Hey folks,
I’ve got a tough question for you: what’s holding you back?
Today’s episode is all about resistance—the kind that sneaks in internally, shows up in your team, or trickles down from higher leadership.
Resistance is frustrating. It creates stagnation. It keeps great leaders from taking great action.
But bold leadership doesn’t ignore resistance. It confronts it head-on and turns obstacles into opportunities.
In this episode of The Chris LoCurto Show, I walk through what resistance really looks like, how to break the “why even try?” mindset, how to reignite boldness, and how to communicate in a way that fosters real collaboration.
This episode isn’t theory—we’ve packed in real-world examples and practical techniques you can implement today.
Whether you’re a seasoned leader or just getting started, this is one of those episodes that’s going to help you shift your thinking, refocus your team, and lead with confidence.
Let’s dive in. Here are the timestamps for each key section, with a quick preview of what’s inside (and yes, I share examples throughout!):
Story of Moses and the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt (00:02:15)
We kick off with a bold leadership example from Scripture—how Moses overcame internal doubt, team resistance, and an unmovable Pharaoh with faith and perseverance.
The Nature of Resistance: Where It Shows Up and Why (00:10:19)
Resistance can show up as fear, avoidance, apathy, or even passive-aggressive behavior—learn how to recognize it early and spot it in yourself, your team, or your leaders.
Breaking Barriers: Overcoming the “Why Try?” Mindset (00:14:48)
When people think, “It’s just going to fail,” they give up before they start—here’s how to ask powerful questions to shift limiting beliefs and inspire action.
Reigniting Boldness: Tackling Resistance with Confidence and Purpose (00:21:35)
You don’t defeat resistance by fighting it—you redirect it. Learn how to lead people toward ownership and accountability without fear.
Leading in All Directions: Encouraging Boldness in Your Team & Influencing Resistant Leaders (00:27:30)
Bold leaders don’t just lead down—they influence across and up, using questions, data, and curiosity to turn resistant leaders into allies.
Effective Communication: Techniques to Inspire Collaboration and Mutual Respect (00:31:01)
Resistance often comes from miscommunication and lack of trust—learn how to clarify expectations, set your team up for success, and stop confusion before it starts.
Action Items (00:36:32)
Five steps to lead boldly: identify resistance, challenge limiting beliefs, take bold weekly action, communicate clearly, and always lead with curiosity.
Additional Resources (00:38:04)
Check out Episode 333: Three Negative Mindsets Holding You Back Right Now—a deeper dive into how your mindset might be sabotaging your success.
Conclusion (00:38:24)
Resistance is inevitable—but how you lead through it determines your success. Take our quick survey at chrislocurto.com/survey to help us serve you even better and unlock your free five-day leadership challenge.
If this episode spoke to you, do yourself a favor—don’t just listen, apply it. And don’t keep it to yourself. Share it with your team, your colleagues, or that one leader you know who’s struggling to break through.
As always, take this information, change your leadership, change your business, change your life. And join us for the next episode of The Chris LoCurto Show.
621 | Bold Leadership vs. Resistance: Breaking Cycles and Leading Effectively
Today, we are diving into a critical leadership challenge. Resistance. Whether it's resistance within yourself, your team, or even from leaders above you, it can create frustration, stagnation, and many missed opportunities.
But bold leadership doesn't give into resistance and it doesn't ignore resistance. It confronts it head on and turns obstacles into. Into opportunities. That is coming up next.
Welcome to the Chris LoCurto show, where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are.
Welcome to the show, folks. I hope you're having a fabulous day wherever you are.
Today we're kind of exploring this concept of breaking the cycle of resistance, or caving to resistance, or ignoring resistance and learning how to lead effectively.
So today in the show, we're going to explore a few things. One, the nature of resistance, what it looks like, where it shows up, how to break barriers, how to overcome the why even try?
Mindset that so many folks have. Reigniting boldness, how to tackle resistance with confidence and purpose. You know, how do we do this?
This is one of those things that people always say, well, I hear you, but what do I do about it?
That's why we're always giving practical tips and steps on what to do.
Also leading in all directions, encouraging boldness in your team and influencing resistant leaders, which the more you do that, the more you model being someone who does not cave to resistance or does not ignore resistance, then you will start to affect those other leaders as well.
When they see that you can, they will learn that they can as well. Also, effective communication, how to foster collaboration and mutual respect.
All of that is stuff that we're going to hit today. So let's get started now.
Story of Moses and the Israelites' Exodus from Egypt (00:02:15)
A powerful parable that illustrates bold leadership. And I cannot even possibly get into this enough.
We're going to talk about Moses for a second and I will tell you right now, it took me we do a Bible study where we break it down piece by piece by piece, going through the Hebrew, looking at the context, all that kind of stuff.
And it took me almost three years just to teach Genesis. I'm in. I think I'm halfway through Exodus. So I'm giving you 60 seconds of Moses here and it's just not enough. But it is a good illustration anyways.
Even though it's just a very short piece now, Moses situation, it illustrates bold leadership versus resistance. It is the Israelites exodus from Egypt. Hopefully you know that story. If you do not, it's a phenomenal story.
Moses is called by God to lead the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, but he is faced with all kinds of resistance. And it's happening at incredible number of levels.
Obviously, it starts with him. Again, if you've read the story, Moses is the first person to resist this concept. I can't do this now. In hindsight, it's so easy to look back at this situation and go, what the heck, Moses?
God's got you covered. Listen, think of being a person that God calls and says, hey, I want you to march on up to D.C. and change.
Change the president's mindset, Change the. I want you to go over to Mexico and change the way that their government runs the country.
I want you to go on over to Canada. Imagine being the person who is sent into, you know, that kind of a hotbed, that.
That kind of a political center. But on top of this, most people believed Pharaoh was a God. Pharaoh believed he was a God, right? So Moses has very understandable resistance in this beginning.
And I know a lot of us think that we would just be. I'm all about it. God, send me in, you know, put me in coach, I got this. But I'm telling you, it's understandable when you realize what he's walking into.
So he resists himself. His own people resist him. We see an incredible amount of times that the Israelite folks resist him. Now there's all kinds of understanding why that was and, you know, what was everything that was a part of that.
If you really dig in and understand what was going on at the time, the culture, all that kind of stuff. And then obviously Pharaoh resists him like crazy.
The big thing that we see from Moses, couple, couple of pieces here, is that when God initially calls Moses, he doubts his ability to lead. He even asked the question, who am I to do this?
Who am I to be able to stand up to Pharaoh even though he had been in that household before? Who am I to do this? Who am I to make this happen? He did not believe that he was capable of doing this.
Even though this is interesting, so many people, I believe most people miss this. God says, I'm going to send you down there. This is what you're going to do.
And when you leave, I'm going to bless you. And, you know, you're going to be leaving with flux and gold and silver and all kinds of stuff. God already tells them the end. This is key.
This has happened in my life where I felt like God was calling me in a direction and I struggled with how I was going to accomplish it, not recognizing that.
God doesn't call people to failure. He calls people to success. So God tells Moses, hey, this is what I'm going to have you do. And what's Moses's first response?
What if he doesn't listen to me? God's already saying he gave him the outcome. Not only are you going to go do this, it's going to be a problem.
He's going to push back, there's going to be issues, but you're going to be leaving with success.
And our mindset, that limiting belief mindset, that negative self talk that, that terrible narrative that ends up in our brain had Moses saying, but what if, but what if?
And that's where we spend so much of our time. Pharaoh did repeatedly reject his demands. And even the Israelites complained and resisted his leadership. Even when Moses got tough, right?
Yet Moses persisted. He boldly confronted pharaoh. He endured 10 plagues and and ultimately led his people through the Red Sea to freedom.
Despite resistance, despite setbacks, despite uncertainty, his leadership was defined by a few things. Faith, courage, and perseverance.
So here's what I want you to take away from that fantastic, amazing story is that bold leadership often means pushing forward in the face of overwhelming resistance, even when those you lead doubt you.
And folks, I'm completely aware that's one of the toughest things in leadership, is leading people even when they doubt you.
True leaders don't avoid challenges. They face them with confidence and conviction. That is stuff that I've been through. I've experienced that.
I have been in those places where people don't trust that I'm moving in the right direction. And I am like, well, they're just not able to get there. But we're going this way right now. I am somebody. I will say this. My big caveat is always this.
I am a huge perspective gatherer. I am somebody who takes calculated risks. I'm not the kind of person who shoots from the hip, right?
I'm somebody who's going to calculate the situation, the risks, everything, and then make a decision and move forward.
But many times I've had folks, as I've been leading people, over three decades, I've had folks that maybe their resistance was because it was confrontation for them and they couldn't stand it.
Maybe it was because it was change, maybe it's because they truly believed I was a lunatic.
Whatever it was, when I have done the proper research, when I have gained the proper perspective, when I've done the proper calculations and I know it's the right direction to go in, that's the direction I'm going in.
And in my early days, I will tell you, I have got a. I've got a memento in my safe that I have had for decades of a decision that I made trusting another leader who was well beyond me and very wise and smart and experienced.
But I believed I had the right answer and I believed I was moving in the right direction. And it got adjusted on me and I gave in and said, okay, well, this person knows much better than me, so I'm just going to trust them and move in that direction.
And it costs a lot. It cost a lot. Why am I telling you that? Because there are times you know the answer, you know what's right, you know what you should do, you know what you can't do.
And because of the influence of others, whether they are subordinates, whether they are leaders above you, there are times that you back out because the influence has you scared, or the influence has you believing that maybe you're wrong.
Or fill in the blank. I've been there. I know what it's like.
And that reminder reminds me, when I know that this is the right thing to do, move.
Or if I'm a subordinate to somebody else, then, hey, I'm sorry, I can't go in that direction because I believe it's going to go the wrong way or, you know, I can't take responsibility for that because I believe it's going to fail or whatever it is, right?
So I want you to think about that as I walk through all these different steps, you need to have some caveats. One of those needs to be, are you somebody who gains quality perspective?
Are you somebody who really takes a hard look at the risks, calculates the daylights out of it, and assesses what's okay, you know, what's doable, what's not doable, Right? So let's dive into the key points that we're gonna discuss today.
The Nature of Resistance: Where It Shows Up and Why (00:10:19)
The first thing is the nature of resistance. And you know, where it shows up and why. So resistance isn't always obvious. It can show up in many different ways.
It can be internal resistance, which is going to be obviously. Why say obviously? You may not even recognize the voice in your own head of self doubt, of fear, of failure, of imposter syndrome. You know, who am I to do this?
As Moses said, there are all kinds of fears and experiences that we have inside of our own mind. Some of those are based on situations in the past.
Many of them, all of my Next-Level Life folks that have been through Next-Level Life, many of them are suggestions from other people that aren't true. Many of the things that you hear in your head are tapes from other people because of their insecurities.
And many of them are ones that you have created yourself. I can't do this because I'm not good at this. I'm not strong enough. Everybody says this is going to fail.
The last thing I want, want to do is fail. Right? All of those fears that you're experiencing in there, right. If you operate off of the internal resistance, you'll never do anything of any scale, of any size, of any greatness because you will always be shooting yourself down.
So this is something that we need to understand and we need to learn how to overcome that team resistance. It's quite often we get employees pushing back on change.
That's, that's a common thing. High S's, High C's are consistently pushing back on change because it's confrontation, it's conflict to them. They don't like it, but it doesn't mean that they're right.
Now, there's many times that a fantastically mature High C or High S is evaluating a situation and seeing that the change is not good.
And maybe we have, you know, somebody who's shooting from the hip and they're giving fantastic quality information that should be perspective gathering.
But there's also many times where a High S or High C is immature and they push back because they don't want the change.
So refusing things like change or one of the biggest, refusing accountability, that could be a huge resistance that you experience from your team or even finding out that as you're pushing forward with something, some of the resistance comes in a level of apathy.
You know, I don't believe this is going to work out. So I'm just going to kind of silently sabotage this thing with my actions or my lack of actions.
Another area that you can get resistance from is leadership. Leadership resistance, leaders above you, unwilling to listen, unwilling to take risks, unwilling to empower others.
These are all areas that you're probably going to experience resistance as a leader. Obviously you can take this and apply to the home life.
You know, where are you going to experience this from? A spouse, children, family members, parents, you know, siblings, whoever it is. Right. So let's take an example.
Let's say that you've rolled out a new initiative, but your team is just totally not engaged. Their, their body language is not engaged.
They're having passive aggressive responses towards it or just plain avoidance. Right. That all of that indicates that there is a level of hidden resistance.
If you're looking at their body language, if you're looking at responses. Now, if they're verbalizing stuff, that's a little bit easier to see the resistance.
And if you don't take it personally, if you do not get emotionally handcuffed to it like so many people do, and you hear me talk about it all the time, don't get emotionally handcuffed.
Look at the situation, watch it like a movie, see what somebody's struggling with, and then address it from there.
But if you get emotionally handcuffed to it, you're done. You're going to be responding with your emotions. It's a terrible thing to do. Right.
Recognizing resistance early allows you to diagnose the issue and address it before it causes stagnation. Or, you know, like I say, you know, silent sabotage is.
Pat Lynchioni says it's such a great line that people can sabotage what you're trying to accomplish without having to say anything in the meeting, the discussion, any of that kind of stuff.
So first thing we need to know is we need to know where and why it shows up.
Breaking Barriers: Overcoming the "Why Try?" Mindset (00:14:48)
Second thing, breaking barriers, overcoming the why even try Mindset, which I. That's one that just absolutely.
I'm going to tell you, as somebody who has been leading people, leading leaders, leading entrepreneurs, business owners, companies for decades, one thing that absolutely drives me nuts is the why even try mindset. I hate it.
You know, so many times resistance thrives on learned helplessness, if you will. You know, people get stuck in a cycle of failure or inaction, and they're convinced that change definitely isn't even worth it.
Now, there is the level of hopelessness, and then there is the fear of failure. Or also something that we will see in certain personality styles is the fear of being wrong or looking stupid.
Well, if I do this, I might look stupid, so why even try?
I don't even want to try that. Also, there is also, if we go to our super high Cs, there is a level of but if I try this, it might fail, and that's a waste of time. Yeah, but fix it and move on.
Well, then why even do it? If it's not going to have the outcome, then why even do it in the first place? Because it's a process.
We're practicing this. We're learning how to get to this place. It's okay if we have some failure. The key is, do we fix it and move on? Right. So you will find some folks will have this why even try mindset?
Because one failure is not good for them. One failure says that they're not a Good enough person that they're a failure, this must be overcome, Right? You cannot allow somebody to struggle with it.
I'm not saying that you're going to be able to fix it internally with that person right away, but you can't hold back because they can't get there. Does that make sense?
So let's take an example of a team member who hesitates to take ownership on a project because nothing ever changes around here, right?
Well, I don't want to. I don't want to take ownership. I don't want to take responsibility.
Nothing ever changes. Well, that's great. So what should you do? How about you ask some phenomenal questions to shift their perspective, Right?
How about you help them change their current perspective? What does that look like? I don't know. Ask questions like, hey, what's holding you back from trying something different?
You might be amazed. This could be an hour long conversation right there. Hey, what's holding you back? Well, this has happened in the past and this and this.
And it's giving you perspective that you now can address. You can now do something with this. Unless you become emotionally handcuffed, then you're just going to become defensive.
That is going to be a waste of time. But if you will spend time addressing those issues, you will be amazed at how much you can solve. And you can help somebody have proper perspective, right?
Ask great questions. How about, hey, what's the worst thing that could happen if you stepped up?
Another fantastic question. What you're going to see, probably 90% of the time, you're going to see the fear of failure, right? Well, what if this goes wrong?
What if this, what if it does? And what you'll see is that people are usually concerned about judgment.
They're concerned about how people are going to see them, experience them, label them. That's usually the big issue. This gives you another fantastic opportunity to talk through that with them.
Why do you care what other people think? Why do you care what these people are?
If somebody is judging you because this thing failed, that I'm putting you in this position to do, why are you worried about how they're going to judge you?
What if instead you focused on something incredibly important that you're practicing and growing as a leader or a team member, you're practicing and moving in better directions, gaining experience, right?
So it gives you a great opportunity to talk through that fear of judgment, right? That fear of failure. What it looks like when it comes to other people, that is huge.
But what about if they just think, well, it's going to fail and you're going to be upset at me. Well, that's a great opportunity for you to put parameters on this. I have been there with leaders in the past.
I have been there that when I took ownership and responsibility and ran with something, if it didn't do as well as a leader expected, then I was a colossal failure no matter what.
There wasn't, hey, let's dig in and find out why it went wrong. How do we fix this? There wasn't accountability along the way. This is, this is why I teach what I teach folks. The things that I teach are the failures that I experienced in my life.
I learned how to fix them and teach you so that you could do it too. Right. That's how we solve problems around our place. We don't sit there, put somebody in charge of something and then if it fails, go, well, you're a piece of crap.
Instead, what we do is we are walking with them through the process, holding them accountable, having discussions, what's working and what's not. We're doing the things to set it up for success.
We don't just dump it on one person and wait to see what happens, which I've experienced that so much in my younger life with other leaders above me. Right.
So what do you do when somebody's concerned that you're going to be disappointed? You show up, show up as a leader, help them to understand what you're going to do to make this successful.
Help them to understand how you're going to walk them through this process as well.
You're going to work with. But Kris, I don't know anything about it. That's why I've got them in that enroll. Yep.
But you're still a leader who can look at things and maybe analyze problems, situations, ask questions, find out what's working, what's not, hold them accountable, help them out in the process as well.
So these are things that you can do. What if, you know, if you ask somebody what's the worst thing that's going to happen if you step up, what you'll discover is there's a really good chance they're going to give you great questions.
Also, what if you said something like, you know, what if this time things actually do change? You know, I hear you. Things haven't changed.
But what if this is the process that gets them to change? Shouldn't we be looking at this as an opportunity to change instead of an already failed process that we haven't even started yet?
So helping people to recognize their own limiting beliefs can absolutely inspire them to take action instead of staying stuck, instead of staying in that fear of failure.
Reigniting Boldness: Tackling Resistance with Confidence and Purpose (00:21:35)
Number three, reigniting boldness. Tackling resistance with confidence and bold purpose. So you have to understand that bold leaders don't just push back against resistance.
They redirect it towards action. Folks, you don't just battle resistance. You don't just defend yourself. You don't just argue resistance. This is a colossal waste of time.
Now, helping somebody to gain perspective is fantastic, but sitting there emotionally handcuffed and arguing against resistance is a colossal waste of time.
Don't waste your time. Instead, point that towards action. So, for example, let's say a business owner is struggling to implement accountability.
I know none of you out there struggle with implementing accountability. I'm being sarcastic because that happens to be one of the biggest issues.
All leaders, all leaders that we work with. I shouldn't say all. Let me rephrase. Most leaders that we work with, a large number struggle with implementing accountability.
One of the biggest reasons is because they fear that, you know, if they put higher standards in place, that they're probably going to cause team members to leave. Aha. You just might.
Just about every StratPlan that we talk about implementing accountability, one of the things I tell them is, hey, listen, you might have one or two people back at the office that when you do this, they're not going to like it and they may walk out.
That's exactly what you want. Oh, gosh, no, Chris. I can't lose people. I can't. Listen, if people cannot step up to higher standards and people leave, listen to me.
Because they don't want accountability, then those are the absolute last people you want on your team. You do not want people who are unwilling to accept accountability. Period.
There is no ifs, no ends, no buts about this. You should not hold on to a team member who is unwilling to accept accountability, allow that person to either step up or step out.
I'm sorry. I don't care what they do. I don't care if they, you know, if they're a rainmaker inside of your business. If they can't have accountability, I don't need them.
Why is that so important? Because if they won't accept accountability, then I'm freaking herding cats all the time. I'm having to manage the living daylights out of people who will not receive or accept accountability. And that's not my goal as a leader.
I don't. I don't want that job. What I want to do is lead people to be able to receive accountability so that they rock their roles on their own, they do a great job, they're self motivated, they kill it.
They're able to step up and go, hey, I failed at this. What can I do differently? You know, they can take responsibility, they can take ownership.
So instead of fearing the consequences of, you know, team members leaving or whatever else, or them pushing back too much or whatever it is, what if you reframed the narrative?
What if you ask questions like what happens if you don't take bold action? What's going to happen? And allow them to speak into that, allow them to come up with information.
Chances are if there's somebody who doesn't want to receive accountability, they're probably not going to have any good answers. So help them along.
Ask questions like who suffers when you avoid difficult decision making? How does your lack of difficult decision making affects the company, the team, the clients, whoever?
You know, what about what's the long term impact of tolerating resistance? You know, like this resistance that, you know, I'm experiencing with you right now, what do you think the long term impact of that is going to be?
When you step up and you're able to embrace the temporary, the temporary discomfort, then what you're going to experience is long term success.
But if you back down and you allow team members or even leaders to push you around with, no, I don't want that because.
And it, it shows that it, there's definitely a fear of accountability, then what you're going to find is we're not going to move the needle. We're going to stay the same.
We're going to struggle through, you know, ins and outs of every aspect. We're going to struggle through not growing and failing and not learning how to practice and not learning how to grow.
So take bold leadership and what you will find, you know, pushing back on that, you will find that it's going to suck for a bit.
But the more you model this and you help other people to experience it and walk through it, you will be blown away at how people just start doing this.
I can never say enough about my team. I can never say enough about how, you know, what we do for a living in coaching leaders, business owners, team members, all that kind of fun stuff.
I can never say enough about how much my team does what we teach.
It is always fantastic to watch my team members just killing it at what we actually teach teach. It's energizing, it's relieving. It allows me to not have to manage the daylights out of stuff.
I don't have to manage squat, Right? My leaders don't have to manage squat. We're able to lead people, they're able to be vulnerable, they trust each other, they speak into things, they give great input.
It's just fantastic.
Leading in All Directions: Encouraging Boldness in Your Team & Influencing Resistant Leaders (00:27:30)
All right, number four, leading in all directions, encouraging boldness in your team and influencing resistant leaders. So great leaders, great leaders influence up.
And you don't have to be a leader to influence up. You can be a team member and influence up. But speaking to leaders, great leaders influence up, they influence down, they influence across.
You can lead up to encourage, buy in from resistant higher ups and then lead down to empower your team.
So let's say a leader has a vision for streamlining processes, but they've got a boss that shuts it down, you know, without discussion. No, we're not doing that. Right.
So what do you do? I've had so many people ask me this over the decades, Chris, what do I do? I have a leader who won't listen. You know, anytime I suggest something, they shoot it down and, you know, yada, yada, yada.
What if you started influencing with questions? What if you started influencing with data?
What if instead of just saying, hey, we need to do this thing, which a lot of people approach leaders, you know, with that mindset, I'm just going to tell the leader what we need to do and that leader is going to be so blown away, you know, and happy with me, and surely they're going to let me do this.
Now that's not necessarily true.
Many times a lack of information causes a leader to shut something down quickly because it wasn't presented. Well, I can tell you now, granted, those leaders should be digging in with questions to gain quality perspective.
There's no doubt about that. But what if you just beat them to the punch? What if you brought the information, what if you said things like, hey, would you be open to, you know, a pilot program to test this out?
You know, we want to put in, we want to do better processes. We feel like we're, we're failing in certain areas, we're not doing as well, yada, yada, yada.
Would you mind if we just did a pilot program of testing out these, these changes in processes? What about 30 days? Let's make it 90 days, and if it fails after 90 days, we just shut it down. Is that something that you would be willing to do?
What if you brought other information like, hey, here's how other companies have successfully implemented this, right? Would you be open to discussing how they've done it?
You know, just to dig in and see and gain some quality perspective. Or what about, you know, asking questions like what concerns do you have about this change and how can we address them?
Now that's a great question to dig and get perspective, but I'm going to tell you to think like that leader and try and understand what, what issues they're already going to have.
You'll probably find out you already know some of them. So when you do this, when you kind of help by influencing through questions and data, instead of just saying, hey, we should do this, then what happens is you can show that you're being curious.
You can show that you're not leading with confrontation. You're not creating confrontation. You're actually making it easier for somebody to digest.
You're giving them more information so they have better perspective and it doesn't feel like you're putting them on the spot, which can be conflict for them. Right.
So lead them through with great questions, great information, great data, great perspective. When you do that, you will find that meeting that resistance with engagement with strategic dialogue actually tends to shut that down considerably.
Effective Communication: Techniques to Inspire Collaboration and Mutual Respect (00:31:01)
Number five, effective communication. So some techniques to inspire collaboration and super important mutual respect.
So resistance is often fueled by an incredible amount of miscommunication and, or a lack of trust. You will find that if you dig in and a lot of people won't say it.
You know, if you get in, you know, in StratPlan, it's something we're able to work through with a leadership team that we can find that there is a lack of trust that people are going to do what they say.
Or a lack of trust that people are going to handle something well, or a lack of trust that somebody's going to have somebody else's back.
Right? That's definitely a big issue.
However, by far, so much of that lack of trust comes from terrible communication. The miscommunication that happens inside a leadership team or, or communicating on projects or whatever.
That is what causes so many people to be resistant. So when you have strong communication, then it absolutely fosters alignment, it reduces pushback. Why?
Because so much of the pushback is mitigated with the information. It's what I've been saying, right?
When you help somebody to know exactly what you're talking about, you get them the right information, then they don't feel so resistant.
So for example, if you had a manager who was like really unclear, giving unclear directives, and then they get super frustrated when results don't meet the expectations.
I know you've never experience that and surely you've never been that person. Right. We all have that. That is a terrible place to be.
Why? Because you're expecting an outcome and you have not directed people well.
You expect they come to a certain place and had you communicated really well, had you guide them to what the outcome should look like and the expectations and the steps to get there and the vision and all this kind of stuff, then they have a much higher chance of being successful.
But this is where, like I say, in my early years of leadership I experienced that with leaders where it's like, I need you to go do this thing and then it's like, okay, great, you go run with it and then it doesn't turn out the way they want and then they're super pissed off and then they give you information that they never did in the first place.
Now again, as a team member or young leader or whatever, you should be getting as much perspective as you possibly can.
But what is not okay is you as a leader shutting somebody down, treating them like crap because you did a terrible job, terrible job giving them direction on where they should end up, right?
So if they don't get to the expected results that you had, shame on you. You did a terrible job.
Well, they should have asked more questions. Hey, leader, that all comes back to you. If you didn't teach them to ask perspective gathering questions, that comes back on you too.
So use clear, intentional communication. Be direct, but be respectful. Hey, I need you to own this project and hit these specific milestones.
So here's my question for you. What support do you need? You know, how can we make this happen?
You know, digging in, provide the context, right? Here's, here's why this change matters.
Here's how this is going to benefit you. It's going to benefit the team, it's going to benefit the company, the clients, the vendors, whatever.
Share the context so they understand it. Especially for folks that need a bigger context to do the work that you're asking them to do.
Create a phenomenal feedback loop, make sure that you're doing regular check ins, make sure that you are, you know, ensuring people feel heard, that they feel valued. Right?
Because if you leave them out there and all they feel is, is that this has been dumped on them and you know, it's up to them to, you know, win or fail, then they're probably going to be very careful about how much they put their neck on the chopping block, right?
They're probably not going to take huge risks if you haven't done a good job helping them to see that that you care about them, that you're, you care about their success, all this stuff, then what you may discover is the last thing that they want to do is take big risks.
They will probably say, do them in their mind subconsciously. Do the minimum amount to be successful, do that, and let's rock on from there.
So understand that communication isn't just about talking. Many folks think that they are great communicators because they talk. Well, that's not it.
You've heard me say this. It's your job to set the other person up for success with your communication. You should be communicating in a way that sets the other person up for success.
So it's about ensuring clarity, it's about ensuring understanding, and it's about building trust.
If I can trust you that you are going to set me up for success and then not lop my head off if things fail, but instead help me, you know, before the end, help me to, you know, learn what's going wrong, what's going right, and make those adjustments, then I can build a lot of trust.
Action Items (00:36:32)
So here's some action items. So if you want to break the cycle of resistance and lead boldly, then I want you to start with these steps.
First, identify the resistance. Whether it's in you, whether it's in your team, whether it's leaders above you, identify it.
Number two, challenge limiting beliefs for the love.
Ask powerful questions that help people to overcome their limiting beliefs. When you do this, you set people free, lead people into challenging their own limiting beliefs.
Number three, take one bold action a week that moves you and your team forward. Just take one bold action, right? As you do this, you're gonna build DNA.
You're gonna practice how we execute the bold action. You're going to practice how we solve failures, how we solve issues. You'll be practicing that the whole entire time. That is going to help your team members to know what to do.
Number four, communicate with clarity to align expectations to reduce pushback, to really reduce the resistance. Number five, lead with curiosity.
You hear me say this, write down the words be curious. Put it on a post it note, put it on your monitor, put it on your phone. Do something, but be curious, right?
The more curious you are, the more information you're going to pull out. So lead with curiosity, not with confrontation.
So influenced by engaging in meaningful conversations.
Additional Resources (00:38:04)
So some additional resources that I want you to listen to.
Episode 333, which is Three Negative Mindsets Holding You Back Right Now. That is an encore episode.
So while many people focus on solving surface level problems, we blow past it to discover the why and you know, what's behind what's happening.
Conclusion (00:38:24)
Now. With all of that being said, here is our hope.
Our hope is that we are giving you what you need, the content that you need to make your leadership better. Right? We're working on making our leadership content even better than we're doing right now.
And we want to make sure that we're tackling the real challenges that you are facing in your business and leadership.
So we created a super quick 5 minute survey so that we can hear from you what's stressing you out, what leadership advice you need most, what would truly help you grow so your honest input will shape our content.
Plus, as a thank you, we're giving you exclusive access to a free five day leadership challenge, which is usually exclusive for clients. So you can find the survey link in the podcast description or visit chrislocurto.com/survey.
That's chrislocurto.com/survey and let's build something that actually means a difference for you.
Folks, please do us this favor. If we have helped you in any way, then we're asking for you to help us so that we can continue to learn and grow.
How do we provide the best content? How do we provide the best help for you? So once again, drop down in the description or go to chrislocurto.com/survey.
All right, takeaways for today. Bold leadership isn't about overpowering resistance. It's about understanding it. It's about addressing it. It's about moving forward with purpose.
Resistance, unfortunately. Well, I shouldn't say unfortunately, fortunately, because it is what grows us. The challenges are what grow us.
Right? Resistance is inevitable, but how you handle it determines your success as a leader. So if today's episode spoke to you, don't keep it to yourself.
Share it with your team, your colleagues, and your fellow leaders.
Well, folks, that's all the time that we have for today. I hope this has really helped you. As always, I want you to take this information. Change your leadership, change your business, change your life, and join us on the next episode.
