Synergize: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
What creates synergy amongst your team? In exploring the sixth habit from Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Rob and Traci explain how this habit is a culmination of healthy conflict, trust-based collaboration, and embracing each other’s differences in order to reveal solutions that outshine what one person could do on their own.
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Announcer:
Welcome to The Overly Human Podcast where we discuss all things human in the workplace. Because it's not just business—it's personal too.
Rob:
I absolutely hate the word synergize. I realized we're going to have to talk about it today because that is habit number six, but that word makes me think of all the bad buzzwords we get in business. And I had to start this chapter over like three different times as I was rereading it, to just check that word and be like, I need a new word. I got to replace it. That word is going to drive me bonkers throughout this entire chapter. And I'm not going to take any of it seriously. Then I'm not going to be prepared to talk about it. And there's no way we can synergize during this conversation unless I find a different word.
So good morning, Traci. How are you?
Traci:
I'm good.
Yeah. It's funny because maybe it has something to do with when the book was written that this word was more kind of a new word that hadn't been beaten up and tortured and overused and twisted over the last 30 years that leaves you with that residual feeling of the word synergize.
Rob:
You know what I think of when I heard the word synergize, the first company that come to mind is Enron.
Traci:
It's not a good company to come to mind.
Rob:
No, but that's what comes to mind.
Traci:
Yeah. That's true. Yeah. That's a good one.
Well, when you were reading it, were you thinking of better words?
Rob:
I tried, I came up with collaboration, healthy conflict, thinking win-win collaboratively, came up with a couple of those concepts. I never came up with a better word. And then as I was continuing to try to come up with better words, I almost gave up because I didn't want to do that to any other word.
Traci:
Well, I feel like he's trying to get the idea of cooperation and healthy conflict in communication. He was trying to come up with one word that packed all that into it. And it is hard to come up with like one word that encapsulates all of that.
I mean, I think the other thing kind of popped into my mind too, is like this whole concept of synergize and cooperation that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It's like living out win-win in the workplace treating differences as valuable and, you know, going into conversations and collaborations with that mind. And it's a big, big concept that I say might be even harder to execute today than it was when this book was written, given everything that's going on in our world. Not just like the division and the polarization, but also the remote work and the sort of mostly like locationally challenged companies, all of these things packed into this habit. This is a hard one. This is a hard one to not just live out, but live out really well with our teams.
Rob:
Yeah. I think that's absolutely true that it's just we're in a place in a world right now where our differences are dividing rather than something that we see as an additive property to conversations as a benefit, as a resource to be pulled from. And I think that's a major point he kind of makes at the beginning of this chapter is there's very few reasons to have conversations or to work on problems with somebody who thinks exactly like you do, that the good conversations and the good solutions come out of having different perspectives that are there. And I think that's why we talk about that.
The other two habits is think win-win and seek first to understand then to be understood is we can't get to this synergize place, this effective collaboration cooperation until we're able to both think about how both parties can win and then be able to have the empathy, right? understand where they're coming from and what they're bringing and why they believe that.
One of the examples that he uses that I really liked is he was talking about a leader saying like, “Hey, if you don't say anything, then I'm going to assume my plans are perfect. And if there's a group of people who are both all really understood really well learned, then there has to be somebody who disagrees. And those are the people I want to talk to.” I want those other perspectives. I want to learn from people who think differently, who are bringing something different to the party.
Traci:
Right. And that's why the leaders that are most ineffective and also the most, you know, disliked are those that have to surround themselves with “yes men” — the people that won't argue with them, that won't bring up the conflict, that won't give a different point of view, mainly because they don't feel safe to. But those are the companies that struggle the most.
And the companies that excel in innovation and creativity, they tend to have a lot of pushback and conflict going on in the meeting spaces. There's a lot of like, “Hmm, I don't know if I agree with that.” Or “Maybe there's another way of looking at this.” Or “Have you thought about that.” Or... now the best teams do it in a very healthy and respectful way, but they do it. There's no artificial fakeness and just get the project out there. And let's just hit our due date and be done with it.
The best teams are the ones that put the due date on the shelf and like jump into the wrestling match with each other and really push themselves. But it takes a certain kind of ego or maybe a lack of ego to be able to do that, to be able to kind of display your baby and then say, “Okay, now beat it up.” You know? Like, “I want to know what's missing. Where are the gaps? What looks bad?” I mean, it takes a very secure team and secure people within that team to accept this habit and to truly live it out.
Rob:
Yeah. And like you said, it's just not easy because you know, it takes a lot of vulnerability and really having alignment on where we're going and having that goal. And that end in mind be the ultimate thing that we all are working towards together, right? Because that ego has to be checked because if the ego is not checked, we'll hold too tightly to the ideas that we have and wanting to be right.
And it's that whole thing we've talked about several times is we want to get it right, not to be right. And if everybody in the room has that attitude going forward, then we can get to places that any one person couldn't get to on their own. And that's really the spirit behind this whole chapter is creating environments where smart, capable people with different perspectives can discover new possibilities that nobody would be able to do on their own.
Traci:
Right. And it takes a couple of steps. Like one—as we just said—personally, you have to check your ego, put your ego aside and be open. And then you also have to respect the person across the table—or across the zoom screen—that is different than you. And you have to treat differences as valuable knowledge.
We always say experience is the best teacher. And if you're not experiencing others in their fullness, experiencing others’ opinions, hearing where other people are coming from because they walked different journeys and you have, or they look differently than you do come from different places than you come. If you don't look at that as opportunity, if you don't say, “Ooh, this person looks different than me, has a different experience than me, worked different places than I did, comes from a different country than I do, whatever part of the country, another country speaks a different language…” Whatever it is. if we don't look at that as like a gold mine, like, “Oh, I need that person's experience. I need to see and hear what they have to offer.” If we don't look at it that way, then we're not going to be able to live out this habit.
Rob:
Yeah. And I think that and when I was reading this and I was thinking about—you know, and we speak on this podcast, mostly to people who are in a leadership position or owners, who are maybe even at the top of their org charts—I think it's really, really important to let that sink in. Let that sink in that you have to surround yourself with people with different opinions. Llet it sink in that you need people that are willing and able to share those opinions.
And for the most part in times, you need to sit down and shut up and listen in order for that to happen. Like if we're looking at creating environments where this can happen, it can't happen if you are going to have to make sure you are heard as a leader. Like you have to be able to step back from that and listen to everybody else.
Traci:
Yeah. And you have to listen to everyone else with authenticity. I think sometimes leaders are like, okay, I'll check that off the box and let everybody speak. But not having the humility to know that they have limitations still, even though they are more experienced than most people in the room, or even though they own the company or even... That doesn't necessarily equate to being right.
But sometimes I find that leaders sit back, let everybody speak. And while everybody's speaking in their head, they're thinking, “Well, I already have the right answer. I already know what the conclusion should be. I'll just let everybody have their turn. And then I'll say what the right answer is or all say what we should do.” And you know, maybe in some cases that's true, but you're really robbing yourself as a leader, you're almost putting a lid on yourself as a leader when you approach every team meeting in that way. Because basically what you're saying is, “I have no growth left in me. I have nothing left to learn. These people are not going to bring me value as a growing human being.”
And I think leaders need to realize that's what you're doing when you're just waiting your turn to speak the great wisdom that you think you have.
Rob:
Yeah. And I think that like, there's two things you said there. The first is when we do that, we limit our organization to our own ceiling. And that's crazy pants. To want to have to be limited by my brokenness and all my problems. Like I want to have a higher ceiling that I'm capable of doing this on my own, where I don't really need the team around me.
And the second thing that I want to point out is you do that enough times and your team will absolutely realize it's happening, and they'll stop talking and they'll stop showing up and they'll stop being there and you won't even hear their ideas anymore. And then at that point, why bother having them? They're going to be unhappy. They're going to be unfulfilled. They're not even going to be operating at your collective ceilings and all of the areas you're going to be so far below that, where you actually start getting into creating a toxic work environment where everybody will wait for you to speak. And then you will be in the process of just filling silence. Because like, “Well, my team is ineffective.” And my response to that usually is, “Your teams probably not ineffective. You've made them ineffective.”
Traci:
And you'll feel unfulfilled and not know why. And it's mainly because you're not growing because you're not giving yourself an opportunity to learn. And that's when we start to feel disgruntled like unfulfilled, maybe we should do something else. And it's a kind of the bed of your own making that you're lying in and not realizing how you got there.
Rob:
Yeah. That quicksand feeling of just like, “Oh, I keep running faster and faster and sinking, farther and farther in.”
Traci:
Yeah.
Rob:
Lovely.
Traci:
Lovely. Exactly. How do I get myself out?
Announcer:
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Traci:
I think one of the interesting concepts that he talked about that made me think of like, beyond the leader is if you're in a room and collaborating with people or even having conversations about things and people are disagreeing and coming from different sides of the argument or coming from different sides of looking at a project or a client or anything happening out in the world, can people disagree and both be right? And I thought that was a great question.
And usually we think, one point of view is going to win and that's how we're going to end this meeting. Or that's how we're going to get through this argument. Or people are just going to be mad at each other and exit. But is there a way to get through that conversation and see that both people could be right?
Rob:
Yeah. And that gets back to that whole idea during win-win in order to do win-win right, you have to be open to be influenced, to be changed. That's what authentic listening looks like. And I think that he gets into there and talks about that is like both sides could be right. Is there a new path where both sides can continue to be right? Like that's the nuanced part of this conversation is if two people show up with their own ideas, what is the other path that can emerge during a conversation? That would not have otherwise been discovered, I think is like the word and concept he kind of uses is it's not that we just have to logically get there together. Anything like that. It's like, no, no, no what thing is going to come about from creating this environment in a way that can happen, that can open up new possibilities.
Traci:
Yeah. And I think the first step, and you hinted at it that authentic listening is the first step, because too often we just shut down in the midst of disagreement or argument. Like we realize, “Ooh, this person is really dug into what they believe. I'm not going to change my opinions. So let's just let this fizzle out.” As opposed to committing to finding that third way. And if we commit to finding the third way and finding what's right in each of our arguments, then that means we really have to listen to each other, pull out the bits that are right in each argument, and then try to merge that into a third alternative.
And so that's a process in there and that means we are not allowed to shut down. We're not allowed to discount. We're not allowed to just exit the building. We actually had to commit to finding the third way, the new way and really, really listening to each other.
Rob:
Yeah. And the other thing I kept thinking about during all of this, and he kind of talks about this is like, what does this look like for groups? Not just two people talking, but what does this look like for a group and the amount of intentionality it requires and accountability to when you have three, four, five people showing up for one of these conversations to hold everyone accountable, to be open to new possibilities, to share what they're really thinking and why they're thinking and how that makes them feel as well as not taking cheap shots at other people's feelings and ideas and responding.
There's a whole art form here about running trust-filled teams that can collaborate well together and rumble through ideas. And I think that that's where this becomes this setting expectations and how we show up as leaders, people will follow. And we have to make sure that we're the stewards for that environment happening.
Traci:
Yeah. And I think a couple things that we always lean into teams with in order to achieve this is one is understanding what everybody's strengths are. If you can see first and people, their strengths. And I know that everybody on the team has strengths that they can bring to the table. That's really helpful.
And then secondly, a word that we've already said a bunch in just the last few minutes is trust, creating a team that really trusts each other. So knowing that we're all out for the best outcome, we're all committed to collective results. We all want the best for the team. And I think that we have to undo some of our learned behaviors in order to really achieve that.
So he talks about how many people have been trained or scripted over time to have a more defensive communication, as opposed to like a receptive communication because we believe—it's sad to read this—but to believe that life or other people ultimately can't be trusted. So as leaders, one of the tasks is kind of like unraveling that in people and building an environment where rather than them entering the room believing that people can't be trusted, they enter a room and see a team of people that can be trusted and that recognize the strengths that they bring to the table. And therefore we can get to a better alternative. We can get to that third alternative, but there's a lot baked in there in order for us to get there.
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Traci:
So they have a lot of steps in here about how to get to synergy—your favorite word—and a lot of it goes back to that seek first to the habit that we talked about before this seek first to understand then be understood. But then he went back even further to the think win-win. And so all these habits kind of build on each other. So this is kind of the last one in this public victory bucket of living out the combination of habit four and five.
So it's almost like operationalizing habit four and five and getting that ultimate creative cooperation. So it's interesting how you have to have a deep understanding of all the habits that come before, before you can achieve this.
Rob:
I mean, all these habits do build on each other. And I think it's really important to remember that the book was structured in such a way to think about, you know, the private habits first in a way that we have to work on ourselves first. So then we can figure out how to show up in a public way authentically with listening and thinking about win-win. And then only then can we get to this plane with others, in the plane with others well, in a close way to hope to get to better results.
This feels so much like the five dysfunctions of a team book, Patrick Lencioni stuff where we're building on top of these things to get to results. And I think that we have to do all this work internally first to understand who we are so that then we can show up in effective ways.
Traci:
Yeah. And it's such a collective process that is completely based on behavioral change. And if you can't get your entire team to buy into this and to collectively have a behavioral change, it's not going to work because people won't put themselves out there and be vulnerable and say, “Okay, yeah, yeah. I'll do this. I'll seek first to understand. I'll work with this habit of cooperation. And I'll be vulnerable. And I'll be open to criticism.” And then watch other teammates not do it. And it breaks down completely.
So it does take the leader saying, “Look, can we commit to this behavioral change? Can we accept this new way of being an effective and cohesive team? And will we all agree to it and commit to it?” So it takes like a moment to actually explain this to the team and then have them all commit. Otherwise there's just no way. I mean, why would I put myself out there? Why would I be vulnerable as the only one, right?
Rob:
Yeah. Well, that's why it all starts with trust. Right? And it all starts with this moment in time that you come to describe that we've all committed to doing this together. And I think the other thing is we have to realize is this isn't something that just happens all at once. This takes time to build into teams.
We talk about this a lot is how do we practice these kinds of things so that when something really important comes up, that we have to really dig in, that's really difficult that we'll be ready for it. We don't just want to have to show up in the Super Bowl. Like we're making some really hard decisions to figuring out the next stage of the company. That's not the time to do this the first time is need to normalize this behavior, this kind of showing up for the team so that when the stakes get raised, we are able to do it consistently with, for each other and with each other.
Traci:
Yeah. I mean, it really comes down on the shoulders of the leader because the leader has to introduce these concepts to the team and then the leader needs to hold the team accountable. So when they see that the team's not living this out, or they see that one person is kind of going at it in the wrong direction or the wrong way, or, you know, almost purposely, especially there are a lot of people who fear vulnerability.
And if you're on the DiSC profile and you're a high, high D you are somebody who fears vulnerability. And so you might be able to see it in other people, but it's really hard for you to practice it yourself. And a lot of leaders are high Ds. And so you need to understand that unless you put yourself out there as well, it's not going to work. If they see you reaping all the benefits of everybody else's vulnerability, but not being vulnerable yourself, there's going to be breakdown.
And you just have to sort of accept that you're a player on this team too. And so you have to participate. You have to hold other people accountable, but you also have to be vulnerable. You also have to have an open mind. So it begins and ends at the top. And it takes a lot of work. And like you said, it doesn't happen overnight. It's like this daily renewal in our team of these concepts.
Rob:
Yeah. And coming from two Ds, you have to also be willing to be held accountable for doing it yourself from your team. If they're willing to. And I think that's one of the signs that you've put in the work with team and held them accountable is when they will stop you as the leader and say, “Hold on, you need to show up differently. You need to do this. You're not playing by the rules that you've set.” That's what health looks like in a lot of cases because none of us are perfect. None of us show up well all the time.
Traci:
Yeah. And that's why it's really important for owners of companies. If you don't have a co-owner or like a co-leader in your company, you need to identify at least a leadership team. But you have to have a couple of people on your team who knew they have full permission, full authority to hold you accountable, to call you out to say these are the things that they've noticed. If you don't have at least one person on your team that you have said that to like, “Dude or Dudette, I want you to hold me accountable. I want you to tell me if I'm not living out these things. I need to practice what I preach. So I will not get mad at, you know, it might sting, it might hurt. I might need a moment when you tell me, but you have full permission to tell me.” Everybody should have at least one person they have said that to if you are an owner of a company.
Rob:
Yeah, absolutely. All right, Traci. What's your takeaway for this week?
Traci:
Well, my takeaway now, as I'm not going to use the word synergy for a while, but I really am holding onto the fact that experience creates empathy and opens the mind. And I just love the treating differences as valuable knowledge. I'm going to start to seek out people...this sounds a little scary, even as I say it, and I encourage everybody listening to it, to seek out people you know think differently than you do and hear their argument. Hear and just ask instead of countering, ask “Why. Why do you feel that way? And what have you experienced that makes you come at this with that angle” and just learn.
Rob:
Yeah. That whole say more about that.
Traci:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Tell me more.
Rob:
I like that. Tell me more. Yeah.
I think my one takeaway besides reaffirming that the word synergized is absolute crap and very Enron-like is just all of the talk about creating environments where this kind of stuff can happen and how intentional design is the work that we are after most of the time. Like I see my job very much is putting the right people around me so that better decisions can be made with our collective intelligence and that we can reach the sum of all of our peaks together rather than be limited by any one person's ability. And I think that's my continued takeaway is continue to focus on the environments we create for good conversations and synergistic conversations to happen.
Traci:
Very good. I like it.
Rob:
Yeah. Thanks, Traci.
Traci:
Thank you.
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