Individual Purpose and Toyota Kata with Sam Morgan | 105

Individual Purpose and Toyota Kata with Sam Morgan | 105

Welcome to Lean Leadership for Ops Managers, the podcast for leaders in Ops Management who want to spark improvement, foster engagement, and boost problem solving – AND still get their day job done. Here’s your host, Leadership Trainer, Lean Enthusiast, and Spy Thriller Junkie, Jamie V. Parker. 

 

Hey there, Ops Execs and Leaders, Jamie here. And I want to share with you just briefly a few things that have been happening in my world and let you know what to expect coming up on the podcast. And then after that, we are digging in to today’s dialog on purpose and improvement. Now, if you’re a regular listener, you might have noticed that in November we did a couple of replay episodes and part of it was to bring those topics of coaching and connecting through one on ones back in front of you. 

 

Because before that we were talking about telling and we didn’t want to get too lopsided on all this telling. The other part of that decision was to give me some space for client work. While Colorado is still technically home base, I am mostly working out of Evansville, Indiana, so I’ve got a corporate rental house there and I’m going deep with one of my clients while still serving all the other clients that that I love as well. 

 

What that includes, though, is a big shift for me. But there’s been an experience and a shift for me because it creates an opportunity to go on site as often as I want. I don’t have to book a flight in order to go and go on site with the client.

 

So I knew this was something that I was missing during the pandemic with so much virtual work. What I wasn’t prepared for, though, was how strong the draw would be for me to be on site and to get involved in projects beyond just the regular engagement that we had already planned. So for the last several months, there have been some things that I needed to lean into and experiment with and navigate and get messy with. 

 

Like I’m making some missteps and I’m learning and just be super present with all of my clients. And what that means is I made a choice to step away from LinkedIn, to step away from some of my leadership hobby groups like Women and Lean and Lean Podcasters and things like that. And just to hit a short term pause on the podcast for about a month. 

 

And so we did play a couple of replays. We picked ones that we thought specifically were relevant, and we have gotten a lot of good feedback on to just get those back in front of you. So these last handful of months have been just a great experience for me. It’s just been a little bit all consuming now. I’m still navigating what my vision is for the next six months, so you might continue to see me kind of making adjustments as I learn and experiment.

 

But I want to say thank you. Thank you for sticking with me and continuing to tune in. And I think you will love what we have planned for you. I’m bringing in some friends and colleagues that I really admire, people that I go to talk to when I need to hear other perspectives, when I need to be challenged, when I want to bounce things off of off of folks. And they are going to share perspective, their perspectives and advice over the next several episodes. We’re going to talk personal development, goal setting and career growth. We’re going to talk leadership skills and developing leaders. 

 

We’re going to talk leader routines. Yes, some even some leader standard work maybe. And I just I’m really excited about the content that we have planned, and I can’t wait to hear which of the next 4 to 6 episodes you love the most. So definitely share that with me. I’d love to hear back from you. 

 

Now we’re starting off with today’s guest, my friend Sam Morgan. So back in May and June, I think it was episodes 89, 90 and 91, I did a series on organizational purpose, so we had an episode on what is the Purpose Gap and an episode on organizational Purpose Pitfalls to Avoid, and also one on leading purpose at work.

 

And this is definitely work that I do with clients. We’re helping leaders to bring organizational purpose to life and helping managers and executives to lead individual team members, as well as collective teams to align with and be inspired by that purpose and to close that purpose gap. 

 

Today, we’re switching gears a little bit as Sam Morgan joins us to talk about your individual purpose and your purpose as a human being, and then how to layer in an improvement pattern and practice with your purpose to build the life and the team that you want. Sam is a self proclaimed confident learner, and after spending the past five years of work in the continuous improvement space, he landed at Kata-Con. He did a great presentation there. 

 

And while he was there, he had this moment of realizing one of his true passions, which is transforming people through coaching. And so now Sam helps change the lives of people through the process of uncovering their purpose, helping them understand the pattern of the improvement Kata and tied together through the practice of daily coaching cycles. Let’s jump into this topic. Sam, welcome to the show today.

 

Sam: [00:05:21] Hey, Jamie. Thanks for having me on. It’s an honor to be here.

 

Jamie: [00:05:24] Now excited to dig into leadership and purpose and improvement, all those things today. But let’s start off with a value, a mantra, a principle, a quote, something that really embodies your beliefs about leadership.

 

Sam: [00:05:41] Yeah, I’d have to say it’s a quote that’s really hit me ever since Kata-Con. About eight months ago, when I was riding home on the plane after getting this big aha moment, I was sitting in the airport listening to an audio book during greatly by Bernie Brown, and she quotes Joseph Campbell where he says, The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek. 

 

And so I think for a lot of leaders, we’re always holding back where fear definitely rules our day versus being open and curious and really seeing that next opportunity in our own development and our team. And instead of going forward, we’re held back by fear. And it was true for me in my journey. And so that really hit home for me and said for myself in my head, in my heart, was like, I’ve been held back by fear. That treasure is in there. It’s dark and scary, but I want to take a step forward and move into there because there’s a treasure just inside that cave.

 

Jamie: [00:06:37] Yeah, it’s interesting because I also really resonate with that idea of fear holding us back. I’m going to kind of deviate here and just ask you a little bit more about this, this idea of fear. What would you say? How do you think that kind of shows up for folks? Because sometimes it’s we may not necessarily recognize it as fear to serve. That may not be the label we put on it, but how might I like what might be some clues like, oh, I may have something going on here.

 

Sam: [00:07:02] Well, I feel like fear shows up in lots of different ways in the way we show up. If we’re leaders, in the way that we’re showing up with the people that were leading in terms of taking control. Like, we have to be in control of everything. We’re focused on only the results, and if we don’t get the results, then something is wrong with the people doing the work. And we need to go and we need to talk to them and have a conversation about what’s going on rather than being curious, seeing what the need is from the people, what is the problem and what are they offering as things we can do to solve the problem. 

 

We put the responsibility on them. We go hard on the people, not on the process. And I think that fear is a part of that because we’re afraid that the results aren’t there, so I’m going to look bad. And if I don’t look bad, then I must be bad. So it really comes back to that identity that we place upon ourselves as leaders in the results that we get. 

 

I’ve talked a lot about this on LinkedIn recently, but it’s just I see it all the time in the way that people show up out of fear and fear that people are going to see me as something less than or short or a failure when really it’s just something more internal. If we’re really honest with ourselves that we haven’t been able to come to the confidence in our self that no matter what the results are, we are capable and able and valuable and worthy, and it just comes out in that way.

 

Jamie: [00:08:27] Yeah, that’s great. All right. Well, I know you are coaching folks these days, and I want to hear a little bit more about the work you do, the coaching you’re doing. Who do you serve and how do you create value?

 

Sam: [00:08:39] Yeah. So the folks that I really love working with and this actually just kind of was a light bulb moment for me recently, having worked in operations for the past seven years and really grabbing on to improvement and lean the last like five. As I’m looking at coaching, I really understand what operations folks, operations leaders, what they go through, what their pain points are. I have friends who are leaders and I see the challenges and the pain that they go through every day, really good people and being able to really step in and help them move forward, help their team move forward, and more importantly, help themselves move forward. 

 

Because if they don’t work on themselves, it’s going to hold their team back. I have someone that I’m working with right now and that’s just so true for them. They’ve got so many balls that they’re trying to juggle. But the biggest one for me is just their mentality of feeling like I can do this and being able to take one problem at a time. So being able to speak to those operations leaders and help them to get a clear picture of where they want to go, because I think too often there’s just as as like operations leaders, there’s like all these balls you’re juggling and you don’t ever take the time to just sit down, take a deep breath.

 

Sam: [00:09:58] Okay. What’s the most important thing and what’s the specific challenge that I’m trying to face? We don’t sit down and pause to do that. And that’s what I see a lot from operations leaders is like, I’m just trying to hold all these things and make all the processes better. But what’s the most important one and what’s the specific thing I’m trying to achieve by when and why? So that’s who I, I like to talk to. And how we create value is just by doing that daily coaching, you know, you’ve gone through it, Jamie. The Kata, it is the most glorious and most challenging thing that I think almost any operations leader can go through because it really forces them to do that. 

 

What my one of my learners called, I have to take it in assessment and not assumption because too often is operations leaders. We have this solution in our head. We just assume we know how it should go instead of assessing it. And so that’s who I talk to and that’s how I help create value, is just by doing that daily coaching, getting the challenge, clear, understanding where they’re at now, where they want to get to in a couple of weeks, and then taking little steps one day at a time. And that’s how we do it.

 

Jamie: [00:11:03] All right. Awesome. Well, we’ll definitely dive into some of that approach and the improvement approach with you today. I want to start, though, talking about purpose. I know when you and I first met, you were kind of going through this purpose journey for yourself, which was really cool to kind of watch because you did it publicly for all of us on LinkedIn. 

 

So very cool to kind of sit back and watch. And I know a, you know, this kind of internal experience for you. You know, when I work with operations executives and managers, we do a lot of work around organizational purpose, really bringing that organizational purpose to life, helping to connect people, individuals with different perspectives and different interests and kind of connecting them to a shared vision. 

 

And I know a lot of the work that you do is also includes kind of that individual side of purpose, kind of individual purpose. So I’d love to learn more about your take on individual purpose and kind of what that is and why you think that’s important for for operations leaders, since that’s who we’re we’re talking to you today.

 

Sam: [00:12:02] Yeah. I mean, we show up as leaders, as people, right? We’re not like I say this often, we’re humans. We’re human beings, not human doings. And so when we show up at work, we all have a why that we’re showing up with, whether we’ve surfaced it or not. So in working with leaders, being able to surface that purpose that why through doing things like I did with Katie Anderson and Karen Ross, you know, two of our good friends here, and being able to draw out like literally draw a picture of purpose so we can see, okay, this is my why, this is what I’m showing up every day. 

 

And when you do that, it really unlocks something when you able to draw it out, like creatively. And then once you see what that purpose is, as you show up in all the different spaces in your life, whether it’s your your marriage as a parent in your community or at work. You. Once you identify that purpose, then we should be thinking, okay, is the work I’m doing, is the relationships I am in aligned with that purpose? 

 

Because when it’s not aligned with purpose, I can tell you what’s going to show up in so many different ways that. Is going to be not healthy. You’re going to be like if you’re showing up at work and you’re in a job that you that’s not in alignment with your purpose, you’re going to be dreading going to work rather than being energized by working with your team, because you see that your purpose is in alignment with the work that you do.

 

Sam: [00:13:26] So when you have that purpose, especially as as individual leader, it keeps you going. When you face those like bumps in the road that you come up against a problem, you’re like, Oh my God, I do not want to be here today. This has hit the fan. And when you see, okay, what’s the reason why I’m showing up? For me, being a light, right? 

 

Like, okay, this is tough, but my values are I want to be fully me and fully present everywhere I go. I’m not feeling it right now, but this is the values. My bigger purpose of being a light that aligns with that. So I’m going to show up right now right here. If you don’t have that purpose and then those values and it’s going to be a struggle. And then when you get to the end of the road, you’re going to have that dissatisfaction. If you don’t have that purpose clear and you haven’t been living in alignment with it. 

 

So I just encourage folks to actually take time to reflect and think about that purpose and then ask themselves, is how I’m showing up at work or is the work that I’m doing, is the role that I’m in in alignment with that purpose? And if it isn’t, then there is time for more reflection in some more thought, deeper thought about how can I get it in alignment with that purpose?

 

Jamie: [00:14:41] Mm hmm. So you think about our listeners. If you’ve got any listeners who are kind of tuned in right now and going, okay, like I get this conceptually, but like, what do you mean my purpose? You know, is it my purpose to, you know, like be a parent or, you know, whatever it might be? Can you give us maybe maybe it’s whether we use yours as an example or something that you can just kind of bring this to to life for us and help us understand what this could look like.

 

Sam: [00:15:07] Yeah, I think for me, what really helped me was being able to take time to again reflect and think about what are those things Like when I was a kid that I got really lost in. This is something that our good friend who’s another coach, Tracy Defoe, was sitting with her at Kata-Con and she sat down one day while we were there and she was like, when my kiddo was five or six years old, he loved putting on costumes all the time. And now here he is 30 days later in theater and commercials and all these things. He’s acting right. 

 

You could see that what resonated for him was has always been there. And so asking ourselves those questions and I think also not only just about like what I was like as a youngster, but like currently. Now what do I lose myself in? What do I like? If I sat down and did it 3 hours, I’m like, Have I ate today? Like those kind of things. And you’re like, okay, what is that? And then if I think about what my dream. Thing that if I could do anything I wanted to do with a role, an occupation, what would that be? 

 

When we start drawing those things out and we start seeing those themes that kind of run through them, we will see themes that run through them, and then you start writing out what you see and then you’re like, Oh, okay, I start seeing that theme. And then when you start putting that down on paper, writing it out and then going, Okay, am I putting myself in places where I can be able to live into that or live out of that, like take action out of it, or find places where I can find fulfillment in that.

 

Jamie: [00:16:38] You know? So I kind of tie this back into the fear, you and I, before we start recording, we’re having a conversation about some things happening for me right now. And as I was where you’re updating me, I’m updating you, and I’m like, Well, it turns out well, it turns out, which we’re learning from experience some things that I’m really passionate about. 

 

But those happened because of through the experience of actually, you know, kind of being and doing, but doing something that I might not have done if I were if I let fear hold me back. Well, there’s too much uncertainty there or. Well, that’s but that’s not in my five year plan. 

 

And so it just kind of all comes back for me. And I think that, you know, you’ve got to be be willing to try some things if you’re you know, if you’re feeling like you are struggling here. Right. Like you may experience it. You may be sitting there going, well, it turns out here’s what I lose myself in.

 

Sam: [00:17:32] So, yeah, yeah, I think like that can give us opportunity to hopefully think about the things that we really want to do, like folks that I’m working with where they get that clear picture of, okay, this is where I want to head to. Now that I have this purpose in mind. This is the place where I want to go. 

 

Like I’ve been scared to do it, somebody that I talked to, a leader who’s in transition. They were talking about how they’ve just settled for so long. And I think a lot of operations leaders, you get so caught up in juggling all the balls, you’re trying to help your team. 

 

You’re trying to be a good leader, help, you know, create more customer satisfaction, doing all those things. We don’t think about developing ourself and we can’t be better for our team, for our families, for those in our life if we don’t really. You know, start working on ourselves, getting our purpose clear, and then start moving in that direction towards where we want to go. 

 

We create these goals that are achievable. You know, in Kata, we don’t talk about, I’m going to set up a settle. No, we say I want to strive to achieve a challenge. Right. And that’s. It’s uncomfortable and it’s scary because we’re like, Well, what if I fail, right? Quote unquote.

 

Sam: [00:18:50] What I love about this framework is there is no there’s no fail. Right. And as you said and as Yoda said, there’s no try. There’s only do or do not. And so we have so much fear in that if we do, we’re going to fail. And if we fail, then what will we look like? But the cool thing about the kata is it’s not about like I had somebody that was working with the other day and they were like, Well, is my challenge statement too long? And I’m like, Well, there’s not a Kata referee around here anywhere that’s going to be throwing a flag on you. So no, we’re so afraid of doing it wrong. Right. 

 

But the real part of it that that you just said, I love it is like we need to just start and do something right. Like get that get that challenge, that place where you really want to go, to get it clear in your mind and start doing something, taking a step, you know, get a coach to help you take, get that challenge clear and start taking little daily steps towards that. I promise you, you won’t be injured in the process.

 

Jamie: [00:19:46] Yes. All right. So we’re going to talk about Kata is this framework. And some of our listeners are really familiar with it. They’ve heard my other podcasts about that. Guys will put those links in the show notes, too, if you want to go back and listen to those. But some of the listeners maybe aren’t really sure of that, that framework. 

 

So not thinking from necessarily a formal academic definition, but just the way you know from your perspective of helping ops leaders to, you know, get kind of get some clarity on where they want to go and get and move in that direction. How does this what does this sort of framework all about when you’re working with leaders and helping ops leaders?

 

Sam: [00:20:21] Yeah. Well, I think there’s there’s twofold, right? One, you can think of it from a like a personal like a personal challenge perspective, or you can look at it from like, how do I how does it help my like my team, myself and my team. So from the personal perspective, I think we talked a little bit about that here in terms of being able to get your purpose, get the challenge where you want to head to and then move forward towards it one step at a time just by doing experiments. 

 

And the same thing applies for you as a as a leader and your team, right? You are obviously going to get like a strategic vision from upper management, like where you are heading as an organization and then you’re applying it to your team, right? You’re going to get that clear challenge of where you want to be by when and what does it look like if we were to pull the roof off, as my coach Julie Simmons would say, and you go fast forward to that date and then why are you doing it? So get that clear. Be very clear about that and then start like understanding where you’re at right now. Like, be fully honest.

 

Sam: [00:21:24] Don’t just lie and try to fudge the numbers. Now, where are you at right now? Where do you want to be in a couple of weeks, like in relation to that, and then start taking little steps every day? But the most important part of that is, you know, this might ruffle some feathers. It’s not. PDCA Right? We’re actually going to take a step. We’re going to set like, okay, what do I predict is going to happen here? A lot of my coaches like to predict versus the expect, but what do I, what’s my expectation or prediction? 

 

And then when we come back the next day, what actually happened? Reality like this. And again, this isn’t a project management. Let me have five tasks. Let me check all five boxes so I could feel good and get an A. When I come back next day. No, nobody’s going to give you a grade when you show up the next day. Sorry. 

 

And then what did I learn when I look at the thing that I was going to do, what I predicted would happen and what actually happened, what’s the difference is, again, the goal. If the goal is just to check the boxes off, there would be no learning.

 

Sam: [00:22:19] We actually want to see differences so that we can have learning and then then like make adjustments on that. So having this process is you’re moving towards like a team challenge or something that’s frustrating I think can be so, so helpful. I’ve got somebody that I’m working with right now and we’re working through that. 

 

She had like six different things she wanted to work on that her her leaders were like feeling the weight of it. And we prioritized one. And now we’ve gotten clear on that challenge and we’re going to start moving forward. And for her, it’s like it really has lifted a weight for her. She said this like it feels so good to be able to like, okay, prioritize. Now we’re at this one and we’ve got a clear place where we’re heading towards. And I think that that’s what this can do for you personally and as a leader. 

 

It helps helps ground you, make you feel like, Oh my gosh, I had all these balls that I’m juggling. Well, actually, I’m just focusing on this one and we’re moving forward towards it, it feels like. Yeah, like very grounding. And I think you can feel confident as you’re moving forward because you have that grounding.

 

Jamie: [00:23:23] Yeah. Yeah. So let’s talk about some of this for ops leaders. As you talk about all these different balls they’re juggling because I can tell you there’s that we’ve got some folks listening who are like me when I, you know, really first started exploring Kata initially, which was you’re out of your dang mind with this whole daily daily stuff. Daily coaching business Like, don’t. What did you not understand about all the balls I have? You know, that I’m trying to juggle. 

 

I’d like to know what even got time for this. You know, so this idea of maybe kind of using card, whether it’s whether I’m using it personally as a leader or I’m using it with my you know, with my team and my organization for organizational progress, it can be a little scary for folks and like, whoa, I don’t know about this. So what would you say to to those ops leaders that are listening and maybe a little suspect and nervous or concerned about kind of adding on another thing that I have to do every day?

 

Sam: [00:24:18] Yeah, So that’s a good question, Jamie. I think, you know, we’ve all in our own head been like, Oh my gosh, you know, like, don’t I have 30 minutes or I don’t have 30 minutes? How the heck are you asking me to find 30 minutes in our time? And I. I think we would all say we want to build a culture of continuous improvement. You know, we want to not have to work hard to be having ourselves and our team thinking about how we can make our team, our processes better. 

 

And the way that we can do that is by doing this pattern of daily improvement to change our mindset. Because that’s all about mindset, right? When we’re talking about building that culture, it starts with mindset and it starts with you as the leader setting the example and you can develop that mindset, but you have to practice, you have to be able to do it every day. It blew my mind when I thought about this a few years back. You know, Tiger Woods, that one golfer, dude, he’s got a coach and you know that dude that’s good at that. He practices every day.  

 

So if we want to build a culture and set the example as leaders, then we need to be willing to be uncomfortable and set the time aside in our schedule and say, You have the time in your schedule, I promise you. And if you try it for like a week. You know, doing the daily coaching, putting that 30 minutes in your schedule. I promise by the end of that week you will go, Oh my gosh, I’ve got to keep doing this.

 

Sam: [00:25:54] I’m seeing that these smallest daily steps are not only moving me forward in this whatever process or challenge that we’re having, but it’s also changing my mindset to start thinking in this way. And I can see how that would definitely affect me and then my team if we moved it not only down for me but through our team and could change the culture to where each and every person on our team is thinking scientifically, is thinking about what’s my next step? What do I predict? What actually happened? What did I learn? We start thinking like that. 

 

Let me tell you, it is going to change things for real, because I’m have been a part of an organization where they had a business transformation office was there for a few years and sadly, it came to an end. And I can tell you, as someone who’s a part of that organization and being passionate about continuous improvement, as I’m sure your listeners are. 

 

I never really felt the electricity in the building in our teams, and I know that’s what we want, but what are we doing? What are we sacrificing in terms of our time and our energy to make that happen? And I would say to you, I get it. I get the pain of thinking about I’ve got like six or seven other balls that I’m juggling over here, but try it for a week. That would be the challenge. Find yourself a coach who who does this, practices this way and try it for a week and see if it isn’t true.

 

Jamie: [00:27:22] Mm hmm. Yeah. I think for I mean, I agree with what you’re saying. And for me, one of the things that really was a big shift as I went into daily coaching cycles, as someone, you know, practicing how to not as the coach. Right. Was that the size of my step next step had to shrink dramatically because I was so used to that more traditional PDK where you have like a whole project plan. 

 

I’m going to do these seven steps and you know, and I’m planning all the next seven steps or whatever and recognizing that, oh, it’s actually tiny little steps that we’re doing every day. But that is critical to do it this way because you get the repetition and it’s the thinking of repetition. 

 

When Mike Rother was on the show will link to those show notes as well. You know, he taught me he’s like, well, you know, so let’s say that you do this once a week, you do a cycle once a week. Yeah. And you’re practicing this new way of thinking once a week. Well, that means, you know, for the hour or whatever it is that every other hour of the week you’re practicing the old way of thinking, Right? And so you’re just reinforcing the old way of thinking.

 

Jamie: [00:28:23] And so that daily, that daily habit, the repetition, the repetition, I think, is what’s so critical. And when we’re doing it on these small little daily steps in these small cycles, it takes away the risk that might, you know, that like sometimes our bosses who don’t quite understand what we’re doing, you know, might, might be like, oh, so it takes away the risk for them and gives us an opportunity to start to change the way we think. And, you know, as you’re talking about that mindset and that thinking, and I think it’s the most powerful thing about the sort of framework, the way that that might kind of put it together is that you change the way you think. 

 

And when you get into that pattern of thinking, you can apply it. You don’t have to have a storyboard to think that way, right? The storyboard helps you as you’re learning it, but eventually you just you get that pattern of thinking and you don’t even have to have a formal storyboard set up on the on a wall somewhere. Right? But you don’t start that way. You start through, you know, kind of this, the repetition that you’re described.

 

Sam: [00:29:21] Yeah. There’s a quote in the book that that Rother talks about, and I can pull it out real quick because I’ve got the book right here. And this this quote is what really I think for me, it’s what embodies what you just talked about. And it’s we are all much more likely to act our way into a new way of thinking and to think our way into a new way of acting. And I just think, well, right. We think we’ve got to, like, change our mindset. So we can act differently. But really what we need to do is just do and then that will actually change the way that we think. And that speaks to you. 

 

We like if we don’t do that on a regular basis, we aren’t going to change the way we think. We aren’t going to develop a continuous improvement culture. If all we do is we have our huddles once a week, our problem solving huddles once a week for 15 minutes, like, is that really going to change the way that ourselves and our team thinks? And I think that’s the way we often think, because again, we’re in firefighting mode. So we don’t actually just go out and do a week and see what happens. Like by practicing it in this way. I mean, I’m guessing you had that experience, right? Like when you did your first week, you were like hurt. But then at the end, you might have been like being.

 

Jamie: [00:30:43] Yeah, it was definitely I mean, it took some discipline for sure, but I think that the discipline was good because I do believe that discipline breeds discipline, right? Like when I, you know, stick to this schedule and I commit and I did it travel. I was traveling and I was taking storyboards with me. Yeah, I was, you know, like in every you know, it was like every single day. And we figure we figured out a way to do it. And so so there’s definitely a part of that is that that discipline helps to breed discipline in other areas which can be really, really helpful. 

 

I think just like the thinking can breed that thinking in other places as well. And I do think there’s a component of doing right, like I think it’s both. I know I first read that quote in a NUMMI article and, you know, I think that the challenge is that we we don’t do both. And we need to like sometimes we need to think our way into a new way of acting. Sometimes we need to act our way into a new way of thinking, but we need to make sure that we have both happening. And a lot of times we’ll have the thinking part where we’re reading books or we’re listening to podcasts like this. 

 

You know, we’re going to a training class, you know, like my clients go to training classes with me, but you’ve got to pair it with the action too. And you kind of and if you attack it from both ways, which is we’re working on our thinking, the work that you do with confidence and purpose and all of that, helping people with their why. So if you pair it with that, that purpose and why and the thinking part of it and you pair it with the acting part of it, then you’re going to have, I think, a higher level of our higher possibility of kind of success in progress and movement than if you just do one or the other.

 

Sam: [00:32:15] Yeah, you know, it makes me think of the process that I like to take people through is why we start with like purpose, right? You get that clearer picture like we kind of when we start a conversation, we have that clear picture of our purpose and then we move in towards that like challenge or vision, make sure that it’s align. Because if we’re moving towards something, especially like if it’s personal, but also in business like and it’s not aligned with it, then what is going to pull us forward when we get.

 

Jamie: [00:32:43] Yeah, when it gets hard.

 

Sam: [00:32:44] Yeah, because it’s going to get hard. It’s not like will it. No, it will. Especially if you actually create a vision that’s like or a challenge. That’s an actual challenge. If you don’t have that, then I would say you probably didn’t create a challenge. You just created a checklist.

 

Jamie: [00:33:02] Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. All right, Sam, it’s been a great conversation. I want to kind of close us out with some words of encouragement or advice that you would like to leave our listeners with today.

 

Sam: [00:33:14] Yeah, I would say. Don’t be held back by fear. Right. Think about that cave that you’re afraid to enter if you’re a manager and you like to be a director. If you’re a director looking to be, you know, the CEO you’re looking to develop and you’ve always settled because I know you’re out there. I know I’ve done it. So I know you’re out there. I want to challenge you to actually take that one step into the cave first, identify what is that thing that you don’t want to settle for any more? 

 

Get that picture and then take one step forward. And take one step forward. And I promise you it’ll be okay. And I’m excited to hear how it goes for you and how it really builds that sense of understanding that you really can do it, that you have. Jamie, as you said before, the answer inside yourself, to be able to go on and achieve this challenge that you’ve always wanted to.

 

Jamie: [00:34:11] Yes, I love that. And it’s going to connect so well to an episode we have coming up. I think it will be the one after yours about possibility and expanding what’s possible because it’s bigger than whatever is in your brain right now for sure. So yeah. So love those. Love those words. Sam, thank you so much. We’re going to put links to your LinkedIn profile, to your website, all of the ways that folks can connect with you and reach out to work with you if they like to get an individual coach. So we’re so excited that you were able to join us today.

 

Sam: [00:34:43] Thanks, Jamie. It’s been a pleasure. Love, love the conversation.

 

Jamie: [00:34:50] All right. So both thinking and acting, purpose and practice. How about for you? What was one key takeaway that you’re leaving this podcast episode with? Identify it. Write it down and share it. Or teach it to someone else so that you can anchor the learning. Stay tuned for the next episode where we build on this conversation, and I have a dialog with our guests about expanding what it is that we believe to be possible. Until next time.