Thanks for Coming Back
Welcome to "Thanks for Coming Back," where every episode feels like a heart-to-heart in your favorite coffee spot. Hosted by Dr. Latasha Nelson, this podcast strips back the layers of leadership to reveal the real, relatable side of guiding and growing, whether you're a seasoned pro or just starting out.
Settle in with your brew of choice as Latasha shares her world of insights and experiences, blending wisdom with warmth in conversations that matter. It’s not just her stories, though; guests from all walks of life join in to share their own tales of triumph and challenge, adding flavors of diversity and depth to the mix.
"Thanks for Coming Back" is more than just a podcast—it's a community where we all learn and grow together. It's about tackling our challenges, getting better at what we do, and embracing the leader within. So come join the conversation, and let’s make leadership a part of our daily lives.
Thanks for Coming Back
Leadership Through Fear and Uncertainty
Growing up as a Black man in central Pennsylvania, Ben Grimes shares a deeply moving story of resilience, navigating life with a single mother and overcoming the challenges of losing a father to addiction. From these humble beginnings to graduating from West Point, Ben’s journey is a testament to the power of optimism and embracing the unknown. His story reminds us all that potential often lies within our struggles, offering powerful insights into how our past experiences shape us into leaders.
In this episode, we dive deep into true leadership beyond titles, focusing on trust, vulnerability, and the power of informal authority. Drawing on his experience as a helicopter platoon leader in the Army and examples like President Obama, Ben discusses the value of admitting limitations and building genuine connections. He emphasizes that leadership isn’t about having all the answers, but about fostering collaboration and creating environments where everyone’s contributions matter.
We also explore the foundational role of trust and transparency in leadership, with Ben sharing practical advice on leading with empathy and authenticity. Whether you’re navigating the complexities of organizational hierarchies or aspiring to step into a leadership role, this episode offers tangible strategies for extending trust and leading through fear and uncertainty. Ben’s insights will inspire you to embrace your own journey, draw confidence from your unique background, and recognize that your experiences have already prepared you for the challenges ahead. Packed with lessons on personal growth, boundary-setting, and leadership, this episode is a must-listen for anyone on their leadership path.
Thank you so much for being with us today and I have to ask, just to kick off. You shared that you didn't believe that people like you could launch into leadership from your background. You've got such a solid background. I have to know what does that mean? What did that look like? Tell us more.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I appreciate that I've got a solid background now, but when I started I didn't feel that way. And for folks who can't see us as we have this conversation, I'm a black man who grew up in central Pennsylvania and I'm a little over 50 now. Pennsylvania was not a place where you saw a lot of successful Black men kind of anywhere and it's not to say there were none and I had a handful of role models that I looked to. But when I was growing up, my family, I grew up in a single parent household. My mom was a social worker raising four kids on her own, and my dad died when I was 12 or 13 or so after coming back from Vietnam as a heroin addict and being in and out of jail as I was growing up, and so not a great source of inspiration and role model for me as a young man. And so you know you grow up in a household that is struggling where it.
Speaker 2:you know, we never wanted for food, but we wanted for a lot of other things. And so as I was getting up high school and looking at what my life was going to look like, it was not where I am now I didn't see the path to where I am now at that time. I mean, that's why I said that I just didn't see myself in my old future. Really it was kind of an odd way to see it, but I hoped at that time to just kind of get by. I knew I was a smart kid and I knew that I could rely on that to some degree, but I didn't know how.
Speaker 1:So you have to give us so much more because you figured it out and even if it was through trial and error, right, you figured it out. I'm curious for people. Well, let me back up. First, thank you for sharing all of that. Thank you for being vulnerable with our audience. I think it's really easy for people to see what they define as success and not really understand the story and the journey that come with it, and so, for me, what you just shared was extremely relatable.
Speaker 1:Not exact details, right? So, for example, I'm one of six and I grew up in inner city Cleveland, and I tell people all the time I didn't know we were technically based on government guidelines, poor, right. My parents did such a phenomenal job of making sure that we had. And as I got older and my dad shared more with me, he passed away from cancer back in 2017. And there's so many things I wish I could ask him today. But as I learned more from him, he would share things like nights that he and my mom would sit up and cry together because they knew they were struggling. I, as like the third oldest, had no clue, right, I had absolutely no clue. I had no way of knowing what kind of pressures you could have as two young parents, because, even though my mom was nine years older than my dad, my dad was in his early twenties when he had me.
Speaker 1:So to reflect on that now and be able to say to people my first real instances of leadership, of what it really looked like, started with my parents, for things that I had no way of knowing at the time. But now, in reflection, I understand there is a journey with everyone, and so your vulnerability I appreciate, because I'm sure that a lot of people will be able to see themselves in what you share.
Speaker 2:I hope that people do see echoes or reflections of their own experience in what we have both shared. I knew that we were poor. Poor is a spectrum right, very much a spectrum. I knew that we were poor. One of the ways I knew that we were poor was when my mom dropped me off at middle school, and she was very good about emphasizing school and making sure we were going to school. But for a couple of years she would drop me off at school and I would slide out of the backseat of the primer gray used car that she was driving with the blue vinyl seats, and then it would backfire before she drove off. And that's when you know you're poor.
Speaker 1:Now, like you said, it's a spectrum, right. I shared with my husband one day. I said, yeah, we had probably at least two televisions in the house and he was like, were they color? I said yeah. He said no, you guys weren't. It's all relative, right, it's all relative, absolutely. I am eager for you to share the mindset that you found yourself in as a youth and the types of shifts you experienced throughout your adulthood that brought you to what I consider a very illustrious background. To know that, first of all, my father was also military. He was in the Army. So high regards there and anyone who gets paid to argue a point for a living, they get high praise from me too. So please tell us about your journey and your mindset as you navigated from youth to where you are today, where you are today.
Speaker 2:I think the biggest factor in my success and I've mentioned this, I think, before, but my naivete in how I approached what was ahead for me. I just didn't know. And not knowing, I think, was really important in me finding success, because while I didn't have a great vision or model for what I was after, I also didn't know what I was up against really.
Speaker 2:I honestly didn't know how to pay for school, to go to college after high school. I didn't know how you paid for that. I knew that there were loans out there, but it never occurred to me that I couldn't get one. And so for me it was all your parents had money or you didn't go to school, like that was it. And then I heard about West Point and you get paid to go to school and all you have to do at the other end of that is serve in the army for six years, which I plan to do anyway and I was like that's great, that sounds like a great deal, and so for me, the mindset that made it possible for me to find success was being open to possibilities.
Speaker 2:It really is that, and it's not about being stuck in where you are, because that's the danger. That's, the risk is that you grow up poor. You're the oldest of four kids and you're helping your mom take care of kids, but you're also like a teenager, so you're a bit of a jerk to start with, and so it's very easy to get stuck in that place where you don't have and you don't see a path to having and you don't see a model that you can actually aspire to. All you know is you could do something and that's enough. I mean, that is enough. And remembering that you could do something, that really is enough, and then just latching on to that.
Speaker 1:Now you said it's enough. I have to ask for those who may have fear of the unknown, to ask for those who may have fear of the unknown right and the reality is, regardless of your circumstances and your specific journey, we live in a huge space of uncertainty right now and it's only accelerated right when you look at the economy, when you look at technological advances, everything and a ton of other things I'm not listing. We live in uncertain times. Is what you described enough to overcome the fear of the unknown, or are there caveats to add on to what you just described to help you overcome the fear of the unknown?
Speaker 2:I think that we don't overcome that, that fear, but we learn to live with that fear. And that fear is balanced. It's never overcome, it's never gone, but we learn to balance it and we learn to live with it. Because we have, uh we cultivate, an optimism about what's possible for ourselves, even if we don't have the money, the resources, the education, the experience we think that we need. We have the optimism of possibility and because of that we're not fixed on a particular path. So I didn't know. I think, like most folks coming out of high school, like I, had some aspirations about what, in an ideal world, what would I be? I would be a marine biologist and an astronaut, right, like every like, or a teacher, or like whatever, whatever it's age, my mom's age, you know. Did you know when you left high school that this is what you'd be doing?
Speaker 2:No there's no way I would tell you that this is what I would be doing. But it's the optimism, it's that power of optimistic possibility and belief that we will find a way. Even if we don't see the way right now, the way will become clear to us, and that allows you to embrace risk and embrace that fear of the unknown, to say, look, this is going to be scary, but at the end of this is going to be something, because I'm making the choices that I'm making now, because they are choices that are grounded in what I believe is going to help me, they will result in a positive outcome. It's not about overcoming fear. It is really about living with fear and counterbalancing fear. It's really, I think, ultimately a faith in ourselves and a faith in the choices that we make, because we don't see the outcome, we don't see the end of the path, we don't see where we're going to land. There's no way I would have predicted that I would be here when I started on this journey a long time ago.
Speaker 2:But it's the confidence that we are making the right choices for ourselves even when they turn out to be the wrong choices. It's commitment to the choice and commitment to the process and commitment to the fact that we will learn along the way and as long as we're learning along the way, we are doing the right thing.
Speaker 1:I feel like what you just shared is that you know you don't have to have all the answers in order to navigate and become successful in your own right. Navigate and become successful in your own right is really trusting the process in some ways and having confidence. Voting fighting there's another word believing in nothing. Yourself right, like if you betting that's the word I know it will come to me Betting on yourself. I want to get your thoughts on a quote that I recently came across in reading John Maxwell's High Road Leadership. It's a quote from Carl Sandburg and it goes there is an eagle in me that wants to soar and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in mud. What are your thoughts about that quote and how it applies? When it comes to creating balance you shared? There's no such thing as living without fear. There's striking a balance between knowing that things may not go right, but also being able to push forward.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that we all, I agree that we all have an eagle and a hippopotamus in us, and I think that we can't ignore either side Absolutely. I think we should lean towards the eagle, right. I mean, of course, we should lean towards the eagle, absolutely. I think we should lean towards the eagle, right. I mean, of course, we should lean towards the eagle. But if you try to dismiss the hippopotamus or pretend like it doesn't exist, all you're doing is hacking away those feelings and those emotions and those reactions and those potential learnings from disappointment and sadness and regret and shame even.
Speaker 2:And so for me, I talk about this especially, maybe not talked about it, but I had this belief, especially in my 20s, when I felt bad. I made a commitment to myself to wallow in my feelings. You have to feel it, you have to feel it, you have to feel it so that you can start to move past it. If you pretend that you're not having those feelings, those emotions, those reactions, if you're not feeling that shame, then it's always going to linger. But you cannot confront it until you dive into it a little bit, to really understand it. And once you understand the feelings that you're having, the emotion that you're having now. You've got an opportunity to figure out where the learning is and what the opportunity for change and growth is.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Now, you touched on the power of naivete.
Speaker 2:Power of naivete.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love how you describe it. What I took away is there's this openness to the unknown that you can benefit from. How would you describe or how do you think that aspiring leaders could embrace that power of naivete, and especially when it comes to stepping into new roles, new challenges and that unknown?
Speaker 2:I think that one of the things that new leaders in particular miss the opportunity on is admitting that they don't know everything. I really do. I think that this is one of the biggest opportunities that we have as new leaders is to step into a role and say I am excited to be here and I don't know everything. It really is one of the reasons why we have teams right. If it only took one person to get it done, you wouldn't have a team to lead, but it takes more than you, and the more senior you get in leadership roles, the less you are likely to know everyone else's job with depth and expertise, and so you really do have to embrace that open mindset, that openness to learning from others while you're still leading others.
Speaker 2:I learned this very early on. After graduating from West Point, my first job in the Army was as a helicopter platoon leader, and so I was the senior person in the platoon and we had three aircraft and two flight crews and a bunch of mechanics and crew chiefs. So about 30 soldiers or so and three aircraft, and we fly around South Korea or Fort Campbell, kentucky. But the takeaway is I was in charge but also the least experienced and least qualified pilot and by far the least qualified mechanic like I would. I wouldn't have allowed me to, uh, change the oil, um, with a lawnmower, let alone a million dollar.
Speaker 1:Black ops, black and of course you didn't tell anyone that right oh they yeah.
Speaker 2:no, I absolutely told people that because they have to understand, they have to know that I know my limits.
Speaker 2:You know when you're able to articulate and embrace your limits, you create trust with your team because they know that you're not going to overstep what you're capable of.
Speaker 2:You're not going to walk them into into inordinate risk or adversity.
Speaker 2:And now in the army that has a particular kind of connotation or framework to it, but it works everywhere else.
Speaker 2:As a lawyer, if I'm leading a trial team, my team needs to know where my expertise lies and that I know that it does not extend to certain areas so that when we're making litigation decisions and strategy decisions, they know that I'm not just going to pop off with some idea to file a certain motion or call a certain witness or make a certain argument because I think it sounds good. They need to know that I know my limits and I'm going to rely on them to bring their expertise to the table so that we can all contribute to our organizational art, like the team's success than me working in a particular court or with a particular judge or with a particular co-counsel, so they can help read the environment to help us make those tactical and strategic decisions that are going to lead to success. If I only rely on the way I read the room or the way that I read the case, then I'm really cutting us all short and diminishing our opportunities to succeed.
Speaker 1:And and I hate to say it, but it's also limiting your capacity to learn from others.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:I love how you just described it because, as you were just going, you know describing this for us, I thought to myself. Another exceptional example aside from yourself that I think of is President Obama, when he first entered the White House. Now, this is not to politicize this episode, people. So, however you feel about whoever you feel about it this is not that, but I remember there being a lot of conversation about his experience, or lack thereof, at that stage, on that big of a stage, and what I watched him do for several years was make sure he was surrounded by people who knew more than he did, and, as a leader, that's a great way to create capacity so that you can learn, so that you can become a stronger leader and you can create other opportunities for other people as well.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I'm really glad that you included that you reminded us how important it is for us as leaders to learn from our teams. I really think that that when we think about working on a team, it has to be it has to be a collection of equals, really, with different roles and my role as the leader is to make the ultimate decision but we are a collection of equals when it comes to our contributions. We all are contributing differently my contribution is the final word, kind of at the root of it but we all come at this as equals and I think that that is a really critical way to approach the obligation of leadership, not just the authority of leadership.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. So take the pressure off of yourself as a leader if you think you have to have all the answers, because you don't and we touched on uncertainty already and how accelerated it is today you can't possibly know everything but ensuring that you're co-elevating, you're collaborating. I tell my team all the time. I had a meeting recent and one of my team members introduced herself and she said recent, and one of my team members introduced herself and she said yeah, I report into Latasha, she's my leader, and it was something about the way she said it. I said we work together. We work together.
Speaker 1:She has phenomenal insights from her experience that I would not have at this stage because I don't have her exact experience, and vice versa. There are certain things that she may lean into me for and ultimately, when I'm responsible and held accountable to, it's just different from what she does, but she is still very much a leader in her own right and I expect my team to step up in that way. So you have to treat people the way that you expect them to show up and deliver.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely I love the way you talk about collaboration, and my brother's a counselor. He works in state prison in Pennsylvania and one of the ways that he talks about collaboration is to break that word down into co-labor, work together, like it's not just talking at each other, it's not just sending emails back and forth and like, oh, we're collaborating. No, we're actually working together as equals, and I really appreciate the way you brought that example in.
Speaker 1:No, and I like that co-labor. We will do this together, every bit of it, the good parts, the easy parts and all of the other stuff that comes with it. Now you tickle me because I'm thinking about your background, or even what stepping stone to place your footing on in order to move forward. You somehow landed in the military and the legal profession, which for some I'm sure that this is probably the perception and not necessarily the rule, but for some both can come across as pretty firm, rigid, even hierarchical comes to mind. What lessons can you offer aspiring leaders in more of a structured environment for how to develop their influence, even when they lack direct authority?
Speaker 2:even when they lack direct authority. This is an idea that I talk with my coaching clients a lot about, primarily in law firms, in very hierarchical and structured environments, but it's something that I really learned in the Army, which is, of course, as you suggest, a very structured environment. But your real question is like how do you lead without formal authority? How do you lead with influence? And my answer really is you lead with informal authority, very much the same way you lead with formal authority. You lack one thing. When you're leading informally, you lack that one thing the title or the role. But everything else should be the same, and this is an idea that I think does not. I see this in the legal world. That does not translate well, at least into the legal world. We look at formal authority and we stop there and say this is all I need to lead, I'm the partner, I'm the director, I'm the general counsel, I'm the whatever, and we stop there. I'm the SDP of whatever. But leadership, the vast majority of what makes leadership successful, is not the formal authority, it is the relationship, it is the influence, and you generate that influence by creating relationships with other people, and I'll tell you, even in the army, this is so important.
Speaker 2:We think about the army as an environment where I tell you I give an order and you just do it because I'm in charge, and that works sometimes and there are situations where that has to work right In combat.
Speaker 2:Of course that has to be the way that we react to orders, but in order to create an environment where you are actually going to do something unpleasant that you don't want to do, that might be dangerous for you, you have to trust the orders that I'm giving and that trust is generated long before I give that order. And so when we're talking about formal authority that formal authority where we're really going to rest on our position, that sits on a base of informal authority and relationship and trust and that has to be cultivated over time. And so when we're looking at what we can do, leading from the middle, we're leading from the bottom, leading up. We talk about leading up all the time. That comes from relationship and trust, and those are the same kind of skills and practices and behaviors and habits and techniques that we use in a position of formal authority. We're just doing it without the title.
Speaker 1:And it's not just leading up either. Right, because we have those peers who are like you're my peer. Why are you trying to get me to do anything? You still have to have trust and I love your emphasis on trust, transparency, empathy and passion. I love your emphasis on trust, transparency, empathy and passion Because I trust you to be looking out for me the same way you would look out for yourself. I'm more open, perhaps, to taking your lead, following your lead.
Speaker 1:Transparency you're sharing with me what I need to know and not just what you want me to know. Empathy you understand where I'm coming from. When I question why you may be suggesting what you're suggesting and if I don't believe, you believe what you're saying. That's where the passion part comes into me. I don't know why you're talking to me at this point, why you would expect me to take any reasonable, much less risky steps forward in their daily interactions with everyone across and out. And if there are folks who are at levels serving more frontline bases, by all means consider them too. But how can they implement those into their daily interactions to create a greater impact within their leadership?
Speaker 2:When I talk about that, I'll start with trust, because I think that this is the bedrock. I talk about these four pillars of leadership trust, transparency, empathy and passion. I think they are co-equals, but the first among equals is trust, and so I that I share with folks. It's four questions that I share with folks that I recommend that you use to start building that trust. The questions are how are you doing? How are you? How are you doing? What are you working on? How is that going? What can I do to help? That's it, and those are questions that you ask with curiosity.
Speaker 2:It is really about asking curious questions. Asking a question about how you're doing allows you, if you choose, to share with me not just how you slept last night, but like what's going on in your life. How are your kids, what are your parents up to? Like what, what other things are on your mind? That might be a factor in you, in what you're bringing to work, to the office, to the family, to the meeting, to the Cub Scout Jamboree, whatever. How are you doing? What are you working on? And particularly as a supervisor, from a supervisor's perspective, that should not be. The question is not are you working on that thing that I gave you. It is what are you working on?
Speaker 2:Because that recognizes there may be other projects out there that are important to you, especially when we're working in a dynamic environment where our team might have relationships or responsibilities to other supervisors. What are you working on? How is that going? Again, open-ended, just curious, and that might lead to what you enjoy about it, what you don't enjoy, where you're stuck. The final question how can I help, or what can I do to help Again is an open-ended question.
Speaker 2:It should not be. Would it help if I did X? Because then you're again. You're inserting yourself into their decision, you're taking autonomy away from them, and so an open-ended question like what can I do to help? The answer might be nothing. The answer might be let me think about it and get back to you, but you're giving them autonomy over how they resolve the tension in the project if there is any and you're demonstrating trust.
Speaker 2:And so when I think about trust, it's not about what can I do to earn your trust. Trust is not something I get. Trust is something that we give, and so if I want you to give trust to me, particularly as the leader, but if you're talking about peer leadership or leading up or any type of leader, the leader goes first, and so if I hope that you're going to give me trust, well, I got to go first. I got to show you trust, I got to give you trust, and so that's where it all starts for me. And from there you have.
Speaker 2:These small questions can lead into broader conversations. They can be as short as two minutes as a part of a check-in at a meeting, they could be a 15-minute coffee with your friend, talk about peer leadership and peer relationships. They could be coffee lunch, but it's really these bite-sized opportunities to interact and share with each other, and for me that then rolls into transparency, which is both. Transparency for me is both informational transparency, as you suggested making sure that you have relevant information, not just the information I think is useful to you but it's also transparency about who we are.
Speaker 2:When I show you who I am, I make it okay for you to show me who you are, and then we can stop coming to work with our mask on, like the figurative mask. We're all pretty comfortable, especially some of us who grew up code switching because that was the safe way to operate. But when you do that less, then you have less stress to deal with during the day and you can enjoy the work better, you can enjoy your, you can lean into your relationships a little bit better. And even if we don't have, you know, coffee and drinks and dinner after work, we might not be best buds, right, but we can still understand each other in a more holistic way, and that contributes to trust, builds a relationship, so that when times get tough, we have that foundation that is going to allow us to work effectively together.
Speaker 1:I like how you just described transparency and being able to show up as your genuine and authentic self.
Speaker 1:I read an interesting statistic about perfectionism, which I think a lot of people also struggle with, and I'm connecting dots back to earlier in our conversation where we said as a leader, you do not have to have all the answers.
Speaker 1:But generationally, there's a generation that is coming up now and they're really struggling with having to be perfect and it leads to depression, it leads to health issues because of the stress that comes with it and it doesn't work for everyone else, because even if you get something like I hit that at the park, there were probably things that could have been done differently, better. It's not about you, and a lot of that, I think, comes down to environment and expectations, not just your own, your personal expectations of yourself, but also environmentally. If you happen to be in an environment where, to your point earlier, if you feel like you have to code switch or the expectation is that you're going to be perfect, do you feel like you can show up as your genuine and authentic self? Show up as your genuine and authentic self. What are your thoughts on how you can navigate or suggestions for people who may find themselves in an environment where they can't show up as their genuine and authentic self and, by extension, can't show their team members who they are authentically.
Speaker 2:I think an environment like that it really depends on where you are in the system. Right In a system like that, it really depends on where you sit. And if we look at like an org chart, that is your traditional pyramid org chart. If you're at the bottom of the pyramid there's not a lot you can do, quite frankly. There's not a lot you can do, quite frankly. You can influence your own little bubble and you can develop habits and practices that protect your own well-being and might radiate out to the folks that you interact with the most In an environment for which the culture does not allow that. Culture change at that level really needs to start at the top and it really takes an interested senior leadership team to want to recognize that they have an environment like that, and so there are tools.
Speaker 2:Obviously there are tools that they can use to discover that, but they have to want to know how they're doing. If they don't want to know how they're doing, quite frankly, I think my recommendation is find a different environment. I think that those cultures are-.
Speaker 1:Are you suggesting to become that eagle and sword, are you?
Speaker 2:suggesting to become that eagle and sword. Yes, I mean, you're exactly right. Yes, absolutely, because those types of cultures, I think, are bound to fail, especially in the legal field, where some of the biggest law firms in the world are very rigid and do not give their attorneys and legal professional staff the opportunity to come to work and be themselves, or to come to work and learn by doing, which includes failing. Learning requires pushing the boundaries, and when you push the boundaries you are inevitably going to not get something right, and it's a matter of scaling that failure, like finding failure at the right scale that is acceptable risk for the organization but still offers some learning. If we only ever do things that we know how to do well, you're never going to become a great lawyer or great leader.
Speaker 1:You can't evolve.
Speaker 2:You can't evolve, you can't evolve.
Speaker 1:If you only do things that you know how to do or that you're comfortable doing, you're never really challenging the status quo. You're assuming that all of your variables remain the same. You can't account for certainty when there's nothing that's certain at this point it for me, everything is subject to changing, so yeah, so.
Speaker 2:So if you're in a situation, if you're in a culture, an organization that that is unwilling to see itself and see its challenges and make some change, go someplace else, because that that organization is not going to survive in the long term. And if it does, is that a place you want to be a part of? I mean, I think part of finding your eagle wings is realizing what you will put up with. I mean really I mean, it really is kind of that simple. What are you willing?
Speaker 1:to put up with? What are your boundaries?
Speaker 2:Exactly what are your boundaries, and we're all going to make choices. Sometimes we're going to make choices that we wouldn't make because the money is really good or it gives us an opportunity to work with a particular person or a particular city, or because it looks good on our resume and maybe later that's going to be that we find that really important to us.
Speaker 2:All of that is perfectly fine so long as it's a choice. But when it's when it's inertia rather than a choice, that's when I think we start to do ourselves a disservice absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I agree with everything you've just shared. I think shows how did you describe this? The co-equivalency of each of these traits, because if you have to your point, if you're part of a system where your senior leadership is not interested, does not explore, just starting with those day-to-day interactions you described. If you're asked how are you doing today, and the answer you don't feel like you can give a real answer or you feel like you have to give the answer that's expected, then that's not real trust, right, that's fabricated. That means that there's no level of transparency right At those levels in that interaction.
Speaker 1:It's difficult to empathize with something you're not aware of. Right, and I don't know how you can be passionate in an environment that you don't feel like you. Now, again, everyone is very different, everyone is uniquely gifted, and so you may perfectly in an environment that someone else may not, and that is okay. You need to establish your boundaries and, when warranting, allow yourself to wallow in the muck like the hippopotamus if that's what you feel like you need to do, and also be open and willing to the uncertain and soaring, spreading those wings if you need to. I love that. It went very philosophical.
Speaker 2:That's good. That's how I like it. That's how I like it.
Speaker 1:Nice, nice. Now, as we're wrapping up here, I would love for any other advice you might have for aspiring leaders who might be listening and they're feeling a little unsure about their leadership potential. What's one piece of advice you'd leave them with as they work through their boundaries, how they show up opportunities, as they consider different opportunities for growth and impact? What final advice would you give them?
Speaker 2:When I talk with young leaders, one of the biggest challenges that they face is a lack of confidence in you know, because they haven't had this sort of opportunity before, they don't have the right schooling or experience or job history. What I like to remind them is that their unique history is the proof that they are ready.
Speaker 2:They may not have done this thing, but I guarantee that we have all had experiences that speak to the thing that it is we're worried about. So if we're worried about taking on a leadership role because we've never been a manager of a team before, well then you need to think back to raise.
Speaker 2:You know, when you grew up with five siblings right, five siblings take turns being a leader and it doesn't matter if you're the oldest although, as the oldest, you might be in that role more often but everybody's going to get a chance to lead that team and motivate, inspire and deal with conflict and have difficult conversations and thinking about what the next step is going to require. And then looking back at our history and saying, yeah, I did that and this is how it may not look the same. I wasn't wearing a name tag that said team leader. But I have this in my history, whether it was in the family or in school, and sometimes it wasn't even the good stuff. Sometimes it was leading the revolt on the basketball team.
Speaker 1:Leading the opportunity for change is what I heard. Leading the opportunity for change.
Speaker 2:Yes, I love, yes, exactly, exactly. But it's a matter of looking at all of our experiences from a different perspective and finding the relevant value in them.
Speaker 1:Now I can't let you go without you sharing how we can stay connected and where we find out about all your awesome work.
Speaker 2:So the best place to find me is on LinkedIn. Just search for Ben Grimes on LinkedIn. Everybody. Please feel free to reach out to me directly by email, ben at BKG leadership coaching dotcom, and you can imagine then that my website is bkgleadershipcoachingcom. I do one-on-one executive coaching for new law firm partners who are struggling to balance all of the new responsibilities of partnership and still billing time and finding clients and managing the rest of their lives. So that's what I do primarily, but I also do some speaking workshops. If you stop by the website, I've got a tool to help kind of take a snapshot of where your leadership is and where you can put some energy towards refining it. I'm happy to share that for free, and stay tuned for my books. I'm working on two books that should be out soon before the end of the year. It should be out soon One on mastering partnership as a new law firm partner and one that I'm really excited about. That is focused on empathy-driven leadership, and I think it's going to be really good. So stay tuned for those.
Speaker 1:I have high expectations, so no pressure. Thank you so much for joining us today and sharing all of your wisdom, especially for your vulnerability. Again, I know historically it may be seen as a sign of weakness, but I'm not sure how you can make real and genuine connections with people without sharing your real and genuine journey with them, and so thank you for sharing that with me and our audience today.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share and connect with folks Absolutely.
