Rob McIntyre with Dale Carnegie Training demonstrated the tools that can be used to take control of personal attitudes, build relationships, and enhance communication skills which will ultimately enhance leadership skills during the 2021 Virtual CAAR Conference.

McIntyre began by asking attendees what they think is the most important way to view a leader: with trust, with like, with respect, or with admiration. He reveals that every time he does this exercise, a minimum of 90% of the people surveyed chose trust or respect as the most important.

“When we talk about employee engagement, and when we talk about building relationships, one of the most important variables, we’re really talking about building relationships based on trust and respect, versus building relationships based on being liked,” said McIntyre. “Now keep this in mind, most people would agree when trust is there, respect is there, like is there as well.”

He then asks the question do we trust and respect someone based on what they have, what they do, or who they are?

“Have” refers to someone’s job title, experiences, certificates, reputation. McIntyre says some people may trust and respect someone solely based on this, for example, a Nobel Prize winner, or someone who has the success one is striving to achieve. However, what they do is more important.

“What we do speaks louder than anything we’ll ever say. And from a leadership perspective, when we start modelling, in theory, we can stop demanding.”

McIntyre states the most important, however, is who we are. Someone’s values and belief systems are what truly make the difference in overall trust and respect.

“We tend to focus on what we want to have… If we only focus on what we want to have, it can cause us to do things which is incongruent with who we are. And its why some people are successful but they’re not happy. Because they’ve found success, but they forgot to bring themselves with them.”

He mentions that a leader should give their employees their trust, instead of waiting for the employees to earn their trust. If the leader thinks that the employee doesn’t care, then that’s all that the leader will see. If the leader changes their mindset to trust that the employee does care, then they will see them in a much more positive light. Conversely, leaders shouldn’t expect employees to give them trust, instead, leaders should realize that they themselves have the responsibility to earn the trust of their employees.

McIntyre then went over some principles from Dale Carnegie’s book that were designed to build relationships based on trust and respect.

Criticism -- The first point doesn’t necessarily mean that a leader should never criticize anyone, but emphasizes that when coaching, leaders should not begin with the word “don’t.” Instead, leaders should reinforce what should be done rather than pointing out what shouldn’t.

The second point, appreciate, highlights that appreciated employees are much more engaged.

“When a manager ignores us, 40% of us are likely to actively disengage. You know what’s more astonishing? Is that when a manager gives us manager feedback… 22% of us will actively disengage, meaning that those that receive no feedback are more likely to disengage than those that receive negative feedback.”

The point isn’t to give negative feedback but to instead give sincere appreciation and recognize employees for their efforts.

McIntyre then closed with an analogy. When the police pull someone over, it will always be because the driver was doing something that they shouldn’t be doing, and the officer will proceed to tell them what they did wrong. Because of this, when most people see a police car, they will tense up and slow down, even if they weren’t speeding or doing anything wrong in the first place.

The same case can be applied to leaders. If a leader only criticizes their employees and solely tells them what they are doing wrong, then eventually just the sight of the leader can cause the employee to tense up and do things differently, even if they were doing it correctly to begin with.