Podcast Episode #1
Rachel Eller
Human Resources Director
SHOW NOTES
In the first episode of the No More Carbon Copies Podcast, host Roger Johnson welcomes people expert, Rachel Eller, to discuss one of the toughest challenges in professional development: why high-performing individuals often struggle—or even fail—to grow, when promoted to senior leadership roles. They dive into the "high-performer trap," the struggle to delegate, the crisis in middle management training, and how true confidence is built on humility, not omniscience. Learn the difference between authentic leadership and just performing as a leader.
TRANSCRIPT
Roger Johnson (00:00)
All right, well, welcome to the No More Carbon Copies podcast. I'm excited today to have a conversation with one of my favorite people, Rachel Eller. Rachel and I started working together, ⁓ my goodness, in 2012, I think, long time ago. And Rachel was a partner of mine in one of, ⁓ again, one of my favorite roles, which was doing a leadership rotation program for MBA graduates.
And we had a fun time partnering together to do that. So as my HR partner, Rachel's passionate about leadership, passionate about growing healthy organizational cultures. And so this has been a fun conversation talking about leaders, what they do well and how they get stuck and how they might sabotage their success. So welcome, Rachel. Thank you for joining me today.
Rachel Eller (00:44)
Yeah, thanks. I'm excited to be on here.
Roger Johnson (00:46)
Beautiful. So first question for you, Rachel, is ⁓ what fires you up to get you excited about the topic of leadership in general?
Rachel Eller (00:53)
Yeah, I think multiple things. I'm a people person, so I love the people side of my job a lot. And I love watching people grow over time and become the leader that they're gonna be. No two leaders are gonna be the same. And I think that's exciting and watching people grow into those roles and see how they're going to become different and then how they evolve over time. And then about myself personally, how I've evolved over time as a leader, right? I still don't have it all right or get it right all the time.
But when I look back at the leader that I was even five years ago to now, or last year to now, it's vastly different. And that's what I feel about the leaders that I've had the honor to support over time is just watching them grow.
Roger Johnson (01:35)
So follow up on that. what has been the most, I guess, useful thing for you to help you grow as a leader over time? Like what have you found that's worked for you? What have you been your challenges? Talk a little about your kind of growth as a leader.
Rachel Eller (01:49)
Yeah, so I, like so many other people, I came out of a high performing individual contributor and was promoted as a leader because, know, hey, you're a good individual contributor, we're gonna make you a leader. ⁓ But I couldn't let go of stuff. So I took on this leadership role, but I couldn't give anything away because I held my value was in what I did every day and what I could contribute and what I could produce.
Roger Johnson (01:56)
Mm-hmm.
Rachel Eller (02:16)
and not in the people that I was growing. And I would say my first batch of employees that I led, although I don't think that they would hope that they wouldn't say negative things about me, I would say that they didn't grow as fast as I hope that the employees I'm leading now would say. I had a conversation with one of my individual contributors recently, and she reminds me a lot of myself, and I'm trying to grow her into a leadership role.
She wants to hold onto everything really tightly because that's where she finds her value. And I've told her, you have to let go of some of the stuff, even if you love doing it, even if it's something you love doing, but it's more of a task oriented role, you need to let go of that so that I can use you in places where I need you to be more strategic and where I can grow you in those areas. And I would say I was much the same way. I went through the, you know, through the areas where I was like, I don't, I...
I was stunting my own growth and stunting the growth of my team because I wasn't letting them take stuff on. So I say that's a path that I'm going on, right? And still growing in that, still learning what that means to give up that holding everything so tight.
Roger Johnson (03:22)
we can go down a couple different paths with that.
Talk about some of the challenges and as you work with leaders across your organizations, the various organizations you've worked with, what do you think has been the largest kind of challenges for leaders as they get promoted throughout the ranks?
Rachel Eller (03:36)
Yeah, I think we take these high performing individual contributors, some who rightfully so should be in management and we'll make good leaders and some who won't, right? But we don't, so I think we do two things. One, we don't give people who were never meant to lead people, we don't give them a path beyond, you know, like they top out at a certain level. And so then they, it's super enticing for them to jump in a leadership role. And I feel some people know they're not supposed to be a leader. Like they're like, that isn't my passion.
I don't love it. I don't want to do it, but that's the next step. we're so, you know, I have to get to the next step. have to get to the next step. I have to get to the next step. We're so driven by that, that that's a path over. And we, rather than saying, hey, this isn't your path, we say, yes, we'll promote you to a leader. We give them no tools. So even if they were going to be a successful leader, we often give them very few tools. We are, in every organization I've been in, we have been
working managers, like we are in the grind every day. We don't have hours on end to mentor and grow. have tiny windows, tiny pockets. So if you have a new leader coming on board, you don't have time to grow them. It's just the next big thing is going to happen. Even if I sat down with you and I have four hours one day, I'm probably never going to get that again, right? So we promote them.
And these are high performing individual contributors. We promote them into these leadership roles. And oftentimes two or three years later, we're saying, well, they're failing. Well, yes, they're failing because we did nothing. We didn't give them any tools. So we took an individual contributor, which that role is extremely different from a leader of people. And now we've given them this team, but we haven't taught them like this is a team. So take some of that work, give it to the team. We haven't taught them how to do that. We haven't showed them that.
We haven't seen like what makes them succeed, right? And I feel also like, you when you come from an individual contributor and you're used to doing everything yourself, and then you have this wonderful team, sometimes that can be intimidating because you'll get a vision of people who are also high performers, right? And so now you almost feel like you could feel like you're competing against your own team. And again, we don't give people the tools to even deal with those feelings that they're having. And that's something that happened to me early in the career too. It was like,
Well, this person is good at something that I am not good at, right? I am not good at that and they are good at that. And that is a threat to me as their manager. Where now I've turned that into, you know, I ⁓ am a person who will throw out a list of things, but I am not the person that's going to put together a project plan. That is not my strength. But I have a person on my team who they are a whiz at that. And I tell them all the time, like they are my brain dump. Like I brain dump to her.
She puts everything in a project management and brings it back to me. And I'm like, wow, I had some really great ideas, but used to where that would have intimidated me. That doesn't intimidate me anymore. I feel like she is like a superpower of mine because I have this brilliant person on my team who is fillin in a weakness and something that I'm not fueled by. Never going to like doing that. I don't, it's never going to be for me. So, ⁓ so I think that's why, why people fail because we don't teach them that that's okay. We don't put them through, you know, ⁓
through any courses to say that, you we might say, hey, go out and watch some LinkedIn videos or hey, go out and do this. Or we might do a one-time class. Like, hey, here's the 10 videos you need to watch about being a leader. But that's really cookie cutter, right? And every leader is not gonna be the same.
Roger Johnson (07:09)
Yeah, I think that it's really interesting the idea of being threatened by the people that we work with. We want to hire and work in, like bring in the best talent we can and then end up being threatened by that great talent that we brought in. Which is obviously the dynamic of not for people not being comfortable with what they bring to the table. And so threatened by the people who bring who they think bring great stuff to the table.
Rachel Eller (07:16)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (07:40)
⁓ What's the, interesting to see, what do you think has been the most helpful thing for the leaders who you see who thrive versus the leaders who you see who struggle? What's the difference in terms of how they approach their own development? Do you see any patterns in there? And not just for you, but I know you're well kind of, you're well.
well networked in the HR leadership community. So I'm wondering, what are the things that you hear, what are the things that you see that people think like, this is a really good strategy for developers.
Rachel Eller (08:13)
Yeah, yeah. I think the leaders that I have seen who are successful are, constantly learning and constantly growing. And they are out there like seeking stuff. They're out there reading the journals. They're out there doing stuff. They're embracing AI right now, right? Like they're like, how can I learn more about AI? What can I do? How can I grow this? And they're really being thoughtful about...
their team, not only themselves, but how can I grow my teams? How can I put people in my seat? Right? Like who can take my seat so that I can take the next seat? They're really, they're thoughtful about that. I think those are the leaders that I see grow. I also think the leaders that I personally think have grown myself and also that I watch grow are those leaders who have a lot of humility, right? Like they're not the person in the room. Sometimes you get in a room with a leader and they talk big, right? They're going to use big words and
and you're in these meetings and things are gonna be, and they're just kind of boasting or like, I don't even know if it's boasting is the right word, But the person that I think is the constant learner is the one who takes the time to say, does everybody get that in this room? And there are no, bad questions or, know, and they really mean that, I have a CFO now
he does a very good job of that, like in a room where his brain works faster than most people's, but he will take a moment and stop or jump on a call and say, hey, did you get all that? Like, what can I do to help explain that? And I see that and I think like, man, this is a leader that gets it, that gets that it's not only the people on their team, but it's the people that they work with, it's the people that they are. And he's never gonna ask you to do.
a project that he's not willing to jump in and help you with. And I think those are the leaders. When I think of leaders who grow and leaders who succeed in their career, it's that, right? It's leaders who jump in, who aren't afraid, who aren't afraid to teach, who aren't afraid to learn and are constantly doing that. And that's what I appreciate. And I think those leaders make the best leaders.
Roger Johnson (10:05)
Yeah, so you use the word humility, learning, like engaging with people, making sure people connect and listen, great qualities. On the reverse side of that, we've all kind of been in organizations where we've seen people who kind of progress through the ranks and you're like, wow, they're really good at
Rachel Eller (10:11)
Mm-hmm.
Roger Johnson (10:23)
this amazing skill set, but they have these pretty big areas of, you're like, wow, how do we sharpen that? And I'm wondering, what are some of the things that you think cause an organization to, guess, foster or allow or tolerate those major blind spots within leaders? Is that something that you've seen?
Rachel Eller (10:25)
Mm-hmm.
Roger Johnson (10:47)
of addressed within the organization you've worked in? Tell me about your experience seeing that with the leaders.
Rachel Eller (10:53)
Yeah, I think sometimes if you bring success, right? And success could look different and you are successful in an area that's growing the business and you, or maybe you came from, you know, three acquisitions ago and you're the holder of the, you know, you're the holder of the information. Cause I've worked with lots of businesses everywhere that have been mergers and acquisitions, right? And so you get over time, you get different, information and different knowledge and skill sets and knowledge are getting lost. So I often think that because
when you get to that, somebody will have this skillset and because they've kind of moved through the ranks and they've been maybe the keeper of at a smaller organization, they were ahead of something. And over time, they have that knowledge, but they have not grown their skills, right? And they are not a good culture fit of the new culture that you have because through mergers and acquisitions, you get a new culture and that just happens and you have to be willing to adapt. But some people don't adapt, but because they have the knowledge or they're really good in an area where they have that skillset,
They're not growing. They're not growing a team. we haven't done good at succession planning and so there's nobody to take their role. losing them is difficult. Keeping them is difficult. And so it's like, which, which do you choose? And often you choose to keep them because it's the lesser of the two evils. Cause you don't want the knowledge to go away. And I think that that happens a lot.
Roger Johnson (12:12)
That kind of triggers another, I guess, thought or question I have as an HR leader professional, one of the things that you're responsible for and the HR kind of world is responsible for is managing performance reviews and to put a best practice together. And how do we do that? How do we steward the resources we have? And you and I had a conversation, I think, earlier this year about
feedback and where feedback, know, of what helps feedback be effective and what doesn't and how resistant people are to it versus what allows people to hear it. ⁓ Love your thoughts on using feedback as a strategic tool versus having people be resistant to feedback that would help them grow?
Rachel Eller (12:39)
Thank
So I'm going to answer it two ways. One, it kind of depends on the culture of your organization. If you have an organization that is feedback driven, then feedback becomes part of your norm and it's easier for everyone to accept. But that takes time and that's not easy. And most people don't want to do it, right? They don't want to take the time to do that, to have a feedback generated culture because that
It's uncomfortable at first and it takes effort to say, does that mean? And you have to really set the parameters that this can't only be positive feedback, but it also has to be, know, ⁓ productive, I don't want to say negative, but productive feedback where areas can change. So I think if you don't have a culture within your company, it is really hard to be the, you know, a person or a team or a group that is constantly giving feedback.
I think if you have that in your culture, it's something you want to build. can grow, right. And your culture is only better by getting feedback, both good and bad. And I think back to that leader we, that we were talking about a minute ago that comes from all these acquisitions and has this bad thing. And, know, everybody's kind of whispering behind their back, right? Like, gosh, I wish that they would do better. Gosh, I wish that they would do this. And I think in that case,
I would want to be the person that they're giving the feedback to, even if it's difficult. I would at least want to know that people were having those conversations. And I think often we do that, right? In companies, we have these feedback conversations, but we don't have it to the person that should change, right? And so we're doing that. We're having these feedback conversations. But like if I'm talking about you, Roger, I'm talking about you behind your back, I'm not talking to you. But how much more beneficial would it be if I were talking to you, the person who can actually change it, right?
Roger Johnson (14:32)
Right. Right.
Right, right.
Rachel Eller (14:38)
⁓
So I think that is, you know, thing that you have to kind of flip the switch to say even constructive feedback is good feedback because it's how are you supposed to know if it's something you can change willing to change if you don't get that.
Roger Johnson (14:53)
Yeah. Yeah, of the things that I think about when I think about feedback is how much care, how much care do we actually have for people? The idea of like talking about people and kind of allowing that that conversation to happen and filter down really puts a lot of pressure on a manager probably hasn't been trained to actually have really good hard conversations may avoid conflict.
Rachel Eller (15:06)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (15:15)
one of things I say is like, you know, as you get higher in your career, you're doing a lot of work. Your direct manager's not in the room with you. Like as a senior leaders, their manager's not in the room, but they don't see them work. They don't see them facilitate meetings. They don't see them negotiate. They don't see them, you know, manage our conversations. They don't see how they manage their team. And so.
Rachel Eller (15:26)
Yes. Correct.
Roger Johnson (15:36)
A lot of the information that they get is second-hand. so information you get as a leader isn't about how you lead or what makes you effective as a leader. It's feedback about if the business is succeeding. But it's not really about how you lead and how you can get better. How do you resolve that challenge of people actually getting feedback about what makes them effective as a leader, not just about
Rachel Eller (15:49)
Yeah, yeah.
Roger Johnson (16:01)
you know, is the business succeeded?
Rachel Eller (16:03)
Yeah, no. mean, I would love to say like, yes, I have that solved. I don't, right? I see it in pockets sometimes, but not, yeah, but not overall very often, right? Not, it's not something that I have, I have seen people do well,
Roger Johnson (16:19)
One of the things that I think is true for me, and as I've worked with executives over the last several years, is that as people progress in their career, they actually get less feedback about how they lead and what makes them effective. And they only get feedback about, the business succeeding? And so they don't learn how to lead.
Rachel Eller (16:22)
Okay.
Mm-hmm.
Roger Johnson (16:47)
or don't get feedback about how to lead at a higher level, they only know if the business is succeeding. Whereas early in our career, feedback's kind of built in. get a lot more of it, but we, again, we don't get as much as we progress through our career, primarily because our boss isn't in the room, but doesn't see us. just wondering
you seen anything that is helpful in a systematic structured way can help a leader understand how they lead effectively, not just that the business is successful?
Rachel Eller (17:18)
Thanks.
Yeah, I really haven't, right? Like I haven't came up with like the secret solution or sauce, right? And I have had the privilege of working with and still do have the privilege of working with some amazing leaders, right? And I feel, you know, but I still haven't found, you know, like the secret sauce, but you're right. People don't get feedback on how they're managing or how they're, you know, or beyond what they're doing. And that's kind of what we measure them on. I mean, I think if you look at metrics for most, you know, ⁓
bonus plans or anything, the metrics aren't gonna be, when you're young in your career, right? They are about some metrics of like your overall performance, but you're right, as you progress through your career, your metrics are really about how's the business doing. And we say all the time, especially in those like, HR fields, you know, that are kind of like overhead that we don't really have like a, we cost the company money, we don't, you know, we're not bringing it in. So we don't have like a tangible, this is what you bring in, but.
we could, right? You could have more of a tangible, like, I'm bringing in this benefit, you know, this feedback I'm bringing in, I'm keeping. I mean, we definitely have those metrics, like turnover and retention. But what if we even added another measurement to that, which is, candid feedback and maybe not necessarily candid feedback, but brace on leadership and what feedback those leaders are giving and how you grow, you know, in a leadership and not a promotion rate, because we also measure that. And I think while I think that's valuable,
but the success of those that are promoted, the success of that management team. I do not know how to manage that, but, how you do it. haven't found like a, you know, a magic tool out there, but ⁓ yeah, I think there's definitely something to that.
Roger Johnson (18:59)
Yeah, just a quick aside, one of the things that I think is helpful, when you look at what makes a leader, like how much time does that leader spend doing things that they're really good at and that people go like, my goodness, they're really good at this versus how much time do they spend, or how much information do they have on where they trip themselves up and get in their own way as a leader.
Rachel Eller (19:13)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (19:23)
If we can help a leader improve by one or two or three or 4%, how much value does that give to an organization to help them lead at a higher level? But we don't quite have the tools to invest that amount of time, which brings me to another question I have for you, which is a concept of, you said HR costs, right? HR is a cost center, which I think is,
Rachel Eller (19:46)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (19:48)
consistently
with HR folks that were a cost center. And so with that comes a very limited amount of where do you invest and what do you ask for when it comes to these things? Because when you look at the opportunity to invest or bring in things that are going to help do leadership development,
Rachel Eller (19:58)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (20:07)
How do you measure the ROI or where do you find the biggest impact if you're going to do a leadership development program? it's entry level folks or whether it's know, budget's hard to come by, right? So what have you found that's been effective or what have you used that you're like been really happy with?
Rachel Eller (20:17)
Yeah.
It's very hard to come by, yeah.
Yeah, I think if I'm thinking about what to measure or how to put it into budget, think you have to have, ⁓ if I'm thinking about it from that perspective, I think you have to have ⁓ business case for it, right? But again, here's where it gets tricky. The business case would usually be, you know, people are exiting or, not getting what we need. We're not giving them, we're not ramping people up. Like what if we could ramp people up, right?
What if we could ramp people up that usually takes them a year to onboard and we're onboarding them in six months? But again, and I think that that will always kind of have like a, you can usually get a budget for that, right? Because it's like, ⁓ I see that if we are ramping people up in a year and we're getting them to stay to the three to five year mark. But again, when you're talking about those leadership roles, at least in most of the companies I have been in.
they're not moving out very quick. So you can't say the same thing. You can't measure that if you lose one or two a year, that's about what you would see at the, at the senior level.
how do you make a case for that? Right? Like what's going to be the case to make them better? ⁓ and I've always really thought that we do a disservice to middle management, right? You know, they're the ones we throw in the fire. They're the ones who are kind of the conduit between your individual contributors and those senior leaders. They're also, they're oftentimes your unsung heroes, right? Like they're the ones who are in there doing the work, producing, you know, a lot of times like giving the senior leaders the metrics. And then the senior leaders are putting that up.
So I think we can train and have these really good middle managers and really invest in that, then everything else kind of flows through them, right? But a ⁓ lot of the courses that I have found or a lot of the things that I have found for those middle managements are a ⁓ la carte. And like we kind of discussed earlier, everybody has different needs.
I've had managers that come in and they are just naturally gifted at it and probably are going to move into executive roles. How do we get them ready to move into that? you and I had the privilege of working with so many wonderful people in our leadership rotation period. So we had the ability to look and see under the hood what that looks like. And of course that's really hard to do a program like that for every middle manager, but.
those that you identify, that are like emerging and truly emerging leaders, like how do we give them the moxie to then be in that senior leadership room? How do we get them a seat? And what does that look like? And if we're preparing them for that seat before they get there, instead of after they're there, it's so much better, right? what if they already enter that room with the confidence that they belong in that room?
That would be pretty powerful, I have a few things, right? A few tricks and stuff of things that we've put people through. ⁓ But again, the budget is very limited
Roger Johnson (23:13)
Yeah, but it sounds like what you're saying is that that the opportunity or the focus would be on the middle management, the folks who are really in the trenches, both leading the people, doing the work, that's a group of people that tends to get less attention.
Rachel Eller (23:23)
Mm-hmm.
Roger Johnson (23:32)
what do you think allows leaders to be confident? You talk about confidence, like entering in the room with confidence. I'd love to hear your thoughts on what
Rachel Eller (23:40)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (23:45)
what allows someone to be legitimately confident.
Rachel Eller (23:48)
think if somebody is legitimately confident, it's environment and personal, right? And I think it takes both. I think it's an environment where they know that they're allowed to speak and make a mistake, right? Like they're allowed to make a mistake.
but they don't have to be like the smartest person in the room, right? And they can just be like, this is my opinion. And they have that confidence. ⁓ And I was recently talking to somebody about this. as we're thinking of emerging leaders and as I'm always thinking of emerging leaders, it's how do you get them to that next level of the moxie, right? Because.
To me, the confidence isn't always the person that's gonna walk in the room and turn the heads right away, right? Like that's one kind of confidence, but it's the person that once you see them working the room and moving around, you're like, wow, that person has a little bit of extra, right? Like they have moxie. But I think again, if we go back to that humility, they're not afraid to ask the questions. They're not afraid if they're not the smartest person in the room. They're not afraid to...
be to be wrong, right? They're not afraid. They're going to have that conversation and seek it out in a learning manner because they're always wanting to grow and they're always wanting to learn. And I think that's true confidence. I don't think confidence is the person that walks in and knows everything I think it's the person that is walking into the room and is asking the good questions because they're not afraid to do that. They're like, I'm supposed to be here. I have a seat here.
They asked me here for a reason. And if I have a question, who else has? Because oftentimes when I see somebody and I'm like, man, they are confident. I have the same question they have. I just didn't ask the question and they asked it. And I think that's what true confidence is. It's not afraid to be like, you know, I don't know what you're talking about. Can you explain that to me? You know?
Roger Johnson (25:28)
Yeah, you said a couple things like one thing is fear like what causes some people to kind of have fear and some people have less fear or willing to admit they don't know something or they're willing to questions other people maybe are not willing to ask And that gives them a sense of like yeah, I show up
Rachel Eller (25:32)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (25:45)
I'm good. I know what I know. I know what I don't know. And I'm always curious as to what allows someone to have that confidence? because you notice when someone is like that, they stick out, right? It's not common.
Rachel Eller (25:54)
⁓
No, yeah, no, you see it and you're like, wow, that person has, we call it in our space, we call it moxie. We're like, that person has some moxie, right? Like, how do I get that? Yeah. ⁓
Roger Johnson (26:07)
Yeah, it's
interesting. you do you equate Moxie with executive presence? I think this common word that people throw out there is executive presence. that is that in your world is that equivalent to Moxie?
Rachel Eller (26:20)
Probably, yeah, probably like the executive presence. Yeah. Yeah.
Roger Johnson (26:23)
And do you guys teach that?
Rachel Eller (26:25)
Do we teach executive presence or moxie we do have, so through our PE firm, we have an emerging ⁓ CEO class think it's actually called emerging VPs, it's kind of for CEOs. And that is the class has not been launched yet. That part of that will be like that kind of moxie stuff. Yeah.
Roger Johnson (26:26)
Yeah.
it's interesting to see people who actually have, presence about them and energy about them versus people who are pretending to have that, right? Like performing that it's like they're forming and it's, it feels this authentic.
Rachel Eller (26:53)
Yes, yes, yeah.
Roger Johnson (26:58)
Hard to put words to like how that, how you see that, but you see it, you agree with me?
Rachel Eller (27:01)
yeah.
I agree. Yeah. And I think, yes, I agree. And I think it's hard to put into words, like what makes one person get it and one person don't, right?
Roger Johnson (27:11)
there's people that you point to, you go like, when she walks in the room, or when you're around her for a period of time,
You understand like there's a there's a subtleness and authenticity. There's a there's a ability to take risks. There's a self belief. There's a there's a lot of that stuff that just that just comes out and you're like, oh, that feels authentic. It feels right versus other people where you're like, it seems like they're trying so hard. They're trying to do it.
Rachel Eller (27:38)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (27:44)
But they're actually trying to emulate this other person. I think it really sticks out. I'd say as a person who loves people and I know you love people, like makes you sad. how do you have compassion for that person to help them develop?
Rachel Eller (27:45)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Roger Johnson (28:02)
and it has to be connected to real work. I assume you guys have a pretty positive feedback culture and you've been in an organization that have developed a really good feedback culture. How do you solve those two issues that is connected to the real work and it's invited?
Rachel Eller (28:16)
Yeah.
think the invited part is the hard part, right? You can connect it to work, but I think wanting it, people say, I want feedback, I want feedback, but what do they really want when they mean that? Like, what does that mean, right? I think if you do like these ⁓ performance reviews once a year, right? If you get in that cycle of, we're gonna do a performance review once a year, and that's where I'm gonna give all of the feedback for my employees. We're really doing a disservice, right? Because they're getting this feedback once a year that you're going to put into a drawer and never look at again.
Right. they're all they care about is does this equate to an increase? I've never worked in an organization that does a performance review process in that manner that that isn't the outcome. But I think if you, you know, and maybe you're doing that for because of, you know, a broader, you know, a broader initiative. I'm not saying that that's wrong. And I'm not saying that you don't have to have some sort of process in place. But I think when you really think about,
feedback constantly like what if I'm telling you in real time like hey, here's some feedback for you, right? And you're telling me like I want this feedback. I would rather have a feedback loop. But I think you also have to set up those expectations. And I think as a leader, you need to talk to your team about that. You need to have that conversation and say I'm willing to offer candid feedback if you are willing to accept that candid feedback. I don't think it can just be like something that you're constantly doing, right? Like that you go into with no, ⁓ with no
framework around. But I think that also comes with having a team of trust, right? Like you have to have a team that, trust that I'm giving you feedback that's going to make you better. And then I trust that you're going to accept that. And I trust that if you have a problem with what I'm saying, or you have an issue, or you have something that you'd like to say back to me, including feedback, both positive and negative, I trust that we're going to have that. But
I think there has to be some trust involved in that feedback or it's not gonna work.
Roger Johnson (30:11)
I think that idea of having trust, building trust, the idea having a framework or a structure to it is important for it to be invited. One of the things that I learned early in my career, which I think I've unlearned ⁓ over the last six or seven years.
Rachel Eller (30:16)
Yeah.
Good.
Roger Johnson (30:33)
probably in large part because the work we did together with the MBA program is in my career I thought feedback was actually owned by my manager. It was their responsibility. Over the past 10, 12 years, I think I totally changed that. actually feedback is owned by the individual.
But you have to be willing to ask for it, be willing to be in control of it and to say, hey, I need this, I want this, I'm going to go get it. Because that's only going to increase the trajectory of your growth. I think about some of the ways that you build in feedback in a systematic way your development processes. Like you said, can't be once a year.
have to build in this system of trust for it to work. And we tried to do it with the MBA program. think were some helpful dynamics in terms of like making sure there was shorter periods of really direct feedback that was welcomed by the folks.
Rachel Eller (31:23)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (31:31)
who are asking for it. you seen any other systematic ways that you've seen good managers incorporate that or bring that in?
Rachel Eller (31:31)
Yeah.
I think it can be in tandem. We were talking earlier about when leaders get feedback only on productivity and what their output is. And I think that that can be in tandem. And I think that those managers that do it well, probably are doing both.
they're not afraid to have a very transparent culture amongst their team. Like, I'm not afraid to put Rachel's metrics against Sally's metrics. Like, I'm not afraid of that. And I'm not afraid of Rachel to see Sally's metrics and Sally to see Rachel's metrics. And then we can give feedback on it and have a conversation and what you can do better. And I'm not afraid to listen to Rachel's calls with customers and Sally's calls with customers and give feedback on both equally, right? And there is this kind of
culture of it's collaboration, it's feedback. It's just that culture of we're all in this together. And so none of this is meant to be punitive, right? And you because if you don't have a culture like that, feedback feels punitive. And it feels like because you're only giving that feedback when there's negative feedback and you're not saying, Hey, Rachel, wow, that was a really good phone call or Hey, Rachel, that was, know, you've really
done really well on implementations this month, or you've exceeded your expectations, whatever that looks like. Rather with the flip of that could be, Rachel, I've noticed that you're struggling on this, some feedback I have on how you could change what you say. Then it takes away the punitive nature of it, and it's more of a collaborative nature. And leaders that I've seen that have done that well do that, like it's all encompassing, it's not just feedback, it's not just that it is.
It is transparency, it is feedback, it is collaboration, and it really comes together to be a culture where everybody's in it together.
Roger Johnson (33:19)
I love the idea of it not being a separate kind of isolated thing, having it incorporate in the total culture of collaboration and transparency. great.
Rachel Eller (33:27)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (33:30)
Couple of last thoughts are,
when you think about executive leaders who we've talked about, get probably get the least amount of feedback about how they lead. Again, you've worked with leaders who who are in that situation, where clearly they've, they're great at certain things. They have some pretty big blind spots.
What are the ways that you've seen organizations effectively intervene or effectively jump in and engage with those folks in a way that not, that to be retained the human capital, retain the person I've seen a lot of folks where they use an intervention as a way of
of removing a leader, not really retaining them. I guess I'm curious as to what you see be effective
Rachel Eller (34:10)
Yeah, yeah.
yeah, so I have been really lucky in my career to have had leaders like CEOs in positions that really do want to retain people. if they're if they're 75 % of what they're doing is great, we're missing this 25%. What do I do? Right. I have seen be successful is again,
I also have been lucky to have some senior leaders who are not afraid to have candid conversations with the individual. And I think that is wonderful. And I think also some of the things I've seen the organization enter into is mentorship, right? Like, hey, we need to get you here and we need to get you here. So we're going to bring out a mentor. We're going to bring on an executive coach. We're going to bring this on for you and see if we can get you to this next level, try to, you
get you through those blind spots. It might be putting them through an executive leadership course And 360 reviews of their peers, especially, let's sit down and go through this. Now you just do the 360 review and they're just reading the feedback and they're like, I don't know who said this. I don't know what my next step is.
that isn't in itself valuable, right? I mean, you can read a bunch of things, but it's like, what's next? I don't know what to do with this. So it's when it's in tandem with that and then going through, you know, some mentorship that can get you kind of to that next level to have that moxie, right? To have that next step that we want, to have that executive presence. ⁓ And I have really noticed that in a lot of things, it takes little tweaks.
Oftentimes those leaders go into this thinking I'm gonna have to change so much about myself, but it's these little tiny tweaks. That's all we're asking to make. We're asking you to change 3 % to get 25%. Like who wouldn't want that? I want that rate of return, right? And I've been very lucky to watch that happen and to have been under leaders who have been like, that's worth it, right?
Roger Johnson (35:54)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
so much we could we could talk about there, but I totally agree that typically the way that a leader sabotages their effectiveness or shoots themselves in the foot is typically very very easy addressable behaviors or mindsets and
Rachel Eller (36:10)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (36:24)
to get them to realize that and be motivated to address or change or have the humility to go like, could, okay, I could listen. I could listen just one beat longer or hey, when leading a meeting, I can make this change. ⁓ I find that 360s, like you said, can have limited value because
They don't see it as a springboard to address that small kind of thing that's gonna make them better. They see it really as I don't trust this because I think people have to get me. we respond better to feedback when we get it from people who we know care about us. We know want the best for us.
Rachel Eller (37:03)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (37:04)
When you hear feedback from someone who you know has your best interest at heart, even if it's feedback to say, hey man, you really got to address this, in that context, you're like, oh, I'll hear that because I know you care about me. And I think that's what's missing in most kind of survey related feedback loops.
Rachel Eller (37:23)
Yeah. Yeah.
Roger Johnson (37:25)
one last question as you've observed leaders in a lot of different contexts. What do you think causes someone to stall out and plateau?
just to kind of sit, get stuck. do you think are the things that cause that and keep someone just kind of sitting in the same place?
Rachel Eller (37:47)
Yeah, I think. ⁓
I think it's an unwillingness to give up control, right? Oftentimes, yeah. I feel like naturally when you're a leader, your instinct is to make all the decisions, protect everything, protect all the authority that you have in your role as a leader. And those leaders who feel that and feel like this is my space and I have to protect this space and I have to protect this role.
Roger Johnson (37:52)
Woo.
Rachel Eller (38:12)
I feel like they plateau much quicker than those who are willing to get, they're like, hey, ⁓ I'm gonna let go of a little bit so that I can get a lot back, right? we talk about those people who walk in the room and know everything, they're afraid of giving up the control of knowing everything. they're not gonna ask the questions even if they don't know what's going on. And so they walk away from the room with only half of the information, right?
they're afraid to be wrong. But I think it all goes back to the control. think it goes back to just being afraid and those who get to a point where they have to do it all and they're the, you know, and they're, the only person that knows it and they like that. And that's the feeling that they like. There's no room for them to grow because you see that and you're like, why would I ever move them into a new role? Why would I ever give them a new team? I would ever do, you know, any of that because they're not, their team's not growing. So they have a little higher turnover.
they're constantly burnt out because they're the only one who knows the information. They're the only one who can be in that role. So I think, yeah, I think that's a higher rate of burnout. think it's, we don't see them as anything beyond that. Even though they're a leader, start seeing them again as an individual contributor because they're contributing one skill set. That's what I think. I think that is what I see most people kind of plateau at.
Roger Johnson (39:22)
Yeah.
That's fascinating. wasn't expecting you to say that. That's fascinating because
absolutely think of a lot of examples of that where someone has so much expertise, but their fear of giving away some of that expertise or their fear of sharing information, their fear of not getting the credit that they want,
Rachel Eller (39:33)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (39:53)
their fear
not having all the answers causes them to isolate themselves. In a sense, they create kind of a moat around themselves, which ends up capping their opportunity to grow and take on more. And like you said, actually impacts the people in their organization, causes them to stifle their growth.
really great piece of insight.
I love that. That's awesome. one last parting thought from you. What is one piece of, honest or uncomfortable advice to leaders who have a lot of ambition and want to lead at a high level.
Rachel Eller (40:26)
Yeah, I would say.
Build a team that isn't afraid to take chances or make mistakes or ask questions as long as they're making them with thoughtfulness. It's okay to take a chance as long as you've done all the analysis to move forward. Build teams that have a collaborative culture. Build teams that...
are the people that we're looking at to lead. Go into your team saying, this is the team I want to build. And I think that that comes with having those candid conversations, not being afraid to grow yourself, to walk into a room and ask the questions, being that person and leading and setting that example. And I think the leaders that I have seen who are
who are extremely successful and I look up to, they're not afraid to say, hey, I use ChatGPD for that, right? they're not afraid to say that. They're not afraid to say, hey, look, I only understand half of that. Can you, can you back up and explain the rest to me? But they're also going to hold you to a high accountability. You can also have a team that, feels safe to, make decisions and mistakes and is okay doing that.
and have high accountability. And I think those can go hand in hand. So I think that would be my thing would be go out of what feels natural and comfortable. But if you really want to be in a high performing organization that is going to go forward, you have to be vulnerable. And I think that vulnerability comes with having teams that aren't afraid to try things.
Roger Johnson (42:02)
Yeah, so take risks. try things, try to fail, push the envelope, but in an environment where there's clarity of expectations and there's accountability. Good.
Rachel Eller (42:08)
Yeah
Yeah, yeah, maybe I've
been in the agile workspace too long, but fell fast. ⁓
Roger Johnson (42:17)
That's good. Well,
Rachel, thank you for jumping on having the conversation. We'll definitely have, I can already think of like a ton of more conversations where I want to be more focused on a particular topic and pick your brain about it because I think HR professionals have a very unique strategic perspective on organizations.
Rachel Eller (42:29)
Yeah.
Roger Johnson (42:42)
And I'm fascinated to learn more, to have more conversations pull out some of your perspective. So Thank you for joining the conversation, Rachel. And I'm sure we'll talk a lot more.