017-Three Habits That Build Better Teams: Listen, Be Real, Recognize

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Heather McDermott  0:00   

So, human-centered leadership is not, it’s not a trend, it’s not a personality trait, like you said, Adam, it is intentional choice. 

Adam Salgat  0:09   

Welcome to Beyond the Class, from Knowledge to Action, an audio cast that helps Chattan Foundation alumni turn skills into practical, intentional actions for everyday life. I’m your host Adam Salter, and today we’re starting with something many leaders are feeling, but may not fully understand. Across workplaces right now, there’s a pattern: engagement feels lower, trust feels thinner, and stress – it’s not just background noise anymore, it’s shaping how people show up every day. This isn’t just anecdotal, it’s a pattern leaders can no longer afford to ignore. Research shows that 80% of team members do not trust the leadership within their organization. 75% say it’s their boss who is the leading cause of their stress at work. In organizations where stress is high and sense of care is low, people are more likely to intend to leave, less trusting of their leadership, and less engaged and productive. And in response, many leaders are asking, Why aren’t people more motivated? Why isn’t performance where it should be? But what if we’re asking the wrong question? What if what looks like a performance problem is actually something deeper? That’s exactly what we’re exploring today. Joining me is Heather McDermott, Senior Director of Learning Innovation at the Chapman Foundation for Caring Communities. Heather is a master trainer and a leader in organizational design for culture, with over 23 years of experience in government leadership, her work has primarily been with local government, public officials, and first responders. She specializes in helping organizations intentionally design their culture using human-centered strategies, creating environments where psychological safety can exist, and where people can truly perform at their best. She’s also a pretty awesome human. I would like to toss in there. Heather, welcome to the show. 

Heather McDermott  2:10   

Thank you, Adam. I’m glad to be here. 

Adam Salgat  2:13   

All right, so in my intro, I asked the question, what if what looks like a performance problem is actually something deeper. What do you think about that? 

Heather McDermott  2:24   

Yeah, Adam, I think you’re on the right track. What leaders are experiencing right now isn’t just about performance. When we break it down in reality, it’s really a relational problem. When trust feels low, stress feels high, like what you said, and people don’t feel seen or supported. Performance is naturally going to be impacted, but that’s what’s important to understand, that this isn’t a talent problem, and it’s really not an effort problem either. It’s an environmental problem. People aren’t pulling back because they don’t care, they’re pulling back because they don’t feel cared for, they don’t feel seen, safe, or supported enough to fully engage, 

Adam Salgat  3:03   

that’s interesting. Yeah, like, can you give me a scenario, or do you have any real-life examples of what that can look like in the workplace? 

Heather McDermott  3:10   

Yeah, absolutely. It’s funny you asked that. I was actually talking to my son-in-law the other day, he works for a really prominent company who, with the best intention, like a lot of companies lately, required everybody to go back into the office three days a week. The intent was to improve teamwork and performance, except for nobody actually talked to him about this plan, and it turns out his entire team is actually entirely remote. They don’t even work in the same state, so no one’s in the office with him, he’s a really hard worker. He loves people, but guess how motivated he is to go into work on those three days, right? Like, not excited about it anymore at all. What’s interesting is he’s now had another manager, maybe fortunately from the same company, who wants him on her team, and she’s actually spent a lot of time talking to him about what he likes, what he dislikes, about its work, his work, and he’s very likely to take an opportunity that he has with her, and it’s not even because it’s a promotion, it’s just because he already feels more seen and heard and supported by her. 

Adam Salgat  4:14   

That’s a love hearing that story, because it’s a real-life example happens, I’m sure, often where someone gets asked to do something, but it’s not really thought about the intent of that question, like the overall intent is good, but not necessarily good for the individual, the individual, 

Heather McDermott  4:29   

yeah. And that’s why this conversation, I think, matters so much, because once we understand that performance, right, my son-in-law is not very motivated during those three days, but that’s shaped by his environment, and if we can understand that, then it shifts how we lead, and it moves us from asking, like, how do we get more out of my people, i.e. maybe requiring them to come in three days out of the week, then maybe we can ask something better, like, what conditions am I creating that shape how my people show up, and I think that’s where leaders have a tremendous amount. Of influence and opportunity. I 

Adam Salgat  5:03   

know you can’t speak this like specifically to that organization, but why do you think organizations in general have a tendency to overlook that part of the environment or culture side of things? Is that a natural instinct or something that might just.. that’s become like an accepted cultural business norm. 

Heather McDermott  5:22   

Oh, that’s such a great question, Adam. What’s interesting is our natural instinct is actually to be socially driven, but social thinking, thinking about people first, is more complex. People are people in culture issues are often ambiguous, they’re slower and harder to diagnose or resolve, people are, let’s face it, a little bit messy, and the things that get our attention are those things that are visible, measurable, and concrete. There’s also, I think, some cultural norms, like you indicated, that are at play here too. Leaders are typically trained in management, so think about that. Management is not necessarily leadership; they’re not trained in the care and nurture of people and a culture. And we typically promote leaders based on results, deadlines, and numbers, not how well their team interacts. And we also have this really crazy, persistent myth that people skills are soft skills, they’re optional skills. So, yeah, it’s this cultural business norm that’s really costing organizations more than they realize. The impact of human-centered leadership isn’t really soft or abstract. It impacts how people think, behave, and perform, and it’s human-centered leadership that’s actually a strategic advantage and a performance accelerator, but we seem to forget that all the time, because it’s not concrete, 

Adam Salgat  6:50   

you know. Thinking about that as like a performance accelerator, as opposed to just this soft skill set, that’s a powerful shift to me. So, to recap, if we start looking at performance issues as environment issues and believe in the power of human-centered leadership as a strategic choice, and, and that performance accelerator, we can really shift a company’s culture to improve performance. I’d say, 

Heather McDermott  7:18   

yeah, and I love that you use that word, choice, right, focusing on human-centered leadership and your organizational culture is a choice, and it’s not necessarily difficult to implement some key shifts to make some different choices. There are certain behaviors a leader can start adjusting right away to begin this type of transformation. 

Adam Salgat  7:41   

All right. Yes, I’m pretty happy you stepped right into that, because that’s where we’re going here with this, you know, from knowledge to action. So, let’s get right at it. In a blog you recently wrote, you talk about those intentional, specific leadership behaviors that shape performance, not necessarily big initiatives or, you know, new programs, but everyday moments, as you just alluded to. So, you highlight three in particular. Let’s start walking through those. As our audience is made up of many our community listens alumni, they know that there is impact when you listen with empathy, especially on your individual relationships. So, it’s not a huge surprise that your first tip would be focused around listening, right? The first tip about behaviors to adjust in everyday moments is how leaders listen. What do you mean by that, and why does that matter for a leader to consider this when they’re trying to help their people? 

Heather McDermott  8:40   

Yeah, it’s funny you think that it would be so much more intuitive that this is such a key skill, but when we talk about how leaders listen, we’re really talking about whether or not people feel heard or whether or not they feel dismissed. Listening is one of those things that seems so simple on the surface, but it really has this profound impact on how people experience their environment. What’s amazing about listening is actually doesn’t cost anything to implement the skill in a more intentional way, and that really looks like leaders leaning into this idea of listening with presence, curiosity, intention, so that they do communicate to the people around them that they matter. It tells other people you’re seen and your perspective is valued. It doesn’t even have to mean we agree. What’s interesting is I think most people rarely experience positive listening experience with this level of like intention, but when they do, we know they feel valued, respected, and understood, and that those experiences begin to establish trust, they build connection, and they shape, they shape people’s sense of safety and mattering at work, so something as simple as how a leader listens in a conversation, even if that conversation is only like five. For 10 minutes can really either start to open the door to engagement or it can start to slowly close it, and that’s why listening matters so much. 

Adam Salgat  10:10   

So, what I’m hearing is it’s not necessarily about just hearing the words someone says, it’s it’s about whether that person leaves that interaction feeling like they mattered in that conversation, 

Heather McDermott  10:22   

yeah, exactly. I think there’s this expression that people don’t remember what was said, they remember how they felt in that moment, and I think we all know what it feels like to be genuinely listened to, and those moments accumulate over time, and they translate into their overall experience of the workplace, and in particular, right, you mentioned earlier the their experience of the person they work for, their leader. 

Adam Salgat  10:47   

Let’s do a few quick tips inside of this tip. So, can you give a couple distinct examples of how a leader can show that they’re intentionally listening? What are some specific things they can work on. Yeah, 

Heather McDermott  11:02   

no, I appreciate you asking if there’s anything. Hopefully, I’ve gotten better in my leadership time. Is these skills so a couple things come to mind immediately. One is like deep presence, which means really some basics of setting aside the phone or the project that you’re typing away on set aside any other distractions, like I said, even if it’s just five to 10 minutes, it is a simple thing to do, but when we get, we get busy, and we forget to do another key thing is really setting aside judgments, assumptions, mental rebuttals, I have that happen a lot, setting aside the advice and instead really leaning into this place where we ask curious questions. One of the things I love about our organization is that intentionally every six months we do stay interviews, and it’s a half an hour where we ask meaningful questions, and then we just listen. We had just had those, and it’s really enjoyable, I think, to sit there and know that how we feel, what matters to us is heard. So, the third thing I’d say is practicing empathy and perspective taking to really gain an awareness of what matters to the other person. I think back to my example of my son-in-law having him report to an empty office without taking time to just even understand the impact, right? You might not agree that you are or aren’t going to report to the office for three days a week, but not even taking the time to understand that impact really indicates a missed listening opportunity, a missed opportunity to give empathy and just share some perspective about what the impact might be. 

Adam Salgat  12:42   

Yeah, I’m sure if he was given the opportunity in something like a stay interview, where he gets to share, you know, how things are going for him, and just those general insightful questions that get asked, he might take that opportunity to say, hey, when I come in, I feel a little demotivated, because I’m not able to connect with people as much as, you know, we may have anticipated when this was implemented, and it could be a discussion around that, making a change for him. 

Heather McDermott  13:07   

Yeah, absolutely. 

Adam Salgat  13:10   

Heather, thank you for those tips inside the tip. Let’s keep moving on to our second intentional leadership behavior. How leaders model vulnerability. Now, the depth of that word can mean different things to different people. How would you explain vulnerability in this context? 

Heather McDermott  13:28   

Vulnerability can, I think, in leadership be misunderstood. Vulnerability doesn’t mean that you’re required to overshare or you turn every leadership moment into some sort of personal confessional, that’s absolutely not what we mean by that in this context. Vulnerability is really about leaders being open and honest and willing to acknowledge that they don’t have all the answers, and they might not always be at their best selves. It’s about creating that space for authenticity, so when leaders are willing to admit mistakes or ask for input, say something like, I don’t know, it sends a very powerful signal to their team, and it tells their team that it’s safe to be human, and that’s really critical for psychological safety in the workplace. 

Adam Salgat  14:16   

And I hear you say that, and everything, but, like, I must say, like, I think there’s this stigma around leaders, aren’t they supposed to have it all together? Aren’t they supposed to be all buttoned up and have answers at the tip of their tongue? I mean, that just feels like what we’re supposed to do as a leader. 

Heather McDermott  14:32   

Yeah, I think that is definitely a common myth, maybe a common perception that continues to persist these days, but really plainly stated no, because if a leader feels like they have it all together, or that they always have to have it all together, be buttoned up, like you said, you know that pressure gets transferred to the team, and then people start to feel like they can’t take risks, they can’t speak up, and they certainly. They can’t make mistakes, and they probably can’t have personal lives or any outside stressors that we’re going to talk about and acknowledge the impact that it might be having on the work, but the reality is people aren’t two separate selves, they aren’t this separate personal self and this separate professional self. We all come to work as whole human beings, and when the humanness of who we are is never spoken to or acknowledged, it limits engagement and performance. The alternative, though, is when leaders model vulnerability in a thoughtful way and say things as simple as, you know, I’m not my best, or I’m not sure I know the answer to that question right now. What are your thoughts? Those things actually strengthen trust and they create an environment where people feel more comfortable contributing, problem solving, and taking ownership. So, rather than weakening leadership, vulnerability actually expands what’s possible within a team. 

Adam Salgat  15:58   

I appreciate that clarification, and I wholeheartedly agree with you, because in my experience I’ve always appreciated and felt a deeper sense of trust when a leader, coworker, friend, family member, whomever you know stands up, admits they’ve made a mistake, admits they may not have the answer, maybe admits they need a little help, that always for me personally, has gone a long way. 

Heather McDermott  16:23   

Yeah, you’ve got it, Adam. Right, exactly. When vulnerability is paired with, like, not only this authenticity, but their expectations and accountability, it creates these conditions where there’s just this transparency that occurs between two people and occurs on a team, and as you said, that’s where trust really begins to grow, and you feel like you’re not, you know, alone in the workplace 

Adam Salgat  16:49   

on a personal level. How has authenticity and vulnerability helped you perform at your highest, at your highest level throughout your career? 

Heather McDermott  17:00   

I have learned that in the hard way, Adam. There was a time early in my career where I honestly, I played pretend every day was a good day. Matter of fact, it was a really good day. Every day I was positive, I had my act together, and I honestly, I could, I could solve all the problems, or at least pretend that I could solve all those problems. Unfortunately, what was happening underneath for me was that everything was falling apart for me. Unfortunately, my life at the time was kind of a little bit of a mess, and I learned later that a couple of my other team members also weren’t doing so well either. They had some significant challenges they were facing, both professionally and some of them personally, and the problem was nobody was talking about it, the stress, the worry, and the impact on our work because of our heightened but undiscussed emotional state that we were all experiencing. We made some poor decisions about how we challenged an executive decision that got passed down to us. The decision, in all fairness, it should have been challenged, but how we did it led the team to being disbanded. And let me tell you, that compounded everybody’s stress, and it took a long time for people on that team to kind of recover, and even for the organization to recover, because restructuring was required, and from that moment on, I really changed my perspective about being authentic and vulnerable. I don’t play pretend anymore. If I’m not having a good day, you will likely hear me say just that. If I’m not sure how to resolve particular issue, you’ll probably hear me say that as well, and I’ll ask for other people’s thoughts, and what I’ve learned is people really appreciate authenticity and vulnerability. It actually still surprises me sometimes how much people really value it, but it makes sense, right? Often when we are authentic or vulnerable, we think I’m weak, but the reality is when other people model vulnerability, we, we tend to see it as strength and courage, and, and courage, and we do, we admire those things in other people. So, I guess I just go boldly there now, because I see too clearly the consequences of avoiding it. 

Adam Salgat  19:16   

Grateful for you being willing to share a story where you know, you, you, it sounds like when you look back on it, you really start to realize, had we done or been more open with each other, we might have done something different. Is it fair to say that, that when you look back on that, that’s what could have happened? 

Heather McDermott  19:37   

Oh, absolutely. And, honestly, the not to blame the person who we all reported to in this structure, but there was no vulnerability modeled throughout the organization as a whole, and I think had we started opening up and having that transparency, a lot of mistakes could have been avoided, 

Adam Salgat  19:57   

avoided. I’m very thankful. Are you sharing a story like that? I’m sure there’s listeners out there right now who are kind of maybe hopefully not exactly living the same scenario, they might be, but they’re looking at the opportunity now to say, okay, if I’m a little more vulnerable, if I talk about what might be going on professionally or even personally a little bit, if necessary, maybe we can overcome more, become a bit more resilient. So, let’s move on to our third intentional leadership behavior. How leaders recognize contributions. And I’ll say right now, thank you again for sharing your story, your personal story. So, there’s me trying to recognize your contribution to this audio cast. Tell me about why contributions, though the recognition of contributions are often overlooked, because it really is a performance lever if it is utilized in that way. 

Heather McDermott  20:53   

Yeah, absolutely, recognition is really incredibly important. It’s something I’m still learning about myself and trying to do better at, because it directly impacts whether people feel visible or invisible in their environment, and I think I’ve understated the value of it in my, in my career, but the reality is, when leaders take time to acknowledge contributions specifically and meaningfully, right, so we’re talking about something more than just thank you. It really enforces a sense of value for other people, and it communicates like what you did matters, and that has a powerful impact on people’s engagement. People are so much more likely to repeat behaviors that feel seen and appreciated. 

Adam Salgat  21:40   

Let me ask you a quick question. As we just covered vulnerability, and now we’re talking about recognition, do those two go hand in hand at times? Might someone become vulnerable even to recognize someone else? 

Heather McDermott  21:54   

That’s such a great question, Adam. And the answer would be absolutely. I think it requires something of us as leaders to dig deeper. Then, thank you. It requires us to slow down. It requires us to look at the things that we might not often realize we depend on. 

Adam Salgat  22:17   

So, if someone is struggling, maybe with that vulnerability to recognize someone. What happens if we don’t recognize contributions? 

Heather McDermott  22:26   

When contributions go unnoticed, I think people start to feel disconnected. They might start to question whether or not their work makes a difference. Matter of fact, there’s some really interesting research out there by Gallup about how just the lack of noticing contributions actually is more harmful than negative feedback, right. At least with negative feedback, we know what we can fix, but if I don’t think I matter at all positively or negatively, that tends to shut people down, and it impacts how people show up. I think what’s important here is that you know recognition doesn’t have to be elaborate. I did say it needs to be more than just the thank you, sure, but it’s really about being consistent, and I think it’s about naming things like a contribution and a meeting, acknowledging somebody’s idea sharing, and it looks like expressing appreciation in a way that is genuine, again, not that something was done in a perfect way, but that there was something underneath it that was valuable, something like initiative or creativity that you want to reinforce, and so when I think when we can do things like connect people’s efforts to impact those moments reinforce the kind of environment where people start to feel like they’re seen and they’re valued, and then we become more motivated to contribute, and probably makes sense over time that shapes performance in a very real way, 

Adam Salgat  23:59   

so you know, you made a notation here. It’s not about big celebrations, although I, you know, I would say I wouldn’t mind a big giant cake with a big thank you written on it. I’m just, that’s an option, I, you know, everybody can likely appreciate that, but it is about that consistency, right, to consistently help people and to show them that what they do matters, 

Heather McDermott  24:24   

yeah, you’ve got it. Cake is great, but when people feel valued, they bring more of themselves to work, even when there’s no cake, and that’s where we send, you know, like team performance improves, individual performance improves, and organizational performance improves. 

Adam Salgat  24:41   

Let me recap the three intentional leadership behaviors that we’ve talked about so far. The first one, how leaders listen, how leaders model vulnerability, and how leaders recognize contributions. And again, what we’re trying to point out here, and what. We’re hoping stands out is that none of these have to be large scale initiatives, that they can be everyday choices. 

Heather McDermott  25:08   

Yeah, again, I love that word, choices, and I like your emphasizing that it doesn’t have to be large scale. We, of course, certainly love it when people are very strategic and intentional about their culture, but a leader can be very just intentional about their choices, their actions, their listening, their vulnerability, and their recognition of other people. They can, they can shape the environment where people start to feel like it’s more relational instead of just task and transactional. And over time, those environments influence how people show up for their work, they influence whether or not people continue to stay in their jobs, and how the organization as a whole performs. So, leaders have this opportunity to design environments with this level of intentionality, and performance follows in very predictable ways. High-performing teams are developed in environments where people feel respected, understood, and trusted. And when leaders design for humanity, accountability strengthens rather than weakens engagement. It becomes more durable, and performance improves as people bring more attention, creativity, and care to their work. And we see this time and time again. So, human-centered leadership is not, it’s not a trend, it’s not a personality trait, like you said, Adam. It is intentional choice. It’s does require disciplined practice, and it’s shaped by our daily choices. Yeah, so we do have this opportunity where I think you mentioned earlier, right, the degree of stress and disconnection we’re all feeling. We can design environments where people feel like they can overcome that, where people feel like they’re seen and they’re heard, and doing that, I think, is no longer optional. It’s actually essential to be competitive in today’s work environment, do as 

Adam Salgat  27:05   

always, we love to leave our listeners with a level up opportunity. What’s one thing that they can take away from our conversation and put into practice right away? Heather, 

Heather McDermott  27:15   

I love that you said one thing. I would encourage listeners to focus on just one of these areas this week, choose the one that matters to you most. You probably have already heard something that resonated with you. So, whether it’s listening, vulnerability, or recognition, just start to be very intentional about how you show up in that space. Pay attention to your inner options. You can ask yourself things like, did I truly listen in that moment, did I create space for openness? Did I acknowledge someone’s contribution in a meaningful way? And you might miss the mark the first time around. So, if you do, just loop back and go do it. You don’t have to change everything all at once, though, is the important part here, but just making those small consistent shifts in these areas, acknowledging that you’re working on doing something different, really can significantly change how people experience their work environment with you and experience your leadership. So, over time, just know that those changes help shape performance and strengthen trust and increase psychological safety. 

Adam Salgat  28:23   

Thank you so much, Heather. If you’re curious, how the Chapman Foundation helps individuals and organizations implement principles to create long-lasting human-centered culture change, we encourage you to learn more about our Caring Workplace program. We partner with organizations looking to care for their people and power up performance at the same time. Visit the link in the description of the audio cast to see all the details on our website, and there’s also a contact form for you to fill out and reach out to one of us here at the Chapman Foundation, which could very likely end up being Heather. So I’m sure she’d be happy to speak to you. One 

Heather McDermott  29:01   

thing that you can also do is, if this conversation resonates with you, we encourage people to share it with a colleague, another team member, and just open up the conversation to their team as a whole. 

Adam Salgat  29:16   

Awesome, Heather, thank you so much for being adventurous with me today to be on our audio cast. I’m very thankful that you, I know, stepped a bit out of your comfort zone to record with me, but I know your knowledge is expansive, and I’m glad that you get to bring that to our alumni. So, thank you very much. 

Heather McDermott  29:34   

Yeah, thank you, Adam. I feel like we should both share in that cake we talked about, and I really appreciated the conversation today. 

Adam Salgat  29:41   

Until next time, walk your path with intention, because you are the message. Take care, my friends.