Leadership Author Series: Keith "Flip" Griffin

and Dale Walls. I came on board after he had originally founded and we're just Look, the simplified version is that we love to bring value driven leadership content, whether that's with applications, whether that's with you know, podcasts, whether that's with courses. We just we want we want people to be able to do more. Right. We know they listen to you, but we want to we want to

help them. How do we do this where we can we can help and and and elevate their games in in easy ways, right, and and not only that, but you know, simplistic ways that that doesn't need to be you know, drawn out or or you know, necessarily theories are potentially put forward. But that's the Lion's Guid's all about. And we're we're excited to be here with it.

brought that to Lion's Guide afterwards. And now I'm the managing director and we're really just setting off kind of where we're going with it.

you've broken this down in the content. So like, let's just start there with kind of the first couple of things from an everyday leadership standpoint, you know, the core beliefs, Like, talk to me about these core beliefs, why they're so important and why you have to start here.

the bottom up. So the first but when I just when I designed the core, the every day letter quor, I had to start from the core, right the where it all, where this leader is coming from. And so you know, leadership starts from then really looks at who you are, because if you don't know who you are, there's no way that you can go out and lead in any capacity. Like you have to figure it out that scared, or you're gonna end up being hollow, right, and then give what you want to gain, which is

that other part of this core belief is what are you trying to give to other people? What are you trying to not only get out of them, but knowing that you got to give that first right, like you have to be able to say that, and so the quote enables those two together by kind of really bringing it together, like, look, just be honest, be consistent, be transparent, because you're gonna get that trust, that loyalty and respect that you're looking for, and everybody's gonna kind of be there.

And so the first two in Core Beliefs really did the benchmarks really dive deep into kind of figuring out who you are and then figuring out what you want to get from your leadership experience.

be able to go forward. And I think it's such an important concept. You know, we do so much on the podcast with our with with our one minute hacks and like self reflection, take the time write this down, think about this, how would you do that, how did

you do this? And what could you have done? And so when I hear you talk about these core beliefs and really this being at the foundational element of where you go from here, I think they are so important and I think that they sometimes we can jump over them quickly and we don't spend the time to really consider not only how we show up for each other, but how we show up for ourselves. And then we rarely ever do temperature checks on asking people how am I actually showing up for you?

your people in that same foundational aspect, I just when I put it together, I just thought it was such an important thing that you had to start with, no matter what, because then no matter where you go, it'll

apply for anything. Right Like this this thing to me, I can look at that core belief and say I can apply that to my children, right Like, if I'm honest, I'm consistent, and I'm transparent with them, right as much as you can be as a parent, Right, then I'm going to get that trust, that loyalty and the respect that we're all trying to write that we're looking for. So it is and Lion's Guide real mantra over it all is just it's it's it's applied throughout life. It's

not just applied at work or at your business. So great points, Thank you, I love it. I love it. Let's move on to core abilities.

But really the abilities like for the abilities for yourself, right, observability, responsibility, and accountability, those are all if you think of it as a like a target, those are really going to be at this center of things that you have to work on. Right, I have to work on how I'm observable to my people? Am I there all the time? Do they see me? I have to you know, I have to relate to the responsibility and knowing that I have these things to do? And then the accountability Am

I doing the stuff that I am? And am I holding them to the same point? So that was like the inner circle kind of portion of the abilities. Now when you move to the next string, you end up ending with you know, the core abilities for your team. So now this is the next step out where you look at dependability, where now you're leaning on someone else to do something, and that's that's an ability that you can work on. You're looking at availability right, Like they

say in the NFL. In sports, the best ability is being availability and the same things here right, are you there? Are you present? Are you engaged in what you're doing? And then the last one, and I think it's the most important in the team, is the relatability factor. You're bringing in X amount of people on your team, they all think see the beach ball in a different way. How do you relate the entire thing to make sure that what you're you know that the mission is getting

done and that you're able to do that. So the relatability piece is also it's a lot of the why like why are we here? And you're going, oh, I'm going to show you that you're important because I'm going to relate the you know, the top mission down to what we do down here in our department. And so the team was really the second ring. And then when I got to the company, you know, the air quotes parts,

that was really the biggest one. And I'll tell you that the core abilities for your company were driven a lot off COVID because what we saw it COVID was people who had no idea what to do, how to pivot, how to change, how to adapt, and so adaptability being the first one of saying we have to have our department, our company, whatever, we got to be able to make us small change or adapt to what has just changed.

And if we can't, and so when you can't or when you have something like a like a major thing happened, then you get into the weather ability part where you're like, all right, we got to weather this storm. How are we going to do it? And here's the last piece that most people don't do. They don't then go to sustainability part to go, okay, everything is now changed. What else has to change with it? Is it salaries? Is

it people? Is it right? They don't sustain what they're doing because they were never meant to do it in the first place. But right, but the pivot, the event changed so much that you can lose that. So when you when you when you take all the abilities together, you look at them from the context of you know, the closest to you to the next closest to the outer hole. You really have these abilities that you can you can work on and focus on each one and go, okay,

what do we need to do? So a great example the company one, do we have things in place if if stuff happens, Like a lot of people don't. They just think it's gonna, you know, go that way. And so those are the things I really wanted to find actionable items that a leader could go I can target these things and make sure that I'm doing each one of them well. And that's really what the core abilities were all about. Yeah, I love that.

things that are being you know, required of change. And that ability to not just make this change, but to sustain the change and then kind of grow from it that you call out is phenomenal. We're going to take a quick break for some sponsors. After we get back, I want to talk about application and specifically, I'm going to ask you about spam. So we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. All right, Flip, we're back.

I want to talk a little bit about the core applications here and kind of break this part down of the Everyday Leader. But I really want to make sure that we pause for a moment here and we talk about spam. So start where you want, but we're going to take some time to talk about spam.

your toolbox. And so I always wanted to start with building your foundations because one thing that happens all the time is that you take uh people get people get off their their original north star really easily. I use the example all the time of a pizza shop that's making the best pizza in a town they get said, man, why can't you make kel zones? Why can't you make

an apostos? And then all of a sudden, they're not making the best pizza, but they're making all this other stuff and they've really forgotten they're brilliant on their basics. And I got it from General Maddison and he had kind of really talked about the Marines of you know, every marine, no matter what, is a rifleman. And I thought, you know, your business people need to know that that.

They got to figure remember your core, remember what you're really there for and why you guys are there, because that's that's kind of going to be your north star?

Are that moved into kind of learning your flexibility? So leadership has all these paradoxes, right, like how much time do you spend on the floor as a positive as you know of the of the manufacturing as opposed to not being a micromanager or right, all these different things that you have to be super educated as well as as well as letting your people kind of being empowered to do things on their own. And so that flexibility of just being able to bend to what's happening, right,

like they're never really called out to that effect. And another great one in there is we operate in the gray. Right, we have all these black and white things, but leaders operate in the gray. So being able to be flexible and operate in that gray is super important. I'll leave

this span until the end. I'll just cover the other two, so the other ones. The art of simplicity we have innately in leadership. We make it probably more difficult than it needs to be to some degrees, but at the same time we don't take advantage of what other places. A great example is NASA. Right, we could all probably agree that being an astronaut is a very technical requires a lot of intelligence that but you'd be surprised to know that every single thing that they do is simplified

down to a checklist. And I thought to myself, why don't we do that? Why don't we simplify leadership down to be able to use a checklist of even the fact of like, hey, on Fridays, I want to go and make sure that I recognize someone for the good work they do. But that's not written down anywhere. It's a memory item, and I don't want it to be Simplification of stuff is yeah, break it down Barney style in leadership, not just your job, but your leadership portion

of it. And then the last one before we get to spam, is really about people don't understand their authority, nor do they understand about empowering people and allowing those people to lead upwards, right, And so it's a lot about I use two specific words here that I call out. I don't like the word culture, even though I know it's true. I know culture means something. I like to look at what I call ROW, which are results oriented

work environments, and those are small pockets. So if you can change and you could make a small group within your company empowered and that what you'll end up seeing is that every group if they're if they're that way, then the culture just comes naturally on its own and you don't have to push it, right, because nobody wants to hear about culture. We don't talk. It's just something

that does that. So let's get to spam though, because it's one of my favorites, and to be honest with you, it's one that I never saw anywhere ever, Like I don't know that there's a course ouse or that talks it. So spam stands for sex, power, alcohol, and money. And the simplified way is to say that I have not, and I challenge all your listeners and all the viewers

please flip atlianceguide dot com. Go on and tell me if you've found a situation that a leader wasn't taken down by either a sex, something to do with sex, something to do with power, something to do with alcohol or drugs, or something to do with money, because I haven't seen it yet, and they all revolve around that, and so we dive into each one, and really it's not about just calling it out. It's about putting active things in place so that you, as a leader, can be prevented for that.

Like if everybody knows these other things, well, it's because of what you just said, which is we don't talk about it enough. We don't say that this is a thing, and then we don't share the fact that there are going to be as you rise in your career, as you take on more responsibility, then there are going to be things that you will have access to. There's going to be you know, financial parts of this that maybe

you weren't used to. And these types of new places create the opportunities for one of these four things to show itself. And if you're not prepared for it, if you're not thinking about it, if you're not aware of it, it's really easy to trip and fall into this trap.

it's like they're extremely bad and toxic. And then they do this and we're shocked or we're odd about it. It's usually the other way around. So I appreciate you talk about this a lot.

the thing that used to sit on my desk. That thing is from I think it's twenty fifteen. That can is Actually I would never eat it anymore, but people always ask what is it for? And I say it, and just by saying that, they know that I'm aware of those things, I'm still susceptible to them, Like it's not that it's not, but but you you kind of go, it's out there, right, I put it out there to go that and then it's not just that simple thing

did that? And I think the other point to me is is remembering that you're a servant, right, Every leader is servant. It's a servant leader. You're doing what you can for the people that you have the privilege to lead, right And I use the word privilege that the word privilege all the time in that because it is it's a privilege to be a leader and you have expectations

around you that people right. And and what happens when you falter you nailed it right, like, then they become not a good person or they become not a good leader. And the truth is America loves a comeback story too, So it can happen. The human side kicks in and it sometimes is unavoidable. But I think the more you're able to put it out there, like, the more the more wall you have and protections you have from it, right, Like, it has to invade a few levels before it's really

gonna really going to matter. And that again, people don't you said it. People don't talk about that enough because nobody wants to. It's the it's the it's the bad stuff. We don't we don't want to keep it positive. I can keep it positive by telling you that those things are the ones that take us down and and just

knowing it, so it was important. And again real side note, I didn't really how receptive people were going to be to and I thought it was a little bit silly of a thing that I had learned from Amment's work. And people just took off and we're like, oh my god, this is awesome. And I now know of about probably twenty five thirty people with kids a spam on their desk at work and great, it's working. That's all I care about. But it's awesome. Man.

as well, and to see that page. So we're we're not hard. If you see the purple and you see the logo of the face, you know you're at the right place.

in the Lion's Guide Academy. So if you're looking for more content like that, and if you're excited to learn more about the application of these theories and these books, that's where we're going to have our content live. So again, check out linesguide dot com and the academy there. And thank you all for listening and checking out the show and Flip thanks again for coming on and providing some great content and context for our leaders out there listening.