Micheal Pacheco 0:00
All right. Hey, everybody, welcome once again to another episode of their markup coach podcast. As always, I’m your host, Michael Pacheco. And today with me, I have Jason Weber. Jason is the founder of SLI coaching and consulting. Jason serves a wide range of clients and teams as a coach and advisor, SLI coaching and consulting seeks to build leaders and teams who desire to make a positive impact in their work and lives. Jason, welcome to the remarkable coach.
Jason Weber 0:29
Thank you so much, I really appreciate the invite.
Micheal Pacheco 0:31
Yeah, thank you for making time to chat with me today. As always, I’d like to open the podcast by inviting our guests to just tell us a little bit more about yourself, in your own words, and what got you into coaching? Yeah, so
Jason Weber 0:43
I have been in the leader development kind of field for the last 12 plus years. And it really was a career change. I was at a point in my career where I wasn’t finding that joy in that satisfaction. And it was through a conversation with a mentor who said, you know, if you could do anything, kind of at this point, what would you do, and for me, it’s really the people development side, you know, and that could mean a lot of different things. And so I made the made the decision and was fortunate to have an opportunity to start out as a staff development employee, and, you know, over the last several years have worked my way up. And, you know, coaching has been, you know, within the last several years, and I’ve been able to do it both internally with organization that I work with, but then primarily been able to focus externally working with a wide range of clients, from the executive level, all the way down to those individuals who aspire to become leaders someday, or those who recently have become leaders and really want to gain a better understanding of how to establish a team. You know, I do a lot with teams, that’s really my passion area of being able to, you know, take a team, as I will say, with people, I love teams that are in conflict, because what a great opportunity to come in and provide that support, to guide them through whatever those challenges may be to create that most effective environment for them.
Micheal Pacheco 2:22
You say your life coming in? If there’s, you know, Team conflict, are you more? Are you more like? I mean, this is not a perfect metaphor. But are you like the the plumber that comes in when there’s water spraying everywhere? Or do you do you work preventatively with teams as well? Or what’s your sweet spot there?
Jason Weber 2:43
Yeah, and that’s that’s actually a great analogy, right. But, you know, teams that are really struggling to kind of take that next step. And again, I know that’s a vague answer, because it could mean a lot of different things. But, you know, really, specifically, you know, we focus on the overall effectiveness, if there’s conflict in the team, how do we create healthy conflict versus that negative? How do we balance that line between personal and professional knowing that they’re both going to be there? And if there is, especially new team members, what does that dynamic do? And how do we work through that, when there may be some kind of bumpy spots? Right? So there’s a lot of different avenues that I’ve worked with teams, I’m a big believer and advocate of servant leadership, uses a lot of just my own research and other applications of that field to create a space where we are able to recognize accountability in ourselves, but then also be able to hold others accountable when appropriate to do so in a manner that creates growth and not angst.
Micheal Pacheco 3:58
Hmm. Nice. Like you mentioned, one of the things you mentioned, there was kind of the idea of balancing the personal and professional, let’s get a little bit into the nitty gritty, if you don’t mind, tell us what does that look like? How do you balance that?
Jason Weber 4:12
Well, here’s an easy example. So if you are at work, you’re working with your peers, and maybe you offer a suggestion or you answer whatever question or whatever that may be. And somebody automatically comes up and says, I don’t like that idea. I don’t know that we’re not doing that. What tends to happen, you know, we tend to tense up, we kind of go back to our safe spot for me, I tend to get quiet, because I’m gonna go more into a listener more of an observer. I’m not going to engage at that moment that it’s just me. I’ve learned that about myself. But many times when we offer feedback, whether it be constructive or not, and obviously we want it to be constructive. We tend to autumn magnetically go to a personal. So if I were to say to you, you know, can I offer some feedback to that thought or that idea? Many times, what I find is that individuals will naturally go back to well, they’re coming after me. And that may not always be the case. In fact, most of the time, that’s not the case. So how do we recognize that in ourselves to be able to accept that feedback? Or accept that other opinion? Consider it and then make a decision as to? Yes, I want to go with that, or No, I don’t. But really, it’s helping individuals that when we’re creating that environment of accountability of ownership of responsibility, that we’re doing so through a work lens, and that when we’re evaluating and kind of considering the work that we’re doing, it’s through a professional lens, not a personal lens, because if it’s personal, then that’s a separate issue. And we need to figure that one out. Yeah, I tell teams all the time. You know, I’ll hear from individuals that say, well, but I don’t like somebody on my team. Honest, my response is, I don’t care. Because we don’t have work rules that say you must like everyone, on your team, but we do have work rules that say, you must treat each other professionally and respectfully. So there’s a difference there? And how do we identify and acknowledge that so that we can keep our to our keep our team moving forward, and not become derailed? When there is this back and forth between points of view?
Micheal Pacheco 6:41
Yeah, that’s interesting. So what do you do in a situation where, you know, team members may like seriously not get along? Because that’s, I mean, that in, in my estimation, as as a business owner, and as a team leader? That’s a big, that’s a big problem if two of the team members don’t get along? I mean, for me, of course, I guess it’s, it may be a little different, because we’re very, were relatively very small organization, right, less than 10 employees. But I mean, if there’s certainly if there’s two people who are otherwise working close together, and they don’t get along, like, what do you, what do you do there, if you think about it in terms of sports, right, if if if two teammates don’t get along off the ice, that relationship is going to reflect on the ice or on the field or on the court or whatever, you know, sport, you can only
Jason Weber 7:32
fake it for so long. And even with a smaller team, it’s actually more visible, it’s more impactful to a larger team, and you use that sports analogy. It’s not like we can just trade them away, or pick one trade the other way. So we can rebalance the team. Sometimes that might be nice. But you know, most of the time, we can’t. So here’s where I tend to find most of the challenges emerge. One, it goes back to and this is more of, again, a workflow type disagreement. And I understand you’re asking what the personal but here’s how I see they’re connected? What are the expectations that we have for each other? I tend to go back to looking at the team as a whole, to say, what are the expectations that we have for each other? And here’s what I mean by that. If we were to say, and I’m going to ask you this, if we said that we wanted to communicate effectively, how would you define that? Oh, man, never thought about putting you on the spot here. Right.
Micheal Pacheco 8:39
Now. I gotta think on my feet. A, how would you defect define, communicating effectively, I think, you know, communicating intentions and ideas with clarity. I think clarity is the word right, clarity. That’s it, that’s
Jason Weber 8:55
all. And but at the same time, you could also then hear from others that communicating effectively is being direct is being blunt, is being, you know, they may say, Oh, well, I get a body language response, or they nod their head or I hear yes, I hear what you’re saying. It could be a lot of things. And that’s, that’s the thing. A lot of times in our interpersonal relationships at work. It’s because there’s a misalignment on expectations of what we have for each other. So if I say are in how are we going to balance conflict, some may say, You know what, it’s not a big deal. We need to just put it aside and move forward. Well, from the outside, then we say well, but then that problems not resolved and others may say, well, we need to just tackle it head on. Okay, so we’ve got this disparity. So then what we need to do is we need to figure out okay, how can we come to a common ground? How can we where is it that we can both agree, and it’s literally saying all right, If we fail in this example, how do we want to respond to it? So when we’re talking about our expectations, what we’re getting at are, what are the behaviors that we expect of each other? Again, we’re talking about the behaviors at work in the moment, it’s the professional realm, we’re not talking about the behaviors of outside of work, this is how you should respond. That’s for outside of work, we’re talking inside of work now. Does that mean that those employees are all of a sudden going to get along? No, it doesn’t. But if we can start with our expectations, go back to ensuring that everyone is clear on what it is that is being asked of them. And they’ve agreed to those behaviors. So there’s some activities that we can do around that, then as a leader, it gives you that opportunity to keep it professional, meaning, if I need to have that accountability, conversation, listen, you know, you and I, we had discussed even as a team that we were going to approach the situation in this manner. What I observed was this, how do we need to move forward? Do we need to clarify do we need to, and what we’re doing is, then we’re naturally creating it to where this isn’t personal? Because we agree that this is how we wanted to respond to it. You’re not doing that? What do we need to do them? And it encourages that continuous conversation goes, I mean, then, you know, you think is that the goal where everyone gets along? I don’t know, you know, maybe for some teams it is. And if that’s the case, then we can talk other topics, such as emotional intelligence, psychological safety, kind of all of that, right? And how we can create that environment? How do we appropriately respond? So, again, it’s a rabbit hole, you know, when we talk about this is we can go a lot of different directions. But I think, you know, you had said, clarity. And I think, ultimately, that’s where we need to go is, do we still have clarity around what’s expected when we’re in this space?
Micheal Pacheco 12:12
Yeah. And that’s, that’s kind of the overriding, overarching theme that I’m taking away from that. And you said it a couple of times, is setting expectations and making sure expectations are communicated with clarity. And that, you know, I know what’s expected of me, you know, what’s expected of you? And if we can meet those expectations, or, you know, maybe exceed them, then then things go well, right. This is, this is a lesson that I have learned again, right, this is huge. I don’t think you’ve learned at once you you, you’ve learned time and time again, over the course of your lifetime. But this this past summer, we had some, you know, transparently, we had, we had a couple little bumps in the road with some new clients that we were onboarding. And the reason why we didn’t set expectations as well as we could have in that first phone call. Yeah. And it was like, it was like, okay, so then we went back through, and we looked at our SOPs and our processes, and we looked at our slide decks, and we’re like, Okay, where can we make changes here, so that the next client that we onboard, is going to be smooth as silk expectations will be set, and everything will go smoothly? I think that’s I mean, yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s a great one for any any kind of team any kind of relationship, right? It’s not just teams, it’s just relationships.
Jason Weber 13:42
Well, and I think, too, when one of the one of my favorite questions that I asked the team right out of the gate is, if there was one thing that we could improve on the team, and I only want one answer. There’s one thing what would that be, and 98% of the time, and I can say that confidently, at least for those that I’ve worked with, it’s communication. It’s the easiest to identify yet it’s the hardest to align. And, you know, it makes sense when we think about how we were all brought up the different experiences that we’ve all had in our life. And you can make sense why that’s a challenge and which is why we have to be overly intentional. And, you know, as some would say, as the leader we have to be that Chief reminding officer, right? Where we’re, we’re constantly reminding of remember, this is what we’re doing. Remember, this is what we’re doing, to try and keep that understanding going
Micheal Pacheco 14:37
and keep people in Yeah, keep people in alignment. Make sure everybody’s rowing the boat in the same direction. 100% How do you how do you recommend your clients do that? You have to have weekly standing meetings and like, you know, those there’s there’s certain bullet points that are gone over every meeting check ins that kind of thing or
Jason Weber 14:55
Yeah, and you know, there’s a there’s several different key ways that we do that. I I’m recently have been going back to the questions that we ask and working with the clients on what type of questions are you asking? You know, because they may be saying I’m not getting the information that I need. Okay. Well, let’s look at the questions you’re asking. So, you know, we can look at that row, you had mentioned your SOPs, kind of your procedures. And maybe that’s a road that we need to consider as well. You know, do individuals have clear understanding about what and this kind of goes back to the expectations? Do people have an understanding of what those processes are? Because if they don’t, then that kind of add some, okay, well, that makes sense. While they’re not doing it. It could be weekly check ins, it could be every team is a little bit different, especially now that we’re seeing so many more higher levels of hybrid work environments, remote work environments, and even those that are in person. It really depends. It’s fine, let’s find what works. I’ve worked with a variety of teams where one of my favorites, they said, well, we need you to help us communicate better, we need you to help us kind of get things back together. And I said, okay, and they said, but you got five minutes, that’s all we can give you. And I’m like, Oh, well, sure, right. I mean, that isn’t that always the challenge is trying to get time, but but again, you adapt to what you have, right. And I think as coaches, that’s what’s required of us, we need to be able to be adaptable, and be flexible. So instead of me saying, Alright, I’m gonna make it about me and come in and do this training and be in front of people. I’m jumping behind the scenes. And instead, what I’m going to do is I’m going to give you, the leader, a question sheet, right? And I want you to start focusing on this. So we can pull what you need, and we’ll build on it. So, you know, so much of it is let’s be as flexible as we can. Let’s be willing to try different things. I’m very much a type of person where? Well, let’s try it. I mean, let’s see, there’s only one way to know if this is going to work. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. So,
Micheal Pacheco 17:07
yeah. So with the understanding, then that, that it’s not necessarily formulaic, and that every team is a little bit different. What are some What are some common? Or or, you know, very effective questions that you have identified? What Yeah, what are some questions that you have identified as being very effective? To to reach these, these results?
Jason Weber 17:33
Yeah, and you know, and I think this is one, you know, considering our audience here of being coaches, you know, what are we trained to do is we’re trained to provide those open ended questions, we’re trained to ask those.
Micheal Pacheco 17:45
When I stop you there real quick. Jason, we also a lot of our listeners also are kind of peak performers and and managers and business owners that listen in because there’s, you know, we interviewed coaches like you that are giving tips and useful tips and tricks for leadership. So it’s a mixed bag. But yeah,
Jason Weber 18:03
thank you for that. Yeah. But But again, I you know, what I would say is, it’s the open ended curiosity type questions. So you know, as we I work with a lot of leaders around the idea of conversational intelligence. And that actually comes from an author Judith Glaser, who has a wonderful book out there on it. But we talked about the different levels of communication, the many different ways that we can approach it, and are we approaching it, where we are more closed off many leaders and many individuals that I’ve worked with, they are wanting to go into team meetings, wanting to go into these events where they’re trying to get information, and they want to control the space, they want to be able to be the one out front to, you know, give the ideas and give that because they feel like that’s my role. Instead, let’s, let’s scale it back a little bit. And why don’t we ask those questions of, you know, maybe here’s the challenge that we have in front of us, what are some ideas that we could potentially come up with? of those ideas? What do we like? What don’t we like? What barriers What challenges do we see, but so it’s really being that open ended? And that ability to pull that information out of our team members, because we got to remember, a huge disconnect that we see, especially with executives is getting the information from those frontline workers. Right. And we see a big disconnect there. We have that opportunity to create the environment where that is the norm by asking those questions. What are you seeing what are the challenges? What are the barriers that we might not be considering? And so being able to help change our language to the Alright, if we went this way, what are the challenges that you that you see, and I’ll say, you know, opposition, a common opposition that I hear to this says, I don’t have the time. But it doesn’t take a lot of time. Because if I were just to simply go into a meeting and say, Alright, so this is, this is what I would like to get some feedback on. So I want to open it up. What are your thoughts around? That? takes a couple minutes, right? And then Okay, let’s get back to business. But where can we find those areas to open up to get that additional feedback from our from our employees? Yeah,
Micheal Pacheco 20:28
I love I think that’s super important. And this is I’ll throw another analogy out there. And this is one that I’ve used a few times on this podcast with a number of different guests. But it always makes me think of Star Trek The Next Generation. Captain Picard was such a great leader. And one of the reasons why is because he didn’t ever presume that he knew everything. He was the captain of the ship, and he would hold conferences with his team leaders, the engineer, the doctor, security chief, right, all his different people. And he would ask them, like, what do you think? What do you think? What do you think? And he would gather the key information and then make a decision based on the intelligence of people with boots on the ground, essentially. Right? And that’s kind of what you’re talking about, with that disconnect between the C suite and frontline workers who have their noses in it day to day?
Jason Weber 21:26
You know, and it’s a I think it’s what type of culture do you want to have in your organization? And that is a question that I will ask leaders all the time, what kind of culture do you want? Do you value your employees feedback? Do you value their approach? Or how they do that? I mean, you brought them on board for a reason. Do you value that? And if you do, then how can we create that space? Where you’re able to gather that information in a meaningful way? Because again, that could look different depending on your industry? Depending on how you depending on how you want to create that culture? I mean, we know the leader sets the tone. So what type of a tone what type of an approach do we want to set?
Micheal Pacheco 22:15
Yeah, yeah, I like it. I think for you know, for, for my team, one of the things that I do is, I will require that if anybody comes to me with a problem, they also need to come to me with at least one preferably three options for solutions, or at least at least paths to get to a solution eventually, right? Give me Give me some ideas on how to fix this, don’t come to me with problems, I’ve gotten enough of my own. Right, come to me come to me with some some awesome ways, some ideas, some potential solutions. And that just it gets any kind of conversation like that gets started off on the right foot immediately. Because we can immediately start talking about the idea to get to a result. And that’s just that’s been a big help for us. And that may not work for everybody. But that’s just a thought I’d throw that out there.
Jason Weber 23:08
Well, I mean, what you’re talking about here is being solution focused. And I’m gonna go back to what type of culture do we want? Because ultimately, that’s what we need to be able to communicate. If I go back to our expectations, if I’m a CEO, or president or a vice president, and I’ve got my team and, and I’m saying, this is the kind of culture that I want. And I want people to be solution focused, I want them to come to us and say, Alright, here’s what I’m seeing as the problem. Here’s what I’m thinking, or here’s what I’ve tried. If we want that, then again, that goes back to the expectations.
Micheal Pacheco 23:43
Yeah. Yeah. Like, I want to circle back a little bit here, Jason, and talk about your clients. Who specifically are your client? Who is your ideal client? Now, you said you work with a broad range of people. But do you have, you know, an ideal client? And who are they?
Jason Weber 24:04
Yeah, so I would say, you know, those that are really those that are primarily thinking about how can they effectively or how can they best leave their team or guide their team? Many of the executives that I’m working with now are going through significant change in their organization? How do they bring the team along? How do they lead using different leadership styles? And how can we again, create that space that allows us to work through that change? So that has been really those are the areas that I enjoy the most is working with those leaders? Who are I got to really be able to rally my team around this we need to be able to, you know, see peak effectiveness in there. Those are those are the clients that I you know, again, enjoy working with
Micheal Pacheco 25:00
What are we talking about in terms of company size, team size? That kind of thing?
Jason Weber 25:05
Yeah, I’ve worked with teams that are as small as three to four, and teams that are, well, organizations that are up to 60,000 people. So it’s really again, I mean, it’s been a wide range. But, you know, for me, it’s, you know, if we have those leaders with the larger organizations, we’re going to drill down to individual teams, right? We’re going to start there and say, again, let’s focus on this team, what are our goals? What do we want to develop what’s worked with them? And then we can move on to others. I mean, we do need to be targeted in how we’re approaching it. One of the tools that I leveraged the most is a team effectiveness questionnaire, use this with teams to identify where are we in regards to our confidence around our roles? The purpose? Again, clarity of expectations, where are we in regards to outcomes? How are we in collaboration, so there’s a questionnaire that I use with all of my teams, it gives us a baseline. And then from those domains, it’s up to the team to say, Hey, this is where we want to start. And then we can break down to individual statements that lead to behaviors that they’re either struggling with, or maybe they’re not struggling, they just want to improve them. And so that’s been one of the avenues that I’ve utilized, you know, with current teams.
Micheal Pacheco 26:30
So it sounds like yeah, so so just to clarify, make sure I understand you’re working primarily with point teams, and not necessarily, for example, the executive suite and how that might trickle down into bigger teams or that.
Jason Weber 26:44
Yeah, and I do well, and again, I know we’re, I’m hitting this vaguely, but, you know, we’ve got, I do have some that I’m working closely with the president of the company, and serving more as an advisor for them, you know, and just kind of talking through some of these challenges, and really providing them the tools and resources they need. And I think an easier way for me to phrase that is I’ve got some who want me to be heavily involved, meaning upfront the face of it, and working specifically with the team members, a supervisor, maybe that next level, and I have other clients who are saying what I would what would help us the most is being more of that advisor. And so then I’m observing, and I’m then working with that executive to provide them resources for them to go and do. And I’m coaching them through how to best deliver what they think is going to be the best route.
Micheal Pacheco 27:38
Gotcha. Nice. And so with your suit, you’re serving kind of a broad spectrum of type of client. How do you where do you get your clients right now? How do you market your services.
Jason Weber 27:51
So a lot of mine come through just online marketing connections through I do publications, I write with several different magazines regularly speaking events, had several international events recently, but then also just kind of connections throughout my career, being able to really hit on those industries that, you know, there again, they’re going through significant change, it’s been very widespread. A lot of it is again, through just connections and events that I do.
Micheal Pacheco 28:23
That’s great. For those. For those who may be listening, who maybe maybe newer, lesser experienced coaches, how do you? How did you get into that kind of PR game where you’re writing articles for a few different publications, you’re doing public speaking? How do you How does one get into that?
Jason Weber 28:45
Man, that was that that was difficult, internally. And here’s what I mean, by that. I had to build the confidence to just do it. I think we have so many wonderful tools out there today. And I would encourage any professional, any coach, any individual who has interest, just start, I think LinkedIn is a wonderful space. And again, I’m not promoting only them. I know, there are a lot of great other resources out there, but you just go, you know, I’ve got some articles that are out there where I’ve only got like, two, two people who’ve read it. And it was one of my favorite articles, right? And I’ve got others that I’m like, Well, that one’s okay. But it just took off. And then from there, it was responding to magazines and publishers who are saying, Hey, we’re looking for new content, reaching out and saying, I’m going to submit this. What I was most afraid of was that a publisher was just going to look at it go no on to the next and I wouldn’t ever hear. But what I found is those that I worked the closest with, you know, they’re they’re saying, hey, send me a draft. Let’s collaborate on this. And they’ve been they’ve helped me tremendously in how I write articles and understanding what they’re looking for. And so I’ve ended up finding just by putting myself out there, more collaborators, right? Sure I get those every now and then they’re like, no. Okay, that’s fine. It doesn’t mean I can’t put out my own stuff, right. But it really is, I love what I do. I love the field that I’m in. And I love teaching and just getting stuff out there. You know, it’s, it’s just been, I’m gonna put myself out there. But the hardest time is the first time. I think once you get that, get over that. And maybe that’s not the best way to put it. But I think once we can overcome that, then you know, it really becomes far more enjoyable, especially now that, you know, I have SLI coaching, I can put it under there to say, Yeah, this is what you’re going to learn, this is what you’re going to find. And, you know, it’s just really been a lot of fun for me, that’s awesome.
Micheal Pacheco 31:01
This is this news to me that you can like that publishers will, you know, reach back out to you and say, let’s, you know, let’s try this, let’s work on this together, let’s make, you know, make a tweak here and make a tweak there. And and thinking about it, right, that kind of makes sense. Because it’s a win win for them. Especially if they know like, they know your content is good. But maybe you need some technical tweaks for a news style article or whatever, you know, whatever the format is, if they can help you take your ideas, they know your ideas are good. And they know they can get content from you every month, why wouldn’t they work with you to help because it’s going to be if they can train you to write well for their publication. They win in the future, right? So they put a little investment upfront to help you make some tweaks here and there. I mean, that’s, that’s, that’s brilliant, it totally makes sense. I love it.
Jason Weber 31:55
Well, you know, and at the same time, the webinars that I’ve now done with these companies came from that, and just the conversation. And I think what’s important is if you as the author, have a willingness to change, like, change up how you’re doing things, if you are open to that collaboration, it makes things a lot easier. You know, sure, if there are some things they want to change, and you’re like, nope, then say that, right? If you’re willing to partner and work with them. Yeah, I mean, good things will happen. I’ve just been amazed and just honored to be a part of different panels in webinars that I mean, come on, I never would have thought that, you know, people would want to hear my thoughts or my ideas, but it’s just putting it out there. And, you know, getting it going. And, you know, a good analogy that I had a good friend of mine, who’s a coach, as well, had said, think about how many people would you need to have a successful business, right, and everyone, it’s going to be different for everyone. But then think about how many people are in the city you live in? How many people are in the state you live in, and then the United States, right? There’s more than enough people out there potential clients. And it’s about finding what it is you’re the most passionate about what you love the most. And then through that is where you’re going to start finding those people who, you know, see things the same way. And they love it just the same way. And they need that. So, you know, don’t ever think that your content isn’t going to be valuable. Because you never know, right? You never know what is going to strike a chord for somebody and help them.
Micheal Pacheco 33:45
Yeah, that’s brilliant. So just to your your suggestion is just get started. Take that impostor syndrome, shove it into the closet, bury it was very, it was tough. And just do it. Make an app and just do it once.
Jason Weber 33:59
Absolutely. And, again, it’s the ability to put yourself out there some people really enjoy doing videos. I love doing podcasting. So I do it for my work. I do it for SLI, I don’t have to, but I do because I enjoy through that medium, right. So find what you love. And just start and it will naturally evolve the way it needs to.
Micheal Pacheco 34:28
Yeah, imperfect action is better than inaction. Exactly. That’s great. Jason, what Tell me tell me what does a typical engagement with you look like? Are you working with clients on a monthly retainer type basis? Do you have like a three or a six month program?
Jason Weber 34:44
Yeah, so I will. I will always, you know, compatibility with the client is top for me. I want to be able to meet with a potential client will of course talk goals what they want to get, but then I want to make sure that the client and I have good chemistry, I do have a large coaching network. I don’t know if this is normal or not normal, but I have no issues referring somebody to somebody else who I think may be a better fit for them, right. Because ultimately, if a client comes to us, they’re looking for support in some area, I want to ensure that they’re successful, right? So I want to first spend some time getting to know you at that point, for one on one executive coaching, I recommend no less than three months, just that’s been my best practice and what I’ve seen in the research, and just through my training with the ICF, or the international coaching Federation, no less than three months, all of my clients right now are on a six month or a one year engagement. And so I generally will do packages in that sense, I find if we if we do the package route versus a session by session, I get higher levels of engagement, higher levels of commitment, versus just doing a Alright, let’s do one session, and then I’ll let you know if I need you. So generally, that I do also offer speaking for either Keynote or session breakouts for conferences. And then for teams, I will also come in and work with teams again, on a set schedule, where we would administer the team effectiveness questionnaire only takes a few minutes to do. We’ll look at the data collectively as a team, and then build our engagements from there. Nice.
Micheal Pacheco 36:26
Yeah, I tend to agree from, from my experience in interviewing almost 90 coaches now on this podcast. That three months seems to be a good a good minimum for, you know, C suite level or just business leadership in general. any less than that? And it seems like you’re not really quite, you know, you might start to walk in the right direction, but you’re not really going to not quite gonna get there. Yeah. What sort of things did you struggle with when you first started coaching?
Jason Weber 36:58
Wow, confidence. I have no problem admitting that, right. I mean, your think about the work that we’re doing and what people are trusting you with, right? So I think really getting into my comfort zone, it was about also figuring out what type of a coach did I want to be, you know, don’t go into this. My advice for anyone is don’t go into this and say, I want to be a coach, and I’ll coach anyone, you’re going to struggle in that sense? What is your niche? What is it that you want to do? No, who to say yes to and who to say no to? It is okay, if you say no to a client, you know, and that that’s only been for the better of both of us. So I think, you know, once I figured out and got comfortable with all right, really, as I’m looking at my clients, as I’ve, as I’ve gotten more comfortable with knowing who I am and what I can provide, it’s realizing that, you know, I adhere, and I follow a lot of the servant leadership methodology in that thought process. And I need to know that our clients are going to be people focused, and they’re people centered. So I may not be the right fit for some of them. For teams, again, what are their goals? Where, where are their pain points that they know they want to go? And if they don’t, let’s explore that. But, you know, there needs to be a willingness and a drive to be able to move forward. So I would say again, who do you want to be as a coach? What contributions Do you want to offer into this vast field? that’s out there?
Micheal Pacheco 38:30
There are, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of opportunities for specializing in different things. And if you’re, if you’re just going out there to help everyone, you’re probably not really going to help anyone because no one’s going to resonate with that.
Jason Weber 38:44
Exactly. And I think that’s kind of the beauty of it. Right is with coaching is and I see it on on just through my own connections with different coaching organizations and an online is, I think it’s a wonderful to see, Hey, everyone, you know, I’m, I’m, I’m a coach, and I do I focus specifically on this type of a client, that’s wonderful. Because then when I come across that I can go, Hey, I’m not the person, but that one might be right. So let’s focus on and I think that’s just a huge advantage. Because, you know, we know with with with anyone that we all need different things. I know I resonate with some people, I don’t with others, that’s okay. But I want to be able to support and how to make sure that you’re getting the you know, whatever it is that you need.
Micheal Pacheco 39:32
Yeah, you you just you just mentioned right that you resonate with some and not others, and that’s okay. I would argue that that not only is that not not only is that okay, it’s actually a good thing. And the fact that you’re putting out content, whether it’s your articles or your podcasts or your speaking engagements. What you’re doing by putting out this content that comes from you, is the people that are going to read that blog HSU or listen to you speak, are going to either resonate with you or they’re not your pre qualifying clients. Right? So the people that don’t resonate with you, they would never work with you anyway. Exactly. Now, they’re not going to bother you for discovery call or a chemistry call and then not buy right as you’re saving yourself time. And what you’re doing is you’re finding the people that do resonate with you, the people that you know, they’re able to, especially with, with video or speaking engagements, right, this is this podcast, here’s a video podcast. So people are going to be able to not only hear what you have to say, but if they go and watch the video on YouTube, they can look at your mannerisms, the way that you talk, you know, they’ll they’ll hear what you’re speaking passionately about. And as they resonate with you, or don’t the ones that do resonate with you, those are going to be ideal clients, potentially, right, depending on their issue. But those are going to be clients, if they reach out to you. And they want to do a chemistry call, or a discovery call, whatever you call it. They’re the ones who are more likely to pull the trigger and buy anyway. It’s, it’s great. It’s great marketing, and it’s great relationship building, right? It’s all about the relationships.
Jason Weber 41:15
Well, you know, one of the one of the things that I love doing the most is, is building, you know, leader programs, in addition to all of this, but in my, you know, Monday through Friday, nine to five job, I focused specifically on building leader programs. And just earlier today, I was working with a leadership foundations group, and we were talking about influence. And really the key asset and the key thing that it comes back to is understanding people, right? All of this is about relationships and how we can connect, maybe we’re not a good fit. Now. We might be later. Right? And regardless, it’s not about do I like versus don’t I like it’s, you know, what type of value add can we give to each other so that, you know, they’re reaching the success that they want to see.
Micheal Pacheco 42:01
Yeah. And I think that’s that’s part of the the resonance that we’re talking about, right? If someone resonates with you, it’s not only necessarily because, you know, maybe they like your personality, but they also like what you’re saying, your content of what you’re saying it helps them in some way you’re doing that, you know that that value add, you’re giving them value ahead of time, I think it’s super important. I think it’s a smart way to market and run a coaching business. I really do. Jason, tell us about some big wins that you’ve had with some of your clients. Yeah, so
Jason Weber 42:33
one of them was actually a recent example. There was a team that I had been working with, I was asked to come in and work with and they had experienced significant turnover, they were turning people over like, it was crazy. And it was because of a culture. There was a lot of infighting, there was a lot of disagreement about how things should be done. When I started working with the team, I had asked them about their goals. And that very first session was difficult because they were just like, this is the way it is. And you know, from my viewpoint, I’m like, no it but it doesn’t have to be right. And we can can control this. So by the second engagement with them, we started to have some more forward thinking conversations, we started identifying some goals and and then started moving them in the direction of what is it that we expect of each other? You know, we’re together during this time, we might as well understand what it is we expect of each other. We still went through some turnover. But instead, what we ended up doing was when we’re hiring, let’s hire to the expectations we have for each other. So let’s consider that and how we’re bringing people aboard. Let’s move forward a year, you know, a year forward. And just the other week I was meeting with them. And I asked them I said how are you? How are you as a team, they haven’t turned over one person in the last six months, their effectiveness and the profit from the team is the highest it’s ever been. And ultimately what it is, is they have been able to come become comfortable with saying this is what we expect. Either you’re doing it or you’re not. And how can we work through this so we can move forward. The dynamics in that team? When I first walked in, it was one of those teams where you’re like, oh, I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be a part of this team. But now you walk in and and individuals are talking now. I’m not saying that team is perfect. They have their challenges, they have their struggles, but they’re able to overcome them a lot quicker because they have a common understanding of what’s expected. So that’s one example. You know, another example is I had a CEO that was going through a pretty significant change in the organization and they were really struggling that a new team come aboard but they were really struggling with how to connect with them. Again after about six months, we were starting to see some changes. And it was an awareness. And that’s really what it was it was developing an awareness, helping them through their lens, develop an awareness of what their team needed, there was an assumption that was holding them back. But yet, once we were able to overcome that, again, we started seeing significant progress moving forward. And in this industry in which they’re in, there’s going to be some hard years coming up. But yet, you know, they are now able to look at it and say, but now I have the confidence that we’re going to be able to get through this, or we can start collectively looking forward instead of me having to come up with it, and then try and get their buy in. And we’re now able to do it as a collective. So those are two examples that stand out to me as a recent.
Micheal Pacheco 45:49
Nice, I like it. I want to be going to be cognizant of the time here, we’re coming up on the on the hour, is there anything that you would like to chat about that we have not had an opportunity to touch upon yet?
Jason Weber 46:06
Yeah, you know, I’ve spent quite a bit of time talking about, you know, the expectations and all of that. But, you know, I’ve mentioned servant leadership a few times, and I’ve had many people say, what is that? Like? What, what would that look like in an organization? And I think the, the way that I would phrase it and how I phrase it to everyone else is, you know, it’s an opportunity for us to build effective working relationships, I think it’s important for us to understand, you know, what is it that we are wanting? What is it that we’re needing from our peers? You know, if we break down an organization, what is it, it’s just simply a group of people? I mean, really, we’re working towards a common goal, we’re hired to do specific tasks, but we’re just people. So we have to be able to figure out if we can leverage servant leadership through assessing, you know, how are we caring for those that we are responsible for? Servant leadership is not about letting go of what I want to give everyone what they want. Instead, it’s about being able to hold individuals to a common goal, hold them accountable, so that they too, can grow and inspire and themselves become, you know, contributors, positive contributors to the world around us, there’s always going to be challenges, how do we respond to that? That’s the big thing. Are we going to respond in a manner where Woe is me? And everything’s negative? Or can we look at it and say, Okay, this is a challenge in front of us, what do we need to do to overcome it? Because we can I mean, that’s when we look at an organization that’s been in business for a week, they’ve overcome challenges, right? And so you know, how is it that we can keep the optimistic look, not the, you know, oh, everything’s got to be happy and wonderful and great, but let’s be optimistic with it. And so a lot of the servant leadership is how do we build effective working relationships, where we’re sincere, we’re genuine. And we truly do care about those around us that they’re successful just as much as we want to be successful.
Micheal Pacheco 48:14
servant, servant leadership is essentially in service of you not only the organization, but the the team members individually, right. And their growth, their health from a holistic standpoint, professional, personal, all that.
Jason Weber 48:32
Yeah. And it doesn’t negate an org structure. I have a role, I have people who report to me, we have a responsibility for the organization. But that doesn’t mean I can’t still care, and make sure that they’re, they have the support and the resources they need, that they have, again, kind of fill in the blank. And so, you know, yes, there are those rigid structures in which we operate. But then what happens in between that, that’s where I think we have a ton of potential in regards to building quality work, workplace relationships, where we’ll see higher levels of engagement and commitment.
Micheal Pacheco 49:14
I get I get Jason, what are what are three books that you recommend your clients read? You want all your clients to read these three books? What are
Jason Weber 49:24
they? I’ll tell you I’m and I’m looking at my bookshelf now because I just have so many of them. The first one that I would say is, I’m a fan of John Maxwell, his 360 leader is a good comprehensive book around influence leading up leading across leading down and how we can be true leaders. I’m looking at the servant and that again, is exploring servant leadership. And then I would say you know, I’m a Big fan of authentic leadership, Patrick Lencioni. All of his work around The Five Dysfunctions of a Team the advantage. And then, oh, well, one right here on my desk is simple truths of leadership to Ken Blanchard, Randy Conley, book. And that is one that I work with executives consistently on. But really, it’s Oh, man, and I’m, again, I’m looking, there’s some great, great resources that I would encourage crucial accountability. When you struggle with accountability, and you want to make it easy, crucial. Accountability is a wonderful leadership book, maybe not one that you read page, one to page, whatever, but you can pull from the chapters. And then I mentioned conversational intelligence. So those are kind of Top of Mind top of lists. But I’m a reader. I love learning from different authors and bringing different perspectives in. So I could go on and on, but I will, you asked for three, I gave you more than three. So I’ll call it there.
Micheal Pacheco 51:04
I got five or six here. That’s great. Yeah. I love it, Jason. So Jason, you’ve got a free 60 minute coaching session that you would like to offer our listeners and viewers. Can you tell us more more about that? Yes. So
Jason Weber 51:17
if you reach out to me and reference this podcast, this video on YouTube that you watched it from, then you know, we’ll absolutely I’ll schedule you in, we can, again, set up some time to talk make sure that we’ve got good chemistry, we understand kind of what we want to go. And then that next session is on me give you a 60 minute engagement where we can talk about any challenges, any successes and any desires that you may have. And if it’s a good fit, then we can talk about further and if not, we can talk resources about ensuring that you have the support that you need.
Micheal Pacheco 51:51
Well, and Jason, where can our listeners and viewers connect with you online to either reach out with you about that offer or just for to look up and learn more about you?
Jason Weber 52:01
Sure. So my website is SLI coaching.net An S li coaching dotnet. And also, you can find me on LinkedIn, search there. That’s where I got a lot of my content materials. But the websites, we’re going to have the majority.
Micheal Pacheco 52:18
Awesome. And we will have those links as well in the show notes, of course. So if you guys want to find those, you can go to boxer dot Agency, and the links will all all be up there. Awesome. Jason, that’s everything I got, man. I appreciate you making the time to chat me. This has been great. Yeah.
Jason Weber 52:36
Thank you so much. I’ve really enjoyed the conversation. Thank
Micheal Pacheco 52:38
you. And thank you to our listeners and viewers, for joining us again. We’ll see you guys next time. Cheers.
