Courage to Influence: Transformative Leadership Tips | Lida Citroen | Episode 336

Scott McCarthy [00:03:23]:
Lida, welcome to the show. It’s so good to have you here.

Lida Citroen [00:03:27]:
Thank you so much. I’m looking forward to a great conversation.

Scott McCarthy [00:03:30]:
So we were just talking before I hit record, and you mentioned your family origins. And it I will tell you, as a auto enthusiast, I feel like I’m with automotive royalty right now.

Lida Citroen [00:03:44]:
You know, if we still own the company, I wouldn’t be here. I’d be in the South Of France with somebody putting a drink in my hand or something. Really elaborate. But, yeah, it’s fun it’s fun to have a backstory to your family.

Scott McCarthy [00:03:56]:
Yeah. I got nothing from McCarthy. Like, we just let we left Ireland and came to Canada. Like, that’s about it. That’s a

Lida Citroen [00:04:03]:
cool story.

Scott McCarthy [00:04:07]:
Well, it was long before I was ever thought of and my parents were ever thought of, but, you know, it is what it is. It’s, like, 99% of Canadians. Well, 98 now. Anyway, we’re not here to talk about backgrounds. We’re not here to talk about automotive history. We’re actually here to talk about, well, something you probably could have helped with automotive history, influence and influence others, which is, like, a super important topic as leaders because, you know, it’s one of the primary jobs to influence others. Yeah. So how did you, like, even get into this space of influencing?

Lida Citroen [00:08:03]:
Anyway I see. I take a deep breath for that one. Oh, because because I’m gonna need a lot of air. You know, I, Scott, I spent twenty years in corporate helping to stand up and market and promote companies, right, all over the world, consumer brands, professional services. And throughout all of that time, I was witnessing what it took to build the brand or promote the presence of an organization or a product. Right? How do you convince someone to go this direction instead of that direction? When I started my own company in 02/2008, I kinda had done the business thing, the corporate thing, and I wanted to apply those same skills to working with people. So I focused on personal branding, which in 02/2008, nobody knew what that was. Today, it seems like everybody, is talking about personal branding, which is wonderful because it really is how we promote and market ourselves.

Lida Citroen [00:08:57]:
And over the last seventeen years, I’ve noticed that a lot of my clients, and I work in over 30 countries, a lot of these clients were telling me the reason they wanted to build their brand. And it wasn’t to have something that sits on a shelf or, you know, that’s a logo or something that they would put on their lapel. It was because they wanted to be heard. They wanted to know that when they spoke up, they had credibility, they had clout, they could affect and sway important conversations. And that’s influence. So when I started to think about the book, what occurred to me is that’s really what we all want, isn’t it? And the old ways that we were taught maybe twenty, thirty years ago how to do that aren’t working anymore. So there was all this landscape recognizing that we kind of all want the same thing. We wanna know that when we have something to say that someone will listen, and that’s influence.

Scott McCarthy [00:06:28]:
Much like this podcast. You know? We got something to say. All the guests have something to say, and here we’re we’re trying to, you know, pass that knowledge on to you, the listener who’s tuning in here right now. And this is awesome. I I love the backstory. I’m always intrigued in backstory, especially with books because I always find there’s a story. Like, there’s a story to the story per se. And one day, whenever I get around to writing a book, there’s a story back there too.

Scott McCarthy [00:06:55]:
So over here, we’re talking about your book today, not mine. That doesn’t even exist yet. So let you know, let’s start off with, like, you know, one of my coaching clients, you know, that was one of their big goals was to be able to influence others. So out of the gate, you know, someone who’s like, oh, I wanna be able to influence others. Where should they start? Like, I feel like it should start, like, kinda within. You know what I mean? Start with ourselves first, but I’d love to hear your your thoughts there.

Lida Citroen [00:10:45]:
Well, I’m tracking exactly with you. So the book that we’re talking about, the new rules of influence, when I wrote it, I really organized it around four different ideas. Right? So first is, why do you wanna have influence? Which to your point is looking within. Right? Why do you wanna have influence? Do you feel like you have something to say? Are you sort of at a place in your career or your life when you wanna be more visible and vocal? Like, what is the motivation? Then who do you wanna have influence? And then the last is the where and the how. Right? Where will you have influence and how will you influence? But but before you can even do that is the first section, which is looking inside. And it is the sticky, uncomfortable, messy stuff that most of us don’t wanna look at. But it really is the foundation of the influence model. And not everybody should have influence.

Lida Citroen [00:08:13]:
That’s okay. But I think in the past, we defined influence as positional power. Right? So when you got to a certain rank or you got to a certain position in the company or level of authority, people would take you seriously. When you spoke, they would act. They would take your direction and adopt your vision. But we’ve seen, you know, across different geographies that that’s not working anymore. That we have people in the back of the room that have something really important to say or an idea to share or an objection to raise who are suddenly being heard. And so what we had been taught were the ways to have influence have really changed.

Scott McCarthy [00:12:15]:
I love where you went with that and breaking out the theory, you know, the different power types. Right? And, actually, with this client, I even talked about those. You know, positional power, referent power, expert power, etcetera, you know, all those different types and and explaining you why they’re so important. And into your example, like, that expert power, that person sitting in the back of the room who’s that expert in whatever that is. Right? Maybe that is widget making. You know?

Lida Citroen [00:09:21]:
Right. We all need widgets. Yeah.

Scott McCarthy [00:09:23]:
We all need we all need that widget. Right? And they’re like, you know, and they’re sitting like, why isn’t Joe a thing? Joe is the expert here. Not a good idea. Right? But before, it’d be like, you know, the person who held the highest title, highest rank, highest position. And like I told you before we hit record, like, my background is military. Huge hierarchical structure. The entire system is based on hierarchy. Right? But even for us, we you’re listening more and more to those, you know, those technical experts and such.

Lida Citroen [00:09:55]:
Not even just technical. Right? We might be talking about an initiative or a project that doesn’t require a different technical voice, but it requires a voice that isn’t represented in the room. Right? And how do you bring that forward? If the person doesn’t have seniority, doesn’t have any type of unique expertise, they have something to say that could change the way that this all unfolds. I I think leaders today who are getting it are recognizing that they need to ask more questions to listen without judgment and then learn what comes back. And what they’re finding is so much richer and so much more important than just the people who typically agree with them or will poke holes in it from whatever lens they’re looking at.

Scott McCarthy [00:10:40]:
Yeah. I absolutely agree there. I’ve said many times that leadership today is all about asking the right questions, not having all the answers. Now earlier, you mentioned that, like, when we start looking at ourselves, it’s that murky, sticky stuff that people, they don’t wanna dive into, right? They kinda avoid. Why is that on, and how to, how can the leader of listener listening can get past that dive into, like, okay. Why do I want influence in the first place?

Lida Citroen [00:11:11]:
Well, let’s face it. I mean, do you wanna look at the stuff that’s uncomfortable? Do you wanna look at the things that could be painful? No. I wanna see the happy stuff. I want people

Scott McCarthy [00:11:19]:
spent many time days in therapy, so I’m fine there. But no.

Lida Citroen [00:11:24]:
Okay. And then you’re the exception. Most people, you know, it’s uncomfortable. It doesn’t feel good. But what we can find is unfolding that can make us so much better. So in the in the rule new rules of influence, the first rule that I actually unpack is the rule of courage. And you being military, you know, courage does not mean the absence of fear. It means working through fear.

Lida Citroen [00:11:48]:
And to be able to look at yourself and ask yourself those hard questions, to really understand, do I wanna have influence for financial gain or because I see something, a need in the market or a need in my community that’s not being met? To be able to ask yourself those really hard questions takes a lot of courage. What you find that comes back may not please you. But we know that just like we’re flawed and sometimes broken and messy and all of that, so are the people that we wanna lead. So being able to have the courage to look at that and, you know, I talk about purpose. I’m a I’m a big fan of leaning into your purpose, and that comes from the courage to be able to look at it and think, maybe what I’m doing, that I’ve been doing, that people tell me I’m good at is really not what makes my heart happy and really isn’t where I’m supposed to thrive. And it doesn’t mean giving everything up. It means being able to look at that and either accept that you’re going to continue or make changes. That takes a lot of courage.

Scott McCarthy [00:12:50]:
No. I totally agree with you. And a lot of people will say to me, like, it took you a lot of courage for you to hit record that first time. I was like and I was like, you know what? Yeah. It kinda did. Like, at the moment, I probably didn’t think of it that way. I was like, you know, I’m gonna take my voice and simply put it out there to the world. And who wants to listen can listen, and who doesn’t wanna listen can listen.

Scott McCarthy [00:13:14]:
But I liked your point there. Like, you can adapt and change with time. It’s kinda what I heard. And if you go back, and I’m not talking about how good of a podcaster I was and my audio equipment or anything like that because god knows episode one was terrible from a production standpoint. But what I mean is my message. If you go back to episode one and you come up to now, this is, like, gonna be episode close to around 03:40 ish. By time I hit record, actually, in total, in the four over four hundreds total episodes I’ve ever recorded, my message has changed throughout. It’s evolved with as I learned more from the guests like yourself, like, wait now.

Scott McCarthy [00:13:56]:
I I need to adapt a bit more here. I need to adapt. This actually doesn’t work. And I’ll give you a prime example. Early in the podcast life, my tagline was lead don’t manage. Now the podcast tagline is lead don’t boss. Well, I like that. There and those are two different worlds.

Scott McCarthy [00:14:19]:
Right? So I was like but I’ll tell you, like, you know, the original one was like, hey. Let’s let’s make leaders out there. Let’s but then I’ve I’ve come to realize one, management is actually super important even from a leadership standpoint. Right? And, actually, the my my my model has changed to incorporate management skills into my leadership model. Because if you’re an effective manager, you can’t be effective leaders. My point. So I was like, well, I can’t be, you know, drafting here and, like, you know, attacking that. But then I come to realize, like, no.

Scott McCarthy [00:14:54]:
What I’m actually after are those terrible bosses out there that kill their teams that, you know, stomp them out, that are micromanagers and stuff. Like, well, let’s change the model. Too easy.

Lida Citroen [00:15:09]:
And I’d love to build on that because I mentioned earlier that, you know, one of the things that I I focus on in my work around influence is the old model of executive presence. And I think a lot of these leaders that you’re using the term boss, I think when we think of the visual, we think of executive presence. Because what executive presence taught us, and I grew up learning this model, is you had to look a certain way, you had to sound a certain way, and you had to have gravitas. And when you had those three ingredients, and it would really help if you were male and middle aged, you know, then you could be a leader. And it worked for a while, and I’m sure there are still some places where that model still takes root. But the problem with it was not all of us wanna look the same way. Not all of us wanna sound the same way and have that exact scripted message. And what the heck is gravitas? I taught executive presence.

Lida Citroen [00:16:06]:
I taught these skills, and I was always terrified someone would hold me to task to really define executive presence because I couldn’t. And I’ve been through so many seminars and programs where they talk about it, and it’s a quality. It’s a it’s a it’s a, you know, charisma. It’s a it’s a something we know is important. We we know it when we see it, but we can’t teach you how to get it. And I was like, well, that’s not fair. What about the rest of us? What what if you’re not an extrovert and you’re not charismatic and you don’t walk into a room and heads turn? Like, can you still have influence if you don’t have that kind of executive presence? And what I found is absolutely you can. It just requires a different set of skills, and those set of skills are actually getting people further than the old model.

Lida Citroen [00:16:55]:
So I love that you fed that one perfectly with your example.

Scott McCarthy [00:16:59]:
And now you got me peaked. You know, like, okay. We talked about the old school skills, which, by the way, I’m 100% behind you. Like and, yes, what the heck is What is that? In the army, we have the exact same by the way, the exact same thing. We just call it a different word. It’s called command

Lida Citroen [00:17:15]:
presence. Well and I’ve heard that too. Right?

Scott McCarthy [00:17:18]:
Right. And it’s just like, okay. Cool. But, like, what? I have to stand up and put my chest out and not smile? Like,

Lida Citroen [00:17:25]:
no. But if I’m a happy person, I wanna smile. You know? Yeah.

Scott McCarthy [00:17:29]:
Yeah. It all depends. Like, it all depends scenario you’re in. But I would love to dive into okay. Let’s talk about the skills and what’s required for the newer generation and, you know, those who may not necessarily have the old school, you know, skills and such.

Lida Citroen [00:21:07]:
Well, so that’s that’s where the 10 new rules come in. Right? And and something else you were talking about happens to be one of the other rules. You were talking about it without using the word. The word I use is agility. So when you sort of pivoted and morphed and evolved your voice in your platform to meet the needs of your audience, and you were able to confidently and courageously take a look at that, right, That’s agility. And that is critical to having influence. Because we can think in our head that we have it all figured out. But if we’re not asking the right questions, if we’re not open to things changing and being able to adapt and move through that, then we’re going to be rigid, and that creates fixed mindset instead of growth mindset.

Lida Citroen [00:18:31]:
So agility is absolutely one. So hats off to you. You were doing the influence thing back then. Didn’t maybe didn’t realize it.

Scott McCarthy [00:18:38]:
No. Thanks so much. But can I can I just can we dig at that one a little bit more? Because what I what I’m hearing, like, okay. Yep. You need to be agile. But what happens if you’re not agile? That’s why it was in my head. And what I hear there is, you know, I just see the scenario where you can’t pivot as a leader. You can’t, you know, make those micro changes required, and you said it yourself, like, you get that rigidity.

Scott McCarthy [00:19:05]:
And as soon as that comes in, my mind now goes to psychological safety, And suddenly, the team are like, well, I’m not being heard. I’m being you know, I can’t contribute because they’re not listening to what I have to say because they’re so rigid here. And now, you know, that psychological safety starts diminishing. Is it am I on the right track here?

Lida Citroen [00:19:24]:
Yes. Agility is a mindset. So it’s a commitment to sort of recognizing within yourself that, you know, when are you defaulting to rigidity and, you know, if if you ever hear yourself say the words, this is how we’ve always done it, that’s a good indication. You’re not being agile. And I guess the way I would, you know, answer that is think about where you were in September Right? When all of a sudden we started hearing words we had never heard before, social distancing and coronavirus and lockdown at home, and and this was something globally we all went through. There were people who froze and admittedly had a certain reaction. And then there were people who just went, okay, so this is different, let’s figure this out. And worked through it knowing they could look at what they could control and what they couldn’t, but responded in a way that created more influence.

Lida Citroen [00:20:23]:
So it’s not it’s not a skill as much as it is a mindset. And it’s not a one size fits all. You might be more agile at work than you are in your personal life. But to commit to not just seeing things one direction, not just seeing things one way. Another one of the rules is inclusivity. And my publisher even said, oh, you’re tackling the inclusivity conversation. And I said, well, let me look at how I’m tackling it because I’m doing it a little bit differently. The point of being inclusive is to say, I may not have all the answers.

Lida Citroen [00:20:54]:
Who else do I need to hear from who might have something to say or or view on this that it is worth considering? I see so many leaders today making decisions in a vacuum, and there’s this complacency that almost gets piped in through the HVAC system, and and they forget to reach outside. And inclusivity, the rule of inclusivity really says, make sure the right people are in the room. And then when they’re in the room, trust them enough to ask them those hard questions and see what they say. Don’t micromanage them to use the expression you say. Don’t talk over them. Don’t discount them. Because there are people in different parts of our community and parts of our organization where we can’t be, and we have to be able to hear their voice. We still get to hold our opinion.

Lida Citroen [00:21:42]:
We can still make the decision we want, but we’ve been courageous enough and inclusive enough to be able to hear from them. So these are really practical, gritty. They’re not life changing rules, but when you put them all together, they create a palette that is very easy to operate off of. I’ll give you another rule. The rule of being real. And my publisher kept saying, are you sure you don’t mean to be authentic? And I really wrestled with authentic because it’s so popular. I mean, boy, we love the word authentic. Right? I use it a lot too.

Lida Citroen [00:22:19]:
But I think it’s different than the word real. Because if I said to you, you know, Scott, be authentic with me. You’d be like, well, I kinda thought I was. Right? What am I not doing? But if I said, let’s get real here or I’m gonna be real with you. There’s a different layer of vulnerability that comes up, and it feels attainable to people. And, yeah, to have influence means you have to be real. You’re gonna have to let people know what drives you, what scares you, what keeps you up at night, and what gives you hope. That being said, I I often draw the distinction.

Lida Citroen [00:22:57]:
I think we need to be real, and we need to be genuine with people. But I don’t believe we have to be transparent. Then I’ll explain that because that gets a lot of reaction usually.

Scott McCarthy [00:23:07]:
If you’re going I’m actually, like, oh, because transparency is, like, one of my core values as a leader.

Lida Citroen [00:23:13]:
Well, so there’s situational transparency. Right? If you’re in the government, you should be transparent with where people’s money is going. If you’re going to make a business case, you need to be transparent with how you got here, right? But I think there’s risk involved in transparency for people. I also do reputation repair work for individuals, so this is a lot of where that comes from. I think we can be genuine. We can be authentic and real and wholesome and honest with what we post on social media, how we conduct ourselves with our teams, how we are one on one. But it’s a choice. And I have the choice to say, you know what, Scott? I’m not comfortable answering that.

Lida Citroen [00:23:55]:
I also have the choice to say, I’m not gonna weigh in on that political conversation because it really doesn’t do anything for me, and I’ve drawn a boundary there. I think we get into trouble when we think everything about our lives and our background and and our, you know, existence is up for fair game. And I’ve navigated that with a lot of clients who, you know, maybe suddenly got a negative diagnosis, and and they’ll look at me and say, so now do I have to be a poster child for cancer? It’s like, no. Who said you had to? Do I now need to tell my staff that, you know, I’m getting a divorce? Well, says who do you have to tell that? If it’s going to affect your work, you probably wanna have some conversations. Do you have to put it on Facebook? If it says who? And and we’ve got this social pressure that’s going on right now that I’m really alarmed by. And so I try to tell people, you know, think in advance about the topics you’re comfortable being open and conversational and genuine in, but then where are the gap the guardrails or the boundaries? Maybe you don’t wanna talk about the fact you have young children at home. That’s a little scary online to talk about young children. Maybe you don’t want to talk about your political views or your opinion on what you see going on in the world.

Lida Citroen [00:25:14]:
You don’t have to. I mean, if you’re a politician, you probably have to. But if you’re people like us, you don’t have to. So we get to draw those boundaries to keep ourselves safe. And then once we’re inside our boundaries, we can we can play all we want.

Scott McCarthy [00:25:27]:
I won’t disagree with anything you just said there. Actually, in fact, I’ll all double down. Like, I do not talk politics. Hence, I don’t talk about my political beliefs.

Lida Citroen [00:25:37]:
Reconcile transparency with not talking about something?

Scott McCarthy [00:29:04]:
So I think I, you know, like like you hinted at, I’ve established my boundaries. So when I say transparency is is a core value of mine as a leader, I’m transparent in the times, in things such as rationale for decision making. Why did I make this decision over that decision? Right? Like, I got no issues explaining why. If I’m late, I’ll actually, like, hey. Like, sorry, guys. Boss called me right before I was about to step out of the office. My apologies. You know, I showed up five minutes late due to meeting.

Scott McCarthy [00:26:13]:
Or, like, you know, guys, honestly, I got no good excuse here. My bad. Right? Like, it happens. Like, crap happens. Like so those types of things, I am transparent, but you kinda you kinda hint to that. Like, you know, there’s established boundaries. Right? Actually, even transparent a bit, like, some people go, oh, that’s a bit that’s a bit crazy. Like, medical stuff.

Scott McCarthy [00:26:35]:
Like, yeah. Like, I have a back and neck problem, and I’ll talk. Why? Because, like, I have medical appointments that are associated to that, so I’m not skiving off work. Right. Right. It’s it’s about, you know, showing I’m being transparent. I’m being authentic with with my team so that, actually, you know, like, hey. He’s not actually, like he’s not, you know, pulling the wool over our eyes or anything like that.

Scott McCarthy [00:26:58]:
No. This is actually, like, legit. Here it is. Here we go. But, you know, things such as political views, don’t talk about it. Even though I have very strong political views

Lida Citroen [00:27:07]:
Exactly. And you might you might think about whether the word for you is transparency, or is it honesty? Because the way you were describing it is, I’m not gonna I’m not gonna make up a story for why I’m late. I’ll be honest about some of the things going on in my life so that you understand why I might miss something here and there. Because transparency really is the underlying assumption that if I ask you something, you’re just gonna tell me whether you want to or not. So it’s just one of those tricky words, and people walk around all the time saying how transparent they are. I don’t know that that’s such a good idea. I I still have people who think I’m an open book. I’m very active on social media.

Lida Citroen [00:27:49]:
I tell stories throughout my presentations. My books have so many personal stories. There’s still a lot that I don’t share, and that’s okay. I’m allowed to keep myself safe and keep some things private.

Scott McCarthy [00:28:02]:
So for the listener out there, what’s better? Is it to be transparent or not transparent or simply go pick what you are and just be that?

Lida Citroen [00:28:12]:
You know, I’m not gonna say better or worse because that’s just so heavy judgment. I think everybody has to do what’s comfortable for them. I think going into the transparency objective without thinking it through is where we get into trouble. Right? So you can be open and and, you know, collaborative and expressive and honest and still keep things private. I don’t know that we have to define that for ourselves. It’s just really hard to put the genie back in the bottle if you find yourself going down that path and then decide you don’t wanna talk about it.

Scott McCarthy [00:28:45]:
Right. Right. Right. That’s awesome. Oh, I’m really enjoying this, actually. I like how the conversation isn’t revolving around, like, show up and shake their hand with a firm grip and look in their eyes and these types of things, but rather it’s about principles that people can simply follow on a daily basis. Now if you did have some tips for people, like, more of that tactical, you know, level, what would you say to people like, okay. I’m going into this big meeting.

Scott McCarthy [00:29:12]:
I need to influence this group group of people. I know there’s, like, a key person in there that, like, if that person comes, you know, gets on side with me, I got this. What’s your advice to that person going there?

Lida Citroen [00:36:10]:
I love the question. My advice would be, think about it before the meeting. Right? So have you established credibility? Does the person who’s the one you wanna influence or does everyone in the room, do they know who you are? Do they know what you stand for? Have they experienced your brand and your inner have they interacted with you before? Because to put all of that in one meeting, it might be a little bit of a pressure. Right? So I try to think about that ahead of time. Think about a job interview. Right? I had somebody ask me today, how do I build influence in a thirty minute job interview? It’s like, well, the recruiter will have looked at your resume. They will maybe talk to people who know you. They’ll have looked at your LinkedIn.

Lida Citroen [00:30:06]:
I mean, it’s not a thirty you don’t have thirty minutes to build influence. You have a lot of context to build that influence in. But then going into that meeting, two things specifically. Come prepared. You know, whenever somebody says, oh, I’m better if I wing it, they’re never better when they wing it. You’re always better if you prepare. And it can just be thinking through, how am I gonna deliver my message? What’s my goal? Who is my key target audience? And how am I gonna make sure by the end of my message that the action is actually happening? So really think it through and come prepared. If there’s data or facts or supporting material, have them with you.

Lida Citroen [00:30:47]:
And then and this might be the scariest one. Take a seat in the front of the room. It’s so much more comfortable in the back of the room because that’s where the cool kids hang out. Right? But the front of the room is sometimes where those decisions are being made, and that’s where people are more visible. So I encourage you to get up from the back of the room and go sit in the front of the room. There’s a quick story that I sometimes tell and I’ll just share it here real quick. In one of my last corporate jobs before I started my own company, I worked in an organization that had a board of directors. And every month, the board of directors would come together with our team.

Lida Citroen [00:31:21]:
We were senior staff, and we would talk about, you know, what had happened, and they would make decisions. The format was always that the staff sat around the perimeter of the room, and the board of directors sat at this big massive table in the middle of the room. And there were always empty chairs, but we sat on the perimeter of the room and when we were called on we spoke. And one time I was like, it is so much easier to sit at the table because I could write and I have something to lean on and put a so I sat at the table, and nobody had said don’t sit at the table, but nobody had said I could. And I remember I got a few looks and my my team was like, get back here, back here, you’re gonna get in trouble, but I didn’t get in trouble. And yes, I got some sideways looks, but life went on. The next time, the next month, I sat at the table again. And this time, I had something I wanted to offer.

Lida Citroen [00:32:14]:
And so here I am sitting with the board of directors at this massive table, and I spoke. The next month, one of my colleagues joined me

Scott McCarthy [00:32:22]:
at the

Lida Citroen [00:32:22]:
table. And the next month after that, that person spoke up. So the point is, like, we have to start sitting at the table. We have to start moving away from the back of the room, and we have to start having the courage to speak up. We’re all afraid of getting judged. We’re all afraid that they’re gonna laugh at us, yell at us, you know, write off our idea, whatever. And you know what? We always will feel afraid. I get afraid.

Lida Citroen [00:36:10]:
It’s human nature to worry about being judged, And the reality is people will judge us, and life goes on. And sometimes we make a huge change in a process or initiative that needs to happen because we had the courage to speak up and to have that influence.

Scott McCarthy [00:33:03]:
Can I throw in my own similar story?

Lida Citroen [00:33:05]:
Please.

Scott McCarthy [00:33:06]:
So I run a lead mastermind community Mhmm. Called Leader Growth Mastermind. So we get together weekly calls. I provide content, and we it’s all about working towards working through our problems and so on. So from time to time, we kind of, you know, do challenges. And at one point, we had a challenge where it was, like, developing a bit more healthy life habits, life routine, and stuff like this. So one of the guys in the group, he’s like, you know what? I’m just gonna go and start walking at lunchtime. You know? I was like, cool.

Scott McCarthy [00:33:38]:
Awesome. Like, get up. Take a break. He’s like, I’m gonna go for a thirty minute walk. Like, a lot of people normally do. He’s like, they just sit and crunch email at their desk. I’m like, alright. Sounds good.

Scott McCarthy [00:33:48]:
So that’s where he started doing it. Well, you know, fast forward a month later, guess what had transpired? The whole team was walking at lunchtime, you know? And it’s just, you know, that’s just that he got consistent. He just did every every day at lunch. He got up. He went for a walk, and he came back to me. He came back to the group one day, and he’s like, you know what? I’m actually more productive. And the rest of the team are saying the same thing. Yeah.

Scott McCarthy [00:34:13]:
We were not taking a break. It’s a good thing. But it’s, you know, such a similar story. Just like you sitting at the table, and suddenly, you know, more people started joining you. And at first, like, you know, he said the same thing. Like, people are like, what are you doing? He’s like, going for a walk. Like, going for a walk. Why are you going for a walk? I just wanna get out and go for a walk.

Scott McCarthy [00:34:32]:
Like, what’s the big deal here?

Lida Citroen [00:34:33]:
Right.

Scott McCarthy [00:34:34]:
And then, you know and eventually, like, everybody started joining him. So Right. Very similar.

Lida Citroen [00:34:40]:
That’s cool. So he influenced his whole team, and people are healthier and more productive and clearer minds. And

Scott McCarthy [00:34:47]:
Yep. Yep. For sure. Lita, this has been fantastic. I have absolutely loved it. Before we hit end here, is there anything we didn’t touch that you think is super important to the audience listening right now?

Lida Citroen [00:34:57]:
You know, I I think you’ve got a previous program on psychological safety, and and I think that can’t be under understated or overstated. I I think we really need to think about psychological safety. We live in a world that is oftentimes unsafe emotionally. So influence really is also about making sure that people around you feel safe. And the more we can do that, the more they will trust us, the more they will share, and then I think the world becomes a better place.

Scott McCarthy [00:38:47]:
That’s awesome. Final question to show, how can people find you, follow you, be part of your journey? Shameless plug. Have at it. It’s all about you right now.

Lida Citroen [00:35:32]:
You know, I am pretty much on every social media platform out there. The book, The New Rules of Influence is available wherever books are sold. Of course, Amazon, the big one, and alita360.com is the website. But I’d love to hear from your listeners what they enjoyed about the message. And if they read the book, I’d love to hear what they enjoyed about the book.

Scott McCarthy [00:35:52]:
Awesome. And for you to listen as always, it’s easy. All these links are in the show notes. If you just go to leadtheboss.com forward slash the episode number once we actually produce this in digits, you’ll be brought right to the show notes, and you can find the links there. So, again, thank you. Thank you for coming out, talking to us, about this super important

Lida Citroen [00:36:10]:
topic. Thank you.