Hey leader and welcome to episode number 334 of the L three leadership podcast, where we are obsessed with helping you grow to your maximum potential and to maximize the impact of your leadership. My name is Doug Smith and I am your host and today's episode is brought to you by my friends at fair tongue advisors. If you're new to the podcast, welcome, I'm so glad that you're here.
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So thank you in advance for that while leader in today's episode, you're gonna hear my conversation with ginger heart . If you aren't familiar with ginger, let me tell you a little bit about her.
Ginger retired as the senior vice president of culture and communications at Southwest airlines after an illustrious 25 year career, where she served as a member of the CEO's executive leadership team at Southwest ginger led a team of 150 people responsible for building and sustaining the organization's legendary culture and communications enterprise in 2017, ginger launch unstoppable cultures of brand design to help organizations create and sustained cultures of enduring greatness.
And in our conversation, you'll hear ginger talk about her journey to leadership at Southwest. What she's learned from the CEO she's got to serve under, and we talk about all things, culture related , which you're gonna love if you're a leader, so get ready for that.
But before we dive in just a few announcements, this episode of the L three leadership podcast is sponsored by Bartung advisors, the financial advisors at Barone advisors, help educate and empower clients to make informed financial decisions.
You can find out how bar tongue advisors can help you develop a customized financial plan for your financial future by visiting their website@bartongueadvisors.com , that's be RTU N G advisors.com, securities and investment product and services offered through LPL financial member, FINRA , and S I P C bear tongue advisors, LPL financial, and L three leadership are separate entities. I also wanna thank our sponsor.
He jewelers they're jeweler owned by my friend and mentor John Heney, my wife, Laura , and I got our engagement and wedding rings at he jewelers. And we had an incredible experience and not only do they have great jewel , but they also invest in people. In fact, for every engaged couple that comes in, they give them a book to prepare for marriage. And we just love that. So if you are in need of a good jeweler, check out, he jewelers.com. And with all that said, let's dive right in.
Here's my conversation with ginger Haage. Well, ginger Haage, it is an honor to be with you welcome to the L three leadership podcast. And I just wanna start by actually diving into your career. You've had quite a career and , uh, you worked for 25 years for Southwest, and you started off as the , the director of PR and worked your way up to where you were overseeing all of the marketing communications for the organization and reporting to the CEO.
Um, I'm just curious, can you kind of walk us through that journey? What, what was it about what you did that maybe set you apart for that career path that you were on
Doug? Great to be with you? Um, I actually studied , uh, communications and advertising in college. So that was really, I was one of those lucky people that got to jump into my career field. So Southwest wasn't my first job. Um, so I had worked in, in the field , uh, honing those skills with communications primarily. And then when the opening , uh, came available at Southwest, I, I, I just was so anxious, but there was a moment there. I was afraid I wasn't gonna get it.
Um , because I'd interviewed with the founder, her Kellerher and Colleen Barrett , um, and Colleen eventually became the president of the company. And , um, I , it went great. I mean, we had a great conversation. I just, I knew I'd nailed it. And then I didn't hear, I didn't hear, you know, I was sitting at my other job and then one day I , I got a call from , uh, this guy identifying himself as a vice president of Southwest airlines.
And he said, you know, I , I'm sitting here with the vice president of marketing and we're waiting on you for your nine o'clock interview. And I just went, what , and, and then he started laughing. He said, we realize we didn't tell you about it. So
And he said, and we're in so much trouble because we've waited so long. So wow. So that's that, that was my funny start to Southwest airlines, but yes, I did start in communications. And then over time , um, like, like any great organization, if you show an interest in something , uh, in your, have the capacity to add it to your team , uh, that happened there so continued to grow added. We created an emergency response department.
Uh , we , um, added other departments , uh, along the , along the way , uh, philanthropy came along internal communications. So we ended up building a team of about 150 people focused on culture and communications.
Wow. That's incredible. When you got the privilege to lead that , uh, I'm curious, can you talk to, to leaders who may be emerging leaders listening to this that say, Hey, I'm, I'm starting out of the company. I'm not at that , that senior leadership level yet. I would love to get there one day. What are some things they can do that maybe you've seen you've did personally, or you've seen others who've rose , uh, through the ranks in the organization, do that can set them apart?
Yeah, I, I , I think one of the basic things on performance is to over deliver . Um, always look for whatever you can do on top of the assignment that you're working on. How can you over deliver to really distinguish yourself , um, or your team? How can you make the , the request or the assignment even better than what it, what it, someone thought it might be. And then I'd also recommend focus on solving problems for the organization.
So early on in my career, I might have done the assignment of producing a newsletter, for example. Um, but, but over time it was, how do you solve the problems of the , of the company? So another way to think of that is we need another type of publication following that along. So for example, we created something at Southwest that was called read before lead, and it was a publication that we sent out or an alert that we sent out just for leaders.
Anytime there was a major change in the company to help all , here's all the things you need to think about as a leader. So looking for things like that, that solved a problem for the organization. Um, look at your employees survey that should have gone in your organization. What are employees, what are employees needing differently , uh, look at how you could solve that problem.
If you're in the marketing side, look at what , uh, customers are saying, what are their pain points, look for the pain points in new organization? What are those pain points? What would make your product better? What would make your people perform better? What would make your customers happy? How are you solving those problems in your company?
Wow. And so solve problems and leaders will naturally notice you, which I, I would say that that's absolutely true. And the more problems you could solve, the , the , the more leadership respo opportunities that you'll get. Absolutely. I love that. Uh , speaking of leaders, great leaders , uh, you got to work for two legendary leaders and the founder, as you mentioned.
Uh , and then Gary Kelly , um, can you talk about the , your time under both of those leaders and maybe one or two lessons that you took away from both of their leadership styles?
Sure. And I'm gonna throw another leader in, at Southwest airlines. Yeah . Colleen Barrett. Okay . Um , who is president emeritus of, of Southwest airlines? Um, but let's start with herb Kher. Uh , herb really taught all of us the power of relationships. Uh, he, he would re he had an incredible capacity to re remember people's names and , uh, certain things about them. And I learned the importance of relationships and really focusing on people.
When you were talking to him, you felt like you were the only person in the room, cuz he was talking to you. So the importance of really focusing on people and then from Colleen Barrett , uh, Colleen was the perfect , uh, balance with herb , uh, because she made sure all the systems were in place.
So , um, such things as systems to make sure that , um, customers always received a response from Southwest airlines, even as the airline grew from a few thousand customers to , uh, you know, millions of customers a year. So she was really , uh, the diligence about the, the repetition of systems. And then from Gary Kelly, what I've really learned about is how to set up a leadership team. Uh , when Gary , uh, Kelly became CEO, we , uh, worked together as a leadership team.
We set up how we wanted to , uh, interact with each other, how often we wanted to meet our cadence of meetings , um, and how we wanted to , uh, disagree. And , uh, cuz you know, we can't all agree. So how are we going to debate issues? And the tone he set, he really is , um, upset, such a respectful tone and that made it so enjoyable for all the leadership team because we worked so closely together. Um, and we decided we would have lunch together every Tuesday.
Um , we weren't just talking about business, but we understood each other's lives and the importance of working together as a team.
Yeah. That that's really, really fascinating. Can you, can you dive into maybe some of the other , uh, habits and systems that you put together in place as a leadership team, you were talking about the boundaries, how you disagree, anything there you think would be helpful for leaders? I think that's really fascinating.
Well, one of the things, if , um, I , you you've probably followed pat ly yeah . And his leadership books . So we, we worked with pat as well. Um , and we worked read all of his books, but worked directly with pat as well on um, on how to establish , uh, some of that rapport with our team. So one of the things we definitely didn't, we didn't , we tried to really focus on one topic at a time.
Um , so if we had somebody coming in for 30 minutes to talk about , um, something new, we were gonna provide on the aircraft as an example, we would focus on that. Um, but we all we had, pre-reads where we were, everyone had to be prepared for a meeting. So we came really prepared for our meetings.
Um, and , um, and, and we, but we , and we also just always , uh, asked really respectful questions cuz you might be having someone really junior coming into the senior leadership team presenting and uh , you wanna be respectful , um, of them. They may never have done that before. So how are you he helping them be successful in that environment? Um, the other thing that, that Gary really did, he gave a lot of us opportunities.
So along that lines of having people come into the organization, he would make sure that we had lots of junior people coming in who got exposure. We got to see them, but he also made that sure that , uh, us as his executive team, we were always presenting to the board , uh, and the board of directors had familiarity with us.
And he also encouraged us to be involved in other outside boards as well, not just giving our time back to Southwest airlines, but how we were influencing , uh, the world to , beyond that.
Wow. Well what an opportunity for you and I'm sure it was a huge blessing for them to get to work with you as a leader as well. Um, I am curious, just last thing on your , your career at Southwest before we start diving into culture. Uh , is there anything else about your journey at Southwest that you wish people would know that maybe they don't know you haven't shared on other podcasts?
You know , um, I , Southwest was really great at , uh, recognizing talent and um, they didn't call it this, but I do , um, allowing freedom in a framework where in all of our jobs, there's a basic framework, but Southwest excelled at letting you take it beyond those boundaries. Um, and, and really looking at your personality and your strengths and allowing you , allowing you to develop those strengths and , um, have that freedom and a framework.
So I came from a graduating class, a rural graduating class of 16 people
wow. Yeah .
Right. So I, and I had my college degree, but I didn't have a great pedigree. Right. I didn't go to an Ivy league school and that Southwest, luckily wasn't just looking for that. Uh , they were looking for somebody who had a track record and , um, and, and was willing to work hard. So I would encourage leaders , uh, not to just look at the pedigree or just look at the schools. People have gone to really look at their track record and , uh, Southwest was great about that.
So people literally you've heard the story about starting in the mail room. Uh , we had one of our vice presidents started in the mail room. Wow. And , um, he went all the way up up , worked his way up because he truly , uh, was an outstanding leader.
What a story. I love that. And so obviously you had a phenomenal career at Southwest, but then in 2016 you actually jumped out and started your own company called unstoppable cultures, which is what you do today. I certainly want you to talk about what you do through that, but talk about that transition. I mean, it seems like you were in a pretty comfortable place, a lot of recognition, huge staff, a lot of exciting things to be a part of. Was that talk about that journey? Was that a big risk?
Was it scary? What was that like?
Well, it's something I contemplated for a long time. And , um, and there was a period of time , uh, quite a period of time where my CEO knew that that's what I would be doing. Um, my parents were in their nineties and lived several hours away and it was getting harder , um, for me to be able to really be there for them. So that was a primary consideration for me, wanting to have that flexibility.
Uh , the demands of a , a job in an airline , uh, is 24 7 and I needed, I needed to break away to be able , uh, to focus on them. And I'm , I'll never, I'll never get that time back. And I never regretted , uh, ha taking that, taking that turn. But at the same time I had my, the , the team was in place at Southwest airlines. The bench was there , uh, great leaders in culture, great leaders in communication.
So it was , uh, it , it afforded me , uh, that opportunity to step , to step away because the leadership was in place. So I was able, I took a little pause and , um, then decided to, I'd learned so much at Southwest airlines and I'd been blessed with so many experiences that I wanted to , uh, go through more doors , uh, share that with more companies. So I primarily, and , um, do keynote speaking. That's my primary focus.
I also do some consulting , uh, but also , um, I have a masterclass and culture , uh, called the fellowship that , um, really helps other organizations develop the culture , um, that they want in their companies. And no, no cultures are cookie cutter . Um, it , they're all so different. And it's so important that you really know what an organization is trying to achieve. They shouldn't try to pattern after Southwest airlines or Chick-fil-A or any of those iconic cultures.
Uh , they can learn some of the lessons, but they need to focus on what their own behaviors and values in their organization should be.
Wow. And , and we'll dive into that in a second. Um, more on the transition. I love how you said you had a deep bench in place. You'd been communicating what you wanted to do. Uh , for some time, obviously family was a big
Privately to my boss.
yes . Private . I
Didn't want my team to know ,
Uh , any, any advice for, for leaders there may be leaders listening to this that are in that season that have a dream, but , uh, how can leaders transition well, how did you build that deep bench ? Uh , was it difficult, any other advice for transitioning leaders?
Um, no. Um, at we , that's, one of the key things to look at , um, in your organization is really how, how are you building that bench and not just the next bench, not, not just the next generation, but the generation below that. So if there's anything we worked on hard at Southwest, it was a lot of mentoring and a lot of development. I just saw one of my , um, team members from years ago , um, just completed the high potential , uh, class for Southwest airlines. He posted on social media.
So I know that's still happening that continue to develop the various decades , uh, of talent that they have, and really focus, focusing on bringing those people up. So it's just like one of the things I mentioned earlier, how are you getting your talent , uh, on your team, in front of other leaders in the organization, if they need presentation skills, what kind of courses are you sending, sending them to?
It's just really realizing as a leader, your key responsibility is to develop those , um, people in your organization so that they can do great things in your organization, or they may go on to other organizations. You know, one of the things we saw, a lot of , uh, not a lot of occasionally we would see it would be , uh, when somebody would leave the organization , um, they would boomerang, they would decide to come back .
Wow. That's
Great. And , um, so I, that's, one of the things I talk to organizations now about is how are you handling farewell? So what does farewell look like? Because oftentimes we are people decide they do wanna come back and they bring other experience back to the organization when they come back and a lot more experience.
Yeah, that's so good. And I'm assuming one of the main reasons that they came back was the culture you created. And this, I think this subject is so pivotal right now in Asia, we're living in, you know, we're in the middle of what people are calling the great resignation and people have options. They realize that they can go to any company. Well , pretty much any company they can work remotely.
Um, but it seems like what really can set an organization apart and cause them to retain and attract new employees is their culture, which is what you focus on. And so in today's era , I'm just curious, how does focusing on culture help in an organization during the times we're living in?
Right . Um , well now there's so much , um, uncertainty right in our world and trying to really provide that type of stability in , in our organizations. How are we doing that, that consistency. So people know what to expect from their leaders and know what to expect from their organization and culture is , um, is all about the behaviors that we have that we're showing as an organization.
So if we are trying to muster through this difficult time, or we're trying to really change our organizations because of the effect of the economy or the pandemic, the only way we can do that is focusing on the behaviors of our people and how are we setting them? How are we letting them know those expectations and how are we training them and supporting them , uh, so they can deliver in the best way for our , for our organizations.
Yeah. And talk to leaders. I , I am curious on this. So you worked for, you know, three significant leaders at Southwest Southwest is known for their culture. Have you found that, you know, Southwest's culture stayed consistent under all three leaders? Or have you found when a new leader comes in based on who that person is, maybe some of the values stay the same, but the , the culture shifts based on that leader, what , what would you say? What come , it's kinda like what came first?
The , the chicken or the egg, what came first? The leader of the culture? Um, I'm just curious your input . Yeah .
That , yeah, a lot, very often organizations, there are key times when an organization's culture is probably going to change somewhat , um, under a new leader , um, or , um, in , in times of crisis. Um, and definitely a lot of organizations have been going through crisis , uh, from economic standpoint or the pandemic standpoint. So there are changes. So I'll talk about a major hospital network that I've recently worked with.
Um, they realized under a new CEO, a new CEO wanting to have a new focus, a new value , um, that dealt with impact. And so they really , uh, are focusing on leaning into this new value. It's not, it's something they're already doing. And that's the important thing about our values in our organization. They could already point to how their employees were doing that already having an impact individually on, on their patients.
But they really wanted to emphasize that how are you as an individual in, in the healthcare organization having an impact on the patients? So that's an example of when a CEO might bring in , um, something new for the organization to really focus on it's something they're already doing, but how are we , uh, adding a focus to that?
Okay, can you talk to leaders? Just, we'll just pretend a leader starting from scratch. If a leader really wanted to start shaping their culture and creating a strong culture, where would you encourage them to start?
Well , I'd start , uh, with looking at what are the values of their organization. Most organizations already have articulated those values. Um, and I, I would just make sure as a leadership team that they're fully aligned upon that because nothing can turn an organization toxic faster than leaders, not living those values. So if you have a value that you're not holding people accountable for the organization's gonna see that they can feel that.
Um, and if , if you see a leader not being, let's say , um, displaying integrity, for example , um, then how in the world, if, as a leader, a leader's not displaying integrity or respect back for individuals, whatever that value might be , um, you probably need to revisit those values are you need to make sure that that executive has an opportunity to make a correction, or that may no longer need to be with the organization , um, because we allow bad behavior , um, it's, it's gonna be noticed
and perpetuated in the organization.
So ,
So align , align , align those values, and then talk , uh, describe, get a lot of employee involvement on describing the, the behaviors that are going to display those particular values. So for example, one of the values that Southwest airlines , uh, was to have a servant's heart. So we're look , uh, look , the company was looking for people who want, wanted to serve others.
Um , and you see that every day , if you are out there at Southwest airlines on the aircraft, the flight attendants are doing the best to make you comfortable. They might tell a joke or something. So you, so you're relaxed. So in every aspect of every job, have those particular behaviors that would , um, really show what that, that value looks like in the company. Another one of the values was warrior spirit, which means persevere work hard.
So if you think of somebody loading the luggage, they're working hard, they might be out in the snow in the winter. They might be in Phoenix, they're in a hundred degree heat, right. Uh , in the summer. So how, how is that warrior spirit being displayed in every aspect , um, uh, of every employee's job. So take your values, have your employees help you describe those behaviors?
Yeah. And it sounds like on the , the accountability side, you know, holding people accountable to living out those values, if they're not, it sounds like, you know, the first step is coaching to hold them accountable. And if that's not working, it sounds like it can actually get into serious, you know , issue documentation, and ultimately leading to them, not be there.
Uh , and then you mentioned, you know, stories of people where people are living out the values, what are some ways that Southwest is recognized and celebrated? You know, those employees living out the culture.
Yeah. So you , uh, culture, isn't , uh, a faucet you can turn on and off, and those values, aren't something that you can stop talking about. So I encourage companies , uh, at every point of the employee journey, how are you in reinforcing those values?
So if you look at an employee journey , um, all cultures start before hiring, so they're starting back they're people, how they're looking at your LinkedIn, how they're looking at Glassdoor, how, how they see you showing up online and how you talk about your employees. So all of all of our cultures start before hiring.
And then when we get that hi , in that hiring process, how are we involving , um, as many people who do that job as possible to help select those people and then onboarding in, in terms of onboarding, how are we making sure that that first day is so memorable? And then in the recognition recogni , we could, we could talk for an hour on recognition alone. I'm sure. Uh , but recognition, how are we gathering those customer stories? How are we doing peer to peer recognition?
And how are we making sure that the best of the best stories are elevated in our, in our organizations? Um, so I can talk about how Southwest did that.
Yeah. I , I would love to, I work at , uh, I work at a nonprofit and we serve the homeless. And so we're always looking to collect stories . So, you know, system wise , I am curious, you know, of how many thousands of employees you all had, how did you systematically collect those stories and communicate them ?
Yeah. And that a lot at point I work with organizations that the system of collecting those stories is one of the things I struggle with.
Yes . So help me help me, ginger. Yes,
No , I know we , we all do. We all do. Right. Um, so really looking at , um, if, if calls came , came into our reservation system, for example, and it mentioned employee , um, congratulated employee , um, that went into a special queue so that, so that that employee would know what the customer said about them. And they would , uh, they would be recognized , uh, same thing with email , uh, any recognition went to a special queue .
So, so that all of that types of recognition , uh, would be tracked and then very aggressively tracking social media because they , they may just , um, a customer may just be putting their news out on social media. So how is org as an organization? Are we capturing all of that on social media, tracking it, cataloging it, and making sure that the employee , uh, gets that type of recognition.
So many organizations have robust systems and practices for, for tracking all of that and making sure that the best of the best stories get retold as well. So how are we retelling those legendary stories that our employees do? And , um, are we using our social media to , uh, to , to retell those stories?
That's so good. You , you mentioned, you know, culture starts from before people even start the interview process, but one thing you mentioned was making sure that people's first day is as memorable as possible. A , is there anything specific that you guys did to make people's first aid memorable? That just sparked my curiosity.
Yeah. You know, I, I , um, I encourage you guys to Google that just do Southwest airlines onboarding and you'll see , um, something that looks a lot like a pep rally. So employees are literally , um, so when it , all employees come to Southwest early on for training , um, so when they show up on Monday morning, there literally is a red carpet and pompoms and cheering. And , uh, they get saluted on that very first day. And the training in celebration of them starts right there.
So how are we making that so memorable that first day? And , uh, cuz we never forget it. We never forget those, those early moments in , in our , uh, organizations.
Yeah. And talking more about culture too. Uh , you talked about a strong culture, obviously Southwest is known for their culture. How can leaders actually measure the culture of their organization? Is it something, is it a feeling, is it something that you can tangibly get that on? What advice do you have for that?
Yeah. Well there's there , it can be a feeling. Absolutely. But it also is data. Um , but when you walk into an organization, you can feel what the culture is like when you walk into say one of your healthcare professionals , um, what does it feel like when you go into their office? What is, what is , um, you know, their , the receptionist, which, which I call the vice president of first impressions, right? Mm .
The receptionist, what , how welcoming is that when you go into , uh, an environment, how important that is? Um, so yeah, we can feel it when I walk into trader Joe's, I know I'm in a different kind of grocery store because I, they're probably gonna approach me and see, you know, do you need help with something? And , um, they're, they're gonna go out of their way to help me in , in their, in their environment. So all you can feel it, but you can measure it.
Um, so one of the things we do is really look at employee surveys and what , what , what are the kinds of questions we're asking in our employee surveys? A lot of , uh, a great question for that is , um, similar to net promoter score that many people use in their marketing efforts. And the question is how likely would you be to refer this product, refer this company to someone else? So that's a net promoter score. Uh, you can ask employees, how likely would you be to suggest someone work here?
Well, if they're not very likely to suggest someone work in the organization, their view of their organization is pretty low. So that's one of the questions. One of my favorite questions is how do you view your job at the organization? Is it a job? Is it a stepping stone in your career? Or is it a calling and organizations that have tapped into making sure that their employees feel like their job is a calling, that they have the kind of freedom to really deliver their job.
And , um, they, they see the connection between their individual contributions as an employee and the big picture of the organization. They they're contributing to something bigger than themselves. They see it as a calling. And I think that's one of , that's a incredible question to be able to measure within your organizations. So there are lots of ways, but there's a few of them.
Yeah. And did you , I'm just curious, did you develop that survey from, in internally or did you use an external company to come in and conduct those for you
Both? Um , we started, when we started out, we had some of, you know , um, decades ago we , uh, had some of our own questions, but we through the years worked with , uh, experts and , um, experts, but Southwest now, of course , um, does, does it , I , I'm not sure exactly what they're doing today. Um , but I know that they are aggressively surveying their employees. The trend , um, definitely is to ask fewer questions more often because our companies are changing so quickly.
You know, the time when you do that big annual survey , um, you probably can't wait a year to tap into what's going on with your employees. So more organizations are doing surveying , uh, smaller surveys and more frequent, frequent to be able to keep , uh, up with the pulse of the organization.
Yeah. That that's really insightful. We, we started engaging in an organization called B CWI best Christian workplace Institute. And , uh, they would do annual surveys. We , we still use them, they do annual surveys and they've been phenomenal. The feedback that you actually get from those that you can actually do stuff with is incredible. But like you said, it is so fast paced that year goes by like that . Yeah. That's really, really interesting. So thank you for sharing that.
Um, so let's say you're a leader and I doubt this ever happened at Southwest, but all of a sudden you start getting feedback feeling and through data that your culture is terrible and it needs fixed. Where, where would you even start to, to start to turn around to bad culture, toxic culture ,
More than likely it might be a pocket of the organization. Generally, that's one of the things you may might be seeing. Um, so I would do focus groups with those employees to dive deeper into it , um, and have a very aggressive action program. Well , to acting on acting on what you're hearing it , uh, it might be they're overworked, they're understaffed , um, get to the root cause. And how are you addressing it as an organization?
That's definitely one of the things a lot of companies are hearing is people are feeling , um, overworked because so many people are leaving our organizations. Um, people can't keep up with the staffing and hiring. So it puts a lot of pressure on those employees who do stay and how are we taking care of them and how are we showing them that we're trying to quickly bring people back into the organization?
The other thing I'm seeing is organizations are allowing much faster decision making because they're needing to get more people into the organization. So a LA cutting, letting , uh, recruiters make direct offers when they find the right kind of employee, as opposed to having it go back to a committee or something that might take, you know, two weeks. And you might lose that employee in that time period. So empowering , uh, recruiters to make offers on the spot.
Yeah. It's so interesting in the culture we're living in, cuz a lot of times it's like, you know, higher , slow fire fast has been the motto. Uh , I , I don't know if there's enough data on this because it's, it's just starting to happen. But do you feel like the, the end result of, of hiring quickly is the same as hiring slowly , uh, from before? Do you have any thoughts about that?
Well, I think it's always great as many people, so it may be more like speed dating, right? Let's think of it that way. , you're just gonna expose them to quite a few people in a shorter period of time. So it puts a lot more pressure on the organization to be really or organized in how they go about the hiring, how many people might have a touchpoint with that employee in a short amount of time , uh, to do that kind of in depth interviewing.
And again, I mentioned this earlier, but making sure you have people who actually do the job as part of your interview panel as well.
Um, I wanna transition and talk about communication, but before we do anything else that you would share with leaders when it comes to culture, how you can help them with their cultures.
Again, I would re look, look at your values, look at your employee journey and how are you reinforcing those values at key moments within that employee journey? And how often do your values show up in storytelling?
Um , that's, that's one thing we , you and I didn't talk about, but storytelling, how are we really te taking those stories of something that an employee's done and help other employees see the limitless boundaries they can go to , uh, to try to serve our internal customers, our external customers. So using storytelling to bring our culture to life , to show people what it looks like , um, and to reinforce those lessons
And storytelling is obviously a form of communication. And , uh, you hear it all the time. I know you've been on Andy Stanley's podcast, he has that famous quote , the vision leaks, and you need to, you know , keep repeating, keep repeating, you were in charge of all communications. And , uh, I'm just curious as you've worked with , with CEO and leaders, what , what advice would you give leaders on, on communication?
You know, their cadence of communication, how often, because I'm , I'm sure that they think they need to be communicating way less than they actually do.
Bingo that is universally true , uh, leaders , uh, you know, think, well, I , you know, recently I spoke with , um, a CEO , uh, of a firm I won't name and , uh, a national firm. And , um, I asked him how often he was communicating. He said, oh gosh, I have a , a monthly. And I'm like, you know, I was just, okay. You know, I didn't wanna , I didn't wanna shut down the conversation right there, but I'm going, whoa, we gotta speed this up. Um , wow .
So for example, Gary Kelly had, when he became CEO in 2004 , um, he started a weekly communication to employees. And back then in 2004, we had flip phones so
He ,
Uh , to employees, so they could hear his voice cuz he was, he had been with Southwest airlines, but he was new as a CEO, so they could hear his voice and uh , they could listen to it. And over time that evolved into a me , you know, he still recorded it. You could still hear his voice, but you could dial in on the internet. Uh , you could read it on the internet. Um, and, but the consistency of that, he did that every week from 2004 to 2022 when he retired earlier this year.
So that is the kind of consistent communication commitment that is unbelievable. And those communications always ended. Every one of his communications ended with some sort of thank you or shout out . Um, and it was usually a story about a , at an employee, something an employee had done or something an department had done in thanking them so that, you know, that that's, that hits on a lot of leader tenants, right there, consistency high level of frequency on communication.
And um, again, modeling and talking about the kind of behavior that we're all looking for.
And as far as the content you mentioned, you know, specifically with Gary, but I'm sure it was the same with all the leaders, they leadership teams around them. Uh, how did they put, how did he put together the content? Was it just, Hey Gary, you need to have a , a values lesson , uh, or was it you as the communication lead to feeding him stories and putting that together? What , what did that process look like?
Yeah. And, and it depends on the size of your organization we had with , um, I think Southwest now has 60,000 employees. Sure . So you need quite an infrastructure obviously , um, to , to keep that going. We were lucky that we had communications people assigned to each of the major divisions, so they could assist those leaders in, in writing those communications.
So, or in your organization , um, you might have a hundred employees, so who can as the leader, who can you work with to develop those , um, communications? So I believe culture leadership and communication go hand in hand and I'm very partial , uh, to making sure you have a strong communications person helping guide you in that, in that process. And , um, and we have to look at all the various channels.
We know, I mean, we're kidding ourselves if we think our employees are getting up every morning. And the first thing they're doing is looking on our internet .
, , they're
Looking Instagram, they're looking at Facebook. Right, right . And we know that , um, so we've gotta be on Instagram and Facebook as, as organizations. So I , I look here a leader that , um, I admire is the CEO of McDonald's corporation. And so I watch , uh, look at his LinkedIn , uh, Chris can Kinski and look at what Chris is doing on LinkedIn. Uh, look at what he's doing on his Instagram. How are leaders that you admire? How are they showing up?
Um, not only are they talking to their employees, but they're also talking to their customers on those ma major communication lines.
Hmm . That's so good. Um, I wanna dive into , we have a few minutes left what I call the lightning round. So thank you for all the, the great content on communications and culture. Fantastic. And your career. Uh , and the first one is what is the best advice you've ever received and who gave it to you?
Well, you know, Doug, I thought about that. Um , I thought you might ask that question cuz that's usually, , that's usually a podcast question and for me it wasn't hearing them or , um, having a leader that was great at quoting advice. Uh , it was watching them. Mm . Um, and so I, I would, I think we learn more from watching our leaders than we do from listen , hearing our leaders always.
So I really did watch and, and admire the behaviors of so many of my leaders about how they would listen to people, how they would , um, not , um, try to answer the , you know, try to speak for them, try to UN , truly understand what people were , uh, struggling with and , um, offering that kind of support. So looking at our actions , um, and how people interact and the relationships they have with other people,
If you could put a quote on a billboard for everyone to read, what would it say,
Oh, don't compare everyone is on a different journey. Um, we're all on a different journey and , uh, we have to be authentically ourselves to be authentically happy.
You've got an opportunity through what you do to, to hang out with a ton of incredible leaders. And I'm always looking for great questions. I'm curious when you get to have lunch or coffee with a great leader, do you have a go-to question or two that you always ask in those those times together?
Well , you might, you might ask them what the hallmark of their leadership is. Um , and it , it would either be, you know, that they, it , and those kind of, I think those answers can be really interesting. What is the hallmark of their leadership? Um, I , you probably would hear a lot about mentoring and listening.
So, so usually what I do for this question is whatever you ask is what I'm gonna ask you. So I would ask you, ginger , what is the hallmark of your leadership?
Oh , I hope it was , um, mentoring and listening. Uh , I really do. I, mentoring was very important to me , uh, just because what an opportunity, if you're able to help someone achieve something greater than they ever thought possible and helping put them into in giving them the confidence , uh, and the courage , uh, to step up and be , uh, an incredible leader. So , um, how we mentor, mentor others.
Yeah. And just outta curiosity as you did that, was that more you mentoring, you know, the people that came under you organizationally, or did you find other ways to intentionally mentor leaders throughout your organization or externally outside of your organization?
Um , all of those , um, I , I had a mentoring call this morning. Um , oh , wow . I am I with someone who's trying to decide, do they need to change their job? Um , and so, yeah, I, as leaders that we've probably seen , uh, a lot of different scenarios and, and a lot of times, if you just listen to someone, they may not realize they already have the answer, but if you're really listening to them, you're probably gonna pick up that they already have the answer to what they're asking you about.
Um, in the case with this person today, I could hear that they were already made the decision to leave. So , um, and just encouraging their heart to continue to move in that direction.
Wonderful. Uh , what's your biggest leadership pet peeve?
Oh . Leaders that don't wanna spend time with their people and you probably think that's crazy, but , um, I've seen it a lot. and leader leaders not realizing the importance of, of being out face to face . So I encourage leaders to look at their calendars. Uh , how much of their time are they , um, really giving back to their employees? How much of the time are they spending in front of their employees?
So , um, if , if they're not , um, mark the a few, you know, whatever time during your day, if you have an energy slump during your day, you know, at two o'clock, you feel like, oh, I'm getting tired and need a cup of coffee, stand up and set instead, and go visit with some of your employees , uh, surprise them in , um, you know, greet them for when , when they walk in the door every day , do something unusual to try to , uh, really interact with your employees.
That's so good. Do you speak of unusual? Do you have any unusual habits that have enabled you to be successful in your life and career?
Oh , I have a , I, I have a lot of weird ones. I'm sure. Um, one of the things I've realized about myself is , uh, get as much done early in the day as possible. Um, and the other one is, of course, I , we all have electronic list , uh, that forever keep us organized, but I've started making , um, a daily list. I do it the night before, so I do, I , I do a written list. I know that sounds old fashioned, but I I'm
The same . Yeah ,
You , I hate, so if that written list isn't , um, you know, I , I don't wanna have to rewrite that on tomorrow's list. Right. so , um, really keeping a written a written list , uh, is old school , but it works for me.
Yeah. And if you could go back , uh, and have coffee with ginger at any age in your life where you could have said something to that version of ginger, that would've made a difference, what age would that be? And what would you have said?
Wow. Um, I think age 22 is , um, a real transition point where a lot of people, because we're coming outta college and we're starting our careers. Uh , so if I could go back to that 22 year old, I would say, boy, you are doing a great job of listening to your heart about where you would and would not fit in what types of organizations you wouldn't would not fit in and continue to do that for the rest of your career. um , wow .
But really you're really listening to your heart about if, you know, something's not quite right and wouldn't be a good fit in an organization , uh, having the courage to keep going. And until you do find that right fit for you,
Anything else you wanna leave leaders with today?
Well, I, I encourage, I just salute the leaders leadership , um, is, is a , is a lonely place sometimes and leaders cast a long shadow . So I, I salute you knowing that you're casting a long shadow, and may you be touching a lot of people and making a difference in , uh, lives that maybe 20 years down the road you'll hear back that feed feedback, maybe you won't. Um , but if you're lucky enough to get that feedback that you really made a different in someone's life and you made it better.
Well , ginger, this has been a fantastic interview. Thank you for your time. Thank you for adding value to me and all of our listeners. And hopefully we'll get to do this again sometime .
Thank you, Doug and thoroughly enjoyed it. Thank you for your leadership.
My pleasure. Well leader, thank you so much for listening to my conversation with ginger. I hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did. You can find ways to connect with her and links to everything that we discussed in the show notes@lthreeleadership.org slash 3 34 and leader as always. I want to challenge you that if you want to 10 X your growth this year, then you need to either launch or join in L three leadership mastermind group.
Mastermind groups have been the greatest source of growth in my life over the last seven years. If you don't know what they are, they're just simply groups of six to 12 leaders that meet together on a consistent basis for at least one year in order to help each other grow, hold each other accountable and to do life together. If you're interested in learning more about masterminds, go to L three leadership.org for slash masterminds.
And as always, I like to end every episode with a quote and I'll quote Dave Ramsey today. He said this, he said, change hurts, but staying the same can hurt even more. That is so good leaders. And Hey, we were talking about culture today. Change hurts. It may hurt to change your culture, but staying the same can hurt even more if you have a toxic one. So I hope that that challenges and encourages you today. Well , leader know that Lauren and I love you.
We believe in you and we say it all the time, but keep leading. Don't quit. The world desperately needs your leadership. We'll talk to you next episode.