Balancing Vulnerability and Strength in Business Leadership

Starting the conversation:

Human behavior is ever-evolving and very dynamic. It takes courage to connect and share, really share, what we’ve gone through and learned from those experiences. Steve Utech, CEO and Founder of illumyx, discusses how being real and open make you a stronger leader.

Every aspect of your life has you in it. You are on a universal journey of continuous self-improvement. Perspective is the result. To get perspective requires looking a little closer: taking time to claim the good and bad; choosing what to learn from; and deciding how to show up and be our best selves, regardless of what we’ve done before. THIS is where fulfillment is found.

In this program, you will hear a recipe for openness, rewriting the rules when necessary (and sometimes it is necessary!), and how to take care of yourself in times of deep self-development. Jess Dewell talks with Steve Utech, CEO and Founder of illumyx, about intentional and effective communication.

Host: Jess Dewell

Guest: Steve Utech

What You Will Hear:

04:00 Dealing with Past and Future Concerns.

• The past vs. future thinking and the gift of awareness.
• Importance of recognizing whether the attention is on past events or future possibilities.
• Acknowledge the impact that worries about the past or future have on everyday life and relationships.

09:20 Parental Influence and Personal Growth.

• Ability to know what is really happening.
• The impact of quality on individual development.
• Personal experience of having young parents and the advantages of being a more experienced parent later in life.

18:45 Steps to Rewrite Rules and Find Solutions.

• The process of identifying problems and agreeing that there is a problem to solve.
• The courage needed to address issues and suggest solutions.
• The importance of understanding and potentially breaking existing rules to achieve a solution.

27:20 Understanding and Rewriting Personal Rules.

• Explores the concept of rewriting personal rules from personal experiences.
• Consider the challenges of recognizing and acting on problems when confronted with conflicting rules.
• Encourages acknowledgment of existing problems and setting new rules for better engagement and solutions.

40:30 The Impact of Self-Reflection.

• Self-efficacy and self-reflection in relation to personal and business decisions.
• Personal stories to illustrate self-accountability and personal growth in challenging situations.
• Values the experience of reflecting on past actions to inform current and future decisions.

57:25 It is BOLD to prepare and communicate effectively.

Resources

• How We Did $8 Million in Sales with Zero Employees or Investors

Transcript

Jess Dewell 00:00
I’m thinking about receiver or perceiver. I have something to say. Can you actually hear it the way I actually want you to? And are you hearing it beyond what you want to hear?

Steve Utech 00:09
So I’ve learned that boldness, maybe it’s taking the risk, but really evaluating some of the consequences of that risk.

Jess Dewell 00:17
I’m so glad you’re here. Thanks for stopping by. At the Bold Business Podcast, we are normalizing important conversations. Yes, there are tips. Yes, there are ways to solve problems. More importantly are going to be what do you need for yourself to be able to solve those problems and make the most of the education, the training and the programs that you are already using? This is a supplement to that. It can sit on top of it, fuel your soul, fuel your mind. And most importantly, regardless of where you’re at on your journey, maybe you’re starting out, maybe you’re ready to scale, maybe you’re going through reinvention. The conversations we are having will help you at each of those stages. So hang around, see what’s going on, and I look forward to seeing you engaging with our videos..

Announcer 01:09
You are listening to the Bold Business Podcast, where you will hear firsthand experiences about what it really takes to ensure market relevance and your company’s future.

Jess Dewell 01:21
Three takeaways to listen for and where we’re going to go deep in this conversation are that if we knew the rules, we’d probably use them. So when you’re showing up in a situation, are you choosing the rules or do you have agreed upon rules with which to work and engage? The second thing is going to be about, well, what happens when you’re in a situation where there are no rules or no rules have been made yet, or the rules need to be rewritten. We came up with those together in this conversation. And the third thing is that it’s important to take care of yourself, to do the deep work that it takes to communicate well in a connected and open way with those around us. And who am I talking to about this? I’m talking with Steven Utech and he has a mission to unlock the mysteries of complex human interactions so personal relationships and business relationships can be more meaningful, fulfilling and satisfying. And he founded Lumix to help us do just that. He has a interesting sense of humor. He has adhd. He is an experienced leader with a lot of success and a lot of failure. And he really thrives in helping and bringing the insights he has in culture optimization, in organizational effectiveness to you in your life and your role to you in your life, in your company. And to you outside of that as well. I’m really excited for you to meet Steve. How much family therapy did you get? And it was by proxy. Now I’m curious.

Steve Utech 03:07
By proxy.

Jess Dewell 03:08
Oh, yeah. Because of your awesome profession.

Steve Utech 03:12
Yeah. So if I got in trouble, like, I never. I got grounded one time, and it was the best experience ever. It was amazing. If I’m a kid, I would choose being grounded any day over what I got. I didn’t get beat. Instead, I just sit, literally sit on the couch and talk about my feelings.

Jess Dewell 03:28
Oh, so you’ve been talking about this realness of whatever is for a long time.

Steve Utech 03:34
I would wait it out. I would spend hours, like, just. And I couldn’t leave until I was able to understand the impact I had on other people.

Jess Dewell 03:45
And how old were you at this grounding?

Steve Utech 03:47
I was in high school when I first got grounded.

Jess Dewell 03:49
Okay.

Steve Utech 03:49
And I think it was like, my folks were tired, and they were like, we don’t have time for these emotional talks, so we’re just going to ground you. So I was like. I was probably 16, but everything before that and after that was, you’re sitting on the couch and you’re going to talk through this with us. Steve.

Jess Dewell 04:03
I was thinking about my first grounding. I was in the fourth grade. It was my one and only. And what I did was, okay, I’m grounded. So I got. My dad grounded me. I did a horrible thing, and I got rid of grub worms, which got me an A on a project. Got my whole class A’s on projects because the ground. Because our yard was free of grub worms. But we didn’t put the grass back when we were done. I got grounded for leaving in a pile because we peeled it all up and we got all these things for a school project. So I got grounded, and my dad heard him. I heard him as he came around the corner in his car screaming and hollering about his lawn. Okay? He’s one of those guys. He got home, he goes, you’re just grounded. And he didn’t talk to me for a while, so I said, okay. And I sat next. I was. And there was no end time. So I sat next to him the whole day, the rest of the day and most of the Saturday. I was just, like, glued to his hip because I’m like, what? I’m also like, you can’t watch tv. Can’t play with my friends. I guess I’ll hang out with my dad. And he goes, okay, you’re ungrounded.

Steve Utech 04:59
Get out of here. I need some Space.

Jess Dewell 05:00
Get out of here. Yeah.

Steve Utech 05:02
I like how you introduced that, where you really framed it as this. You picked all the grubs out of the yard when really you just destroyed the lot.

Jess Dewell 05:09
I literally thought I was helping. I invited my whole class over and then all the neighborhood kids came over. We had a big yard and I did. From my dad’s perspective, I destroyed the yard. And it’s. Isn’t that interesting about perspective, though. What you’re doing, what your intention is versus what it’s perceived to be. I think that’s a huge. I think that’s a huge thing. We. Is it a struggle or is it just the thing that we’re less aware of than we need to be?

Steve Utech 05:33
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 05:35
I don’t know. This is where I’m like, Steve, I think this is an interesting concept because I know you work with personality and technology to come up with some of these things and to help make us better at that.

Steve Utech 05:49
That’s the hope.

Jess Dewell 05:50
Usually that’s. I’m trying.

Steve Utech 05:54
Yeah, you’re trying to. You’re reaching for something. Yeah. And I should probably pick that up. Please.

Jess Dewell 05:59
We’ve had such great conversations so far. I. We haven’t practiced the handoff.

Steve Utech 06:04
No. But that. I think there’s definitely some truth to that. So back in the childhood rift, I had this issue with wanting to fit in as a kid. So I. I started drinking alcohol heavily because I found it greased the skids and I went from the socially awkward to feeling loose and footloose and fancy free when I would interact with people. And I think my folks saw this on the outside. And then when they did catch me, then it was more about trying to under uncover like why I was doing some of this stuff. And really at the root of it was just like I didn’t know how to make friends and they started pushing me and challenging me around. You know, these friends you have now, are they really your friends? And they’re like, what happens if you stop drinking? And I’m like, I’ll still hang out with them. Lower the halls. I stopped drinking and became instantly unpopular. No way. Yeah. It’s 100%. So it was a cool. One of many life lessons I got. I learned from them where they didn’t spoon-feed me the answer, but they kind of let me figure it out along the way.

Jess Dewell 07:06
You had really good parents. Or how about this? I should I say had you had really good parents as a kid. I’m sure your parents were still really good. That was, I want to make very clear. I’m like Looking back. Huh? That’s cool. So they were in a place where, of course, everybody has their own things, but they were in a place to be able to support you and your growth while they were still growing themselves. Yeah. And that’s. I don’t know about you, but as a parent today, I know that’s some of the hardest things. And I’m glad I became a parent leader. I was. I have very young parents, and I am the oldest parent of somebody right from my kid’s age. And I. I can tell you I know I’m a better parent because I have had more time to experience and feel and who am I than being tossed into it before, not really knowing and then not necessarily having any support along the way.

Steve Utech 07:54
Yeah, parenting is a challenge.

Jess Dewell 07:57
I know. I try and live a real intentional life, and I know that the clients I work with tend to also want to be intentional. And it does like what you were saying. Oh, look what I learned. It’s not the drinking didn’t help. The fact is I didn’t know how to do something. I think that’s really what every day is like.

Steve Utech 08:18
Maybe the gifts they gave me as parents was the power of insight. And the more awareness you have, the better decisions hopefully you can make. If you can go deeper and understand the root of why things are happening, that’s probably why I’m doing the work I’m doing right now.

Jess Dewell 08:34
What do you do right now?

Steve Utech 08:35
Currently, I’ve run a people analytics company. And that’s a fancy way of saying, like, we assess people, teams, and organizations largely to give organizations insights to make better decisions. So what that might be is like a company, let’s say they go from a hundred to five hundred employees over a couple year period. And it can be very chaotic and disruptive. But what’s worked at a hundred employees doesn’t necessarily going to work at 500. So they got to figure out new ways of operating, organizing, and it can be challenging to know, hey, what do we actually need to focus in on? So giving them some insights and some. Some clarity and guidance on where to start can be pretty powerful because if people knew what to do, they would usually do it.

Jess Dewell 09:17
I find that to be true.

Steve Utech 09:19
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 09:19
Oh, yes.

Steve Utech 09:22
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 09:23
Why? Yes. If I knew the rules, if I.

Steve Utech 09:26
Knew how to make friends without drinking as a kid, I probably would have done that.

Jess Dewell 09:29
Yeah, exactly. I know. If I knew that getting my whole class extra credit actually meant destroying the yard, I probably would have done it differently.

Steve Utech 09:35
Totally.

Jess Dewell 09:36
And I said we knew the rules, but it’s almost Just ways to engage.

Steve Utech 09:40
So say more. What do you mean, ways to engage?

Jess Dewell 09:43
If I have self-awareness and I know about me, it’s not only who I am and what I’m about, but it’s also what is my situation today? How am I today? Am I a hundred percent of what I think? Am I dragging along other things that happened to me before I got to work? Am I dealing with stuff that doesn’t easily end, that carries stress, and usually that’s around a child or a parent and the relationship of the kid being the caregiver somewhere in there. Right. So those types of things. So that’s a kind of awareness. But then there’s the engagement piece of. Regardless of what I’m bringing today, I want to show up and I want to talk to you, Steve, and I want to make it meaningful and I want to do the. I want to have to have the least amount of redos today in the moment, but also the redos of asking more questions or causing delays of whatever project we’re working on together that has some other deadline.

Steve Utech 10:39
I stayed at a hippie commune in Oregon once for. I was trying to save money on a work trip.

Jess Dewell 10:45
I’m all about that. You never know what you’re going to get in hostile hippie communes. Okay.

Steve Utech 10:51
Yeah. This place was disgusting. I ended up. I think I tented. I was in a tent. I went in the shower and I remember coming out and my feet were black. Cause it was just. It was.

Jess Dewell 11:00
Ooh, ooh. Okay.

Steve Utech 11:02
I was working with a mentor of mine, and he talked about this idea of openness, and he had two philosophies. Like, openness starts with self-awareness, but then also disclosing those awarenesses as a way to. As a way to build trust. So, I don’t know why your comment triggered that thought around the recipe for openness.

Jess Dewell 11:21
How do you practice openness today?

Steve Utech 11:23
Having an awareness and then usually sharing it with somebody.

Jess Dewell 11:26
And do you do that without any filters?

Steve Utech 11:28
I used to be filterless and now I’m trying to maybe have a few more filters on, like what’s appropriate to share and what’s not, what that’s a thing. Or maybe I think I have the awareness, but I’m just like at the surface. So then I spit it out too quickly. Oh, I got to tell this person, like, why I’m upset or why I’m acting like a butthead today. And it. Maybe it’s too early or they’re not ready to receive it, that kind of stuff.

Jess Dewell 11:54
Do they even care?

Steve Utech 11:55
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 11:56
Do they care words, right?

Steve Utech 11:57
Yeah. Okay, can I just let it lie?

Jess Dewell 12:00
Say, I talk to think. And so when you say that, like, you show up with a. With this intent, with this. You talk too soon. And I’m like, I talk to, like, process sometimes. And so I’ve actually started to preface. I have that moment of, oh, hey, I gotta talk to think a minute. So there’s no pressure for the first little bit of somebody trying to go, where is she in the universe? And am I even close? And how do I participate in this? Gives people grace to go, okay, this is just a thing. We’re not there yet.

Steve Utech 12:28
That’s cool. I think to talk from the opposite and. And my defaults, like, when I’m not at my best is emotional constipation. So usually people are just like, what the hell’s going on? You look like you’re gonna crap your pants. But something stuck. I’m like, no, I’m just thinking.

Jess Dewell 12:44
Oh, so you think expressively?

Steve Utech 12:47
Yes. Yeah, I think loudly.

Jess Dewell 12:49
Can you hold your cards close? Are you a good poker player?

Steve Utech 12:53
Not good.

Jess Dewell 12:54
I’m not a good poker player because it’s all on my face all the time.

Steve Utech 12:58
Yeah, I think people have told me, like, why would you be honest about that? But there’s been a couple times, like, you should have just. I tried to actually accidentally stole energy drink the other day. Just the other day. And I went in, I was tired, I grabbed it, I was like. And then I just left. And I got to work and I was like, holy shit. Like, I don’t think I paid for this. And I checked my bank statement. I’m like, yeah, no transactions. I just left with the energy drink. And then I just felt massively guilty. So I went back to the store the next day and I said, hey, I’m gonna buy two energy drinks and just keep this one. And I’m just gonna take one because I stole from you guys yesterday. And the lady was just so confused. I started trying to work it through with her for five minutes and then she’s just like, how about I discharge you for this? I’m like, okay, fine. She wouldn’t let me. She wouldn’t let me correct my mistake.

Jess Dewell 13:49
By the way, good for you for feeling guilty and actually even better for you that you realized the same day dependence. Sounds like something was really going on between those ears and the connection between your head and your heart. You’re listening to the Bold Business Podcast. I’m your host, Jess Dewell. This is your program for strategizing long-term success while diving deep into what the right work is for your business.

Announcer 14:15
Right now, you are listening to the Bold Business Podcast, hosted by Jess a nationally recognized strategic growth consultant. She works with business owners and executives to integrate just two elements that guide business through the ups and downs of growth. Number one, know what work is necessary. Number two, do all the work. Schedule a complimentary consultation to find out [email protected] hey, if we have this recipe. For

Jess Dewell 14:15
Right now, you are listening to the Bold Business Podcast, hosted by Jess Dewell, a nationally recognized strategic growth consultant. She works with business owners and executives to integrate just two elements that guide business through the ups and downs of growth. Number one, know what work is necessary. Number two, do all the work. Schedule a complimentary consultation to find out more at redirection.com. Hey, if we have this recipe. For openness and we meet somebody and we have to write the rules as we go, is there a first step.

Steve Utech 14:52
For writing the rules?

Jess Dewell 14:53
Yeah, for writing the rules in the moment.

Steve Utech 14:55
That’s a really good question. I don’t. Can we unpack that together? Maybe?

Jess Dewell 14:59
Let’s do it.

Steve Utech 15:00
So do you have a scenario that we could break down?

Jess Dewell 15:02
There was this thing that happened, and you were like, ooh, I want to make it right, but the people might not have been the same in the making it right or the rules of. The rules of how we engage with customers might not have had a scenario for that that had been trained on. And so you didn’t give up. I guess maybe that’s the first thing. Don’t give up.

Steve Utech 15:21
Eventually gave up.

Jess Dewell 15:22
But you didn’t start that way. You tried, right?

Steve Utech 15:24
I tried. I made the attempt.

Jess Dewell 15:26
Yeah, you made the attempt. So. Oh, I got a situation. Okay, so what are the rules going to be here? Don’t give up. Have courage and take action of some kind. Show up and say, hey, can you fix this with me? And you tried to fix it. So then. So I guess the first step is, oh, I have something to do that kind of is weird and different and unusual, and then you stick with it. No, I really want to make this right or I really want to make this. I’ll call it winfinity supportive for everybody. Right. So there’s two steps. What else could we do?

Steve Utech 15:55
I think you have to agree that there’s a problem. Oh, and I don’t want to be a thief, so I have to rectify this. And the lady didn’t care that I stole. And then also, she was older, so I think she got confused because I was buying other stuff. And then she got concerned that she was overcharging me, so then she just said, hey, go along, young buckaroo. Have a good day.

Jess Dewell 16:18
So she had conflicting rules. You were trying to. Right or wrong, you were trying to come here. Couldn’t agree that there was a problem to fix. And I’m guessing I have experienced this with people before, and I’ve been on the other side of that Where I’ve been accused in past positions when I was working retail once upon a time of double charging somebody or right. Charging them too much and they leave and they come back and they’re like, I didn’t have this thing. So then what. So there’s the thing of the repercussion of overcharging. Somebody is now going to come out of my pocket as the person who did that. So can I even help you make it right? When it’s. The inventory is now not going to.

Steve Utech 16:56
Match up in this moment because there could be some. Yeah. Past experiences around overcharging. And then because that was her concern. I don’t want to overcharge. You know, I’m like, you’re not overcharging me.

Jess Dewell 17:05
The rules that might have to be broken might be the next one. So can we agree there’s a problem? And are the rules that we’re facing breakable?

Steve Utech 17:13
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 17:15
Okay.

Steve Utech 17:16
Is there another step from my vantage point, if you can agree on a problem, are the rules breakable? And then can we arrive at a new rule? What’s the new solution?

Jess Dewell 17:25
And maybe a new rule.

Steve Utech 17:26
And maybe a new rule.

Jess Dewell 17:28
And you come from a therapy background and I have had therapy, but I am not a therapist. And you by proxy from your family, which I think is really great. So one of the things that I think in talking about all of this is being okay with the fact that we can’t agree that there’s a problem. I actually think is a theme that I see over and over again. Because all of us, and I’m now I’m talking real world, all of us at some point in time are going to bring the traits forward we think will help us in this situation. Not necessarily the strengths that we are strong in, not necessarily who we actually are. And I’m curious your take on some of that in the sense of just if we’re talking about when do we have to rewrite the rules, can we. Are we doing it from a place of our own efficacy, steadfastness, right self? Or are we doing it from this perceived awareness of I want to be liked, I want to right or wrong. In my case, I want to help everybody get a good grade.

Steve Utech 18:32
Maybe I’m going to get at this in a backwards way through.

Jess Dewell 18:35
I love this.

Steve Utech 18:35
I had, I had a leader who had an employee recently that was just sharing stuff with me, not to solve it, but just to process stuff through a friend, actually. And they had an employee that just started dating somebody at the company, also not at the company. Outside of the company, not related to the company. And then this person got arrested. I don’t know the specifics, but I think it might have been some sort of assault. And. And this woman felt extremely embarrassed and mortified and had to take up mental health days. And she was like, what the hell is going to happen to me? This is just embarrassing. And my friend was just like, how is this a problem? I don’t see the problem. I don’t see how your life is ending. I. Can you help me understand this? And. And the person couldn’t respond. And they’re like, huh, I guess I don’t know this person for very long. And it really jumbled with their head. Like they didn’t even know how to process it. So that might be in a different tangent. I’m not sure if I’m tracking with what you’re putting down, but I don’t.

Jess Dewell 19:43
Know if it is or not. All I know is I love the exploration that we’re having because what I heard was, oh, this person decided what the rules were. This person decided there was a problem. That the person is the only one who saw the problem. Stop.

Steve Utech 19:57
Number one, I did give some feedback. I’m like. I’m like, I can see where you’re coming from. Or you might not see that as being a problem. But has this person had a lot of relationships? Is this fear of loneliness? Maybe. Maybe she’s afraid of being alone and she finally got a boyfriend and all of a sudden now he’s a criminal. And holy crap. So I’m like, maybe go back and slow down and try to figure out, like, what the problem is for her.

Jess Dewell 20:23
So the employee was feeling embarrassed, like this was going to somehow impact their performance or perception of performance at work. And the employer was like, I don’t know what this has to do with anything because it’s not you.

Steve Utech 20:37
Yeah, you didn’t commit a crime, so how is this a problem?

Jess Dewell 20:40
So glad to know I’m in good standing with you, but it does not make my heart feel better.

Steve Utech 20:45
Don’t have any feelings about this at all.

Jess Dewell 20:48
Not necessary. Let them all go.

Steve Utech 20:51
But I think it’s really important to gain agreement. Be curious and understand. It might not be a problem in your mind, but, like, why is it a problem? So I would really appreciated it if this gas station attendant go, hey, sir, why is this a big deal for you that you want to make this right, that you stole an energy drink?

Jess Dewell 21:06
And I think it’s both. Right. You knew. You knew why it was a big deal to you, but nobody asked you.

Steve Utech 21:11
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 21:12
So got stuck. And in the other example that you gave, looking at a pair of binoculars over here and a pair of binoculars over here and they were crossing paths, you just didn’t see the same outcome at all.

Steve Utech 21:20
Yeah.

Jess Dewell 21:21
We’re talking about being open and we’re talking about self-awareness. So now I want to know is there a place or a thing that you have ever done that was so out of your comfort zone you almost got stuck and made it a problem that you didn’t do it? Or that was almost too. I don’t know how I’m going to have enough courage to try this or this goes against everything I ever thought I could or would be.

Steve Utech 21:48
I was married at one point in my life, no longer married right now, and I made a mistake. I cheated on my spouse like six months into the relationship, had too much to drink at a conference and. And just felt awful about it and just carried this guilt. And I was like, how can I ever say anything and keep my. And have any semblance of trust going forward? So I carried that for eight, eight years maybe. And then I finally told her. I just felt, man, I owe it to this woman to be honest with her because I felt like it was holding things back for me. I just noticed that I was not showing up in the relationship the way I wanted to. And in my head I was like, I gotta get rid of this guilt. And I was very much thinking of myself. And in my head I was like, I’m also thinking of her. But I was more, I think, wanting to just rid myself of this burden. So I remember telling her and just devastating news. And it took a ton of courage just to even get up to that point. And I’m still not 100% sure if that was the right thing to do because I don’t think our marriage never recovered from it. And it was probably the right thing to do, but probably a very painful, painful thing to disclose.

Jess Dewell 23:12
There is always more than one solution and sometimes all the solutions suck. I mean, honestly and truly. And so what I hear you saying is even outside of any personal stuff that you were saying and what you have come to recognize within yourself, there’s that element of all the outcomes of this could suck and I’m actually afraid of that. Or I have no choice but to choose something. So can I choose the one that sucks least? And I know, I know we face that on many levels as individuals, but we face that in companies, we face that in our relationships, we face that. I don’t Know, there are so many places I can think of for that. So that’s very interesting. Where you had to. And so you started out and some of the words that you were saying were about to try something new. And you had said, let’s see, I want to make sure I get the correct me here. And because I. You had said, I think I needed to just release myself of the guilt. And that still took courage to do, courage to speak up, courage to not keep secrets, and courage to recognize and shared that this guilt was hold. The guilt itself was holding you back. As that is courageous.

Steve Utech 24:24
I like to think that I also felt very. I felt like a coward. Like, I felt like I’d been living a lie. And I definitely putting myself in her shoes and just trying to understand, like, replaying all those previous years together and going. And having her go, was this real or was it a lie? And for me, I’m like, oh, man, that messes with somebody, I think.

Jess Dewell 24:52
When people say they have a midlife crisis, is that it? I haven’t been showing up as who I really am. So is everything a lie, whether it’s internal or whether it’s external? So I’m at. Because I actually think there are points of our life when we have that. I know for me there was one in high school. I know for me there was one. I don’t know. I think I might be in one right now of am I really who I want to be? And I think I really am. And. All right, so you and some of what. There’s a word for that. What’s the word for that? When we have to think about who we are, there’s a word for that.

Steve Utech 25:22
When we have to what?

Jess Dewell 25:23
Think all of these things. Are we really ourselves? Is everything we’ve had a lie? Are we truly on the path of who we’re becoming?

Steve Utech 25:31
There’s a word like authenticity. Congruency.

Jess Dewell 25:35
No, older than that.

Steve Utech 25:36
Oh, older. Older than that.

Jess Dewell 25:38
Older than buzzword. But I’m going to call this that. That feels like buzzwords. Okay, so the answer is yes. So I’m going older than that. I’m like, oh, existential.

Steve Utech 25:46
No, I said, oh, existential. Okay. Yeah, there we go.

Jess Dewell 25:48
Okay. Does that word fit here?

Steve Utech 25:51
Sure.

Jess Dewell 25:52
And do you understand now why I said older than that?

Steve Utech 25:55
Yeah. Like an existential crisis.

Jess Dewell 25:57
Yes. Those things are important, and I think they’re part of that. They’re. Who are we and who do we want to be? And I don’t know how much. And I’m glad we talk about that now. It is and if we are there, as hard as it is, if we feel like we’re living untruthfully, living lies, it is up to us to figure out how to make it right. And it is unfortunate when there’s fallout.

Steve Utech 26:22
From that, but part of life.

Jess Dewell 26:25
It is part of life, like I can tell you. And one of. One of the things that has happened to me, and I’m going to use a business example to tie the things together, is that I wanted another success so badly. I overlooked a lot of red flags in a partner that I chose for business. And in fact, I did it three times in a row. So here we go. So to the. Going back to the issue with the relationship, I’m like, okay, so I can. Yeah. So I wanted this so bad, and I wanted it to work. I remember picking a partner because we worked together. We thought we had the same values. And this person, we did all of this work. We had clients, we had work that had been being done. And one day she decided she was mad at me, and she took all the money out of the bank accounts and disappeared.

Steve Utech 27:15
Holy crap. That’s pretty extreme.

Jess Dewell 27:17
So I had to figure out, what am I going to do about this? So I had to be like people, I have no money to do this work. And by the way, they were the craftsperson, I was the salesperson. So I can’t even do the work we promised to do for you. So I had to. I was able to work it all out. And I found people to refer to. I found people that split the difference of the cost with me. So I paid for some of that work to be done out of my own pocket, and they paid for some so that they could keep their projects going. And everybody got taken care of. But I will tell you, that was the biggest thing of how. How could I have done that? How could I have not seen? And it was only upon that reflection of, I wanted it so bad. I overlooked everything else. I don’t know what the emotion is, but it’s as it was, as strong as guilt could be. Can’t you know that? Can I do it again? Am I really that cool? I don’t even know what the thing would be, but it was there. And so I hear what you’re saying, and I recognize that it’ll show up in a lot of different ways. And it. It was still very personal. That was the hardest thing that I ever had to recover from, at least in my business world.

Steve Utech 28:31
Yeah, that’s challenging. Business partner challenges, difficult.

Jess Dewell 28:34
And I didn’t know this person for very long. And when you. And it doesn’t matter about the contracts. It doesn’t matter about everything else. But I was like, holy cow. So now what? And do you find that. So here’s an interesting shift. So we’re talking about this and how we show up and the things that are showing up for us, which some are part of our personality and some are part of our upbringing, and some are part of the challenges that we have uniquely faced. But so how do we take this concept of our strengths and be able to go cool, even though. And I say that cheekily. Right. Cool. All this is going on even though it’s very uncool because I have this thing I could bring and I actually did this big five with you, and I still haven’t decided some things, by the way. I am in the size of here. But it was really cool to see. Oh. When I am under stress, I can see myself doing these things. Now that we have that conversation and how that could get in my way. Ooh. I really want this to work, no matter what. And I’m going to power through no matter. I will do that. I’ll do that. If I care deeply about the brand of toothpaste we’re going to buy or the brand of toilet paper we’re going to buy. As much as I’ve got. I see this. If you’re on board, I’m gonna believe a hundred percent in you. Let’s go. Whether that’s good or not.

Steve Utech 29:50
Well, I think that’s the cool thing about doing personality assessments or trade assessments is you can pretty clearly see maybe some of your tendencies.

Jess Dewell 29:57
Yeah.

Steve Utech 29:58
And how maybe strengths can go overboard. With your business partner example, I’ve made some, like, maybe quick decisions that I should have maybe deliberated on for longer.

Jess Dewell 30:08
But.

Steve Utech 30:09
And. But I always find, like, when those things happen, it’s an opportunity usually to own your mistakes and move forward. And I think the beauty of what the story you shared is the dilemma you’re in that feels like blues. Like, I can’t do the work, but I have to service the customer. Holy crap. And they already paid. What about. That’s just an impossible dilemma.

Jess Dewell 30:34
So I’m glad I was able to bring something like that to the. Yeah. Yeah. All the choices were bad.

Steve Utech 30:38
Yeah. But without that awareness and the humility to.

Jess Dewell 30:41
Yeah.

Steve Utech 30:42
Hey, I need some help here. Can you work with me?

Jess Dewell 30:45
Yeah. And I’m glad I was able to help everybody. I’ll be real with you. And I don’t. I actually just started talking about that really for the first time recently, I felt I. So there’s probably some residual shame. Nope. I didn’t get to be as successful as I wanted to be Again, so is that. And that’s more of that. I don’t know. I have a very strong critic for a lot of different reasons, but it comes naturally, too. There’s a good, healthy dose of just Jess in that. Yeah. But it’s interesting because if we’re not so, like, in. In the examples that have been shared all the way through from our childhood ones to now, what I find interesting is that we’re willing to look at them. And then if you take that in congruence with something like the big five or a personality test of how we can show up and what can we do for our own accountability, for our own moral compass that we have chosen for ourselves. That’s pretty cool.

Steve Utech 31:42
I like strengths finders because it’s cool. It’s. Hey, what are you good at? But I also like the assessments that don’t that look at you. Like, the dark side.

Jess Dewell 31:52
Shadow work.

Steve Utech 31:53
The shadow work. Yeah.

Jess Dewell 31:54
Shadow work. Yeah.

Steve Utech 31:56
Like, when strengths become the flip side. The flip side, yeah.

Jess Dewell 32:00
The flip side, huh?

Steve Utech 32:01
Yeah. And there’s just, like, cool work to do there, I think.

Jess Dewell 32:04
Where’s a place that you’ve done that work?

Steve Utech 32:06
I remember I worked with a government client once. Like, early on, like, my first year, I was, like, ambitious and completely overly optimistic and naive about my ability to generate revenue. And so I remember we finally got this government contract. Like, I. I was scraping by, like, barely able to make payroll for a year. I think my salary was, like 14,000 annually. Like, I was, like, poverty level. Flew through my bank account. Like, I had, yeah, ramen noodles. It was fun.

Jess Dewell 32:39
But.

Steve Utech 32:40
So when you got this first government contract, I was, like, so excited and had this overwhelming desire to, like, prove myself. So I remember, like, we ended up doing all these focus groups across this. This county organization, and we uncovered all of these issues. And I worked with this OD team, and we literally plastered the room illustrating these systemic dynamics with these massive visualizations around this big. Not even a conference room, almost like an auditorium. And I was so proud of myself and the work me and, like, the team did around, hey, we could. They were curious about, like, what was happening in their organization and why people were upset and engagement was low. And we just spelled it out in gory detail for them.

Jess Dewell 33:34
We went from honest truth to brutal truth.

Steve Utech 33:37
Yeah, Brutal truth. I thought they were gonna love it because I. Like, when we first met with them, the leadership teams, they asked for us. They’re like, we just want insight as to what’s happening. So I’m like, I delivered tenfold. They did not like the presentation at all. And to be honest, it was the beginning of the end of that contract because I think out of my own desire to prove my worth, I overwhelmed the living out of these poor leaders and I just, I gave them too much to focus on. And I was, it was more about me trying to prove myself rather than going, what can they actually handle? Let’s start small. So after that project, one of my, one of my colleagues at Steve chewable chunks from now on, like chewable chunks, just give them a little bit. I like, once they’ve digested that, give them a little bit more food. Yeah, that was a fun early project that we, we didn’t technically get fired, but we slowly, they slowly just stopped talking to us.

Jess Dewell 34:34
That was a on the job learning.

Steve Utech 34:36
Yes. Yes.

Jess Dewell 34:37
At its best.

Steve Utech 34:39
Yeah. And what that. Especially in our early days, one of the feedback pieces we got was like you guys over deliver and like the people that liked it, they felt like they were taking advantage of us. And then some people just didn’t like it because they felt like we were just overachieving people pleasers.

Jess Dewell 34:53
I’m your host Jess Dewell and we’re getting down to business on the Bold Business Podcast. This is where we’re tackling the challenges that matter most to you with actionable and achievable advice to get real results that lead to your success focused on growth.

Announcer 35:11
Listen to more programs like this which support the challenges and opportunities you are working with right now. Search Bold Business Podcast for the key terms@red direction.com or your preferred podcast listening app.

Jess Dewell 35:25
I’m thinking about receiver or perceiver. I have something to say. Can you actually hear it the way I actually want you to? And are you hearing it the way that. Beyond what you want to hear in the way that I want to. So there’s a. There’s that that was coming out of this and the incongruence of that over deliver. It’s interesting that there were a lot of responses to that and what I.

Steve Utech 35:46
Realized now was like leaders don’t really. They want to know what to improve, but they don’t want to get pummeled over the head as to why they suck.

Jess Dewell 35:56
By the way. I think that goes to everybody. This work is. Is deep and it takes more time than whatever time blocking or meetings that people tend to set right. So there tends to be this loss of momentum and that must be a Lot on you as a provider, as a consultant, as an advisor, to be able to hold that space and hold all of the things and keep momentum going. How do you take care of yourself?

Steve Utech 36:24
I think how I was operating back then was I was not taking care of myself. I was a bit of a workaholic. And I’ve. It’s still a work in progress, but I’ve noticed that I’ll. As I’ve learned to accept and appreciate myself more, I am much more kind and gentle with clients.

Jess Dewell 36:45
Okay. Oh, I was going to say with yourself.

Steve Utech 36:46
And I was going to get old with that, too.

Jess Dewell 36:49
That’s so great. Yeah. Okay.

Steve Utech 36:50
But I remember I used to do some, like, training workshops, like, earlier on in my career, and I bumped into a guy, like, probably eight years later, and I had. I just had a coffee with him, and he’s. Steve, like, you just seem very different. And I’m like, really? How? And he’s like, when you’re in that training group with me, like, you’re an asshole. And I was like, are you serious? I’m like, I thought you liked me. And he’s. I’m like, he’s. You were likable, but you’re just a dick. And I was like, what?

Jess Dewell 37:18
So callous and cold meaning or aloof or distant.

Steve Utech 37:22
Okay, maybe all the above. Or just like, delivering feedback and not really caring how it landed. More interested in my own powerful insights I can generate rather than thinking, not taking into account the receiver and treating them with respect and like a real person that I painted my picture of myself as a real piece of work.

Jess Dewell 37:45
Only because you were.

Steve Utech 37:46
Yeah, true.

Jess Dewell 37:47
You know, I mean, this is the whole context of this is how am I using what I’ve learned from all. All of these assessments to continue my own curiosity, by the way, the. And I’ll just come out to say it, I don’t like being the dick in the room, but I will when I have to be.

Steve Utech 38:03
There’s a place for it sometimes.

Jess Dewell 38:05
So I just keep hearing over and over again, I know I was doing something for the best interest. I didn’t know they were receiving it that way. But I also didn’t take the time to care. And so anybody who’s working with a peer or managing up or managing down or setting the stage or bringing people together across all kinds of strategy, maybe across multiple locations, maybe across thousands of people, hundreds of thousands of people, that is something. That is a real thing that when we are pressed for time, we forget. So I appreciate you talking about it because I don’t think it’s coming across that way at all because you’ve done all of the thinking and are sharing in a way that other people can go, maybe I need to take more time with that in front. Maybe I need to take more time because it is. It’s deep work, it’s important work, and it’s. It will prevent goals that should be doable on paper because we have the right money, we have the right people, we have the right skills, we have the right timelines, we have the right suppliers. They will be missed because of this stuff.

Steve Utech 39:10
Like, something we like to do is like, really sit down and go, okay, what. How do we present this in a way that people can hear it? And. And I always like to put context in. Sometimes I’m like, am I walking the line of rationalizing crappy behavior? And maybe I might go too far by, like, overly normalizing things. But I also, like, want to. I want people to be able to accept things and understand. And there’s usually a environmental or contextual reason for why people behave badly or. I remember I had one client, they had at one point, their biggest customer was Starbucks, and they would produce. I don’t know, I forget what they would produce products for them, maybe in terms of packaging. And they. Overnight, Starbucks got a new procurement manager and their business completely went away. It was like $30-40 million just gone.

Jess Dewell 40:01
Oh my gosh.

Steve Utech 40:02
And. And so it was traumatic for this organization. They had a downsize. The CEO went from this, like, guy that everyone loved to just like an asshole dictator and never wanted to make that mistake again. So he would just yell at people and went from hands-off to micromanaging and did this for years. And so it’s like this fine line of. This man was obviously trying to look up for the best interest of the company and really felt like he was carrying this guilt that he let everybody down. And. And people felt that too. But also, like, how he was going about it was just brutal. So needing to have him hear us. But also employees who, to be honest, experience abuse from the guy and being able to relate to both groups. It. It’s a very sensitive line to walk or fine line to walk.

Jess Dewell 40:55
Is it condoning bad behavior? Maybe. But hey, we can only have one battle at a time. Truly, honestly and truly, the way we grow a garden is that we decide what’s the weed and what’s not, and we keep getting rid of the things we’ve decided are weeds. And then same in a business, right? What has been working and what is not. And all of those things. If we’re not getting to our goals, let’s look a little deeper and see. Keep peeling back the onion to see what else could grow nicely with this in our garden or to help us scale our company so the people are actually having this and it matters. It matters what we do as leaders.

Steve Utech 41:31
Yeah. Quick story. Actually, I’ve. So my dad, I worked under my dad for a little bit. He was a work development consultant, family therapist. That’s how I got in the field, actually. And he told me this one story early in his career. He’s working with this big food distributor. I think it was like 6,000 employees, billion plus dollars in revenue. And the CEO was just this micromanager. He would. So 6,000 employees, he would approve everyone’s raises manually. Isn’t that incredible? I don’t know when the guy slept, but he was just in the weeds and a lot of things. And my dad knew his story and so he started uncovering like his. He had a history of alcoholism in his family. And he described like, hey, growing up, if I wasn’t in control of every detail, like it could be chaos in my house, My dad could just wreak havoc in minutes if we weren’t aware of his mood and if I wasn’t in charge of things. So they did these video calls every month to employees. So he’s, he’s. I need you to talk to your employees about this and give them some context for your behavior because they can look at you as this micromanaging, controlling. But if they understand, understand why and where this behavior is coming from, it allows them to support you in a different way and not rebel against you, but to maybe help you out so you don’t have to do that behavior anymore. And his words to my father were, I will do it, but if this doesn’t work, you will never work in this town again.

Jess Dewell 43:00
Isn’t that amazing?

Steve Utech 43:02
Yeah. And it worked out well.

Jess Dewell 43:04
And that response, look at that. Was, I’m really afraid. I’m willing to try something. I recognize where I might be too controlling. So, if I’m going to go out on a limb, you’re there with me. By the way, I’m all about holding Lincoln arms and holding hands and going together. So that’s good that he did that in his own way with your dad. It’s a crazy, awesome story.

Steve Utech 43:27
It is. And he always had a really cool way of connecting with people. I always say he’s great at loving other humans to the point where he’s allowed to get away with a lot of pretty direct feedback.

Jess Dewell 43:38
And that. That’s good. That he was that kind of person, that whatever the feedback needed to be in that moment, that was the. That was able to be received early in my career.

Steve Utech 43:48
I probably was just excited. Oh, I love the insights you provide, dad, or his name is Ken, since retired. And I just want to be the inside guy. And then I missed the critical part of the story of having a relationship and actually caring about people and being curious about their story.

Jess Dewell 44:03
Yeah. Now I need to know about your morning routine.

Steve Utech 44:05
My morning routine?

Jess Dewell 44:06
Yes.

Steve Utech 44:07
It used to be very running-focused. I got into this endurance running thing, like ultra marathons, so that I would just wake up early and just run. And now I’ve since from like living on my own to I moved in with my girlfriend and our kids. And I hate to say this, cuddling with another human being is so amazing.

Jess Dewell 44:30
It’s amazing. It is. It’s amazing.

Steve Utech 44:34
And I. My morning routine is completely gone. It is unpredictable. And if the cuddling is exceptionally warm, especially in a cold Wisconsin winter day, I’m likely gonna be maybe sleeping a little bit longer.

Jess Dewell 44:49
That’s amazing. Yeah, I get that. I know. My morning routine changes too. But I will tell you, I love elbow to elbow, back to back. I love curled up with right now. In the mornings, I get up and I’ll make a cup of tea and I sit with our. I call him my pup. He’s 6 years old, so he’s really not a pup, but he’s still my pup. And he’ll sit in my lap while I read and have a cup of tea because that he’s not ready to wake up yet. And I’m like, cool, I can carve out 15 or 20 minutes to just sit with you in my lap. Why not? Because that there’s something to be said for that. Is that your love language is touch your love language.

Steve Utech 45:25
It’s up there for sure. Yeah, I think it is definitely number one for me.

Jess Dewell 45:29
I was like, oh, I know this. What is this? Yeah. Okay, so now I’m gonna ask you a question about. It’s bold. What makes it bold to take time to prepare your communications so you’re really able to have people understand the message you have for them.

Steve Utech 45:44
Oh, that’s such a good question. Because I used to think it was just I. Okay, there’s this one values-based assessment I participated in. I don’t even think they use it anymore. But one of the things I always picked for myself was bold. And my nickname growing up was shock and awe because I would just say.

Jess Dewell 46:03
Okay, a facet of bold. I love it.

Steve Utech 46:05
Yeah. Because I would just like in, in social situations, just drop nuggets of very uncomfortable insight or wisdom that people would. It was like my way of like testing are you going to accept me or reject me? And I’m going to find out right away by sharing something mildly inappropriate. And people either loved me or hated me for that. So your question about boldness. So I’ve learned that boldness, maybe it’s, it’s taking the risk, but really evaluating some of the consequences of that risk. So someone, someone gave me a nickname too, or not a nickname. They described me and they said, steve, you make it safe to be dangerous. Which I was like, what the hell does that mean? And like, like you make it okay to take risks. And I think bold, like actually one of our values at the company is venture boldly. And it’s about maybe stepping outside of your comfort zone.

Jess Dewell 46:57
Every single time I have a conversation, I take away something that I want to share with 25 people. I know when you’re listening to this podcast, you’re also listening for that and will have something that you want to share in the comments. I would like for you to engage with us. What is that thing that you want to tell 25 people from this program? Here’s why it’s important. It’s important because, yeah, there are going to be how-to’s. Yes, there are going to be steps. Yes, you’re going to be like, oh, I wish I wrote that down. I wish I wasn’t doing this and I could actually take action on that right now. But guess what? You’re not so engaged right now because that one thing you want to share with others will be the thing that you can figure out how to incorporate in your business, in your workflow, in your style.

Announcer 47:45
Tomorrow get more information about how to drive solutions and reset your growth mindset at reddirection.com thank you for joining us and special thanks to our post-production team at the Scott Treatment.