Humility in Business is a Cheat Code

Summary

• Always maintain humility to avoid getting consumed by pride and ego, which can harm your ability as a leader to grow and to effectively manage your team.
• Remember that true power is a danger without humility; it can lead to you becoming untouchable and treating others poorly, which has ruined businesses.
• Avoid letting success go to your head; I saw this firsthand when some gym leaders at Gym Launch became arrogant and their team's opinion of their leadership plummeted.
• Make decision-making about what is right, not who is right, as this fosters team growth and focuses on achieving collective goals over individual accolades.
• Prioritize hiring and promoting individuals who show humility and fire those who are driven by ego and pride; skill alone shouldn't warrant a promotion if teamwork is being compromised.
• Understand that humility is a better indication of potential than overconfidence; an inflated self-view stunts growth and impacts the whole team negatively.
• Being open to admitting to having deficits is key to personal growth and team progress.
• Acknowledge your mistakes openly, create solutions to prevent repetition, and then move on without dwelling on them; this encourages a culture of learning and accountability.
• Don't be afraid to ask for help; it builds relationships, is a sign of strength, and contributes to the success of the entire team.
• Practice active listening by exploring, acknowledging, and responding properly during conversations; this will make you a better teammate and leader.
• Remember that improvement is continuous; identify your weakest skill related to humility and commit to working on it.
• Humility isn't self-doubt or silence; it's having an accurate assessment of your strengths and weaknesses and using them to contribute effectively.
• Always give credit to your team rather than seeking individual recognition, and avoid becoming defensive or resistant to change due to pride.

Video

How To Take Action

I would suggest focusing on reminding yourself that you're part of a team, and it's not just about "me," but about "us." Here's a plan to put humility into practice:

1. Stay Grounded: Every day, take a moment to remind yourself that you are part of a bigger picture, and that you didn't get where you are alone. A quick look at customer feedback or employee suggestions can keep you grounded.

2. Decision Making: When you have to make a decision, think about what's best for the team, not just what's best for you. Write down the team benefits of any major decision you're considering.

3. Hiring and Promotions: When you're thinking of promoting someone, look for signs of humility in their behavior. Are they team players? Do they share credit? Keep a list of these observations to help make informed decisions.

4. Learn from Mistakes: When something goes wrong, openly say, "I made a mistake," and think of one action to prevent it from happening again. Write it down and share it with your team.

5. Ask for Help: If you're stuck, ask someone for a hand. This can be as simple as, "Hey, you're really good with organizing, could you give me some tips?"

6. Listen Carefully: When someone is talking to you, really listen. You can practice this by asking questions like, "Can you tell me more?" or "Did I understand that right?"

Remember, these aren't big, expensive changes. You're just adjusting how you think and act a little bit each day. If you're not sure where to start, pick the one area you think you need the most help with and focus on that first. Maybe you need to get better at asking for help or listening. Work on that for two weeks and then pick a new area to improve. It's about taking small steps toward becoming a better leader and teammate.

Quotes by Leila Hormozi

"Talent is god-given; be humble. Fame is man-given; be thankful; conceit is self-given; be careful"

– Leila Hormozi

"Power is dangerous unless you have humility"

– Leila Hormozi

"Hire and promote for humility, fire for ego and pride"

– Leila Hormozi

"When making a decision, be concerned with what is right, not who is right"

– Leila Hormozi

"High performance does not equal a promotion"

– Leila Hormozi

Full Transcript

I want everybody on this team to understand what it means to have humility and you understand how to apply this to every decision and take action on what we talk about today there's a story of this guy who basically it was the Roman Empire back in whatever BC who knows long time ago right and there's a general who he won like the greatest battle that they had in all of the land and so this guy goes he wins this battle and everyone's prais him when he comes back and they're all saying like you're our savior you saved us you're our leader while this is all happening he like comes back into the village and everyone is like oh my God you're amazing they're all like praising him and as he's coming back through he actually asks one of his men to get down and repeat something to him the entire time while everyone's saying like you're amazing you saved us he asked this guy to repeat this which was you're only a man you're only a man you're only a man why did he do that because he understood the danger of letting the attention go to his head right and so he knew that by remaining humble he had a higher likelihood of winning the next battle and so he sought to maintain his humility I love this quote by John Wooden Talent is god-given be humble Fame is man-given be thankful conceit is self-given be careful and so humility is the anecdote to Pride that can come from recognition and fame and by making an everyday choice to credit others and not just ourselves we remain open to continue growing as leaders and make room to celebrate the success of not just ourselves but all of everyone around us so why is this so important I love this quote as well power is dangerous unless you have humility how many times have we seen this ruined businesses I know that us on the portfolio side we have seen this time and time again with multiple Founders where it's like they start to get successful and they start to get more power and then all of a sudden they think they're Untouchable they think they have no room to grow and they start treating other people poorly and so power is dangerous unless you have humility so the reason I want to talk about this with you guys today is because actually I experienced this seven years ago in gym launch I had a handful of young I would say insecure leaders uh in gym launch who aspired to be big leaders one day I love when people are aspiring leaders and they want to be poured into and they want to be help like that's probably my favorite thing to help people do is like I think most people on this team probably feel that way it's like you like helping others right you like helping people achieve their goals you like pouring into people and so what did I do and what did everybody else on the leadership do poured into them mentored them and praised them into their potential right and so we took these people who were very green um and gave them a lot of Praise gave them all the credit like constantly trying to do that and I that's something I focus on a lot is like I always want to be giving people credit what happened was that I didn't warn them of this old saying just that nothing Fails Like success and so what happened was that those leaders that were the very young insecure humble leaders they became what I would call as like drunk with power like legitimately they started suppressing other people around them they started claiming all the success for themselves and worse off they started to put their personal success above the teams and so there was this complete switch and I think a lot of that happened guys because the company was very successful it became very successful very fast we became number one in the industry and you know what it got to people's heads they started thinking oh my doesn't stink like like I'm the world's best at sales marketing CS whatever it was right when in fact even myself I think that we just got lucky to a very large degree but I started watching like people on the team like letting all of this stuff get to their heads and I was like gosh I don't think I've done a good job of making people aware of this and so what happened was we had this tool called office Vibe and I remember two of the leaders they had ratings where they were in the top 998th percentile of leaders and that went to less than 50% within 8 months what does that mean that means their teams think that they became shitty so their teams literally said they became worst leaders and it really sucked for me to see it happen I don't want that to happen here and so a leader who lets success get to their head becomes a bully truly it's like you look at the difference between a hero and a villain it's like the story is the same it's just like what they choose to do with the power that's why I refuse to make the same mistake twice instead I just want to educate everybody on what humility and true leadership actually looks like how can we apply humility to how we show up As Leaders three things one when making a decision be concerned with what is right not who is Right second hire and promote for humility fire for ego and pride that's how I look at it and I want to share that with everybody here so you guys know and third is in order to admit that you have deficits that's how you grow when making a decision we want to be concerned with what is right not who is right what does that look like we need teammates who do not get offensive or emotional that if they're wrong but instead insist on finding the best solution for the the company and the team right so we need people who think what is the best decision for the team rather than the best decision for me this is how I make decisions constantly thinking trying to put myself honestly just out of the equation because often times the best decision for this company is going to be the most uncomfortable for me because I'm like gosh I'm going to have to tell I'm going to retrain these people on this I'm going have to get this many people hired I'm going have to change this I'm to reset these expectations reset these rules it's like you have to put that aside and put aside the short-term pain you're going to have to incur and rather just say like what makes the most sense given the vision of where we're going and our values of how we want to get there and so we need people who sacrifice their own status if you look at people who are the best teammates they will constantly do that they don't care if they look stupid in front of the group they want to do what's best for the group and there's a difference between trying to look good in front of people and trying to do your best and so it's people who are more concerned with making the right decisions than getting the credit for them the second piece is hire and promote for humity and we fire for ego and pride right and this is just how my brain works like if somebody in this in this company is the Michael Jordan of their division but they're a complete you will not be on this team I don't give a how good you are and I would like everybody in this company to understand that because that one person they stand out because they step on others and if you actually read the uh biography of like Michael Jordan or any of these great players the reason they were able to be great is because they learned how to be a te teammate so read any of their biographies that's a key piece in all their learnings is that they realized they could not be great on their own unless they understood how to interact with the entire team and so high performance is not equal a promotion right half the time would allow somebody to be a high level individual contributor right stunts their growth in a leadership position especially because a lot of the times when you are an individual contributor right you do things that you get credit for and what happens that a lot of people on this team could tell you when you move into a leadership position you don't get the credit anymore ask people who get promoted people like I'm so excited to be promoted okay what happens is that you now get measured on your team's performance and all the praise goes to your team not necessarily you and so that is part of stepping into a leadership position and it's say to be expected question is do you know how many Star performers never make it to the Championships over 80% do you guys know why this is because humility is a better indicator of potential than confidence is much of the times because if you are incredibly confident in yourself but you cannot be a teammate you can't be humble and you can't Corral other people together and collaborate with other people then nobody's going to want to talk to you they're not going to be around you and you ultimately if you do that make the average of the team lower so a lot of times what it is is that one person stands out you know they're a nine out of 10 or a 10 out of 10 but the reality is it's because they're suppressing everybody else on the team and it inflates the difference and if you think about it right when someone is unskilled in their own area they often don't also see their flaws and they're overconfident has anyone ever seen that and then for a lot of people on the other side it's the people that are second guessing themselves they're feeling insecure but it comes naturally to them and therefore they don't recognize as strength because it isn't hard and so that's what a lot of people refer to as humble and so Pride looks like someone who refuses to be flexible because in being flexible they may in turn be wrong prideful people hate to be wrong and they're going to argue their point of view every step of the way so I just want you guys to understand what this looks like it's getting defensive it's arguing our point it's not being open-minded to what other people have to say being very defensive like this is my area this is my point this is my thing right it's like what this is this is our team this is we're all going towards the same goal and we should absolutely share our perspectives and points of views and and we should be open to those things and be open to being wrong you know sometimes people will give me an idea and it sometimes they come from you guys in the surveys and I'm like oh that's so good yeah I'm should not be doing it the way I'm doing it it what it's not like you have the experience being a CEO and you're telling me it's like it's coming from somebody who has no experience but they have a really valuable perspective and so what I'd love is if everyone in this team can take that same perspective which is like the more perspective you can gather and take into consideration on the things that you're doing the way that you act the way that uh you develop yourself I think the better you'll be and so example one would be we have a prival teammate accepts no feedback or becomes defensive when it's given right and then they play victim and often blame others for having a poor perception of their behavior has anyone ever seen that on a team of somebody who's like oh God everyone thinks I'm this way but I'm not you're like yeah I'm pretty sure it's it's just because you're like that example two would be that a primal teammate doesn't respect anybody else on the team they talk down to others and use their power to suppress others and make themselves look better anyone ever seen that where it's like someone taking credit for something that you've done and you're like what right so ego looks like someone resistant to change because it goes against the belief they have or way they things want to be a way they want things to be and if they accept that it needs to be changed is also mean that they're wrong right and so if you see someone being very defensive in the way of doing something and saying like can't do that won't do that Etc even if it seems like it comes from a place of fear it's also coming from ego it also looks like someone taking all the credit for a teams work rather than giving it to others right so like leaders in this company we want people who are constantly giving credit to teams not people who are taking credit themselves and if you aspire to be a leader you will give credit to everybody around you rather than take it yourself another example of this right is sometimes what you see is people start over hiring for a department because they want to claim they have a big team feels good to people's egos the second example of this is a leader who refuses to give up tasks and projects now they may not do this consciously but subconsciously because what does that also mean it also means you give up credit when they're actually successfully completed I think one of the reasons that it's hardest for somebody to move for example from like a salesperson to a sales manager role is because when you're a salesperson you're constantly getting reinforcement from the sales and getting like great job thumbs up like so so good close the sale and then when you move up into managing a sales team nobody says jack to you it's like it it's like all you ever hear is probably one like hey why is the team low today and then you're like man I kind of miss selling like I made money every time I like was on the phone and people tell me I did a good job and so it's funny because in our portfolio companies I talk about this where it's like I get why that's a hard transition I myself did it where it's like you're constantly getting praised and then you move into a position where like you're not getting any of that and you're not getting the the I would say like high of even like closing a sale so there's multiple things that you lose and the last example of Pride would be a Mander who does not give his or her team time and training necessary to be successful so you see some people that do this so they can exaggerate their own importance in the company right to look like they're needed again I'm giving this to you guys not saying that anyone here does this but I'm trying to protect us so that if somebody makes their way in here who does this you guys push them out this is not acceptable we don't want anybody who does this and I think that the reason I want to convey this in these trainings is because I want you guys to do that for me I don't see everything people act way differently in front of me than all of you I know that may be surprising but everyone's always on their best behavior when they talk to me and so most of the time I'm like wow everyone's amazing I never see anything bad and so it really is the job of this whole team to listen to what I'm saying and be able to spot it we're going to add probably double the team this year and so there's going to be a lot of people that come in we're not going to hire every person as the right person and so we need to know if these things are being seen because ultimately we are all stewards of the business and if one person sees something it's likely that somebody else has also experienced it and lastly micromanaging people who micromanage because they don't have confidence in their team often because they themselves are just insecure right because if you lack belief in yourself you probably lack belief in others right that's something we don't want to have here we don't want people who are micromanaging not delegating not giving people the opportunity to fail and I think that a lot of teams a lot of people they 's a stigma around failure that's not something we have here it is totally fine to fail and fall on your ass and I actually think the more that you fall on your ass and the more that you look stupid in front of other people on this team the higher up you will be able to go because it shows that you're not fearful of making progress and lastly not letting an idea go because it was their idea or they're being above the work right and I think a lot of the times we do see this uh in team settings which is like you want to do something because it's your idea but then somebody gives you a different idea and maybe because of who it came from or how they said it you're not open to it but then in the back of your mind you're like that's probably a better idea and so I think that it takes an extra layer of muscle to say even if I don't like who that came from or the way it was delivered is it still a better idea than mine and like I can tell you that happens all the time with me me and Alex and Dr cashy like they'll say stuff to me and they'll be like oh that thing you did yeah that's wrong wrong wrong wrong and like the way that they deliver it it's not the way I sometimes want to hear it and I this is open conversation which why I'm sharing you here but then I'll sit back and think and I'm like you know what you're but you're right like I could totally do it better if I did it this way and it's not about who is right it's about what is right and what's going to get us towards our goal and lastly the third thing is that in order to grow we have to admit that we have deficits right because you can't receive feedback if you don't believe that you have room to improve you will also not be open to feedback if you use excuses that are tied to character traits I've always been this way this is just who I am I have heard that in people in this team I've always been this way I've never been able to do that this is always who I am so you have been repeating the same behaviors for many years you have a lot of past experience to indicate that you have a lot of practice acting this way I I'll give you common examples like learning to be organized that's not a personality trait that's a skill you know uh learning to regulate your emotions not a personality trait it's skill you know learning to be attentive and focused that's a skill and so I think a lot of the time times if we want to be open to growing as a teammate on this team we have to realize that any excuse we hide behind it's just making it easy for us to continue doing that behavior and often times it just means that we have a lack of a skill and I think that luckily there's a lot of people on this team that do have skills that other people don't and so if for example you're listening this you're like yeah you know I have been saying that I'm just not X I'm just not why it's like well there's someone on this team that has that maybe I can ask them for help so those who grow the most most I would say are the most fluid in their identities with this you stand up for your values you stand up for your beliefs but you remain flexible in how you act this is some of my favorite sayings it's not a do right it's a do not a who right it's what you do it's not who you are so like being organized acting focused you know being flexible those are all skills they're not part of who you are and so you know in order to move up into a leadership position for example those are skills that people have to acquire and I think something really cool that uh Neil's been working on is kind of like we're putting together like a little rubric of what those skills are to be clear for everybody of like what that looks like in the company but just to be clear I think that this is probably one of the biggest things that blocks people is they say like that's just not who I am I've just never done things that way well well why could you not learn you know what I mean and so I think Defending Your deficits is the shest way that you're going to stunt your growth and the team that surrounds you so anytime you catch yourself it's like watch yourself are you defending the deficits that you have and I think that every time for me like I've personally grown a lot it's been when I finally said to myself like this is and you need to stop defending this because it's stopping me from growing right and the funny thing is that how does a company grow company grows when the people in it grow and so in my opinion if you look at a company what's the only appreciating asset in it people are the only asset that we can continue to Compound on our skills time and time again pretty much everything else in a company if not taken care of gets worse over time but people are the on one thing that can continue to get better now that we've established what humility is right and what it means I want to clarify for one for a larger segment of the population what it is also not being insecure and uncertain of oneself that is not humility okay only letting others speak and never voicing your actual opinion that is not humility constantly people pleasing that is not humility beating yourself up for your deficits and only focusing on the negative think about this too if you beat yourself up you are literally becoming a victim of of yourself this is not humility either humility exists on a spectrum so on one side what I just referred to cility which is overly attentive to one's weaknesses and oblivious to their strengths now I would say that a lot of really great leaders start here and because they are so oblivious they try very hard so I would actually always rather over index on that side of the spectrum than the opposite so I'll just say if you relate then I wouldn't say it's a bad thing now on the other side you have people who are overly attentive to their strengths and oblivious to their weaknesses in my opinion this one is harder because you have to get someone to see where their deficits are which is like an extra step in the process but in the middle we have where we'd like to get to right which is an accurate assessment of one's strength and weaknesses so that is where humility sits it is just an accurate assessment of what your deficits are and what you're good at so I was having a conversation yesterday with one of our CEOs and he was saying he's like you know I'm really struggling with the fact that I think that I know what we need to do in this situation but I've got these two other stakeholders that I have to Loop in and I was like you're very good at making decisions you should make the decisions he was like I don't want to sound arrogant he literally said that and I was like having an accurate assessment of what you're good at is humility it doesn't mean you're arrogant it means that you're using your resource like yourself as a resource to the company in the best way possible because you recognize what you're good at and when you recognize what you're good at you can apply that strength to areas that's needed in the company this case it was decision-making and he's like you're right I should probably do that and so this is also permission to all of youve like if you have something you're really good at you should be vocal about it and also try and apply it there's nothing wrong with that it doesn't mean that there's like you're arrogant to any degree it's like thank you for taking your strengths and applying them in the company like we would like to utilize everybody's skill set and so I really like this quote by Clayton Christenson we decided that humility was defined not by self-deprecating behaviors or attitudes udes but by the esteem with which you regard others generally you can be humble only if you feel really good about yourself and if you want to help those around you feel really good about themselves too I love that quote because I think it it nicely ties the two sides together and so here's what I want to do next I want you guys to grab something to write with or pull up like a pad on your phone or your laptop whatever you're on right now because what I want to do is that spectrum that I just referenced I want us to figure out where you sit on that so we're going to assess ourselves we've got what we call the Four A's of humility here's the Four A's we've got ask for feedback acknowledge mistakes ask for help and actively listen if you look at all across like all the different things that go into humility I would say these are the top four skills are there other skills surrounding it sure but like if we break it down into what I think is most applicable for everybody here I would say it's these four so the first one is ask for feedback I want to make this really Tactical for you guys there are two rules in asking for feedback these are really really important one ask specific questions general questions lead to general answers vague questions lead to vague answers so if you're like how do you think I did like I hate when people ask me that question I really do I'm not gonna lie like I'm just like uh good you know because because if they didn't do amazing you're like uh bad like what do you want me to say it's just like you're going to get it's not going to be the best answer from the person now the second rule and this is following what we talk about with praise versus punishment ask what you can do better in the future rather than what you did wrong in the past we don't want to say like how do you think I did a great alternative would be something like what's one thing I could do next time to make that a 10 out of 10 so like for me if I was like I'm going to ask the team for feedback after I do this if I was just like how do you guys think I did like does it prompt a very specific answer probably not but if I were to say what's one thing I could do to make it a 10 out of 10 next time it's like okay I just need one thing that would make it a 10 out of 10 paints it in a positive light as well if we look at questions to ask for those of you who want to ask for feedback I've put what I think are like the top five what could I do to make that a 10 out of 10 what one thing if I did differently would improve this the most on a scale of 1 to five how did I do what would raise it to a three what would raise it to a four what would raise it to a five what is one thing I could do more of to make Le this better what is one thing I could do less of to make this better these are fantastic questions to ask people because if you ask specific questions you get specific directives and directives move you forward towards where you want to go rather than asking for vague feedback about how you did which just makes you feel shitty and so again if we're like taking the frame of Praise versus punishment we don't want to ask for punishment like half the time when someone's like how do you think I did they get insulted people like H you know I actually not that long ago asked somebody when I did a a speech I was like how do you think that was they're like could have been better and I was like Jesus okay that was a terrible question to ask and now I feel shitty about myself wish I never asked it but I didn't do a great job asking for feedback in the way that I was going to get the best answers right I probably could have said something like hey what's one thing I could do more of to make this better that would have probably gotten me a better answer so here's what I want you guys to do we're going to rate our scals on a scale of one to five on asking for feedback so one is you're very bad at this you ask general questions and you ask about how you did in the past five is you ask specific questions and you ask future pacing questions what can I do better next time what would make this a 10 out of 10 so I'd like you guys to just take 15 seconds to write down where you fall on that scale let's move on to the second one we're going to do something and share at the end acknowledge mistakes acknowledging mistakes has really three parts the first part is just admitting that you made a mistake so I think in a lot of companies you guys have probably been at places where they want you to hide mistakes there's one thing I want from you it's that you're honest and what does honesty mean to me it means that you admit that you made a mistake I will take somebody who admits they make mistakes over somebody who doesn't make mistakes all day right because everybody makes mistakes I make mistakes all the time I'm sure you guys see half of them and so I want people to know that's okay but if you perpetuate a culture of hiding mistakes you perpetuate the problem that might have existed in a past company you've been at right where everyone doesn't talk about where they up where they make a mistake or when they're not feeling great and so the first piece is just admit it and exclaim it hey team I just want to let you know that that Miss on Thursday it was actually my mistake I mixed up blah blah blah which resulted in the error just own it be honest about it and then the second piece is act on it and again exclaim it I have already put up into place a process in a so this doesn't happen again moving forward this is to prevent any errors from occurring or missteps here's a link to that thank you all for understanding you don't need to dwell on it you don't need to excuse it you don't need to even say why it happened you just need to say what you're going to do better next time I don't care what happened I just care that you took precaution so that next time it doesn't happen because what is learning same condition new Behavior so if we make a mistake and then we have no new behavior that occurs then that means we didn't learn if you make a mistake and you take action on it means that you learned and that is what's most important and then the last piece is move on once the mistake has occurred there's so much time especially people in this team that are hard on themselves and try very hard to be a 10 out of 10 all the time you rob yourself of the time you could have spent focusing on the solution by dwelling on the mistake this is something I did for years and I think it was about three years ago that I realized I was just done with it because it literally makes you worse you beating yourself up you dwelling on a m taking any time you're just robbing yourself of future potential to actually do better next time and so there's a lot of studies on this it doesn't help you doesn't help anybody around you no point in doing it so again we make a mistake we want to own it and we want to say what we're going to do better next time and then move on that's it so let's rate ourselves on a scale of one to five one being I don't admit that I make mistakes and if I do I don't always change my behavior five being I always own my mistakes and I make sure that I put something in place so it doesn't happen again third piece is ask for help asking for help is a skill When someone tells me that they don't ask for help I'm not impressed the best teammates ask for help in the areas they're deficient they're learning or they realize it creates an opportunity for another teammate in terms of growth recognition team bonding the best people I know that are the most successful are really good at asking for help now do they ask for help all the time no but when they need it they have an accurate ability to assess their own deficits right and so then when they have an area of deficit they're able to say like hey there would be a better outcome if I asked this person for help who's good at this so for me I have plenty of areas of deficits which is why we have an entire team right if like I didn't it was like that wouldn't make sense so a lot of the times I'm constantly bringing people in because I'm not the best person for something especially the fact that I'm not doing your jobs for you half the time people come to me like what do you think of this I'm like I don't know you're the one doing it every day how the do I know you know like I have no more information than you but I'd say that that is something that I've worked on a lot over time which is like when do you ask for help and so these are three things that really helped me when I understood why asking for help is such a positive not just for you asking but for the person who's asked the first one was relationship building if we didn't ask each other for help we wouldn't have a lot of opportunities to bond with each other and so every time you ask somebody for help you have the opportunity to form a deeper relationship with that person my favorite thing to do is people that you're trying to form a relationship is put them on a project together because then they have to help each other to get to the end goal the second is usefulness people like to see the result of their help does anybody here like when someone asks them for help and then you like crush it and it really works yes so people like feeling useful and most often it's like they like seeing the impact that their help has so if you ask somebody for help and then you take the credit for the thing at the end and give them no credit and don't show them what happens at the very end they're probably not going to to help you again but if you show them the impact of what their help did they're likely going to want to do it again and help more people on the team and lastly is recognition people do more of what they're praised to do and so if you praise somebody in public for helping you with something they also will want to do it again because they like getting praised in public and there's benefits for both of you what does asking for help look like I would say this is like the perfect way to frame it hey name I'm really struggling with producing enough calls for the sales team I know you have some really great ideas about how to do that I was wondering if you had some time where we could work together towards the solution to book more calls and I think it would have a huge impact on the team it's like who's going to say no to that but I think that a lot of the times rather than asking for help we just remain quiet we say oh I don't want to bug that person I don't want to nag that person they've got too much work people love getting asked to help with stuff people love feeling useful and like other people need their help and so you actually do them a favor by asking if you've ever been the type of person that's like I don't like to ask for help I don't need to ask for help I just want you to know that doesn't help the team so here's what we're going to do rate ourselves on a scale of 1 to five one is I never ask for help and when I do I probably don't praise that person or recognize them enough for it and a five is I'm great at asking for help and I always give recognition to the people that help me last one you've got actively listen people who are on the side of arrogance when it comes to humility right and they start off off over there often times you talk to them you don't really feel hurt and so active listening I think would be more for that end of the spectrum and the reason that it's a skill when it comes to humility is because of these things people are going to talk more to people who they know listen to them if you want more people to talk to you you show them that you listen if people don't talk to you you might not be a good listener that's just it if you're like not a lot of people talk to me not a lot of people come to me maybe you're a bad listener that's also okay that is a skill it's not like you were born with a listening skill this is something that we can work on I just want you guys to understand the reason this is an important skill is because in a team you want engagement and activity when it comes to communication you want more people talking at more points in time and so to do that if you want more people to talk to you you show them that you listen that's it it's honestly that simple like I don't it's like why is active listening important because people won't talk to you if you don't listen that's that's literally it they'll avoid you and they would rather talk to somebody else it might not be the right person to solve the problem or to talk to but they're going to talk to that person so what does that look like an active listening skill there's really three pieces to it the first is explore so it's literally just asking open Ed questions followed by probing oh interesting okay is there anything else that you would add there can you help me understand that piece that you just said about this is there anything else that you would put of this part so you're basically exploring the questions that they're asking I would say someone on our team that does this really well is Neil is fantastic at active listening I don't know if you guys ever noticed but like he's nodding his head and then he's asking for more he's like oh interesting okay what about this what about that what about this very good at doing that so that's the first piece we explore we actually if you're actually interested in what someone's saying you do this naturally but if you're not interested and you're more distracted with something else you're doing this is something you're going have to work on uh because normally it's just curiosity based questions and so if you're not curious you kind of have to manufacture it the second piece is acknowledging and this is literally just getting the person to acknowledge that you understand him or her not the other way around so it's literally if I understand you correctly this is what you meant right and so a lot of the times when me and Alex are talking because we communicate differently he's going to say a bunch of stuff to me and then I'm going to be like what did that mean like what about this what about that what about and so then I have to say okay can you I I asked like probably like 27 questions I'm like what about this what about that like he's telling me the book launch plan right so I asked like 17,000 questions and then I repeat back to him what I think he meant and what it actually what it means okay so this means this is the plan to launch the book right is that accurate and he's like yes I'm like got it and the last piece after you've done that is just respond and again this part is up to you there's no right way to respond to somebody but once you actually understand what the person has said your response is probably going to be more thoughtful and targeted so again explore acknowledge and respond that's is how we actively listen to someone what we're going to do is just rate ourselves on scale of 1 to five so one I do not show that I'm listening I I just sit there as the recipient of their words like a brick wall which is also okay we can work on that five is like you're very actively engaged when someone is giving you information um and you will ask questions until you comprehend what they say and people want to talk to you I'm telling you like if you look at people in the company who most people like talking to it's because they're good listeners what was your lowest score I want you to Circle it right now and then where can you improve to actually operationalize this humility take what you got from this presentation but I would make a very small one goal over the next two weeks just like a Sprint in terms of where your lowest score is and then commit to it and just let everybody know because you are more likely to achieve goals that you share with other people