Say It Skillfully® is a show that helps you to benefit from Molly Tschang’s expert guidance on the best
possible ways to speak your mind at work in a positive and productive manner. Episode 191 is a juicy one: handling when leaders bad mouth one another and won’t embrace change in themselves, and a candid conversation re: big corporate communication blunders—is the pendulum on inclusion swinging too far … anything the rank and file might do?
Molly’s first caller Mary is a clear example of “being part of the solution”. Prioritizing creating 1:1 connections, no surprise she’s trusted by folks senior and junior—they tell it like it is to her. She shares her frustration with the authoritative/directive style of a leader (that’s not serving him or the team), and flagrant “bad behaviors” of leaders that everyone knows don’t get along! Molly offers options to take this head on.
Then Phyllis calls in with how she can approach her CEO and co-founder, who unapologetically treats junior staff in ways where they don’t feel respected. She and Molly discuss how to ascertain what drives the CEO, enabling Phyllis to confront the situation and serve both the organization’s culture and its ability to deliver both financial results and social impact (23:50).
Next Gary bravely raises the elephant on the table—when a big corporate campaign intended to advocate for greater inclusion falls completely flat, so much so that the fall-out results in very bad PR, brand damage and plummeting sales. The conversation turns to how such “catastrophes” happen and what brave souls can do to potentially avoid such impending train crashes. They get real about understandable fear “white males” have about using their voices and how to settle the pendulum swing to perhaps less extremes (33:50).
Molly’s thought for the week:
You will continue to suffer if you have an emotional reaction to everything that is said to you. True power is sitting back and observing things with logic. True power is restraint. If words control you that means everyone else can control you. Breathe and allow things to pass. —Warren Buffet (Thanks to the culture coach, the brilliant Garry Ridge, for sharing)
