Coaching from a Place of Love with Mike Lee

Voiceover: Welcome to the Future of Teamwork podcast, where we explore cutting edge strategies to keep teams human- centered, drive innovation, and empower you with the tools and insights needed to help your team excel and thrive in today's rapidly changing world. Your host is Dane Groeneveld, a seasoned expert with over 20 years of experience in enhancing team dynamics and innovation. Have you ever had a hunch, a gut feeling that you should take a certain direction, make a specific decision, or approach a problem in a unique way, and then doubt sets in? You start to second guess yourself, and suddenly, that clear insight is drowned out by the noise of opinions, advice, or even your own fears. You're not alone. Trusting our intuition can be a challenge, especially in a world where we're constantly bombarded with information and feedback. But what if we could learn to tap into that inner voice, that deeper sense of knowing more consistently? And what if doing so could lead to not just better personal decisions, but better teamwork and leadership as well? I'm excited to introduce our guest for today, Mike Lee. Mike isn't just any leadership expert. He's a keynote speaker in the Future of Leadership. In this episode, Dane and Mike dive deep into a series of powerful themes. First, they'll discuss how vulnerability isn't a weakness, but a strength that can bridge connections and fuel collaboration. Second, they'll discuss the ways we can tune into our own subconscious intuition and shield ourselves from outside noise. Third, they'll discuss the underlying causes of bad behavior in teams and the protective measures leaders can take. Fourth, the intriguing concept of why winning only 80% of the time might be more beneficial than striving for a perfect score. And finally, they'll discuss one of the most challenging tasks for any leader or teammate, approaching tough conversations with genuine connection. Teamwork makes the dream work, and we're here to inspire your next collaborative breakthrough. Gather your team, put on your headphones, and let's dive in together.

Dane Groeneveld: Welcome to the Future of Teamwork podcast. My name's Dane Groeneveld, CEO of HUDDL3 Group. Today, I've got a good friend, Mike Lee, joining me to talk about the Future of Leadership. Mike's a keynote speaker in the Future of Leadership. He's doing some great writing, coaching, and we just had a great conversation around coaching from a place of love as well. It's going to be a great conversation. Welcome to the show, Mike.

Mike Lee: Dane, thanks for having me on. It's great to see you.

Dane Groeneveld: I've had your introduction before, but our listeners haven't, so perhaps you could tell them a little bit about your backstory in basketball and some big names and how you came to be doing all of this great work.

Mike Lee: Yeah. It's a story with some small humble beginnings. I started a basketball camp actually in my hometown of 15, 000 people after my freshman year in college. We just did it with a group of friends because it was something that we wanted to do to give back to the community. It just grew year after year from a small basketball camp in a town of nobody in the middle of Wisconsin to working with several NBA players running events quite literally across the world from Indonesia to opening up a training academy in Barcelona. That was a good 15 plus years of my life. I'd always dealt with depression. I grew up in Wisconsin and the winters in Wisconsin were just brutal, kind of like the last five months we've had in Southern California. The sunlight really took a toll on my mental health, and it got to a point where I just decided that I could not take another winter in Wisconsin. I decided to pick up and move out to Los Angeles. Our business was doing pretty well at the time, and I thought it was a time that I could step away a little bit and not be as involved as much in the day- to- day. I got out to LA thinking it was only going to be for a few months just to get out for the winter. I got out here January. It was sunny out and I was feeling amazing, way better than I'd ever felt in the winter before. I decided to get off an antidepressant medication that I had been on at that point for about 14 years. Getting off of it was quite literally getting off of heroin. Board certified doctors at UCLA have compared the process for getting off the specific medication that I was on to that of drugs like that. It was insane. I went through a period of just insane emotional instability. I would go from laughing to crying, to debilitating depression, to crippling anxiety, all within a couple of hours. Just incredibly unstable. One of the ways that this really affected me was that I couldn't get present. I could not be present. And if I wasn't present, I wasn't able to focus on any of the work that I wanted to do in the world. I knew I needed a tool to help me win this battleground that had been created in my mind because that's what I felt like. Every single day was that I was going to war in my mind. I picked up a mindfulness meditation practice. I had been practicing yoga for about a year at that time. Dove deep into mindfulness and into meditation. After a few months of consistent practice, I realized why elite athletes like Kobe Bryant, why visionary CEOs like Steve Jobs and luminaries like Oprah all attributed a meditation practice or some form of a meditation practice to their level of success. And at that point, I realized that my life was going to shift and I had a deeper purpose in my life than to build basketball players, and that was to build people and to build leaders. I've blended these worlds of sports performance psychology with all of my coaching background and the players that have been around with practices like mindfulness and emotional intelligence to speak on the Future of Leadership. We do this through keynotes, through workshops, and through coaching.

Dane Groeneveld: That's awesome, and thanks for sharing that story. We're talking about mental health right now as a crisis right across our communities, which I think was further exacerbated, accelerated through COVID. I've even seen even with my son suffering some low level bullying, just seeing how that anxiety and stress can really manifest and change the individual's life, the team role that they play, the family role that they play. I love the way that you crafted as shifting from building basketball players to building people. What a great place to be spending your time and putting in great work.

Mike Lee: Yeah, it's been amazing. It's been amazing. Not just the actual work, but I think it's the conversations with people afterwards when you hear their story and what they're going through. I read a quote several years ago that when I was going through this process of getting off medication and it really helped me have the vulnerability, I think, the courage to share my story, because I think there's a lot of shame around it, a lot of shame around being on a antidepressant medication, pharmaceutical medication. It was almost like you associated with a sense of weakness. Being in the sports world, that's the last thing that I'd want to admit. I know last month was Mental Health Awareness Month and this month is Men's Mental Health Awareness Month. The quote that helped me find the courage, I think, to share it was your story might be the key to unlocking somebody else's prison. I think that's what I get out of connecting with people afterwards is just knowing that in some way, that door maybe has opened from their own prison of their own mind that they're dealing with.

Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, no, that is powerful. And you're right, there has been a sense of, particularly amongst the male community, weakness, shame around medication or going to therapy. A good friend of mine, Sean McCambridge back in Australia, he and I were talking about it recently. He said men 50 years ago wouldn't really talk about their diet and their weight, but now it's very normal for men to talk about, " Hey, I'm dropping carbs. I dropped 15 pounds. I'm sleeping better," but we're still not quite there on mental wellness. We're still not talking about, " Hey, I dealt with this panic attack last week and I'm adopting these breathing practices or whatever it might be to deal with this stress and anxiety overload right now for whatever reason."

Mike Lee: I think that's the key to breaking down those barriers is just people getting out and sharing their stories, having the vulnerability to go first. I mean, I first shared this story seven or eight years ago, probably seven years ago now, and I could not believe the people that they did not comment on any of the posts, but they sent me DMs or emails or text messages afterwards. I think like anybody out there who is maybe ashamed or withholding, your story matters. It doesn't matter if you have five people following you on social media. It doesn't matter at all, five people, five million. Your story matters and can have a compounding effect on affecting other people's lives.

Dane Groeneveld: And it's accessible. We actually did a storytelling series just recently. One of our guests, Francisco Mahfuz, talked about the fact that yes, there's lots of technical documentation out there around health and mental wellness, but when someone sees a friend, a loved one, a hero talk about their experience, particularly if it's in video, which is even more connecting, all of a sudden they get it. That's something that they can really act on versus going and getting a book or a doctor giving you a pamphlet. I think you're right. I think story is super powerful in that. We're all part of teams, part of communities where it's touching someone that's close to us at any given time of the day.

Mike Lee: I think the thing with stories is they create connection. I think one of the things that I've overlooked a ton in my own journey to wholeness, or whatever you want to call it, is the power of belonging and connection. I think especially as men, you try to do it all on your own. You try to push through. You try to be strong. You try to be resilient. I've been able to develop some really close relationships with guys in my life over the past few years and being able to be seen and supported by another guy in your life is it is incredibly, incredibly powerful. I've learned that in the vulnerability and allowing yourself to be supported is actually where you find an incredible amount of strength. I think sharing that story and being vulnerable is the first step to allowing that connection and sense of belonging to exist.

Dane Groeneveld: I think you're absolutely right, and that's a good segue back into the Future of Leadership. You made a point there earlier, a soundbite that said it takes a lot of courage to go first in sharing that story. As you've been doing work towards your new book, as you've been out there doing these keynote speeches, where have you seen these great examples of leadership mindset that create vulnerability in teams that bring the team along to a place where they can have more psychological safety, they can be pushing back on each other and helping bring out the best at each other?

Mike Lee: I think it's the leader stepping up and being willing to be vulnerable and say, " I don't have all the answers." I think one thing that we need to be clear about with vulnerability is vulnerability is not using your team to be your therapist. Vulnerability is sharing something in a way that helps move the needle forward, and just showing up with the humility. We don't have all the answers. Having the humility to show up and say, " I don't have all the answers. I need help and support," actually allows other people to step up and take ownership in things, and that creates that sense of connection with the team. I definitely don't have all the answers in my life. I'm constantly asking people for help and support with things. It's something I need to do more of. But in that, vulnerability creates a connection. The connection creates a collaboration. The collaboration is what drives things forward.

Dane Groeneveld: I like that. This concept of vulnerability into connection, into collaboration, and then creating that momentum that we talked about, I like the way that you frame it as a team sport. It's inviting others to be a part of it, not just being the leader that's on their own trying to do it all for themselves. You've obviously seen that in basketball, but where are you seeing that evolve, emerge in the business world as you look at some of your coaching customers, et cetera?

Mike Lee: I think the big thing really is, we kind of talked about earlier, but just have the humility that you don't have all the answers. I mean, we live in this world where data is everywhere. There is information... What is the quote? We are drowning in information, but we are starving for wisdom. I think it's a Tony Robbins quote. It's being able to sort through all that and discern what is what and being able to ask for outside perspective. I'm shifting gears here, but I also think at the same time, in this world of drowning in information and the research and the data and the news and the chaos and disruption and all these things, we are living in a world where we have to make decisions when we don't have all the answers. I think yes, it is important. I'm doing a 180 on this, but I do think it is important to ask for the help to be vulnerable, to be willing to admit that you don't have all the answers, but at the same time being able to trust your own intuition because everybody else's opinion is going to be filtered through their experience of life, through their experience of business. That's why it is important to bring people into the conversation within your organization, but also people that are outside of your organization, outside of your industry. When I was coaching basketball, I rarely read basketball books. I was always reading books on leadership and on business because I wanted to bring an outside perspective into our work. I think there's lots of ways to get that. But I think when we are surrounding ourselves with these teams and support, I think, and this is another conversation, but the diversity in where we are getting support is super, super, super important. Because like the other people filter their opinions to their experience of life, so do we. Having that is super important to have the awareness of the totality, let's use your customer base, for example, like the totality of your customer base to understand that and be able to understand that by having the diversity in, I guess, your cabinet or your council.

Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, I like that. There's two points I picked up there from you, Mike. One of them is bringing in diversity of thought, of experience from the outside or from other departments within an organization if you're a product business. Actually going back to sport, there was a time early in the 2000s in Australian Rugby League where Craig Bellamy, the coach of Melbourne Storm, brought in some Greco- Roman wrestling coaches and helped the guys adjust their tackling method. They became dominant because they had a different tackling method, which slowed the other team down in getting up and getting the ball going again, until such time that other coaches caught on and everyone was doing it, and then a few rules changed. But it can really spark team performance, innovation, a number of things, bringing in those outside insights and experiences.

Mike Lee: Yeah, 100%.

Dane Groeneveld: And then there was a second one there that you talked about. You talked about trusting intuition, and I agree wholeheartedly with that. I think we've seen a lot of organizations maybe go a little bit towards the fluffy side of empathy and inclusion and giving everyone a voice, which can be dangerous. It's important that everyone gets a voice, but at some point in time there is a shot clock, a decision needs to be called. The leader needs to have the faith in themselves and the feedback they've got from the team. The team needs to support them to call the shot. And if it's wrong, it's wrong and you'll adjust and learn from it, and you might not call that shot the next time. But I do think there's something really there. We don't want to see teams trying to do things that are great for people only to cost themselves the chance to win the game.

Mike Lee: Yeah, I think the intuition aspect, there's been several times... It's hard because you have to really create that connection with your own internal voice, your own higher self. Until you do, until you can really quiet that, you are going to be dealing with the noise of everything around you, the other voices around you. It's hard to discern sometimes your voice from the other voices. But when you can, it's an incredibly powerful skill. I've had a few big decisions that I've had to make in the last few years where the data, the external, all the things around me were telling me, " You absolutely have to make this decision." If that's all you looked at from the people that I talked to that were 20, 30 years older than me that had tons of experience in life and business, they're all telling me to do the same thing. There was this internal knowing that I had to do the opposite, and it turned out to be right. If I had followed their advice, a whole list of things would've unfolded that would've not been great to deal with. It's a super powerful thing to be able to do.

Dane Groeneveld: That own higher self, I like that concept because it's human, it's personal, but it's kind of out there rather than in here almost. That's the way I'm envisaging it anyway. Is that something that you work on when you're working with any of your customers on coaching or if you're doing keynote speeches to help people really think about how they tackle that, how they create an awareness of and a connection with that own higher self?

Mike Lee: The two biggest ways that I think we can do it are through journaling, specifically through a stream of consciousness journaling. Set a timer. Maybe you set an intention. You'll write the question down at the top of the page and set the timer and you just write. The pen doesn't come off the paper for the next 10 minutes or whatever it is. The purpose of it is to not filter your thoughts. I think we could get into a whole nother conversation around creativity with this as well and problem solving. But the purpose is to not filter your thoughts. We block our own intuition, we block our own creativity, we block our own higher selves through filtering, through judgment, through criticism. When we can just put the pen to paper, don't allow the pen to come off the paper and just write. For that 10 minutes, you might be repeating things over and over and over again, but you might have a breakthrough that will just... The phrase that I use is it will just come through you. It will come from the place beyond the analytical mind. It will come from what I would say is your higher self. Another way to do this is through a three- step process that I use where I'm trying to solve a problem. This just happened to me the other day, about a week ago. I was trying to solve a problem. We don't solve problems by trying to think about them, by trying to solve them in our minds. I really believe, and this is maybe a little woo- woo for this conversation, but all the answers exist in the subconscious, all the answers exist. We just have to remove the blocks to the awareness of the answers. One way that we do this, again, is through the criticism. It's through the judgment. It's through the analytical mind, the 5%. One way that we can do this is by set an intention or ask yourself a question and then do something to shut off that part of your mind, whether it's... For me, if you know my background, you think it's meditation and it's really not. I don't get a lot of these answers through meditation. But I will set an intention or ask myself a question and then do something to get out of my head, whether that's breath work, whether that's going for a run. Honestly, running is probably the number one thing that helps me. Going for a run, taking a yoga class, doing something to get out of my head, to shut my mind off. Lots of times that answer will come through. It might not be the answer, but it is an answer that's going to move me closer to the ultimate solution or whatever we're trying to work on. Those are really two strategies, two practices that I think are super, super powerful to tap and to do.

Dane Groeneveld: I've actually got a couple of weird alignments with that story. One is when I get on a plane to go somewhere for business, I'm invariably tired, so I sleep for the 15 minutes to take off because I can't be on a device. And then that first 10 minutes that I wake up and I'm in this weird environment, I'm in this cigar tube in the air, the pressure's different, it's amazing what thoughts pop to mind just from that little practice. Now, unfortunately, I can't go and get on a plane every day that I need to have some light bulb moments, but it's interesting how that works.

Mike Lee: But you can build that into your... That is exactly what I'm talking about, and that's why people suggest journaling first thing in the morning. You get up. You journal first thing in the morning. You meditate first thing in the morning. It's because your mind is in that in- between state where you're not fully... I'm not fully on where I'm thinking about the day. I'm thinking about this problem and that problem and all the things that I got to do. I don't know all the exact science behind it, but your brain is in this in- between state, between wake and sleep. That's like the bridge between the subconscious and the conscious, and that's where a lot of these answers can come through for you. You could recreate that throughout your day, whether that's journaling first thing in the morning. One thing that I've been doing over the past probably about 10 months or so that would create the same state is a practice called yoga nidra. It's kind of a hybrid between a meditation practice and a... God, how else would you describe it? But it does a very similar thing. It'll put my brain into a very relaxed state in about 15 minutes and you get out of it and it's kind of a reset for the day, or you just gave me another idea, maybe I already got my workout in today, so I'm going to use this in order to get to that place that you're at when you get on a plane. You just gave me an idea there.

Dane Groeneveld: I know Dan Pink talks about the Nappuccino, where he'll drink coffee, like a really quick shot of coffee, which normally takes about 25 minutes to hit, and then he'll put his headphones and sit in the chair, sleep, and then wake up. That's probably got some similar elements to it. Even though he's not doing it to come up with ideas, he's doing it to quickly rest in the middle of the day. But I bet you there are some hats out there.

Mike Lee: If you follow Andrew Huberman, he's got a huge podcast. He's a researcher at Stanford. He's got all the science behind it. He's coined it non- sleep deep rest. It's really a practice called yoga nidra that's been around forever.

Dane Groeneveld: Interesting.

Mike Lee: It's called non- sleep deep rest. He's got a ton of research on it around not necessarily what we're talking about, but other benefits for a reset for your nervous system, for recovery and things of that nature.

Dane Groeneveld: Which is really important, particularly I think for leaders right now because there's a constant state of stress and anxiety. Leaders don't put a lot of time into recovery, and I think their teams see it, their families see it. I think it's part of the equation.

Mike Lee: It is 100% part of the equation. We like to look at the sports world for what's peak performance. We look at all the sexy things. We look at the ice baths, and we look at workout routines, and we look at meditations, and things like that. What we don't look at is what do they do to recover? We were just talking about this before we got on the show. When the clock runs out game seven of the NBA Finals, the next day, guys aren't on the court getting their work in. They go through a deep recovery process. I think for leaders to be at their best, recovery is a huge component of purpose, or not of purpose, of performance. I think we have to take that into equation. Going back to the process I was sharing earlier, set an intention, shut our minds off and allow these answers to come through, I think lots of times we don't need to... Obviously we need to work hard, but we also need to... These answers exist. I mean, I'm sure you've had it. How many times have you ever been trying to solve something? You can't figure it out all day long. All week long, you and your team, we're in brainstorm sessions. We're doing all this stuff. We're in our strategy sessions trying to solve this problem, and Saturday night you get in the shower and boom, there's your answer.

Dane Groeneveld: It's right there.

Mike Lee: That answer was there on Monday when you had your strategy session. Lots of times we just need to give our ourself permission to have the space for these ideas to unfold and trust that the answers are there.

Dane Groeneveld: No, I think that's entirely right. Actually in an era where a lot of leaders feel like they always need to be on, available by cell, responding to emails quickly, people aren't giving themselves that opportunity. And that's not just the leader, that's the team members too. There's a lot of people churning through a lot of work right now. We had Andrew Friedman shooting a show with us the other day, and he shared a 2020 Microsoft study that said, since COVID, the number of minutes that people are in meetings has increased 252%, which is just mind- boggling. People don't even have time to do work or do thinking or do recovery in the day because they're in meetings, meetings, meetings, meetings, and then they get home and they're hustling to make up for work that they didn't do during the day.

Mike Lee: I think that's an important point from a leadership perspective is to allow people, give people permission for this space in their days and then just step into a place of deep trust with your people. If you hire the right people and you create the right culture and then give them so much trust and autonomy, all this stuff is going to take care of itself and in a more sustainable, healthy, fulfilling way that is going to drive everything you want for the future. It's not going to be a blip on the radar.

Dane Groeneveld: I think that's it. Right now with everything that's changing, generative AI coming out, the truth of the matter is is that there's going to be team members that are seeing stuff in the perimeters of your business, in the fringes of your business that might spark the next best thing for your business. I think gone are the days where centrally you could plan and coordinate the best strategy for your team or for your company or for your product. We're in a world nowhere everyone's got to be looking outside, to your earlier point as well, on bringing in outside influences.

Mike Lee: Yeah, absolutely.

Dane Groeneveld: As we were preparing for this conversation, you talked about this concept of coaching from a place of love, even when that means bringing a lot of challenge. We stumbled across this concept of compassion over empathy and the way you explained compassion was really interesting because you felt that it was more of a driver on action. Could you explain that a little bit more and what you're seeing in that space?

Mike Lee: Yeah. I'm not in any way, shape or form trying to dismiss empathy. I think yes, sometimes people do need to be seen, they need to be heard, they need to be felt, and that's all that they need in that moment. You as a leader have to know, you have to have the awareness, does this person just need to be heard right now, or do we come at this from a place of compassion where it is, yes, they need to be heard, but now we need to combine this with a solution oriented action, something that's going to move things forward? Empathy and compassion, the way I would define it is empathy is feeling what other people feel and compassion is feeling what other people feel plus some sort of action oriented solution. They're there and they're sharing something for a reason. There is some problem that is going on. Compassion is empathy plus solutions, and empathy is just feeling what other people are feeling in that moment. I think they both have their own time and place. But I think the key though is to move people to that place of action is you really have to have a deep sense of connection and trust in the first place, and that can be created through empathy. They all play off each other. They all are important. But at the same time, it's like you as a leader in your organization are not there to be somebody's therapist. To a certain extent you are. Actually maybe I'll take that back. To a certain extent I think you are, and maybe coaching is more the right word than therapist, but you're there to listen and to help people solve problems. That's part of what you're doing, right? I do think in most cases, the compassion is more important than the empathy because it's actually going to move things forward.

Dane Groeneveld: I like the way you tie the action and the problem solving into play because empathy just for the sake of empathy can be a lot of work and it can invite a lot of distraction. But empathy, like you say in that construct of, well, I'm empathetic, but we now need to move into the problem. It's going to solve, I think, for a lot of challenge, a lot of confusion as well. Because at the end of the day, we're not here to solve everything. We're here to solve this problem based on the challenge that's in front of us or the target we've got for the month. There was actually a marriage and family therapist that came and spoke to my group recently, and he had a MVEP construct, and the way that it worked was for conflict resolution. He said, in conflict resolution, you should never have to say sorry, because you didn't necessarily put them in that place, in that whatever the problem was. He's like, you start with saying you matter and showing them that they matter. You move on to explain that you value them, that you don't want them to be continuing to feel this way and you value their opinion, and then you explain the empathy. I've felt that way before. It's not what any of us want to be here, so let's now move into the problem. It gets someone ready for the problem solving. At the end of the day, what you can achieve in the problem solving might not be exactly what that individual or that team wants, but you can at least say, " You want this. The next best thing I think we can achieve right now with the time and resource we have is this. How does that feel? Does that seem like we're going in the right direction?" And even if it's not enough, you've gone through the process. You've shown that compassion. You've moved towards action. And maybe at the end of the day, that person isn't going to stay on the team. They're not going to make the cut for Saturday's game or whatever it might be, or get the promotion, but you've done it in a compassionate way. You've shown a willingness to accept them, to be empathetic, and then move into a more collaborative problem solving effort.

Mike Lee: Yeah, I think that's awesome. You gave me an idea for something else that I've been using. I have not used this in the context of my work yet, but it's similar. It's called SET communication. When you're in a difficult conversation with somebody, the first part is support. Hey, I'm here to help you. I'm here to work through this with you. Second part is empathy, where it's, I understand this might be incredibly difficult for you. I can't even imagine how hard it's for you. The T is for truth, but the truth is this, this, this, and this. You did this. This is the reality. And then how do we move things forward? Doing it in that order, I think, is really... It can be powerful because it's like we want... If we feel supported and we feel like we've been heard, we're in a much better place to take action and move things forward.

Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, no, I like that. My only concern is I've run into so many problems with the word truth in the last six months because truth doesn't mean the same thing to different people anymore. I think we overly the word truth in the world because a real truth is a scientific fact that can't be disproven. We've even seen some of those things change in time. As soon as the word truth comes out, I think some people can be almost saying, " Well, if your truth is not my truth, let's call it truth with a little T, then we're opposed. We're never going to meet the middle." I like the approach of SET and the construct, but I'm just seeing that word get me into more trouble than not in a team construct and at home with my wife.

Mike Lee: I can totally, totally see that.

Dane Groeneveld: But it is interesting.

Mike Lee: Yeah, it is. It can be loaded.

Dane Groeneveld: It can be. It just goes show you we're living in this hypersensitive world. I love the way that you talked about us being drowning in information because we are. I think that that concept of drowning information means that people go and grab whatever piece of information helps support their truth, helps support their argument, and they're no longer curious to understand why someone else might have a different viewpoint. It's a challenge for all leaders and all teams.

Mike Lee: I mean, we can find any study, any research, any statistic, anything we want to support whatever we believe. It's all out there. Sometimes that's not the issue.

Dane Groeneveld: If you think about it, I guess in a closing question, we've covered things like vulnerability, higher self, shutting off some of that criticality and judgment to be able to get to the answer that's there in the subconscious. We talked a lot about inviting others in as leaders. All of that's really important. But if we go back again to that concept of leadership from a position of love, really being able to have some of those hard conversations, get teams really working, pulling the oars, rowing in the same direction, what is it that your hope is for the future of teams? If we roll forward five, 10 years, what do you think a great team will look like on a more regular basis, not just in the elite sporting realms?

Mike Lee: I think it's a lot of the stuff that we've talked about already. It's the connection. It's the trust. It's the vulnerability. It's forgiveness. It's belonging. I don't know how to put this into words, but this incredibly deep felt sense of support and trust. It's like something that you just feel. I guess the feeling of being held by something bigger than yourself is maybe the way to put it, where it's like, all right, you know what? Today I might not be at my best. Maybe I was up all night with my kid. I had an argument with my wife. Whatever it is. I didn't sleep well. Whatever it is, to step into the day knowing that I might not be at my best today, but these people got me because for the last month I've had them. We're all going to have these days when we're not at our best, and being able to create that just deep sense of trust and being held and supported by other people.

Dane Groeneveld: I love that. Actually a word that comes to mind there, I love that default sense of support and trust, but a word that comes to mind and the way you describe it is gravity, because gravity is consistent over time. If you've got a gravity in your team around, " Hey, I'm part of the team. I belong in the team. A bad game, a bad decision, a rough week of sleep isn't going to cause me to become detached from the group," because that's a huge issue. Fear of separation is probably one of the biggest drivers of misbehavior in teams. That gravity concept that I've heard you describe is very powerful.

Mike Lee: Yeah, I would sum it up as that.

Dane Groeneveld: That's cool. That's very cool. It's funny, because I've had a boss once before who told me, he sat me down, I'd had a couple of really good months. I was on cloud nine, hit some of my biggest ever sales quotas. He goes, " Dane, you're only ever as good as your last month." It was a little bit jolting. I just had a great last month, so I was like, " Oh, I'm really good now." But he's also saying, " You might not be good tomorrow." I don't think his intent was to say, this is a very transactional relationship. I think his intent was like, hey, have some humility. Be there for the team. But just the way that it came across was jolting. Immediately it makes you think, am I really a valued part of this team if I'm not knocking out good months after good month? What you described has a lot more wholesomeness to it, has a lot more sustainability to it, I think.

Mike Lee: Yeah, it's interesting that you bring that up. I know we're trying to wrap this up here, but I think it was Gregg Popovich from San Antonio Spurs. He said something along... One of their focuses was, our goal is not to win every single game. Our goal is to be at 80%. If we can be at 80%, we're going to be incredibly successful. I think it takes some of the weight off. It's like, we're not going to be perfect every day. We're not going to be at our best every single day. But if we're at our best 80% of the time, we're going to win over the course of the long run.

Dane Groeneveld: Yeah, I think that's a great message. That's a really good message. It gives you that time for the recovery. You can ease off in the second half of a game and say, " Hey, they got us. Let's try a few different things today, but just accept that this game's kind of done and not push ourselves to breaking every time."

Mike Lee: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think as people who are leaders and are high performers in any industry, the standards and the self- criticism that gets you to the top can also be your downfall. There's a reason that CEOs experience depression at double the rate of the average population. It's like 40%. Part of it is this incredibly hard inner critic that they have. It is going to drive you to the top. But at a certain point, if you don't learn to work with it, it's going to be your downfall. It's going to be your burnout. It's going to be your breakdown. I think operating at that 80% rule is something that helps mitigate that, create sustainability.

Dane Groeneveld: It does. I'm definitely going to work with Alicia to pull that Gregg Popovich quote out too. I appreciate you raising that one, Mike, because I feel like I could do with a little bit more of that myself right now, and I'm sure a lot of the team could too.

Mike Lee: Same here.

Dane Groeneveld: It's awesome. Well, thanks again for joining us today, Mike. If any of our listeners want to get into some coaching, find a book when it releases, look at bringing you out for a keynote, I know your keynote material is awesome, how do they best find you?

Mike Lee: Best place is mindshiftlabs. com, or you can go to whoismikelee. com. Both go to the same place. You can also connect with me on social, mainly hanging out on Instagram and LinkedIn @ whoismikelee.

Dane Groeneveld: Very cool. Well, thanks again for your time today, Mike. I'm sure a number of listeners will benefit a lot from spending some more time with you when they get the opportunity.

Mike Lee: Thanks, Dane. It was great to see you, and thanks for having me on.

Dane Groeneveld: You bet.

Voiceover: Thank you for joining us. Remember that by embracing vulnerability, trusting our intuition, and approaching challenges with compassion, we not only strengthen our teams, but also pave the way for a future where collaboration thrives. If you're hungry for more insights, strategies, and research on collaboration, head over to thefutureofteamwork. com. There, you can join our mailing list to stay updated with the latest episodes and get access to exclusive content tailored to make your team thrive. Together, we can build the Future of Teamwork. Until next time.