340 – When Leaders Create Waste

John Over the last two decades, I’ve been on an insatiable quest to learn everything I can about leadership. What makes the best leaders so good? After running companies small and large over the last 20 years, today I speak on stages all across the world to audiences who are interested in that same question. My name is John Laurito. I’m your host, and I invite you to join me on this journey as we explore this very topic and what makes the best leader so good. Welcome to tomorrow’s leader. Welcome to the show.

John Welcome to tomorrow’s leader. This is John Laurito, your host. I hope you’re having a great day today. I sure am. Okay. So a couple of things. First of all, let me give you today’s Daily Riddle and this film and a couple of episodes back to back. So I did not get any responses yet. I don’t have any winners to announce on the one that you probably just listened to recently. So I will as soon as that has gone live. It is not as I’m recording this. So you know the deal. Okay. So here is today’s riddle. It’s coming. Okay. It is coming. Here it is. Here we go. Here is the riddle. And I’m almost there. And I have it. It is right here. And I’ve got it right about here. Okay, got it. All right, so here it is. What word has Kirsty so. What word has Kirstie in the middle in the beginning and at the end? What word has Kirstie in the middle in the beginning and at the end? Again, I will say that what word has cast in the middle in the beginning and at the end? No. Thank you for playing today’s Riddle Escape game with John Laurito.

John Okay. So it’s interesting. I was, um, I was reading a story which was kind of pretty interesting to me, one of my favorite foods out there. And truly, if I see it on the menu, so a lot of times when I go to a restaurant, I will narrow it down to two or three or four things and I will have the waiter or waitress pick my meal out of there, sometimes by surprise. They’ll just say, Your choice. You tell me, surprise me. Sometimes I’ll just say, Hey, what do you think is best? But I usually 95% of the time will narrow it down to three or four things and I’ll get the waiter waitresses input. There’s one thing if I sit on the menu, I will always order it because I love this thing. Chilean sea bass. Mm, that’s right. Two, two sea bass. God, it’s so good.

John It is phenomenal if you have had it. You know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t had it, you’ve got to have it. Find a place, whatever it is, whatever you get to pay, have it. It is just it melts in your mouth. I got to say, it’s one of my favorite foods. I don’t see it enough out there. But it’s interesting what the Chilean. Here’s a story with Chilean sea bass. It was not always called Chilean sea Beth Bass. In fact, back in like I think it was the seventies when they first founded, um, they didn’t really know what it was. They thought it was just this cheap thing. They didn’t really know what to do with it because sea bass, if you don’t know, is a very bland fish. It doesn’t really have flavor. It takes on flavor. It’s great to cook with because it takes on other flavor fantastically well.

John But in and of itself it doesn’t have a lot of flavor. It’s an incredibly tender kind of meaty fish. It’s just so great melts in your mouth, but in and of itself it doesn’t have a lot of flavor. So when they first kind of discovered it in their taste and they’re like, Well, this isn’t very good. So they they really didn’t do anything with it. In fact, they called it it was called the Patagonia Toothfish. Yes, that’s correct. The Patagonia toothfish. Now, first of all. I don’t think I would ever want to try something called the toothfish. A toothfish. I don’t know what that what? It’s a toothfish. So I’m thinking, okay, it’s so amazing how a name changes people’s perception on something, right? So if I was at a restaurant, they’re like, am those mussels tonight or the Patagonian toothfish? Uh, and it’s marinated.

John What’s no way. No way. I’d expect that to be, you know. Oh, well, then with Jack’s Tavern here, we’re going to. We’ve got the Patagonian toothfish, and, you know, we’re going to we’re going to marinate that. Then we’re going to bake it. We’re going to fry it, double deep fried, and then we’re going to go back and then we’re going to marinated again and charred. And it’s the Patagonian toothfish. It’s fantastic. No, no, not really. Um, whereas you go to a restaurant and it just rolls off your tongue, right? Would you like tonight special or the Chilean sea bass? It’s marinated in a light, buttery sauce, whatever. But you know the deal, it’s just amazing how a name changes everything. So if you’re your leader out there trying to get some buy in to something, it’s just amazing how how sometimes the way you label something or describe something, you’ve got a new program, a new new initiative or whatnot.

John Think about it. How do you describe it? How do you name it? Believe it or not, it does make a difference. There’s a great book called 10% Happier By Who? Hold on one sec. That is by, I believe, um. Dan Collins, I believe. Well, I’m not prepared, but it’s it’s a great, great book about meditation. And it’s I’m just looking it up as we are talking here. I’m sorry. Not prepared, but 10% happier is by Dan Harris. Dan Harris, great. Great book, highly recommended. But part of the appeal of that book is it wasn’t overpromising everything, right? Anything 10% happier people can buy into that. It’s not 50%, 100% happy. Your double your happiness. Triple your happiness in two days. It’s 10% happier. Yeah. Who wouldn’t want to be 10% happier?

John The way you name something, describe something is very meaningful. The words you choose are very meaningful. So event quick aside, that’s not the purpose of today’s podcast. Today’s podcast is about the ROIC return on investment of tasks. It’s going to be a quick one, but I’ve seen this in many situations where a leader may be thinking and this is one of these unintended consequences where a leader is trying to get something done and trying to roll something out, trying to to basically delegate to other people certain tasks because he or she is thinking that, wow, it would be really nice if this was done or if we did that or if we had this process in place or if we double checked or triple check this and this was a quality control. And there is a return on that investment. When I say investment, investment of time of people, labor, time, power, whatever it is, resources. There is a return, but the leader is not really thinking about the cost of that.

John And truly, is it really a good return on investment, in other words? I’ve talked to people on both ends. I’ve talked to people who have had leaders put things on their plate. And I’ve looked at as a leader and I’m like, boy, that’s that’s a really, really marginal, incremental difference that this task that you’re being asked to do is going to make it it’s going to take 6 hours of your work week every week. And is that really the best use of time? Is that really worth it for that extra 1% in reality? Because what can what else can you be doing that 6 hours, 6 hours or 10 hours or 15 hours, whatever it may be. But I see that sometimes where leaders are not thinking through, okay, yes, that will improve things a little bit.

John But is it worth having these people or this person go through that extra effort? And what is the downside? What’s the cost? What are they not able to do? Because I have them focused on this. If I’ve got somebody filling out a tracker every single week or some kind of spreadsheet every single week that I’m going to look at once every, you know, once in a blue moon, when it strikes me that, hey, what’s the number on this thing? But yet I’m having them complete this every single week. It’s taking time, it’s causing aggravation, it’s causing frustration. And if I’m having them do it and I’m not even using it’s not being used for anything, then it’s just a waste, right? All you’re doing is bringing down the morale and you’re running a business that’s not efficient. You’re not helping people become as as great as they can be. So and sometimes you have to just take a step back and look at, okay, what am I having people do? Is this really beneficial? Could I have them doing something that’s more impactful? Can they make a bigger difference doing something else? If they took that hour time and did something different, if they took the mental energy they’re putting on this because it has a cost.

John And sometimes if you just put something on somebody’s plate, it’s not just the time it takes to do that, but it’s the impact on them. If it’s a real big pain in the ass task, that’s not bringing a lot of high impact. It’s ripple. It’s got a ripple effect. It’s affecting other parts of their role and their day and what they’re doing and their leadership of other people. I promise you, you may not even realize that. They may not even realize it, but I promise it is. So just think about that as a leader. You’ve got a lot of power as a leader because you can influence a lot of things. But it’s not just about giving people work to do. It’s not just about putting stuff in other people’s hands. It’s about putting getting a team of people, the right people, doing the right things.

John The hardest thing is finding the right people, the easier thing. But really, absolutely mission critical thing is getting those right people to do the right things. So this this conversation in this piece is all about do you have the right people doing the right things? And if you’re not sure. Ask them honestly, ask them and just say, hey, you know what? Think about all the things that you’re doing right now. If you were to read these and look at these, what’s the least impactful thing that you feel like you’re doing? What’s the. Is there an area that you feel like you’re wasting your time? Ask them, what’s the worst thing that happens? They tell you and you just say you disagree. Okay, well, that’s fine. At least you’ve asked the question, you know, but you might have your eyes open to the fact I didn’t realize that.

John So that’s taken you that much time. That’s really. Yeah, you’re right. We’re not really using this. I just think there’s so much waste in organizations and teams. Wasted talent, wasted time, wasted resources that really are not bringing a great return on investment. So think about that, leaders. This is really, really, really critical. I can’t tell you how important this is because you may be losing or about to lose some of your players because of some of this stuff. So I hope this helps.

John Again, I’m here for you. Anything you need, any time. Email me, text me, call me. You know the deal. I’m available. I’d love to help you in the meantime, like share, subscribe, go down below. Give a five star review and I will see you next time I’m off to the mountains. Have a good one. Bye.

John Thanks for joining us on today’s episode of Tomorrow’s Leader. For suggestions or inquiries about having me at your next event or personal coaching, reach me at John@johnlaurito.com. Thanks, lead on!