051: Nailing the basics of being a great manager with Kristen Hartley, Learning & Development Leader at Workday

 I think one of the biggest shifts that happen when you go for an an individual contributor to a manager is like this mindset shift from where before. The value that you're providing is like you're an expert, you're achieving, you're delivering. You have the answers. When someone comes to you around your subject matter expertise and then all of a sudden you're a manager.

Welcome to the Managing Made Simple podcast. Where I bring a decade of experience working in some of the most influential companies in tech to help you navigate the ins and outs of being a people manager from conflicts to feedback to delegating and more, we will leave no stone unturned when it comes to what makes us love managing, kind of hate it and everything in between.

Doesn't matter if you're a new manager looking for some tips. Or a seasoned manager looking up their game. Everyone is welcome to hang out with Managing Made Simple. Let's go. Let's go, let's go. I know you're here because you want to be a better manager, but I also know it's often easier than done. That's why I put together a scorecard of 20 things that you can do this month and every month to show up better for your team as a manager, from positive feedback to recognition, to honoring those working norms that we know we gotta do, but sometimes forget.

This scorecard serves as a checklist and accountability buddy to remind you of all those things you gotta do to be a great manager. Download your copy today at Liagarvin.com/scorecard. 

Welcome back to the show today. I am so excited to have Kristen Hartley with me. Kristen is a principal in leadership effectiveness at Workday.

She's passionate about management and development and has worked in the space of leadership effectiveness as a consultant coach. Facilitator, a manager herself, and now as an architect of leadership experiences in a large company. Kristen and I met while doing our coaching certifications and had an instant connection around how to bring coaching into the workplace to build better teams.

I've been a fan of her work across Pinterest and now at Workday, and was so excited to bring her in to talk about all things learning, development, and coaching in the workplace. Welcome Kristen to the show. Thank you. I'm so glad to be here and have an excuse to talk to you, so thanks for having me. Yeah, so excited as well.

You know, just diving right in. You've worked as a leader in the learning and development space across multiple different companies, and I'm curious, you know, what are some of the competencies you see most important for managers, right? You have a captive audience of managers in big companies, smaller ones, small business owners.

What would you say are the real fundamental things that you think folks need to develop? Yeah, I think the, the first one that comes to mind that's just become more and more clear to me is the ability to really communicate expectations and priorities to your team. And I think when those are clear, when a leader is able to do that, and it, it's often a translation of the strategy into those expectations.

Everything else. Is much easier and more possible. And then I think holding your team accountable to delivering on those expectations and those goals. And so that can take a lot of different forms. You know, it's, it's checking in and tracking progress. It's coaching people when they're running into issues and recognizing them when they're doing great.

But I think it really starts with getting clear on those expectations and communicating them. And there's a lot that goes into that make, you know, in order to be able to do that well. Yeah. I love that answer. I mean, I, it's like there's nothing I think I talk about more than expectation setting, probably feedback.

I know I talk about that a lot. Yes. But like you say, well, we don't have feedback without expectation setting. So it's really about expectations. And it's so critical when we think about, is something unclear as managers, the question we actually should be asking ourselves is, have I set expectations? Do I need to reset expectations?

And, and this, I, I love that you mentioned it because. It can seem like, well, expectation settings on a skill that's not a competency. It's like, oh, yes it is. It's actually very much, and I mean, I think talking about expectations a little bit more, like where do people get stuck when they think they've set expectations, but they really haven't?

Like what? What's happening there? Yeah, you know, I've been thinking about this a lot, like thinking about different size companies that I've been at too. Like I think, you know, one scenario where it can be really hard and tricky is if you as a manager or a people leader aren't clear on what the OKRs or the goals are at the level above you, then there's like very little chance that you're going to be able to translate that and make that clear to your team.

And I think at, you know, smaller companies or startups, there isn't like this really well-oiled cadence of. Setting those OKRs and communicating them. So it makes it really hard for the managers kind of sandwiched in the middle to take this lack of clarity and then try to bring all kinds of clarity to their team.

But I think that's one situation where it's really hard and I've definitely been in that situation. Then I think another situation is, Maybe that's not the problem. Like maybe the, you know, the top level goals or OKRs are really clear and you communicate them. I think there's a step that needs to happen between manager and the individual contributor.

The team member where you're like checking for understanding. Yeah, which sounds so simple. Like of course you do that, you share something with someone and you ask 'em if they understood, but. We're all moving so fast that I think sometimes we forget that step. So, you know, if you're a manager sharing, here's what I expect, like, here's what we're going to be focused on for the next quarter, and then saying something as simple as, why do you play that back to me?

Mm-hmm. Or what does that mean for you? What's the first thing that you'll work on this quarter to deliver and then you start to surface. Where are you using different language or where is there maybe a misunderstanding? And it's better to get that out at the beginning of the quarter, the beginning of the year versus the end when things have, you know, Splintered off and gone in all different directions.

Yes. Yeah. I love that so much. Also as a tool for delegating, I mean, I think one thing manager can get stuck on, right, is, is I wanna delegate, but I need, I need to kind of know where things are at and I need to be checking in and, and, and, and there's all these he hesitations and reservations. Well, if you set those expectations up front saying, Hey, here's the task.

I want you to be leading it. And the expectation is I check in, you know, every Friday we do a little debrief so that I can communicate to our stakeholders. Or expectation is. You know, I'm involved in this piece or whatever it is. Now you can delegate with more confidence that the person's on the same page, but you can step away and I love you.

Absolutely. And you know what that makes me think of too is like, you know, maybe as a step more detailed than the setting expectations. It's like thinking about what structures or systems Yes you wanna put in place with your team, like you just said, to check in, like just set it up front and say, Every one-on-one that we're going to have every week or every other week, I'm going to ask you how it's going and what help you need, and I'll give you feedback.

And then when you get to that one-on-one, it's not so awkward and uncomfortable to say, how's it going with that goal? Or, here's what I'm noticing. So I find that that like upfront communicating of how, like you said, how are you going to track and monitor you Just, it's like a prevention that you put in place and then it's so much easier when you just are, you know, repeating on that structure.

Yeah, exactly. And then you don't feel, like, you said, you don't feel like a micromanage, you don't feel like, ugh, I don't know if I should ask about this again. Cause I've been asking because you said it and you said, Hey, as we talked about, we're gonna do these three things in the agenda, you know, in this, in this one-on-one.

It allows that person to be. Kind of co-creating it with you because you've said, you know, and I think in the expectation saying, Hey, wanna make sure checking like we talk about this. Any questions, anything you wanna add so you can open it up for some two-way feedback. Absolutely. In that expectation setting, but, The more clarity up front.

And, and you know, we, we said already, and, and I always say to teams is we cannot be accountable to something. We cannot feel like a owner. We don't know what that thing is. Look, of course we're not gonna do it, of course we're not gonna feel comfortable. But when we have that expectation set and we know what success looks like, now I can say yeah.

I wanna be responsible for that. I wanna, I wanna do that. I want to. And so this is something I know I talked about in my recent episode about ownership, which I'll put in in the show notes. But because really it is impossible to be accountable, and I know you, you talked about again, like this kind of connection between expectations and accountability.

It is impossible for our team members who wanna be accountable when they don't know what they're accountable for. Exactly. It seems exactly. Well, and you're also. I just have this, this belief that like, people wanna do a good job. Yeah, exactly. Like, you know, people are at, at work because like they wanna make a positive impact and they wanna deliver awesome results.

And so like, as the manager, let's make that possible for them. Yeah. By like painting the picture of. What we expect, like what good looks like. And often we can co-create that. Like, I know on one of your past podcasts it was a lot about like co-creating that vision and collaborating on it. Like that can be a big part of it.

It, it doesn't have to all be top down, but people wanna deliver. So let's make it clear what success looks like. Yes. I love it. So when kind of building on, you know, that's a place that folks need to be focusing. So we said setting expectations and all that goes into there. When, when you think about, or when you're working with managers on their own development, where, where do you feel like, you know, beyond expectations?

Where are people getting stuck? Like, where could they still be doing a little bit more? Where are they getting lost in it? I mean, I think, I know you'll like this because you love this topic, but you know, I think delivering feedback and then like asking for and receiving feedback yourself is just really hard for all humans.

Like, yeah, at work, not at work. Individual contributors, managers. And so I think you kind of can't go wrong with that as an answer of something that we could all keep getting better at. And one thing that I think can make it a lot easier is, Like setting a culture and an expectation and a vibe of asking for feedback because then I think it's just easier for everyone to give it.

And so, yeah, you know, I know it's gonna sound like a really idealistic state, but you know, if every time a manager and a team member are having, you know, quick connect or having a one-on-one and they're asking each other, Hey, what's one thing I could have done better on this project to have more impact?

Or, Hey, I wanted to let you know that I'm working on being a more direct communicator. Can you watch me for the next couple of months and let me know when I'm doing that well and when I could be doing it better? You've all of a sudden opened the door. You have this open invitation for feedback versus a scenario where it's like, You know, Hey, Lia, I just, I wanna tell you something I didn't like about the podcast.

Like, are you ready to hear it? It's so much different, you know, if you text me after and say, Hey, what's one thing I could have done to make it even easier to be a guest? Like, how easy it is for me to give you feedback then. Yeah. Yeah. I love this. I mean, it's, I, I share this strategy in many of my workshops around demystifying feedback, because what you talked about making a specific ask, okay, this is a huge differentiator, and you said it in your example of not just saying, Do you have feedback for me?

So not framing it as yes or no, where the person's like, uh, no, I guess. And then not having it be like, name anything ever under the sun that you don't like about me as a person. So like, you know, that's like, that's the don't do this. Yeah. And the strategy that I love that you've just talked about is when you make an ask, be very specific.

Frame it up like saying, Hey, here is the area that I want the feedback on. Yeah. What is one thing, so you've scoped it down to like, okay, gimme one thing specific, and then you know, it's an open invitation and yeah, the person maybe says, actually, I thought that went great, but speaking of the podcast, I had this other thing, so.

Maybe they go outside of that box. Right? But you've given them somewhere to be and, and I think one thing I would add to that is, is saying, you know, Hey, I've been working on making my guest experience more seamless for the podcast. Here's one thing I've tried, you know, any other feedback you'd have now for asking your manager for feedback or your direct reports.

I think that naming one thing you've tried is really helpful. I love that because it's like, It also shows that you have self-awareness about something you've been improving. Totally know. And you're not starting from this blank slate of like, oh, I've never thought at all about this before. I'm just throwing out this random development area.

But you're like, I think you're just, like you said, you're showing this self-awareness. Of like, this is something that I personally wanna get better at. Or maybe someone's told me like, you know, this is career limiting in some way and I've been thinking about it and I've tried this and this part's hard.

And like, you know, show that like vulnerability, growth mindset, like all of those things. And then you've got the invitation open for like, and what else, what else could help me? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I mean, especially if you're worrying, a lot of managers ask, you know, I'm worried, I'm micromanaging. I don't wanna be doing that, and I don't, I don't really know how to ask my team about it cuz it's like, ugh.

Like it's kind of scary. Like what are they gonna say? Well, think about it if you said, like if I said to you, you know, Hey, I know I'm someone that really wants to be in informed in the weeds. But I recognize sometimes that can come across as micromanaging. And one thing that I've tried to do is to be delegating more and, and setting clear expectations.

And is that something that you can keep an eye on, please? You know, I'd love to hear feedback on if that's landing for you. Yeah. Like, look, now I've already taken responsibility that like Yeah, I know I can be a micromanager and Absolutely. And then it's less scary for you, whatever I say next. Yeah. And I also now feel like.

Wow, you really value my opinion. Yeah. Like you value my observations and my experience and you think that I could have something to share with you that would help you with your development. And I, you know, a lot of, I was talking to someone the other day about like, how do you build trust? As a manager, like how do you build trust on your team?

And I actually think that this what we just talked about, this is one of the great ways to build trust. Like being vulnerable about something that you wanna work on. Telling someone that you value their opinion and then like having that conversation, what an amazing way to like authentically build trust versus, you know, like a team building session or a trust fall or you know, whatever else you could do to build trust.

Yeah, exactly. You're modeling it, you're showing it, you're going first. Yes. Right. And you're setting that threshold of vulnerability because you know, if you give an example and you say, I'm trying not to micromanage, you know, that's why I created this task list at the beginning of the week, so you know what to do.

It's like, it looks like you haven't really taken responsibility there, you know? So you also, you can really set that floor that like, hey, we're willing to really self-reflect. We're willing to go deep. And yeah, like you say, there's nothing more that builds trust than showing up and modeling that for your team members.

Absolutely. And you know, you just made me think of something else too, like you'd shared a question with me earlier around like, where do you think. People, leaders struggle on their own development or like might fall down on that. Like, one thing that I think has helped me with my own self-development as a leader is talking to other people, like outside of the company, you know, not, not my manager, but like whether it's a coach or a peer who's in a similar role to me, and kind of having this open space, no judgment, no evaluation to talk about what's hard.

And it helps you process out loud what it is you think you wanna get better at. And then I think you can bring that awareness to these conversations. But I think people, leaders or managers, they're so busy and they're so focused on helping their team develop. They might not even spend a minute thinking about what's the thing that they wanna develop in.

And so I, I think that's really key to like spend the time how, you know, whether it's. Individual reflection or working with a coach or talking to a friend who's also a, a manager. But think about like, where do you wanna improve and, and then share that with your team and with your manager. Yeah. Yeah.

Absolutely. And again, like what a way to build trust because you're saying, Hey, I know I have flaws. I'm working on stuff. It's also really helpful for combating imposter feelings that team members might be seeing. Yeah. Is like, yeah, we don't reach a certain level and everything's figured out. We're all just kind of figuring out as we go.

And it, it does create more psychological safety because you're saying, yeah, I'm working on this too. Yeah. And in fact it get like you opposite of figuring it out, it just gets more and more complex as you move up and you're confused about more and more things. Yeah, you're right. That's exactly right. And, and you're showing that's what it's like, you know, you're giving that insight.

So you mentioned coaching, and I know you and I both do a lot of coaching with leaders and managers and teams. And you know, I'm curious on, you know, I guess I would love for you to talk a little bit more around how the importance of managers tapping into things like coaching. Mm-hmm. And, and how. You know how that can really create that personal transformation and for their team, just by investing that time and effort.

Absolutely. I love talking about that and I, there's a couple books that I've, I've read that are really about using the coaching approach as a manager, and I just love that concept. So like thinking about it from the manager lens first and like what it can do for you and your team. I think one of the biggest.

Shifts that happen when you go for an, an individual contributor to a manager is like this mindset shift from where before. The value that you're providing is like you're an expert, you're achieving, you're delivering. You have the answers. When someone comes to you around your subject matter expertise and then all of a sudden you're a manager, and so.

You're there to, you know, get work done through your team and to develop your team and to delegate work to them. And so they're gonna come to you and ask you, what should I do about this? What should we do about this? Like, they're gonna come to you and I'll speak for myself. What I used to wanna do is, Give them the answer because that feels really good.

Like, I'm gonna give you some advice, like, I know the answer, I know what to do. Let me tell you. You know, it's kind of like patronizing, kind of, you know, like parent child, like teacher student kind of thing. But that isn't doing anyone good any good. So like, as the manager, what it's doing is it's. It's making you the bottleneck, like it's teaching people, okay?

They, they can keep coming to you for the answer, you'll solve it, you'll take the monkey on your back and you're just gonna reinforce that like you at the center of it and you're not helping your team members figure out how to solve it and build their skills around it. And so that's where I think you can deploy like a coaching approach.

And so, you know, just like you and I would around coaching, be like, You know, what are you trying to achieve? Like what's the vision here? What does success look like? What have you tried? Okay, what are some options for the way forward? What's the first thing that you might try? So like it's just stop giving advice and then instead, you know, use whatever kind of coaching model you like to take a coaching approach to it.

And. I think it's just such a win-win for the manager and for the people on your team. Like that's how you develop people in the flow of work by coaching them on like a specific problem or work that they're doing versus, you know, like a, a training that they go to separately outside of their actual work.

Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, this is a time saver for managers. It's like, it may feel like, well, it's faster for me to just tell 'em what to do. It's actually not, because like you said, you create this bottleneck where you're always having to then solve and resol and resolve that problem. Yeah. And so if you really wanna optimize yourself and scale yourself as a leader, as a business owner, as a manager, then.

Get empowering people to solve problems on their own. And literally the episode that came out today in my show was about how to not problem solve. It's, it's exactly this thing, right? It's cuz it's like, if we are in that role, we're never gonna get outta that role. Yeah. And this is something I see business owners talk about all the time is, God, I, I wanna be building the business.

I wanna be scaling, I wanna be looking up and outward, but I'm always having to answer everybody's questions. I think it comes up with, You know, managers in any size company is when you've gotten in this habit of always like, don't worry, I'll take care of it. Even if it's out of service, even if it's because you're wanting to help people.

Not even if you fully trust everybody, but it's just like the pattern you've gotten into, then they're never gonna be able to do it. Absolutely, and I do. I think you're right that that is. At least for, for me, like it, it was the speed thing that made it hard. There's like a speed and a risk thing too, so you're like, it's faster if I just do it.

But in the long term, like it's faster if you empower and enable others. Yeah, and then I think there's another real. Thing that comes up around risk too, right? Of like if someone comes to you with a problem and like it has a lot of visibility or risk around it, right? You might be nervous as the manager, they might do it wrong.

What, how will it look on our team? And so I think there's ways to get around that. Like put support around the person who's going to go try to problem solve it. You know, check in with them frequently. Give a heads up to your manager that, yes, you know, this is what's happening. I'm gonna monitor it. I, this is a development experience for this person to solve it.

So like, there's things that you can put in place like, you know, guardrails or support, so it doesn't get really risky. Yeah. Um, but I, I think you're right. Like this is probably something that keeps people from scaling, like their management and their leadership. If, if they can't make that shift Yeah, exactly.

And you prevent yourself from learning another way to solve a problem. Like what's awesome, you know, we hire people so that we get their ideas and we add their, you know, special sauce or whatever to, to the work. And so if we're always saying it's gotta be this way because I. That's the way I know. We, we really have no idea what else is out there to solve it.

It's so true. Yeah. Like it's, yeah. That's where innovation comes from. And yeah, I think that's part of the shift too from like a, an IC to a manager is, and it's hard. I thought it was hard. Like it's not about you anymore. It's not about you like getting the glory of having the best idea, being the smartest, like you are taking a backseat.

It's your team that you want to shine and innovate and have the great ideas and. You're behind the scenes like coaching and enabling them and I, that can feel really different and yucky sometimes. You know, like that's, that's a hard shift. Yeah, and I, I've noticed for managers in the C world, especially in larger companies, a lot of times you become a manager and you're having to play, you have a number of like individual contributor responsibilities.

Still. Still. Oh yeah. Like you're doing part of that old job and you're managing people. Yeah. And so for a while you're kind of straddling these both worlds, and like you said, it can be very, it can be a lot, it can feel like you're doing two jobs. Yeah. It can feel like, well, I'm, I'm kind of like straddling these two worlds and I'm not, you know, I'm not doing a good job at either one.

And yeah, I think in that situation, it's back to where you started, it's about setting expectations with your own manager and saying, you know, here's what I'm gonna focus on. I'm noticing. My team is needing more support in these areas. It's taking this amount of time. It's ca you know, here's some places that I'm feeling stuck.

I could use development support here. Yeah. Really setting expectations so you don't feel like you've just agreed to do two jobs for no more pay and like you're working twice the time and you're just burning out. Because I think that's where we start burning out. Yeah, I think so too. And, and in addition to what you just said, the.

You know, like ask for coaching from your manager. Mm-hmm. Like, hey, you know, all those things. Like, I'm struggling, I'm feeling burnt out. It's too much on my plate. Like, you know, can you coach me through this? Yeah. And I'm thinking of one other thing that, you know, in retrospect, I wish I'd done differently in my last role.

Like I was playing a, a player coach role, and I think I thought about those two things pretty separately. I was like, this is my work over here in this bucket that I need to do, and then here's the work over here that I'm like, Delegating and organizing and monitoring for my team, and I wish that I had blurred the lines more.

Mm-hmm. And thought about how could I take that work that was in, you know, my like player bucket and delegate some of it or bring people into that work because they would have loved it. And so, like, I, I think about that a lot. How I could have made my life easier. I could have made, you know, the work more engaging for others and, and have more development experience if I hadn't thought about it as like, So binary of player coach.

Yeah, I love that example. And I think, you know, one critical thing with delegating is to not delegate some like BS tasks. Nobody wants to do like, but say, Hey, here's some really awesome work that's on my plate that would give this person visibility. Give this person some opportunity to grow. And you're delegating that stuff, which is like you say, when you're navigating this player, coach Malo, or you're doing individual contributor stuff while you're managing.

You have a ton of work that could be really high impact for somebody else and to not sort of like keep that to the close to the vest because it was cool, cool work that you actually can scale yourself better by developing your team members and Exactly. Giving some of that. And that's what I see at great leaders here at this company doing that all the time.

Like they're giving, you know, the coolest, most visible, exciting, innovative work away to their team. They're like, here, take this. Like, this is so, yeah. Cool. I'll be behind the scenes like, let me know when you need me. And I just, I think that's just such a great way to lead and manage. Yeah. And like you said, for folks that are worrying about doing that because of the risk piece, Well, there's a lot of things that you can do to mitigate it, like scoping it down, offering support, having them shadow you for a while.

There's a lot of different strategies you can do to, to manage that. You know, doing like a trial run, whatever it is. Yeah. Where it's not like, no, they're not ready. I'm gonna give zero of this. Like there's a lot of gray space where you can be. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. Well, I'm curious, you know, working in learning development in larger companies, I'm sure kind of that may look a little bit different than.

You know, focusing on it in, in a smaller company, like if you're running a small company, how do you still prioritize things like learning and development if you don't have, you know, a dedicated person that's managing it. Yeah, I think there's so many amazing things that are available now that, you know, maybe were really expensive before, weren't available, but just so many resources on LinkedIn learning on Udemy, on like all of these different platforms where content is becoming more and more readily available.

And so one model that I've seen folks do where they don't have a lot of budget, they don't have a dedicated l and d person is like, You know, how can you curate an experience where people are kinda like a flipped classroom where people are consuming some of that content that often can be free and really readily accessible, and then bringing them together in discussion groups like group coaching, you know, peer learning and like, you know, that's not high tech complex.

Scaled like that can be, you know, done small, like small company and have a really big impact. And so I think that's one that you know, comes to mind for me. And I also think, you know, being a different size, I've worked at a lot of different size companies. Like one lesson that I learned was. If you're at a really small company or medium sized company, it's good to get inspiration from, you know, like the Googles, the Facebooks, the Workday.

Like see what they're doing, but don't compare yourself and like try to recreate what they're doing at your very small company because it will be too hard, like, It'll be too expensive, like that's not the right fit. I found a lot of success by talking to l and d leaders at peer companies of similar sizes and like I put together a community of of L and D folks, you know, with that like 1000 to 3000 size company and my last role, and we just got so many good ideas from each other.

Like, what vendors are you using? What free content? How are you creating a. Really lightweight cohort experience that's free. So I think that's just one thing that I've learned, like, you know, think about where you are, company, like size and maturity level, you know, what kind of budget are you working with, and, and talk to your peers and see what they're doing at similar size companies.

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I would say too, like I think asking your teams, like what do they wanna learn about, like what are they interested in from a development standpoint? And I know even companies I've worked with that have, you know, four or five employees as part of the career conversations, they talk about professional and personal development and they say, is there a course you want to take this year?

Is there a conference you want to go to? And you know, that's not only a benefit that a small business can offer is. You know, sponsoring this kind of continuing education, but it's showing them like, I, I'm investing in you. So I think absolutely. That's too, yeah. And that's like the beauty of being at a smaller company like you can do that make it so customized to exactly what, what they want to work on.

Yeah. So I love that and. I think another place to go, you know, looking for like inspiration on topics or, or things to get after from a learning and development perspective is to think about like, what's your business struggling with? Or like, you know, what's the next year going to look like? What do you really need to do?

So, you know, maybe it's around like. Customer centricity or operations or you know, whatever it is that's on the horizon for you, like use that as inspiration for what people can grow their skills in. So then they're growing their skills and it's benefiting them and their career, but you're also simultaneously solving like an actual business challenge.

So it's not just like activity for activity's sake. Yeah. In terms of learning. Yeah, I love that. And you're saying why you should make time for this? Like, hey, this is connects to our priorities and our vision. This is why I'm asking you to invest in this. Now there's a lot of debate between requiring and having optional trainings and so the more you connect it and and land that, why?

The more the person's gonna be bought in. Yep, definitely. Awesome. Well, as we start to wind down, I'm curious, you know, what's something that you're working on that you're excited to share with our audience? Yeah. You know, one thing that we're working on that I'm really excited about is trying to make more like practical, simple tools and templates for managers to use.

And so that might not sound exciting to other people, but like what I've seen over the years in l and d is that often we will put out, you know, these like beautifully branded long guides for managers of like how to have a difficult conversation. And the first. Five pages are about why difficult conversations are difficult and you know, like all this preamble and what I think the user is actually doing is, you know, similar to what you do when you're like reading a Google, you know, Google search results or reading an articles, you're like, where's the 1, 2, 3 list of what I should do?

Yeah. Or like, where's the script that I should use? And so we're experimenting with this concept of like strip out all of that beginning part and just show the tool, like what are the instructions? Is there a Google Doc template that like I can use to have that one-on-one meeting or to cascade these OKRs and like just give people the useful templates that they can use right away in the flow of work.

And so I'm super energized by the simplicity of that. And yeah, like as an L and D professional, it's also a lot easier to make those. You know, you know, do all the copywriting for, you know, a 10 page facilitation guide. So that's something that we're playing around with and so far feedback is good. Yeah, I love that.

And share a little bit about your coaching. You, you work with folks one-on-one. I do, yes. I'm having so much fun, you know, since you and I got certified, you know, went through our coach training. I have a few one-on-one clients and working with people who are newer to management or looking up level their leadership, and I just love that kind of the combination of working in a big company and kind of doing this scaled like systems work and then having a few one-on-one.

Clients and yeah, so you can check me out k hartley coaching.com and always happy to chat with people about any of this, like managing coaching, getting coaching, talking about l and d, just really jazzed about all those topics. Awesome. Any last words of wisdom to leave folks with before we go? You know, I think my main advice for just thinking about this manager population is, Like if there's something that you're struggling with or you know you're having imposter syndrome or like you don't know the answer to is like there's very likely someone or a lot of someones who are struggling with something similar.

And so what I've found to be really helpful is like, Just let people know what it is you're struggling with and you'll find people who will give you advice or who will be a peer to bounce ideas off of. So I would just say like, don't struggle alone with whatever kind of management challenge you're facing, because a lot of people are facing it too and have like really great advice and ideas for you.

And I think what it takes is being vulnerable enough to share, like, I'm not really sure how to do X, Y, Z. Do you have any advice or ideas? Yeah. And like it will just, you know, come back in, you know, spades. Yeah. I love that. I mean, that's a goal that I had with this show was talking about like, these are the real things we're wrestling with, right?

All of us across all these situations. And so, like you said, we're, it's rare that we're going through something that's. So like only unique in this situation, it's probably never the case. Right? Right. Someone will have something related, they can share some learning. And that's true. Whether you, you know, you know, if you're a small business owner talking to other small business owners joining community.

Yeah. If you're a manager in, in a bigger company in the corporate, then you maybe have more access to a network right there. So yeah, not being afraid to share. I love that. And not being afraid to ask for help. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for being honest. It was such a fun conversation and just love talking.

Awesome. Thanks Lia. This is great. That's all I have for today. Thank you so much for tuning in to the Managing Made Simple Podcast where my goal is to demystify the job of people management so that together we can make the workplace somewhere everyone can thrive. I always love to hear from you, so please reach out at liagarvin.com or message me on LinkedIn.

See you next time.