The Two Piers Podcast
The Two Piers Podcast
The Strength in Humility - with Anthony Luévanos, PhD.
In this episode of the Two Piers Podcast, host Erica D'Eramo is joined by Dr. Anthony Luévanos for an insightful conversation on humility and its role in effective leadership. Together, they explore how leaders can balance confidence with humility, the importance of self-awareness, and practical steps for fostering a culture of curiosity and growth. Tune in to learn how humility can transform your leadership approach and drive team success.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Coaching and EQi 360 services
Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling - by Edgar Schein (affiliate link)
Hello, and welcome to the Two Piers podcast. I'm your host, Erica D'Eramo, and in today's podcast, we'll be exploring the powerful role of humility in leadership. Today we're diving deep into how humility, confidence and competence intersect to create effective and inspiring leaders. Joining us is Dr. Anthony Luévanos. He currently serves as an Assistant Professor at the University of Oklahoma and is an expert in leadership and organizational behavior, and he's also a coach who works with Two Piers you Welcome. Dr. Luévanos, it's so good to have you here.
Dr. Luévanos:Thank you, Erica. I appreciate you for having me on the show today. It's great to be here and discuss such an important topic.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, it's great to have you rejoin the podcast. So you know, always, always a friend of two peers and and a collaborator with Two Piers. And this is maybe your third podcast or fourth podcast episode that you're joining for. So that's awesome. Yeah, exciting to have you back. So for anyone who hasn't caught your previous episodes, though, tell us a little bit about you know, your your journey, your kind of path to get to this, the state you're in right now, or, you know, the this role that you're in right now?
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, totally. So I've worked with school organizations for quite some time, and then I've kind of jumped ship, and not really jumped ship, but have worked with other organizations and looking to kind of build my experience with different types of industries. And right now I'm working with the construction industry, work with educational organizations, working with the health with health industry. And so my background is in building curriculum, building, you know, building coursework, building professional developments, trainings across a variety of topics. And so I have experience building that curriculum and speaking with leaders and trying to pinpoint, really, where their key point indicators are in terms of performance, overall performance, and then maybe even specific, specific performance for anything that they have a focus on for that particular quarter or that year or that semester, depending on the organization. And so the other part of what I do is also I just provide consulting services and, you know, building surveys and taking in qualitative data auditing organizations, not in your your traditional audit format, but auditing for, you know, special purpose audits, focusing on on a particular portion of the organization to see what resources, time and attention, money, human that's being devoted to a particular area of the of the organization, so that they can be successful or address any kind of root causes for, you know, sort of a problem of practice or problem that they're experiencing in the organization. So this kind of led me to the idea of the function of leaders, of the role, the important role that leaders play and all, and what the organization or the organizational outcomes are for a particular organization. And in and working with leaders, I've noticed quite a few, just different attributes about leaders that have sparked my interest into understanding a little bit more about this idea of humility, and maybe even just conceptions of humility, misconceptions of humility. How do you get it off the ground if you're not, if you don't, if you're not a humble leader. How do I know you know? How do I know if I can be or if I am a humble leader or not? What can I do if I'm not a humble leader? And so part of our two peers approach here is not only not just providing you with, you know, a survey instrument, but also how to work with you throughout the year you and your team to be able to inculcate these, these, this humble attitude towards the organization and understand what that means, and living that out every single day.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, I love that I mean, and that's such a macro perspective on this as well. And I think that your first of all, I think you were just so impressive in terms of what you've accomplished in your career, in academia and in your work trying to support organizations. I mean, you. I think you you're a doctor multiple times, you know, you have your PhD and multiple PhDs, right? Like this is, you're one of the most academically achieved people I know.
Dr. Luévanos:Well, I appreciate that. Yeah, it was, it wasn't. It was somewhat by choice, but a little bit or a lot of it was just the work I was interested in, and it just kind of took me down a path, and I just ended up here. So it's kind of crazy, but there we are.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, yeah. Anthony and I actually met in in the CoachR coaching program, so we kind of began this coaching journey together, and he was the person that I was paired with as a coach, so I got to experience his coaching real time, and that was what made me so eager to have you work with Two Piers and support some of our efforts. So thank you for that.
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, it's been a great trip. I've enjoyed it in hopefully years to come. So I'm looking forward to working with more clients, and, you know, just amassing the experience of coaching, so it's a lot of fun. Stays Interesting.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, yeah, it's been great. And I've gotten to know you more as a human being too. So like, we work together and collaborate on the professional realm, but tell us a little bit about like, so who, who are you as a human like, what are the things that you're excited about? What are you interested in beyond just the beyond just the professional realm?
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, well, I mean, I like to approach life really kind of holistically, and so I do a lot of work. I'm also a physical trainer, and so I do that on the side, and I like to encourage folks, you know, in their training and nutrition, you know that there are a lot of parallels in the work that we do. And so, you know, when I step away from, you know, the classroom or the organization, I like to kind of inculcate that idea of just that holistic journey. And so, you know, I invest a lot of time trying to eat healthy and also in gardening. And, you know, just got the parallels. I mean, it's all, it's always, it's always fun to see that. And then, you know, some of the just volunteer stuff that I do is working with local community and just developing leaders and and that is kind of sort of away from the professional end of things, just developing, small businesses, developing, particularly the I guess, maybe marginalized, if you'd like to use that term, or folks that don't really get the attention in the community or have less access to it, maybe because of a language barrier, especially Spanish speaking folks. But yeah, I mean, other than that, I do, I do go fishing and do a lot of that kayaking when I can get it in, and hiking and, you know, a lot of active, active things outside. And especially when the weather's a lot cooler, it's, it's beyond, uh, hot right now. So early morning walks are are preferable in the summers in Texas. So
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, the, yeah, you're in Texas. So this is, like, your toughest season. I'm in Maine. So this is a season where we soak up every ounce of sunshine we can before the, like, the eight month winter sets in, but, and I think salsa dancing too, right? Or ballroom or dancing in some form as well?
Dr. Luévanos:Honestly, I almost forgot that, you know, I do, I do a lot of that, you know, on the side, and have just been so into just the season of just trying to understand the different dance, you know, different ballroom dance types, and just enjoying that aspect of life, trying to figure out my footwork. I guess, you know, at first it was two left feet, and so now I figure out, I figured out how to, how to step and move. In, you know, you know, just a lot of interesting things, songs that I never thought you could dance a salsa or a waltz to that I'm just, I'm kind of floored at the, I guess, the advancement or the modernization of dances that I just thought were kind of stuck in the past. So it's really fun to get out there and, you know, partner with different folks, and, you know, just dance, whatever it is that they have on the, you know, on the on the speaker. So it's a lot of fun.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, a lot. I love that. I mean, this is a bit of an aside, but I am. Yeah, I remember just like, kind of joking around and dancing. I think it was a salsa. Maybe we danced cha cha to it, but to, like Juveniles Breathe, which is, like you can dance any, almost anything, to anything. But I the a game that my husband doesn't exactly enjoy, I don't think, is when a song will come on and I'll be like, okay, is this so what do you think this is? Like, what kind of Is it a salsa? Bachata, is it like merengue? Like, what would you dance to this? And he's gotten so much better at like, being able to be like, think it's a salsa? I'm like, yes, it's a salsa.
Dr. Luévanos:And just wait for it, because I I just discovered that you can actually combine all these different dance types. So you can do a salsa bachata, salsa waltz and a merengue Fox Trot, and I'm like, what I mean, yeah,
Erica D'Eramo:like a crossed up waltz and like, yeah, yeah, that's fun.
Dr. Luévanos:It stays exciting.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, that's fun. I i am just trying to get back into dancing up here in Maine, so I found a couple pockets of salsa dancing, and I haven't made it to any event of the events yet, but I'm hopeful, before the weather starts to cool down and folks retreat inside, that I will at least make it to one like outdoor dancing. Yeah. So, yeah, yeah.
Dr. Luévanos:Along with that, comes with the interesting outfits. So I mean that that's, that's the other, that's the other part. I haven't gotten into the bedazzled anything just yet, but, yeah,
Erica D'Eramo:I don't know. I used to dress up a lot to dance in. These days, I'm like, maybe stretchy jeans and some Rothys. I used to be able to wear the four inch heels and dance all night. But yeah, yeah, I'm in my my fifth decade now, so I don't know, but I do think that all of these kind of tied together. This is not totally like Off, off piste, so to speak. Because to me, I see things like my dancing and even my yoga practice, like I'm starting to teach yoga classes again, and you know your activities outside of your coaching practice, I see them as being so interrelated, because I think it speaks to this like deep curiosity and this desire for engagement and connection and just exploring the world and the people around us, and so I don't know, I think it's kind of part of our ethos here at Two Piers, is we like to go out and do a lot of stuff and Meet a lot of people and volunteer in the community, and, yeah, and
Dr. Luévanos:that's a really pivotal point, and also a milestone in many people's lives, is this idea of self awareness. You know, this really doesn't matter when you're considering, kind of the overall value of who you are in the midst of groups or organizations, because you do communicate that through body language, through the words that you choose, ideas that you offer to the team or to the organization, your self awareness really does matter, and understanding you understanding yourself as an individual, and then across these different contexts, do help you become a little more comfortable in your own skin. And so I think that does kind of point to, again, this, this idea of, you know, we're talking about humility earlier. If you are not self aware, you don't know where the pitfalls lie, where the triggers lie, where you could be taken off kilter, or when you're taken off kilter in terms of maybe a challenge that's been, you know, that you're facing, either as an individual trying to get over, you know, maybe a different way of thinking, or get into a different way of thinking, or dealing with team members, or dealing with or navigating conflict, those all really do matter whenever you consider your level of self awareness in the grand scheme of things. So
Erica D'Eramo:yeah, I think there's a piece here too about putting yourself in potentially uncomfortable situations where you might not know everything and you might be adapting and maybe mess up. Like, that's one thing about that was difficult for me, both for yoga and dancing, was being able to let go of my ego a little bit and, like, learn to laugh and play with it and just, you know, okay, so you missed a somebody. Was trying to lead you through a turn and you missed it, fine, laugh, do something spontaneous and move on right like that. Skill set doesn't just stay on the dance floor or on the yoga mat when you fall out of the handstand or whatever. That comes back into the workplace as well, and just into how we approach different, potentially scary, you know, new environments where we don't have all the cultural context, where we maybe don't know all of the nuances or unspoken rules that might be happening underneath. So,
Dr. Luévanos:Gosh, yes,
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah,
Dr. Luévanos:Learn laugh at yourself.
Erica D'Eramo:Yes, learn to laugh at your Yes, really, I mean, and that's tough. Like a lot of us can be very tough on ourselves for good reason, like we grew up with that serving us for whatever reason we had to be tough on ourselves, and it's probably gotten us to where we are. So it can be hard to learn how to take ourselves less seriously and and laugh when we look look silly. So I I'd love to kick off our conversation around around humility. I think it would be helpful for our readers or our listeners. Hopefully most people are listening, although we do have this transcript available on our website. So I'll say that to kick us off with sort of your definition around what humility means in the context of leadership. So, like, how, how would you describe or recognize a humble leader in the wild? Yeah.
Dr. Luévanos:So there are a variety of different definitions, but the one that i i Keep, I continue to land on, is it's about having an accurate assessment of your own strengths and weaknesses. And again, it's this idea of self awareness that we're talking about, and then your openness, or your availability to learn from others. And you had mentioned it earlier, you hit the nail on the head, this idea of curiosity. A humble leader is someone who acknowledges their limitations. They seek input from their team. They give credit what credit is due. You know, they listen more than they speak. And again, let's you know, consider the context, consider the situation, but they're always ready to admit their mistakes and learn from them. So you can recognize a humble leader by their willingness to put the team success above their own ego. And again, this goes back to the idea you you've got to learn to just let go with some things you know, you know, figure out what's what's not a hill to die on. And also, you recognize a leader by their humble leader, by their ability to inspire and uplift others. So not being a constant siphon or energy taker, but that you're able to put energy into others and be interested in others, genuine interest in other people's lives, and that really does show what it is to be a humble leader.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah. I mean that element of curiosity, I think comes through so deeply. I'm just about to speak to someone about a potential kind of professional development course for a chamber of commerce. And this, I think this is the theme that I'll be focusing on, is really how to build a curious culture, you know, like a culture of curiosity within your organization and a culture of coaching as well, right? Because those, those skills kind of go hand in hand and are so valuable for leaders as they navigate the ups and downs and the pitfalls. Like, it's so much easier to get back on your feet if you can switch from that, that anxious brain to that curious brain and say, like, Okay, now what, what are we doing here?
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, for sure.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah. I mean, I've come up through, through the energy industry, right? Like, a lot of steel-toed boots, a lot of time in the field, a lot of those, like, what I would call hyper masculine types of cultures. And I think that there is maybe a challenging relationship with the idea of humility. And I think a lot of those environments sometimes mistake humility for weakness or perhaps a lack of confidence. Like I still remember the time I asked a mechanical supervisor, they were saying, you know, do you want, do you want us to run this turban wash or not? And I said, Well, I mean, you know, I just showed up today or yesterday, like, I just got on board. So you tell me, like, what do you what? What's your assessment? And he was like, Well, you're the boss, right? Like, in that moment, it was actually by me asking for his input, because I the way I framed it wasn't seen as humble or being or trying to get their insights. It was seen as weakness, like I wasn't making a decision. I think there's a lot of confusion around that so, so tell us a little bit like, how do you differentiate between humility and say, I. Low self esteem or insecurity or weakness, or some of these ways that it's it's often misinterpreted.
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, so you touch on a great point, because a lot of folks are managing their weakness right now in a lot of industries or across different industries. And managing weakness comes comes with stress and anxiety, elevated stress and anxiety. And so when you, when you're at that point, yeah, there's, you're going to more likely burn out a lot quicker, or you're going to burn others out because there's, there's this front that you're, you're, you know, you're putting up, and it's it has to be unhealthy. And I mean, you know, those listeners out there that are feeling the heaviness of managing their weakness or hiding their weakness and these ultra competitive environments, take a big breath. Take a deep breath, because you have to. You're gonna have to change your culture. And if you're at the bottom, you're gonna have to manage up and be open to this, to this idea, and start, start, start small, you know. And so a lot of this weakness that we're, you know, we see, you know, lead in leaders, or that they perceive as weakness. It it can really eat you from the the inside out, to be honest. And you know, humility and weaknesses, or humility and weaknesses, they're often mistaken, you know, for one another, but they're fundamentally different. I mean, humility is rooted in strength and self awareness, right? And so, whereas weakness stems from a lack of confidence. And, you know, I don't know how to do this, you know, how long are people going to Yeah, or how long can I keep up this charade? You know, I don't know everything, but I, you know, people expect me to know everything again. You know it's one of those places where it's it feels like a risk. But if you can change your culture, your team culture, to appreciate the weakness and move from there and as a team tackles, you know, tackle an issue or tackle a situation within the organization, with your team. You know, a humble leader has the confidence to admit when they don't have all the answers and to rely on the expertise of their team. And so, you know, in contrast with someone that you know, with low self esteem, they've tried they might avoid a responsibility of of taking ownership of a particular mistake or or even making decisions and putting it, you know, putting putting those decisions on someone else. And so to understand true humility is to have a strong sense of self and the ability to foster that trust and respect among your peers. But in I, you know, the caveat to this is the idea of confidence. You know, leaders can have humility and confidence. And there was a, there's a there's a wonderful, wonderful article on on this idea of confidence, where you are, where you get into elements of narcissism. And, you know, Steve Jobs was a really great example of going from complete narcissism and a toxic company culture to being a more confident with some narcissistic traits, but still not getting in the way of the end outcome or the end goals of the company. And now we see that Apple has become, you know, very or a very wealthy company, a trillion dollar company, if I'm not mistaken. And so again, you can, you can balance out this humility and confidence by being more self aware and staying focused on the goals of the team rather than your personal accolades. You know, again, giving credit to where credit's due. And sometimes, you know, not not being a credit hog, I guess you know, not being someone who just takes on, you know, like I did make, you know, I did come up with the idea, but hey, celebrate some of your, some of your teammates, and you know, for, you know, for things that they, that they've done. And so one example is this Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, who's known for his empathetic and inclusive leadership style, encourages that growth mindset, listens actively to his employees and stays open to feedback, but also stays confident in driving that company's vision And the strategy to the end, to the end goal. So balancing these traits, again, involves that continuous reflection on your on your own actions, and then your own actions on or the how they impact other people in your team and the company.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah. I mean, I think I'm hearing so many different kind of themes that are coming through for me. So. So one is this element of trust that I think starts to, starts to kind of come into the forefront, because just reflecting on that the leaders who will take responsibility, I think that that that does, that that situation that I described before was an indication to me that something had happened in the past, perhaps, or there was an existing culture where the leader there wasn't trust, that the leader would take responsibility if things went wrong. And that's why it felt like I for that person. It felt like I was kind of, you know, had sloppy shoulders in terms of the decision rights. And so the way that I learned to reframe that question was, you know, like I will make a decision, I will own the outcome here. Now I want you to tell me everything that you know and what your opinion is, but I'll still make my own decision. You know, this is not going to fall on you, but you are the subject matter expert. I do want and value what you have to say, and changing that because, because I had assumed that that trust was there, but it wasn't yet there. And so in organizations where there's not a high level of trust, where perhaps leaders haven't displayed humility in the past, where they haven't taken ownership like I could see it being tough to overcome that, and there's a lot of groundwork that would need to go into that. I also think that the the concept of humility and confidence go hand in hand, because it's like you have it's confidence in what right like confidence in your ability to overcome difficult situations, which is very different than confidence, blind confidence that you just know everything right. Those are, one is like a fixed mindset. The like I the idea that I am expected to know everything right now, that's sort of a fixed mindset. The growth mindset is I might not know all the details right now, but it's okay if I ask, because I have confidence that I will a, learn quickly, or B, I'll be able to adapt, or C, I can be resilient. I have data for that. So, yeah, just sparking lots of ideas as you're talking.
Dr. Luévanos:Wow. Fantastic. Yeah, this, this, this idea of of confidence, you know, it's, it does, it does. It's kind of tricky, because, again, you can also, you can move into overconfidence, or egotistical confidence, where you kind of lose traction in terms of humility, and you begin to just self focus and think about, well, this is what I accomplished, and my and my team helped me, or kind of, they're just the they were a fixture in the room, but it was, this was All me, you know, and that doesn't bode very well. It does. It does begin to create a very competitive environment. And now again, don't, don't get me wrong, there are in environments where you must remain competitive. And there's there, there's a little less teamwork involved in your in your job. But there is, there is a there are opportunities to give credit to those around you and really celebrate others and take away this, this idea of you know, this eagle, egotistical, self indulgence, if you will, into these building these accolades, as opposed to caring for the company as a whole, because that sends the message there that this organization is unhealthy, and you want to move from that unhealthy, self centered, egotistical, narcissistic Corporation, as I described earlier, the way that that Steve Jobs started out to more of a collaborative, cooperative, team based approach, where You are relying because you're going to get to a point where you don't know everything you know you.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, that's the goal of being a leader. Is that you eventually, you know, become a leader of multiple team. Well, I don't know, depends on what people's goals are, right? But like often, if people are progressing, they eventually progress to a point where they're not just leading their own the subject matter experts of their own discipline, but they might have cross discipline teams, or they might have cross functional teams, right?
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, and that's so true, because when you're getting into kind of multi, you know, multi departmental decision. Decisions where you have to connect with your team leaders from across different departments and different expertise levels. You know, I run into this issue with CEOs quite a bit with superintendents, where they're having to make these financial decisions along with health and safety, or safety and security, health and wellness, what else? Operations, management, human resources, and it all comes down to one leader. Well, obviously that one, that one particular leader can as as as best as they can try manage the knowledge that they have. But again, things are changing in those fields, specifically so quickly that it would be difficult for one leader to keep up with all of those areas. So really, when you become a CEO or part of the executive suite, you're having to think about your organization on a holistic level and and understand how to how to work with your level of competence. Lose the ego or leave the ego at the door, because, honestly, competence is crucial for credibility and trust, and humble leaders are that are also competent. Are more effective with their teams because they combine their own skills and their level of knowledge, or, you know, crystallized, fluid, or whatever you want to call it, with a willingness to learn and adapt, you know, learn from others and adapt to the situation, especially because so much of it's dependent on the industry, so much of what you do, kind of, it comes, comes at you in a variety of ways that you're having to, like, for instance, safety and security. A lot of superintendents deal with safety and security in their organizations, not just to maintain safety for the student population, but also safety for the adults. So if you have just, you know, just something that just blindsides you in terms of safety. What do you do? You don't have, you don't have all of the understanding you're having to rely on folks that are outside of your you know you're within your team, but that have a knowledge that is that that far exceeds your your your your abilities, your capacity at that you know at that particular moment, especially because you're not trained in that area and to react very quickly. So this combination that helps and fosters respect and loyalty from your team and those people in the community that you're working with, and competent leaders can make informed decisions and guide their teams effectively, while their humility ensures that they're approachable and they're open to feedback in creating that collaborative environment. So,
Erica D'Eramo:You know, it's, I think that this is one of the reasons that it's almost like senior leaders have, in some ways, more opportunities to develop this humble approach, or to develop humility, because they are inherently not going to be the expert in every department that they, that they lead, that they have, you know, leadership oversight over and so it's just par for the course that they that they'll rely on subject matter experts And the functional leaders that are reporting to them, and the expertise within the teams. And ironically, sometimes we've all like seen that leader who maybe was an engineer or an accountant or whatever, and like tends to gravitate towards that, and it almost becomes a liability. You know, the the vice president who used to be an accountant and, like, really wants to get into the details on the debits and credits, because that's where they feel comfortable. And it's kind of like everybody's like, uh Oh, there they go. Like they're going into the details, and they don't know to step back. But when you look at especially people in their first leadership roles who are maybe coming up through an individual contributor role where they were the expert, they were the deliverer, they were the one doing and producing a work product. And then they get into that team leader role or supervisory role, and it's very hard to shift from that mindset that you're supposed to know it all and you're supposed to have the deep expertise, because it's in your field, and so it can look I think people get a little more worried about looking weak or looking like they don't know if they start relying on the team and building that awareness that like I am intentionally empowering the team, because I don't want to be the micromanager. That's not the point. I need to be worried about strategy. You need to be worried and I need to be worried about motivation and team, well being and delivery and taking away barriers and stuff and and I'm going to explicitly empower my team and and explicitly take a step back, not from weakness, but from from a place of power, from a place of empowerment. Sure,
Dr. Luévanos:yeah, and you know, it's, there are a lot of opportunities here, not just with, you know, with it, with the idea of becoming a humble leader, demonstrating this humility with your team, because you get to develop. I mean, this is a way for you to just stop, pause and think, okay, I can develop others by taking my ego away and relying on other people to contribute, and that reliance on other folks is going to help develop your team, and it's also going to put you in a place to coach others and believe in others and celebrate others, which also contributes to a corporate culture, organizational culture that is going to be more that is going to be more collaborative, positive and engaging, not just for that leader, but also for those team members.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, I think in some of these environments that are more that lean more command and control, top down, directive leadership. You know, I think that a lot of that sometimes will come from high stakes environments where, in at times, you do need to sort of have that command and control to operate quickly and yet. And I've mentioned this in other podcasts. In emergency response training, they literally build it in to the to the sequence, to the cadence, that after you go around the room, you get everybody's updates, you tell people what the plan is, and then you stop and ask people, What have I missed? What have I missed? You have to ask people explicitly. You can't say, Have I missed anything? Because people will just say, no, what have I missed? Right? Open ended question based in curiosity and asking other people to tell you what have I missed. So in those types of environments where it's a big risk that you'll miss out on information. It's built in to the process, and if you don't do that, you will fail your emergency response assessments. So we see how valuable it is. But in day to day operations, sometimes I think it gets missed. You know, leaders don't often say, What have I missed? What are we missing here? You know,
Dr. Luévanos:yeah, it's a built in humility, right?
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah,
Dr. Luévanos:you know it, if the safety, safety and security industry saw value in it, there must. There's got to be value for other teams as well out there, outside of that industry,
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, they've literally, like, systematized it and proceduralized it the humility. But you can do that too, right? Like leaders can literally do that. They can embed it into their team meetings. They can embed it into their one on ones. They can build they can, they can proceduralize their humility as well, if it doesn't come naturally.
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah. And, I mean, and there are a couple of things you know in practice that you know, that you just, just as you had described, you know, tell me what's going on. Let me, you know, let me know that involves things like active listening, you know, seeking feedback at our you know, at regular intervals, or at intervals that you know that can be adjusted so that you can respond appropriately to the situation, right and across different industries that looks a little different. You know, you might, you might have you know. You know, day by day, week by week, you know, whatever that looks like for your industry, and then acknowledging the contributions as others is key. You know, because, again, you're building a culture that encourages people to share so that you can get a greater perspective of what's going on, and so that, you know, they should model that vulnerability. You know, humble leaders have to admit their mistakes and or should admit their mistakes. And you know, showing that it's okay that they don't have all the answers is critically important. And then to create a culture of humility, leaders should encourage open communication and celebrate team achievements like I mentioned earlier, just you know, don't miss out on the opportunity to celebrate and build somebody up in your in your organization or on your team, and then foster an environment where everyone sees or feels valued and respected, because oftentimes We overlook something, or we, you know, we don't really acknowledge the contributions of other people, and again, that's just a missed opportunity, but also reflecting regularly on your own leadership style and the impact that it's having on others is pretty essential. And I mentioned, you know, benefits. You know, when you do this, when you implement these things, you'll see overall organizational benefits. You'll see that humble leaders, in humble leadership, often see higher levels of employee employee engagement and satisfaction. They'll have this environment of trust. They'll have psychological safety, where team members. Feel comfortable sharing their ideas, taking risks. You know, how many companies are asking you to take risks, you know, and go outside. You know, think outside of the box. They say, which is essential for innovation motivation, you know, collaborative, or collaboration, you know, is also enhanced because team members are more willing to work together and support each other, you know, overcoming barriers, knowing their contributions are going to be valued and respected. That, again, breaks barriers in terms of communication and so that's, that's, that's what we're, you know, that's what humble leadership can do. Those are some of the things that humble leaders leadership can do, and exhibiting that humility with others can do, you know, while overcoming all of these challenges that you typically see in organizations, you know, across the world, honestly.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, I love the part about celebrating, because I think so often we're trying, you know, we're focused on continuous improvement, continuous improvement, and I think it can lead organizations to only try to review situations that have gone off the rails or didn't get the outcome we expected, or didn't hit the goal. And then we go back and do like an after action review or a wash up or debrief, and we try to figure out what we could have done better next time. But I think like standardizing that curiosity and exploration just, you know, after any large project or effort or upset, or, you know, any focused effort, not just doing an after action review when it's gone wrong, but just standardizing that and doing it all the time, so that you can capture the learnings of where things went well and build that into the organization as well. And that helps to build the confidence. And then the confidence, like we said, builds the humility and allows people to take more risks, and because they're seeing that even where you do have improvements that you could use for next time, it's all a gradient, right? Like maybe you did it well and it and it could have been better, because you learned something there. Maybe it didn't go well, and there's some learning to take, but we're not going to, like, shame people, or penalize people, or punish people, because we know if we do that, we're not going to get people engaging in this learning process as well.
Dr. Luévanos:So true.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah.
Dr. Luévanos:And it's, and it's not easy, like I said, it's not easy to implement, to overcome the challenges of incorporating or inculcating humility into your into your organization or your team. There are, there are a lot of challenges that you're you may face, trying to incorporate humility and into your own leadership style. But you know, a couple of things to think about. You know, whenever you do incorporate humility, you might see that folks kind of see you as well. This is, this is, seems like weakness. You know, I smell this. I've seen this before. Oh, that's that. That's weakness. You know, there's opportunity for me to move up or something, but again, there's, there might be a perceived loss of authority or difficulty changing, you know, kind of long standing habits that you'll have to kind of get people out of that mode of thinking. But, you know, to overcome those challenges, I think leaders should focus on building that self awareness, the reflection and feedback you know, and that feedback will you know be that'll come from folks on your team, folks in your organization. Sometimes what you know and what we offer at two peers is some of that 360 feedback and so in reflection, sometimes reflecting on your own is great, but find a coach. You know, we're, we're great with with helping you reflect through these items and and we, you know, we provide that service as well to help you build that self awareness through reflection. And so you can also seek mentorship opportunities within the company in order to develop your humility, but it's important to communicate that value, or the value humility, to your team, and to demonstrate those benefits through your consistency. And so without consistency, it's just like anything else. And as I mentioned earlier, I try to live my life, you know, in a parallel fashion. You know, you go to the gym and you show up and you do the same thing. Are you going to change? Is your body going to change? No, it just going to adapt to the lowest mode of performance, and it's just going to keep at that same level of that same level of output. What you want to do is you want to get into those uncomfortable places. You want to challenge yourself. You want to go deeper with this and see where you can move into this. You know this, this, this humble leadership style, or in or incorporated into your leadership style, this humility into leadership style, because it's, it's going to you're going to demonstrate the benefits again, with consistent. See and again, you know, just like you do at the gym, just like you do with your social life, just like you do with your dancing, consistency over time, eventually, will have the positive outcomes that you're hoping for and and it'll help with it, with overcoming that initial resistance and creating that, that corporate culture, that organizational culture that you're looking for.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, and I think so many of these elements, they really build upon each other. So that curiosity, as you encounter that discomfort, as you try the try on, the stance of humility, and you feel a little discomfort, feel a little fear, again, that curiosity comes back and says, like, oh, what's going on here that's interesting, right? Or, as you see a leader displaying humility and being, I think, like, as we incorporate this awareness into our mode of operating, you start to see it more and more, right? You start to see the leader that before maybe you thought came across as really strong. And then little by little, you're like, Oh, interesting. Maybe some of this is coming from a lack of confidence, you know, like, start to see through some of that. And then the leaders who are making space, you recognize that that skill set, and you're you kind of start to see what they're doing when they when they create space for others to shine, and they do show self reflection. And I mean, I still remember this one leader who I just thought the world of, because he had such a charisma about him, and really had like sort of that I don't know he had, like a presence about him, and always had like, top performers in his midst. He would seek out top performers and bring them in. And yet that kind of all crumbled when one time I asked him, um, he was giving me some, like, career advice, and I asked him, you know, what was, what would you say your biggest mistake was, like, what's your biggest regret? And he could not bring himself to answer that. And I thought like, oh, oh, this is a facade like, you can't tell me that. Well, first of all, that means one of two things, either he doesn't have any self awareness about mistakes he's made, because there's no way in. There's no way that this person never made any mistakes at all. That's not possible. I witnessed some of them so so either lack of self awareness and like cannot see that they have made mistakes, which is scary, or knows that they've made mistakes, but cannot bring themselves to share that and be vulnerable because they feel like it reflects poorly on them, or it will change, like, this persona that they've built up, which then tells me, like, Oh, it's a facade. It's not real. Like, if we can't be real, then it's a facade. And so I don't know, as we're talking about this, I hope folks are listening and thinking, you know, maybe doing an inventory of the people in their life that they look up to, and maybe starting to think about some of these things,
Dr. Luévanos:You know. And I'm almost curious to ask you whether or not you felt that that person could laugh at themselves, you know. I mean, some, some people that are in that situation, they can't, they don't have that relationship with themselves, or don't understand themselves well enough to say, Oh yeah, you know, I, you know, I'm a terrible, you know, I'm a terrible this, you know, I don't do this very well. You saw that the other day. Or, you know, or this, you know, have a story, you know, and that that involves, again, reflecting, and I again, I encourage you. Grab a coach, grab someone that can really help you dive deep into this, because it's going to it's going to be very important for you to become a more self aware leader and understand how to laugh at yourself rather than taking yourself so seriously. Even if you're in an ultra competitive environment, you're going to need that outlet to be able to just talk to somebody about what you do, and to help develop that self awareness so that you can develop a path towards humility and integrate that humility into your leadership style. So
Erica D'Eramo:So, yeah, I agree with all that. I think that to answer your question, if they could laugh at themselves here, here's my complicated answer. This leader and many others in that organization who were at the quote, unquote, top of their game, had what I would call performative humility. So they they understood how to mimic humility in front of a group, and so they might make, like, some self deprecating comments about their awkwardness, or, like, in this case, they would joke about, like, the university they went to, or something like that, right? Like coming up from humble beginnings, stuff like that. And yet, I think. We can eventually that falls away if it's not rooted in true, earnest humility, and we can see behind the curtain. And that was exactly what happened in that moment, was I realized like that was not true humility. I think even the CEO of that company would take on that kind of really approachable, humble stance and and would seem performatively humble, but when you saw behind closed doors, that humility completely went away. And so I guess I don't know what's what's worse, in some ways, I think like fake it till you make it, at least if you're setting the tone within the company publicly that humility is appreciated and accepted. Maybe that's better than nothing, but it's always going to be better if it's rooted in true authenticity. Because just like that, like we can people know like they eventually they know when it's not true humility. And that's where I think you mentioned, you know, you mentioned 360 so I do want to mention that, like both Dr Luevanos and I are certified in EQi, and can do, you know, EQi assessments, which can be very, very helpful in leader growth, especially in this area. And we, we can do 360s which means polling the people in your organization around you so that you can get a sense of like are the people that work with me? Do they have? You know is that is their view of me aligned with my view of myself there, and that can be those 360 conversations can be very eye opening. They can be very challenging, because sometimes it's tough to hear that other people see us differently than we see ourselves. Sometimes, many times, most times, when I do 360s with leaders, they actually rate themselves much lower on things than than their than their peers, or their direct reports, or even managers do, and so it can also build confidence. So, you know, it's not all about like getting tough truths. It's also about like, building the confidence in the areas that maybe you're not giving yourself credit for already, which is part of true humility, I think, right,
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, for sure,
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah. So definitely reach out if any of what we've been talking about today has resonated, there are a multitude of ways that we can support. Any resources out there, besides, besides our wonderful coaching, you know, offerings that we have and 360s and whatnot, anything else on your radar that you think people should check out?
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, well, my advice, just to kind of wrap up to leaders or aspiring leaders, and maybe even those that are looking towards integrating humility in their leadership style, is to start by genuinely valuing other people's input and also the perspectives of others, like getting a coach completing a 360 as you had mentioned. You know, EQi 360 is a great one. Embrace the mindset of continuous learning. Again, that curiosity is key, right? Remaining curious and staying open to feedback. And remember that humility doesn't diminish your authority. It you might. You might see some challenges, some perceptions, erroneous perceptions, as they may be, but remember that it it strengthens your leadership by building trust and respect within your team and your organization, lead by example, remember that consistency that we had mentioned earlier, showing that you're committed to personal growth, that you're committed to the growth of your team by celebrating and acknowledging others, and by doing so, you'll create a more inclusive and dynamic work environment that can be, that can achieve remarkable results.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, absolutely. I agree. I'll add one, one final thought here, just in case people want to do some further reading. I know that there was a book that was actually assigned as part of our coaching curriculum way back in the day called Humble Inquiry. And it's a it's a pretty easy read, pretty short, short read. And I know I've recommended that to a couple of my executive leadership coaching clients, executive coaching clients, and I have one executive coaching client who works in HR, and she now buys that book for any new leader that joins the team, because I think it really kind of helps people who are used to having to have the answers. It helps them shift that mindset into asking a lot more questions. So I'll throw that out. I think it's Edward Sheen is the author, but we'll include it in the show notes, along with some of the other resources.
Dr. Luévanos:Yeah, he's really good. Yeah, yeah. And I have an article coming out too about humility and leadership, so watch out for that. Hopefully it'll be out by November, December. So we'll publish it here through Two Piers, but it'll also be not sure in which journal just yet. So
Erica D'Eramo:feel so honored to have such a published, published academic author and an expert you know on the team. So thank you, Dr Luevanos, really, and thank you for sharing all of your insights today. For folks looking for a recap of this, you can find the highlights in our blog post that comes out with each of our podcast episodes on the twopiersconsultting website, and we will include some links in the show notes, and you can find a full transcript as well. So that's linked, linked online as well, if you prefer to read instead of instead of listen. So we're looking forward to some other collaborations coming up in the future as well. So keep an eye out. Dr Luevanos is going to be back to talk about a few other topics as the year progresses. So looking forward to this as well. Thanks for being on.
Dr. Luévanos:Fantastic. Thanks for having me again. Appreciate you.
Erica D'Eramo:Yeah, cool. And for our listeners, we will see you next episode.
