Leadership, Human Connection, Optimizing Communication- Jason Anthoine

Welcome to the Executive Connect podcast where we explore innovative leadership ideas and transformative insights. I'm thrilled to introduce Jason Anthoyne here today to talk about employee relationships within organizations inspired by its father, a formal assembly line foreman at a school bus factory, Jason specializes in effective communication with blue collar workers.

He has guided numerous companies in transforming their internal communication strategies to boost workplace culture and enhance business outcomes. Welcome Jason. Thank you so much Melissa. I appreciate it. I'm really excited to be here today. We're so excited to have you and as I normally do, we're just going to jump right in and talk about friction and company communication.

I know that the big buzz word these days is maintaining frictionless communication amongst different levels within organizations. So from your perspective, let's discuss a little bit about communication challenges that companies are having right now.

Well, you know, I love it when people say right now because we're having the same communication challenges now that we always have had and we always will have just because, you know, at least right now, there are humans working in all these organizations and humans are funny.

So some of those challenges typically include leaders who don't think they have the time or the skills or maybe a strong enough relationship with their employees to feel comfortable to communicate with them and then on the employee side, I'm hard to reach. I'm used to things like tick-tock and Instagram when I'm not at work and my communications from the company aren't like that, then they're boring and I don't want to read them or watch them.

And so, you know, there's just a ton of things that sort of cause that friction and there are a lot of ways to reduce that, overcome that, some digital, some not digital. But to me, the biggest thing is that you both need to want to. I want to be communicated too. I want to get feedback. I want to know more about what's going on in the company and what I can do to help. And the company also has to feel the same way.

It is important for us to communicate and build relationships with all of our employees, not just the ones that are easy to get to just by pushing the email button. Yeah, absolutely. I think it's like you mentioned it, some mutually, a mutual want. I know a lot of times I have a high energy, fast pace dialogue when communicating and a lot of times I've had to re-change how I speak to people because they were, I was moving so fast for them that it was hard to understand what I was saying.

So just kind of what you were mentioning a bit. Can you share some tips and tricks for people on what is the best way of communicating? I know a lot of times. We think we're communicating like you said at the beginning, you're right, it's been a long time. We think we're explaining things clearly and then things come out the wrong way.

And as in your experience in the factory, it's important to understand what we need to do because everything builds on top of each other to get to the final product. So I guess the question is any tips you can share with our listeners?

Yeah, absolutely. And I think the biggest tip is particularly for what we call distributed employees, those who are non-wired, which typically end up being sort of blue collar types of employees, front line employees. The biggest thing is to ask them how they want to be communicated with. Most times organizations just kind of skip over that and say, we've got an internet, we've got email, we've got digital signage.

And then your front line supervisor might do some team huddles before or after shift. All of which or none of which might be what your employees want or not. So just ask them what they want because what's important is some people, like you were just saying, well, there's some people learn by listening, some people learn visually, some people like a mix of those things.

And so the more you can think about who your audience is and what their preferences are, the easier it is to tailor your communications for them. There's a whole lot of other conversations we can have about what the messages need to be, but the actual delivery of that really should take into account what your employees want and how they want to receive information and how you want to receive information and communication back from them.

So once we establish those things, then we can start building, you know, who's going to do it when they're going to do it? What are they going to say when they do it? But we have to start with a foundation of what is that literal connection of the communication between one and the other before we can have any of that other stuff even be remotely successful. In your career, have you, do you have any examples that you can share about maybe some challenges

you had with communication in your career? Oh gosh, yes. You know, just because I'm on here talking about how to do communications really well doesn't mean that I do really well all the time. You know, even when I've been on the corporate side and working, you know, has had a communications for different organizations, we would get it wrong all the time too. There are some really good examples. All right, one is I worked for a company.

We had 60,000 employees, 30,000 of those we could reach on email, 30,000 we could not reach on email. And when I first got there, nobody knew that. So whenever we were sending an email out from the CEO about, you know, what's going on with the quarter or how the business is doing, we would just, you know, the team would just hit the email button thinking it's going to 60,000 people. It's only going to 30,000 people.

And so, you know, we're missing half of the organization in, oh, by the way, that half is the one that builds all of our stuff. And so they're not getting any of the information. So that was a, you know, a big miss when we went, you know, when I first arrived at that organization and so we, you know, we quickly fixed that sometimes that means giving everybody access, you know, to email, which sometimes can be a little bit of a, you know, budget crunch because of licenses and things like that.

But other times it's, all right, we can reach the managers and supervisors. How can they then take that information and share that in a different way with those employees who aren't reached by email? So, you know, that's one big example. There's tons more like a lot of organizations have digital signage. We push out content on digital signage that has QR codes on it. So people don't have time to stand there and read the whole thing. So they just see it, click it and it goes somewhere.

Sometimes people forget to put the links in there for where the QR code is supposed to go. So you think you're communicating and people are actually, no, there's code in the code and it's not going anywhere.

So there's just, there's a lot of little hiccups like that that happen that sometimes get kind of missed in the rush to make sure the bigger things are working and we're trying to reach everybody as often as we can, but it's easy to kind of overlick some little details like that, which can derail the whole thing. Yeah, absolutely. I think of, you know, communication like you said is not just verbal communication. It's like through email, it's our body language.

It's how we interact with people and then, you know, I think there's another layer of it when we look at different cultures and how they communicate. 100 people. And they work. So kind of pulling back the layer a little bit and looking at culturally is there from your perspective, have you seen different communication struggles through different cultures? Absolutely.

You know, that's a really important point about culture, not just the culture of the organization itself and all the different little sub-fultures that they all have, but also culturally as in where people live on the planet. So what might be appropriate, you know, for the U.S. might not be appropriate for APAC, for example. And a great example of that is most of the employees for our clients who live in APAC use what's app to communicate between themselves.

It is rarely an official company channel, but that's how they want to communicate. And so there's a bunch of communication going on amongst those employees that A, the company is not aware of, B is kind of off and not, you know, not tucked behind, safely behind the server and the firewall. It makes the high-speed people all nervous. But that's how they prefer to communicate. So we have to take that into account culturally from where the people live, but then also the culture of the organization.

You may have the kind of culture where it is perfectly normal for the CEO and other senior executives to show up at your facility and walk around and talk and, you know, get to know people. Other places, if the CEO and a bunch of executives show up, it causes panic because they don't normally do that. And so something must be wrong. And then if you know they're coming a week before that, you know, people are fit shining the whole place of spotless, when the CEO gets there.

So the culture, I think, really kind of helps determine what's going to work and what's not. You know, there are times in certain cultures where short, you know, TikTok style videos work really well because you have that kind of workforce. There are times when that won't work well. Maybe you have an older workforce or one that's not quite as digitally connected as you might think they are. People school posters and bulletin board postings and things like that work just as well.

So you always have to take that culture into mind when you're thinking about how to reach them, what's going to work, you know, what feels like us. Not, oh, I read this somewhere or I was on a webinar and they said, do this, this is the best practice. Best practices are a bunch of hooy. The part about a best practice is the practice part. Anything can be a best practice as long as it's the right thing and you practice it.

So just because industry says do it, that doesn't mean it's necessarily right for your culture. Yeah, absolutely.

I think about the different industries I've worked in and I'm banking to this, engineering to, you know, gaming and in these industries, it's quick to the point. There's not an hour dialogue of communication on how things are going to be done. It's very short. Like you mentioned, TikTok videos about what we need to accomplish. Yeah. Like you mentioned A-pack and you're up in other areas. They want to sit down for an hour and have a beer and visit and talk about things and sort through things.

And so it's a much slower communication process than I think a lot of times we are in the United States is quick, get things done, quick as possible. Do you understand? Good go. I think so. The problem with that is a lot of times what people are communicated. We think the receiving person understands what we're asking for. I find that that's not always the case. So a lot of times what I'll do is say, do you understand what you need to do? And I'll ask them to explain it.

And then when you hear it back and you understand what they're saying, if it's right, then they can go. If it's not, you can kind of correct it a bit. It's not that's kind of how I try to bridge some of the cultural and just age gaps, race gaps, country gaps, all kinds of different communication. It's funny. It's said that about working in an engineering organization. I've worked in several large manufacturing companies, tons of engineers in there.

And so we have a meeting with just the engineers. Senior executives talk about whatever they're going to talk about. And in the end they say, all right, who has any questions? Engineers hardly ever raise their hands because they're a little bit introverted, which is fine. Most people are to a certain degree and certainly, you know, in a big public space like that. And so the, oh, there's no question. So the assumption is, oh, they get it. They understand it. No. Now they're going to go back.

They're going to sit and think about it. They're going to talk with their buddies up and down the hall and on Slack and teams and whatever. And then they're going to have their questions because they're engineers. That's the engineering process. So just because they didn't raise their hand, that mean they get it and also doesn't mean they don't have questions. So in that type of culture, it's fantastic to wait a few days and then follow up. All right.

Golf had time to think about it and percolate on it and talk with your buddies. Now what questions do you have? So you're exactly right around really tailoring things to the culture. In a high-tech company, that would not fly. They were going to have questions immediately. They won't answer them easily. And then they're off to the next thing.

Yeah, I think about, you know, back in my previous life and engineering, there was a leader who was communicating with the field workers to basically cut out and amounted, right? And they thought they were actually taking out the dirt in an area and moving it to another area, which in heavy equipment, it's not a cheap process to move a giant mountain from one side to the other side.

And so they went along and did what they thought that leader wanted them to do, which ended up costing the company a lot of money because they didn't really understand what they were being told. English wasn't their first language. And the leader that was communicating it was an very impatient, I would say not very friendly personality. And so they just said, "Yep, got it. We're going." And so, you know, when I think about communication, there's the, we need to get the job done.

And then there's the difficult conversations. In that example, if they didn't really understand, they should have said, "What I hear you saying is this and clarify before they go and do something." So when I think of, you know, difficult conversations, it can be anything like that example, or, you know, maybe an employee is not performing well and you have to have that discussion or

people are showing it to work. Yeah. And so I guess the question for you is, you know, avoiding difficult conversations, it can be really detrimental to anybody's business and any feel. That's cool. And so I want to get from your perspective, the long term impacts of not having these tough, these tough conversations with employees. There's, that's a great question because there really is a long term impact.

So in the example that you just provided where, you know, a mean leader said, "Go and do this," and people are like, "Yep, something's broken in the relationship there where those people probably didn't feel comfortable to raise their hand and ask a question." I think sometimes both the askers and the answerers confuse asking a question with being questioned.

Like, I'm not necessarily questioning the decision or your authority, but I am asking a question about what it is exactly that you want us to do. So I think that that happens a lot. And so, you know, you're avoiding a difficult conversation there and sometimes you don't even know you're avoiding it because people have just learned to be that way because this is how that leader is and this is how we have to act. So I think you have to be cognizant of that.

And then I think the other thing that happens is the longer you avoid those difficult conversations, the more friction begins to build and build on top of it, build on top of it, and then different kinds of friction is kind of show up. So that, you know, over time, things are getting worse. I watch a lot of YouTube videos about physics and things like that and things, once they're perfect, they will not stay that way. They will tend to become unperfect and even more unperfect over time.

So if they're already not perfect, they're going to get worse. Everything hardly ever gets better on its own. So it applies in physics, it applies here as well. And so the longer you let that kind of stuff linger, the more difficult things become. So as a leader, I think it's important for you to initiate those conversations yourself. There might be a lot of reasons why your employees aren't comfortable doing that.

But if you initiate the conversation and it's very conversational, not necessarily, hey, let's meet at 3 to 320 on Thursday and hammer out some things that I don't think you understand. That's the wrong approach, just, you know, drop by wherever it is they are and say, all right, here's what we talked about. Let me know what you think about that. Is that going to work or not? I mean, you're the ones doing it. So does this work? Does it not work?

And so sometimes it'll take the leader having to initiate that. Sometimes leaders are a little bit reluctant to do it because they're like, I told them what to do. I'm not going to explain it again, but you do. Humans are humans. And so, but the point is, along you avoid any sort of those kind of friction, feeling, conversations, the worst they're going to get. And so, you know, just tackle it. Head on, just head on. So if you're a leader, initiate that conversation.

If you're an employee that has a question, ask your question because undoubtedly, if the other people standing around you have the same question. Yeah, well said. And I think the other thing for senior leaders, if you're people are silenced and they're not giving feedback and they're not communicating, that should be an immediate red flag.

That maybe it either needs to be escalated or maybe pulling aside one-on-one and better understand why an employee that's been virulful for a long time has gone silent. And I think that's something we all, like you mentioned, beginning. Something we're all working on is better communication.

And I think, you know, effectively communicating to your employees is key and making sure that they're, they feel safe to give you feedback and tell you things like, hey, I can't come in at eight because I got to drop my kid off now. Can I come in at eight, 15? So do they feel safe to tell you that or do they just show up at eight, 15, hoping and praying that you're not going to say anything?

So I think creating, you know, an open dialogue and with your employees and the people that you interact with, your friends, your spouses, your children, creating a safe and comfortable space for them to come to you and talk, I think is really key in communication these days. Absolutely it is. And you know, so many companies talk about, you know, employee engagement surveys and things like that. Oh, our engagement score is 75% and that's really good, but they still have high turnover.

It's because of stuff like that. You know, you send out the engagement survey and people go, yes, absolutely it's good. I'm telling you it's good because I don't want you to ask me more questions. I'm just going to tell you what you want to hear. And I may be engaged, not cause I love this place, it's because I've got three kids and a mortgage and I don't want to lose this job.

So engagement number can be so tricky to understand and to your point, I might feel engaged this hour just afternoon after somebody's made me mad, I might not feel engaged at all. So you know, that whole idea around that engagement score really does sort of hinge on not the communication as much as what the communication creates, which is a stronger relationship between the leaders and the employees. You can help you do that without it.

No, you're not going to have it, but with it you have the opportunity to have it plus, you know, a whole bunch of other things that go into creating that relationship. But you know, if you're not really focused on building those relationships, then you as a leader, employees in their careers and the company as a whole just aren't going to get to where you need to get to be successful. Can't. Yeah, I think about the engagement survey.

A lot of times I hear people say, oh my gosh, we have 98% of our employees are so happy. We have the most happiest employees. And like you mentioned, key people are leaving the company, but a lot of times I feel like the engagement survey people and employees know that they're being seen and what they put in those surveys. And if they say, you know, one, I don't like my boss, they're afraid for retaliation and other things. So they score up things.

And so I find those surveys really interesting in companies that say they have really high retention, but they're skinny scores, but they don't have high retention. That's right. And I think too, you know, there's nothing wrong with engagement surveys. I don't want to pick on them, but you know, that's just one data point. So, you know, in what you just explained, let's get the survey back. Let's look.

Now, let's go out and just talk with a select proof of employees and say, generally, everybody write this question as a three. How do you feel about that? Why or why not? What's important? What's not important? So that you can get some emotional context around why they answered the way they did to go with those rational numbers that show up in the engagement survey results themselves. The rational is okay, but without the emotional context around that, you're only getting half the story.

I think. Yeah, absolutely. So in the world where we're all on our phone all the time and always sending emails and not communicating verbally, is there some tips that you can share with our listeners on ways they can become a better communicator and maybe even listener when they're leading people? Yeah, and that really has become not that it never was, but it's become even more important

now since the pandemic, mostly because almost every organization just threw any kind of platform at their employees that they could to connect to them, teams and Slack and Zoom and WebEx and whatever else like. All right, some of you aren't going to be working in this building anymore. That's fine. You can fight that or not. Anyway, but that's the reality. Some of you will never have the opportunity because you're working on a similar line and that's just not an option for you.

So what we've done is just throw a bunch of digital tools at everybody and we've done a pretty good job of connecting to them, but we've kind of forgotten about the main point of that, which is to connect with them. So the more you can use digital tools to have that feel like a true connection, it's a high tech approach to help deliver this high touch feeling. So an example of that. So most leaders, I'm going to make it up.

So most leaders are going to have a team meeting on Mondays and Thursdays. And so they send out the invite and everybody shows up and then they go through the thing for an hour, people are doing other stuff, probably supposed to pay me attention. And on Thursday, we're going to repeat that. That's the only time the leader really kind of connects with two their employees.

So Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday are wonderful times to just schedule one-off meetings with any of your employees individually, small groups, or collectively. And you talk about anything but work. What's going on? How are things going in your life? People want to have conversations about things, particularly with their managers and leaders. They don't necessarily have to do with work. And the more you understand them as people, the better you'll understand them as your people.

And so what can we do to have more connections that talk about what if versus all of what is that everybody has to deal with and focus on every day? And that's just an easy thing to do, particularly if you've got people connected digitally like that. If you don't, then the old school management by walking around concept still applies. You're going to have shift change meetings. You're going to do monthly or quarterly town halls.

And that's how you primarily connect with your employees who aren't digitally connected. Great. In between that, get out there and talk with folks. You're lunch in the break room. You hang around in the parking lot like they hang around in the parking lot. Like all these things are opportunities for you to insert yourself into their lives. It's very hard for them to insert themselves into your life just because of the roles and the dynamics and the politics of what happens inside most workplace.

But it's easy for you to do that. So do more of that. That takes everybody's guard down and then you will get more honest feedback. Then you will get more questions. You will get more ideas because now people see you as not. He sits in there and every time he does something screwed up and probably my fault. I have a conversation and a relationship with that leader on a more regular basis.

Then it's perfectly acceptable for that person to come up to me and start a conversation because then I'm not panic that I've messed up. Yeah, absolutely.

A lot of times I hear people say Jason, whether, well, I'm not. I'm just not social. I'm a non-social person. I like to come to work and do my job and eat my lunch and then go home and see my family. And I think if you're not social and you're not comfortable starting dialogue with people, simple things like, wow, it's hot outside. Wow, can you believe it? It's known as the day of last night. How was your weekend? Whatever. I think those are teeny ways to start dialogue.

I know a lot of times when I work in engineering, people would just, there would be 20 people in a room and they're all kind of circling and walking around each other, getting stuff done and nobody's talking to each other. And I would stop and say, hey, how was your weekend? How was your kids ballet? And people would look at me kind of like, why is she asking?

And I think that's the other side of what you were saying with these meetings is, we're all here to do a job no matter what, you know, whether if you're owner of a company or W2 employee, everybody has something to get done. But I think the human factor is really important in any teams or any business that you're running and really understanding who's working for you, what they're focusing on and just understanding outside of just doing their job.

I think the more that you include that human factor in your dialogue, I think it will benefit everyone both in their personal and professional lives. God, if you nailed it there. And the thing that's a mystery to me and you tell me if you've experienced this too, let's pretend. Whoever the leaders are, they're sitting up here and then everybody else is down here. At some point they were down here and their leaders are up there.

So they started out, wherever it is they started out doing whatever it is they were doing and somehow they made it up here. And then when they were down here, they were like, when I get up there, I'm not going to do it that way. Now they're up there and now they're doing it that way. So what happens between here, here's where I started and here's where I am now because a lot of what you just described to me feels like they've forgotten what it's like to be where they themselves used to be.

And when they were there, they craved that. They wanted that. They needed that. And now that they're the person that can deliver that, they somehow have forgotten the importance of that for the folks who need that. It's just a mystery to me and that's just that's not being a leader. That's just being a human factor. And so to your point, the more human you can be and build those connections like that, the more you can identify with them because hey, you used to do that job too. Yeah, absolutely.

I think from my experience, the higher up you get, the more you have to do, the more you have on your mind and you're really moving from task to task to this, to that, to this to that. And so, you know, I call it the fighter flight way, right? And I know even myself, I get stuck in. And meeting, demeaning, demeaning, demeaning, demeaning.

And what I've started to do this really helped Jason is not being reactionary to every email and every call and everything that happens to me and really focus on, have I touched base with the people that are important to touch base with? Do I understand what's going on? That's pertinent to their job and pertinent to them, right? They have a child's graduation, I've had some people with child graduation coming up in friends and they had to take some time off.

And do I have, do I understand the human side so they can do the work side? And I think the higher you get, the more pressure that's on you to get things done and your, your high level building strategy and visions and making sure you're hitting the mark with the financials and everything. So I think the one thing I would say is if you aren't like you mentioned, if you're not doing it now, calendar it on your calendar for yourself, you know what I mean?

Have I spent five to ten minutes with somebody that's important to me? Could be your spouse, could be your children, could be your boss and really just connect. It doesn't have to be about the job. And if you're not doing it, calendar it for yourself. Right. That's such an important point because, you know, you've said how you're getting the organization, you know, the more senior you are, the more you have to do.

But the flip side of that is that now you have the luxury to actually own your calendar. You own it. So if you're complaining like, I don't have time to do that because my whole day is filled with all these meetings. Don't go to all of them. It's your calendar to climb those things. Like if it's not important and I'm just kind of there to be there, I don't need to, I'm not going. Like you own your own calendar.

So, you know, take control of it and build some, you know, take back some of your time and build some time in to do the kinds of things you've just described. And a point you made earlier, I think is an important one, particularly when managers and leaders say, oh, you know, I'm a little more introverted. I'm just not the kind of person who's going to do that kind of thing. I'm sorry. You don't have that luxury as a leader. You don't have that luxury as a leader.

What you have to understand is that communication is leadership, responsibility, not a department down the hall. You don't have to be a rock star at it, but you do have to try. And even if you're not that good at it, just try. We'll get you halfway there with the people that you're trying with. And so, you just, you just got to have a different mindset for more people that you have reporting to you because that, that sole thing helped them to lead them, not manage them.

That's totally different thing. But helping to lead them is what's going to help things be more successful for them, for you, for the organization. And if you shrug off that responsibility, you are missing out both on being effective and having a much more enjoyable career to me. Yeah. I think, you know, if you have a company with 10 employees, you have more available time to call the 10 employees.

If you have a company like you mentioned beginning with 60,000, it's going to be really hard for a CEO to call all 60,000 of his people in a year. But what could they use technology in AI? For example, you know everybody's birthday in your company. You send them a birthday card in their email. And if you're the bottom of the, the bottom of the company and you have, you know, a task where you'll never engage the CEO, getting a card from a CEO and you have, you're not an executive, it matters.

It means something. But I know that those little teeny tiny things, although they seem like there are a lot of work, there's tools out there where they can automatically be done for you and you can touch all your employees. And that is such a great idea. And to me, the power of that thing is that if it's a card that you personally sign and it gets mailed and sent to the employees home, nothing is more powerful than an analog thing like that in a digital world, you know.

It's just a powerful way to deliver a message that has to do with work, but you're receiving it at home and your family always wants to know more about what you're doing. You're proud of what you do and that is getting recognized in front of your family inside your own home. And there's nothing more powerful than that. Absolutely. I'll tell you a quick story.

I had an employee about four years ago who I didn't directly manage, but I had spent some time helping them with some things they were struggling with at the company. And this employee left the company and had sent me a letter, like you mentioned, a hand-written letter about how much it meant that I saw them and I spent time with them. And I'll tell you, I didn't, you know, I did do a ton of meetings or anything.

It was just a very simple meeting to help them sort through some things and really just to be a sounding board, but to one person that was everything. And they took the time to send me, you know, a thank you. And for me, I was blown away and it really impacted me and how I lead people based off this letter that I received from somebody years and years ago. But I just challenged all the leaders out there to figure out what works.

And if you're a time poor and you have 100,000 employees and you can't touch everyone, like you mentioned, Jason, could you hand write a card or hand write a bunch of cards and have somebody mail them for you? Or could you do, you know, a round table with all your employees and just casually connect with them one supporter or one some one, been no specific reason just to connect with the people that work in your organization? Yeah. I love that thought about those notes.

A lot of times people are like, oh, I'll just fire off an email. We've all gotten those kind of emails before. But like, where do they go? Like, I got an email 10 years ago from a leader at the company I worked for. I don't have that anymore. But I keep this right at my desk. Somebody took the time to write me a note and say, hey, you did this and it meant something to me. Thank you very much.

It is right here in front of me and it will be here until I go out of this house feet first because it matters. I don't know where the other emails are, but that is right there. And when I'm having not a very good day, I like to read that and that gets me going. Yeah. Well said. I am closing here on a mindful of time. Any final thoughts or anything you want to share with our listeners that we didn't touch on here today?

Well, I think, you know, we touched on so much like you were saying you and your friends do in the short amount of time. You cover a lot of things. I felt like we did too, but, you know, I just really want to emphasize the fact that, you know, particularly with AI and automation and factories and manufacturing sites are coming, you know, so full of technology and all that is great and we need to be moving in that direction certainly as a society and as a culture as a whole.

But as that gets to be more and more and more, the personal, human, analog things will mean more and more and more. And so, you know, are there ways that you can do things digitally that will help you connect with two folks? Yes. There are plenty of that and you're already doing that. But the idea is to use those things to connect with them. And the more as a leader, the more as a manager, even if you're just a frontline supervisor, it doesn't matter.

You've got people who are relying on you or looking to you. The best way to connect with them is to have that feel as human as possible. Face to face, ideal, video, second to that, you know, anything analog, you can send them. It just creates a special connection that there's just no way digital stuff can ever do. And if you haven't done it and are scared to do it, don't be scared. It will be well received. You can misspell every word in there and have the worst hand-write. They won't care.

They got a note from their boss and that matters. So you talk about what engagement means. That's what it means. That's exactly what it means. Not. Oh, I can't wait to wake up and get more earnings per share. Nobody thinks that. I can't wait to wake up and go to a place where I feel appreciated and I get to do my best work and I get recognized for that. That's what engagement is and if that's what everybody wants. And leaders, managers, supervisors, it's in your hands to do it.

Yep. Yep. Absolutely. Well said. Jason, thank you so much for being here with us today on the Executive Connect podcast and sharing all your knowledge in this space. That's it for us today on the Executive Connect podcast. (mouse clicking)