True Leaders Don’t Hide Behind A Title
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Audio Transcript:
Asher Smith (Producer)
Good morning, welcome back, happy Flourish Friday, or whatever day it is for you when you're listening to this. Today we have an interview that we did with a guy named Mike Huff from Double E Workplace Solutions.
And this is a full interview, so it's a little bit longer than the typical episode.
And we previously have released a clip from this interview, but we thought we would put out the whole interview because Alex wasn't able to sit down and record an episode for today.
Asher Smith (Producer)
So, this is mainly around Alex's leadership style. There's a lot of questions asked about that, and he kind of gets into his own personal experiences with that, and a little bit more about his personal story. So, yeah, take a listen and enjoy.
Mike Huff
Yeah, tell me a little bit about yourself. You know, a little bit about yourself, mountain leverage, and then maybe your leadership style as well.
Alex Reneman
Wow, yeah. So, yeah, I guess, I, it's almost funny to say that I don't really think about, and I'll use the analogy. So when I was younger, I was, I'm 6'2, so I'm fairly tall-ish in general population, but I wasn't always that way.
I was like 5'5, coming in as a freshman. And so I always kind of looked everybody in the eyeball.
And as I've grown, and I grew six inches my sophomore year, I still to myself see myself just about as tall as everybody else I'm around, even if they're a good foot shorter than me.
And I guess that would apply to when you asked me about my leadership. I don't really consider myself a leader in that way. And I know that seems silly, and it sounds like I'm making that up, but it just is.
So yeah, I'm certainly the founder of the company, and I'm the CEO, and that certainly implies some things. And I know there's responsibilities with that, and I take those on.
But even to talk about, like, oh, me as a leader or whatever, it feels almost, I don't know, arrogant or whatever, but like elitist. And that's kind of, I guess, I share that with you as you asked me, and it kind of struck me on the side.
That permeates my leadership style, I guess. So I'm not your typical, you know, pound the desk type of leader. The same way in my house, I'm the same way at the office and wherever.
I'm much more of a collaborative leader. Now, there are times to take charge, and I will, but generally, I'm really cautious. Those all around me are equals, you know?
So that's a long-blown way to explain kind of my philosophy, but out of that stems lots of other things. But I think that's probably a pretty good fundamental basis for how I look at things.
Mike Huff
I'm laughing about your height because you are about a foot taller than me. And when I was a freshman, I was four foot eight.
I'm still not looking people in the eye.
Alex Reneman
Well, I'll tell you what, if you and I met and if we get the chance to do that, you will know that I'm thinking I'm just about as tall as you are.
Mike Huff
Yeah. No, that's great. We talk about in our leadership training, we talk about the position of leadership, not throwing that around versus being an influential leader.
And if you got to throw your position around, then you're probably not going to have a team that wants to follow you versus having to follow you.
Alex Reneman
I think it's the weakest form of leadership there is, to leverage your position, your birthright, your name. I mean, whatever, your finances. That is the absolute weakest type of influence you can put on anybody.
And I think you're right. It doesn't age well, and it often, that's almost like being a dictator. At some point, the head comes off.
And so I absolutely think it's silly when I see guys throwing their stuff around, whether it's a title or whatever.
Mike Huff
Yeah, I find you're going to get the bare minimum amount of people. They're going to do exactly what they have to do, what's required of them, and then nothing more.
But if you have a leader that's inspiring you and leading by example, that's the one that they're going to take charge, come up with new ideas and find, you know, and just kind of help everybody grow.
Alex Reneman
Yeah, I think you're right. There's probably some science around this, and maybe even I've read someone have forgotten it or whatever. But like when someone becomes subservient, I think that turns off parts of their brain.
And now you're not getting the full magic of that human. You're only getting what they're going to do. You know, they're going to do what you tell them to do or what they think they have to do.
And it's not even if they're not revolting, right? There are obviously people are going to push against that, and they're going to say, well, yeah, okay, buddy, I'll do the bare minimum. But generally, I think to your point, we become subservient.
It's like, okay, what do I do next? Now what do I do next? And you've locked, you've just basically eliminated probably more than half of their magic in their brain.
Whereas if you can unlock people and say, okay, here's the world of the universe of opportunities to you. Now, lots of people don't want that. I get that.
And so that can be a challenge. Then people die. You know, they struggle in their own freedom.
But generally, if you can create an environment that nourishes that and then you lead in a way that encourages folks to be their magical self, I think you unlock all kinds of goodies.
Mike Huff
Yeah, yeah. Sounds like psychological safety. We talk a lot about that in the training as well. There you go. Creating that environment where people feel safe.
You know, they can make a mistake. And, you know, there's repercussions to mistakes, but you also learn from them. And, you know, they're going to admit their mistakes and not hide them, so.
Yeah, that's great.
I do have some questions. You know, just to kind of talk about, you know, I guess about leaders. So the first one is about someone who's stepping into a leadership role for the first time.
Maybe they were a peer and then now they're going to lead or maybe they're taking on a new team. What's some advice you would give to somebody making that transition?
Alex Reneman
Not have a short memory is probably one piece of advice. And what I mean by that is, yeah, I don't know how many times and we've all seen it. Someone, it when they're in the rank and file, if you will, with you, they do certain things, X, Y and Z.
Once they become a manager or a leader in some way, they act as if they've never did any of that stuff. They don't understand it. Well, this is what the company needs.
That is so disingenuous. And I think probably turns more people against folks who've been promoted instead of them championing you, they'll tear you down.
So I know we talk about short memories all the time and learning quick and all that kind of stuff, but in that regard, I think you want to not forget where you came from because it's so easy to think, well, I'm a manager now and this is what they're
telling me. And you're getting a lot of noise from potentially people above you or whatever. But man, boy, that's the quickest way to sink yourself, I think.
Yeah, here, I just saw a post from a former colleague, and they talked about making that transition and the struggle with the people you were close with on the team that maybe like, you know, holding them accountable and just kind of like not, it's
not like you're indebted to them to do favors or treat them differently. You know, how about navigating that type of environment?
Yeah, I mean, that's the other side of that. You know, one is not forgetting. You need to be able to empathetic because you've been there.
But you also, if you were maybe behaving, if you weren't the greatest employee or what, you know, you made these mistakes with someone.
If you just then condone that kind of behavior, you can't do that either because you're there to make the organization better.
But I think it becomes for me, at least in my experience, if it's less about what's best for the organization, but it's even what's best for that individual employee, right?
Because what's best for the organization often is what's best for them, unless you're in some kind of CD company. And if you're there, you should probably be looking for another job anyway.
But if a company recognizes that employees that are flourishing means the company's flourishing, then you can match those up.
And so I think when you come back to an employee and say, hey, dude, now I'm at a role where I can actually help you now, right?
So whereas before we were both here, now I'm in a leadership role where I can help make this place the place we need, and I can help leverage your skills in a way. It's just kind of basically almost as a group win. It's like we are winning together.
I just had to make this role. And I know that can be difficult to navigate, but it's less about I won this thing, now listen to me. And it's more about, hey, I'm here, bro.
I can connect the thread that we both know and saw in this position. I can help in my new role. Yeah, if that makes sense.
Mike Huff
Yeah, it does. It does. And I kind of tie in this back to your recent podcast on feedback and in accountability. And I don't know how we got to this place where accountability is a bad thing.
But it definitely seems like that's the case. Nobody wants to be accountable, but everybody else wants somebody else held accountable. How do we kind of navigate that or maybe change that perception of accountability in the workplace?
Alex Reneman
Boy, that's a real challenge, because there is a workplace solution here for sure, but it's a human solution as well.
So in the workplace, to your point, zero tolerance isn't going to cut it. If there's zero tolerance, I think you mentioned this earlier, people start hiding their mistakes, they start hiding things like that.
So now, if you hold someone accountable, what you're doing is telling on them or you're getting them in trouble, because that means they maybe didn't deliver in the way that they had committed to.
And well, now everybody's running a CYA show and it's all cover-up and it's all smoke and mirrors and nothing gets done. And so I think there can't be a zero tolerance. You have to be able to fail.
It's win or learn, man. And both those things are great. And if you're an organization that doesn't tolerate learning, then you're in trouble.
Or if you just lose, then you're in trouble. So I think organizationally, there has to be an environment that's set up to allow for people to fail and support them along the way. And it'd be okay and it'd be great examples.
On the human side, though, I do this is one of those things and you see it across our discourse in in whether it's politics or religion, well, you know, name anything.
It's it's it's it's got to be okay for people to make mistakes and grow and and not judge one another so harshly. Because to your point, none of us want judge that harshly. But I think it's so easy to judge others harshly.
And what happens really? I mean, you've got more of the psychology in this, I'm sure. But when you're judging others so harshly, you are judging, you're the same kind of person that's judging yourself so harshly.
Give yourself some grace. And everybody else too, we all need some. It's a key part of success.
We don't have grace for one another and for ourselves. It's a miserable existence.
Mike Huff
Yeah, in your last talk too, just about how we accept feedback.
I know personally, I don't want to make mistakes, and I probably wasn't good at accepting feedback in the past, like not defensive, or just like feel like I let somebody down and let myself down.
I think I'd listen to, I don't know if you listen to Craig Groeschel at all, or read Amy's books, but maybe. So the Bible app, he's the guy who does the Bible app. Bunch of companies and stuff.
But he talks about just kind of framing those conversations, those accountability conversations as like, like where you're coming from, you know, it's like, I'm having this conversation with you because I want to see you get better and I want you to
improve, but this is going to be some stuff that you know, you need to take action on and work on. And when we do our leadership training, we go through this exercise where it's like, what's, what does good feedback like look like?
What good constructive feedback looks like? And we always get the compliment sandwich comes up there, or whatever you want to call it. But you know, the problem with that is you miss, you could miss the message.
You know, they, they see like, you know, they said I did this good thing. Then they had this one bad thing I have to work on. And then this one good thing.
And they're like, you know, basically, yeah, right.
So how do you, like, how do you, like, how do you approach that, that feedback with somebody that's, that is a difficult conversation to make sure that it's gonna hit home and they're gonna like take action on it.
And then even afterwards, following up.
Alex Reneman
This is hard. And I think to your point, again, I appreciate you've listened to our stuff. I mentioned this in the podcast.
I have struggled with this through the years because I genuinely love the people that I work with. And so giving them feedback, to your point, I think sometimes feels, it's hard.
And so you want to deliver it as softly as possible on a silk pillow, you know? And the problem is sometimes people fall asleep on the pillow and they don't ever get the feedback.
So I think that's where for me, I really, when I'm doing it well, and that doesn't mean I'm always doing it well, but when I'm doing it well, it's like, hey, Mike, we got to talk about something real good. This is going to be fun.
I mean, we really got a problem here in this. Yeah, you know, I don't like the way you approach this or whatever else. And you just go right into it.
Then you can be, then it's all about, it's not break them down and build them up. And I'm like like a drill sergeant or something, but you just get into it because they probably know they screwed up or maybe they didn't either way.
But if they did, it's super awkward like doing the whole sandwich of, oh, here's some good stuff. And then here's the thing. And here's some good stuff again.
So for me, when I'm doing it well, I just come right out and I say, hey, this thing will go on, let's do a thing. Let's talk about it. Here's what I'm seeing.
What did you see? How did this go down? Questions are always more powerful than statements.
That's always important to me. Instead of coming in and accusing, it's like, hey, this didn't feel right to me. What did you think?
Or this didn't seem like it worked out. Do you think the same thing? That kind of thing.
So again, I know there's some tactics there, but generally come right to it, asking questions, trying to understand that helps me. And then ultimately, I will follow up to make sure I'm still who they knew me to be.
And I still love them, and we still want to move forward. And it's about learning. It's not about blame.
It's about what could we have done better? And is there anything we can do now to fix it? That kind of is more outcome focused.
And so I think that those are the tactics. But I don't think any of those are going to work if you haven't already created an environment that allows that conversation to happen.
Even though we'll all have our personalities and we'll come in and we'll have some defensiveness or prickliness or whatever else, there's an environment that nurtures that kind of learning organization and that kind of iteration and improvement, and
you can fail fast and all the kind of things. And if you don't have that environment, it's really hard to come in and just start talking about feedback because the first thing is going through their mind isn't...
We all have the first things, survival stuff like, oh, this is terrible, I'm in trouble, blah, blah, blah. But then that goes away and they can hear the actual message.
If you're not in an environment that's conducive for feedback, you know where that goes next. It's like, am I going to get fired? What's going on?
Mike Huff
Yeah, that's a good point too.
And you think about bringing in somebody who's maybe come from a different environment, and they kind of have that baggage from a leader that maybe didn't deliver feedback that way, maybe just only focused on the negative.
Even with the culture that's built, you have the framework with PACT and what you're trying to do there, and what the culture you're building. How do you help somebody that's kind of holding on to that baggage in a new environment?
Alex Reneman
That's astute, Mike. I mean, that's one of my biggest frustrations.
We bring an employee and I think, man, they're going to be a rock star here, but they're bringing some PTSD from the previous work environment and maybe multiple previous work environments. Some people have a whole career that way, and it's hard.
It's hard, and it's terrible because that person generally sticks out like a sore thumb here for a while because everyone else can see it.
They know the environment is different, and the little bits of feedback, there's lots of excuses in defense and whatever. Honestly, man, it takes patience, it takes time, it takes a team of champions to help them.
One person isn't going to be able to do it because they're going to need sounding boards. When those folks come into the organization, we assign them basically battle buddies.
They've got a fit and performance partner, and those two people can just help be a sounding board for them through that process.
Now, the performance partner has some of those more feedback type conversations, but they've got to have trust, and it takes a while, and so they've got to poke. They're looking for the defense. How do I break through this defense?
And then they realize after a while, some sooner than others, oh, this is a safe place, and they'll have relapses and they'll do all that.
But man, I would love to have a magic bullet for that, because employees that come here would be so much more happy and so much more effective, so much sooner if they could just let that go.
But we all build our defense mechanisms, we all have our experiences, and it's kind of hard to break through. So I think it's a supporting cast. No one leader is going to be able to do that.
And from my perspective, because especially as a leader, if they come from a real parochial hierarchy organization, and you are much more of a collaborative leader like myself, they're going to see you as the big bad man. You're the man.
That's who you are. And that persona, you're not going to change that. It's going to take time, it's going to take how they see others see you.
So it's complex and nuanced. And unfortunately, I think time, I found is the biggest determinant there. As long as you're consistent in your behavior, over time, that stuff will come down.
Not for all. Some people wash out, dude. Some people, we bring them here, we want them to be here. I'm so excited about them being here. And they can never get over it. They hold on to this, I can't trust anybody.
I've got to be, you know, and they end up subterfuge. And I hate that, but it happens.
Mike Huff
Yeah. Yeah. That's good.
Yeah. I think I like the, what would you call it? A fit and performance buddy?
Alex Reneman
Yes. That's right. Fit and performance partners.
Mike Huff
That's great. Yeah. That's a good way to kind of like show that you're investing in that person. You care about them and you want them to be successful.
So that's right.
Alex Reneman
It's stemmed from in the military. Now we had battle buddies, right? So you had a battle buddy.
Wherever is going on the battle, you better know who this guy is or this guy. And that kind of extended out to, we had battle buddies at Mountain Leverage early on.
And then we split that into a fit partner and a performance partner because there's kind of different conversations. And I think it's helpful. We've got some work to do there, but it's been helpful, I think.
Mike Huff
So when you're bringing somebody in at Mountain Leverage, how do you weigh that potential fit versus maybe just potential? Maybe the fit isn't quite there, but the potential really is. And how do you kind of like navigate that?
Alex Reneman
It makes hiring hard because our standards are really high in terms of their competency.
So you have to be really good at what you do. And that's a... All right, that already lops off a ton of the workforce, just is what it is.
We're not all, I get it. But we're looking for high performers, so it starts there. However, then the next phase for everyone to be looked at is this lens of fit.
And candidly, once you get there, fit becomes more important than performance for me. Once you're a certified high performer, if you will, we've all seen it, I guess, in sports.
You look at a star slugger or somebody, whatever sports you follow, right? And they're great, point guard, whatever it is. They're great at one team and they're killer.
They're MVP, they're doing their thing. Then you ship them off in a deal to another team, and all of a sudden they struggle, or they don't do well, or whatever else. That's not performance.
Their performance is suffering, but it's not a performance-related item. It's a fit-related item that typically impacts their performance.
And so here, when someone's coming in to evaluate them, that fit piece is the most critical part once they've kind of passed to that initial performance component.
And so I've always said, you know, you could be the best at whatever you're doing in the world, but if you're an A-hole, you don't belong on Mount & Leverage. You know, I mean, go somewhere else.
There are people that tolerate that stuff, there are organizations built for that, and you guys can cut each other's throats all day long. At Mount & Leverage, we want people who are great at what they do, but they're good people.
They're going to be good to one another. They're going to be able to be a team, and that's super important. So that fit piece is critical.
Every time, Mike, every time I have ever went against my gut on somebody for fit, it's come back and bit me in the butt. Every time. It's never worked out.
Now, performance, sometimes it's worked out, sometimes it hasn't, because sometimes somebody will surprise you. But fit, anytime you get it in your upper gut, and it's like, I don't know about this person, it fails every time.
And it doesn't mean we still don't go against our gut and learn the lesson over and over. It's one of those silly things. As humans, we sometimes, lessons just were thickheaded, but every time, dude.
So yeah, the fit is absolutely critical for us. I mean, every organization is different, I guess, but for us, fit is primo.
Mike Huff
Okay. Yeah, I think it makes sense.
You can train the other stuff or most of the other stuff, and that fit is harder. It's harder to shape and mold.
Alex Reneman
It is hard, but I think one of the things we get lured into sometimes, and this is the trick. So you can focus so much on fit and lose that part of fit is being a killer worker, right? So like, oh, this person loves what we're doing.
They love, because there's a lot of things to love about Mount and Leverage. If you fit here in the employee perspective, but you can come and ride along, right? Oh, I fit really well in this seat.
I'm not doing it. I'm not productive. I'm not a killer in my role.
I'm not really contributing, but I'm fitting. And that's so easy to lure ourselves into. We've been in those situations where we're all ourselves to where we think this person is a fit, but they're just not getting the work done.
It's like, well, are they really a fit? Because people who fit here are people who want to be effective and want to be contributors and want to have high outcomes for our customers and each other. That's also part of fit.
It's not particularly about the specific performance of their job role, but it's a fit in terms of where they are. So that's where it bridges across. And for us, I've seen us sometimes be, we've masked that.
We've seen someone who like, well, they fit, but they just aren't getting any work done. It's like, well, then do they really fit? And so that's tricky.
Mike Huff
Yeah. And I was thinking like, you know, you come off as a really nice guy. You know, what do you find that that is?
I guess I'm trying to ask, like, how do you how do you prevent people from kind of taking advantage of that?
Alex Reneman
Yeah, that's a good question. I think if you ask my wife, maybe she would disagree about the nice thing. I don't know.
I'm just kidding. I would hope she would say I'm nice. I think she would know.
So that's a really good question. Here's here's what I've experienced in my time. So and I don't always get it right.
But when I'm when I'm doing it well, it's that old statement that people like to say when they're told, like, don't don't mistake my kindness for weakness. You know, that's true.
So I think projecting strength, not in a silly statesman way of pound the table or I'm going to do these threaten these things. It's not that. But to be able to also execute myself, I'm not a passive leader. I'm engaged. People see how I think. I'm very authentic in that.
So I reveal who I am and they see my work ethic. They see what I do. And I think that's important.
So when I see that somebody's trying to take advantage of me, I have that direct conversation and I'm not, I don't pussyfoot around about it.
They know I care, but they also know I expect, you know, great results, I expect excellence, ultimately, or at least the pursuit of excellence. And so I think that helps, right? Just in comparing that with being nice.
I mean, there are managers that go around and pet people. That's, you know, okay, man, what are you doing though, right? So I try not to do that necessarily.
I mean, I have lots of compliments, but people deserve them. They deserve more than I can give them in terms of compliments. So I think that's important.
But there's another piece to this that, cause I'm not, I'm not the best manager. I'm not actually a terrible manager, to be quite honest.
And so instead of trying to be a better manager, which I've tried to be over the years, I built a culture that creates this immune system that will kind of push people out there trying to take advantage of me or others.
And it'll be uncomfortable for me. It turns up the heat in a way where they're uncomfortable or they swell up and stick out, where everyone kind of looks around and goes, wait a minute, and there's then championship takes in place.
So others are talking to them about something. I'm talking, whoever who's working with them, it begins to be, it's truly an organism.
It's an organization, but it's an organism that has this immune system of culture that for those of us that fit here, it's super cozy. We love it. It lets us flourish.
It's great. We can grow. And for those that don't, it's really difficult.
It's a difficult environment for them to be in. So there's an old country song, some girls don't like boys like me and some girls do. It's like that.
If you don't fit here, it's going to be miserable, a miserable experience for you. And if you do fit here, it can be the best place you've ever worked.
And that's, and I say that without hubris, that's been feedback over the years, and that's what we've tried to build.
Mike Huff
Yeah, it sounds great. It sounds like you're, you know, other people are holding each other accountable. And when something does come up, you're not letting it fester to where it's going to be more painful to kind of address down the road.
Alex Reneman
And our best, yeah, it still happens, but it does a pretty good job.
And normally, you know, you can tell, right? Even if you're letting something fester, you're like, okay. It's just like any of us, right?
If we have something going on, it's like, ah, no, that's a bug bite. It's swollen up. I see it's there, but you live with it, but you know it's there.
And we try to address them as soon as possible in a way that, because again, I think this is important for me anyway. My goal isn't to take advantage of our employees to achieve an outcome that I'm looking for.
It's not about my, I want to get rich, so I'm going to hire a bunch of people, turn and burn, build it up, sell. And I'm winning. My goal fundamentally is for you as my employee to flourish.
And even to save my employee's heart, for us as a team, but for my goal is for you to flourish. And I want you to flourish at Mountain Leverage if you can. And if you can't, I want you to flourish.
So that means you'll have to go flourish somewhere else.
And so when I focus on that and the rest of the team is focused on that, I think that adds a bit of a just a bit of a magic for us that allows it to be more real as opposed to all the games that lots of people try to play and companies play.
And it's just, it feels like a ton of waste, man. But if I'm focused on your flourishment, and now here, okay, this plays up to, okay, I'm not altruistic. I want this to be successful.
I want to create a valuable company. I want to build things for our customers and do great things for the world.
But if I'm focusing on your flourishment and your flourishment and everybody in the company, if we're all flourishing, you're going to win. You're going to win. You're going to win all that stuff, right?
You're going to do it right financially. You're going to do it right from a product standpoint. You're going to do it right from a service standpoint.
Your customer is going to be happy. Your partner is going to be happy. The world is going to be happy.
If you're doing it right, if everybody's flourishing, you win. So I guess that's probably a hillbilly way to look at it. But that's how I kind of look at things.
Mike Huff
No, I love it. Kind of a field of dreams, right?
Alex Reneman
It's exactly right.
Mike Huff
To be successful, who's your most impactful leader in your life and why?
Alex Reneman
Wow. Who's my most, man, I'll tell you what, it's such a smorgasbord of things I've drawn. So growing up in small town West Virginia in Grafton, love this place.
It's a small little old railroad town, sleepy to a certain degree, but not in other ways. There were all kinds of people who influenced me growing up. Of course, my parents, you've got all kinds of neighbors, community members.
I grew up as a kid shooting pool in the VFW and lots of old veterans that were there that had life stories to share with me. Some maybe I shouldn't have heard at a young age, whatever. But all kinds of people took interest.
My community took interest in me. But also what I didn't have is, so that was a lot of good horse sense and how to live and how to be a human and treat others and all that kind of stuff. But I didn't have leaders per se from a business standpoint.
And so that's where books on tape back in the day, motivational speakers back in the year, get a cassette tape, plug those things in, books, pop up in books and read. I really got a lot of mentorship from those guys.
I can start going through their names right now, but back when I was a teenager and even younger a little bit and certainly as I aged. So that all kind of influenced me. And I've always carried that through to this next life.
So I don't really have a dedicated mentor of one person who's like guiding me through things. I've got a whole cadre of awesome people, both living and dead and those I know and those I don't know that have really influenced me.
So I'd like to think I'm somewhat of a, just a product of their grace and their gratitude and their, yeah, their grace in terms of offering whatever they've offered to me, to be able to take a piece of it.
But, you know, obviously again, I go to the people around me, my parents, my wife, my kids, you know, people that are around me on a daily basis, all the people I work with, they lead me just as much as I lead them.
So, you know, the team at Mountain Leverage is all very cool. And I know that sounds very, very hippie. I get it.
I actually have a buddy of mine who works with us. He's called me the Hippie for years because I do sometimes go into the Hippie land. But yeah, that's probably not a satisfying answer, sorry dude.
Mike Huff
No, that's good. I mean, that's an answer.
It's something we ask participants when we do the leadership training, who's their most impactful leader and why, and then just kind of get them to get that mindset of like, what made them the most impactful leader.
Alex Reneman
And yeah, I would love to tell you that I had a, I have a Yoda that I go and sit with and, and it levitates and teaches me how the force works.
But it's been lots of people. And I see it, when you ask me this question, I see him flying through my visual mind. It costs, there's a ton of them.
And it is, it's all the people I mentioned and more, but there's, there's not any one singular guru that I could point to.
Mike Huff
Okay. Let's talk about culture a little bit. And I'm just going to, I'll preface this by a client we're working with that has a really, we've been to a lot of their sites.
We've been to sites in China and Ireland and across the states. And before we went to any sites, they warned us about this one. They said, you're going to hate it there.
Their culture is terrible. People are terrible. Blah, blah, blah.
You know, you're, you know, you're still going to go there, but you're probably not going to make an impact. So we went there. It was our third training event and it was probably our best one.
People were great. We've been there since. People were not great.
And it's, it's a big site. They got three unions. There's a lot of, there's a lack of trust. There's leadership. They don't bring up leaders from the, from the front lines because there's such a distrust.
Distrust, yeah.
How do you, when we talk about culture, you talked about a little bit earlier about like kind of setting that environment. But when you go somewhere, and we talk about the leader bringing past baggage, but what if the environment is the baggage?
And as a leader where you have like your small section to work on, like what do you think, like what would advice would you give somebody in that position to kind of not be discouraged, but also be able to kind of make an impact?
Alex Reneman
Yeah, that's a, that's a tough question. And in some cases, it's an impossible question, because maybe, maybe what you've got is bad material in terms of what you're trying to do. And I think we all have to recognize that sometimes is real.
There are just people who have a world view that the man is trying to keep me down, the company is the bad guy, the boss is always trying to screw me. When we hired, we acquired a company back in 21.
And by all accounts, it's been a fantastic smashing success. But companies have cultures, whether they put a lot into it, or they think they have one or not, every company has cultures, every organization has cultures, a group or whatever.
And we brought those in. And now our cultures were similar enough where it all looked the same on the surface, but there's lots of differences. And we still have, we've got echoes of that kind of mishmashing together and kind of the challenges.
But there was a particular individual on that team that just would not see me as anything other than a terrible beast trying to destroy the worker, the proletariat. And it was, I was like, I don't understand. This is not who I am.
I literally grew up in West Virginia where we watched the mine wars in history. And we've, you want to talk about labor history, I've got it in my blood. My ancestors bled on the ground for labor and their rights and all these things, right?
But he just couldn't get over it. And so ultimately he had to find another place to flourish. And so sometimes that's a reality.
And I think if we go in facing that we can fix everything and we can make everything work, you're going to be in for a real rude awakening and a disappointment ultimately.
But I'm, look, I say that I'm a glass three quarters full almost every time, even if I have to make it up. So it is, there is a bit of hope in me that, oh yeah, this can work.
And so for me, that's where I guess, and this sounds like maybe a trope, but questions are more powerful than statements. So like coming in to just, boom, this is how it's going to work, coming with questions.
And I think when you look at culturally, like you're talking about whether it's like an environment overseas or something else, man, there are things they may do, mannerisms that you don't understand, but they're actually loving what you're saying.
I mean, I went and taught in Japan one time, and I remember everybody sat there with a stone cold face. I'm like, these guys aren't picking it up at all. Until my interpreter asked me, like, oh yeah, we're loving what's going on.
This is great. Woo! It was like a party.
And it kind of struck me for a minute. I was like, OK, so I've got to understand this environment more before I go trying to put my culture in it, because some of the tenets of the culture that I'd want to set are already here.
I just have to plug into them. I got to change my adapter. It's like when you travel overseas.
We've got our American plugin, but there's all kinds of different adapters in every region. You've got to find that adapter and then plug in. Then you certainly have to add your own culture and stuff, but plugging in first makes sense.
So that's why for me, in any of those environments, it's understanding really what's going on. So the questions are way more powerful than statements.
And I'd recommend anybody, if they're put into a new role or a new group or whatever, really try to understand what the heck's going on first before you come in and lay down the law. But that's, again, that's me. It doesn't work for everybody.
Mike Huff
Yeah, we had... So we had been meeting with all the supervisors, doing the training and that. And then we had a session with the next level up.
And we always do post-event calls. We try to keep the momentum going and, you know, just, how are you doing on your activities? And we had three guys in there and it was just, it was, you know, it was sad.
You know, I felt bad for them. You know, it's just like, you know, one of the comments, I come in here and I get, you know, I sign up to get punched in the face for 12 hours a day.
Or, you know, it's just like, man, you know, it's like, why do you go there? Why do you stay there?
But at the end of the call, I told them, I'm like, the one thing I like about this project is that hopefully we're part of this, that's reshaping the culture and kind of helping, you know, turn that around.
Cause I didn't, you know, I'm kind of that guy, like if there's, if there's something that's really broke, I kind of navigate towards that because I want, you know, it's going to make the most impact and be able to fix it.
And that, and I kind of felt like these guys were just kind of up against it.
Alex Reneman
It was, it's tough.
It's almost, and this is probably not politically correct or nice to say or whatever, but it's almost like how much cancer do you want to live with?
And the answer is always going to be, well, none, I don't want any cancer, because who knows it's going to grow and spread and, and jump around my body and all this kind of stuff.
So the answer is always no, but in organizations, we tolerate cancers all the time in terms of employees who just will not buy in and they will, they will make you pay. They'll, they'll influence other people around you. They'll subterfuge things.
And so there are unfortunately bad actors in the world. And if those are in those organizations, good luck. But, but I'm with you though, Mike.
I try, we try to focus on how we can help support that person and really try to gain their trust that we are about their flourishment. And if they can see that, then it can be sometimes really a magical story. And that's cool.
Those are some of the best, some of the best experiences I can have in my memory from, from leading Mountain Leverage, if you will, on the leadership side is when those folks, we thought, this isn't going to work.
And we say, all right, one last try, one last try. And it works. And all of a sudden, they're flourishing.
And it's like, oh, hallelujah, you know, cue the angels kind of thing. So that is, that is a great experience. But again, I do have to ask myself sometimes, how much cancer am I willing to tolerate in my body?
And the only answer is always none. I don't want any of that's rooted out. Sometimes you get employees that make it just too hard.
Mike Huff
Yeah, and it's hard to like we talked about memory earlier, short-term, having a short-term and not having a short-term.
How do you not like, you know, hold a grudge against somebody? Not hold a grudge, but just like keep that like attitude they had in the past and just kind of move past it as a leader. Because I mean, we're humans.
We remember that. Like somebody wrongs you, it's hard to let that go. How do you move forward and just continue to invest in them without letting that stuff creep into your mind?
Alex Reneman
Grace. Grace is the answer, man. And it's not, it's easy answer. That's hard to live out.
But if I, instead of this person was against me and I'm mad at them, I'm more of this person, and this may or may not be fair, but more of this person was struggling with some things, past history, some events, whatever else.
And they responded probably how anybody would. And maybe not Hollywood, maybe Hollywood, I don't know, but that's where Grace comes in. I'm like, they responded as best they knew how in that moment.
And they found a way to overcome that. Then I become their champion and I'm excited about that because they have found a way through in growth. And that almost always just neutralizes whatever angst or pain they gave me in the past.
And I don't know, man. I don't know. Maybe that won't work in every situation, but it's worked a ton for me to like, all of a sudden they go, wow, they overcame this thing.
Having some Grace to go, that thing is hard. First of all, so Grace first. And then like become their champion.
Then you're like rooting for me. Like, oh my gosh, this is great. All of a sudden, you're no longer their former opponent.
You're their champion. And that switch in my head has helped me not to hold grudges for people who were A-holes earlier. You know, made it hard, whatever it may be.
Mike Huff
Yeah, my buddy Ed that I work with, he has a saying, it says that people aren't necessarily doing something against you, but they're doing it to meet a personal need.
Alex Reneman
And that's almost always.
Mike Huff
Yeah. They're not out to get you. I share that.
Alex Reneman
In most cases, and even those, yeah, you get deep in psychology, dude, but most, most cases, even people are trying to get you. That's still coming from something inside them. You know, it's like, yeah, I mean, it does.
Again, it doesn't mean you can tolerate it all. I get that. But it does help to your point.
You know, after the fact, if there's been some remediation or some correction, it helps you from not holding on to that.
Mike Huff
OK, just a couple more here. How do you spot an emerging leader? Like, what do you look for?
What do you see in that person that you're like, this person is going to lead someday and do great things?
Alex Reneman
Curiosity. You know, they want to understand how things work, why things are the way they are, what we're trying to do, and, you know, those kind of things. So that's important.
I think, you know, folks who aren't afraid to fail, they want to stick their face in the fan. That's a phrase that's used a lot in sports or whatever else.
Because being a leader, you have to be able to be, you have to have this intellectual curiosity, or else I think you become tunnel vision and you can really, you know, be a bad leader, candidly. So that's important.
But then, you know, things are going to be hard. Things are going to be hard, and you have to be able to just be willing to face the storm, if you will, and plow through that. So I think those are two things.
Obviously, there's all kinds of baseline skills and empathy, right? Empathy is really important, I think. You know, again, this is the world according to Alex, man.
Who knows, next week, I might have some different opinions for you, but the world according to Alex, empathy is just vital. That emotional intelligence, whatever you want to call it.
So I can understand, I can do my best, even if I don't understand your plight, I understand you have a plight, and I can have feelings for that plight.
And I think that's an unsung value of leadership that I've found for me has been as valuable as anything. You know, obviously you want smart people, you want people who are capable and all the baseline stuff.
But when I look at like the intangible, like I guess the next level of things, it is that. It's curiosity, it's the tenacity, the persistence, just willing to not give up.
And, you know, I mean, ultimately that whole empathy, I mean, you got to care for me. Again, some organizations, you can just come be a tyrant and that's what they want in leaders. And that's cool.
You can line a bunch of those people up.
But the people who can drive when needed, who are curious to make sure they're going the right direction, and the people who can make sure the people that are coming with them aren't absolutely being drugged by a chain behind them.
That's that's the kind of leader I'm looking for.
Mike Huff
Okay, what about, I think you did a little bit on imposter syndrome a while back, what about when that person doesn't necessarily see that in themselves, but like that value?
Alex Reneman
You have listened to the podcast, man. I'm actually impressed. I'm pleased, I'm honored, I'm honored, I'm humbled. So yeah, that's a big one.
You line a bunch of Mount Leverage employees up, and I'm not telling on them, but you line a bunch of Mount Leverage employees up, and you start separating them by who thinks they're better than they are, and who has the imposter syndrome and thinks
they're worse than they are. And you will be so lopsided that the seesaw will fly anybody on the other end, clear out to the next county, because I've got a ton of people who are awesome. They're absolutely killers. They're amazing in the world.
And they second guess themselves and question their abilities. And so we're trying to solve that in every way. We've got a cool program we're about to put in here in another month or so, another attempt to help solve that.
And so that's a lot of my discussions with folks, as you are. And I think I can tell them all day long, they're great. And I think that's important.
So as a leader, if I spend time focusing on the lowest common denominator, so let's say we have some folks that are failing and aren't getting it done.
If I'm spending my communication to the company, and a lot of CEOs do this, like, hey, we're down on our numbers. We've got people not selling and whatever else.
Your killer salespeople or we're not developing fast enough or digging a ditch fast enough, whatever it is. Because your killers are hearing that as well.
So your A players are hearing that and they're hearing, we're not doing enough, we're not doing enough. That's hard on them. And so they're, and I'm not saying you should code everything.
There's a reality that sometimes there's challenges. You got to bring them up. But I spend more time on the other side of talking about what we're doing well.
And maybe we need to improve, sure, but not focusing on the lowest common denominator of the people who are just dragging along and maybe probably shouldn't be here. Or they're just struggling right now and they'll find a way through it.
The more I spend that way when I'm talking corporately, the more I'm bringing everybody down and the more I'm feeding that piece.
So again, fundamentally, I try to create an environment where we're focused on the best parts of ourselves and encouraging that and kind of supporting that. But I think there's another piece of this that's really important.
When I'm in individual conversations, I can compliment them all they want. My goal, I'm trying to help them see. I'm trying to help them see what they're doing.
And so I had somebody the other day ask me about, or we were talking about something. They said, well, I'm just somewhat new here, and I'm not really, you guys have done this great thing. And I just gave her the analogy.
I think it just shares to the company last week. But I just gave her the analogy. I said, when you're building a puzzle, which piece is the most important?
Is it the first one? Is it the last one? Is it one in between?
And she was like, well, that makes sense. And it helped to realize she's important to what we're doing. And just things like that, I guess, again, I can tell you, oh, you're doing great.
They want to hear that. And that's important as long as it's real and not made up. But I've found what really sticks with them.
That compliment lasts for a day or two a week, who knows, maybe a month, I don't know.
But helping them see their awesomeness in a way where I can be another voice in their mind and also help them be another voice in their mind with their imposter syndrome to balance it out. I think that's, as a leader, that's a really important thing.
That's not easy to navigate, and everybody's different. So I don't have a template to just hand somebody and say, these are the seven things you want to say to your employees to have them sorted out.
It's tough, but that's my responsibility as a leader, I think. That's one of the big responsibilities I have.
Mike Huff
Yeah, I think you nailed it with the balance part of it. Because as a leader, it seems like you should be giving the team all the credit, and then when something messes up, you're taking all the blame. And I think there's that fine line.
And I've worked with people that they think they're the best. And then, you know, I've struggled with imposter syndrome, you know, big time. That's probably of the books I've read, it's probably mostly on that type of thing.
Like, you know, John Acuff's soundtracks, one is one that sticks with me. You know, those soundtracks you play in your head. Those things that you say to yourself, would you say that to somebody else?
I try to think about that. But yeah, just kind of, you know, finding the good. That's another thing we focus on in the leadership training is, you know, finding the good.
And, you know, we challenge leaders to talk about that and the impact it had on the team and the organization. It's a struggle for them.
Like, tell me about something, you know, a specific behavior that was good, that recently happened, that had a big impact on your team and the organization. And I see them, you know, they're all kind of looking up and trying to figure out what it is.
But if you ask them, like, when was the last time somebody let you down or somebody failed or you had, you know, unplanned downtime, you know, they're writing lists of that stuff. So we're just trying to change that mindset of finding the good.
And then when you find that good, recognizing that specific behavior because you do that because you want it repeated, right?
Alex Reneman
Yep. I think it's interesting you bring that up.
One of the things I think about from myself, and I think this is applicable to this conversation and many others, when you talk about that soundtrack, we all have the soundtracks in our head, what we tell ourselves. And Mike, weaponize that guy.
Weaponize him, man. Like we talked on the podcast, weaponize him. He's an asset, or he or whoever in your head is an asset, ultimately, if you can weaponize him.
But how I see myself often in the company, and this goes back to the old movie, Wilde movie, Clockwork Orange, I don't know what it's called, right? And he phrases himself as the humble narrator, right? He's the humble narrator.
And I really kind of consider myself that at Mountain Leverage, that I'm the humble narrator. Yeah, I'm the founder and the CEO, right? Somebody has to fill that role, but I'm also the humble narrator.
And so when we have a year or we have a period that's maybe not been as successful as we wanted or something difficult happened or whatever else, I can narrate the story and remind us of some things that were amazing in the process.
Mike Huff
Yeah, I think.
Alex Reneman
That's what's going right. And he, he phrases himself as the humble narrator. Right. He's the humble narrator. And I really kind of consider myself that at Mountain Leverage that I'm the humble narrator. Yeah, I'm. I'm the founder and the CEO. Right. Some of us fill that role, but I'm also the humble narrator. And so. So when when we have a year or we have a period, that's that's maybe not been as successful as we wanted or something difficult happened or whatever else, I can narrate the story and remind us of some things we we that were amazing in the process.
Or even when I'm talking to an individual, I can remind him of things that were awesome to help be another storyline, another soundtrack in their mind that they can play themselves. And so I do think that's that's an important piece. And you're right, I, I see myself as the humble narrator of Mountain Leverage often.
Mike Huff
What was the… Frank. Is that what was your Frank.
Alex Reneman
Yeah you're right man. You are dialed in dude. Yeah. Frank is my guy. Dude. He's he's talking me right now when you ask me. Look, seriously, when you ask me the opening question about leadership and being a leader, Frank's like, are you kidding me? You're not a leader, blah blah blah, right? You hear all that stuff? And then you heard me kind of psychologically work my way around.
There's a lot of effort. Yeah, I get it. And I. And I went through all that. You play this recording back, you'll see me. I'm. I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to Frank. I'm talking to myself. And, you know, I've. I've tried tricks where I say, you know, you talk to yourself like, I like. Don't talk to Alex.
That way. Alex doesn't want this. But, the best thing for me is ultimately been to weaponize that guy and say, hey, I appreciate you, man. It's like my primal brain saying, you know, go eat that snacky cake. But but my other my modern brain said, Frank, is more of a primal guy. And that's okay. I can appreciate it.
But not everybody's kind of navigated that for themselves and sorted out. So I just try to help be the narrator, to help, help be another voice and allow them to have another voice in their head. Because I gotta tell you, man, they're probably I get I get it. There's turd employees out there everywhere. But, for us, in my experience, there are more people that want to be good, that want to do the good things.
They want to be great. And, if they had someone help them see how great they were, they would be great. And then they would help other people be great. And now I'm getting Shangri-La, and I know this is where the hippie comes in, but but ultimately, that's how we work, right? That's the that's the momentum we want in the world of more people being great and wanting others to be great, as opposed to I going to be great to cut you down or I gotta cut myself down.
And it's just, it's not the whole thing's ugly.
Mike Huff
Yeah, yeah. No, I get it. Yeah. I think it's a it's a great mentality to kind of like, you know, not not to get biblical, but you're kind of the spine of that message and, and they're sending the message and.
Alex Reneman
Yeah, sure. You know, hey, good news is spread fast, man. And I know that any of you negative news spreads to ten and good news to two, but but true good news when it spread, it lands and it sticks. It doesn't just it doesn't wait for the next news cycle. Really good news sticks. And I think the more of us that are spreading that, the better.
Alex Reneman is the founder of Mountain Leverage and Unleash Tygart and host of Flourishing w/ Alex Reneman. For 20+ years he has worked as CEO of Mountain Leverage, honing the concept of flourishing and experimenting with it in the business. In July of 2024, he decided to begin to share this idea with others, which led to his podcast, social content, and the plans for other initiatives in the future.
