Simplify to Amplify: The Leadership Strategy That Improves Performance (W/Jimmy Burroughes)

Workforce Alchemy

Why do capable leadership teams stay busy, stressed, and stuck?  In this episode of The Mason Duchatschek Show, former military leader and high-performance advisor Jimmy Burroughes explains how business owners, CEOs, and executives can reduce complexity, improve decision-making, prevent burnout, and help their teams perform at a higher level.  Jimmy has applied lessons from high-pressure military environments inside major organizations, including Samsung, LEGO, and Bank of America. His Simplify to Amplify approach helps leaders remove systemic friction, clarify priorities, build trust, and focus on the work that produces the greatest impact.  You will learn why executive multitasking creates confusion, how leaders can stop reacting to every fire, and what it takes to create a more focused, aligned, and productive organization.  In This Episode, You’ll Learn:  • How to identify the lowest-effort, highest-impact priority • Why sequencing work matters as much as prioritizing it • How multitasking creates confusion throughout a leadership team • Why CEOs should stop trying to be the expert on everything • How to use Purpose, Value, and Capacity to evaluate priorities • What to stop, slow down, or swap when new work appears • How to turn your to-do list into a “who’s-to-do list” • Why trust is essential to sustainable high performance • How smaller decisions can reduce risk and maintain momentum • Why simplifying one leadership habit can improve execution and profitability  Jimmy also shares a real-world case study involving a CEO who believed he was an exceptional multitasker. His leadership team was overloaded, priorities kept changing, and important projects remained unfinished.  The solution was simple: focus the leadership team on one major priority each week.  That shift helped the organization complete more work, reduce stress, improve engagement, lower absenteeism, and increase business performance.  Key Leadership Frameworks Discussed:  Purpose, Value, Capacity  Use these three filters before committing time and resources:  What is the purpose of this work? What value will it create? Do we have the capacity to do it well?  Stop, Slow Down, or Swap  When a new priority is added, decide what will be stopped, delayed, or replaced.  The 3-by-3-by-3 Framework  Share with your boss:  • Three things you completed • Three priorities for the coming week • Three things you need to keep moving  Connect With Workforce Alchemy  Website: https://workforcealchemy.com/  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ReverseRiskConsulting  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/workforcealchemy/  X / Twitter: https://x.com/WorkAlchemist  Rumble: https://rumble.com/user/WorkforceAlchemy  Dailymotion: https://www.dailymotion.com/WorkforceAlchemy  YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@WorkforceAlchemist  Connect With Mason Duchatschek  Website: https://masonduchatschek.com/  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/masonduchatschek/

Transcript

00:05welcome to the mason dukacheck show and before we jump in in this episode it's brought to you by

00:11workforcealchemy.com a place where business owners and executives go to uncover profit leaks hidden

00:18in your everyday operations jimmy burroughs is a former military leader who has taken lessons from

00:24high stakes high pressure environments and applied them inside some of the world's most

00:29recognized organizations including samsung lego and bank of america known for his simplified amplify

00:36approach he helps leaders cut through complexity improve performance and reduce burnout this work

00:42has driven measurable results at scale and today he advises executives on how to lead with clarity

00:49and environments that demand both speed and precision welcome to the show thank you so much

00:54lovely to be here in your military experience when everything is high stakes and fast moving

00:59how do you decide what actually matters most it's such a there's such a deep question because

01:04the flippant answer is it depends um the the more considered answer is we've got to look at value

01:14and impact as our two i guess measures of of where to start and i think often what happens is

01:22we react to

01:23the thing that's the most urgent or the biggest fire that's sitting in front of us um whereas actually

01:29from from the work that we do with leaders it's around how do i choose what's the most important

01:34thing to work on uh the thing that's really going to move the dial or the thing that's going to

01:38shift the business in the most meaningful way and if we can combine that with finding the easiest

01:44highest impact thing um then we kind of hit this sweet spot of of where activity goes and you know

01:51if i think about this from a military perspective or a commercial perspective we're always asking

01:56people to say what's the lowest effort highest impact activity you could do out of all the things

02:02you've got to do um that's that's how you can find what matters most it's funny you're reminding me

02:07of a conversation i had and i was just a brand new second lieutenant so we're talking a long long

02:11time

02:12ago but uh colonel calvin broten um he was in the missouri army national guard and he pulled me aside

02:18one day he told me something i've never forgotten he drew a little matrix he drew four boxes he said

02:23mason there's two ways to do things there's the right way to do things and there's the wrong way to

02:26do things he says there's also the the hard way and the easy way and he literally challenged us to

02:33think in terms of first of all what's the right way to accomplish this thing what's the wrong

02:37the easy and right box is the one he said you want to focus on and that and just that

02:41it's always

02:42stuck with me but anyway i digress when you moved into working with large organizations what surprised

02:48you most about how leaders handle complexity i think probably the thing that surprised me the most

02:52was people don't have a system for dealing with complexity uh most leaders by virtue of the workload that

03:01they have and the the way that leadership training has been developed over the last 25 or so years

03:07um haven't been given a system for complexity and you add to that the fact that complexity is

03:14significantly up compared to a generation ago what surprises me is we haven't developed better ways of

03:20navigating that and helping leaders to think through the problems that are in front of them and be less

03:26reactive uh i think nearly every leader i talk to now is is firefighting whilst whacking moles whilst

03:33juggling a million balls um whilst putting out lots of fires and so there's very little time for them to

03:39go what is the right thing to be doing right now and why is this so complex and how can

03:44i make it less

03:45complex so maybe it's just complicated uh and and and how do i resource and and plan my response here

03:53most effectively so can you give me an example of what a systematic approach to solving those kind

03:59of issues might look like well we just think about too uh having a way of saying well what is

04:04the

04:04lowest effort highest impact activity i could do here and having a little grid that i could put stuff

04:08on what's the right easy way of approaching this the majority of leaders that that we see will uh have

04:15a

04:15list of stuff they've got to get done and they start at the top of the list and they work

04:19their way down

04:19and they hope they get through everything on a daily basis that's not a system that's just i guess

04:24you it is a system it's not a very effective system for when you're working in a complex environment

04:27they also don't have a system for uh thinking about the purpose or uh the why we're doing certain

04:36things and does that contribute more meaningfully to the business or not and they don't also have a

04:41system for defining is this the work for me to be doing or is this somebody in my team to

04:46be doing

04:46and often leaders carry on doing things they shouldn't be doing or take over things they

04:51shouldn't take over because they just believe in the system they're operating and they believe that

04:57they are ultimately responsible therefore they have to do it they haven't got the system of going

05:00in this complex environment my job is to marshal resources my job is to find the experts and my job

05:06is to make decisions and to make sure things happen not necessarily to do them myself that's a very very

05:11good instinct it's funny because you talked about people having their list because i mean i've been

05:15guilty in the past and fortunately i've been surrounded by good mentors and even little

05:19even little designations like being able to identify what's important versus what's important

05:25and urgent because there's a lot of important things you can have that like you talked about

05:28earlier someone can have a whole list of all these things they need to do that are all important

05:31but if they can't prioritize and say well which ones are urgent which ones are time sensitive which

05:35ones are going to cause consequences if they're not addressed sooner rather than later it lets me move

05:40those up on the priority list or if i don't address some of these issues early then i'm clogging the

05:46system downstream and just little distinctions like that for a lot of people can make a big difference

05:51i i just know that one in particular was a big difference for me early in my career so it's

05:56it's

05:57those folks that do have the list and go through it yeah they can get through it but if they're

06:01wanting

06:01to be super high speed that's a that's a different level of uh of intention as far as what

06:08that list so i think the other one that we don't have we struggle for is is the idea of

06:14um sequencing

06:15and in the military it's called concurrent activity but basically setting something off so it can be

06:20baking in the oven while you're preparing something else uh and often i think when we're in complex

06:26environments we don't have the the ability to and the headspace to say actually this is something we

06:32should get going now uh so we can work on this later and we get a product at the end

06:37or actually this is better to leave for a little bit so we can work on this and focus here

06:41and then

06:42we'll start that later like that sequencing is a really core skill of leadership that again is not

06:47taught by many people uh and means that there's a gap in capability for a lot of leaders it's

06:53well you're triggering a bunch of things and i haven't thought of in a long time i was a combat

06:57engineer and one of the things they taught us about and i have not these words not come out of

07:02my

07:02mouth in probably 30 years but critical path method where we did exactly what you're talking

07:07about like what is the path from where we are now to what our end product's going to look like

07:12what steps can can be arranged in a way where we can organize our labor and our our resources

07:17to get as much done in the time that we can so what like you said maybe while let's say

07:23in my case

07:23concrete was curing there are other things that we could be doing but we had to make sure that we

07:28would do that to early in the process to give that time to cure so we could work on other

07:32things while

07:32that so it's really about maximizing resources and i was in my early 20s when i first got exposed to

07:37that and there's a lot of people that have never been exposed to something that strategic for lack

07:42of a better word so how do you know when a business problem is actually a complexity problem in disguise

07:46the world that we work in um is is less about leadership development and it's more about business

07:52performance and the the analogy i use uh when i'm trying to explain it to leaders is it's kind of

07:59like you've got you and your leadership team in a rowboat and you're all rowing as hard as you can

08:04and you're getting tired because you're rowing so hard and the uh the challenge we've got is that

08:11everybody's facing in different directions rowing in different directions everybody's rowing out of time

08:15the boat's sitting in treacle and there's a rope attached to the dog and so we've got this enormous

08:20amount of what i would call systemic friction getting in the way of of you being successful

08:27um this is the complexity thing is one of the systemic frictions and so i think most business

08:33problems are we've got to identify what's the friction point here that is getting in the way of

08:39us performing and oftentimes it's because either we haven't fully understood the problem we haven't

08:44understood the why we haven't understood the purpose we haven't understood the system and we haven't

08:49understood what's going on and so it looks really complex equally it can be we have because we're

08:54rushing we haven't understood the complexity of it so we're underestimating it so we're either over

08:59or underestimating and estimating complexity and we're sitting in this rowing boat which is rowing

09:05in treacle full of friction so our system doesn't work properly even if we attack it head on that's

09:10where i kind of sit sit with this i think the the business problem i mean there are other business

09:15problems obviously with people and other stuff um but from from this perspective where i saw this

09:19question um taking us was trying to trying to encourage leaders to say well if this is a business

09:26problem what are we not seeing what's really going on here how do we boil this down to something to

09:32get

09:32to the facts how do we understand what problem we're actually trying to solve is i had a great

09:36conversation yesterday with a group of od leaders organizational development leaders and the

09:41first question that every time was asked in in this conversation well what's the business problem

09:44you're actually trying to solve what's the thing you're struggling with here because people were

09:48getting into these really complex solutions before they were even understanding what the problem was

09:53because they felt they had to create something really elegant and complex and i think that's that

09:58causes the problem so it's that kind of overestimation or underestimation of complexity can often

10:02exacerbate the business problem so what are the biggest mistakes leaders make when they try to improve

10:06performance by adding more instead of simplifying let me ask you a question um if if you are if you

10:13don't sleep very well and you go to sleep go to work tired and when you get to work there's

10:18three people

10:19standing by your desk and they're all asking you questions at the same time and your phone's ringing

10:24and your wife is in and you had an argument with your wife just before you left the house or

10:27your

10:28partner just before you left the house uh and then the ceo comes in and says i need to talk

10:33to you

10:33right now and as you're walking down the corridor the cfo says oh we've got a problem with the budget

10:38how are you going to be feeling you're going to be on the back foot right you're going to be

10:42what we call a fight or flight response and which takes your brain from being in its wizard mode this

10:47super intelligent executive mode into a lizard mode which is a reptilian response part of the

10:52amygdala at the back of the brain that does fight or flight or fleet and the problem is that when

10:57we add

10:58more we just exacerbate that response so we go from being a wizard to a lizard and then we become

11:03even more lizardish when we add more things on top and what we need to do is to slow down

11:08create some

11:09capacity so we have methodologies that we teach the people we work with that that create space to think

11:14and reflect and work on the important stuff which creates hopefully more space so they're doing less

11:23and working on the important things i think often we when we think about high performance we just say

11:28let's just turn everything up to 11 and it'll be great uh let's add bigger goals and more ambitious

11:33targets and push people harder well if your system is so full of friction that you

11:38can't rowing the boat harder is not going to go any faster then you've got to look at why are

11:43we in

11:43treacle and what can we do to sort that out and so the only way you can do that is

11:48to stop and look

11:48around and think and in the military we call it the condor moments where you sit down you make a

11:52cup of tea

11:53and you go what's going on in this battle uh the same thing applies in in business you can't just

11:57go let's just attack more and hope we win what if you're attacking the wrong thing what if you're

12:01going in the wrong direction what if you're doing the wrong thing entirely you've got you've got to

12:04look at that so can you maybe walk us through a real example where simplifying something led to

12:09measurable jump in performance for an organization that you've worked in yeah um actually my second book

12:14was was a case study essentially of this um we it's called escape the multitasking trap and i worked

12:20with a ceo and his leadership team for about a year and a half on a variety of projects but

12:26the

12:26first one was actually working with the ceo directly and he was mr multitasking he was the master of

12:32multitasking in his mind and he could carry you know 20 things in his head at the same time

12:37and he would always be you know setting projects off and dipping his fingers in here there and everywhere

12:42to try and make sure that everything is running effectively and when i started talking to his

12:46leadership team what i discovered was that they they didn't know um if they were arthur or martha

12:53you know is he working on this today or is he working that today where's the focus today where's

12:57the priority today he keeps changing his mind um or it feels like to me like he keeps changing his

13:01mind uh we're uncertain of what success looks like because it keeps moving and we keep changing

13:06direction uh we've just got too many things on i can't actually get anything done because we keep

13:10starting new things and so i had this conversation with the ceo and i said let's try a new

13:14phenomenon which is called monotasking uh in the old days it was called doing one thing at a time

13:19um and let's see how that goes so let's focus on one project per week with the with the leadership

13:25team let's marshal all the resources to fulfill that project people who aren't involved in that

13:30project get a week of reflection and building their own business out but as a leadership team

13:34we're going to crack one thing a week not 17 things a week just one and let's see what happens

13:39over the course of the next six months we did this um as part of their regular cadence obviously i

13:43took a little bit of time to adjust into it but we got this as part of their regular cadence

13:47um

13:48we then did some uh follow-up interviews and to a to a what 100 of the exec said um

13:55the first thing

13:56that's happened is i'm achieving more in my own business unit um because i'm not so overloaded with

14:02stuff for the ceo second one is we as a leadership team have achieved more than uh in the last

14:06six

14:07months than we have ever achieved because we actually got stuff done versus things getting in the way of

14:11each other we had to stop and think what is the next most important thing to do this week versus

14:15just trying to tackle all of them uh cortisol levels were down we did blood tests on people

14:20cortisol levels were down absenteeism was down uh people weren't getting sick as frequently because

14:25they weren't as worn out engagement was up uh business results were up profitability was up so

14:31like just you know a very simple thing which is and this is the thing i say to nearly all

14:35of our leaders

14:36uh we're everything we teach you is really simple not necessarily easy but really simple and part of

14:41being simple is it's got to be simple uh so for us it was like let's stop doing lots of

14:46things

14:46let's start doing one thing and choose each week the most important thing for us to do it's it's what

14:52what thoughts or advice do you have for people because most of the folks are tuning into our show on

14:56a

14:57regular basis or business owners or ceos and people who aspire to those roles so for the people who

15:02aspire to those roles who are getting things consistently dumped on them and they're maybe

15:08at their capacity or maybe a little bit above and things are overflowing and that happens what

15:13any suggestions do you have to those folks and how to handle that with a ceo or business owner who

15:19keeps adding to the pile before they've or i'd say keeps putting more on their plate before they've

15:24chewed what's in their mouth yeah no i i hear you and this is a really common question that comes

15:28up

15:29in in our workshops is like well my boss just keeps adding so what do i do um we use

15:35a we need a couple

15:35of tools here the first one is a framework we teach called pvc um which for the engineers amongst you

15:41will know that's polyvinyl chloride but for us it's purpose value and capacity and the it's i guess a

15:47series of decision gates that you can jump through to help you work out where you should put your time

15:52and energy the first thing is then purpose what's the purpose of this being done and are we really clear

15:56on which strategic pillar that this links to the second piece is what's the purpose of me being

16:01involved i do i have to do it or could i find somebody in my team to do it and

16:06often what we

16:07see is that uh managers who are really overloaded are overloaded because they haven't learned to

16:12delegate effectively or they don't trust anybody else to do stuff or that they feel like it has to

16:17be them who does it so even though the ceo is giving it to them oftentimes and i've had this

16:21my own

16:21personal experience the ceo doesn't mean for them to do it they're saying hey i need you to take

16:25responsibility for this and get it done not i need you to personally do this so what's the purpose

16:30of this being done do i understand the purpose and and where it links and what's the purpose of me

16:34being involved the second piece then is v which is value value is all about um what's the what's the

16:40value of this this is that so again we're talking about doing the most important thing here so value

16:45you could look at whichever metric you choose let's just randomly choose revenue as a metric um if this

16:51is going to make us 10 million dollars in revenue and that is going to make us 1 million dollar

16:55in

16:55revenue then i should probably put more energy into the 10 million dollar project very simple example

16:59but it kind of paints the picture and maybe your value is in uh wastage or loss or absentees and

17:06depending on what role you're in um but looking at the value the second uh piece of value is what's

17:12the value of my time and we use a very simple uh equation for this you just take your annual

17:17salary

17:18you divide it by 2040 that gives you your rough hourly rate and you say could i find somebody in

17:24my team or outsource somewhere else in the world to do this for less than my hourly rate so let's

17:30say

17:30for example your hourly rate is round numbers 50 bucks an hour and you're doing a job which you could

17:35pay somebody 15 dollars an hour to do maybe organizing the morning tea or stocking the stationary cupboard

17:41or doing the social media comments if you're still doing those in your business then you're not

17:45working on the more important stuff that your ceo needs you to step up and do which i would say

17:49is

17:49the 500 an hour tasks so working out where you're putting your time and energy by that the last piece

17:54is the one that most people forget and this is is capacity so yes your ceo is just adding another

18:00thing on and adding another thing on and adding another thing on um you have a set number of hours

18:04per

18:04week and the danger if you don't manage those hours is that you head down the track to burnout which

18:09is

18:09another whole conversation so one of the tools we teach um to manage capacity is write down everything

18:16you've got going on go to your ceo and say let me for a minute just let me read out

18:21all the things i've

18:22got going on you tell me which three are important to you or the three you want to hear about

18:26that

18:26immediately tells you what your boss thinks is important for that week and that's where you put

18:29your energy what you then do is you follow that up with um what am i going to stop slow

18:33down or swap

18:34from my current workload that allows me to just reduce the workload a little bit so i'm going to

18:40say look my boss wants to hear about this this and this so what i'm going to do is i'm

18:44going to stop

18:44this project until next week next month next quarter uh to allow me to focus uh and i'm going to

18:51slow

18:51down this one because it doesn't need to be delivered today it can next wednesday is fine

18:55and i'm going to swap this in for that because we've said actually we're now not going into this

19:01market we're going into that market so i can swap and i can change it out but once you've understood

19:05where your boss's priorities are then you can align on that and then we follow up that final piece

19:10which is uh what we use a framework called the three by three by three which is a very simple

19:14feedback framework to your boss to say this is the three things i've achieved this week this is my

19:18three priorities for next week and this is three things i need from you to keep going and again that

19:23gives you and your boss the opportunity to get aligned for him to say why did you do those things

19:28this week not that thing and why is that your priority for next week and yeah i can help you

19:32with those things it allows those conversations to take place meaningfully so then you gradually

19:36manage to reduce you bring your workload down because your boss is more aligned with what

19:39you've actually got going on from experience most executives have no idea all of the things their

19:44leadership teams are involved in they have no idea um because they're so busy themselves that they

19:49don't have time to stop and think you know they've got a bunch of you reporting to them so it's

19:53up to

19:53you to help create clarity for your boss that they keep adding things you go well hey look we need

19:58to manage this so it's effective i can't do everything for you i need to make sure we do the

20:01things that are most important that's excellent advice i thank you for sharing that i i reflect on

20:07listening to this uh listening to alex harmosi not too long ago and he was talking about people in

20:13situations like that and he said sometimes you have to let the little fires burn

20:19and you make sure you watch them so they don't become big fires but let the little fires burn

20:24if you don't what's that can lead to like you talked about you hinted at burnout i mean if you

20:29if your dance card is full and you're at capacity and more gets piled on it's like what am i

20:34going to

20:34not do in order to do this and question at that point is way harmosi was describing is what are

20:39my

20:39little fires that i can let burn for a while and that versus someone that has a mentality like oh

20:45i can't

20:45let any fires burn i mean that's if you're in a high pace high stress environment that's a recipe for

20:50eventual burnout and disaster i mean that's just not sustainable i mean maybe in short bursts but

20:55not as a everyday part of the culture like that's just not conducive to long-term anything but it

21:01doesn't work it doesn't work i agree with you you reminded me of another story um i worked with a

21:06large american retail business a very fast-paced business and um we ran a an exec program for them

21:13where we brought in a senior leader from amazon to to have a conversation with him and he said on

21:18a

21:18daily basis um my day starts about 4 a.m on a daily basis i'll get anything between 1500 and

21:24two and a half thousand emails per day and in those emails um around 200 things will be going wrong

21:31and

21:31there'll be about 20 crises and on a daily basis i can probably deal with about five of those maybe

21:38maybe three so the secret to success at this level is to is to work out where do you turn

21:45up to

21:45fight the fire yourself and where do you send your junior firefighters and it was it's just like you

21:52saw the light bulbs go on you know sometimes as you say you let the fires burn other times that's

21:56where you send your junior firefighters to learn how to find the bigger fires later in their career

22:00so how do you know when a leader is over complicating their strategy or communication

22:04sorry that i missed that one but how do you know when a leader is over complicating their strategy

22:09or their communication i think there's a few ways that from from my perspective what i look for when

22:15i'm diagnosing over complication generally comes up in a few with it with a few signs the first one

22:22is high turnover in the business so people keep coming into the team not surviving very long and

22:28leaving um then you go and talk to the people who are still there and they look fraught you know

22:33they look strung out because they're working on so many things but none of them can really clearly

22:38lay out what are the priorities for the team they've just got all all the things are priorities we've

22:43got 644 priorities that we're working on at the moment and we're trying to get them all done this

22:49quarter the the third piece is when you go a layer below that and you start talking to them people

22:55are just doing their jobs i just do what i'm told to do i'm just i just turn up and

22:58do my job they

22:59don't have any strategic line of sight between the ceo the leadership team's objectives and what

23:05they're doing on a daily basis they just turn up and do stuff to me he says that things are

23:09over complicated and lack of clarity has been passed down and passed through the business

23:14which means that people aren't then able to make good decisions which means that they're in that

23:17rowing boat rowing in opposite directions um they're making the best decisions they can with what they

23:23have what they know but that isn't taking the boat to where you want to go so what are what

23:28are the

23:28patterns that you see in leaders who consistently get high performance without creating unnecessary stress

23:34um that's a good question from our perspective uh there's five um sort of high performance

23:41differentiators that that we see uh the first one is they are able to build trust with the people

23:48around them uh i think it's simon sinek who talked about his work with the special forces where they

23:54did a um a trust and performance matrix and obviously everybody was everybody was the high trust high

24:01performance guy nobody wants the low trust low performance guy but he would always rather have

24:05a high trust low performance person than a high performance low trust person because when you've

24:10got a essentially it's what i trust you with my life and what i trust you with my wife and

24:15uh if i uh

24:17if i if i if i don't trust you it doesn't matter how good you are you're going to be

24:21toxic so we need to

24:23be able to have a mechanism for understanding what trust looks like and a mechanism for building trust as a

24:28leader so people will go into battle with you they'll fight alongside you and they'll know you've

24:33got their back so trust is the first one that we see i won't go through all of them i'll

24:36just do a

24:36couple um the second one is the ability to make good decisions uh decision making as a leader is

24:43basically your job you know you're not expected when you get to senior leadership to be the expert

24:48anymore you're expected to be able to bring experts together to solve problems we use a phrase

24:55which is your to-do list should now become the who's to-do list as in everything on the list

25:00should be allocated to somebody or you're bringing in an expert to solve that problem with you and so

25:05the ability to make decisions is hard and the more complex the environment that you're operating in

25:10the harder it is to make decisions so one of the things we teach is people to bring in their

25:14decision

25:14making horizon to what's the best decision i need to make right now to give me enough information to

25:21make the next decision and i'll give you a perfect example from a another retail organization we

25:27worked with where they were looking at do we do we get do we launch product a or product b

25:32and

25:34lots of research went into this and they said well what we're going to do is we're going to do

25:37a

25:37national pilot of product a and we're going to see um and we're going to put millions and millions

25:44and millions of dollars into it and we'll we'll check out and see if product a is the right option

25:48our gut tells us it is but we're not sure and one of my team in the room said why

25:53don't you just do

25:53both at the same time but at a smaller scale like maybe do have you got any um representative test

25:59towns or representative regions that are a really good test bed for products and they said well

26:04yeah actually we have we've got two towns that we always test everything in cool so let's test product

26:08aim one and product b another one and see which comes out comes out on top it's a much smaller

26:12decision the horizon is a lot closer the cost outlay is a lot closer but it gives you the

26:16information to say product a is probably a better chance of winning than product b or product b has

26:21actually got way more legs than we expected let's go with product b and scale that up but it's always

26:27making the smallest decision you can to keep momentum versus waiting on the perfect information

26:32to make the big decisions that's good stuff could you share a story where a leadership team was stuck

26:37and simplifying just one thing changed everything for them yes um i'll go back to the the trust example

26:43again uh so trust is is kind of like scuba diving in my mind i'm a scuba diving instructor and

26:49i love

26:49to get into the water and blow bubbles and look at turtles and sharks um but when you start scuba

26:55diving you're probably going to initially begin with snorkeling and then you then you learn to do a bit

27:02of basic scuba diving get your open water license um requires a bit of training you can go a little

27:06bit

27:06deeper and then you can get your advanced open water you can go a little bit deeper a bit more

27:10training a bit more complexity and then if you want to get seriously into diving um then you can

27:14go into tech diving which is where you're mixing gases and you can go well i've got a couple of

27:18friends that have been to 140 plus meters um i don't know what that is in feet like 400 feet

27:23um which is

27:25pretty deep so it's pretty dangerous down there and you can see things that nobody else can see

27:29but it's the consequences of getting it wrong are much higher and i like to use that as an analogy

27:35for

27:35for trust you know you're going to have some relationships that are at the snorkeling level

27:39of trust you're going to have some relationships that are at the the you know the the basic scuba

27:44level the advanced scuba level and some are going to be really really down in the weeds you need to

27:49know where those relationships are at and you need to know you need to have a mechanism for building

27:55that trust so if i go back to your question that one of the leadership leadership teams that i ended

28:01up

28:01working with um they had been together a very long time i think the the youngest person the youngest

28:07serving person in the team was four years in so they you know they've been working together for

28:11quite a while but they just didn't trust each other they were they were all working in different

28:16directions they were all working in silos they were very much a leadership team made up of um

28:22functional heads versus a team of leaders working together on the business so the leadership team

28:27meetings were very much reporting back what's going on in my bit of the world not how are we going

28:31to

28:32run this business they just didn't trust each other so in public uh they agreed in private they

28:38undermined each other and they would make sure that their business unit delivered but at the expense

28:44often of another business unit so the very simple thing we did was we um we showed them the scuba

28:51diving model we showed them how to start building trust with each other and we encouraged them

28:55to start getting to know each other as people they put many of them would work together for years and

28:59they didn't know things about each other they didn't know who had kids whose kids were disabled

29:03who was allergic to thai food who was a wine and a wine drinker who loved to cook pizza at

29:09the weekends

29:10they didn't know any of that personal stuff um but also they uh they saw each other as a threat

29:15because they were all thought well the ceo is going to go sometime soon and i want to be the

29:19contender for

29:20it um so they were all just and it was this that was this crazy culture of undermining so our

29:26job

29:26was let's get to know each other as people first let's start giving you some mechanisms to build

29:30trust with each other uh so you and not we're not talking trust falls and stuff we actually give

29:34people some activities they can do that that actually make a difference uh and then let's start

29:39talking about making decisions in public and sharing those in public with other parts of the business so i

29:45would have the cfo go into the marketing team and talk about why the budget was set and how it

29:48works

29:49like that i would have the the gm sales come into the operations team and talk about how sales was

29:54going and what was happening there and that started to break down the silo mechanisms to the point where

30:00you know leaders and managers in operations would say well how can we help sales better

30:05uh that started to build the trust with the teams across the teams and then we created one very simple

30:11rule which is we argue in this room when we go out we're a unified front and there's a very

30:16simple

30:17change as opposed to saying we agree in this room and then we go and undermine each other we argue

30:22in this room now we have constructive criticism sorry constructive conflict to weed out the issues

30:28to surface any problems but when we fought when we make a decision we agree and we get on board

30:32with

30:33it and we had this it was a written rule that all of the leaders signed up to and it

30:37made such a

30:38massive difference that they said okay i i have promised now that i'm going to do this

30:42and it took us i don't know three or four months um turn this corner gradually doing these little

30:47little simple things but they stacked up it's almost like a sort of dragnet effect so they start to stack

30:52up over time and the culture of that business shifted so so dramatically so if there was only

30:57one piece of advice that you could give to business owners ceos or executives who are listening

31:02today what would be the most important piece of advice you could give and why the one most important

31:07piece of advice you don't you don't need to be the expert as a ceo you know if you're if

31:12you're the

31:12boss your job is to make the best decisions you could possibly make and the best mate the best way

31:19to

31:19make the best decisions is to get the smartest experts in the room around you and ask them what

31:24they think and use their knowledge and skills to help you make the best decision failing that if you're

31:30the one who makes all the decisions and you're the one who is trying to be the smartest person in

31:34the

31:34room all the time actually what you do is you stifle other people wanting to share and you stifle

31:40the talent that's there behind you from from shining uh which means that you descend it with more on your

31:46shoulders you know one of the themes that you've talked about throughout our conversation there's

31:51been trust and for those who are listening i what you're saying is is resonating with me deeply and

31:57i i've worked for a man one time who once told me he goes um your decisions are only as

32:03sound as the

32:03facts in which they're based and if you apply that thinking to what you just described that hey i don't

32:08have to make all the decisions i don't have to be the smartest person in the room i can have

32:12all these

32:12people around me but it's the importance of trust if those people can't trust that they can speak

32:18openly and share what they actually see or what they actually feel and what they actually think

32:23then by default as a leader you're hamstrung i mean you're limited in what you can do because

32:28they're not giving you information you need to be able to make solid decisions by default like you

32:34are creating the disadvantage for yourself and that's why i really like what you had to say about

32:41the importance of trust because if my decisions are only sounds of facts in which they're based

32:47and i have to rely on all these other people to give me the facts and the insights and whatnot

32:51and they can't trust me that i'm going to respond in a healthy way and or helpful way and or

32:59appropriate way then all i'm teaching them is to sugarcoat whatever information they're going to

33:05give me it's exaggerate the good news cover up or hide bad news and if you've got a whole team

33:11of

33:11people that are exaggerating good news and covering up or hiding bad news it doesn't take a genius to

33:15figure out what kind of decisions i'm making if i'm running the show yeah yeah it's it's so true and

33:21you know you've probably read the the amazing book turn the ship around by l david marquette um

33:27if i if i kind of boil that down into one sentence it's you know if you've got one man

33:32running the

33:32ship uh and 143 people not using their brains that's never going to be as good a ship as 144

33:39people using

33:40their brains together and so asking people to uh you know we we use the phrase what do you suggest

33:45is our core leadership phrase that unlocks expertise in people versus me having the answers

33:51and we teach this on day one of nearly every program that we do what do you suggest as opposed

33:56to me giving you the answers and the the change we i literally closed out a program yesterday with a

34:03dairy company um and as a group they freed up 27 23 and a half hours per week sorry of

34:11collective time

34:12just by asking that one question just by stopping doing and asking people what they thought instead

34:17it's funny you say that i had a gentleman i have not released the podcast yet um and he used

34:23to work

34:23for disney and he was talking about he helped launch their signature restaurant chef mickey's and he was

34:31talking about how they needed this the problem they needed to figure out is how do we get 400 people

34:36through in 43 minutes or something like that and how do we get mickey around to see all these people

34:41and along with your suggestion i don't know he might have used the words like what do you suggest

34:44but they the people who had the answers were the servers they said we've got all these little

34:49different salt and pepper and ketchup and mustard they're all spread out and we have to move them

34:52all and then he goes but if we had them all in one little carrier we can just lift it

34:56up and swoop

34:56it that would save us about you know x number of seconds per person per per table and per interaction

35:02and you multiply that up solve the problem but it was literally a manifestation what you're talking

35:06about well what do you suggest and they're asking people who knew i love that advice

35:10so if people first of all thank you second of all if people want to know more about you

35:15your books your consulting the work you do what are the best ways for them to connect interact learn

35:19more or engage with you i would say probably three ways uh we have a website uh which is jbl

35:25highperformance.com uh on there you can find books blogs white papers free resources loads of stuff

35:31um that allows you to uh i guess immerse a little bit more in what we do you can find

35:37me on linkedin

35:37uh which is jimmy burrows spelt like it is in the title uh and the third thing i would say

35:45is we have

35:45a really cool digital platform which is essentially uh a performance management system in your pocket

35:52but it's based around uh a ai coaching conversations and a lot of other stuff that plugs into it

35:59um but there's some really incredible intelligence to surface what's going on in your team what's going

36:04on in your business where should i be putting your energy and time so if you want to find out

36:07a little

36:08bit more about how we do what we do there's a lot of stuff in there that's there's that's that's

36:12live

36:12and available and you can you can have a play with it it's the cost of a cup of coffee

36:16a week so it's

36:16super cheap um but it's designed to be available at scale for people who are interested and you can

36:21find that at aidencoach a-i-d-e-n coach dot i-o um other than that feel free to

36:27reach out have a chat

36:28i'm always here to nerd out and have conversations with anybody who's interested

36:32it was an absolute pleasure thank you so much for taking the time and i hope everyone else

36:36enjoyed it as much as i did thank you thanks mason

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