getting something for 

Kristen: Mm-hmm. 

Mike: Maybe it's like, don't know, it's a rebellion against authority, It's, yeah. It's a good habit, but it's like,

Well, the punishments seem to really be tied to our, like, deep seated beliefs that we all have, right. That are often limiting beliefs. Yeah. I think, you know, I guess I just, I really respect anyone that wants to foster human potential.

Kristen: Mm-hmm.

Mike: In everybody.

I think that's the, the turning point toward like the great harmonious world. Yeah. When we recognize everyone has, an untapped, including ourselves, has an untapped potential and we stop, like looking at other people is different.

Yeah. Looking at, you us and them, it's all just us and we're all just trying to grow our potential.

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: And restore ourselves.

world Wouldn't it be a different world?

Kristen: all have this

Mike: habits. Simple concept. Very difficult to stop 

Kristen: right now,

Not believing that some groups of people are better than others. You know,

I, sorry to get religious, but I'm gonnaLike, I think 95% of the people on earth believe in God, or some type of God or some type of, Some religion with the deity

Mike: Sure. To it.

Kristen: to it. Sure. Something like that. I don't, I don't know about that percentage, but it's, it's high. Yeah.

Mike: I just think of it like a mother, right. Like, and we're all, or we're all her children.

I, am not a mother. I don't have children yet, but when I do,

Kristen: In like a week.

Mike: a week. But I think the thing I would want the most is for them not to fight.

Kristen: Mm-hmm.

Mike: I don't, or, you know, a good mother doesn't want one of her children to beat up the other one and to win at the expense of the other and be like, yeah, go get him.

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: She's like, stop fucking fighting. That's the message.

Stop fighting.If you, if you saw a mom that was like encouraging one of her kids to You're better than your brother. Beat him up.

that's Starve him. Bomb him. 

Kristen: So much 

Mike: doesn't, 

Kristen: Future therapy required.

Mike: track. Yeah. But there's something wrong. Yeah. You know, that like, it's very obvious to look at and you look at it and you're like, that person is sick.

There's something wrong with, but that's not, and that's not like our soul mother. Right? Like, stop fighting.

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: Yeah. Stop fucking fighting. It's like Peaky Blinders. No fighting. No fighting. No fucking fighting. Any Peaky Blinders fans know the scene that I'm talking about, it's legendary.

Kristen: Good thing we just entered a war 

Mike: Come on, man.

Kristen: on man, as we're recording

Mike: stop fucking fighting.

Kristen: Uh, I also love how like we, we set an intention early on. We're like, this is not a political podcast. And the world is just so crazy right now. It's, you can't not comment on some of it.

It's not us 

Mike: us and them. I'm not a Democrat, I'm not a Republican. I'm not a libertarian.

I'm not any of those things. I'm just a person. Let's just start with that. Yeah, we're all human. Start with that. I'm not American. I'm not rush. Who cares? Who cares? Everybody wants the same thing. Everybody. This is back to John Kennedy's speech, right? We all want the same thing. Peace for our children, food for our children.

You know, safety for our, our families and ch that's not that hard. Stop fucking fighting. There's enough food on the earth for, there are enough resources on Gandhi said it. There's enough, uh, uh, resources for everyone's need. Just not everyone's greed. I,

It's not political.Politics is dumb.

Like how, like you, everybody's wrapped up in that.

Kristen: Yeah, no, it's true. It's really not. So much of what's happening is not even really political. It's about

Mike: not, it's a, it's humanity.

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: And go, let's go back to control. that's what it is. there's really two camps right now and it's those that believe that other people should be under their control in one way or another.

And other people who believe that you shouldn't be controlling other humans. And they don't always know how to express that. And that's fine, you know, but it, it kind of comes down to that. Do you believe you are, should be in charge because you're smarter than everybody else? 

Kristen: You're not. Nope. Yep. Nope.

Mike: So,

Kristen: yeah. Well, this is, yeah, very. It's all very real in the context of everything

Mike: happening. I'm, I'm gonna send you the link to the, the video of, of, Killian Sian.

Killian Killian Murphy. 

Kristen: Yeah. Who's just 

Mike: I think he said It's Killian. Is it? I think I saw him. Yeah. I'm gonna, I'm gonna send you the 

Kristen: The, this is from Peaky

Mike: It's so good. it's just a bunch of boys, you know, and it's a bunch of drunk Irish. Are they Irish? I think. I can't remember.

But they love to get drunk and fight, and they're just tough dudes. And they're, you know, and they're all going out. And he, he goes around the room. He is like, no fighting. No fighting, no fucking fighting. 

It's just a question of attention. Here's Michael Bungay Stanier telling you, that everybody has value and you should, if you're gonna do anything useful, help them find that value. Mm-hmm. And the way to help them find that value is to get outta their way and stop acting like you are the king of the universe.

Kristen: Yep,

Mike: Ouch. Sure. Ouch. Okay. Fu part four, future You. To help make this transition, you need to know not only what you're stepping away from, but what you're stepping towards. This is future you, a way to think better, lead better, feel better, and be better. Here are some of the benefits of a new form of leadership.

Primarily Tell it, you tell it Future You Benefits.

I add value by empowering others rather than offering up advice. I don't always have to have the answer. I can rely on others to contribute. I still share my advice and wisdom, but I do it deliberately and selectively rather than reactively. Primarily Save It Future You Benefits.

I don't need to be responsible for everyone else's lives. They're adults and they can be responsible for their own choices. I mean, this is Therapy 1 0 1 or 2 0 1. At least I can support people by supporting them and making choices rather than making choices for them. Primarily control it. Future you benefits.

I can trade control for empowerment and engagement. I can teach people to drive rather than doing all the driving myself. I can take a backseat. I can let in the unknown. Often a source of competitive advantage and innovation. Future you leadership, where's all this taking you? Future you lives and leads from a place that is more empathetic, more mindful, and more humble. They make you smarter, more human and more effective. Empathy, mindfulness and humility. Empathy means being other focused. Mindfulness means that you're less reactive to what goes on around you. You create that tiny pause between stimulation and response.

Mindfulness means having a deeper sense of understanding of what's real about the situation you are in. Empathy is a greater sense of what's real for the other person. Mindfulness is a greater sense of what's real about the situation. Humility is a greater sense of what's real about you. Again, mic drop.

I mean, that's like, it's so hard to describe humility, right? But there it is. It's a great, humility is useful. Is is the useful opposite of your advice, monsters? I'm better than the other person dNA. So the etymology of the word humble is the Latin word for ground.

Kristen: Which makes 

Mike: Yeah, right.

Kristen: MBS encouraged us to practice and recognizes the road. It will be, uh, very up and down. And I like to quote from the campy eighties, uh, 1980s movie, Remo Williams from his, um, Korean master who was not Korean, so we can't do that anymore. But anyway, uh, great funny movie. Uh, Chiun says, uh, perfection is your road, not your destination. Which just stayed with me for like 30 years. So, um, part two, I mean, it, it really kind of sums it up, right? Like, yeah. No

Mike: Part two, stay curious longer.

Kristen: Yeah. This has all been the first, like, third of the book basically, but it's, so

Mike: The first third is the meat and then he just kind of goes through his lists and exercises and masterclass.

Yeah, that's it. You know, like you could stop there and the rest is just like him going through sample exercises. Yes. Which annoys me, to be honest, it really kind of annoys me. It's just like, I got it, sir. Let me work on it. But that's me. And he'd probably liked that. He'd probably be like, good, go do your thing.

You know?Part two, stay curious longer. 

Coaching. It's simple. Your job is to, to be curious. The practice has clear, useful tools, a definition, three principles, seven questions, and three ways.

This is what I fucking hate about Michael 

Kristen: Bungay Stanier?

Mike: We combine and then even then it would just be like, list it, dude, list it, but he doesn't list it. He goes into some like weird, okay. Uh, we combine them and we combine them. And the eight ways to ask them. Well, uh, it's actually, oh my God, I can't even keep track of the

like well, 

Kristen: The seven questions and the eight ways to ask them well are straight from a

Mike: Straight from Coaching. Straight from Coaching Habit. Yes. Uh, it's actually not simple. And I say, oh my God, does MBS love numbering stuff in a non-logical, asymmetrical way?I bet he's not that good at math. Like, this is a dude who studied, he's a lawyer, like he studied law and English and that kind of thing.

Math guys have very like orderly, lists and bullet points, and it's like, you know, the headings are one, and then it's a, and then it's a big A and then it's a dot. He doesn't do that. You know,

Kristen: It's very 

it's very like lyrical almost like, I mean, fair. I mean, I, I don't have the organization problems that you do with this book, but I do, I do see how like, he used a lot of big headings.

A lot of like thing, yeah.

It's not necessarily like,

Mike: But you are more on the language side than you are the math side of 

Kristen: Mm. I don't know about that really. Yeah. I mean it's heavy, but I feel like

Mike: No, no, I don't mean with this, but I just mean in like your studies and learning.

Kristen: I mean, at this point, yeah, but that was not always the case

Mike: Really.

Kristen: Yeah.

But yeah, no, I actually like his,

Mike: Of course you do. Okay.

Kristen: You do one definition, three principles, seven questions, three combinations, eight ways to ask them. Well,

Mike: It's like, do I have to learn all those? Do I have to keep track of them? Okay. Yeah. Uh,

Kristen: And I think we can do these pretty quickly because the, these are really covered in,

Mike: They're covered in the Coaching Habit, but it, you know, it helped me to go through this, even more than it did just in the coaching habit.

'Cause it really codified what I was looking for. So anyway, stay curious longer rush to action and advice giving a little more slowly. Coaching focuses on the process, not the outcomes. You're never going to create a situation where you never give advice. Think of it as an overdeveloped muscle.

We have to work the underdeveloped muscle: curiosity. Which is awesome.

Kristen: Yes. I love that. Three

Mike: Coaching principles, be lazy, be curious, be often. Being lazy is a provocative principle as we've all been conditioned to think that working hard is the way to success. It's not, it's, as we see nowadays, uh, the part we need to be lazy about is jumping in and solving other people's problems for them.

I, I have improved a little bit on that. I will say I've noticed myself being a little more reticent to like, solve people's, being curious is the essential principle. This is where we should work hard. Genius. Okay. Being often is the most radical principle. It blows up the idea that coaching is an occasional hierarchical formal event.

Every interaction can be a bit more coach-like. Science tells us that even a half second delay can make a huge difference. It's genius. Uh, MBS goes through the seven questions. Again, the kickstart question, what's on your mind? The awe question and what else? The focus question. What's the real challenge here for you?

Remember the, for you is so important. I do use that one a lot. Now, the foundation question. What do you want? The strategy question, if you're saying yes to this, what must you be saying no to? The lazy question. How can I help? Uh, the learning question. What was most valuable here for you? I like that one too.

Yeah, the, these are the seven questions. I, it's really funny. He says, like in here, that one of his first drafts of the coaching habit actually had over a hundred coaching questions. Of course it did. And he's like, it would've been disastrous. 

100 questions. 33 subheadings. 42. Uh, you know, I am in iambic trimeter.

Oh my God, my Okay.

Kristen: It's like the yay for editing and revision.

Mike: For editing. Okay. Uh, what I, I didn't super get in the coaching habit that I'm starting to get a little bit more of is, uh, combining these questions into combos, like, like a jab, cross hook, you know, uh. The focus combo. What's the real challenge here for you and what else, and what else?

The bookends combo, what's on your mind conversation, and then what was most useful here for you? 

The awe combo. Ask any open-ended question, like what do you want?

And then ask And what else? And then just keep asking that question.

Kristen: MBS says, question combinations are black belt habits .. Single question good, combination questions are better. I mean, to go back to the boxing reference, that's really true. Inexperienced people throw one punch, experienced people throw combos and they train combos.

Mike: So you throw the, you throw the jab three times and then you know, you follow up with an uppercut, like that's your, and some people do very, very well with only a few combinations. That's all actually that you need. 

Kristen: Yeah. Uh,

Mike: Uh, Oh, the eight ways to ask a question. Wow, this is actually useful. I got something from it.

This time, ask only one question at a time, not my forte. Cut the intro and ask the question. I'm getting better at that. Don't ask fake questions, for instance. Have you thought of, yeah,

Back to my, uh, evil vp, He always did. What about this did you think of that, acting like he

Kristen: That's not a question.

Mike: That's not a question.

That's not a question. Acting like he wasn't tr just controlling everything. Okay. Uh, number four,Stick to questions that start with what? Avoid why and how. You avoid how, because it drives the conversation too quickly into action.

and it's oriented time to solve, solve it phase like you're not there. Just ask what, what make people think. Get comfortable with silence. I'm getting comfortable with silence. Uh, actually listen to the answer. Acknowledge the answers you get, and then use any and every channel to ask a question like, WhatsApp, Slack, face, whatever. You know, it's not just like when it's one-on-one, it's every possible channel.These principles on how to ask a question, well, are the manifestation of the three principles: be lazy, be curious, be often.personally, I'm noticing how much lazier I can actually be. Uh, pick one and work on that. That's kind of, I'm kind of working on that. Like, coaching is in a nutshell ask a question and shut up. 

Kristen: Actually, listen,

Mike: You're so good at that. You are very good. I like listened to her.

Listen to Kristen, like on the, on a Zoom call,and she, she'll ask a question and be quiet and I'll just listen to the person, like start to dig into their, you know, their own she'll say like, and what are some ways that you could look to solve that problem? And they'll start to just do it and think, and, and that's what a coach is, right?

It's like helping you codify your own route and your own thinking. And it's, she's exceptional at it. I'm, you are. I'm terrible. I'm terrible at it.

Kristen: Well, these are all things, and like, you know, the, the eight ways that he has in there a lot, these are mostly things that are drilled very heavily when you in coaching training and you have to, it gets so hard to not stack questions at first, like where you ask multiple questions and not to make it about you.

It's just so in, it's in, it's not just that. It's like I listen to you, let them talk where I know that you probably have great answers for them.

For sure. And

Mike: From your long experience and they're like, some of them are new leaders and you're making them do their work.

Kristen: Yeah. And it doesn't mean, you know, it doesn't mean like never offering something, but it's gotta come from them first.

Mike: Yeah. Well, like MBS says like, stay curious longer and rush to advice giving a little more

Kristen: Yeah.

Okay. My MBS asks what was most useful here for me? And I say the combos, I don't have to do all eight, but I should pick two or three patterns and keep working on that. And I kind of notice myself doing some of that. Yeah. I do. The what's on your mind and what else? And then what was most useful here for you? That's my favorite one and the kind of operation I'm in. The, if you're saying yes to the, it's not so useful, but like making them come up with their own thinking and plan

Oh, yeah. For, no, I love his breakdown of that question in The Coaching Habit and like the, there's science behind it as

Mike: Well, the, the, also the, what's the real challenge here for you?

The, for you is legendary because you're telling people, and we went back when we talked about it, when we did the Coaching Habit.

Keno wouldn't solve my problems for me. He is like, what's the challenge here for you? And I was like, my challenge, it's your hotel, you know? And was, Nope, nope. That's why you hired me, right? Like, uh, you hired me to solve problems. Okay. How to practice masterclass One, uh, more sections. Okay. Use priming to get yourself in the zone far beyond what you believe is possible.

A glass of wine. This is very interesting. A glass of wine will taste one way if you drink it with Vivaldi, playing in quite a different way if you're, if it's accompanied by, Wagner. Yeah.

It's very interesting. But it's, it's true. Like, and I, you know, that's why, you know, good chefs will set the vibe, the mood, the colors, the way the table, like everything influences, your perception.

So you can use a keyword to prime yourself. For instance, I think when I st I haven't been doing this, I, I, you know, you can, when you start to notice your advice monster, you can use a keyword that will cue you to be lazy and curious. Uh, sometimes you win by not playing the game the advice monster wants you to play.

You have the best answer. It whispers in your ear. This is how you add value. This is how you save the world. This is how you save. This is how you stay in control, how you stave off failure, how you show your quality. You must always have the answer. Don't play the game. Yep.more lists, Uh, the six foggy-fiers.

Foggy as in foggy bottom. There are six ways that people trip themselves up and fail to uncover the real challenge. Twirling, the first thing they tell you might be many things. Best guess, a starting point, a half-baked solution or a stab in the dark. It's rarely the actual challenge. Coaching the ghost.

The spotlight needs to go back on them when they start talking about somebody else. This is a distraction. Don't become part of the drama.

Kristen: yeah. This is the, the, the, for you and those questions really helps. and the focus question really helps focus that in on them.

It's gonna be very, otherwise it's just a distraction.

Mike: Yeah. Settling. It's not a bad conversation, but you know, on, in your bones, you're missing the point. Don't settle and start to control it or save it. Push back. but push gently.

Kristen: And that's like your intuition, right? Yeah, for sure. Like when you're in a conver when you just like, you know, there's something deeper there.

Mike: Or you might actually know. Um, popcorning, a proliferation of challenges show up in a single conversation. When you ask what's on your mind, a multitude of problems emerge, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. Remember that figuring out the real challenge is their job, not yours. Legendary. MBS you can always say out loud, there's a lot of challenges on the table here.

Then resist picking where to start. Ask them of all of these, which one is the real challenge here for you?

Big picturing. This is a situation where they may be talking about interesting things, but the person hasn't made it personal. There's no I or me in the description of what's going on. When you can't get past generalities, big pictures and conversations about us, them and we, there's no skin in the game.

Use the focus question. What's the real challenge here for you? You can say this is important, but it's still pretty high level.

But move from generalized to specific.From abstract to personal. Yarning. This is where they tell the story of Odysseus and his journey home from Troy.

Even when it's a great story. You are just being yarned.

You might have just asked what's on their mind, but you didn't mean for them to tell you everything. The level of detail is extraordinary. The context they're providing is exemplary. It's too much. Remember that you can coach someone successfully knowing little to nothing of the specifics of their situation.

In fact, sometimes being ignorant of the subject matter is an advantage because you can, you can't offer up a useful technical solution. They know it after all, make them go back to the meat of it. What's the challenge here for you? You must interrupt and stop the madness. You can even say, I'm gonna hold you there.

Kristen: Yeah, this is a big one.

Mike: Yeah, for sure.

Kristen: People will default to just jumping into detail. And it's not necessary. And this is, you know, I coach people across all sorts of different industries and I've really learned that like, I don't need to know the

Mike: details. You don't need to know the industry.

Kristen: Yeah.

To help them work through it.

Mike: For sure. Jocko talked about that at one point. He, he, I don't know if he's still doing it, but in part of his business, he would like connect businesses with leaders. They needed leaders and we connect them with veteranswho, who would come in and either be a consultant or like are the right person for their job.

I think he was helping veterans get jobs and people were saying, well, they don't know anything. He's like, they don't need to know. Yeah. They're gonna learn that part of it, you know.Yeah.How do you know when you found the real challenge? There's, there is a sense of arrival, like Simone Biles landing her vault.

You can still stay lazy by saying it feels like this might be it, but let me check. Is this the real challenge here for you? When they find the real challenge, two things happen. You can see the moment of insight on their face, followed by a nanosecond later by their body language that screams awareness.

So from there, there are two paths. Uh, they're thinking, when can I get out of this conversation so I can actually get going? Which is great. That's what you wanna see. Yep. Or they found the real challenge, but they don't immediately know what to do here. Resist the temptation to rush in. Ask the foundation question.

How can I help? What do you want from me here? MBS reminds us of the AWE question is good twice and maybe more the, and what else question? Okay. How to practice Masterclass two. Put in the repetitions. He discusses the art of learning, which is very profound and probably not the best part of his teaching.

I'm sorry. MBS, he talks about Josh Waitzkin, who I know, He's Marcelo Garcias first black belt in Brazilian Juujitsu. Waitzkin was, the subject of the movie, searching for Bobby Fisher, and he became, uh, uh, you know, a very high level chess player who eventually quit doing that and got into martial arts.

And Marcello Garcia, for anyone that is listening that does Jiujitsu is kind of known as one of the original geniuses of Jiujitsu. He is, he's a very special dude. And Waitzkin became his first black belt. There's some discussion and Waitzkin actually has a, there's some videos you can find online. If you Google Josh Waitzkin, you'll find some stuff of him teaching Juujitsu with a, a process he calls reduced complexity learning, which I think is fascinating and it's actually how I learn. Hmm.

So, you know, when I was learning Jiujitsu, there's dozens and dozens of submissions and, you know, class, honestly, it's not taught well. It's very disorganized. and when I stopped trying to do this choke and that choke and this Lego, and I was just like, I'm just doing Kimora for the next year, and I was like, I started to make progress.

And the video you'll probably find online is Josh teaching a, a, I think it's a New York Times reporter, just how to do guillotine from every position. And he's just looking for guillotines and the guy makes progress in a week. Right. So reduce the complexity of the learning, right? I'm learning sword fighting right now, like I'm just doing, you know, I'll do one drill a day.

Kristen: Some people learn differently, but that's how I learn, Yeah, that's, yeah, definitely.

Mike: Yeah.and I've actually heard that there's, this is, there's a Russian school of chess. They work backwards and they start you with only two pieces on the board, like the king, the opponent's king, and your king and queen.

And they make you checkmate with those two pieces. And then they'll add a pawn, and then they'll add two pawns, and then they'll add a knight and they'll just keep adding pieces. But they don't start with all the pieces on the board. And, I have a friend who used Frankie, who taught, uh, when he was teaching Jiujitsu, he would do this.

He would teach them a submission and then work backwards from the submission and teach them the dozens of ways that they might look at getting into the submission. You know? And I think that's, sorry. It's fucking genius. 

Kristen: Yeah. Yeah. 

Mike: Yeah.Mastery. I disagree with the whole. Mastery is not about time. The whole 10,000 hours to mastery that Malcolm Gladwell popularized is not truly accurate.

The more mindful your repetitions are, the less you will need to do. Yeah. And understanding how you learn will reduce the number. I don't need 10,000 repetitions at this point. You know,, I need a hundred focused, I got there at some point, but, so you have to figure out how you learn.okay.

Another heading, Seal the Exits. Uh, your job is to keep them in the conversation. One, they want to escape. In the Coaching Habit, he introduced Terra TERA, a way of understanding and manipulating the neuroscience of engagement. This, I've been doing a lot more. It's very interesting. I love, yeah, I love it.

Uh, so it's an acronym for the four drivers. Tribe. Are you with me or Against Me? And it's very interesting the way you can teach people safety. Expectation. Do I know what's about to happen? Rank, are you more or less important than me? And Autonomy. Do I have a saying in this or not? When the terror quotient is high, the brain gives the all clear that it is safe.

A safe situation. People lean in, access the smartest parts of their brain, see the subtlety of the situation, assume positive intent and give you their best self. Here are some tactics for improving the TERA quotient. Tribe. Use small words of encouragement. Yes, nice. Great. Lovely. Excellent. Right. Spot on.

Look for opportunities to use we and us. Acknowledge they might be, feel how they might be feeling. Expectation. I've been doing this a lot, actually show them the future. You do this by creating mini milestones and using stage directions. Let me ask you a question. I am going to interrupt you here. Saying that makes people feel safe.

Mm-hmm. They know what's about to happen, even though it's a little abrupt and you're telling them, I'm gonna shut you up and talk and now I'm gonna talk. But you do it in such a way that the brain actually feels safe. Uh, let me jump in here and add my idea. There are almost, these are almost subliminal.

And allow the other person's brain to orient and know what's happening. You can use numbers. We've got blank number of things to cover. We've got 10 minutes left in this conversation. And that was something in, I think, Chris Voss book. It's like, Hey, I, I just, I'm gonna. Do you have two minutes? Yeah. Oh, I have two minutes

Kristen: giving. Yeah. So they know. Yeah.

Yeah. They know what to expect. Yep.yeah. He has a great little resource and, in the resources you can download, that's kind of a summary of this, but it's like a framework for how you can interrupt someone.

Yeah. So you can ask a question and it's like that

Mike: You just jump in and be like, I'm gonna interrupt you there.

Kristen: It's like, announce your intention.

Mike: Announce your intention.

Kristen: She's like, I'm just going to, let me explain the action, which is jump in, interrupt you, cut in here, stop you there. Hit a pause button and then show that it will be painless.

So use words like quickly, briefly, for a moment, and make it clear that it's so that they can stay curious or so that you can stay curious and

Mike: I'm gonna use that for a moment.

Let's not talk while other people are talking. 

Kristen: Yeah. Our 

Mike: My current team, they're like, they, they like to talk. Everybody likes to jump in and it just devolves very quickly into like, 

Kristen: Yep.

Mike: Just everybody talking about whatever's on their own. Um, you're creating limited choice. Don't be a source of mystery.

Tell them what's going on. You can even say, I'm lost in this conversation and I'm not sure what's happening. He's very blunt in a way that I'm not as comfortable doing. And he's probably a more easygoing guy than I am.

Kristen: That's really, that's quite powerful as a leader though, because that's very powerful. There is some vulnerability in it, but it's also like, I think a good indication of like a conversation has gone off the rails where you're like, okay, I'm having trouble following this. Like, yeah. Can we take a step back?

Mike: Yeah.

Rank. Raise them up. The brain wants to feel it's amongst, equals or better.

If it has low status, it's not happy. It's not safe. You know, we, our brains are wired for a time when the higher you were in the tribe, the more chance you had to survive. You had food, you had,access to resources, and you had the ability to reproduce,the higher in the tribe, the more likely you could find a mate.

So there's a lot of survival mechanism.It's not about false flattery or in insincere charm. Let them go first. A great phrase to use is, I've got some thoughts, but before I share my ideas, what are your thoughts first?Here, MBS reminds us that rank is about power and control, and it's worth noting where you fall in the demographics.

Kristen: I talk about this a lot. Yeah. These demographics should inform how and when you lower your own status, for sure. As a white guy with blonde hair and blue eyes, I give away all of the power I can. I don't encourage, a female leader, who's, Hispanic to do the same thing. I mean, it's up to her, but I, I, But it, yeah, it depends on your

Mike: situation.

It depends on your situation, but for some people it will not be the best thing for you to give away power. Other people will take more than you give, unfortunately. Yeah. Yeah.

Kristen: No, I appreciate that he 

Mike: us up. Yeah, for sure. It's, and, and he's, he's a, you know, he's tall, he's skinny, he's white. Like he knows that, you know, and he, his practice, and I think we need to be able to talk about that without feeling uncomfortable.

You know? yeah. Not everyone should give away power in the same way, but I try to, because, I'm conscious of, like, I, I get a boost just by how I look, that's not fair. And I'm not super comfortable with that. I want to earn my respect. I, definitely haven't had an easy time, but it's like. I am not into that, treat people equally, but that's not the reality. So,there's a, have you ever seen Space Force? 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Yeah. There's a very funny, like Michael Scott. It's Fuck Michael Scott. is talking to, I can't remember who's the, the coach from Glee, right? So

Kristen: Oh yeah. Oh my God. I'm blank on

Mike: she's amazing.

She's the general of,

Kristen: She's so funny. I

Mike: She's, I can't remember if she's I think she's in charge of the Navy or something. And, Michael Scott says something, I don't remember what he says, but it's very inno, it's very innocuous. And he's, he's actually showing her some respect as a woman.

And she's like, if you acknowledge my gender again, I'm going to like shove my fist down your throat. And he is like, noted.

Kristen: Jane Lynch is who

Mike: Jane Lynch. Jane Lynch.. Yeah. so, you know, 

Kristen: Yeah, it's great. Yeah.

Mike: And that's how she like, main, but I, I thought it was actually very telling. I was like, that's how she maintained her power in a place where like probably every man wanted to take it away from her.

Mm-hmm. And most people probably thought that she didn't deserve, you know, we see it right now. We saw all these like, generals fired who were we women or men. And everybody's like, they DEI Oh, okay. Are they, or are you just a racist? Okay. But so her, her very smart, you know, approach was like.

I, you can absolutely not take an ounce of power from me.

I'm gonna stand in this position and I will, I will punch you in the face and good for her.So here MBS talks about, uh, Charles Duhigg's, uh, the habit loop, q the triggering moment or contextual instance that sets off behavior, uh, the behavior itself, and then the reward a dose of dopamine that tells the BA brain to do that again.

Yeah. Uh, he,

Kristen: I use this all the time in coaching,

Really, Well, it's, it's, it's a really helpful way to make any, like, behavioral change. Understanding, like what is the trigger? And I think he, he talks about this in the Coaching Habit as well, and he breaks it down a little bit more. Like what? Like the cue, like actually like specific elements that trigger it.

Like, is it like specific people or being in a certain meeting or a certain time or like, there's all sorts of like factors to that, but figuring out a common trigger for the behavior you're trying to change, what you typically do and then what you're gonna do instead. And being able to tie that to like specific triggers and cues is really helpful in terms of actually being able to make the change. 

Mike: For sure. 

Um, yeah, it's super useful. How did I get here? Why am I here? Am I in the same situ and you are, right? It's the same things that like, like therapy is very much at the heart of like figuring out like why you're making bad decisions. There's something there. He's saying to be more coach-like, has to feel good or you won't do it. Celebration is somatic. It's in your body. Uh, I had a juujitsu coach that after class made us walk around in a circle for a couple minutes with our hands held up, like, we won a fight in the UFC. And he was in the UFC. and even though like it, I kind of thought it was funny, first of all, it's hard to keep your hands over your head after, uh, uh, a 90 minute jujitsu class, but he's instilling some somatic.

I won. Mm-hmm. I can win, into you. And if you watch fighters at the end of a fight, they throw their hands up even if they pretty much know they didn't win, right? Yeah. So,Seek saturation. Uh, your job is making coaching an everyday interaction. Uh, I find this section a bit redundant. Uh, he discusses again, the standard weekly one-on-one meeting being very, very, demoralizing and more about compliance and control.

Taking a coach-like approach can revitalize the experience for everybody. Uh, it's important to know that coaching and feedback are often collapsed into the same category. They're actually quite distinct. Coaching is the ongoing act of staying curious and in doing so, enabling the other person to do the work. Feedback is when you need to initiate the conversation to share your point of view on a situation. Uh, often something that didn't go well. Feedback can be integrated into coaching conversations. Uh, after you've told them what happened, the impact of it, and what you want them to do differently, the next time you have a chance to be more coach-like having heard the feedback, what's on your mind?

Yeah. Genius. This is much what's most useful here for me. Coming back to coaching conversations, just in everyday life and all the time, uh, you're not, if you don't do it all the time, you're not gonna do it in your one-on-ones.

Uh, how to practice Masterclass four. MBS references Daniel Kahneman's work Thinking Fast and Slow in referencing, giving feedback.

Uh, while we think that the organization with the fastest feedback cycle would win the science as there's more to it, delaying feedback slightly produces better long-term learning than providing immediate feedback. The insight is that when feedback is immediate, it melds to become part of the experience itself.

And if it's delayed slightly, the gap creates spacing, which improves retention.

Kristen: Yeah, I thought this was really interesting actually. Yes. Yeah. Because it is, I mean, this is usually not what happens. Most people wait way too long to give feedback from the situation, and it's, you, it definitely loses its power if you wait too long from when the actual behavior happened.

But, but this is the, I think, important too, if you do it too fast. 

Mike: for sure. It melds into the,

Kristen: Yeah, so I found that interesting.

Mike: Yeah. So to be honest, I'm mostly kind of annoyed by his master classes. I just wanna practice this and draw my own conclusions in my own life. And I feel like he's kind of given a lot of advice here. I. So, and I, he probably agree. Uh, I still think he's a genius though. And I guess this is the point of everything.

People don't like to be told what to do. Uh, Move Away From Old Fears. Your job is to courageously step into future. You. There are two levels to attract progress. The first is obvious. Did you tame your advice monster and stay curious longer. The second is identifying the fears that you have. That future you will fail using litmus tests for talent.

Tell it, save it and control it.

You need a plan. When that advice monstercrops up, uh, you have to retame the advice monster. He says, we don't rise to the occasion, we fall to the level of our training. And this is allegedly a Navy seal, slightly misquoting the Greek poet Archilocus.

Which is true. I

Kristen: Yeah. I also like "what the hell syndrome" that he talks about in this masterclass, which is very relatably like.

You are, you're on a diet and then you get ice cream and then because you already erred, you eat the whole container.

So it's like the part of this,

Mike: Screw it, I'll do it.

You know? Yeah. Yeah. Part

Kristen: Part of like learning skills and integrating new habits is you have to recognize that like, you're gonna make, you're gonna slip, you're gonna

Mike: sure. Mistakes you need to plan. Yep.

Kristen: and you did plan for when

Mike: happens. You need to plan for when that happens. Yep.

And it might be like, Hey, I'm, I've lost control of my diet for today.

I remember one time I lost a lot of weight. It was like 50 pounds, and I was working in a restaurant with the most delicious food ever. Uh, so it was very impossible not to have a day where I would just gorge on egg rolls. Right. But I, and I was like, I knew that was gonna happen for one day. I knew it was probably gonna happen for the day after, but if it happened three days, I knew I was in trouble and I had to make, you know, I had to drag myself back.

I was like, Nope. Can't do it the third day. So I was like, I knew I would kind of allow myself to slip because you're gonna slip. But I didn't, I didn't destroy my, my journey. I was like, third day is gonna be back, you know? Yeah. Part three, Master Your Coaching Habit. So a box of crayons has six core values, which I think are very cool.

Be generous. Okay. You can be generous with your silence, uh,

Kristen: So like holding space. 

Mike: Generous transparency,

Kristen: Like being honest about what's happening for you with others. 

Mike: And generous with your appreciation.

Kristen: Yeah.

Mike: Be hearty in your approbations and lavish in your praise. Uh, be vulnerable.

Kristen: Yeah. So, and part of this is like, be willing to be coached yourself.

Mike: Yeah. Challenge yourself as much as you can in conversations to be clear about how you want to work together. This might look like telling people the truth about yourself, like, I'm loyal, which can be great, but it also means I may not challenge you as often as I might.

Kristen: Yeah. And you can also self-coach, so you can do a lot of like these same principles on yourself as well.

Mike: Be a student. Yeah. Here he references 52 teachers. His, the year of living brilliantly an online course where you get like a teach a, uh, some sort of like short,

I. Teaching segment every week. Uh, I actually loved this and I looked it up and I wanted to do it, but it seems to be, uh, under reconstruction.

Yeah. So, um, be an advice giver. If you're gonna give advice, do it well, it's not all coaching all the time. Start by knowing the right moments to give advice.You wanna reduce the, because I said so. It must be right aspect of advice giving. Also probably good for parenthood. You can say things like, here's my best guess.

I might be wrong.

Kristen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I was like softening it. And this is another thing. I think this goes back to your understanding, your inherent power, because softening your language, I think is something that women often do, a lot of inherently. So you have to kind of know yourself and where you are in that journey.

And, you wanna make sure you're not softening your language all the time. Right. But if there's a specific situation where, you know, it's, it's gonna be like a little tricky to give advice, um, it can be really helpful to do that. And he also talks about like, deliver it boldly, quickly, make it clear and then also debrief afterwards to make sure it was helpful.

Mike: I think I soften my language a lot.

Kristen: Yeah. But it can be really beneficial. It just depends on the context.

Mike: You can't do it all the time.

Kristen: Yeah, People will not respect you. They won't, they, Yeah. 

Mike: Uh, next principle, be naked on stage. And this actually has a, real life example.

MBS was in a play, I think in New Zealand or Australia, where he was from, where there was like full nudity and when he was in college or something like that. and as phrase as a personal value, but it's a reminder to accept the dare to provoke, to provide the humor in the moment and to remember that, the edge is probably not the edge at all.

I'm unsure of the actual sixth value because the organization of this list is weird. Uh, he has a lot of online resources, in the bonus section. And a lot of, there's leaders who are champions for coaching in their organization, and share their best wisdom. Kristen, will you please share the 12 new business books in the show notes?

He's got a, a list of good

Kristen: He's a great list of books. Yeah. And what I'll do, um, we probably won't have enough characters to put 'em all in there, but I'll link to his website where you can down, I mean, you have to sign up for his email list, but you can download, his book recommendations from all of his books actually.

Mike: There's a lot of stuff on his site that you don't have to like sign up for though. He's very conscious of that. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I have not gotten spam from him at all.

Kristen: Yeah. And I mean, you can always unsubscribe if it's too

Mike: Yeah. Uh, I love that he crosses out his acknowledgements section and instead calls it gratitude and he actually writes acknowledgement and crosses it out.

I think that's nice. And here's a good, he has a, some quotes in there too, like a list of great quotes. And here's one I liked a lot. I am glad that I paid so little attention to the good advice. Had I abided by it, I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.Edna St. Vincent Malay, who, I dunno who that is. Um, meow meow.. There was a cat appearance during my note taking work here. Uh, 

Kristen, what was your Did not resonate here.

Kristen: So, I mean, I don't, I don't have that much criticism. The organization of it does not bother me as much as it bothers you. Um, but I like lists a lot, so, you know,

Mike: I like lists too.

That makes sense.

Kristen: But, um, but yeah, I mean, I think there's, there's definitely parts of it get repetitive. I think the meat of it's very front loaded.

And there's a good amount of re repetition of stuff from the Coaching Habit. Yeah. So that is, if you read them super back to back, you might, like, you might find that a little annoying, but, or you might find it helpful to, to really help like internalize this stuff. But, I will say of the, these two books, the Coaching Habit is the better book.

So if, I think it's a more foundational book. So if you only have time to read one, I would read The Coaching Habit first. But these are both really good and I think the, especially the first like 60 pages of this book is just so packed with wisdom, I think.

Yeah.

Mike: For me, obviously I may have mentioned this, the organization of this book, oh my God, Michael is an amazing coach.

He's a genius, but my logical brain is looking for a kind of order he doesn't provide. I just say maybe that's for the best. I don't totally agree that The Coaching Habit is a better book. Huh? I I think it's a better book, but I think, I don't, the first part of this book is revolutionary.

Kristen: I like the first third of it is so, yeah. Good.

Mike: And under. And this whole thing about like intro, intro, he's really making you introspect yourself to find out why you are the way you are now. The techniques in the Coaching habit are for sure better. Well, not better, but like those are the techniques of being a better coach and you know,and being a better leader.

But if you don't introspect yourself to find out why you are the you won't get there. So

Kristen: So yeah. I mean, they're both extremely

Mike: valuable. They're so valuable. Okay. Life changing takeaways. Ending on a positive note, Kristen.

Kristen: So, I mean, I think overall this is a really awesome companion to The Coaching Habit.

Um, and it goes deeper into the advice monster than the Coaching Habit can in the pretty like relatively brief, easy to read format that it is in. I really like how much it focused on the self-awareness again, like that first third where that gets deep into it and like really understanding like what does it look like, when does it kick in, and why does it kick in?

Like what benefit are you getting from it? I think it just puts you in such a better position to be able to actually change it because the awareness is where it all starts. So what about you?

Mike: Uh, similar I say, you know, I have to continually,introspect myself. Am I working from a place of ego or self-aggrandizement or am I humble and empathetic and a supportive leader. The most useful thing for me, this book, it really feels like an aha moment.

The #winsnotwins and the TERA quotient I think are just so valuable. I have to be intentional with sorting these out. I will say also of all the books we review, aside from Jocko, of course. MBS is the author I would most like to meet, I, I feel like his stuff is so just like at the root of things and so profound.

Kristen: MBS come on our podcast.

Mike: MBS come on our podcast. 

Kristen: Or 

Mike: let's have some coffee.

Kristen: Yeah. or that,

Mike: So, um, thank you for tuning in. That's the Advice Trap by Michael Bungay Stanier. Uh, we will be back sometime this summer. Uh, Parenthood will probably make us a different, different types of leaders and coaches, and we're gonna try and incorporate that.

And someday, he'll hopefully come on the podcast

Kristen: As a guest

Mike: When he, when we're reviewing his New York Times bestselling book could happen.

you know? yep. Yeah, we will. Yeah. This is the last full episode we'll put out for a while, but, um, definitely the last book review.

Kristen: Definitely the last, yeah, the last LBC for a bit, but we will definitely be back. We will definitely continue doing this podcast that's really important to us.

We're just gonna figure out parenting for a little bit first. With a newborn,

Mike: We've already agreed that she's doing the diapers.

Kristen: No, we have not agreed to this. He keeps saying this, but um, it's absolutely not true. So, I will take a picture of Mike changing a diaper just to prove that that's, that's not our reality.

Mike: I mean that's fair.

Kristen: that's fair. All right. Well thank you guys for listening as always. And we will see you guys soon and hope everybody has a really amazing summer. Yes. Um, especially midsummer and we'll, we'll see you guys towards the end of it. 

Mike: Yes.

Thanks for tuning in.

Kristen: The Love and Leadership Podcast is produced and co-hosted by me, Kristen Brun Sharkey and co-hosted by Mike Sharkey. Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. We can't stress enough just how much these reviews help. You can follow us on LinkedIn under Kristen Brun Sharkey and Michael Sharkey, and on Instagram as loveleaderpod.

You can also find more information on our website, loveandleadershippod.com. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you again next week.