Recently, I was on a panel discussion about leadership, and it brought up a lot of insights I’ve learned over a decade of business ownership. As the head of our company, it’s on me to ensure that our team is performing well and smoothly. That means:

• There’s team cohesion and synergy built on trust
• Everyone is committed to, has capacity for, and is sitting in the right seat
• Attitudes are positive, focused on, and excited about serving the mission of the company

You’ll notice that my definition of a high-performing team doesn’t include that they’re working their fingers to the bone, sacrificing their own lives for us partners. When teams are grinding like that, it’s not sustainable, and that’s not the kind of organization I want to be a part of, let alone be the leader of. It simply feels awful for everyone when that is the culture. I’ve learned to keep my focus on how things feel. I’m leading a group of human beings with lives, not cogs in a machine.

So how do I ensure that our team is high performing? It comes down to four things:

• Making sure that I lead from a place of confidence and abundance (not fear and scarcity)
• Seeing our people as people, and making sure they feel seen and safe
• Walking the walk — living my own expectations
• Hiring the right people in the first place

Unsticking: Leading from a Place of Confidence

For me, the hardest pill to swallow was realizing how much of an effect I have on our team. As the CEO, I’m the one establishing and holding the vision of the company. My partners and I co-create the vision, but ultimately, one person needs to be accountable.

For the years I led this team before 2020, I was stuck. My past traumas and personal insecurities were hampering me and holding us all back. That burden felt too great at the time. I had experienced — again and again — that when I was off kilter personally, it was excruciatingly evident in the business.

Our team back then was begging me to step up and lead them, but I was simply stuck in the loop of insecurity and fear. I realized that my main job was to resolve my personal blocks to unblock the company. I went through a long, hard, and deep process of self-healing, and now I can easily lead without fear, with humanity and compassion. With this newfound confidence, I am able to truly support my team. The positive impact on Smith & Connors was immediate and has returned compounding interest in productivity, a great culture, and people who want to stay and help us grow. 

Seeing People as People

I believe that my first job as a leader is to make sure that people feel seen and valued as human beings. I must listen, build a relationship, and support their growth. By doing the hard work of seeing myself and working through my own identity issues, I am freed up to now aim my focus on supporting each individual on my team.

Part of seeing and hearing people is creating a culture where that’s possible. As Patrick Lencioni says in Five Dysfunctions of a Team, “Trust is vital.” As a mere human, I, too, want to feel seen and be allowed to be human at my job. I want to come to a place every day where my co-workers respect me, allow me to fail, lift me up. It’s one of the main reasons we founded this business: to shape and create our experience day to day.

When COVID revealed the cracks in our business and we reconstituted in 2021, I started by sharing with the team how I was struggling (in addition to where I was kicking ass). In the professional group I'm a part of — Entrepreneur’s Organization — we call this the 5 percent. That means that we don’t have to share all the little details of our lives. What I do expect is that we get to the deep, hard, important stuff fast, together. That’s where we all need transformation. As a leader, I started framing my story of failure as the key stepping stone to growth. This practice has given the team permission to be human.

We started having team retreats and virtual gatherings throughout the year where we always begin with personal updates and sharing what each of us is learning/struggling with. At first, it was scary for people. Could they trust us with this story of where they’re stuck, what they don’t know? Could they share stories about where they’re failing at work or in life?

Quickly, and because the expectation was to just listen to each other and be present (not fix or take it on), a barrier crumbled between us all. We were all of a sudden connecting at a deeper level, and feeling validated. 

I started to bring this “seeing” into our daily lives on Slack (we’re fully remote, with team members all over the country). I would admit when I dropped the ball, ask for help, call out the courage of a team member who did the same. It’s now the CULTURE.

Staff have reported things like: I don’t feel like I’m putting on a mask to come to work — my life and work persona are one and the same, and so I feel excited to be here and contribute. It’s intensely healthy. 

I started framing my story of failure as the key stepping stone to growth. This practice has given the team permission to be human.

Walking the Walk 

It all comes down to leading with integrity.

Agency life is intense. And we have extremely high expectations for quality and client service. I realized that to get my team to push themselves upward and do hard, big things, they need to feel entirely supported and guided. I had to make it truly ok to fail. I had to reframe failure — not as the end — but as a critical step to understanding and growth. Immediately, our team began to really think and work innovatively. With permission to fail at something, people became more willing to put themselves and their ideas out there. The business started changing for the better, fast.  

People became more willing to put themselves and their ideas out there. The business started changing for the better, fast.  

My team has told me that they see us partners working hard day in and day out to deliver our brand promise and live up to our own expectations. We’re “in the pit” with them. We show them our commitment to them as well as to the vision of our company, every day. We talk about it openly, but not in a defensive or pressured way. We take ownership of our actions and celebrate all of the little and big moments when we live up to our vision. 

The magic is in finding the delicate balance between having high expectations of a team and allowing them to be human. In the end, we’re a business that needs to make a profit to support our lives and families. Creating and maintaining a healthy tension between the demands of the job and being humans in an imperfect world is our job as leaders.

When that balance was off at Smith & Connors, I can tell you that it didn’t feel good to be here. It’s a wholly different experience now.

The magic is in finding the delicate balance between having high expectations of a team and allowing them to be human.

Building (and hiring for) an Entrepreneurial Mindset

This job is not for people who want to sit back and be told what to do. In a small agency like ours with a vision like ours, everyone needs to pitch in and do things they’ve never done before. People have to be comfortable with being in challenging situations every single day — and seeing it as an opportunity to expand.

Now, I love being an entrepreneur, but not everyone does! So, how have we built a team of people who lean in, take risks, and leap off the cliff with me?

It has to begin in the hiring process.

I realized that a critical factor to our team’s synergy and success was in finding people who are naturally entrepreneurial. I’m always looking for this mindset. We ask questions like “tell me a time when you failed in your job, and how you handled it?” I recall one candidate who immediately pointed out how others were to blame for their failure. That was an immediate disqualification for us. Not only do we want to see people take accountability for their mistakes, but we want to see that they’re not afraid of it.

I like to ask leaders “how deep are you willing to go for change?” Ultimately, within an organization, I believe that it all starts with us.

Lastly, books that have helped me: 

• Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick M Lencioni
• Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity by Kim Malone Scott
• The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership: A New Paradigm for Sustainable Success by Jim Dethmer