In this powerful episode, Lezly Kaye, Founder of Grounded Leadership, shares the lessons she’s learned about how our personal pain holds us back from entrepreneurial breakthroughs. There’s incredible truth in this episode for every Reluctant Manager listening, but it’s at a whole different level for women in business with a vision for more!
You will discover:
– How simple and powerful delegation can be for Reluctant Managers
– How entrepreneurial success is found at the intersection of psychology and strategy
– Who is really running your business (and it’s not the current you)
Episode Transcript
Scott Ritzheimer
Hello, hello and welcome. Welcome once again to the secrets of the high demand coach podcast. And here with us today is yet another high demand coach. In fact, we have Australia’s leading CEO architect in the one and only Lezly Kaye, who mentors multi six figure leaders looking to scale their businesses quickly without sacrificing who they are. Drawing on her experience building a $60 million empire, Leslie partners with high achieving women to elevate their business strategies and leadership styles, guiding them through the critical growth stages with clarity and confidence. Leslie assists her clients in overcoming obstacles, tackling self sabotage and achieving sustainable growth while preserving their sense of fulfillment and connections, and she’s here with us today. Leslie, welcome to the show. So excited to have you here. I want to run a I want to run a scenario by you that I think a lot of founders face. They wake up to their alarm blaring in their ear Monday morning after working most of the weekend, and the last thing that they want to do is go and to work, because they know they have to deal with their team. And while they may love their team to pieces, they also drive them crazy. And so how do you help folks? It’s like you can’t grow a business without a team, but you just don’t like what’s wrong with these people? It just feels like what you ask yourself all the time. How do you help folks to navigate that stage?
Lezly Kaye
Yeah, great question. Honestly, relationships are at the core of every good CEO or every good leader, and generally, what is happening is the team is reflecting back parts of yourself that you’re not actually in deep enough relationship with. So there’s a few things. Sometimes we hire a team to fix a problem that’s immediate. So I see this so often people get flustered. They’re like, Oh my god, I’m scaling or x, y and z is not working, and I just need someone to help fix this problem right now. So they hire in a very reactive state, and they hire someone that can fix the problem they have today, and they’re not looking at who’s going to help them grow down the line. So they fix this problem, and in six months time, that person almost becomes irrelevant, because they’ve hired for the skill set of the immediate issue and not for the growth of the company. Yes, and then you have to start. Not have to, but most people I see will start them treating their employees like children, because they haven’t actually set them up for success, because they hired in a panic and then they didn’t foresee what that role would grow into for that person, and they probably either not skilled enough, they don’t have they’re not set up enough. So generally, you know, systems, processes, standard operating procedures, all sound really boring and unnecessary, but when you’re scaling a team, it’s one of the only ways to ensure that you can summon up for success. So yeah, team, team leadership is a very complex thing. Actually, I’ve managed recruitment companies for 15 years, and it’s one of the things that can either set a business up for success or undo an organization, especially in that scale up stage. It’s it’s crucial to know when to hire, who to hire, and what they need in order to succeed in the role for the future, not for right now.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, that’s so good. And I love the in particular the piece on hiring reactively, because it’s true, like we just don’t have time, or at least we don’t feel like we have the time to do it, and and then it adds up, and it’s so interesting how much we externalize it, right? It’s problems with them when, when, really it’s it’s things that we’ve set into motion, both long ago and in the current moment. So I call this the trap of being a reluctant manager, right? Because there’s not a you know this being a founder, coaching with founders. I’m yet to meet a founder in all the hundreds and 1000s that I’ve talked to that say the reason Scott I started this business was to manage people, right, like and so I found that for men and women, they’re equally likely to fall into this trap, but it seems like it happens for slightly different reasons, and may be harder to kind of wrap their mind around. So with women, what are some of the reasons why your female clients, or women founders, tend to hit this that’s different from maybe other founders?
Lezly Kaye
Yeah, hmm, I deal with mostly with women, so I have a larger chunk of that demographic to be able to talk to honestly. I think women are more inclined to people please, and more inclined to not have boundaries. You’re leading a team. It’s not and it shouldn’t be your best friends have a good relationship with the people you work with, yes, but there’s a fine line between having a good relationship and a familiar relationship, and actually having boundaries when it comes to business expectations, when it comes to business I find there can be a lot of. Entitlement from employees and so women will often let people get away with entitlement also than men. It’s like mum and dad in the subconscious parenting roles. So yeah, I think for me, yeah, women just want to have friends. Basically, I want a whole bunch of friends that I can sit around with and build a business with, and that can, yeah, lead to trouble, especially if you’re not. You know, you can lead with kindness, and that’s what I encourage, and you can lead with boundaries and firmness, but you have to be able to say no to people, and you have to be able to hold people accountable for things they’re not doing. And generally, I find that women are just grateful for what is getting done versus actually looking at what they’re hiring the person for. So you’ve hired someone to do 10 things and they’re doing six, and they’re like, Wow, I’m so grateful they did the six things. Versus, hey, I love that you’re doing those six things, but really the role requires you to do 10. So how can I support you to improve your skills, your capacity, your understanding of the organization, in order to get to those 10 things that I need you to do?
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, one of the things that I found is challenging, particularly in new businesses, like, how do you know it’s 10 things, right? Maybe, maybe it is six things, or maybe it’s 16 things. And one of the, one of the things I’ve found in the, again, this generalities, but a lot of the female clients, the voice of imposter syndrome seems to be louder in those moments, right? There’s a sense of like, well, how do you know that they’re supposed to do 10 and it undermines what are very good instincts, right? Their instincts are right. It should be 10, and you can get someone from the outside to objectively say that, or you can trust your own instincts. Why is it so hard to trust those instincts, and why is that that voice of the imposter so loud?
Lezly Kaye
Oh yes, I love this. So I sit in the intersection of strategy and psychology, so I’m actually more looking at the relationship that you have with yourself and the reason why this imposter syndrome is running your business, and I talk about the little girl versus the woman. So imposter syndrome actually comes from a younger version of you that was told they weren’t good enough, or Mommy didn’t love them, or daddy didn’t love them. Most entrepreneurs and most high achievers actually come from some form of childhood trauma. It can be big T or little T. Could be they were neglected. It could be that they never got Daddy’s love or attention. It could be that mommy was never there, or, you know, mummy only praised them when they were achieving. And so imposter syndrome actually comes from that version of you is the version of you that is seeking love and validation or the achievement in their business. So this lack of self trust is actually showing up in more places than your business. Your business is actually the biggest reflection of who you are and how you lead yourself. And in one of the pillars that I cover in supporting entrepreneurs, performance is actually a whole pillar of the three that I go through, people profit performance, because most of your issues actually stem from the imposter syndrome. Most of your issue actually stem from, yeah, I can’t lead. I’m not good enough. Most entrepreneurs, and I’ve done this four times, are just fluking it until cash flow actually kicks in to sustain your business, and if you don’t have the right mindset and the right systems and the right understanding of business at those stages, that imposter syndrome cranks. And I would say to those listening, that if this is you, and you’re sitting there and there’s this voice inside of your head, hopefully it’s only a whisper, and it’s not shouting at you, mine for a very long time, shouted, then you actually need to ask yourself, why don’t I trust myself? And look at all the ways you’re breaking trust. And this might seem so silly, but you know, it could be as simple as well. Today I decided I’m going to wake up and I’m going to do more exercise. So I’m not really a morning person, so I might say I’m going to get up tomorrow at 6am but 6am rolls around and I snooze my alarm. It’s those micro moments when you’re breaking trust, because you just broke trust with yourself. You just broke your own word. So it’s those micro moments when you’re breaking trust with yourself that compound over time that actually imprint this lack of self belief, and you’ve got to start with micro moments. So it could be I’m going to not eat desk at my LA lunch at my desk all week, or I’m going to take 15 minutes a day to walk around the block. And they it seems separate. It seems like trust in business and trust in self are different, but it’s not your business. Is a reflection of how you internally feel, and we are governed by our subconscious mind 90% of the time. So you might think, I’m a high achieving none of this is relevant to me, but I promise you 90% of your thoughts, actions, belief are coming from things that happened to you as a child. But. The fastest way to actually look at those is to get in a conscious relationship or build a business. Most people want to do both. So if you can allow your business to be the reflection of your internal world, you can start to ask yourself, well, I know it’s 10 Why am I not trusting that? And why am I not following through on that belief? And just start to get really curious. I say to people, we don’t find these parts and hate them. It’s not like we’re like, wow, layering on the imposter syndrome and the self doubt. For me, it’s just getting really curious with why there’s a lack of belief in it’s generally worthiness or deservedness. Start to ask yourself, Do I feel worthy of this? Do I feel like I deserve this? And get really curious?
Scott Ritzheimer
Wow, so I love that you you bridge that. Because, again, I say this all the time. Folks are probably sick of hearing it, because they all agree with me, but one of the things that just about everybody underestimates when they’re getting into the game of being an entrepreneur is how personal the journey is, right? And I think you could say that for any great and meaningful pursuit, right? So I don’t know that it’s entirely unique in that, but it’s unavoidable, right? If you don’t deal with your stuff, it is, it’s just so hard to hide it. And if we’re not careful, like you mentioned the beginning of the show, we can kind of externalize it. So I love that you went there. I want to kind of shift gears just slightly and get into some practical kind of outflow of that. So we’ve got the same person, they’ve started the journey of working on themselves. They’re working through that, but they they realize at this stage in their business they can’t do it all anymore, and and they’ve got to get stuff off of their plate. But it feels like I can’t, for all the reasons that you mentioned earlier, or I don’t want to overwhelm people. There’s just 1000 reasons why we don’t delegate. How do you help your clients figure out what they should be handing off first and how to do it?
Lezly Kaye
Yeah, I love this. People actually make it seem harder than it is. Write a list. What do you love? What do you hate? Because if, as well, subconsciously, if you’re scaling a business, and it’s going to mean you have to do more of what you hate, subconsciously, you’ll block your business from growing. Yes. So the first step is to write column A, column B. This is everything I do in a week. This is everything I love, and this is everything I don’t really love or enjoy. And your first point of call is finding someone that can take everything you don’t love or enjoy. The second step is to look at this list and ask yourself, if I got 100 clients tomorrow, what would break in this list? And that’s how you hire the second person. People over complicate and then also under complicate, and I’ll touch on that in a second. But they over complicate hiring because they want it to be harder than it is. And there’s probably a belief that only they can, you know, be the hero in their clients journey. I see this one so often, like they want to be the one to save the day, they want to be the one to fix all the problems. And this was me, so this is why I know it. So you’ll hire people that probably aren’t as good or you as good as you, or aren’t as skilled as you, because there’s a part of you that needs the validation from your clients being like, Oh my God, thank you so much. You saved the day. That was me, and it’s the big trap I see entrepreneurs fall into the second thing is maybe writing it down will make them feel like an imposter, because maybe there’s things they know they should be doing that they’re not. And so writing it down actually looking at their business ecosystem and going, well, this is everything I do. But holy shit, there’s 10 things I should be doing that I’m not actually highlights their belief that they’re a failure. So first thing is to actually write down everything you do in a day, everything you do in a week, even if it seems dumb, like entrepreneurs say to me, I don’t need to hand off this email response because I only do it once a week. Okay, that’s 10 minutes over 52 weeks. We need to take back that time, because even if that was just 10 minutes, you go out from your desk and you went for a walk, that’s going to serve you better than sending that email that can be delegated. Yeah, people also assume, and a lot of it, is that they’re fearful, like, if I teach someone else this, maybe they’ll just steal my business because I don’t believe I should be in business in the first place. Yeah. So, yeah, stop over complicating it. And if you’re sitting there thinking, I can’t trust I’m not going to find anyone only I can do this, that’s a lie you’re telling yourself to make you feel important. I love this part of you, and it’s time to let it go. And then secondly, this part I touched on that people it’s it’s easy and it’s complicated. What people don’t really realize when they’re hiring that person to take off the list is the reason that most business relationships fail is because we’re treating them like business transactions. So when I’m supporting entrepreneurs. To hire, I actually get them to ask about the person’s values. So when you understand what motivates someone, money will only motivate someone so much, but if you understand their values, you can curate a job that serves them. Now, the simple way to explain this is, if someone values family highly, you could pay them all the money in the world, but if you ask them to miss their kids recital, or don’t take two holiday two, four weeks of holidays a year, you’re never going to keep them long term. So if you start to ask your new hires what they value, you can start to shape their position and your company values around the types of people you want. And that way as well. In a competitive market, someone down the road might pay 10k but they ask them to miss their kids school rehearsals. You pay them less, but your culture is actually aligned to who you are, so don’t change your culture to hire someone firstly, and you’re getting on more people that are bought into the bigger vision and the bigger mission and values for the organization. And it becomes less about values and mission written on the wall, and more about the like, intrinsic relationships that you’re building with your team as you grow.
Scott Ritzheimer
It’s so good. That’s so good. There’s so much in there to unpack. Um, I’d say this every once in a while, but there’s some episodes you just have to go back and listen to again, because there’s a lot of gold in there. And again, just goes back to this idea of, it’s such a personal journey. It’s such a personal walk and and the cool thing about that is, when you take agency of it, when you take ownership of that, it unlocks so much growth so quickly. So yeah, there’s so much in that. Again, I wanna shift gears a little bit here for a question that I ask all my guests, and I’m very interested to see Lez, what you have to say? What would you say is the biggest secret that you wish wasn’t a secret at all. What’s that one thing you wish everybody watching or listening today knew?
Lezly Kaye
Scaling business isn’t hard, having a relationship with yourself is. So most people assume that they’re separate, and most people are avoiding themselves by being in business. And as you just mentioned, the fastest way to actually build a business is to build a relationship with yourself. And most people are using business to avoid themselves. It’s a very generalization, but most entrepreneurs are like, let’s stay busy so I don’t have to deal with the trauma that happened to me when I was seven. If you actually merge those worlds, if you actually start to use your business as a mirror into all the ways in which you do self abandon, self sabotage. Maybe you’re not the nicest person, maybe you’re a dictator. Maybe you are unfair at work, but it’s born from the thoughts, patterns, behaviors and habits of the version of you that wasn’t seen, heard, understood or loved. And so there’s this misconception that you know you can be a tyrant or you can be closed and cold and build businesses, because that’s sort of, I want to say how traditional business was built the world. And entrepreneurship is calling for more entrepreneurs that actually are connected to themselves. And sustainable businesses are led by entrepreneurs that are connected to themselves, especially when markets, as in, like employee markets, get tighter and tighter and tighter, it’ll be less about how much you pay them, and more about how you treat them. And that type of treatment, you cannot just bang a HR person in and be like, fix my culture. Everything rots from the head. And so if you don’t have a good relationship with yourself, then your your business isn’t going to have a good relationship internally.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, so true. Lezly, there’s folks listening to this, and they want to know where they can get more. They want to know more about the work that you do and how you might be able to help them and their personal journey. Where can they find more about you in the work that you do?
Lezly Kaye
Instagram is the best way to get me. It’s me on there, so you’re not going to get pumped off to one of my team. So it’s @lezlykaye, but l, e, Z, l, y, k, a, y, E, check the show notes. I like to be different, and I spell my name very differently.
Scott Ritzheimer
Awesome. Lezly, thank you so much for being on the show. Just a privilege and honor having you here today with us, and for those of you watching and listening, you know your time and attention mean the world to us. I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I know I did, and I cannot wait to see you next time. Take care.
Contact Lezly Kaye
Lezly Kaye, Australia’s leading CEO Architect, mentors multi-six-figure leaders looking to scale their businesses quickly without sacrificing who they are. Drawing on her experience building a $60 million empire, Lezly partners with high-achieving women to elevate their business strategies and leadership styles, guiding them through the critical growth stages with clarity and confidence. Lezly assists her clients in overcoming obstacles, tackling self-sabotage, and achieving sustainable growth while preserving their sense of fulfillment and connections.
Want to learn more about Lezly Kaye’s work at Grounded Leadership? Check out her website at https://www.groundedleadership.com/ or connect with her on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/lezlykaye/
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