733: The Way to Notice People Better, with Zach Mercurio

Dave Stachowiak [00:00:00]:
When you ask people what mattered in their careers, few of them cite the bonus or the stock options or the employee of the month award. What they do talk about are the times they were remembered, supported, thanked, and seen. In this episode, how to do that better. This is Coaching for Leaders episode 733. Production Credit: Produced by Innovate Learning, maximizing human potential.

Dave Stachowiak [00:00:43]:
Greetings to you from Orange County, California. This is Coaching for Leaders, and I’m your host, Dave Stachowiak. Leaders aren’t born, they’re made. And this weekly show helps you discover leadership wisdom through insightful conversations. One of the things that we all want, we all need is to matter. Matter in our families and our relationships, and, of course, mattering in our professional responsibilities and roles and relationships as well too. Today, an invitation on how we can do a better job at creating a culture of significance in our organizations by noticing people in such a genuine and effective way. And I’m so pleased to welcome Zach Mercurio. Zach is an author, researcher, and speaker specializing in purposeful leadership, mattering, meaningful work, and positive organizational psychology. He teaches a course with past guest Simon Sinek on how leaders can show everyone how they matter. He is the author of The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance.

Dave Stachowiak [00:01:36]:
Zach, so good to see you.

Zach Mercurio [00:01:37]:
Thank you, Dave. I’m glad to be here.

Dave Stachowiak [00:01:40]:
I love this book, and I love the work that you’re doing on helping us to get better at thinking about this word mattering. And it’s so human, and it’s so central to who we are. And I think that’s probably why a story that you told in the book grabbed my attention and maybe also because it’s my story too of being a parent. And you tell about how your oldest son loves his tablet and can go down the rabbit hole on it. And like every parent, you’re being mindful of screen time and, him not spending too much time on that. And you decided to make a shift in how you approach this dynamic, this tension that I think a lot of us feel who are parents. And I was wondering if you could share that story.

Zach Mercurio [00:02:27]:
Well, yeah, I have a 10 year old and a seven year old. So I have two boys. My 10 year old loves watching his tablet during his allotted tablet time, but when it’s time to turn it off, interactions typically went like this. Hey. Turn your tablet off. No. And then some sort of grumbling, and then afterward, he would finally turn it off because I made him, and then he’d go run away and do something on his own, and we’d go on our way. And it’s not exactly the parent child relationship I was going for.

Zach Mercurio [00:02:58]:
And I started researching and really thinking about what it means to notice somebody, and I realized, wow. I was just treating him like a transaction. Hey. Do this. Shut this off. Do this for me. Comply, and that was it. And then there was one day where it all came together for me.

Zach Mercurio [00:03:19]:
I was in the kitchen. I was doing dishes, and he was on his tablet, and the timer went off. We do set a timer. And instead of saying shut your tablet off, I went over to the couch. I sat down next to him, and I just said, hey. What are you watching? And his eyes lifted up from the tablet. He started talking to me about the show he was watching. And I said, what do you like about the characters? And he started talking to me, and very slowly, guess what happened? The tablet shut off, and we were having a conversation.

Zach Mercurio [00:03:53]:
And it was one of those moments where, you know, when you research something and we’d think about something and then you see it in action, especially with your kids, and you see what happens when someone feels seen and the connection we had in that moment and the conversation and the relationship that we were building, when I just stopped treating him like a transaction and started coming alongside him to be with him and seek understanding instead of evaluating him, it was incredibly powerful.

Dave Stachowiak [00:04:18]:
I’ve had a very similar thing happen in our family, and I think about how whether it’s with our family members, with our employees, with stakeholders, how it’s all about humanity at its core. And you write, “when I ask people to describe a time that they felt they mattered, I don’t hear things like when I got my paycheck or when I won employee of the month. Instead, they recall small moments of being seen in their struggles, helped, thanked, shown the difference they made, checked in on, remembered, or told they were needed. As one employee told me, don’t give me a free lunch or certificate. Remember my name and say thank you.” And as I read those words, I got to thinking how our first inclination often, especially in our roles as leaders, is not to do that. It is too often be transactional when something’s not working. It’s, well, how can I recognize this person? How could I give them a bonus? How could I do those things? And those are all good things, but sometimes we just go there first before we even think about the more human things, don’t we?

Zach Mercurio [00:05:27]:
Absolutely. I mean, most of our interactions in organizations are transactional. You know, one thing you could do think of your last week. Just plot out the interactions you have with the people around you, your team members. With how many of them were just transacting information? Here’s what I need from you. Here’s what I need you to know. Update me. You know, most meetings in organizations that I observe are update fests.

Zach Mercurio [00:05:50]:
We go around, and we have people give us updates. There’s no surprise that that cliche of most meetings could be emails is a cliche because it’s largely true. Most meetings are transacting information, but what what can’t be an email is looking you in the eye and checking in on how you’re doing because your parent is in the hospital. What can’t be an email is resolving a conflict in the ways we’re working together. What can’t be an email is coming alongside somebody and really deeply understanding how they’re doing and how their work is going. And so what I did with my son there is I came alongside with him and sought to deeply understand him. But as as leaders, we have to make the time and the space to do that, and hurry and care cannot coexist. And so are we making the time? Are we making the space to truly see people in those ways? And just doing a quick scan of your interactions and how much is spent on what you’re doing with people and how much is spent on understanding how the person is doing can be very revealing and help you know where to focus your energy.

Dave Stachowiak [00:07:00]:
You cite some of your research in the book and say, among 1,000 employees in 22 industries, my team and I found that a leader’s behavior accounted for almost 50% of whether participants experienced increased feelings of mattering and meaningfulness in their work. I suppose the both the good news and the bad news about this is that the manager, the leader, that person matters a ton. If they’re doing it well, it really, really shows. If they’re not doing it well, that the organization tends to suffer, doesn’t it?

Zach Mercurio [00:07:32]:
It does. And it is very hard for anything to matter to someone who doesn’t first believe that they matter. You know, one of the things that we find is that mattering is a leading indicator for almost every other lagging indicator. If you take engagement, for example, a lot of people measure employee engagement. Engagement is, the emotion of what someone feels when they’re answering a survey. But the three predictors of engagement are psychological meaningfulness. Do I know that I and what I’m doing matters? Psychological safety. Can I speak up? Can I share my voice without fear? And then availability.

Zach Mercurio [00:08:06]:
Is there someone to support me? Do I have what I need to do? My job. All of those things are outcomes of feeling that we matter. One of the things I think that’s going on is we’ve, for so long, expected people to care about their work before we’ve actually robustly invested in and scaled the skills to ensure they feel cared for. And I think that’s why you see things like engagement in January of 2024 at its lowest rate in almost ten years despite the employee engagement industry becoming a $1,000,000,000 industry in that time. And there’s two data points that I think all leaders should be aware of. One, just 39% of that sample said that they felt like they had someone at work who cared about them as a person. Mhmm. Just 30% of that sample said that they felt that someone at work knew and invested in their unique gifts, their potential.

Zach Mercurio [00:08:57]:
That mirrors research that shows that 30% of people feel invisible. But the good news is you cited that research study we did is that the things that really moved the needle on mattering and meaningfulness were interactional, not programmatic. This is not something you have to add on as an initiative or a program or a new platform or an app. It’s really about optimizing the interactions you already have to make sure people feel seen, they feel heard, they feel affirmed, they feel needed. And, again, I you know, I can ask everybody listening. Think about when you most feel that you matter at work to someone else. And you will most likely think about small interactions, not big actions. And that’s great because we can do something about that.

Zach Mercurio [00:09:41]:
We can optimize the next interaction we have.

Dave Stachowiak [00:09:44]:
And the line that I’ve highlighted probably more than any other in the book is “when people feel like they matter, they act like they matter.”

Zach Mercurio [00:09:53]:
Absolutely.

Dave Stachowiak [00:09:54]:
It’s not the other way around.

Zach Mercurio [00:09:55]:
Right. We often think that people should be valued once they add value. That’s the traditional approach to business really since the industrial revolution. If people perform and produce, we should recognize them, give them bonuses, promote them. But from a human psychological standpoint, the opposite is actually true. People need to feel valued to add value. And that’s really what mattering is. It’s the experience of feeling significant to those around us that comes from feeling valued and knowing how we add value.

Zach Mercurio [00:10:26]:
And the reason why that’s so powerful is because when we feel valued by someone, we start building two beliefs that researchers find are predictive of performance more than any other beliefs. And that’s the belief that I’m worthy, also known as self esteem, and the belief that I’m capable, also known as self efficacy. The number one predictor of both of those things are verbal reinforcement from others. And so when we have that evidence that we’re valued by someone, we develop the confidence to go out and add value. And the more we see how we add value, the more we’re confirmed that we are valued, and that’s really the virtuous cycle that leaders create when they optimize interactions to ensure people feel seen, heard, and valued, and needed. And this all goes back to childhood attachment. You know, I know we’re in a coaching for leaders podcast, but it really goes back to as children, we are wired to feel important to others. And when we feel important to someone, we are more likely to go out, experiment, take risks, and learn because we have what’s called secure attachment.

Zach Mercurio [00:11:27]:
We know someone cares about us when we return. That’s also the role leaders play in the workplace. They are people’s secure base. People develop confidence. They go out, experiment, take risks, innovate, perform because they know they can come back and someone has their back. They already matter.

Dave Stachowiak [00:11:45]:
This, of course, begs the question, well, how? Right? Like, I think so much of, like, what you’ve just said, like, resonates with me so deeply. And yet as I think about just in the last week or two, like, some of the missed opportunities I’ve had to do this better both at home and in work, I think like, well, how can I do better? And you have just some beautiful invitations for us on where to begin, particularly just noticing folks. And and there’s a ton in the book that it goes way beyond this, but it does start with noticing. And I was really captivated by a a series of a few questions that you invite us to ask. And particularly, if we’re reflecting on a personal relationship that maybe we someone we’re having a hard time getting to know, or maybe we perceive negatively for whatever reason. And you invite us to start just by asking, how do I see this person? And I’m wondering if you could tell me a bit more about that as a starting point.

Zach Mercurio [00:12:46]:
Yes. Noticing is the act of paying attention, right, to the ebbs and flows and details of people’s lives. It’s seeing a person. But to see someone fully, we have to be aware of how we are coming to see them. And I have to just start just briefly by sharing how important this is to me. You know, my second son was born with a genetic condition. It makes his face look different. His eyes are much smaller than the normal eye openings.

Zach Mercurio [00:13:13]:
He was born without an eyelid muscle. And he frequently has had conversations and interactions at school where people have called him weird or what’s wrong with you. And we read a book. It’s called We’re All Wonders by RJ Palacio, and it’s a made for kids version of her novel, Wonder, about a child with a facial difference. And there’s a line at the end of it, and it says, I cannot change the way I look, but maybe, just maybe, you can change the way you see. And when I translate that to my work with leaders, understanding how we’re seeing somebody and how that affects how we treat them is so foundational to being able to deeply understand them. When we look at the research, it’s very clear, and it’s called the Pygmalion effect or the self fulfilling prophecy that how we see people is usually how we treat them. How we treat them is usually how they see themselves.

Zach Mercurio [00:14:05]:
How they see themselves is usually how they act. And a couple of questions that you can use immediately to bring this to conscious awareness is to ask yourself, how do I see this person? Write down some of the labels that you might have ascribed to them, like, if you think they’re difficult or challenging, and write it down. And and don’t feel guilty about it because it’s powerful. And ask yourself, am I treating this person as I’ve labeled them, or am I seeking to understand them? For example, one thing I invite people to do is say and if you think someone’s being difficult, instead of saying this is a difficult person or a toxic employee, say, this is a person who’s behaving in ways that I perceive as difficult. This allows you to separate the person from the behavior you’re labeling, and it allows you to seek understanding of the many possible reasons in in their environment that’s manifesting their behavior, including you. I’ll give you just a very quick example of this.

Dave Stachowiak [00:15:06]:
Please.

Zach Mercurio [00:15:06]:
And I worked with a maintenance supervisor, and we

Dave Stachowiak [00:15:10]:
were doing some coaching.

Zach Mercurio [00:15:10]:
And he was a frontline supervisor. And he was complaining to me about this woman who was absent too much. You know? She was getting too many absent absentee points that they get, and then they send it to HR. And he’s like, yeah. It’s just so frustrating to me. She’s just always absent. And I asked him, I said, you know,

Dave Stachowiak [00:15:29]:
how do you how do

Zach Mercurio [00:15:30]:
you see her? Oh, you know, she’s she’s just not punctual. She doesn’t wanna be here. And I go, how how does how you see her affect how you treat her? She goes, oh, well, I just try to avoid her. I just try to make sure that she’s here and she knows the consequences. And I go, do you think that’s gonna want help her want to be here? I go, what do you want her to become? Who do you want her to become? And he said, you know, I want her to be proud of being here. I want her to want to be here. I go, what if you treated her? What if you saw her and treated her like you wanted her to be proud of being here? How would that change? And he had this big realization. And one of the things that he started doing was when she was absent, he would just tell her why he missed her.

Zach Mercurio [00:16:13]:
He said, you know, people on the line aren’t laughing as much because you’re not here. It’s not as good without you. And he said just that shift helped change his behaviors, and it ended up helping to address that attendance issue because she wanted to be here because she was treated as if she could be proud to be there.

Dave Stachowiak [00:16:32]:
You quote a composer in the book who said “music is the space between the notes.”

Zach Mercurio [00:16:38]:
Mhmm.

Dave Stachowiak [00:16:39]:
And I was thinking about what you said a few minutes ago about how the daily, the informal, the transitional interactions that we have each day, those actually are so significant in our opportunities to really connect and to show people that they matter. Sometimes even more so than the more formal events, aren’t they?

Zach Mercurio [00:17:01]:
Absolutely. I was in my first study I did around meaning in work, we worked with a group of janitors, group of custodians, and we’re embedding ourselves with them and really trying to understand what made work meaningful and what cultivated motivation in a very, very difficult demanding job. And I remember one woman who had been there for almost twenty five years. I asked her, when’s the single time in your job when you most felt that you mattered? And she goes, Zach, it was when there was a student in one of the buildings I was cleaning, and he looked at me and he said, hey, Susan. Just wanted to say hi. And that was it. In her whole career, it wasn’t the free lunches. It wasn’t the awards that the university was giving them every month.

Zach Mercurio [00:17:47]:
It was just a student looking her in the eye in that in between moment and remembering her name. And I’ve come to see this space in organizations as liminal space. Right? It’s the space between the notes. The notes in your organization or in your culture are the meetings. They’re the rituals. They’re the standing one on ones. They’re the award ceremonies. There’s the recognition programs.

Zach Mercurio [00:18:09]:
But the in between moments is where connection truly happens. It’s when somebody comes on to a Teams or Zoom call, and they’re there a few minutes early and you’re there with them, instead of opening up another tab or answering another email, just stop and say, hey. I just want to check-in with you. What have you been working on today? What is your attention today? What are you struggling with? And any way I can help, I may not be able to, but I wanted to offer that. Or when you’re in the hallway and you’re passing somebody, instead of just kinda putting your head down and going by and just saying, hey. Good to see you. Hey. I just wanted to stop and check-in.

Zach Mercurio [00:18:46]:
I know you were nervous about that sales meeting you we had last week. I wanted to check-in on how that went. Those little moments are really, when added up, are what create your culture.

Dave Stachowiak [00:18:57]:
And it reminds me of something you point out from John Gottman’s research that when those moments happen and the bids for attention that we all make in our lives of wanting to be noticed, of wanting to matter in the eyes of others is we tend to respond in one of three ways. Either we turn towards someone, we turn away from them, or we turn against them. Could you share the distinction between those three? Because, like, it’s been so helpful for me just thinking about that in recent days of how we respond.

Zach Mercurio [00:19:34]:
So I love how Gottman calls these gestures bids. Right? Because when somebody is bidding for connection, it’s usually in very small ways where they’re making eye contact, asking a question of you. And he called these bids, these in between moments, like, the fundamental unit of emotional communication. One of my favorite quotes that he writes is that “the quality of a relationship is determined by seemingly meaningless and inconsequential exchanges between people.” And I love that because it means as and inconsequential exchanges between people. And I love that because it means as leaders, our relationships depend on what we do in these small micro moment. So there are several ways we can respond to what what he calls bids of connection as you mentioned. Turning toward someone’s bid for connection means you acknowledge it.

Zach Mercurio [00:20:27]:
Let’s give an example. Say an employee’s, like, sighs and is like, that meeting, you know, meeting’s finally over. If you’re turning toward, that’s a bid for connection, that nonverbal interaction, that employee sighing, that nonverbal communication that, hey, something’s wrong. You can turn toward that by saying, hey, I noticed that you side there. Is everything okay? Is there anything you wanna talk about? So turning toward is noticing and engaging. Someone has an idea, and they say, hey. I’d like to talk to you about this idea sometime. Turning toward is saying, hey.

Zach Mercurio [00:20:59]:
Let’s schedule a time to do that. I might be busy right now, but let’s schedule ten minutes. I wanna hear that next week. Turning away is either unintentionally or intentionally disregarding or ignoring the bid for connection altogether. For example, an employee sighs and says, glad that meeting’s over with. You might say, oh, yeah. Well, that that’s just how it is meeting with sales, or that’s how it always is. It’s just that time of the time of the quarter.

Zach Mercurio [00:21:24]:
You know, we’re all frustrated right now. That’s turning away. Or say someone introduces how overloaded they are at the beginning of a video call. You might just say, oh, you know, that’s just the nature of our business. Right? Those are or everybody’s overloaded. That’s turning away. That’s disregarding and ignoring the bid. And then finally, turning against is an outright rejection.

Zach Mercurio [00:21:44]:
So if if during a one on one, that person says, hey. I have an idea I wanna talk to you about. And you say, I got a lot of things going on right now. Let’s just stick to the agenda today. Like, those little things that’s turning against. And when Gottman’s lab researched the best relationships in all different types of relationships, those who turn toward their relationship partner, whoever it it was, had much more healthy relationships over time than those who turned away or turned against in those very small moments.

Dave Stachowiak [00:22:16]:
And the hard part, kinda getting back to what you said earlier too, is that it takes more time. You know, it’s so easy to just turn away. And I think that’s probably when I think about my own behavior and I observe behavior of others, like, that’s the most common thing is when we’re busy, when we’re overwhelmed. It’s like, oh, yeah. You know, tough tough situation. Oh, it’s Monday, and we got a lot going on. Turning toward takes more time, but, boy, in the long run, it pays off so much.

Zach Mercurio [00:22:40]:
You know what’s helped me a lot? Because I had a leader who, after I did a talk with a large company, she came up to me and that she said, Zach, you know, I have this practice that I have a do over journal. And so every night, if I maybe talked over somebody or if I didn’t give someone the attention that they needed, I thought of, like, what are my do overs from today in my relationships? And what will I do the next time that situation happens? I thought that was so brilliant, and I’ve actually thought about that because this is not you shouldn’t feel guilty about being human. Being human is hard. It is hard to be human. It is hard to turn towards someone every time. But a couple questions that you can ask right now is, are there situations in your life or work? Are there things going on when it makes you more likely to turn away or turn against somebody? Is it a time of day that someone comes to you with a bid for connection? Is it a way they worded an email? And just being aware of that could help your brain say, I’m at risk of turning away or turning against here in this situation. What can I do to choose to turn toward? Or if you do that do over journal, what was going on that made me, you know, shut that person down? And when that’s going on, next, when that happens again, because it will happen again because I’m a leader and these situations happen again, What will I do differently to turn toward? And, again, I think you asked earlier, like, we all know this stuff. That showing people how they matter is important.

Zach Mercurio [00:24:06]:
And I think the problem is is that we’ve relied on common sense to do it, and a lot of this is common sense. The problem is is it’s not common practice. We haven’t elevated it to really a rigorous practice in how we approach our days and how we approach our relationships and how we reflect on our relationships in these small moments.

Dave Stachowiak [00:24:25]:
Yeah. Indeed. And it does take more time and attention, but not a lot more most of the time. And I just think about that example with the janitor and the student noticing her and calling her by name. And it reminds me of one of the other examples you mentioned in the book of a physician who was going through a really tough time professionally. And she comes onto the floor one night for her shift, and one of the charge nurses says, oh, I’m so glad it’s you who are here tonight. And how she remembered that years later, like that one sentence of like connecting personally and showing someone that they mattered and turning towards someone that that’s like, boy, a sentence or two can go such a long way as a starting point for this. Once a day.

Dave Stachowiak [00:25:16]:
Right?

Zach Mercurio [00:25:16]:
Yeah. There’s there’s no more powerful feeling as a human being than knowing that your presence and your absence mean something to just one other person. And I think that, you know, she was a pediatric on on a pediatric intensive care unit, high stress occupation. And she sees outcomes, both positive and negative, all the time, but she said that that one moment was what kept her going. I’m glad you’re here. And that’s it. That’s what we call moments of mattering, and they can dramatically alter the course of not only someone’s day, but their life.

Dave Stachowiak [00:25:55]:
You write “leaders who look closely and notice people tend to follow a process characterized by three behaviors, and the three behaviors are observe, note, and share.” What does that look like?

Zach Mercurio [00:26:09]:
So one of the things that we did, we we’ve also asked a lot of employees what their leaders do to help them feel seen, but we’ve also asked a lot of leaders, what do you do to help your people feel seen? And I stumbled across this practice by accident because I got asked to go work with a distribution center, and they had 20 teams, and they were all very disengaged. They scored very low on their their quarterly engagement survey. And there was one team though that was an outlier, and I love outlier. So I went to this team and I just said, hey. What is going on here? And all of the team members said some version of, oh, it’s our supervisor. She just gets us. We do anything for her. So I asked her.

Zach Mercurio [00:26:48]:
I said, what do you do here, and can you just teach everybody to do this? Because it would make my job a lot easier. And she said, Zach, it’s really simple. And she pulled out this old Moleskine notebook. And she said about three years ago, I realized I was having a really difficult time remembering the details of my team members’ work and their lives. And I thought that that was really important. And so on Fridays, what I do is I write down each of my team members’ names, and I write down one thing I heard them talk about, complain about, a piece of equipment that wasn’t working that needed to be fixed. They were nervous about a meeting, if their kid was starting baseball that weekend for the first time, and I’d write it down. I just write their name, and I write down what I observed.

Zach Mercurio [00:27:27]:
And then the next Monday, I’ll start my week looking at that list. I may not get to everybody, but I try to schedule a three minute interaction with each person to check-in on something I noticed last week. And she’d say things like, hey. I remembered last week that you were nervous about that meeting. How did it go? Or I remembered last week you were struggling with that piece of equipment we haven’t gotten fixed. Have we taken care of that yet for you? And I remember she looked at me and she goes, Zach, there is magic in being remembered. Mhmm. And that noticing notebook that we’ve come to call it was her tool.

Zach Mercurio [00:28:00]:
She didn’t leave it up to chance. Now you may not keep a personal logbook on your people’s lives that may not come naturally to you, and that’s okay. But leaders who pay close attention, they tend to do three things. They have a process for observing the details of people’s lives and work. That process could entail asking deeper questions, going beyond how are you and how was your day to asking, what is your attention today? What are you struggling with? What’s been most meaningful to you today? How can I help? What do you need from me today? Then they note what they hear. They note what they see. Noting is one of the most powerful practices to relearn how to pay attention. Researchers find that our attention spans have dwindled over the last twenty years precisely because there’s more things competing for attention than ever.

Zach Mercurio [00:28:47]:
And if you’re a people leader, that, you know, increases tenfold. So we need a practice, a process, and noting down those details, having some way to document it is powerful. You know, I just write on the top of my one on ones, don’t forget to ask about dot dot dot. Mhmm. And it helps me remember to ask about something. And then the key is sharing back what you remembered. There are a few things more powerful than if you talk to someone a few months ago about a project you were working on. And then months later, you talk to them, and you haven’t talked to them in between, and they say, hey, Zach.

Zach Mercurio [00:29:19]:
Hey, Dave. Well, last time we talked, I remember you were working on this project. I just wanted to check-in on how that was going. It’s like all of a sudden, there’s this feeling of deep connection from being remembered, but it’s a process. It’s a practice. It’s a skill that we can learn.

Dave Stachowiak [00:29:33]:
Yeah. And I’m so glad you’ve highlighted all three of those because I think so I just think about myself. The things that I’ve systematized and gotten better at as a practice over recent years is number one and number two, observing and noting. Where I fall short is sharing back consistently. I tend to be a little bit too reactive on that. Like, I’ll bring something up in the context of when it comes up in a conversation, but I don’t necessarily have that practice like the supervisor who taught you. Like, okay, on Mondays here, I revisit it. I intentionally set up time to, like, come back to some of those conversations.

Dave Stachowiak [00:30:09]:
And I’m already thinking like, okay, how can I start to make that more of a practice? Because like, once it’s a practice, then it’s something that you are really connecting the dots. It’s the good intentions become also really real in people’s relationships with you.

Zach Mercurio [00:30:29]:
Yeah. I had a realization myself. And if you’re listening and you think that I’m doing this all the time perfectly, that’s not happening. I teach and research what I need to hear the most. Yeah. And I had this observation of myself where I would be out walking my dog or I’d be in a long drive in the car. And when my mind would wander, I’d think of all the people I should thank. And I think of all the people I should check-in on and all these shoulds when it comes to my relationships.

Zach Mercurio [00:30:55]:
And I realized, like, I’m the nicest person in the world when I’m out walking my dog. Oh, wow. When I get back to my desk, I have this big to do list. And I start jumping into what I have to do, and I put off these acts of kindness. And I’ve learned that I have to schedule my good intentions. Like, I have to put it at the top of my to do list. I have to elevate these acts of care to a priority. It’s amazing how often we put off an act of compassion, an act of noticing, an act of checking in for answering another email, and, put it on your to do list.

Zach Mercurio [00:31:30]:
Like, think about for you as a leader right now. Think about that feeling you have. I should check-in on that person. You may be having it right now. Now if you’re in the car or something, don’t just stop right now. But when you’re done listening to this podcast, write it down, put it on your calendar, put it at the top of your to do list, and do it. And you’ll start to not only see the power of mattering. You’ll be able to start seeing how much these small gestures do matter and start to remember how much you matter as a leader.

Dave Stachowiak [00:31:58]:
You have been studying this for a long time. You’ve been teaching so many leaders how to do this better. You’ve working with extraordinary leaders like Simon Sinek. As you’ve been doing this work and helping people to get better, I’m curious what you’ve changed your mind on.

Zach Mercurio [00:32:14]:
One of the things that I assumed was that leaders themselves felt that they mattered. I thought that if you were leading a group of people, if you’re responsible for where a group of people spend a third of their one life, that you would just know that you mattered. And I have learned through talking with leaders that leadership can be an isolating journey. There’s a lot of people that ask me, you know, what if my leader doesn’t do this for me? And I always say, do you do it for them? And oftentimes, the leader is in a position where they’re creating culture for everyone else through their interactions, but sometimes people aren’t doing it for them. And that’s why I think having peer groups, I think being in communities, listening to podcasts is so important for a leader. But one of the things that we’ve been surprised at is how many leaders need to hear how they matter from the people around them, from the employees they serve. So I’ve been working now with people who are individual contributors on how do you show your leaders that they matter.

Dave Stachowiak [00:33:18]:
Zach Mercurio is the author of The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance. Zach, thank you so much for your work.

Zach Mercurio [00:33:27]:
Thank you, Dave.

Dave Stachowiak [00:33:34]:
If this conversation was helpful to you, three related episodes I’d recommend. One of them is episode 223, start with why. Simon Sinek was my guest on that episode. Of course, his book of the same name introduced to so many of us the key concept of why in organizations. It’s not just enough to talk about the tasks or what the goals say or maybe the vision statement, but what’s really the why behind the work. And when we do that well, that are not only do we do a better job of reaching out in the world and doing meaningful things, but we also connect with people better. We notice people better. It’s one of the reasons I’m sure Zach and Simon have teamed up to send that message.

Dave Stachowiak [00:34:12]:
Episode two twenty three, a wonderful compliment to this conversation

Dave Stachowiak [00:34:14]:
Also recommended, episode 690, how to shift behavior for better results, Mitch Warner was my guest, from the Arbinger Institute, and we talked about the most recent version of Leadership and Self Deception, a book that many of us, including me, have, loved for years. And so much of that book is about seeing people better. I think a wonderful compliment to this conversation and also with the added lens of, how do we shift behavior in order to do that well? Episode 690 for that. And then, of course, I’d recommend the recent episode with Donna Hicks, episode 724. How to bring out the best in people. Donna’s work on dignity, so crucial for our relationships, our connection with others, our teams, and, of course, the humanity that so many of us want to bring into our work regularly. Donna’s elements of dignity, so foundational. Episode 724, a great starting point for that.

Dave Stachowiak [00:35:12]:
All of those episodes, of course, you can find on the coachingforleaders.com website. And I’m inviting you today to set up your free membership at coachingforleaders.com because it’s gonna open up a suite of access to more benefits on the website, including the ability to search by topic, the episodes that are most relevant to you in our library since 2011. Also, all the audio courses that are available for free on the website and my weekly leadership guide. And one thing I’m starting to include in the weekly leadership guide each week is a link to our new expert partner program in featuring some of our expert partners. I mentioned on a recent episode that I’ve had this great privilege for many years to build relationships with experts across the world. Many of them who’ve become friends, who have come on the podcast many times over the years, and have helped us to do a better job at being able to support our organizations. And many of you reach out to me on a regular basis and say, hey, who is are the people you’d recommend for this particular workshop we’re doing in organization or an off-site, or we are looking for a keynote, or I’m looking for a coach. And one of the questions that I get is how do I help my team do a better job of communicating, especially with stakeholders in a way that doesn’t feel boring or robotic or noticing that people are just getting lost in the data whole bunch.

Dave Stachowiak [00:36:36]:
And one of the people who is so brilliant at helping leaders and organizations do this better is David Hutchins. He helps leaders and teams develop a more human and engaging voice. You’ve heard David on the show many times over the years. He has taught me so much about the element of storytelling and leadership. He’s been a great leader for many of us of bringing that message into organizations. I recommend his materials all the time, and many of our academy members are also working on storytelling as a skill in order to engage people, for folks to feel and hear that human connection inside of our organizations and, of course, influencing stakeholders and customers as well. David has worked with a number of teams of, many folks who have listened to the show over the years, and he may be a resource for your team. If you are looking for that right now of helping leaders, team members to communicate with that more human engaging voice.

Dave Stachowiak [00:37:33]:
I hope you’ll reach out to him through our partners page. Go over to coachingforleaders.com/partners. You’ll see details where you can reach out and tell us what’s top of mind for you right now. Maybe it is, that, right now of finding that more human connection or maybe you’re seeking something else. Coachingforleaders.com/partners is where to begin so I and we can make a connection to the expert partner that will support you in the best possible way. Thanks, David, for all your support over the years and for being one of our expert partners. Coaching for Leaders is edited by Andrew Kroeger. Production support is provided by Sierra Priest.

Dave Stachowiak [00:38:13]:
Next Monday, I’m glad to welcome Judith Joseph to the show. We are gonna be talking about the path towards more joy in your work and also in your life. An important conversation. Join me for that chat with Judith. Have a great week, and see you Monday.