Recognition and Influence: Making Your Manager Work With You

Alex Grande:

Hey everybody, thanks for joining on this Tuesday. We're gonna be talking with Corey Capella. Really excited to, to have a discussion around, making a manager work with you, and, and how to have constructive

Relationships with your teammates. It's going to be a lot about trust and.

candid honesty and respect, and working together as a team, rather than looking at other people, what they can do for you. So I'm really excited about this conversation. But while we're getting started, this is a live webinar. We are in this room all together.

Which is really cool, and I love that live component, so please share in the chat, where are you in the world? Corey, remind me, where are you in the world?

Corey Crapella: Yeah, I'm in the Greater Philadelphia.

Alex: Beautiful, beautiful. That's right, right outside Philadelphia. That's really cool. I'm excited to be over in the East Coast next week for the IMA Conference, the Rewards and Recognition Conference in Baltimore. Never been there, never been to Philadelphia, but I'd love to visit. What's a fun place you like to go to in Philadelphia?

Corey: Oh, listen, there's plenty. There's so much going on here right now, but, be weary of traffic, right? You got the World Cup, in town. You just had, Major League Baseball was here for the All-Star Game, so there's.

Alex: Very cool, very cool. Yeah, the World Cup's been really exciting. I'm in Seattle, so we've had some World Cup games here. I was up in Vancouver. They had a Canadian game as well up there.

Really awesome, actually. I think, I think we're all having a great time with, with the World Cup, but yeah, a lot of people calling in from Houston, Tucson, Wyoming, Sundance, Wyoming. Wow, that's beautiful. That'd be fun if we were all in Sundance together. We got Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, awesome. Montreal, a few people from Montreal, love it.

Love seeing the, the Texas folks. I used to live in Austin. I may be moving back there at some point. So, I, I love seeing the Texas crew in the house.

All right, Toronto, very cool. But yeah, let's get started. We're 3 minutes in. We have a wide-ranging conversation ready to go for y'all, so I think you're gonna have a lot of fun here. And feel free to ask any questions you have along the way.

in the chat. We will get to them when we can. Jade will be looking out for that. We also have a poll in a little bit, and in the end, I'll let him know, you know, how we're doing.

So just a little bit about who I am and who Corey is. But essentially, I'm Alex Grande. I'm the CEO, co-founder of Recognize. It's an employee recognition and rewards solution for HR. We're helping companies improve their culture, communicate the company values.

Systematically reward international employees or distributed employees.

So we're all about company culture. My background is in psychology, it's in software engineering. And so that's why I'm here today with you all. I'm very passionate for these kind of conversations.

Corey is the founder of Core Coaching and Consulting. He has over 15 years of HR leadership, including overseeing 4,500 employees across 45 locations.

And he brings that deep expertise, helping organizations strengthen leadership effectiveness, improve team dynamics, and support individual career growth.

His current focus is equipping professionals and leaders with practical, insight-driven strategies to thrive in complex workplace environments. Corey, thanks so much for being here. Anything you want to add to that?

Corey: No, Alex, thank you for having me. I appreciate the invitation. Excited for the conversation. Love the work you and the team at Recognize do. To your point, it goes well beyond rewards and recognition, right? It goes down to culture. So that's what I believe leadership is all about. So excited for this conversation. And thank you again for having me.

Alex: My pleasure. I'm gonna stop sharing my screen. We're gonna focus on the interview with Corey. And so, you know, we have a set of questions that we discussed and I'm really excited about getting into it. So we have about 10 questions to go through in the next 30, 40 minutes.

But yeah, just right off the bat, you know, since we are talking about, you know, recognition and managers, tell me about a time in your career where you were recognized and how that feel.

Corey: Sure, I go back, every year, it's right around the Masters. I'm a golfer, when the Masters come on, that's, that's the symbolism, like, the seasons are changing, golf season is here. And I had a manager one time, you know, I was part of corporate America, they went on a trip very regularly down there.

To the point where they were almost desensitized to the ability to go to such a major event, and…

I had a manager advocate for me once to say, hey, Corey's been around, he loves this, he has a passion for it, he's been doing great work, I'd love to take him. It wasn't even my manager. It was somebody else that I had a dotted line to, and that was just…

Really impactful for me. It kind of changed the way I thought. I felt seen, I felt valued, and I wanted to carry that forward. And I, you know, every time the Masters comes on, I think of Jim Nance, and I think of this manager here and the way they influenced me and advocated for me and recognized me. Like I said, always just made a big impression, especially to the fact that it, like I said, wasn't a direct line.

Anybody could give that recognition, right? And, and that, that was a big moment for me.

Alex: We carry those moments our entire life.

Those small moments.

Corey: Yeah, I mean…

Alex: Yeah, okay.

Corey: The way I felt, right, like I said, being seen, being valued, and tying it back to something that I really cared about, this wasn't like, oh, get him tickets to the local, you know, game here in Philadelphia, like, hey, he's a golf guy, this is the mecca of golf, why not that?

it aligns so well with me. It showed the advocacy, but the thought behind it as well. It wasn't, you know, just

anything, or, oh, we do this every month, so he'll like that. It was… this would be great for him.

Alex: I think as managers, we underestimate the power that can do.

Corey: Yeah, no doubt about it. I think we all know recognition, right? We have it in some way, shape or form.

Sometimes we get desensitized to it. That's all. And I think because of sometimes how we do it or, you know, how we lump everybody together or make some assumptions, it doesn't get the the ROI out of it that it should, because it should be a positive, impactful experience. You should have people that like employees like myself talking about it a decade later.

Alex: I love that. Well, moving into the conversation about managers, when you hear the phrase making your manager work with you, what does that really mean?

Corey: Yeah, it's, it's, A lot of going, changing your dependency or your mindset from dependency to partnership.

Whereas I need my manager, they have to do this, it's how do I support them, and how do they support me? It's a two-way street.

So it's a shift in your thinking, in your perspective of, you know, what is my manager doing for me, which is important, but also how can I help support my manager and how can we be successful together?

The more you have that greater understanding.

Right? The more you recognize what your manager's goals are, or their pressures that they're facing, or the priorities, whatever those things may be.

the better off you could align with them. So, again, to me, on a base level, it's really moving towards a partnership, not just looking for your manager to give you all the guidance and the direction, but you supporting up as well.

Alex: We gotta think for ourselves, and we also need to remember that the tide rises all boats.

Corey: Absolutely. And I love that saying. I think one of the things is

We understand that managers have a tremendous influence over us in our career.

But sometimes we let that get away from us and we forget that we could advocate and influence our managers, right? And that's the difference in the way you're thinking and approaching the process as opposed to they just dictate it, they point me where to go, they tap me when to move forward. How is this a partnership? How do we work back and forth?

Alex: Exactly. And that's where you create that relationship as the manager. I think, you know, are you a type of manager who, you know, your direct reports work for you and they do your bidding, or are you collaborating and getting the best solutions?

And the best tactics. One thing I found interesting is if you tell someone how to do something, you know, might be the best way of going about it, but they're not going to internalize that and they're not going to take it forward and fill in the details themselves. Whereas you let them come up with a plan, maybe it's not the best plan, but they have ownership over it.

Corey: That's tough to do. We're all facing pressure, deadlines, doing more with less.

Yeah. And we know the value of leading others to the answer, but just sometimes, situationally, we normalize and we get sucked right back into telling.

And then, again, that's a perspective shift, that's a slowdown that needs to happen, but you nailed it. The key word I'm gonna hone in on there is relationships, right? Knowing your people, right? Because that manager knew me, he was able to tie some recognition back to me.

He was able to know when I was maybe stressed out or know what my workload was and the right time to intervene and give that recognition.

Relationships, though, go a long way in driving this give and take.

Alex: I'm curious, what responsibility does employees have in their own engagement and career growth?

Corey: We're not all lucky sometimes to inherit the greatest manager, right? You know, Michael Jordan doesn't just get paired up with Phil Jackson right off the bat or vice versa.

So…

Managers matter, but at the same time, I'm a firm believer that employees need to own their own careers.

And the distinction I make, I'll call it as career by design, or a career by default.

It's very easy to wake up 20 years down the road

and go, I'm not really fulfilled, or how did I get here? And it's because other people moved you around in their succession planning, or on the board, where they needed you, or where they saw your career going.

Versus you stepping up, advocating, and doing that by design. Again, not by default. And in partnership, in conjunction with your manager.

I think a lot of people, though, it's overcoming that hesitation and waiting for someone to develop you, right? Waiting for them to tap you.

Being proactive.

Asking for feedback.

looking for opportunities to grow, develop, right? Volunteer for stretch projects.

Alex: Yep.

Corey: Learning opportunities, right? Whether it's in your industry, continuing education, whatever it may be, and being really clear, I guess, where your path is and where you want to go with your career.

I say to people all the time, like, I can't help you get there if I don't know where you want to go. Help me help you.

Alex: Mmh.

Corey: And that's, I think, where an employee has to kind of take ownership and responsibility and say, I'm not going where I want. Did I clearly communicate where I wanted to go? Does my manager know that? If not?

I have to take some ownership of that.

Alex: There's that idea, somewhat related to this is the locus of control and where, you know, I can't affect the weather, I can't determine how other people will respond to me or politics or the economy.

But I can control what books I read or write, right? I can control, you know, the things I say.

You know, and, and so, yeah, I, I love, someone said to me, 5 year plan, I don't know what I'll be doing in 5 minutes.

But I think it's really important to have some kind of idea, you know, and then working backwards, you know, what do you need to read? What do you need to be asking? Taking responsibility over yourself, right?

Corey: Absolutely. I, you know, I make the comparison to a GPS.

hopping in a car, you don't just drive for 5 minutes and hope you're headed in the right direction, right? You set a plan in place first of, where am I going? What's the end game?

and we reverse it backwards and figure out the best route to get there. You never would just start a… well, maybe, but you usually wouldn't start a road trip without having a destination in mind, or where we're going to end up, or conceptually, are we going east to west?

But many people do that with their careers, right? And to be fair, they're not set up well, like, again, it's tough to ask an 18-year-old what they want to do for life, commit to it for 4 years, and get the right decision.

But at some point we wake up and we go, I'm not being fulfilled, but we're a little bit more entrenched. It'

nobody's gonna care about your career more than you. You gotta raise your hand and start making that change, right, whenever that realization does come.

Alex: Definitely, definitely. So moving on, I'm curious, why do so many managers or employee relationships break down despite good intentions?

Corey: Hmm, okay.

Again, the word relationship, right? It starts off with a manager who values relationships. Let's start right there, right?

Going back to, if you get somebody who just wants it to be transactional, it's gonna be tough.

Not impossible. Again, you could influence that. But here's what I think it comes back down to.

Most workplace conflict, it isn't bad intent, right?

Right? I don't think managers go out on a daily basis and say, I'm not going to engage with my team, I'm not going to recognize good work.

It goes back to assumptions, or unclear expectations, or poor communication.

Pressure.

Alex: Right.

Corey: I talked about we're doing more with less. We got deadlines. We know the value of asking employees and gaining their buy-in.

But when we're stressed, we default right back to telling.

And our intent is good. We want to get the project over the finish line, whatever it may be.

But intent doesn't always equal impact.

So I think one of the best things for managers when building relationships is not making assumptions, right? Going out there, leading with curiosity before making judgments, having conversations instead of kind of filling in the blanks in our head.

That being said, space and grace, to all the managers on the line, it's human nature, right? That's what we want to do. We want to fill in the incomplete sentence. It's very natural. But how many times do we assume, and then we realize, oh no, we kind of, we went down the wrong way?

I get it. It's, like I said, very human nature of us.

But the value of leading others there, asking questions, seeking to understand, that's what real relationships are built on.

Alex: Yeah, seeking to understand. I think learning how, you know, teaching employees how to communicate effectively so that they can get their thoughts across without coming across negatively. You know, I think there's a big point of getting out of the chat in Teams or Slack, getting on the phone.

I love, Jocko Willicks. The, he's an author, in like, you know, business strategy. I'm drinking.

Corey: One of Jocko's drinks right now.

Alex: He has a… he has a drink? I didn't know he…

Corey: Oh, he's a whole, protein and nutrition line.

Alex: Oh, there he goes. There he goes. That's how you do it. I just was at the, Whole Foods yesterday and I saw that Liquid Death, the water is now doing eye masks.

They're doing, electrolytes, yeah, it's so interesting when people branch out from a product perspective, but I just love how he phrases things for people. I feel like everyone should read, his books, just because he's just, you know, he's big on just being like.

hey, boss, you know, I'm in with the mission, but I want to make sure I understand it. I have some questions to ask about it, you know what I mean? The mission, or the project, or what have you, and just learning how to communicate

You have to add a couple extra sentences, but it goes so far in communicating that you're not being aggressive, especially when you can use your tone of voice over a phone.

Call rather than over, you know, especially you don't know what, you know, in a, in a work, in an office environment, I can come up and I can knock on the desk.

Hey, you got a moment? You know, whereas on Slack.

Just blah. Just write something and you don't know what that aversion state of mind is.

Corey: Yeah, I am, I am big on modality, all right? Like finding the right thing for your people. And again, think of your own lives and more of a personal, I got 11 and a 14 year old girls, all right?

How do they communicate with them? They don't. That was a trick question.

When they do, it's heavily through text message, right? If they're calling me, I'm naturally concerned something's wrong, because we don't call. I got a friend who's the same way, like, it's all chat, it's all, you know, GIFs, it's all emojis and stuff.

Alex: Mmm, yes.

Corey: Calls, I get nervous. Same thing with your people. I have this natural aversion to teams. When people call me through teams, I don't know, a natural worry comes up. So how do your people like to be communicated, right? Do they like the email? Do they like the text?

to your point, what's the right mode? Should I be going down and knocking on a door and giving that recognition?

You know, in that vein, I know one of the big things is, you know, the old adage is.

But praise in public.

And it's so funny, because when I talk about recognition with people, I say, how many of you actually like when a boss sends out one of those emails, like, hey, I'd love to recognize Corey for doing this. And you wouldn't believe how many people are like, that kills me inside, right? I don't like that company blast.

I would rather them come down and just acknowledge it one on one. Some of your people though are going to love it the other way. The more you have a relationship, the more you know how to show up for your people and kind of be agile with how you recognize and tailor that to them, the more impact that's going to have as opposed to thinking it's a one size fits all.

Alex: I wanted to ask about your philosophy that people follow people, not titles. And how does that apply to influencing Upwork?

Corey: Yeah, I think,

we've all been there before, and those in the chat, tell me if I'm wrong, but we've…

We've had people that have the title but don't really have the real influence of the room, right? Or the hearts and minds of the room, so to speak.

And they say something, but everybody looks to the second-in-command, or maybe the unofficial authority in the room, to kind of get the real cues of, like, are we buying into this? Are we getting on board? Right? Titles give you…

positional authority. That only goes so far, right? That works great in things like the military. But

In corporate America, in at-will employment, it's relationships that create influence.

Because you know individuals, and you know what matters to them. And it's not just a one-size-cookie-cutter-fits-all.

But the more you have a relationship, the more usually there's trust.

Right? Because all good relationships are built on trust.

That leads to credibility.

Those things matter more than just where you fall on an org chart. There's plenty of people that have the title, but maybe I can't depend on them, or I don't see them as credible.

that… that's gonna hurt their leadership ability, or their authority, or their quote-unquote, their influence. The more you follow through, the more you do what you say you're gonna do, right? The more you show you're a person that can be trusted and credible. The title matters a lot less. It's much more about how you're showing up for people and reciprocating.

Alex: Exactly. It's so much about doing what you say you're gonna do when you're gonna say you're gonna do it.

And that goes both ways, you know, building that trust, and actually going back to previous thought, you know, your direct reports, you know, if the boss says, the manager says, hey, I got a task.

You know, if you're raising your hand.

Consistently, hey, I'll do whatever that is. I don't care what it is. Cleaning the bathroom, right? I'

Then you build that trust so that when you want to have a real conversation, the boss says, I want to do this. Hey, you know, I'm in with a plan.

I'm down for the plan, boss.

That's what you want to do, but I have some questions about it because I'm not sure about that. You know, I have reservations. And now you have that psychological safety as an employee to be able to say that to your manager and your manager should be able to listen and vice versa as well. It's a two way street.

Corey: Alex, you earn the right, right? You put points on the board, you show them, I volunteered, I did these tasks, now you can trust me to do this. And I love your point of, like, it doesn't matter what that is. It could be something as simple, you know, hey, I'll get this to you on Friday.

If Friday comes and I have to follow up with you, even if it's not something grandiose or important, it still hurts the credibility. And every little chip away at that, right.

Trust, credibility, they're those things that are just hard to earn, easy to lose. And something simple like that email, lack of response to an email.

Again, well intent, I meant to get it to you, great, but I didn't. And that… that's what, you know, could hurt. Now, the more of a relationship you have with an individual, the easier it is to overcome that. Hey, that's really unlike them. They must be, you know, they're bogged down right now. I'm sure there's an excuse.

you give more space and grace to people. And again, there's the people side, there's the human side, as opposed to boss, employee, I wanted this, you didn't need it. You bring the human, and you keep that human at the core.

Alex: I mean, as managers, definitely increase anxiety when you follow up and then they say, Oh, yeah.

And then they, there's no, there's no remorse or, oh, sorry, I've been so busy, you know, okay.

Hey, we all make mistakes. We're all busy. But if it's just like, why are you asking me about that? You know, that kind of attitude. That's why sometimes you have to just trust our guts. If the people around us are dreaming, are they energy vampires, so to speak, right? Or are they, or do you want, do you get excited to talk to your direct reports or teammates? Do you dread that one-on-one?

Are you excited about it? And I think there's something really to that.

Corey: yeah, how are you showing up, right? Is it, oh, I gotta go do that one-on-one, or it's like, no, I'm excited to learn and dive in, what do they got going on, so I can better support them. And again, we're talking about this going both ways. Same thing to, you know, our people on the phone, I want you thinking you're, you know, on a call here, I want you thinking about this.

Both ways, as an employee, how you can be managing up, and those who have direct reports, how this flows down as well. Absolutely, it goes in both directions.

Alex: Yep, and that's when the teamwork makes the dream work.

I have a question about recognition. You know, it's usually as something that is seen as managers give to employees, right? The reports. How can employees use recognition strategically?

Corey: I love that because I think it could be even more powerful, right? You talk about building trust. I go back to recognition makes people feel seen and heard. And who doesn't like that? It doesn't matter which way it's flowing, right?

I like to praise and build up my children. That's a big part of being a parent. But you gotta… you can't tell me you don't love when a kid says, oh, daddy, you can do this, right? Like, that is equally, if not more rewarding, filling up my cup, because, to your point, it's supposed to flow this way, top-down. When it comes bottom-up.

it's extra impactful. So It's not one direction, right, is what it comes down to.

Recognize managers rarely receive positive feedback.

At the same time, they're the ones that are expected to motivate everyone else, right? So, when you're thinking of feedback, I do think it usually, or recognition, it usually is thought of top-down.

I think it's more of a genuine just appreciation for other people, right?

Alex: Yes.

Corey: Strengthens trust. Again, it deepens the relationship. And great cultures, they recognize contributions in every direction, right? Up, down, sideways, peer to peer.

And it could be anything. I mean, I was on a call the other day with somebody, and it was an executive.

And I said, hey, I want to recognize this. Like, I was talking to the team, and I've been doing training for your team, but I noticed your change in behavior as a result of this. You've been better at the way you haven't been communicating off hours or something like that.

And he goes, you know, I really appreciate that, right? It was a, it was a validation that he made a behavior change and somebody saw it. And that's what we're going for.

Right? We're trying to reward those behaviors that we want to see continued.

That's what it's all.

Alex: And it's all about, you know, it's not just, I'm not just doing this just to say, "Hey, thanks." It's we're communicating what winning looks like.

And… because we want to see more winning.

And there's a kind of a FOMO. If you see people winning, you wanna be winning too. And also I think what's nice about, you know, something like our platform where because it's peer-to-peer, then the manager, when they go in that one-on-one and a performance review, there's already data summarized with AI based off of recognitions from the last six months, which is super cool.

Corey: And Alex, to that point, the peer-to-peer could be sometimes even more impactful, right? Because like I said, you don't expect it. They sometimes know your work or how impactful you are to a.

or something, maybe more than somebody at the top does down. So when I get it from somebody I'm in the trenches with, somebody I'm shoulder to shoulder, elbow side by side, right? And they…

sometimes that can be the most rewarding. And then you talk about being in a manager's, you know, talk about a performance review. How much more impactful is it is, you know, when you get to pull colleagues and

peer comments to say, hey, you're obviously making some strong impact with the team. Look at a couple of the things people have said. So I agree that peer to peer.

Support is tremendous, and yeah, the platform is great for that.

Alex: Yeah, and then people don't, the manager doesn't have to spend a lot of time trying to find the information, you know, cutting the noise out of their workday. And yeah, if you see a peer-to-peer recognition, you know, and then a manager just comments and says, I love this, that's all they have to say.

That is…

Corey: A heart, a thumb up, a light, something like that. It's little things go a long way, right? It doesn't have to be grandiose. It's little things really do add up, and it… like I said, sometimes people don't even want the… the grandiose thing. Like, that little recognition, that's all we need, and we keep going.

Alex: Yeah, then yeah, that communicates they saw this emoji. It's not just a simple emoji, it's they read this.

I think we have a poll, actually. I'm curious in the group what kind of recognition your company has. I know that 75% of companies have a work anniversary program, so I'm sure most of you have that. You know, that yearly employee of the year kind of nomination is also common.

But I'm curious how many people in the group have a manager to peer or peer to peer program? You can select many, so select all the things that you do. The last one is something that might be interesting to some of you where you actually can report things you've accomplished. It's usually called challenges or incentives so that you don't just wait for recognition, but you can report it.

To your manager, for record or for, you know, rewards.

With something like my platform, you know, the social recognition, the peer recognition, the challenges, work anniversaries, all leads to a rewards catalog to redeem gift cards or concert tickets. Let's see what the results are. I'm curious. Yeah, look at that. I just almost hit 75. Look at that. So similar. 78% have work anniversaries.

Half the people have a social recognition program, almost half.

It's interesting to see more social recognition than there is actually nominations, which is kind of a flip from the past.

Grace shared that they also have a health and safety recognitions as well. So I guess, Grace, feel free to chat more on what you mean by that. But so with something like my platform recognize you have badges that symbolize health and safety and things like that. And that's part of the social peer-to-peer or manager-to-peer.

But I'd love to hear more about your program. Put it into the chat. That's really cool. Other people have maybe specific programs like that where you're recognized for accomplishing certain health or safety initiatives. Please chime in. That's really a great concrete use case.

Corey: Alex, I think you're seeing more and more benefits rolling stuff out like that for the health and wellness, right? And allowing people to do like walking challenges and again, taking it out of the context of just your job description and bringing it over more into the people, the human side, right? The safety, again, that's a big one depending on where you're at and certain types, sorts of business manufacturing.

hazardous materials that come from some of those.

But all great things. Again, you talk about behavioral, tying it back to what do we want to see more of?

That's exactly the tie-in you want.

Alex: Yeah, I mean, Grace is saying that if they have any, if there's… if they, you know, have zero injuries, report safety hazards, have good ideas for safety, we work with companies like Winnebago, other manufacturing organizations I recognize, also healthcare organizations.

that use recognition, or my solution, Recognize, specifically to drive those things. And that's how I think you can help communicate the value of recognition to, the executives. So, Corey, bit of an ad hoc question, but I'm curious if you have any thoughts on how to communicate

Some of these programs, the, the, like, the actual, like, getting across the board with a leader on getting them on board.

Corey: Yeah, no, I love it. Listen, I go back with leadership. You still gotta make the business case. You have to show the metrics, you have to show the ROI, right? You have to tie this into, it's not a warm and fuzzy, it's deeper than that. It's psychological, right? It goes down to culture and how people show up. Guys, it's no surprise we all recognize.

That personal world?

you know, bleeds into professional world as well. We recognize that health and wellness is a big component, right? But it's when we start rewarding those behaviors and putting our actions behind it.

And then showing up, tying that back to the business of, look at that, people are showing up better, we're recognizing, they're feeling more empowered, they're coming up with better ideas, it's leading to greater innovation, right? It's leading to cost savings. But I always go back to, there's the, here's what we're doing.

Here's the impact. And then here's why it matters to leadership. I think that's a large part of when we're talking about building a business case.

Alex: Yeah, go ahead.

Corey: tying these things back to the bottom line.

Alex: Yeah, having even like a template almost that people complete to be able to communicate it effectively. I'm curious, what mistakes do employees make when trying to gain visibility and influence?

Corey: I love this question. I think when people hear about visibility or influence, they're like, oh, I don't want to be that, hey, teacher, teacher, you forgot to give us homework person. Nobody wants to be that person, right? I get it.

I… the other side of that, though, is people assuming that their work will just speak for itself.

It just doesn't happen, right? The hardest work…

isn't the most well-paid, usually, in an organization. It doesn't naturally correlate that way. The person who's doing the most doesn't just get promoted, right? So.

Work, no matter how great it is.

It doesn't necessarily translate to being seen.

Yeah. You need to communicate. You need to advocate. I'm a firm believer in, you know, communicating up. I love something I call the brag list, right? Or the dig list. Damn, I'm good.

Listing out your accomplishments in, you know, in quarterly increments. So when you have that meeting with your boss, you're coming to them proactively to say, hey, here's what I've been working on, right?

They'll know the bad things, like, as managers, we usually remember that stuff, but they forget the little things that all add up.

too big. So, sometimes they fall through the crack, or they're not as seen, or they're not as large, visible projects. You gotta make sure those are, you know, communicated as well.

Don't go raising your hand just when something's wrong. You gotta be sharing the things you're doing right as well.

Just like my challenge managers, you're out there with your team, don't be only catching them doing something wrong, right? Recognition and positive reinforcement? Alex, I'm sure you could speak to this. So much more impactful from a behavioral standpoint, right? I worked in safety and manufacturing environments where

They used to say, you know, we want people to use the ladders. We don't want them to step on 5-gallon pails and use them as a little mini ladder system.

And they shared, you know, you have to tell people 5 times not to do something in a negative way, whereas the one time you tell them good job for using the latter will reinforce the behavior. So that positive versus that negative reinforcement, recognizing the positive, catching people doing something right, I think goes a long way.

The other one I'll share is the old adage, like, you don't bring problems without solutions, right? If you're coming to a senior leadership with, like, hey, this is broken, or this isn't working.

What's your perspective on it? How do you think we could fix it? What do you think we could do better?

But again, I think one of the biggest things is just not sitting on your heels. You gotta be proactive. You gotta be putting that list together.

Candidly, nobody's gonna do it for you. I would love to be your employee advocate, where you guys call me and are like, okay, Corey, here's what I've done. Come into this meeting, kick down the door, and really advocate and tell them that for me. We can't do it, right? You have to gain that courage and kind of go advocate and put that out there for people.

Alex: And you touched on earlier, it's not just about job titles. You know, people know who has merit, you know, that kind of idea of meritocracy that Ray Dalio talked a lot about in his book, Principles.

You know, you want to, you know, the person who has the most expertise should be the one making a decision on certain things, not just job title. There's definitely something to take advantage of people who are maybe well-liked, gregarious.

be able to drive some of these programs. One random thought I have, it's somewhat related, you know, is, you know.

Like, people need to know…

You know, yes, write down your accomplishments, but how do you know those accomplishments are what are tied to your career? And I think it's so interesting how we have, we have, we have, we put out a job rec.

And it's, you know, all this stuff about we're ninjas and rock stars and all this stuff.

And then we never go back and look at it. And so what we do is we have ours be like, hey, we're sane, kind people.

Come work with us. We're. We want to work hard and do good work, but we're, like, nice and chill.

You know? And no, we're not rock stars, we're not ninjas, we don't even mention that kind of stuff. And then, in the actual job description, it says what success looks like. And then we come back to that document every quarter, or every 6 months.

Right, and that, you know, I don't understand why we have job descriptions, and then as soon as that person's hired, we throw it out.

Corey: Again, and even, or we create it and we never dust it off 10 years later, like that job is absolutely involved, right? Evolved. There's no way we can hire that same person back then for the job it is today. But I love your point there. You know, some of those terms, I cringe, right? I absolutely cringe the rock star stuff, the ninja stuff, and you see it out there.

I love a creative listing as much as the next person, but going back to just we're people.

Right, where people communicating with people.

you read that stuff, and our BS meter as humans is pretty strong, right? And I don't need to be a rock star. I'm good at Excel. I don't know if that puts me in a Mick Jagger category, right?

But, I just want to work with, like, some normal, good people, and I think, to your point, putting that out there as a differentiator resonates differently with people, I'm sure.

Alex: Yeah, yeah. I have a question about communication styles. How do CAN employees adapt their communication style to different managers?

Corey: All right, when I talk about adapting here, the analogy I use is a hang glider, all right? And I am not a hang glider, let's be clear.

Here's the hell out of me.

I know enough to, I know, when you're on a hang glider, you don't just make a sudden, like, jerk.

So when I talk about adaptability, right, changing, modifying, morphing, whatever you want to call it.

It's not, oh, I have to be a totally different style, or I have to be like this person.

it just doesn't work, right? It's… a slight adjustment.

will give you the shift you need. It's meeting people where they are.

it goes back to, you know, it's funny, I did a couple communication classes recently, and, you know, we talked about the Platinum Rule. And I'm not sure if our callers kind of know, feel free to drop in the chat the Platinum Rule. Many people know the Golden Rule.

And that is treat others how you would want to be treated.

I, you know, I am a very direct communicator. I don't mind sarcasm.

Alex: Yes.

Corey: Work with a lot of people, right? So again, that will work for a subset, but there's a larger population that are going to be missing out on a lot of back and forth if I treat them the way I want to be treated.

So the Platinum Rule goes a little bit of a step further. Treat people the way they want to be treated. What's their communication style, right? Do they like texts? No, they prefer phone calls. Alright, I can meet them there on that. Like, little things like that go a long way. Like I mentioned earlier.

I don't like that Teams. That Teams notification gives me anxiety immediately. So my boss will shoot me a text or something, like, hey, Corey, hit me up with this before the Teams.

That helps set the expectation, right? Little things like that is what's the adaptation, the agility.

without compromising who you are, and your values. They're trying to be something you're not, right?

It's recognizing we're all different. We're not all the same. We have to tailor messages differently and accordingly. Again, I have two daughters. I can't tell my oldest something the same way I tell my youngest something. It is much drastically different. I have to prepare for that youngest one. She has like three rebuttals. The oldest one gets on board very quickly.

Alex: Very quickly.

Corey: Right? I have to adapt that messaging. It's not going to land the same way.

Alex: Yeah, we need, we need to train our, our, our direct reports.

how they can evolve, become managers themselves, and teach them these techniques for them to do the same thing.

We have a couple more questions here. I want to make sure everyone knows we're speaking with Corey Propella, and connect with him, corecoachingandconsulting.net. There's a QR code, you can take a quick

Snap of that. We'll be sending these slides to everyone in this session after the call. So if you don't write this down, don't worry, we'll send it to you and you can just click on the link in the PDF that we'll send over. And I do wanna mention before we round out the conversation that we, if you're interested in seeing Recognize, the platform that we're, I'm gonna be mentioning here, it's an employee recognition rewards software.

And we do live group demos, so it's low pressure. We actually have a gift card raffle. You can have a chance to win $100, super good chance that you will win those. So please come to that. Again, we'll be sending the slides, or you can take a screenshot.

To register, and if, Jade, if you can put the, the link in the chat, I really would appreciate it, the Zoom link to register. And also, you know, we continuously do webinars, just like this one with Corey.

So, in the beginning of August, I'm really excited to be meeting with Dominique Revere, and she's the founder of HR Remedy Consulting. And again, we're going to be talking more about how managers can create belonging in everyday recognition and experience. We're really excited to hear what she has to say.

All about that. But just one more quick moment. Again, corecoachingandconsulting.net. So connect with Corey.

there. And I'm gonna leave that up on the screen while we round out the conversation. But Corey, another question we have is, on,

I mean, I mentioned, you know, helping managers, you know, or helping employees elevate. What can employees do, to become easier to lead?

Corey: Yeah, again, I think being proactive, right? That switch of reactive, waiting for my manager to dictate everything, taking your career a little bit more by the horns, right?

and and taking more accountability for it.

not waiting for somebody to tap you, you know, putting yourself out there for those assignments, even if you don't know what, just verbalizing where you want to go at this time in your career, and if that changes, recalibrating. But…

Proactive versus reactive, I think, is huge. I think you mentioned something earlier, the old acronym D-W-Y-S-Y-W-D, I think I got it right, but do what you say you will do.

That, you know, I'm very familiar with, and…

Again, reliability builds trust. Like, I know my example is simple as that email, or be on time, and somebody picks me up 5 minutes late, but little things like that

They erode trust and credibility. So the more reliable, the more you're putting, as I said earlier, points on the board, the more you're going to build up that relationship, that credibility.

And again, it's about mitigating risk

Right? That's what a lot of the job is for managers. Mitigate risk. So, try to reduce any uncertainty.

Right? Communicate early, communicate often, over-communicate, just want to confirm. Nobody ever is, you know, that's bothersome. I'll tell you, I would much rather that over-communication up front.

As opposed to having to take the corrective action down the road and untangle something. You know, anybody out there in HR, we don't like surprises. And I find most leaders don't like surprises either. So make your job, manage your job easier, right? Be proactive, be reliable.

communicate early and often and effectively, right? Confirming understanding, summarizing this in email, wanted to recap our call. All those little things go a long way in just making sure we have that alignment. Because like I said, if you don't take the time to do it initially up front, it's going to cost you twice as much time to get that knot untangled down the road.

do it right on the front end, but you've got to get out of that shell of, they'll come to me, and it's got to be, I'll go to them, and I'm going to be a little bit more

I'm an advocate for my career by design.

Alex: Yeah. And, you know, if your manager, your direct reports, you know, aren't internalizing these things, they're fighting you on these things. If your gut.

makes you feel dreaded to interact with them, maybe they're on the wrong bus. You know, we have to be honest with that. We need to respect ourselves as managers, because sometimes direct reports can be…

challenging. We want a team that we all enjoy each other's company, that we all want to even spend a little time together outside of work, even. That's, you know, we want… life is short. Work with people that you like.

One last question today, Corey. I'd love for you to, share, you know, two or three big takeaways you want the attendees to take with them as they go off in their day-to-day.

Corey: Sure. If I'm summarizing this, I go back to kind of the career by design or default. What do you want?

Right? Your career is your responsibility. It's yours.

Nobody's going to care about your career more than you, or advocated for more than you.

Alex: Yep.

Corey: That's your responsibility.

The second one I'd say is… Influence, right?

which you have over your manager, or you can have over your manager, is built through trust. It's built through communication.

It's built through consistency. And those of you who are managers, it's not built through authority, right? The title alone does it. That only goes so far. That doesn't get people to buy in. It may get them to open the door. It doesn't get them to, you know, show up with good customer service or positive experience.

The best manager and employee relationships. Again, they're not dependencies. It's not too heavy one way. It's more of a partnership.

That, you know, where it's a mutual understanding and support of one another.

But I will tell you, this all comes down to, Alex, like, this… one of my favorite quotes from a movie, The Bronx… A Bronx Tale, is, the saddest thing in life is

I've seen it, right? I've been out there as a manager, as a leader in HR leadership roles.

I have seen good people fall by the wayside. And I guess my parting challenge to the group here is don't let a difficult manager become the reason your potential goes unrealized, and where you end up with a career you're not fulfilled in, or you're down that road of, you know, default instead of design.

Recognition goes a long way. Take the time, do it right. There's great tools and resources out there for you to do it, but it's important. We all know it personally. We sometimes just forget it in a leadership role. We're moving quick, and we don't do it nearly as much as we should.