Using StrengthsFinder 2.0 to Engage Your Team with Brandon Miller & Darren Virassammy

//Brandon Miller and Darren Virassammy, co-founders of 34Strong,  share how teams can better leverage their individual strengths in an interdependent way for the wellbeing of their organization and others whom they serve.  

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Transcript

Hey, hey!  It’s Andrea, and welcome to the Voice of Influence podcast.  Today, I have with me Darren Virassammy and Brandon Miller from 34 Strong, which is one of the first employee engagement in strength space development consultancies, that helps the public and private sector companies become best places to work by creating highly trained, effective managers, and highly engaged, motivated employees.

Brandon Miller is the CEO and one of the first Gallup-Certified Strengths Coaches in the world, and Darren Virassammy is the COO.  So, welcome to the Voice of Influence podcast.

Brandon Miller:  Thank you.  It’s great to be here this morning.

Dareen Virassammy:  Very much, what an honor!

Andrea:  All right.  So, I would love to hear how the two of you work together, maximizing your own strengths to accomplish your mission.  So, first, would you guys mind since, you know, you guys are big in the StrengthsFinder ⎼ my audience knows a little bit about that ⎼ what are your individual top five strengths?  Let’s see, who wants to go first?

Brandon Miller:  Darren does.

Andrea:  Okay, Darren first.

Darren Virassammy:  Yeah.  So, mine are maximizer, arranger, achiever, activator, and self-assurance.  Those are all in my top five.  I actually retook the assessment.  It was just last year, right, Brandon?

Brandon Miller:  Right.

Darren Virassammy:  I think it was early part of last year, middle of last year.  So, every time I’m asked that question now, I start going back to what my original results were from almost nine years ago.  I have to catch myself in the path.

Andrea:  Yeah, interesting.  Okay, I have a question about that after Brandon goes.

Brandon Miller:  So, I’m a maximizer, achiever, activator, strategic, and arranger.  So, I like to say that I won Darren over to the activator side of things.

Darren Virassammy:  That is a true story.  So that was not in my top five, even when I originally took it back in 2012, and that was even before Brandon and I knew each other.

Andrea:  So, that’s really interesting to me because I’ve heard so much about… you know, well, I guess I have heard at times people say, “Well, you don’t really need to take it more than once because they’re generally the same,” or that sort of thing.  So, is that true, then?  I mean, you obviously took it, and you got some significant movement.  I mean, why do you think that is, and is it beneficial to retake after a while?

Brandon Miller:  So, we have a very different take on that.  We actually think that taking assessments multiple times is beneficial to you because if you think about the moment in time, so it’s like getting an x-ray.  It’s a moment in time, and in that moment, there were strengths that were a part of life for you.  You needed them.  And then there are underlying strengths that are just a part of your core being, part of your learned behaviors in life that you needed to take and make a part of you.

But the periphery, the ones that move around a lot ⎼ we like to call them “bolt on strengths” – they’re the ones that you need it for this season, but in another season, they may not need to be there as much.  So, in a top 10 profile, we will see significant movement.  But typically, six or seven will lock in, and then the others can have some pretty big moves because we grow, we change.  Our brains allow us to explore new things, take on new ideas and patterns.

Darren Virassammy:  Yeah, and on the heels of what Brandon said, for me personally, what took place was I took that in 2012.  I wasn’t a parent yet.  I hadn’t started a business.  I was working as a senior project manager for a construction company.  So, I was very much get-it-done mindset.  It was, “Where’s the project?”  “Is it on schedule?”  “Do it.  Get crossed off the list.”  I’d been doing that for ten years.  Now, when I changed into becoming an entrepreneur, becoming a parent, all of those sorts of things, those are some pretty big life changes.

And as we were going further along in the life cycle career of 34 Strong, I was looking at those strengths, and I said, “Yeah, I can execute.  I can get things done.” And that still showed up in my top five even, that achiever, that arranger being really strong.  But I wasn’t feeling as aligned because that was not the way that I was needing to show up.

So, those revolving strengths ⎼ some of those that were maybe in those top 15 started to really move more in alignment with how my role grew within 34 Strong, and my role grew in life as becoming a parent and really focusing on that, and then thinking of how I wanted to show up from a strengths basis as a parent.

Andrea:  So, Darren, for you, when you retook it and you had new insight, how does that actually impact the way that you interact now?  Feeling more aligned, but is there anything else in particular that it really, you know, helped you with?

Darren Virassammy:  Yeah, I think it helped… because I had been wrestling with this for a while.  I had threatened to retake it, I think, a few years before and I was going around with it.  And I wrestled with it for a while because I was feeling out of alignment.  And then the way that it’s really helped us collectively is some of these wrestling points that we’re going through, it was not only in the self-awareness.  

It was with the team awareness of realizing that, “Hey, as the company has gone through these seasons of growth, here’s what stayed with us with strengths,” for myself and we’ve actually had our whole team go through and retake it over the course of the past year.”  Well, most of the team has, and it has helped to create more clarity around, “Okay, as the company has gone through these massive levels of growth, people gone through life changes, what is our real team dynamics?”

So, we’re really looking at what are the strengths that have stuck that are really a huge part of the core of each of us individually, and then how does that lead into our team awareness.  And we’ve seen some shifts along those lines, and it has helped us to better evaluate how to move as a team, how we can coach and how we can develop on our team members that are on there, how we can better work with each other, and really, elevating our team dynamics to make sure that we’re keeping everybody engaged, including ourselves, and not burning out.

Andrea:  So, how did you and how do you continue to use strengths ⎼ I’m assuming ⎼ then to help figure out what roles you’re going to play in the company?

Brandon Miller:  Well, that’s our favorite part of the job.  So, thinking about, “What is a strength?”  So, at the end of the day, a strength is an activity that you do that makes you feel strong.  So, it leaves you with an increase in energy.  You see outstanding or what Marcus Buckingham – he’s one of the original authors of some of the strengths books ⎼ says, your “standout performance,” that which you do that very few people can.  So, you can look back and go, “I’m energized by that.  Gosh, I want to do it again.  Even when I’m tired, I’ll keep going.”  That’s a strength.

So, in looking at the great equalizer of us all, which is time, where does my time go to tell me, “Am I playing to my strengths?” or are you doing what we call working in the grind?  Just doing the grind, and there’s some fun to that term.  But in reality, the grind feels like the grind.  It feels like it’s grinding back at times.  And so, we evaluate based upon some factors that help a person to know, “Well, [does] this activity fall into your strengths?”

We use terms like greatness and genius.  Are you really at your best, or are you just responding emails?  You’re just grinding.  And so, we can get the time ratio.  There’s a magic number.  There’s a ratio that really tilts a person into their ideal space, and that’s 30% of the grind, 70% operating your strengths.  Buckingham goes on to say that, “If you can reach that ratio, you have transcended career to calling.  You’re doing what you were made for.”

And it resonates so strongly because when you invert that ⎼ so you’re just getting 30% of those strengths, but gosh, that grind is weighing ⎼ I think most of us can attest to that we’re burnout, right?  “Oh, I’m just feeling it.  Can I keep going?”  And so that’s a way in our company… in fact, we’re just going through that right now in Q1.  Every team member is taking the time to keep a log of where they’re actually spending those resources and how are we doing in our ratios.

Andrea:  You know, I started out as a solopreneur and then have added team along the way.  And I even most recently have started to really be able to see how important it is that I do what I really am best at because that is how we move forward.  I think there have been times when I feel like, “Well, I need to do this,” or “I should do that.”  And it’s just becoming more and more clear that it’s so important that I stick with, not just stick with… but I like your ratio.  I like that 70% because the reality is, 100% is highly unlikely.

Brandon Miller:  Right.  We’ve met a few, right Darren?  I mean, we’ve met people in what they call their glide path, right?  So, they’ve done a really good job building their career.  They’re effective delegators.  They’re really just getting to specialize, and I look forward to that day.  But for most of us, you’re right.  You know, that 30, it can fluctuate 30 to 50.

But we’d like to tell, especially leaders, if you get off balance past that 50/50 point, the quality of your decisions will for sure be impacted because you will start to operate from a stress point.  And in a stress point, we have one of the two triggers – it’s fear or anger.  And those are those times when we lose it.  We don’t say what we meant to say, and ⎼ this is a great note for all of us that manage people or our parents ⎼ when you find yourself [there], it’s usually because that load has started to weigh us down.  That grind is grinding back.

Darren Virassammy:  That’s right.  And the interesting part about this when we’re really thinking about our grinds and when we’re intentional in looking at it ⎼ not only individually but on a team standpoint ⎼ what might happen is we might identify that maybe some of our team is  at actually 60% in their grind zone, only 40% in their greatness and genius zone.  The question we got to ask is if we’ve identified that and maybe that’s where they’re at today, but a month or two from now, they’ve gone from 60% in their grind zone to actually 55% or 50% that grind in their zone, the ratio is moving back in the right direction.

I know one leader, Dr. Sabrina Starling… she’s written a whole series of books called How To Hire The Best.  One of the metrics that she uses…  she’s gone through some of our programs.  Brandon, I don’t even know if I’ve ever shared this with you.  She, weekly, in her coaching sessions goes through the grind, greatness, genius ratio with her people.  “Just how much time this week was in your grind zone versus your greatness and genius zones?”  That becomes her operating metric for each team member when she’s having one-on-ones with them, and it forces us to look in the mirror and say, “Am I serving us the best that we can?” which is one of the hallmarks of interdependence that we might get into talking about later.

Andrea:  Yeah.  Okay, so I would love to ask you both then.  Darren, you can go first since you were just talking.  What is your zone of genius?  What is that place for you?

Darren Varissammy:  You know what’s fascinating, Andrea?  I’ve been filling out the grind, greatness, genius, as well.  Part of my grind and everybody’s grind is trying to read my handwriting because I can’t even read it half the time.  So, Brandon is laughing because he’s gotten stuff from me… 

Brandon Miller:  Darren has given me the most sentimental cards that were so impactful that I just cannot decipher.

Darren Varissammy:  He’s like, “Could you tell me…”

Brandon Miller:  But I know, I know some of those words were just, oh… 

Andrea:  You can imagine it and of how beautiful it was, but you just couldn’t read it.

Brandon Miller:  I was, like, just imagine writing, and like, I just feel the sentiment.  No idea what you said, but I can just feel… 

Darren Varissammy:  It’s really interesting.  So, for me, a big part of where I feel my greatness, my genius zones have showed up over the course of time ⎼ and this is something that I’ve been able to serve for 34 Strong and have enjoyed ⎼ has been in negotiations, processes on contracts with clients, even with staff in certain elements and just understanding.

And even if I’m not the one in the chair negotiating, being part of the brain capacity that, “Here’s the things that we want to make sure that we’re putting on the table, and here’s the areas how we want to dance through this.”  The overall financial well-being of the company, just looking at how are we growing as a company that can be sustainable and profitable and do good.  We can all do good in the world, and we can all do well as we’re going along and give opportunities for our team to grow, and kind of future plan the financial components of the business as well.

So, thinking through those elements of the business have been good for me.  I enjoy being in the facilitator’s chair and being in rooms ⎼ particularly on the higher-level leadership type conversations ⎼ and having a seat at the table ideating through some of the vision components internally at 34 Strong and on the client side.  But I think those are some of the areas that really stand out for me.

Andrea:  Great!  What about you, Brandon?

Brandon Miller:  It’s so interesting, the timing of this because we are just doing the work, you know, at that stage as a company where we’re coming out of awkward toddler phase.  Kind of cool, you know.  We’re running without tripping all the time.  And so, as the CEO, there’s the part of the business I’ve always wanted to just get my hands around, the design of it, the architecture.  Looking at all the pieces and parts, and using this arranger, strategic, maximizer in me to help do that.

And that’s when I feel the strongest.  That’s when I see the greatest results is when I can design, envision, and cast out where we’re headed, and then get behind the placement of the right people to do the right roles.  This is Collin’s Good to Great, “Right seat on the bus and get them right where they’re supposed to be.”  That’s my sweet spot because I feel like that gives us the best chance to scale and to further develop.

And as much as I love coaching and solving challenges with my clients and getting in there ⎼ that certainly sits in my, we’ll call, greatness to genius ⎼ but there’s rare air that I’m getting into now and having a great time with it.

Andrea:  Very cool!  Okay, so I’ve seen people isolate the top five strengths to use them kind of to define people’s strengths, you know, rather than illuminating the possibilities… 

Brandon Miller:  I call that labeling, right?

Andrea:  Yeah, yeah.  And it seems to kind of really limit opportunity instead of opening it up.  Have you seen this happen, and what do you do when you come in to work with people in that way?

Brandon Miller:  I think it’s a given that every one of us has biases, right?  And our first bias is that we tend toward is self-bias.  “I like the way I do things.  I like the way that I operate.  And, you, Andrea, should adapt to my style because that works for me really well.”  And so “my side” bias is inherent in all of us.  And so, some of that labeling comes where, “Oh, you’re not like me.  You’re one of those.”  And I’ll give a classic example.  One of the 34 strengths is WOO ⎼ so to woo someone or you can acronym “winning others over.”

I’m married to one such creature.  She’s impressive.  She’s amazing, number one WOO.  But there’s almost this stigma around WOOs, like, “Oh, you’re the life of the party.  You’re the one that’s gonna bring the fun.  You’re the one that…” and some of the WOOs look back, going,  “No.  No, I’m just really good at influencing.  I’m really good at bringing people over to my side but I don’t do that.”  And others, they have all the charm and very gregarious.  They do fit that prototypical, hardline extrovert that MBTI can tell you, “You know, they’re hard there.”

So, I think that’s a way where when we can start to educate and understand around what I think was Clifton’s greatest gift was a vocabulary – a way to describe these internal patterns of thinking, feeling, or behaving.  And it’s like having the human source code, “Oh okay, so you’re this, but you’re also this,” which means it could look that way, and knowing the nuances of just how they appear and how they play together.

Darren Virassammy:  On the heels of that, what was really interesting too, Andrea, is the fact that we have seen that on teams.  We’ll see, “Oh, you have responsibility, I have responsibility, so we get each other.”  And that’s a strength.  It’s very common.  And what’s interesting a lot of times, we’ll get that and we’ll think, “Oh, well, if the team’s all the same, it’ll be better.”  And sometimes what can happen, for instance, with a strength like responsibility is a high level of psychological accountability – big, deep levels of ownership that take place.

And sometimes what we have to do is separate that because people will overly take ownership.  You’ve delegated something to me, or I’ve delegated something to you, and then what ends up happening is I’m still holding on to the baton.  And I’m saying, “How can I help you?”  “What do you need?”  And you look at me, and you say, “Can you just let go of the baton?  It’s my leg of the race now.  That would be really helpful.  I need that to happen.”

Truth be told, that was my fifth strength when I originally took the assessments back in 2012.  And that was part of my personal growth and learning curve because I would be doing that.  My intentions were good, trying to help team members as I was delegating things, but I wasn’t letting go and allowing them to thrive.

And over time, I’ve actually been able to let go of some of that responsibility.  It actually moved from number five…  I think it’s at like 15 or 16 now.  And Erin, our chief of staff, has taken that over as her number one now.

Andrea:  Love it!  I think you guys have convinced me that I need to retake this test.

Brandon Miller:  I would love to hear what your first results were.

Andrea:  Yeah, my top five, which is what I first knew of, because back then they weren’t doing the 34 unless you paid for them, and I didn’t think about that until later.  I looked it up to make sure that I’ve got this right, but strategic, ideation, intellection, learner, and input.  And that was before I really started business seven, eight years ago, and I was stuck in my head.

Brandon Miller:  One more time, strategic, ideation, input, learner; what was the other one?

Andrea:  Intellection.

Brandon Miller:  Can I just say wow?  Wow!

Andrea:  All five in here and I was already feeling stuck in my head.  Like, I have all these things to offer.  I know I’m doing things in my head that are important that are not getting out into the world.  And so, my immediate reaction was, “Oh really?  Because how am I ever gonna get this out there?  How am I ever gonna do anything, execute?  How am I ever gonna influence,” you know, all those things.  So, finally, I opened up the rest of them.  My sixth one was activator.  I’m like, “Ohhh!  Yeah, I do have it with in me,” you know, and belief is the only one, and my top is a number 11 as my first executing theme.

Brandon Miller:  So, it’s cool about your results.  Gallup went through a change of their colors.  They have four domains, and the strategic thinking domain used to be red.  So, we had a name for people with all five red.  You were the red wizard in the group.  You were Andrea, The Red.  And what it told us was that your leadership, your influence comes from your ability to look ahead and see the vision.  You’re seeing the picture unfold.

So, the inspiration you give us, the way that you help us make the best-informed decision, and because strategic is… though it’s a common strength, it’s not as high in women as in men, current stats that have been published.  So, when you think of your intuition… because that’s what strategic is.  It’s intuition.  You’re filling in the gaps before they happen whether you want to or not, right?  Because if I were to say, “Andrea, it can’t be done.  I’m sorry.  We just can’t pull it off,” what happens inside of you when someone says that?

Andrea:  I’m like, “We just need to look at the map.  We just need to look at all the possibilities.  We’ll figure it out.”

Brandon Miller:  Exactly.  And you have so much confidence in, “Oh, no, no, no, no. There’s a way.”

Andrea:  Yeah, yeah.

Brandon Miller:  And it’s almost like, “Challenge accepted.”

Andrea:  Yeah.

Brandon Miller:  “Thank you for telling me it can’t be done,” because that’s what strategic does.  So then when you put behind it the brilliance of that, you know, agile thinking of an IDA, the deep researcher, the persons that, “Oh, no, I know my facts.  I’ve checked them.  This was not, you know, lightly done.”  And then when you add in that intellect, that’s one of Darren and my favorites.  Neither of us are really high in it, but just your ability to be that crockpot, right?  You can just stew on things.

And then what can come from that solitude, you know, those moments of like… there was lightning!  There was the brilliance, and because your learner is always in that growth mode, right?  So, when we think of growth versus fixed mindset, learners live in growth.  They can’t not be in growth.

So, the way that you inspire us, the way that you indirectly influence many of us… and I would imagine several of those are going to stick because usually when they group that heavy, you know, probably see them still in that 15 range Darren was talking about.  That’s the way that you’ll do that.

But here’s what’s fascinating.  So, there’s a gentleman we worked with at Gallup.  He was the founder of a company called ancestry.com.  And we knew him for years.  He’s gone on to launch another company.  I think you have the same top six as this guy.

Andrea:  Oh, really, top six?

Brandon Miller:  Yeah, yeah.

Andrea:  I know that my top five is like the most common top five that actually, like, so many people have.  There’s maybe thirteen of us or something.

Brandon Miller:  Yeah, one in 33 million odds of having the same five in the same order as someone else.  One and 286,000 just to have the same five.  Yeah, and I can’t substantiate the order.  But it’s interesting, because he would say, “I have all of this thinking prowess, all this ability to see and solve.  And then I have this catalyst and the activator.  Like, I can get people moving toward an idea.”

Andrea:  Yeah.  I mean, it feels like it all still that because that’s the kind of stuff that I’m wanting to do in our business.  I want to be that person that helps kick off the initiative, and then let other people execute it, that sort of thing.

Brandon Miller:  A great way to see your strengths is not linear.  See it more like a dial, like on a wheel.  So, the way they show up… all the 15 is, you can dial in the ones you need when you need them, and very often, it’s multiple.  So, we often will have people say like, “Oh, in my top five, I have no executing.  I just can’t anything done.”

Andrea:  Yeah.

Brandon Miller:  Or you know, they’re like, “Apparently, I don’t like people because I have no blue.  I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”  And what we share is “No, no, no, no, no, every one of these strengths thinks.  Everyone gets stuff done, every one of them can influence and be an influencing strength, and every one of them can relate to people.”  So, they all can do it.  It’s just going to look different.  And some we would say are specialists, right?  You’re a specialist in the strategic thinking domain, and that would probably mark a lot of how you lead, your style, so to speak.

Darren Varissammy:  If I can say, one simple point to kind of dovetail on that, we can all influence, we can all think, and we can all connect with people.  The real question when we’re looking at the talent component of it is where do we start, right?  So, when we are thrown into any given situation, do we start by thinking of, “What’s the process?  What’s the task?  What’s the direction?”  or do we start by thinking, “I’m just making this very simple, ” or do we start by thinking, “Oh, if we’re going to do that, who are the people that need to be involved?  Who are the people that I need to influence?”  Where do you start, that’s going to guide really the presence of where the strengths are going to show up.

And then after we get through that initial piece… maybe if we start on the people side, then we move into, “Okay, we’ve got the right people.  Now, what’s the process?  What’s the task?”  And the fascinating part… this is very important for anybody that’s working within teams.  It is powerful to identify if you have people that are more relational in nature.

And that could be…  through CliftonStrengths language, that can be more relationship builders or influencers versus those that are more execution and strategic thinking based.  Because those are more relationship or influencing based, they’re going to need maybe a little bit of people connection before we go to task.  And our process and task thinkers ⎼ more executing base, more strategic thinking ⎼ they’re real comfortable.  We step into a meeting, “Let’s jump into task and process, and then we can talk about how this weekend’s barbecue was after, right?”

So, just understanding the order of which we place things can be the difference between us connecting and engaging with team members or putting the walls up.  Because again, somebody… just using the simplicity of the relationship building component, if we’re jumping in and leading right into process and tasks, and we haven’t checked in, “Hey, good morning, how’re you doing?” getting a little bit of human connection first, they might be thinking while we’re executing, “Oh my gosh, is Darren mad?  Is everything okay?  What’s going on?”

We didn’t check in on a human level to make sure that that piece is okay.  So, these are little nuances that you get into that can be the difference between engaging your team and really becoming the best place to work, or disengaging your team and having very different results.

Andrea:  It’s really good.  Okay, I have another question for you.  Do you implement any particular practices on a routine basis to be sure that your team is really on track, aligned, and working well together?  You mentioned this process that you’re going through right now of everybody kind of reevaluating or tracking their time, that sort of thing.  Other tips that you have for people who are really wanting to keep track of their team and see how things are going?

Brandon Miller:  We have a firm belief that we should eat what we cook.

Andrea:  Yeah.

Brandon Miller:  So, if we’re going to go out and tell organizations, “We think it’s really important that you measure the engagement of your teams.  We think that that is a metric you want to make a lot of decisions based on.”  So, we do.  We measure the engagement in our company.  We have frequent check-ins.  Every Friday, we’re doing what you could say is more the “feel” side, right?  So, how is everyone feeling?  What’s the vibe, you know?

Our chief of staff is on the CliftonStrengths level… very relational, very high emotional intelligence, really consent and tell us where that side is, right?  So, the qualitative side of the team, but then we also want quantitative.  We want data.  We want to know what you say in a survey when it’s anonymous.  Give us that feedback because then we can build off that.  So, we subscribe to Gallup’s Q12, their employee engagement survey that, you know, really, I think was the genesis of what now is employee engagement as a business and an understanding.

And so, we’re aiming squarely to be what we try to help others become ⎼ a great place to work.  And Darren, I think, last count, so far, so good, right?  We were a top 90 percentile team.  So, we had good strokes.

Darren Virassammy:  That is true.  We’ve grown a lot.  2020 was quite a year for us.  So, a lot of pressure coming on the team, but we’ve kept it all together.  And I think we’re probably going to be up for doing another evaluation like that as we’re kind of going on.  What we did pre-COVID, one of the other habits that we had was teams that play together, stay together, right?  So, every quarter, we would have just a team day.  We’d shut the whole company down, and we’d go out, hit some golf balls.  I can’t remember the name of the place, but we would go… 

Brandon Miller:  Topgolf.

Darren Virassammy:  Topgolf!  That’s it.  Yeah, Topgolf.  We had some elements like that that we did.  We did an escape room together.  And that was fascinating for Brandon and I, because we sat around, and we have some incredible problem-solvers on our team.  And I remember we were just looking at each other.  I was like, “I’m so lost right now,” and figuring out all these clues.

And our team just came to life, and they’re going through, and they’re figuring out all these clues.  And I was like, “This is amazing to watch.”  You know, you see elements of your team in some of these dynamics and hidden talent.  It’s not hidden that they don’t have it, but it’s just you don’t get to see that side of them bringing it into the work environment every day.  You get to really see that greatness and that genius zone in a different light, and get to really appreciate that.  And that has been really something that’s been a lot of fun that we’ve done in the past.

Andrea:  Love it!  Based on your own experience working together and with your team, what tips do you have for dealing, in particular, with disagreements, frustration, conflict, that sort of thing?

Darren Virassammy:  So, I’ll start.  You asked about us and within the team.  I think, for Brandon and I, a big part of what has been just incredibly powerful in our relationship, in growing and going through has been, number one, going to strengths, understanding, appreciating where this person is coming from.  This is something that we say to a lot of our clients ⎼ and we work to practice this in our team, but it started a lot with us ⎼ is how do we move from frustration to fascination and kind of moving along in working together.

So, we use a term that has kind of evolved that I think Brandon, myself, and Erin, our chief of staff, have really kind of captured on to recently in our language.  And when we’re going through the process of trying to present a different line, instead of coming and saying, “That’s not the way that we need to go,” and just shutting something down right away, we just say, “I wonder if,” and that creates an opening to build a bridge to move somebody along.

And we always approach, particularly each other, through the lens of we both know that we’re pushing for the best ideas and outcomes for the business.  So, if we’re not seeing eye to eye, we’ll press pause ⎼ and I’ve had Brandon do this to me many times ⎼ and say, “Let me hear you out.  Put it all on the table, and then reiterate.  Let me make sure I’ve got this going.”

So, we will sometimes slow things down to speed things up.  If we detect a level of frustration in the other person coming along, we work on avoiding just going back and forth on email.  We pick up the call.  We say, “Let’s talk.  Let me hear you.  Let me hear where you’re coming from.  What are the concerns?” or even asking the question, “Are these some of the things?  Did I misstep in these areas?  Did I miss this?”

I’ll give an example that happened just this week.  It wasn’t a disagreement.  It was a complete mess on my part.  We were going through making a hire.  Last week, it was presented in our ELT meeting.  I thought that we were going to look at some candidates and then make the decision this week.  The decision was actually made last week, and I think the older version of me would have gotten huffy and said, “How come this happened?  Why didn’t this happen?”

And I looked at this in this moment and I said, “Wow, okay, no.  We did discuss this.  Who was I, last week, that missed that?”  Because Brandon came to the conclusion we’re hiring.  Erin came the conclusion that we’re hiring.  Who’s the one that needs to go through it?  So, instead of coming in and digging in saying, “Hey, we need to shore up these areas,” I can step on it and say, “I own that.”  That was something that I missed the boat on because this team is working towards that.

And you see that within the lens of our team on a whole, this notion of interdependence that we talked about a lot, which is, “I serve us, this team, so that we can serve others.”  And if we have those little gaps, instead of digging your heels in, we move towards, “Okay, who am I being that’s causing this to happen?”  And we practice that.

Andrea:  Did you want to chime in, Brandon?

Brandon Miller:  I think one of the most important pieces for Darren and I ⎼ and he said it really well ⎼ is acknowledge and apologize quickly.  You know, be okay with, “I’m wrong.  I missed it.”  Because if our intention is to build a strengths-based organization/company/agency, then we have to start with the reality that our strengths are going to show up whether we want them to or not.  It’s core parts of our personality.

But Gallup nor anyone else can tell you how they’re going to show up.  They can’t tell you if they’re going to be the best version of them, or the version you wish didn’t show up in public.  And so, the reality that we all get tired, and we all get hungry, and we all get stressed and have our different trigger points and personal space, when we can clue into, “I know Darren is a well-meaning person.  I know Erin is.  I know Zane is.  I know Theresa…” you know, the whole role of our team.  

“I know who these people are, and I know the core of them,” then that allows for them to be an acceptance of the human reality, right?  You get the best of someone some days, and on occasion, you’re going to get the worst of them.  And I probably won’t be surprised at what the worst of them is because it’s gonna follow one of these traits that are part of who they are.

And then we can redirect, and we can have that conversation where, “It’s okay.  It’s okay that we each go through our stress points like that.”  And I think practicing that… and I’ll give you one last point that we really had to come to terms with, and it’s that most organizations operate valueless.  Meaning, they may have values on the wall ⎼ usually a stream of one-word consciousness ⎼ but they don’t really take those values and make it a part of the ethos of, “This is us, and this is how we default.”

And the challenge of a valueless organization is you have values.  It’s just the default value of each individual on the team.  So, now what you have is you have polyvalues.  We have all the values and all the ways.  And at our core, believe it or not, we don’t grow too far away from our toddler and teenage years.  Meaning, we can all be selfish – which is really the root of every use of our strengths in a negative way, typically revolves back to, “What’s in it for me?”  That’s usually the default place.  Well, when values go that way, then we don’t share a collective value.

And so, in establishing those, what we learn is if we can repeat often… we have a phrase we say often that,  “Repetition equals significance.”  So, the more we hear what we need to hear, the more that starts to become how we resonate, “This is who we are, what we stand for.”  Now we have a code, right?  We have a way to help address our conduct that does lead to our, you know, character, our policies, who we are as a company.

Andrea:  So much good stuff, you guys.  Okay, so you’ve mentioned interdependence a few times.  I know that you talk about the toxic triangle and interdependence being the right answer.  So, can you tell us a little bit about what is the toxic triangle?  Why interdependence?  What do you have to say about this?  And I guess I’m going to let you figure out who is going to talk first.

Darren Virassammy:  I’ll take this one here because I think this doesn’t only show up in our work environments.  It shows up in our home environments as well.  So, I’ll start that off, as we’re going through.  When we think about it, we think of this notion of the toxic triangle – there’s three different legs to that triangle, and that can be when we’re a codependent team, that can be a dependent team, or an independent team.  And you might be hearing of, “Well, independent, that’s exactly where I want to be.”

Let me give you some context on each of these.  So, when we’re a codependent, this is this notion of, “I will serve you if you serve me,” right?  So, “I am actively keeping score, you know.  You did something for me today.  I’m going to go ahead and serve you back.  You didn’t do something for me today.  I’m not providing anything,” and that is where we kind of end up.  So that is just… high level, that’s what codependency is.

Now, dependent here, this is where a codependent team evolves or devolves into toxicity, right?  “So, this is basically all your fault.  I’m just following orders.  I’m just doing this.  I have no accountability for anything that I’m getting into here.”  And it’s basically when we see this in organizations where you do have a team structure, what you’re going to see is it’s the manager versus the team, and that’s it.  And you can always find out who didn’t do something.  You can always find out who wasn’t responsible, who didn’t do it, and nobody’s taking ownership of anything.

And then when we get to the state of the independent teams here, this is when a codependent team goes to dependent and then just completely breaks down, right?  It’s just every person is in it for themselves.  That selfishness that Brandon talked about is this notion of, “I am serving me.”  There’s no collaboration that’s going on.  “I’m just in it to be the best here, and I really don’t care what you do, even though what we do collectively actually matters.”  That is the core of the toxic triangle.

Now, the reason we call it the toxic triangle, Andrea, is the fact that oftentimes teams just keep moving through these different places.  So, you might be independent, and then you move back to try and reset, then you become codependent, and then you move back to dependence.  So, you’re just stuck in the cycle, and you never break free into this notion of interdependence, which is, “I will serve us so that we can serve others.”  So, that’s the toxic triangle.

Brandon, why don’t you talk about interdependence because it shows up in teams on the work frontier.  And I know you’ve done a lot of work as well outside of the workplace, but also on the home front with this.

Brandon Miller:  Yeah.  We think of interdependence… and I’ll pause.  So, Andrea, when you hear that imagery of, like, that toxic triangle, we have a diagram where it’s like you’re sinking into it.  And it’s like, you’re, “I’m stuck!”  Because each way you try to look to get out, what you’re realizing is, “Gosh.”  Then we just default back to what’s most natural for us, which is that quid pro quo relationship, right?  “I’ll do for you if you do for me, and we’ll keep score, and let’s keep the score even.”  But you know, in reality, when is the score ever even for long term?  Yeah, you always find who’s feeling left out, who doesn’t feel like the score measured up, and it’s a terrible way to build true unity.

So, when we think about a ladder to climb out of toxicity, we look at some real key indicators for this.  So, as a leader, I will ⎼ whether I want to or not ⎼ occupy one of three positions in the heart and mind of the people I lead.  I have no choice in the matter.  I’m going to occupy one of these three roles, and it is I will either be perceived as their advocate, I’ll be perceived as their adversary, or I will be perceived as ambivalent, and I’ll let the cat out of the bag.

Ambivalent is the worst.  That’s from day to day, “I don’t know if you like me.  I don’t know if you hate me.  I don’t know if you’re angry at me.  I’m just on such shaky ground that I don’t know what to give you.”

And so, what I joke with managers is, “Just try it with your kids for a week.  Just ignore them.  Just leave them feeling like they don’t matter.  I promise revenge.”  You will have an episode in your home marveling anything you’ve ever seen at any stage in their life because we hate feeling irrelevant.  We hate it.  It drives to the core of our need to be recognized and appreciated… 

Andrea:  Ssignificant.

Brandon Miller:  Absolutely.  So, when it cuts to that, like, I would rather you just tell me you hate me than do that to me, because at least then I know where you stand.

Andrea:  I’m totally with you on this, by the way.

Brandon Miller:  Yeah.  So, the interesting part about being an advocate is that people are fickle.  I happen to have written a few parenting books, and we write this part about every child has two questions for their parents.  Question number one, “Do you love me?” and all of us collectively go, “Of course, yes.”  Question number two, “And will you let me do anything I want to do?”  And that question never goes away.

For every authority figure in our life, we want to know, “Do you care for me?”  You know, we may not use the love of a family, but, “Do you have that, you know, feeling toward me, goodwill?  Can I have that commitment from you?”  And then, “Now that you like me, can I do what I want?  Can I get to, you know, do the things that I want to do?”  And a good boss has to go, “No, because, remember, I care about you.  I want your best interest.”  And that’s advocacy.  But advocacy doesn’t always feel that way to the beholder.  It’s a time game.  It’s proven over hard circumstances and resources, and that’s the latter.

So, when management adopts the reality that, “I’m in control of interdependence, and I go first…”  So, it says, “I have to show you that I’m on your side.  I got your back.  I won’t let the bus run over you.  I’m not dishing you to the boss when things go bad, and nor am I taking credit when things go amazing.  I’m not just owning it all.  I’m truly in that space.”  That’s what moves us to that interdependent mindset and model.

Andrea:  Hmm.  Love it!  Thanks, guys.  Okay, another thing I want to talk about before we go.  I know we’ve been on for a while.  I don’t even know what time it is at this point.  This is great.  Okay, so psychological safety.  This is something I know we both really care about and emphasize.  What are some common pitfalls that you see managers fall into that lead the team to feeling unsafe?  Now, you just talked about some of this, but do you have anything else that you would like to add to that?

Darren Virassammy:  So, I’ll start with just a couple, and then we can popcorn through it.  I think some of the areas that people don’t feel safe is just make sure your actual open-door policy…  We hear this constantly, “I have an open-door policy.”  Make sure your verbal open-door policy matches your actual open-door policy.  So, if your open-door policy… we’re on camera here.  And going through, you have an open-door policy, and somebody comes into your office, and you’re sitting like this, and you’re scowling at them…

Andrea:  With your arms crossed.  Yeah, go on.

Darren Virassammy:  Arms crossed, you’re really looking at him, your nonverbal communication presents very differently`.  The tone of your voice presents very, very differently than what we’re saying.  It’s going to really create a shift where people don’t feel safe in coming to you, in bringing some of those components up.  And for many leaders… it’s something that both Brandon and I have to be mindful of with our team because we can present, we can influence, and we have to be mindful of just our tone, how that’s going to come across.

And the fact that as the company has grown, there can be that notion of, “Oh my gosh, I’m speaking to the two founders of the company.”  Even though we work to see them as who they are, when they’re looking at us, they might look at that relationship a little bit differently.  So, some of those areas in adapting our tone and kind of bringing that in alignment is critical.  That leads to not knowing how your team members best learn.

Using you as an example, Andrea… like for you, so much of your thinking cycle is you think to talk.  For Brandon in particular ⎼ and me as well, but even more so for Brandon ⎼ his talking cycle is his thinking cycle.  So, he talks to think.  You’re going to go through the thinking cycle to talk.

So, if we’re at a disconnect from there and if for instance you’re working with somebody that just comes in and says, “Why can’t you just put your thoughts on the table right now?  You’re too quiet.  You’re not sharing.  You’re not engaged,” and you’re totally engaged ⎼ it’s running through your mind ⎼ that really makes people feel that there’s something wrong with them and the way that they think even though the way that they think is their true level of brilliance.

So those are two areas.  And you can remedy that by figuring out different people’s learning styles.  Because that’s going to be the difference between setting expectations clearly for them, and completely missing the boat and making them feel like there’s no trust there, that they can’t trust they can be successful in their role.

Andrea:  Yeah.  That’s good.

Brandon Miller:  We have found this resistance at times from managers who don’t want to own,  we call it, their opportunity to provide positive experiences for their team members.  And realizing that the weight of how we relate to each other often falls on a reality between positive and negative interactions.  The more positive interactions, the more I like you.  I trust you.  I feel good around you.  I’ll let my guard down.  I’ll tell you the truth.  I’ll be, you know, authentic.  Negative interactions, I’m building a wall.  It doesn’t matter who you are to me.  You could be my blood relative in the closest reality.  I’ll build a wall because that negative takes its toll.

So, we really appreciate our partnership with different groups that provide such valuable information.  And one of them is this reality that when people think of recognition needed by a team member that reports them…  At minimum, a person needs at least three true points of recognition and praise per month.  That’s every person, calendar month.  So, some managers might feel like, “Oh my, are you kidding?  I don’t get that.  How can I give what I don’t have?”  Great question, because that should climb the ladder.

But then at the same time, we’ll hear this feedback, “That’s not our culture, that’s not what we do.”  And we gently say, “You may not know how much you’re leaving on the table right now until you go down this path.”  Because people who receive regular recognition are significantly…  sometimes 20%, 30% more productive.

It’s like adding a day of the week to their reality without adding any hours because they’re just working from different chemicals.  Instead of working from fear and working from that anxiety, “Oh my God, I gotta produce, I gotta produce,” dopamine after dopamine rush.  They’re getting serotonin, and they’re feeling good.  And they’re feeling like, “I’m safe here.  I can be my best and do my best.”  And we were like, recognition will do that?  It’s a great start!  It’s a great starting point, and it costs you nothing.  It costs you just regular reminders.

And so, here’s a big takeaway for listeners.  Right now, COVID pandemic, all the fields that we all have about this, we call this commend the common.  If you can’t find something extraordinary, commend people for things that you otherwise would have thought, “Wow, you showed up on time.  Hey, thanks for that.”  “Wow, you turned in this report you do every week, thanks!”  But just remember that what’s behind that right now is the stress, and the feelings, and you know, parents with kids home, and all this reality behind.  So that comment is a big feat right now. And if you can find those, we’ve heard from leader after leader saying, “Huge impact, major impact.”

Darren Virassammy:  Can I make one comment on the heels of something that Brandon said with the bridge building?  And this works on the home front, and this works on the work front.  Just substitute the word “and” for the word “but.”  But builds walls; and builds bridges.  It makes that connection.  It’s that simple.  You can say almost the identical thing.  “You know, but that idea, did you think of this?”  Immediately once somebody hears, “But that idea, did you think of this?” their guards go up.  If you say, “And that idea, can we consider these elements of it?” you’re building upon that idea of what they’ve started on as opposed to making them feel like they need to protect it.  And you can really enhance your communication like that and move in a direction towards interdependence.

Andrea:  So, many great truth bombs dropped today.  And it’s so fun to have this opportunity to visit with you both and hear more about the way that you guys interact.  I’m going to have you tell us about where people can find you, and then I’d like to ask you each what last tip that you want or a piece of advice that you would like to give somebody who wants to have a Voice of Influence.  So, just heads up.  Okay, so 34 Strong, where can they find your podcast, your information?

Darren Virassammy:  So, for 34 Strong, you can just go to 34strong.com.  You can also find us on LinkedIn.  You can find us on Facebook.  Our podcast there is the Leading Strong Podcast.  Season 1 is wrapped up there, and we’re in the process of sorting out season 2 right now, but that’s all available at our website.  You can also find that on Apple, and some other places as well, wherever you consume your podcasts.

And then Brandon, I’ll let you speak about the whole IncredibleFamily, what you’re doing on the book side because we’ve talked a bit about this as well.

Brandon Miller:  So, on the parents’ side, since we mentioned it briefly, IncredibleFamily is a group that we partner with for our books.  So, parents out there who think about influence that might be the stage and place ⎼ incrediblefamily.com is that location.  I did want to say something about your latter question about how people grow and influence.

One of my favorite leadership quotes of all time, it’s attributed as an Afghan proverb, and it says, “If you think you’re leading and no one is following you, then you’re only taking a walk.”  And I add to that, if you think you’re leading and no one is following you ⎼ don’t be deceived ⎼ you’re only taking a walk.  Because it’s such a key indicator, if you want to test your influence, just turn around, turn around.  You’ll know who’s following because that’s such the reality.  It’s a great influence test that we’ve, you know, looked at each other often, Darren and I, going, “So, are we influencing the team?  Are they following our lead?  Because if not, we need to upskill our influence.”

Andrea:  Great, thank you!  How about you, Darren?  What advice do you have for somebody who wants to be a Voice of Influence?

Darren Virassammy:  Start with yourself.  In that, I mean we are what we focus on.  If you’re going to be a Voice of Influence, but inside that voice that you have to start with is telling, “You can’t.  You’ll never be them.  And why me?”  That’s the common question we go through, “Why me?”  Why don’t you shift that to, “Why not me?”  Shift it to, “Why not me?” because in going out there and making that connection with the world and kind of going through, people are going to hear that, that trepidation in those pieces.

And you might not believe it 100% today, but all you gotta do is believe it a little more than you don’t believe it today.  And over time, 50% becomes 51% becomes 56, and you see where this goes.  And that’s how we build that habit, and it’s a muscle.  So, to be become that Voice of Influence, it’s a habit.  And there’s going to be days where you’re slogging through it and you’re feeling like you’re getting beat up, and you show up and you do the work anyhow.

Andrea:  That’s awesome!  Thank you so much, you guys.  For the listener, just so you know, next week, we’ll be applying what we talked about here today directly to us.  So, thank you so much, Darren and Brandon.  I appreciate you taking time to be with us today and sharing your Voice of Influence with our audience.

 

Darren Virassammy:  Thank you so much.  We appreciate it!

 

Brandon Miller:  Thank you for having us!