The counterintuitive secret of leadership | Jessica Kriegel

0:03You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Surrender. It's not a word most leaders want to associate with their leadership style, but workplace culture expert Jessica Kriegel thinks it might be the most powerful tool they're not using. She has the data to back it up.

0:23Jessica Kriegel: The reality is control is an illusion. You can't control anything outside of yourself. The only thing you can control is the way that you show up. In this talk, Jessica makes the case that the leaders who drive the best results aren't the ones who control the most. They're the ones who surrender, not in weakness, but in strategy. Because sometimes the most powerful thing a leader can do is let go. To surrender is not passive. It is not giving up. It is a radical acceptance of what you need to do in that moment that you actually have control of. That's coming up right after a short break.

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2:05Be smart. Get wise. Download the Wise app today. T's and C's apply. This episode is brought to you by Choiceology, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. Hosted by Katie Milkman, an award-winning behavioral scientist and author of bestselling book, How to Change.

2:22Jessica Kriegel: Choiceology is a show about the psychology and economics behind our decisions. Hear true stories from Nobel laureates, authors, athletes, and everyday people about why we do the things we do. Listen to Choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen.

2:46And now our TED Talk of the day.

2:49Jessica Kriegel: Every time I give one of these talks, I have a routine. Okay, I start by showing up early and I do the sound check. I get the mic, and then I go in the halls, and I walk around, and I look at the audience, because I want to get a sense of the vibe. And really, where my mind starts to go is I prepare. You know, I get backstage, I sit down, and I start to think about all the things that I wish were a little bit different. You know, the things that are, they would be better if they were my way. So I wish the room was a little bit cooler. I wish the stage was a little bit bigger. I wish that the audience didn't look so hungover.

3:24Jessica Kriegel: No, you guys look great, not you. Sometimes, though, they look hungover, and I get worried. And I start focusing on all of the things that I can't control because ultimately I want to do a good job. You know, I'm a keynote speaker, and I've been hired to show up and perform and drive results, and I'm worried that all these things might prevent me from doing that. And for leaders, you can probably relate because this is actually a very natural coping mechanism to being under pressure. You as a leader have to drive results. It is harder than it ever has been to get results right now. You have increasing shareholder expectations at the same time as employee expectations are increasing.

4:03Jessica Kriegel: The rapid pace of change. The workforce generally is shifting so quickly, and yet you as a leader, you still got to get those results. And so leaders tend to focus on what it is that they have to do to make it work. And they think about what they have to manage, every detail that they need to adjust, the processes, and really the people, what they need to do differently. But the reality is control is an illusion. You can't control anything outside of yourself. The only thing you can control is the way that you show up. So what if instead of trying to force the world to fit into the way that you would like it to be, we tried something radical and unconventional.

4:45Jessica Kriegel: We tried surrender. Now, surrender can feel like a touchy-feely word, especially when we're talking about leaders driving results. But let me demonstrate surrender right now in this talk, okay? I am going to surrender. I'm going to stop talking and be quiet until someone says, now. Now? Oh, that was fast. Well, thank you. It was so much easier than I thought it was going to be, and that's kind of the point of surrender. I was thinking you guys might take 30 seconds and make me stand here quietly, and it's uncomfortable to surrender. That's part of the point. That's part of why it's so hard to surrender.

5:21Jessica Kriegel: But what happened in that moment? I stepped back, and you, sir, you stepped in. And a new dynamic was created, and we did something different. And we co-created this moment together. The problem with the control mindset is that it doesn't drive results because it chokes adaptability. And adaptive cultures win, not control cultures. I studied with Stanford Graduate Business School a couple years ago. We looked at 243 companies. We looked at their purpose and their strategy, their culture, and obviously their results. And we wanted to know which kinds of companies won. And the companies that outperformed all other types were the adaptive companies.

6:04Jessica Kriegel: They outperformed control companies by three times. Over the course of three years, their revenue growth was significantly higher. So how do you create an adaptive culture? That is the question. Well, it's not by telling everyone that we're going to be adaptive now and controlling the adaptability of the room, right? The way that you create an adaptive culture is by understanding your role in the co-creation of it. So to surrender is not passive. It is not giving up. It is a radical acceptance of what you need to do in that moment that you actually have control of. Now, we know that results come from actions.

6:45Jessica Kriegel: People are trying to drive results by focusing on the actions that people are taking, which is that control mentality. But most leaders, they think that if they want to change those actions, they have to implement a bunch of processes and procedures and maybe new workflows, right? Have a bunch of meetings, do KPIs and dashboards. And when you take that approach, you are in that control mindset. And what I found in 20 years of consulting is that people don't change because you want implemented new processes. People will act in alignment with what they believe. And so if you want to change their behavior, you have to shift what it is they believe.

7:23Jessica Kriegel: And once again, I can't control your beliefs, right? I can't say, okay, you're now going to be comfortable with risk-taking. Thank you. That doesn't happen. But what I can do is I can create an experience, which I control, that will shift your belief, and that belief will have you then proactively choose to take a new action, which will drive a result. So what does it look like in action? I will give you an example. From years ago, I was hired to be the CHRO, the head of HR for a technology company. And I had just had this personal moment of transformation in which I was embracing surrender in life, and I wanted to try it at work.

8:01Jessica Kriegel: And so what happened was I got this new job, I went to my first board meeting. I felt very special being there and the board let us know that we had to lay off 20 % of the workforce and I was in charge. Hmm surrender. So I show up and I I'm trying to figure out what to do and let me tell you how layoffs typically go in corporate America The executives know that it's happening months before anyone else and they control the process They control the narrative they get into rooms and they meet and they discuss who are we going to lay off and how many people and how is that going to affect the budget and how are we going to control the narrative and then when are we going to announce it and then they drop the axe and then they deal with the fallout.

8:42Jessica Kriegel: But I wanted to surrender and so I asked myself what surrender would look like in that moment, not controlling everyone else but making a choice about the experience that I could create. And so I showed up the next day at work, day after the board meeting and I gathered everyone together and I said I've just been told that we need to lay off 20 % of the workforce. And I don't know who yet, and I don't know when exactly, but we're going to be figuring that out, and I'm going to let you know every step of the way. That was an experience that I created in that moment that shifted the beliefs of the people that worked on that team.

9:16Jessica Kriegel: Now, some of the people's beliefs that shifted were, I got to go get a job, right? They started applying for jobs, and then they left. Other people, though, were really grateful for the transparency. And it was something that they hadn't experienced before. And so they said, you know what? I want to stay here and work with someone who's going to tell me the truth and walk through the front door. You can't mismanage the truth. And you know what happened? After the next couple of months, as we watched people leave the organization, we realized we didn't even have to do layoffs because the company had right-sized itself.

9:50Jessica Kriegel: And the people who left, they left of their own accord on their own terms. And the people who stayed, they were with us. They were ready to adapt to the business circumstances because they knew that we had them. Here's another example. This was from one of our clients. It was Ocean Spray. This was years ago. They had multiple plants, and one plant was in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and it was the worst performing plant in the entire company. So they hired a new guy named Tim to come in. He was the plant manager, and his job was to turn it around. And Tim was the surrendered leader. So he was not interested in the command and control approach, and he showed up.

10:27Jessica Kriegel: and he was looking at, I mean, they had the highest costs in the system. They had high injury rates. They had hostile union relations. And Tim came in and he said, what can I do to change the situation? He didn't come in. A lot of plant managers would come in and they would start talking about what you guys need to do differently. You guys have to act right. If we don't turn this around, we're going to have to close the plant. We're going to implement a bunch of new processes and procedures. We're going to have meetings and make sure that you're on track, right? That's the command and control approach.

10:56Jessica Kriegel: But Tim surrendered. And he asked himself, what are the beliefs that people have at this plant that need to shift? And the belief that he identified was largely resentment. I mean, there was distrust between the employees and the leaders. And he could understand why. Because when the plant workers would show up in the morning, they would walk past all of the empty parking spaces that were reserved for managers that weren't even there yet because they don't show up until 9 a.m. when the office day started. So imagine that experience that's being created for those plant workers. So Tim gets everyone outside and he says, come on, everyone, we have a meeting outside, goes in the parking lot, literally brings a chainsaw and chainsaws down every single reserved for manager parking sign.

11:46Jessica Kriegel: And then he looked at them and he said, park wherever you want. Let's go back to work. That was a powerful chainsaw moment of surrender, right? And what it did was it shifted the beliefs. There was more work to be done, obviously, but the belief began to shift in which people said, okay, this is different. These leaders, they do not, I can trust them, right? I can trust this guy. Let me see what I can do to adapt, to turn this around. They ended up reducing injuries by 75%. Their costs went down. They went from the worst, almost shutting down plant to the number one plant in the entire ocean spray ecosystem because Tim surrendered.

12:26Jessica Kriegel: He didn't show up and say, what do you guys got to do differently? How do I wish it was different than the way that it was? Now, think of all the energy that you spend wishing things were different, wishing that they were your way so that you can be more comfortable. And there are a lot of people who don't like the word surrender because it can feel kind of weak, right? Especially military people, it conjures up images of waving the white flag and giving up. But I'm not suggesting that you give up. I'm suggesting that you give up the illusion of control, which you never really had in the first place.

12:58Jessica Kriegel: And you take all of that energy that you're spending in that, and you point it towards mastering yourself, the way you respond, the way you show up. Especially as a leader, when you are responsible for creating experiences that will shape the beliefs of those around you. Now, the Navy SEALs have a saying, which is control the controllables. But there is a corollary. The hidden message within that is also, and stop trying to control the uncontrollables. Right? So the Navy SEALs know they can't control what their brother does. They can't control what the orders are that they've been given. They can't control if the equipment malfunctions.

13:34Jessica Kriegel: They can't control what the enemy's doing. And when the chopper is going down in enemy territory, they're not going down thinking, well, I wish it was different. Wait, hold on. We shouldn't be here, right? They are focused on what do I need to do to adapt in this moment and respond and show up. They are experts in surrender. So my invitation to you is to experiment with surrender, letting go the illusion of control and focus on the experiences that you're creating that will shift and shape the beliefs of those around you that you're there to influence and to support that will ultimately allow them to make different choices about the actions that they want to take because they've got free will.

14:15Jessica Kriegel: You can't control them. I understand for leaders it's hard to understand because you've been given the title of manager and director, and so it feels like it's my job to tell everyone what to do, but ultimately they're only going to do it if they believe in it. And that is how you drive results within teams of organizations. So try surrender. It is uncomfortable sometimes, and it can feel like a risk. But every great breakthrough came when someone was willing to take a risk. So take a risk today, surrender to lead, and once more as I finish this talk, I'm going to hand it over to you. What will you do with it?

14:54Thank you.

14:59That was Jessica Kriegel at TEDx Southlake in Dallas, Texas in 2025. If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at ted.com slash curation guidelines. And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This talk was fact-checked by the TED Research Team and produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tonsika Sungmarnivong. This episode was mixed by Christopher Faze Bogan. Additional support from Emma Taubner and Daniela Balarezo. I'm Elise Hu. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.

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16:42Jessica Kriegel: Choiceology is a show about the psychology and economics behind our decisions. Hear true stories from Nobel laureates, authors, athletes, and everyday people about why we do the things we do. Listen to Choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen.

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