Next Level Listening (The Ask Approach) | Jeff Wetzler

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25:37Turn your expensive wireless bill into actual savings. Go to mintmobile.com slash charm. That's mintmobile.com slash charm. Limited time offer. Upfront payment of$45 for three months,$90 for six months, or$180 for 12 months required. That's$15 a month equivalent. Taxes and fees extra. Initial plan term only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes when the network is busy. Capable device required. Availability speed and coverage varies. See MintMobile.com. AJ and I have even, we've had meetings either with employees or vendors and other people where if AJ and I were there first or before we went there, we would talk about how we would sit and where we would sit in order to make certain people comfortable that we knew would be intimidated in that meeting or in this business acquisition.

26:25So whatever these things were, that was always on our mind because I remember even rearranging seats around a dinner table because we had an idea of who these people were and interacting with them, wanted to put them in the best place to get the desired result that we were looking for. Yeah. You wanted to create a certain level of connection with them that they were going to feel comfortable. So that's part of it. Another part of making it safe that I think is really important is what I just call opening up. If you're going to ask someone a question, explain why you're asking the question. Don't just say, here's my, you know, don't just blurt out the question because people are going to guess at your agenda.

27:03But if you can say, here's my question, here's why I'm asking, all of a sudden you've opened up a little bit more and they start to feel safer. Opening up can also mean opening up about something that I feel vulnerable about too, something I'm struggling with so that they can see it's safe to talk about that kind of thing. And then the last part of opening up that I think is really important, I call radiating resilience. And radiating resilience is really demonstrating to the other person that I can handle what they have to say. I'm not going to crumble. I'm also not going to punish them for my own emotional reaction.

27:32It could even be as simple as saying something to someone like, whatever it is you have to say, I'm really interested in hearing it, no matter if it's good, bad, or ugly. Or it could be saying something to someone like, hey, if I were you, I would probably be really frustrated. I'm curious, is that how you're feeling? All of a sudden, I am now saying to them, I get it. If you're feeling that way, I can handle this. I'm resilient to that. It plays in all our lives. Just recently, I had started doing short form content and there's stuff on YouTube shorts and Instagram shorts and TikTok. And one of the things that you can do with TikTok is just, is you can turn off your contacts and so that your friends don't know that you're releasing videos and, and you can just go on there and do your work and have some fun and be creative and see what happens.

28:20Whereas Instagram, All your friends are going to see that you posted something. They've been alerted. And it makes it much more difficult. In fact, for me, I spent a couple months just doing stuff on TikTok, getting better, having fun with it before I put together an Instagram for that specific reason. I just felt more safe to do the things that I needed to do, to make the mistakes that I needed to, and to learn on TikTok. Perfect example of how your safety relates to your willingness to share with other people. Now, in your example, as a new manager, I think a lot of our listeners, as they move from IC to management, they want to make an impact.

28:59But what's often the case is there's culture and norms that they're now working against. So whether that's their previous manager or how this information has been perceived or reacted to in the past has created an unsafe environment. And then you come in there and you're like, great, I have the ask approach. I'm ready to go. I want to get in there and make everyone feel safe. but there's all this history of in past meetings and past situations where they weren't safe. How do we create a reset so that people know now we really can feel safe? No matter what happened in the past, I recognize that I was reactive.

29:32I understand that previously the culture maybe wasn't as receptive to what you had to share in difficult conversations. How do we hit that reset button so that people can feel safe moving forward? In some ways, I think the way that you just asked the question points the way to the answer as well, which is to actually discuss it and name it. And I think this is part of the opening up strategy of Make It Safe, which is I'm going to open up about how our culture has been before. I'm going to put that on the table. I'm going to make that discussable. I might even ask a question and say, has that been your perception too?

30:02I might even ask a question and say, given our history and our culture, what would make it more safe for you? What could I be doing as a leader in order to be able to create a different kind of atmosphere in this conversation? And so take what was in my own unspoken observation and put that out there, make it discussable, and then add a question to it. Yeah, I think that allows everyone to then recognize that in calling out the unsaid, they can start to share what they've been holding back on and what they've been withholding in these conversations to feel safer to share the unsaid. All right, step three.

30:33Yeah, so step three is what I call pose quality questions. And my definition of a quality question is very simple. It is a question that helps us learn something important from someone else. And I distinguish this from crummy questions because a lot of us utter words with question marks and we think we're asking a question, but it's not really a high quality question. Maybe it's a sneaky question that's trying to lead someone to our point of view by saying, don't you think we should do this? Or wouldn't it be great if we could do this? Or all those kinds of things. There's a whole bunch of crummy questions.

31:05A quality question really helps us learn something from someone else. And I think of quality questions almost the way that I think a surgeon would think about their precision tools. I want this scalpel for this purpose. I want this for this. Depending on what we're trying to learn, we can use different quality questions. And I'll come back to the one that you shared earlier, which is request reactions. What is your reaction to what I have to say? And just one short story about that. Also, when I was a new manager, I was taught this question. And I was taught it's a good idea to ask someone what their reactions are after you give them some direction or some guidance.

31:38And so I was managing someone and I thought I had done a great job giving him some guidance and direction. I said, just to check, what's your reaction to what I just said? And he said, honestly, if you really want to know, I found it totally demoralizing. And I was floored because I thought I was doing well, being a good manager. But had I not asked that question, he would have walked away completely deflated. We would not have had the kind of results and performance. But because I asked that, I was able to discover that. We were able to trace back what was our disconnect. It turned out that I knew something about our client that I was trying to solve for that he wasn't aware of.

32:09Once I shared that information, we got on the same page, we were good. But just that simple question was a game changer for me. So that's one category of quality questions. I think another category of quality questions that is often underutilized is inviting ideas. Simply to say, hey, I've got this dilemma. What would you do here? Do you have any ideas for me? How might we solve for this concern that we have. And this is where people have the most amazing ideas and they aren't going to share them unless they're invited to share them. But when they do, like that can change the entire direction of a discussion or a strategy or et cetera.

32:44So that would be a second. And I'll just give you one other kind of sequence of quality questions that I think is very powerful, which starts with what I call hear their headline. It's so amazing when that people, how often people don't actually tell us their headline view. Like I actually disagree with this strategy, or I actually think this is the wrong way to go or the right way to go, et cetera. So here their headline is just simply saying questions like, what do you think about X? Where do you come down on this? What would you do in this situation? But then you can't stop there. Then there's another set of questions that I call dig deeper.

33:15And dig deeper is really about where does that come from? What makes you think that? Can you walk me through your thought process? How did you get there? What are the concerns and values that are making you worried about this or want to do this? And then there's one more step to go, which is what I call see what they see. because their reasons aren't coming from nowhere. Their reasons are coming from information and experiences they had. So see what they see could literally be just to say, what are some examples of when that concern has come up? Or what information are you basing that on? Or can you tell me a story about that?

33:46And sometimes when we say what information, people get intimidated because they think, well, if I don't have it all buttoned up on a PowerPoint slide, I can't give my data. But the truth is that lived experience is also data. And so by saying, tell me a story of when you've encountered that issue, That's another way to get information from people. What can I learn from you requires a level of humility that at times can be difficult when there's a power imbalance, there's an experience imbalance, or maybe someone has just performed really poorly on previous tasks. And you can feel like, well, what can I possibly learn from this person?

34:18They're not getting it done. They're not delivering. And I got to make sure that they get on track because it impacts the whole team as a manager. So in those situations, how do we wrestle with that ego that's telling us, I can't learn anything from this person. There's nothing that I could possibly gain from this interaction. Well, anything could be taken to an extreme. And so if there's somebody who's just like a completely underperforming and everyone else is really performing well, there may be a different kind of conversation. But even in a situation like that, I would be wanting to understand, well, what led you to make the choices that you did?

34:50And I might also be wanting to understand, how did I contribute to this being hard for you? Or is there something that stopped you from doing what I was hoping that you would do? So that's an example of what I can learn. It doesn't mean that this person has a PhD and they're going to give me all their wisdom. But even if I'm just learning what stopped them from doing this or what made it hard for them or why did they show up late today or how I got in the way, those are the kinds of examples of things that I could be learning from them. Yeah, I'm really happy that we drilled down on that because I know that can be a roadblock, especially once you make that transition from a top performer to now managing a team where you've been judged in the past on performance of your peers, recognize that you're performing well, and now you're in charge of leading them.

35:32And that can come up where that ego is like, well, you know, last week I was crushing it. And now I need you to start crushing it because I'm now responsible for not only myself, but for you. Totally. And so that's, that's when it's extra important to understand their experience of the work and of the relationship as well. And it gives you an opportunity to find those blind spots in your communication too. Because a lot of what I think is happening here is just miscommunication. You We have this perception that we're delivering things perfectly because we've probably thought about these difficult conversations.

36:01We've probably wrestled with what we're going to say before the meeting and how we're going to deliver it because we want it to have the highest impact. And maybe it's the first time we've had a difficult conversation around performance. So after all of that rehearsal and then we actually go to deliver it, we think, oh, yeah, that worked out swimmingly. And maybe that person got hung up on one word that we said or one micro expression that we didn't mean because of our own nervous energy. And they completely sidetracked everything else that was said. So we have to dig deeper. We have to bring curiosity to the forefront to clear up any of those miscommunications.

36:36Yeah. And maybe we can just stick on this concept of blind spots for a second because I think that this is a really good answer to your question of what can I learn from this person? Because just, you know, my kids are teenagers. I mentioned, I've been teaching my son how to drive. We know that in cars, we have blind spots. There's things that we literally cannot see. And that's not our fault. That's just the way that the whole thing is shaped and the way the physics of the whole thing work. And it's the same thing in interpersonal relationships as well. And this is something that we learned from social psychology.

37:09My mentors at Action Design have developed a really powerful way of looking at this. But there are four predictable blind spots that we can always see in any relationship. One is what is the other person up against? So whatever is going on for this other person in their life, I just cannot know that because I'm not there in their life. A second thing is what is this person's actual intention? I might be thinking they're trying to undermine me or they're trying to show off or they're trying to do this. I literally cannot know. It's in my blind spot because it's in their head. Another one is how am I coming across to the other person?

37:37I know how I think I'm coming across, but as we all know by watching ourselves on video, we don't come across the way we think of. And then the last blind spot is what impact am I having on the other person? as well. And so if you're thinking there's nothing I can learn from this other person, you could at least come back to these blind spots and say, I literally cannot know these four things. At minimum, that's something I can learn from the other person. And everyone needs to get comfortable with the idea of blind spots. It doesn't mean that you're incompetent. It doesn't mean that you're a bad employee.

38:06You're going to have these. And the only way to figure that out is to ask. And the other thing about it is, especially when you're working with concepts in your mind because they're abstract. And the only way that you're going to get a 360 view and perspective of what it is that you're picturing in your mind is to get different feedback from different people. They get all those different perspectives. If you are a captain of a ship, the only way that you're going to get to your destination, you're going to need longitude. You're going to need latitude. You're going to need wind strength. You're going to need to know north-south, the stars, all of that information you're going to have to take into account in order to get to where you need to go.

38:48Without that information, you're lost at sea. And just to stick with that, if you thought to yourself, it's my job to know all that inside my head. I can't look at a map. I can't look at a compass. I can't ask the person who's looking across the ship. You'd be up the creek because there's no way you could know that. The same thing holds true in our life. There's no way that we can have that 360 degree information in our own head. We've got to know, we've got to be curious and we've got to ask. Yeah. How dangerous of a driver would you be with no rear view mirrors? Right. And also how dangerous would you be if you didn't know you had blind spots?

39:21We've got to know what they are so that we can know to look. Is there such thing as too many questions? I think it's all situational. I think that, as I said earlier, I think everything taken to an extreme, if you're probing someone so much that they become uncomfortable, that's too many questions. You know, if you're asking so many questions that you're never saying what you think yourself, and it feels like it's an interrogation of the other person, that's in balance. That's too many questions. If you're asking so many questions that you're never actually taking action with what you learned, that's too many questions.

39:53But I think most people in life err on the other side, which is that we are doing all those other things and not asking enough of those questions, which is why I decided in the book to kind of anchor in on the thing that is often underdone. And following up, it's important if you're going to ask the question that we're actually listening instead of preparing what we're going to say next and thinking about how to move the conversation forward. So how do we become better listeners as we become more and more distracted with short form video Johnny's putting out, podcasts, books, YouTube, calendar notifications, et cetera?

40:22That is step four of the Ask approach. It's called listen to learn. So it's not listen to look smart or listen to say the next thing. It's literally listen to what can we learn from the other person. And what I talk about in this chapter of the book is that we need to expand the number of lenses that we listen through. Most of us listen through one channel. And for me, that channel is the content of what someone's saying. I'm listening to the information, the reasons that they're giving, the arguments that they're making, the claims they're stating, all that kind of thing. That's important. And that's where an analytical thinker stays.

40:55That is where an analytical thinker exactly stays. Right. And what I've discovered over time is that there are at least two other channels to be listening through. Channel number two, is the emotion. What are the feelings that someone's having? What are the concerns that they're having? What are the deeper values that are really animating what they have to say? And then the third channel is the channel of action. What are the things that they're actually doing? Are they repeating themselves? Are they pushing back on what I have to say? Are they making requests of me? Are they smiling? There's a whole bunch of things that we can see in the actions that someone's taking as well.

41:32And kind of the same way as if we were listening to music. You can listen to the percussion, you can listen to the harmony, you can listen to the vocals, etc. If you train yourself to focus in on one, then another, then another, then when you put it back together, you just appreciate the piece so much more. Same thing is true with interpersonal communication. We can run through videos and say, let's just first listen to the content for the moment. Now let's first listen to the emotion. Now let's watch the actions that somebody's taking. Now let's start to put them together. And I think to your point earlier, when you were talking about having people watch their own videos, we can say, is the emotion and the content congruent or is there a mismatch?

42:10And if there's a mismatch, that's something to get curious about. So the first thing I'd say about listening is what are we listening for? And then I think the second thing I'd say about listening is that there are a bunch of strategies that can help us listen through those different things. One of my favorites comes from psychotherapy, where therapists talk about something called the doorknob moment, which basically means that at the end of a therapy session, right when a patient is walking out the door, has their hand on the doorknob, that is often when the most important thing that they have to say comes out.

42:43I'm thinking about leaving my wife. I'm getting investigated by the government. Who knows what it was? The entire session went by and they didn't say the thing that was actually most important. And for me, what we can take away from that is that we should not assume that when we ask a question, the first thing that someone says is actually the most important thing they have to say. In fact, it's very unlikely that it's the most important thing to say. They're probably holding back the most important thing because they want to see how did we react to the easy thing that they had to say. Or maybe they're working up the courage or finding the words to say the most important thing.

43:14And so one of the strategies for listening that I find very helpful is simply to ask them, say more. Is there more to say about that? What else do you have to say? Sometimes in my own team, if I'm asking someone for ideas and they give me an idea, I'd say, cool, what else? and what else? And each time I say what else, something even more interesting comes out. And sometimes I'll literally say to them, I'm just going to keep saying what else to you until you tell me that's all you got. And at that point, I'm happy to stop. But more and more comes out. And so it's a recognition that listening is not just about the first thing someone says, it's listening for what's behind that, what else might come out.

43:47And it goes longer than the initial interaction, which I think can also be difficult to wrap our head around if we're primarily focused on speed, convenience, solution, that the doorknob method, sometimes people have to noodle on what was just shared. Sometimes you hit them with new information or your question was so striking that they didn't have an answer in that moment. It was thought provoking. They maybe are introverted and they're just not quick on their feet to respond immediately. And if we just take them at that initial response or we think of listening only in that actual conversation, not following up later over email or checking in tomorrow or circling back in the following meeting to make sure that we heard everything, we rob ourselves of some of those really deep thoughts that people would love to share, but just aren't given the opportunity, especially to leaders.

44:34Yeah. And if we forget that's the case and we just assume, oh, no, they said it was okay. They said my strategy works or they said whatever. We think I've heard them when really we've just scraped the surface. You see this in other professions as well. Lawyers know doorknob moments. Sales folks know doorknob moments. I mean, at the end of all sales, the question always is, is there anything else that you need to tell me in order before we go forward? Because at that point, now maybe they're comfortable because at the beginning, they're going to be a bit guarded. You're not going to get all of those answers.

45:07And then, of course, if you think of it in a courtroom, there's so much tension, pressure. People are nervous going up there. And so, but after a while, they've been on the bench for 40 minutes. They've been talking. Hey, is there anything else that you remember from that evening that you feel is important for this jury to hear right now? And you will get a lot of other information. Oh, yeah. Well, you know, now that you say that, there was this thing. And it's usually the most important thing. Exactly. It's such a good point. Totally, totally. Speaking of other professions, one piece of research that I came across is that 60 % to 80 % of people surveyed report that they don't disclose something important to their doctor about their own health because they're afraid of either wasting their doctor's time or that the doctor's going to judge them in some way.

45:59And I was telling this to a friend of mine who's a doctor, and he said, yeah, I know that. And that's why when I say to someone, so have you been using drugs? and they say no, I will say to them, I'll come back around to it in a different way. So does that mean that you've never used drugs or that you've just used it a few times? And once you finally ask it a couple different ways and you take time and you, oh yeah, actually, I do use it once or twice a month, all of a sudden something totally different comes out. In a lot of these situations, there's a lack of comfort, as we talked about earlier, not feeling safe.

46:27And what's been really interesting to us is to see this transition to feeling safe around AI. So we have clients now finding us from ChatGPT because they're being more open and honest about their actual frustrations, concerns, and worries, searching for answers. But when it comes to human-to-human, where there's judgment, there's potential consequences there, we often do want to protect our own ego, save face. We want to put our best foot forward. And it becomes difficult to really share those deeper things, those insecurities, those values, those goals, those fears that we really need to dig deep into to actually move these larger projects, initiatives, and goals of our own forward.

47:04It is so fascinating what AI is helping us do. There's a small part of the book where I talk about how can AI help us use the ask approach. And one of the things that I just thought was so cool is I put into ChatGPT, you know, I think my business partner is making the totally wrong decision because his strategy is going this or that. And then I just say to the question, I just add at the end, what might I be missing? ChatGPT comes back with all kinds of things that I never thought about that I now can get curious about. Or I've put in like, I think this politician is the worst politician in the world.

47:35Why would anyone vote for that person, et cetera? What might I be missing? In the privacy of my own home, without any pressure, any social judgment, ChatGPT gives me all the things I might've been missing. And I'm like, huh, never thought about it that way before. So it's really interesting. Our audience loves rules and practices. And I know the book has some great examples for listening. So can you walk us through some practices to make us better listeners? Yeah. So, well, one of them is this practice of say more, tell me more, et cetera. I'll give you another one that I think is perhaps the most powerful, which I call paraphrase and test.

48:07This is the most simple thing you can do when you're in a conversation with someone is to literally say, let me just say back to you what I think I heard you say and check, did I get that right? It does so many good things. It's unbelievable. One good thing it does is that it slows down the conversation. So if you're heated, if things are getting a a little tense, et cetera. It just kind of slows it down. Second thing it does is it actually helps you check, did I hear them right? Because so often we don't hear them right. I mean, literally half the time when I do that, they'll say, well, sort of, but actually what I meant was this, or, you know, and it helps them clarify themselves or see what I was missing.

48:43And a third thing that it does is it actually communicates to the other person. I care about really getting you. I care enough to actually stop and check and see, did I really hear and understand what you had to say? And so just such a simple thing, we can all start doing it immediately. And it has just profound effects. And there's really interesting research one of my mentors, Phil MacArthur, did where he looked at teams and compared teams that were more effective and less effective. And the teams that just paraphrased and checked to see if they heard each other correctly, that was one of the biggest distinguishers as to whether they were more effective or not.

49:18Yeah, that mind meld is so important, especially as it goes beyond just two minds, right? When we get in large group settings and everyone's hearing different pieces and they're holding on to different things, if we're not paraphrasing and allowing the other person to correct any of those inaccuracies, you can imagine how quickly they multiply. The other thing with paraphrasing and summaries is it allows the other person to feel heard, especially when you're able to summarize it better than they were able to state it. It blows their mind. Like, this person gets me. It is so satisfying when I'm able to paraphrase back to someone and they say exactly.

49:55I think it's kind of a connecting experience because I know I've gotten them. They know that they've been understood. And so I'm always trying to say, can I listen so closely that I can say back to somebody to a point where they can say exactly? Yeah, it's such an important point that if you're wrong, we can correct it and fix it and move forward. And if you're right, it's an opportunity to deepen and strengthen that connection to really show that you care about their emotions. you're validating them, and you actually have been listening the whole time, even if it may have seemed that in the past you've been distracted or maybe the environment in the past had kept them from feeling like they're being heard.

50:28I'll share one last strategy just among the list that's in the chapter. This is maybe the simplest of them all. It comes from a mentor of mine who at the top of her pad, anytime she walks into a meeting that she thinks is going to be an intense meeting, she just writes to herself, shut the F up. And it's just a reminder to her that one of the best parts of listening is literally just to shut up and listen. And more will come out when we enable silence to do the work. I interviewed Parker Palmer for the book, and he talks about we actually have to treat silence as if it's a member of the group and give it its time just the same way that we're giving other people airtime as well.

51:06And silence, there's a magic to silence. New learning happens, new things come out, new discoveries happen as well. I want to also, with all of the things that you mentioned, these are all great for dates as well. There's so many people who get so wound up researching who they're going on a date with, writing down topics they think they're interested in from looking at their social media. It's like, you don't need to do any of that. And all you're doing is giving you a reason to go into your head when the best thing that you can do on that date is be present and listen. Totally. And there's research, and you may have seen it, that shows that when people on dates ask more questions, they are perceived as more attractive by the person that they're dating.

51:46Now, what all of our clients love in working on their communication skills is the reflection part. And we force it on them at first in the beginning, some of it with the journaling practice, but really starting to unpack what just happened. Let's go back and look at the game tape and think about, okay, now that we've done a great job being curious, we've really tried our best to reflect back to the person what they said and paraphrase it. Okay, let's reflect back on, well, how did we approach it? Is there areas for improvement? Is there areas for us to actually achieve stronger communication in settings or environments where we've felt in the past, maybe we haven't been as confident?

52:22So often we find our clients just aren't reflecting. They're moving so fast and they're so focused on the next task, the next conversation. And without that reflection, it's really hard to level up and turn this into a real superpower. Totally, and that is the fifth and final step of the Ask approach. which it is my favorite of all the steps because reflection is what converts the whole thing into learning and action. Otherwise we have the conversation, but it doesn't go anywhere. And it's interesting to hear you say that you have to force your clients at first to do reflection because I think reflection has a bad rap.

52:55I think reflection is seen as like, I don't have time for this or it's like meditation. Like it's very esoteric. You know, maybe if I'm a monk on a mountain, I might reflect. But the truth is that reflection can be very simple and very practical, very concrete. You said, let's watch the game tape, like professional athletes reflect. They step back, they look at the game tape, they say, what happened? And so in the ask approach, I say that reflection has two parts, and I call it sift it and turn it. The sift it part is just to say, what did I hear from the other person that's valuable? And what can I let go of?

53:29And it's often, because not everything that someone tells us is necessary or important for us to sit with or take in or reflect on and that kind of thing. And so the first thing is sift it, get rid of the crap. And this is where friends can help too and colleagues can help because sometimes we might sift the wrong things out. But if we can say to a couple of people, hey, here's what I heard them say. Here's what I took from the conversation. What do you think is valuable here? It's a great way to sift it. And then the turn it is just to kind of turn it a couple of times through some questions like, what did I learn from this person that might shift my beliefs?

53:59change the story that I have about the situation? Based on that, what steps can I take? And then also, is there anything I heard in this conversation that might push on my own deeper stuff, my own assumptions about the world, my own worldview, my own ways of being, things like that? And if we just can kind of make those three turns, I call them story reflection, steps reflection, and stuff reflection, we can squeeze so much out. But the thing I always say is, it's not enough just to do that reflection and walk away. The reason I call it reflect and reconnect is because we got to close the loop and go back to the other person.

54:31And to say to the other person, here is what I've been thinking about from our conversation. Here's what I took away. Here's what I learned. A, thank you, because you didn't have to share all that with me. And I'm grateful it was a gift. But also, B, did I get that right? Anything you would want to modify about what I took away? And it has the effect of really helping the other person feel so valued. but it also has the effect of keeping the door open for future conversations. Because when they know, like you really sat with what they had to say, you thought about it, you're actually going to take actions and you went so far as to tell them how they impacted you.

55:05That's very motivated to say, wow, this is a good use of my time to talk to this person to share with this person over time. And it brings us closer. Without reflection, you're not getting the real value of those relationships and you're just chasing stimuli. Right. That's a really good way to put it. You're having the experience but not getting the meaning from it. And for those who are time starved and so worried about speed, guess what's inefficient? Miscommunication, not understanding the other person, chasing your tail, going after the wrong problems, making directives that no one wants to follow, not addressing the real issues that are going on.

55:36So yes, these steps might sound completely new to you as uncomfortable, time-consuming, maybe even sound wasteful if you really care that much about efficiency. But over time, there is more efficiency to be gained by going through these steps and getting to a deeper understanding of everyone around us, the way they think and feel and act around what we're trying to do together in personal and professional environments. There's so much to be unlocked in all of this. And that's why I was so happy to have you on to share this with our audience because one thing we hear, we had Cal Newport on, everyone feels overburdened with pseudo productivity as he calls it.

56:13And because we're so time starved, we often then bring that into communication and we try to shortcut and write shorter emails and send text messages and avoid this deeper conversation that needs to happen to avoid miscommunication. You said it so much better than I ever could have that amen to a hundred percent of what you just said. And I think maybe the one thing I would add is any of us can learn this. I consider myself a student of this. There's still times when there's things that other people think and feel that I only find out too late. There's still ways that I can get better doing this.

56:45There's still questions I miss or times that my co-CEO reminds me, hey, why are you not more curious about this. But if we continue to work at it, we can get so much better. And everything that's in there is something that someone taught me and I learned, and I believe everyone can learn it too. Yeah. Whether it's a coach, whether it's a co-CEO, whether it's a peer, a colleague, or a mentor, that ability to sift and turn, to really reflect on what just occurred is so impactful. And a lot of times when people meet me and Johnny, they ask, how did you guys become friends, we seem like polar opposites.

57:17One of the key things that we do is we sift and turn and reflect on all of this that's being communicated, whether it's with clients, potential business partners, other people we're working with, other people we're bringing on the team, or even in our personal lives. Hey, you know, I just had this conversation with my wife and I'm really sitting with it. Can you help me give me another perspective here? It's so valuable when you can build that level of comfort and depth in your relationships to improve your communication, to be a better leader, and to just live an all-around rich, fulfilled life.

57:48So where can our audience find out more about the Ask Approach? So you can go to www.askapproach.com. That's probably the best way. Also follow us on Instagram at Ask Approach. And of course, the book is coming out May 7th, and that's at Amazon and anywhere books are sold. It's called Ask, Tap into the Hidden Wisdom of People Around You for Unexpected Breakthroughs in Leadership and Life. Amazing. Thank you for joining us. It was a pleasure. Thank you for having me. Really enjoy the conversation.

58:26This week's shout out comes from Zach. I'm going to let Zach tell you himself. Hi, my name is Zach. I'm an educator who's always seeking opportunities to challenge myself and grow, which is why I decided to enroll in the Unstoppable course offered by Art of Charm. This course has had a profound impact on me, offering incredible content and personalized support from the entire AOC team. I've particularly enjoyed the comfort zone challenges, which have expanded my limits. I even got the whole family dancing in random public places like no one is watching. Most importantly, that's strengthened our bond and been fun.

59:01What sets this court apart is its foundation in acceptance and commitment therapy, or ACT, always focus on action. I'm eager to take the next step in my development by joining the X Factor Accelerator. I'm hungry for more. If you're considering joining, I assure you the benefits are real. The AOC team is committed to their promises and offer genuine support throughout the journey. I'm confident that investing time, money, and energy in this course will be worth it. for you, just like it has for me and my family. Best of luck. Thank you, Zach. It was a pleasure working with you too. Analytical minds are for analytical careers.

59:39Doing the same things over and over again gets you the same results. If you're listening to this show, it's obvious that improving your communication, networking, and social confidence is important to you. It's also important to us, which is why we've created the X Factor Accelerator. The ultimate solution for analytical men ready to take action, build their wolf pack, and find the one. Frameworks, tools, and strategies that turn analytical minds into social rock stars. Weekly coaching, implementation sessions, and a personalized curriculum designed to skyrocket your confidence, connection, and networking skills.

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1:00:44The Art of Charms X-Factor Accelerator. People skills for computer people. Apply today at unlockyourxfactor.com. All right. Well, if you got value from this podcast, head on over to your favorite podcast player and rate and review the show. It means the world to us, and it helps others find it. All right, before we head out, a huge thank you to our producers, Michael Harold and Eric Montgomery. Everyone, go out there and have an epic week.

1:01:29Cause you had your taste Of black only yesterday Yeah, but I remember you Oh yeah, I remember you In my life But I'm proud to run away