Victoria: Hi, I’m Victoria Downing and welcome to PowerTips Unscripted where we talk about tips, tactics and techniques to help you build a strong, profitable remodeling company. And I’m going solo again. Mark was unavailable and Mark Harari, my co-host. He wasn’t able to be here today, so I’m going solo with our next guest, and I’m very excited about it because she is a brand new part of the Remodelers advantage coaching team.
 
Victoria: Now I want to introduce you to Jessica Lipson, the Vice President of people and Culture at JBL consulting. Jess has been working in all aspects of HR for the past 20 plus years. Her passion, lies and how her passion lies in helping create nontoxic cultures. Building engaging teams, and mentoring team members. And she has joined us as an HR specialist to help all of our members and anybody else out there in the remodeling world.
 
Victoria: So welcome, Jess.
 
Jessica: Thank you so much. I’m so excited to be here.
 
Victoria: Yeah, well, we’re really glad to have you joining our team. It’s great to be able to offer your services to our members. You know, they, like all small business owners, have things that happen and they need major person to help them.
 
Jessica: Yeah, well, that’s exactly what I’m here for. I specialize with small to medium sized businesses and those, types of teams. So I’m here to give you all the, you know, information in my brain.
 
Victoria: You know, one of the things I’ve heard about H.R. A lot of the issues that crop up is that the rules are different in different states. Are you able to help Remodelers in any state?
 
Jessica: Absolutely. Yeah. So in the past, specifically in the past ten years, plus, I have worked for companies that essentially are on the verge of being 50 plus, which is kind of the secret, you know, source number to when things become very standardized and legal. But also, I’ve worked with a lot that are under 50 employees. So there are stipulations and there are compliance laws with each state.
 
Jessica: And I have mapped them out in the past. And yes, when it comes to PTO and specific, family medical leaves, depending on what state you’re in, there are different laws. So, yes, compliance is a is a big, portion of my expertise.
 
Victoria: All right. Great. Now give me a rough idea because I don’t know either what are like, give me the top three types of issues that you have helped people with in the past. Great place.
 
Jessica: Great. Now, a great question. One of the top issues I would say is culture. Culture and engagement. Right? A lot of companies now are remote, so how do you keep a remote team engaged? How do you build a culture of inclusivity? Right. And diversity when everyone is all over the continental United States. So that’s a big portion of what I’m passionate about.
 
Jessica: Another one I would say is leadership, right? How do you figure out who the leaders on your team are? The difference very specifically between team members that are maybe very, hyper forming, which is great, but you also want to measure out the people that have high potential so that you’re building out a succession plan. And third, I would say probably is the compliance, the legal issues.
 
Jessica: You know, so-and-so just got into a car accident on off hours. But, you know, he has to have a driver’s license for his job. What do we do? So I think that goes hand in hand with communication as well. So, you know, a communication measure and a communication practice that’s put in place so that you’re, you know, trickling down information transparently and the appropriate way to a large team.
 
Victoria: You know, what I want to do? Just that just gave me an idea for another podcast down the road. Yeah, I want to have people write in with their issues and have some.
 
Jessica: I would love that. Like an HR Q&A stage. And I would love that.
 
Victoria: Because we have, you know, we’ve got so many companies that are involved in roundtables and issues cropping up all the time, and they need guidance. So that’s right. So let’s dive into this. Right. So one of the things we want to talk about today was really how to identify the high potential future leaders in your company and how to create effective mentorship programs.
 
Victoria: So yeah, dive into a little bit about of that. How can actions identify those high performance, high potential people?
 
Jessica: Well, I think the first thing is you need to know the difference between the two, right? They sound really similar. So there’s high performing employees and then there’s high potential employees. And you need to know the difference between the two. A high performing employee, someone who’s excels at their role. Right. They consistently deliver outstanding results. They meet or exceed all of your expectations.
 
Jessica: They have the technical skills. They’re reliable. They’re efficient. Whether they’re working individually or with a team. And these people usually prefer a specialist specialization in training and have a really strong drive within their current role. Right. They want it and they are an art director, let’s just say. And they want to learn more about being an art director.
 
Jessica: And quite frankly, in most places, if you’re building a succession plan, there’s two parts. Someone who just wants to stay and do and someone who wants to take the management path. And that’s where you have to establish the succession plan of high potential employees, right. So again, the high performing employee, this is someone who wants to stay. They want to succeed.
 
Jessica: They want to they want to excel at what they are doing currently. And while they want to take on new challenges, the high potential employee they show specifically a capacity for aspiration, right? They want to learn and they want to succeed in future leadership roles. So they’re more agile in their learning. They’re more strategic in their thinking. They have a very high emotional intelligence.
 
Jessica: They are very proactive in approaching challenges and coming up with solutions. So this is someone who’s a little bit more motivated to grow beyond their current position. And these people are the ones who are usually seeking out and different opportunities outside of their day to day experience. And you really have to establish the difference between the two.
 
Jessica: And I think there’s a little gut intuition in there too, right? Knowing who’s appropriate for the next pass. And I think that’s really the most important step one. Now, there are a myriad of tools and frameworks that you can use to assess this potential. I’m always a big proponent for behavioral assessments, right. There’s so many out there.
 
Jessica: There’s the desk program. There’s, you know, a myriad of ways to evaluate personality traits and leadership potential. There’s also cognitive assessments that you can do measuring problem solving and learning agility. But a big one for me. One on one making sure you’re spending the time with that person on a weekly basis, you are able to see the way this person thinks you’re building a relationship.
 
Jessica: You’re also going to want to do 360 reviews. You’re going to want to get feedback from their team members, because outside of the scope of your one on one is understanding how they manage, how they lead, how they work with the team. So I think, again, defining the two and then using tools at your fingertips, and these are easy tools to find to make sure that you understand the potential of your employees.
 
Victoria: Do you think that when, an employee joins a company that they can.
 
Jessica: Be defined.
 
Victoria: As high potential within a pretty short period of time, or does it take a couple of years to get to that point?
 
Jessica: It’s a great question. Again, there comes that gut right instinct when if you are a good recruiter and you are recruiting appropriately for your, your, your, your organization. One thing that I always did was build a bench. You’re constantly networking. You’re constantly speaking because God forbid, you know, Joe Smith, you know that he’s looking and he’s not doing really well.
 
Jessica: And he’s, you know, might go on to greener pastures. You want to make sure that you know who’s going to be coming in after Joe Smith. And in the same regard, building succession within your company, right. So I think there are, I just lost my train of thought. You’re going to have to address out there, of course.
 
Victoria: So we were talking about does it take a long time to identify.
 
Jessica: Thank you. So I think if you’re recruiting properly, you are recruiting with the idea in mind that you’re building a succession plan so you can look, it’s going to take someone coming into a business, depending on the size, a good six months to get up and running. Right. They have to learn the business. They have to learn the people.
 
Jessica: They have to learn your culture and your core values. And until they do that, I don’t think you can really make a success. Man, do I think it takes a year? No. I think someone could come in and really capture the attention of the team. They can establish their leadership capabilities and their management capabilities and drive the culture, probably within the first 3 to 6 months.
 
Jessica: And if you see that happening, that’s where you start to nurture and look. And I mean this in the best way possible. Some people fool you. Yeah. And it happens. But when you see it, that’s when you start to have those conversations about what that person is looking for and how to build on that high potential that they are image that they’re showing you.
 
Victoria: Now, couple of things take a lot of our companies are not that large, right. They might have ten, 12, 15 employees. And so there’s there’s sort of two things that come to that. One is they need worker bees. They need people who excel. They need a high performance. Yeah. Person in those jobs, they don’t want the in some companies, they’re just not large enough to have a place for a high potential to go.
 
Victoria: Oh, somebody leaves, our company grows or something like that. How do you, you know, how do you determine what kind of a person do you always just go for high performance? If they turn into high potential. Yeah, yeah.
 
Jessica: Look, if you are a small company that’s just looking for high performing people, then so be it. You know, you want the best of the best. You want the people. Some companies are looking for their next leader, right? They’ve got a CEO. They built this company for 25 years. They want to take a side step. They don’t want to be in the business anymore.
 
Jessica: They now want to work on the business. So they’re bringing people up to kind of take over that role. And that’s great. But there are smaller companies where you just need people to show up every day, right? You do the best they can. Yeah, but the culture still resides, right? Because you want them to be loyal. You don’t want.
 
Victoria: To lose.
 
Jessica: Them regardless of high potential or high performance. A company wants retention no matter on that point. So I think, you know, you determine what you’re looking for. Now, the high, if a great worker bee, as you put it, if they turn into a leader, oh my God, that’s like that’s the idea, right? That’s the dream. Right. Because then that person starts shadowing you and you start teaching them more, and they start taking on a bigger portion of the company, and maybe then not everything falls on your shoulders, right?
 
Jessica: Yeah. So I think it depends on what kind of company you’re in. I think I would never say that high performing or high potential is better one over the other. I think they are both special. And, you know, it depends on what kind of industry you’re in and what your company is looking for.
 
Victoria: What do you feel are some of the specific, crucial skills that future leaders should have?
 
Jessica: Another great question. So, I could list off a myriad of things that people should have. There’s there’s a list of eight things that I always go to, but I’ll give you an idea of kind of my top three important ones, emotional intelligence. That is number one to me. When someone has self-awareness, they can manage their emotions.
 
Jessica: Right? They have the capacity to understand and connect and foster strong relationships through empathy, social skills, communication, conflict resolution. That that to me, is one of the top, competencies or key attributes that these people need. These people being future leaders, resilience, another one, stress management, problem solving, someone who’s willing to stay committed to the goal.
 
Jessica: Right. They persevere through what’s going on. Ability to remain calm, ability to, you know, stay committed to change. And and adaptability in the same in the same respect someone who’s innovative, right. The status quo, whether you’re a large company or a small company, the status quo is not okay. You need someone that challenges that. They need to be an out-of-the-box thinker.
 
Jessica: They need to be embracing creative approaches. And in that same regard, they’re learning quickly, right? They’re digging into what is new in the marketplace and bringing concepts and technologies and to the table, and, and that person also has to be really flexible, right? They have to be willing to change and willing to pivot strategies. Those are the top three, I think most important.
 
Victoria: Okay. That sounds so like it’s so difficult to know when you’re hiring someone, which is why we don’t do it ourselves anymore. We use, you know, that recruiting company.
 
Jessica: I was going to say, if you have a good recruiting company, there are ways in the recruiting efforts to to find this in people. Certain questions, open ended questions, discussion topics. There are ways of interesting.
 
Victoria: So that’s like the hardest part of running this business.
 
Jessica: Recruiting is not easy.
 
Victoria: How does tell me a little bit about how conflict resolution plays into this?
 
Jessica: I think conflict resolution is a big part of this, because whether you have a large company or a small company, there will be people that don’t get along. Yes, you are hiring people from all walks of life. Specifically, if you are a company focused on Dei, right? You have a diverse group of people from different upbringings, from different cultures, different religions.
 
Jessica: They don’t have to see eye to eye, right? But what they do have to do within the confines of a company is respect each other. That’s kind of my my thought on it, right? You don’t have to like each other. You don’t have to love the people you work with. You have to respect them. You have to treat them with respect.
 
Jessica: And you have to be an active listener. And I think that plays a big role in conflict resolution. You need people that are open minded, open to other ideas, hearing people, hearing people’s opinions and not pushing your own agenda onto them. There are ways to compromise. There are ways to get along and look at the end of the day, I’ve been doing this a while.
 
Jessica: Where I’ve seen work doesn’t work out, I don’t. It doesn’t always have to work out. And if you’re a large enough company, there are ways to separate those people and to create, you know, paths for each of them to go and still be successful within a company. But I think in the instance of, you know, your community where there are smaller, smaller communities and smaller, you know, teams that that’s a big, there’s a big opportunity.
 
Jessica: My brain goes right to training and development, and it can be internal, it can be external. But learning how to work with different minded people and bringing them together in a like minded situation. Right.
 
Victoria: Okay. Very cool. So talk to me a little bit about a leadership development plan, like how do you balance that formal training with real world experience?
 
Jessica: So a leadership development plan, you know, I think everyone should have this. And when we talk about this, but we’re talking about people who can communicate, people who have empathy, like you said, conflict resolution, critical skills that future leaders have to have. Above all else. I think the if you have the emotional intelligence to be one of these people, there are ways to set up, there’s a way to to set someone up for success as a leader, if you will.
 
Jessica: So leaders for me are people that have skills and inspiring trust in their team. Overall trust. They are transparent, open door policy. Ask me a question. I’m going to tell you you’re going to trust the people that give you the information. They can navigate challenges between their team, and they can cultivate these high performing, you know, teams.
 
Jessica: Right. So I think communication, empathy, conflict resolution, as we talked about, those are going to be your biggest things. And to to develop these people regular checkups. Right. Have regular check ins with your team members. Give them actionable strategies. You know, hey, let’s try this and see how they do in that environment and and give them the opportunity to fail.
 
Jessica: Give them the opportunity for constructive criticism. Right. And help build them as an HR. As someone in H.R. I typically played the role of many different. But therapists can be one of the. But my biggest one is mentor and coach. Right. Coaching someone you don’t do it for them. You give them an activity to do or strategy to put in place.
 
Jessica: And see how it unfolds. There are a ton of training programs and workshops as well. You know you can build your own or you can go outside, you know, as an HR person fostering a feedback friendly workplace. Huge. Let them get real time feedback from their team. Mindful. Now this is this sounds I always say this sounds hokey to some people.
 
Jessica: But if you can coach a future leader with mindfulness, you know, with wellness, with self-reflection, someone needs to become self-aware. Journaling, right? And feedback becomes self-aware. Know the kind of leader that you are before you go on this journey, And my number one thing with leaders is active listening, right? Make sure that they are fully focused and understanding of what someone is coming and saying to them.
 
Jessica: Yeah, non-verbally right. Undivided attention. You want to ask poignant, clarifying questions? Provide the feedback that you show that you show understanding and making sure that you know they’re allowed to be heard.
 
Victoria: Do you think active listening can be taught and learned?
 
Jessica: Yes. I think anything can be taught and learned if you’re given the appropriate tools to do it right. Some people are always I’m one of them. I will fully admit I’m one of them. When people talk to you, you’re always looking in. You’re always in your head thinking of your response, right? Right. What I have learned to do in past years is I keep a notebook next to me, and I take notes.