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Ged: Milan, Viveka and I are back in the studio for another edition of Card Cast. Now what are we talking about today? Well, let’s deal a card and let’s find out.
Milan: Oh, good news. Hey Judge, what are your good news?
Ged: My, my good news is my wife’s out of hospital and she’s recovering well. So I’ll, I’ll take that. That’s that’s definitely good news.
Milan: I’m so, so very happy to hear that. Well, my good news are that actually yesterday I wrote a card number 50, so we almost have a deck. So it’s actually
Ged: And what hap
Milan: It has come.
Ged: What happens when we have 52 cards?
Milan: Well subscribe and you’ll know.
Ged: Good answer. Good answer. Mm-hmm.
Milan: Excellent, excellent. Why do we start with good news, Jim?
Ged: So this is, this is an interesting one. And you know, this is something I sort, I know the, the, you know, us coaches, we’ve, we’ve been, we do all the time and we’ve [00:01:00] been doing forever. And, and, and before I go into, you know, starting with good news, I. When we start working with a new client, I think that this is the first indicator that new clients get that what we do is different to what others do. And this is probably something that they’ve never experienced before. And literally 3, 4, 5 minutes into the start of an engagement, the start of the first kickoff session. They’re thinking, oh, okay, this is different. He’s asking us a question that we wouldn’t normally think about asking now, what’s made us smile today?
What’s put a, what’s made us happy? What’s what’s, what are we pleased about? And this, I think, sets the scene for an engagement with a client, the work we do with clients, because it’s so different from everything else. So we always start with good news as, as you know, Milan, and we do good news for numerous reasons. And why, why don’t we just. Riff between each other. Yeah, between ourselves and, and pick our next best good reason. So for [00:02:00] me, good news is, is about setting the mood for the session. Now, if you start it with positivity, you are much more likely to continue the session with positivity rather than
negativity. So by sharing good news, we are telling everyone a little bit about our lives, what’s going on in our world. What do you like about good news?
Milan: You know about my ob obsession with psychology and of course, in different words of what you just said. I think that we actually learned this from Barb. When we were at at coach days you immediately get into a creative mode because you have to think about something, right? You are not reacting.
Now you’re proactive. Now you’re looking for something. You’re, you are basically firing a part of your brain that is much more. Better suited, if you will, for you know, a productive meeting afterwards, right? If you’re thinking [00:03:00] from your creative brain rather than from the reactive fight or flight you are in much better, have much better chance to get to a good result.
Ged: Absolutely. Absolutely. The, the other thing I love about good news is it, it helps us understand a little bit about what’s going on in each, each other’s worlds, each other’s lives. And I always start it by saying, Nash, let’s share some good news and we. We don’t go around the room now. We basically wait for the next person to call out.
And and people hate silence, so I don’t call on the next person because someone’s gonna come in and fill the gap, you know? And they, they’re gonna fill the silence because silence gets uncomfortable once it goes more than about 15, 20 seconds. So it’s, it’s just a, a subtle way of making people think, you know, making, make them think a little bit more creatively.. This is where it all crosses the metronomic systems. You know, it’s part of the human system, but it’s also part of the cultural system because CI is helping people to [00:04:00] become more cohesive because they’re thinking, oh, okay. Right. I didn’t realize, didn’t realize. Bob’s daughter was going into year 12.
You know, their kids are at the same age as mine. They’re probably going through the same challenges that we, that we do with, you know, kids as they grow up at different phases. So it just helps you understand a little bit more about what’s going on in people’s lives and. Surprisingly, most leadership teams don’t know much about each other really outside of their professional contexts.
So I always ask for personal and or professional, and most people are more than happy once they’re used to this. And this is a muscle, you have to practice it. Now, once they’re used to it, they’re more than happy to share more about their life, more about their world than they would’ve done before. So personal and or professional.
And you know that the A players are gonna do both and they’ve always got good news.
Milan: Yeah, Okay, the next one values. News are one of the best ways of how to communicate and integrate the values [00:05:00] in the culture because, when you can celebrate a acting on values or a decision that was made based on values, even if it’s, if it’s a harsh one, when you can really celebrate values being lived, it’s the way of enforcing that and. Making sure everybody understand that we mean it when we say it’s not just you know, letters on the wall.
Ged: Yeah, so shouting out for someone who’s gone above and beyond who’s, who’s gave a great, given a great example of living the values. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a team person, it could be a team as well. And I, and a shout out to the marketing team that that email campaign they sent out has really, really hit, it’s really, really connected and you know, really good work. You know, that, that shows the value of, you know, creatively exploring opportunities. You know, that’s that, that sort of thing. That sort of thing. Yeah. So one of the other things [00:06:00] I, I think is, is really good for, for values is. Is going back to the cohesive system and about, you know, really, really getting people to open up about themselves and express vulnerability.
And we sort of touched on this earlier on, but that if, if people aren’t prepared to share, then they, they’re not being vulnerable. And if they’re not being vulnerable, it’s a really indicator that they. Haven’t got trust in the rest of the team, the rest of the leadership team. So it’s the fact that people aren’t prepared to share good news is often as much an indicator as the ones who who are.
Mm-hmm.
Milan: How often did it happen to you that you’re doing this for the first time and somebody. On the team says, I don’t have any good news.
Ged: It, it, it happens, it happens quite a lot actually. And you know, that to me is it’s an orange flag. It’s not a red flag. If they’re still doing that after the first few [00:07:00] meetings, you know, and the CEO is reporting back that they’re not sharing good news, then that’s probably coming a red flag and it’s probably a reason behind it.
And the reason behind is not necessarily that they’re not an A player, something might be going on in their world, you know, something might be, might be. Pausing them to be distracted or be, you know, not in a good place. So it’s, it’s about understanding, understanding why. And sometimes it’s hard, isn’t it?
You know, you, you don’t necessarily, you can’t necessarily think of good news every single day. You know, if you, you know, in your daily huddles and you know. I had a CEO come to me once and say, well, look, you know, the, you know, the good news part of the daily huddles, you know, it’s, it’s really hard to think about good news every day.
And he said, are you asking every single person to shout out good news in their daily huddles every single day? And he said, well, yeah, isn’t that what we’re supposed to do? And I said, well, no, just open the floor for good news. You know, open the floor for good news and people will share. And as long as the same person isn’t sharing every day, [00:08:00] then you’ve got, you’ve got an open forum and people are open.
They’re, if they’re willing to share good news, don’t have to have good news every day. But o over time, most people will find something to share every day.
Milan: Well, I think that’s a daily huddle technique. I think that when you get to bigger meetings like to leadership weekly or you know, God for. It your cordial or annual, you need to go around the room and do that. And the one thing I wanted to say is that the, I don’t have any good news is a indicator, not necessarily when it’s said, but how it’s set, I’ve heard it aggressively, like basically it’s, I’m not willing to share or you know, and somebody just said, nah, I really can’t think of anything.
That’s fine. Right. But if you get that. Tone. If you get the, you know, body posture and they’re saying there’s literally a refusal to play, [00:09:00] that is definitely, definitely a red flag right there. But in my experience, those people usually don’t stick on the team for a very long, but that’s, yeah.
Ged: Yeah, it becomes apparent pretty quickly, doesn’t it? They’re not, they’re not the right people for the team.
Milan: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ged: Yep. So Milan, how, how quickly do you find teams take to sharing good news? Is it days, is it weeks? Is it months?
Milan: I think that, that it varies. It so varies. And look, I work with a lot of multicultural teams, right? So when there are, there are different cultures with the different. Approach, if you will, to sharing and to vulnerability and to, to being open. So it, it varies. It varies quite a bit, but I always. What is interesting is when it starts cascading, right? [00:10:00] When you’re talking to your leaders and you’re talking about good news in their teams, that you as a coach, you are not there. You don’t necessarily even looking at it, but you know, once you start getting it back that the good news are coming when you tell the leaders, like half, half your team share good news because that might give you material of what to share. You know, when you’re, when you’re in the leadership team meeting, it’s. Such an indicator of the energy and you know that it’s always accompanied, for lack of better word, with you know, step up in performance, step up in cohesion, step up in the joy of what you are doing. So it’s tool but also an indicator to how the team is doing.
Ged: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. One of the things I love is after a while, if I forget and I don’t often forget, but I have done, if I forget to ask for good news,
Milan: We
Ged: Team will always pull me up on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We haven’t done good news today. Why, why haven’t we done good news today? Yeah.
Milan: Exactly.[00:11:00]
Ged: They call, they call me on it.
It’s like, ah, okay. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Let’s, let’s share some good news. Who’s got some good news today? Yep. Mm-hmm.
Milan: It’s fantastic. Had you ever had any team just refuse doing that?
Ged: I actually haven’t. I actually haven’t. But I would suggest if I had that feeling, then they’re probably not a team that I would continue with. And if I didn’t continue with them, then they would probably drop the habit of good news pretty quickly. And it comes back to, to trust and vulnerability and yeah, they’re just not prepared to, to be that.
Milan: I do find that very, very related to dysfunctions in the team. And so, you know, once you run. Five dysfunctions of, of a team assessment. And when, when as a coach you are watching the behavior of the team, you start really seeing some [00:12:00] correlations. And again, good news and the, not just the willingness and ability to share them, but also the quality and the passion behind the contribution are a massive, massive indicator of where you are at as a team.
Ged: Yeah, speed for me is also a real indicator if they’re going, no, well, jumping from person to person really, really quickly. That to me is a team who is open and they’re willing to share and they’re being vulnerable. But also they’re doing it proactively and willingly. And, you know, you know, if, if you.
If you are going through good news really quickly, that’s not a bad sign. That’s actually a good sign because people are going, okay, let’s keep going. Let’s go going, let’s, let’s compound this positivity. Let’s compound it.
Milan: Absolutely. So what tips would you give to a new team that’s not used to doing or sharing good news at every meeting?
Ged: I think the, the, the main tip I would share is just start, you know, like most things, if you just start doing it, and it might be awkward [00:13:00] for the first few times, you know, some people might not really want to be. Really want to contribute but just keep going. I mean, I find that, you know, with daily huddles, you know, 28 days from, you know, cynic or skeptics to converter, to converted, I think with, with a good news, it’s probably just about a week.
You know, if you’re doing good news every single day, you know, and you do it reliably and you make it in a non-threatening environment, then week two, it’s gonna happen anyway. It’s gonna happen.
Milan: You know, when in doubt we have the good newsletter, right? Number one is always values related recognition of a value being acted. Number two is recognition of a team member, ideally outside of the room. But even if it’s somebody in the room, you know,
Ged: Yeah.
Milan: Good, you know, third one, know, personal good news.
Something that happened that you know, you can bring on. And then, you know, if everything else fails, there is always [00:14:00] the hey. I’ve got done what I planned to yesterday and I feel good about it. Or you know, I actually slept really well last night and it doesn’t happen to me all the time. Right.
Ged: That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Milan: Matter as much.
The delivery is more important than the content.
Ged: Yeah, it’s the, the emotion that’s used to express it and the energy that’s used to express it. Now, the, the, the topic itself, as you say is, is neither here nor there.
Milan: Yeah, absolutely.
Ged: Yep. Yep. Okay. Well, if you’re not practicing good news at the beginning of every single one of your meetings, and I do mean every single one of your meetings, you’re probably missing out.
You’re missing out on an opportunity to increase team cohesion and find out more about what’s going on in the lives of your team. It’s an easy, easy win. Do them in your daily huddles. Do them in your weekly meetings. Do them in your monthly meetings. Do them in your quarterly meetings. Do them in all of your meetings.
Now did I say that? Do them in all of your meetings. [00:15:00] Good news. It’s awesome.
