126: Energize and Empower Your Team with John Eades

As managers, we’d do well to remember that we succeed when our people succeed. It’s not always easy to know how we need to adjust our behavior - by stepping in or getting out of the way - but when you get it right, your people can truly flourish and accomplish great things. Today’s guest is John Eades. John is the CEO of LearnLoft, Author of Building the Best, and host of the Follow My Lead Podcast. John and I talk about how to connect purpose to your work, no matter what industry or function you work in, how to support your team members through their role development by providing the right support style at the right times, how to get past your own fears so your teammates can really flourish and when to let go because you can’t make someone else succeed if they don’t want to.  Members of The Modern Manager community get access to Learn Loft’s Leadership Styles quiz that will help you better understand your style and their Mastering the Mighty Skills toolkit so you can elevate your leadership. To learn more about membership and to join, go to www.themodernmanager.com/join Subscribe to the Modern Manager newsletter to get episodes, articles and free mini-guides delivered to your inbox. Read the related blog article: Three Steps To Creating An Empowered Team Key Takeaways: People persevere because of purpose, not pay. When you connect your team to a cause, you breathe life into them. Look for creative ways to show your team the impact or results they are contributing to. When possible, make it about the customers not just the business. Leadership is someone whose actions inspire, empower, and serve others. One of the biggest mistakes managers make is thinking they can just hire great people and get out of the way. We all need somebody else to challenge us in order to go beyond what we think we're capable of. There are four stages of development for an employee in a given role. It’s important to establish where each person is on their development journey so you can match their autonomy and responsibility with their readiness. If you give too much autonomy or responsibility too soon, you risk the person failing or being overwhelmed. If you wait too long, you risk the person losing confidence or becoming bored. What you tolerate, you encourage. If your people are struggling, consider how your actions or inactions are impacting their ability to succeed. Managers need to detach themselves from the outcome. You can do everything to inspire and develop your team, but at the end of the day, they choose how much they want to try. According to the 80-10-10 principle, about 10% of your workers will be low performers, 80% are in the middle, and 10% are top performers. Young managers tend to focus on the bottom 10%. Instead, invest in helping the middle 80% get to the top.  KEEP UP WITH JOHN Website: https://learnloft.com/ Book: https://learnloft.com/building-the-best-book/ Podcast: https://learnloft.com/podcast/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johngeades/ [email protected]