In this episode, I ask the question, Who’s Leading You? In past episodes, I know we’ve talked about the importance holding your employees or team members to a higher expectation than they would hold themselves. And the importance of then helping them achieve those goals. So what about you? As a leader? Who are you asking to hold you to higher expectations? A coach? A mentor?
It’s worth a discussion and some thought.
You won’t want to miss this episode! Enjoy!
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Website: https://mikemalatesta.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemalatesta/
Full transcript below.
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Transcript
Who’s Leading You? (Episode 339)
Thu, Oct 20, 2022 10:23AM • 8:39
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
podcast, high expectations, article, challenges, higher, expectations, coach, share, leading, episode, surround, ben, capability, hardy, friday, talk, hold, better vantage point, quote, phd
SPEAKERS
Mike Malatesta
Mike Malatesta 00:32
Hey, it’s Mike and welcome back to the “How’d It Happen” Podcast, the solo series. So every Friday, I do a solo episode, a short solo episode, generally less than 10 minutes, this one will be less than 10 minutes, and I share with you something that I’ve encountered or experienced, an idea that I’ve had, or an idea that been shared with me, or they picked up somewhere else, a story or question. And I do that, I share it because whatever it is that I’m sharing, interested me, made a difference for me, made me think about something. And I think it just might do the same for you or have the same impact on you. And so I want to share it. And that’s what I do in these Friday episodes.
So today, I am going to talk to you about “Who’s Leading You?” Who’s Leading You? So if you listen to this podcast regularly, a few, probably 10 or so episodes ago, I don’t remember exactly which ones, I talked about setting high expectations for people and how I didn’t buy that. People don’t want people to help them set high expectations. I talked about specifically how important it is for leaders to have high expectations for everyone who joins their team or joins your team. And the reason why, as a reminder, is because based on my experience, so few people are raised to have high expectations for themselves. It’s not that they aren’t capable of meeting high expectations, it’s that they are rarely asked to do so. So anyway, do your people a favor and ask if you have high expectations for them? And then help them achieve those, help them push through whatever capability boundaries they might have, whatever limiting thoughts they might have, whatever challenges they might have, but ask them to do it. Don’t dumb down, you know, rise up.
But today, I want to talk about you. So what about you and your expectations? For you? As a leader, you know, who are you asking to hold you to higher expectations than you would otherwise have for yourself? Who’s challenging you? Whose standards are you meeting? Who’s elevating you. You all probably have someone in your life who is doing some of that, you know, maybe as a coach or trainer or maybe you have a group that you belong to that challenges you, maybe you have some online forum or something that you do, maybe you play chess, and you challenge yourself with other chess players, whatever. But my guess is that when it comes to challenging yourself, particularly professionally, there’s probably room for you to grow. Which is why I say coaching is such a big profession now, because you know, the idea that everyone needs a coach in order to perform at their highest capability and to have high expectations for them as needed, like there’s a void for it. So I’m guessing there’s something in your life that where you’re not, you know, setting high enough expectations for you or holding yourself to a standard that you’re capable of meeting.
So those are really interesting questions. And after I did those earlier podcasts, I came across an article that Dr. Benjamin Hardy, Ben Hardy PhD, wrote that tackles it, you know, in a way that made me think really more about who’s leading you. And in this article, which he calls you know, it’s got a long title, “Why it’s Important to Surround Yourself with People who Hold You to a Higher Standard than You Hold Yourself.” In that article, here’s just a couple of paragraphs from it.
If you genuinely want to become better, you must surround yourself with people who will hold you to a higher standard than you currently hold yourself.
You want to be around people with a higher and better vantage point than you have, so that you can quickly learn from them. Your level of talent and “potential” are irrelevant.
Are you’re surrounded by people who don’t help you realize it sound familiar? We all know many people who have unfulfilled potential. Don’t let that be you.
And again, that’s from Ben Hardy’s article, you can find that on his website, which is his name, Benhardy.com. He’s got a lot of great stuff, got a lot of videos, got a lot of thoughtful articles. As I mentioned, he’s a PhD and an author. He’s a writer, a thinker, a researcher, you know, always quoting research and stuff, something that I hardly ever do. And he focuses on the science of high performance, self and organizational transformation. And entrepreneurship. It’s this article is a three-minute read. And it’s really like a masterclass reminder/kick in the butt, who’s holding you to a higher standard of leadership isn’t just about leading others. But it’s also I think, right, it’s about leading you. If you’re not leading you, it’s going to be tough for you to lead others. You’ve got to walk the walk, you’ve got to talk the talk, you’ve got to do the work.
So that’s it for today, leaving you with that thought, who’s leading you? Are you surrounding yourself with people who have higher expectations for you than you might otherwise have for yourself? Are you doing for yourself what you’re doing for your team, or what you should at least be doing for your team? If you liked this, please share it. Reach out to me, ping me, let me know what you think. If you are not yet subscribed to the podcast, please go to Apple or Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts right now and just click that follow or subscribe button and you’ll get an episode every Friday, a solo episode every Friday, and then on Monday I do a longer-form conversation with really successful people about how it happened for them and more importantly, why it matters to you. You can also go to my website, Mikemalatesta.com and you can sign up for my newsletter that comes out every Thursday. It’s called the Inspire, Activate and Maximize Greatness Newsletter. You can find my book there. You can skim through my podcasts, go to my YouTube channel. You can do everything, just check it out and let me know what you think. And until next time, please maximize your greatness and the greatness of the people around you as well.