684 | Your Words Carry More Weight Than You Know

You said it as a thought. They heard it as a decision. And now you're wondering why there's tension. 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 are talking about something that can create trust issues in a lot of businesses.

And usually the leader has no idea what's happening. So let's get into it. Back in the studio is Joel Fortner. Joel, welcome back to the show.

Thank you. Thank you. So good to be back.

We are hitting something that you and I get from time to time. I love this topic because, one, you and I have experienced this. We've experienced in our own business. You've experienced this a lot outside of this.

We're talking about when leaders are giving information or communicating and they say something, the style that they're communicating in, and they don't realize that what they've just communicated is being received as a directive.

So kind of talk to this a little bit.

Why Leaders Don't Realize the Weight of Their Words (00:01:27)

Yeah. So, you know, sometimes as leaders, we don't realize the weight that our words have, that we think that sometimes we're just riffing, we're just talking.

We're just, you know, hey, I like that. Hey, I think maybe we should do that sometime. And. But sometimes we don't realize how people are perceiving us and receiving what we say.

And as a leader, we've got to be able to realize the weight of what we say and the authority it can come with sometimes. And these are. This is like one of those really small things, Chris, that I don't even--

A lot of people probably listening are like, you know, I don't even think about this topic very much. Maybe you do, but it's one of those really small things in leadership that shows up in communication. But it's pretty vital.

And so I don't want to get to this too soon, but we do need to go through. I'd love to hear your ideas of times. And we've experienced that with me because I know that there have been times in years past.

I mean, it's been an incredibly long time, but can think of times in years past where some team members maybe have moved out on stuff.

And it was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's not. That's not what we were saying. The major thing that we're communicating today is this, when you don't communicate, if you're just like you said riffing.

I love that. Christopher Walken in a video just went through my mind on that one. That was fantastic.

When you're just sharing information or just talking, we as leaders or business owners, we want to be able to just get words out. We want to be able to just say something.

Many times we're looking for input. Many times we're looking for pushback. Many times we just want to say it out loud because we want to hear it ourselves so that we could go, is that what I mean?

You know, so many times people say, well, I process out loud. You and I are both people who tend to do that. We tend to process out loud. We'll say things. And it's like, well, now that I've said it, let me adjust or let me think differently.

But what can happen and actually does happen a decent amount of the time is depending upon who you're talking to, they are hearing something, that it comes from loyalty.

It comes from wanting to serve. It comes from wanting to take care of the leader or the business owner. You say something and it becomes that directive. It becomes, Joel just said that I'm going to make that thing happen.

And it is not from any type of, you know, crazy malice. There's no malice whatsoever in this decision.

But what happens is, because we're not recognizing how we're being received, we don't see that somebody just took that information and is going to actually go make something happen.

So why is it that we are spending that time not recognizing how we are affecting other people?

That the thing that we're saying, why is it that we as leaders don't recognize that somebody's hearing that and they're taking one piece and going, run with that and make it happen?

The Loyalty Problem — When Teams Run with What You Never Meant (00:04:32)

Yeah, I think sometimes leaders just don't recognize their authority. But there are also some leaders that are probably hearing this right now, Chris, thinking, I have the other problem, that I say stuff all the time and people don't do anything with it.

And that's why sometimes people, leaders will think, well, it doesn't really matter what I say because. And that's where their mind goes. And so we're going to get into all these today.

But leaders have different problems here. But usually it's a, hey, I'm just one of you. I don't look at myself as any differently. Let's say you're a small business owner, that you've grown this business. You don't see yourself often as like, I am the leader.

You know, everyone, like, hear me when I speak. And you have to be very explicit and intentional about this kind of a thing. So I. I have. I.

You know, I spent 10 years in Air Force culture. And so you learn to listen to your leaders and your commanders and your directors when they speak.

Like, it's just part of the culture, but also working for you, Chris.

Like, you're such an intentional leader that without even having to say it, you create the culture that people who are loyal to you, who want to do a good job are going to listen to what you say, and they're going to screen and filter your information for:

That's a task. I need to go look at that. Chris desires that. He's interested in that. Go work that.

And sometimes I tell you, like, I feel guilty at times over the years because I'm not getting back to you in a timely manner, but you've not laid out a timeline sometimes, but I have.

And then days will go by, and I'm like, I still haven't gotten back to Chris on that.

I feel bad that I haven't gotten back to him on that. I wonder if he's thinking, gosh, Joel, where are you on that thing?

That it is. It cracks me up because. And something you said is exactly where my brain is, exactly how I think. I don't think of myself, you know, as you lay out, like, the, the commander role, I could totally see in a commander's mindset.

We're talking about this. You should be doing something about it. Right. It is very hierarchical. You know, this is how things work. I just shared this information. Run with it. Get back to me.

For me, I don't think that way. I think the way you laid it out. I'm just one of you. We're just talking. We're just having a conversation. Now. There's. I believe.

And please correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I believe that when I do want something to be, you know, taken seriously or action put to it, then I'll, I'll ask or I'll discuss it, or I'll say, hey, you know, who's doing this?

Wonder, what's the timeline? All that kind of stuff.

Yeah, yeah that's true.

And that's. But there's also times that I will say something important. And we literally just had a call 30 minutes ago, I think something like that, where you asked me a question, and I'm just saying stuff out loud because I'm processing.

You asked me the question. I'm processing it out loud. But sitting here, I could totally see how that could have been taken as Chris wants me to do something with it.

Now you and I have the relationship that. That doesn't even happen anymore. I mean, it's just really like you even ask in there, you know, do you want something done with that?

That is the right question to ask. But it makes sense to me that especially in one of the things we talk about a lot is folks that are looking to please the leader.

Now, as I say this, there's a lot of leaders out there that are going, well, great, that's exactly what I want. You don't want it if what it does is disrupts priority.

It disrupts, you know, process. It disrupts, you know, money. Yeah, money, a direction, anything like that.

The last thing you want is somebody who's trying to please you as a leader putting something on the back burner because you said something, and now they're running with it.

But we do have those folks that when we talk about this over the years, they're like, well, that's exactly what I want. No, it's not. That's not what you want.

What you want is somebody who hears what you're saying, and then if this is something you want action put to, create a prioritization here, where does this land, who's supposed to do it, what's the time, all that kind of stuff.

So we've got to get to a place where we recognize that there's really.

While there's many types of communication and process, there's really three types that we, you know, a framework, if you will, that we have to understand to recognize where we are when we're communicating and what we can expect that might happen or might not happen.

Hit those, walk through those for us.

Type 1 — Information (The Decision Is Made) (00:09:42)

Yeah. So type one is just information.

It's being able to say that you've decided and you're just letting someone know and you're communicating it super clearly, very cleanly, because the decision has been made.

But what I don't want to be lost in our conversation is just that mindset that a leader needs to have of being that intentional with how are you setting up your team for success? Because so much of communication, that's what it is.

It's not just communication. It's, am I setting people up for success? It's the thoughtfulness of knowing. I've thought this through. I've researched it. I've made a decision. This is what we're going to do. Yeah.

Guys, are you on the same page with me? What questions do you have? It's just informational. And that is your intent.

Yeah, that I think most people believe that's where they are. Would you agree?

Probably. Yeah. Yeah, I can totally see that. Yeah. Yeah. And so related to this is the mindset of what happens when, when communication goes awry.

So if I can like take a step backwards for a moment before we really unpack these three types even more that it's not always the case, but it's when you're leading, it's--

Do you know that your leaders care about your priorities? Like to me it's been pretty ingrained and I've not always been perfect at it.

That's not what I'm saying. But it's been very ingrained to me to care about my leaders priorities and if it's a priority to them, make it a priority to you.

So where am I going with this? If you're a leader and you've got people that think like I tend to think, which is work your boss's priorities, which, you know, we jokingly say, we don't say boss around here.

You're not a boss because you're going to call me an employee and I'm not going to like that. So. So the point is if you know, wow, I've got a bunch of people that care about working my priorities as a leader.

When I give information, I have to know what may be on the line. Right. That these people are going to work my stuff because that's the level of leadership and connectedness that we have.

That's my background, that's what I come into. So I listen for that. And again, it just shows how intentional you have to be. On type number one, when you give information you got to realize these kinds of things I'm talking about right now.

Yeah. And so this is so different what you experience. I think a lot of people experience obviously coming, you know, whenever you're coming from a military background or part of that.

That is what's set up. Rank and file is set up. Communication structure is set up. The expectation of, you know, whoever the commander is, that's their priority is the thing I work. That sounds fantastic.

As we, as we're saying that sounds fantastic. In a business world we've laid out a few of those issues as to why that's a problem. Here's another thing that a lot of leaders don't think about.

When I have team members or even leaders, if it's my leadership team, we see a ton of businesses where the leadership team unintentionally, this isn't.

They don't even know this until they sit literally in our room during a StratPlan or an EBS or something, and we're walking through one. Communication is happening coming from a business owner to a leadership team.

That's where we help them to see that the way that they're executing things is just, you know, I want to make the business owner happy.

I want to take stuff off of their plate. I see that there's a lot of stress on their shoulders. How do I help? The problem with that concept is multifaceted.

One we explained already. It may not even be a directive. It may not even be something that they want to have happen. It may just be something that they want a discussion around. It may just be information. It may just be perspective gathering.

But here's what I want people to really hear. If you're a business owner or leader and you have people who are doing this, I want you to hear this because what you're doing is holding those people in that mindset, that state of mind.

Where a big part of their daily goal is to please the leader or business owner instead of growing in their own role.

What I mean by that is, if I'm always trying to figure out what Joel Fortner's priorities are, you know, if I'm on your team and I'm always listening for priority and I'm going to go make you happy by me running and doing that thing, then instead of becoming a better version of myself, my leadership, my role, whatever it is, I continue to just focus on pleasing you.

When you talk to almost every leader, and I've not had a leader who wants that, so I'm just saying almost everyone, I can say 100% of the leaders that we've worked with, I could just say that...

100% of the leaders that we've worked with that have that situation or have had that situation, none of them want that, especially when it's their leadership team.

What they are looking for is a leader who steps up as a leader and then carries weight that comes off of that business owner or that higher leader instead of doing the tasks that please the leader because they're not thinking that way.

So the downsides of this were, again, it can sound fantastic to anybody just going, man, I really wish people would just hear what I say and run with it.

The downsides can be detrimental to what your goals are like.

If you have any desire whatsoever to head in a specific direction, get a specific strategy going where we can move the whole company, the whole team in one direction, you're going to find that's going to be consistently torpedoed by somebody who's trying to please you by going after your specific priorities, thoughts on any of that?

Yep, that completely can happen.

And that's where having the clarity in the communication as a leadership team is so important, of knowing, hey, we're talking about this together.

It's like, this isn't just me making a decision. And then you go execute. It's you talk, we talk, you communicate, we ask questions, and then we get to a decision.

And then when you as the leader were making a decision, because even in a unified leadership team, somebody has to make a call and someone has to make a decision.

And now it's a matter of what are you, in the context of our episode today, what are people hearing?

Is it a decision? Is it cloudy? Is it unclear? And being very clear with, this is the decision, now that we have discussed it really well as a leadership team, let's make the decision. This is what we're now going to go do.

Are we all on the same page there? Yes, we're all on the same page there.

Now we can go forward with clarity rather than the owner feeling like, dang, I have to come up with everything. I have to make all the decisions. No one will give me input. I can't tax the collective intelligence.

I ask questions and people just stare at me. That we need to grow a team that actually has good quality communication. And then we get to the clear decision on this is now what's next?

Yeah, so we've got three different types we're talking about that one majorly covered type one. What is type two?

Type 2 — Input (You Haven't Decided Yet) (00:17:46)

Type two is input. And this is where, as a leader, like, you genuinely haven't made a decision yet. You know, you're think, you're just talking, you're thinking, like, this is an option, this is an option.

You may change your direction. And so it's one of those, like, sometimes people will say things like, you know, hey, I'm on board if you guys are.

And it sounds like a decision was made. And then people are like, well, yeah, sure, let's go. Let's. I think, yeah, maybe we should do that. Yeah.

And we nod our heads up and down and you're thinking a directive was given, you're thinking a decision was made.

And then other people are like, no, there isn't. Or the other way around, where you're like, yeah, that's what we're now going to go do.

And then in a week or two, you follow up on it and nothing's been done because your team did not hear a decision being made. They Heard ideas and brainstorming as we look at both sides of the coin here.

Yeah. I think that is something that you have to be insanely clear about. I am somebody who loves input. Obviously, you know, that's, you know, I will ask, what are your thoughts on this?

What's your thought? What do you think about this? Hey, take a look at this. Because I just want input. Input to me. And, you know, I've talked about this forever, but when I.

Way back in the days, in the early 90s when I was at E Trade, I realized very quickly I wasn't the only smart person in the room. Right. If I was, then we're all in trouble.

Right. And I realized that if I would just ask people questions, I didn't have to have all the right answers, I could get better input, better decision making, yada, yada, yada, roll forward way too many decades later that I even want to say how many decades it's been.

I can do the math. I can do the math on that. It's been a long time. It's been over three decades.

Three. Almost three and a half decades. Gosh, three and a half decades. That's just insanity. Anyways.

When you take a look at a person like me, I'm always looking for that input. If I don't clarify that I'm looking for input, what happens?

But as well, what if the team member thinks I'm only looking for input? What happens? Yeah.

So first of all, your signal is if you bring it up repeatedly, you care about it, it's on the top of your mind because you won't let it go.

Not in a bad way. You follow up, hey, like, we're transitioning from ChatGPT to use Claude more that you're learning about it. I know it. You're researching it. I know it. It's on your mind. You talk about it regularly.

And then you will send texts to follow up. Hey, where are we on such and such? Hey. And you will tax that. You will ask questions. Those are just signals that tell me over the years, Chris cares a lot about this.

This is a priority of his. He's not saying it one time and moving on. So I just know you to know that to be like, make this important, this is important to him.

You need to make it important to you. Learn more about it. Get in there. And so that's what's going on in that, in that dynamic that a lot of leaders may recognize that that's. That's what.

In this case, that's what you communicate to me and the team without even having to say, guys, I really care about this. This is really important. Make sure you have your ears on and be listening.

I just, I've picked that up and I just know that. So what we see in a lot of leaders is that there isn't the clarity around the input. And they, they aren't as clear as they need to be around saying, I haven't decided.

I want your input before I do something. Because it's clear that there's a decision point out here somewhere. And you're being so clear as to say, I'm not there yet.

Yeah, I need you to know I'm not there yet. This is just a discussion. That's all we're doing. And this thought brings up a lot of different meetings that, that I've been a part of or that we've had.

That is a. Hey, this is just a discussion because how many, like, you know, on the DISC, how many high Cs or high S personality styles will hear like, okay, am I supposed to do something with that? Or what color would you like that in, sir?

You know, and it's like, whoa, whoa. We're just talking like, we're not making a decision. But High Cs in particular will listen for action items and go dos.

And they want to make sure it's handled. Exactly. And then it's like, back off of that. We're not ready for that. We're just freestyling here. We're throwing ideas out, especially people that aren't really good at that.

They don't, they can't give the input. They're not good at giving the input. And so that's where their brain goes, is I'll just listen for stuff to go do.

Well. And that's such a incredibly important piece to bring up is, you know, we, we talk about this quite often.

Don't try to brainstorm with your high C and a lot of times even with your high S, because unless they're incredibly prepared with the topic, if you do that ahead of time, then it's a little bit different.

But like you're pointing out, a high C doesn't operate that way. They operate in. Let me pick out the one thing I think is important to you and then run with that.

Right? That's the thing I'm supposed to do. And you know, they might miss six other important things because we didn't structure it well.

So structuring the type 2, the input aspect, the more clear we can be. Hey, I'm just looking for, you know, perspective gathering here, brainstorming, whatever, just looking for information, then that can help people to know what direction we're going in.

Yeah, it's actually. It kind of serves as a really good transition, Chris, into.

Into type 3, which is the directive. Right.

Because in the case we just laid out, it's the confused. Is this input or is this a directive? You can see right there why what we're talking about right now is so important. Yeah.

Because you've got people that are confused on where are you and what type are we in. Are we actually in information? Are we in input or are we in directive?

And when you're leading other personality styles, communicating your intent or the goal of what you're talking about is so helpful to set people up for success.

Type 3 — The Directive (It's Time to Execute) (00:24:22)

So type three is what we call the directive, is that it's decided, it's now time for execution. That's where we are. And so this is where a leader wants to be really clear.

Because the first two, if they've been murky, they could have been murky, or the directive may have felt arbitrary.

And this is where you get really, really clear that this is decided. This is the decision. Here's what I need from you. And that's what removes the confusion and it speeds up the execution.

Because now everyone is clear on where we stand.

Yeah. I think another thing that we have to remind people of is when information changes from type 1 to type 3 to type 2, it doesn't mean that your whole conversation, you're having this discussion with your team.

It doesn't mean that your whole conversation is only one type right? Most likely there's going to be during your conversation a shift.

The key is if you want your people operating well. And this is really the takeaway for the day. Right. Communication and clarity is your. Is your best friend.

Help your team to understand where are you in your communication. Recognize when people are going to make the mistake of taking something you've said and run with it.

Or look at the past, you know, look at history and recognize when that's happened before. Or look at times where you feel like you've been clear.

I'll never forget I was at a. I had a leader ask me to come into a meeting that she was having with a team member and she was going to have a very tough conversation with this team member and she wanted me to sit in with it.

It was a guy that she was having this conversation with. And we go through the whole conv-- I'm just sitting there. I'm just an observer get through the whole conversation.

The dude walks out the door and she's like, whew, what do you think? And I go, do you. Do you think that was a tough conversation? She goes, oh, yeah, that was a tough conversation. I go, he doesn't.

And she's like, oh, yes, he does. I'm like, call him back in here. And the guy came back in. And I said, hey, question for you. Was that a tough conversation for you?

He goes like, no. I said, what did you take away from that? He goes, sounds like everything's good. The main leader is like, no, that's not what I said at all. And it's like, no, that's exactly what you said.

So I think one of the things we have to do is we have to recognize that even your personality style, delivering the information can be the very thing that confuses the other person.

So if you will choose clarity, if you will choose...

Here's where I am right now. Right now I am just wanting to, you know, actually have a. An information discussion. I'm just wanting to give information.

I'm just wanting to talk about something. I want you to know this is important to me. Yada, yada, yada. Nothing's happening or the. Hey, I'm looking for your input.

Hopefully again, we've set people up ahead of time to know that they're supposed to be giving input. If we did this properly, then we don't just bring them into a meeting and ask for input. We let them know ahead of time we're looking for input if we can.

Or, hey, let's make a decision on this. The key is all of these things seem basic and seem right, but if you don't recognize where you are and how in your communication style, that's the thing that is setting your team up for potential failure. Correct?

Yeah, exactly. Exactly right. And I think what I would add on to that is that, that when you're in a meeting, sometimes where, where these ball can get dropped.

What we're talking about here, because no one is leading the meeting. No one has the mindset that I'm leading the discussion. And that's where it's. We're not just talking who's in charge here? Who's leading this meeting? That's going to ensure clarity.

That's going to ensure. Is that person and that person, are they actually communicating or talking past each other? What's the goal of what we're talking about right now?

Are we capturing next steps and action items or are we just talking and we think we've set people up for success. And we have clarity after a decision is made to loop this back around to this third type.

And you actually don't have clarity because there isn't a this is now what we're going to go do. Someone's writing it down. And if you're not intentional about your communication in this way, you're, you're--

This is why stuff doesn't get done, and it's what causes us to lose productivity and we waste time and we waste money. Because it all loops back to, oh, I didn't understand that, Chris. I didn't. I was not on the same page as you.

Oh, I didn't hear that was a decision that was made or I don't know what the next steps are. What do you think they are?

And we should have done that in a meeting. It's being intentional about. Lead the meeting and lead it to clarity and lead it to. To now, good execution after the decision's made. Exactly.

The Challenge — Start Every Meeting With Your Goal (00:29:52)

All right, so give our fantastic listeners a challenge this week. What is something this week that they can do differently? Do we expect them to be perfect at this? Absolutely not. Do we expect them to catch everything?

Absolutely not. What is something that they can do this week to change?

Every single meeting, one of my favorite things to do when you're just. When you're talking to someone one on one or in a group is start the conversation with, hey, my goal or our goal of this discussion or this meeting is fill in the blank.

It immediately gets people on the same page. It could be: My goal is just to talk, to get input and not make a decision.

My goal is to make a decision by the time we're done discussing this, my goal is to get your input. Just start there and watch what happens. Yeah.

And don't forget, if you change the direction, reset. Hey, guys, restate the goal. Restate the goal. Hey, guys, this was fantastic. I just wanted input. Now I feel like I'm at a place.

Let's make a decision on this. Who's going to do what, all that kind of stuff. Timelines and all that. Good stuff, brother. Really good stuff.

All right, folks, if you are interested in coaching, for you or your leaders, go to chrislocurto.com.

All right, folks, that is all the time we have for you today. Thank you, Joel Fortner, for joining me on another.

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Glad to be back.

Thanks. Good stuff. Good stuff. As always, take this information. Change your leadership, Change your business, Change your life. And join us on the next episode.