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14–Andy Hite – From Broadway to the Boardroom: Empowering Leaders and Teams
27 Plays2 months ago
In this episode of The Unfolding Thought Podcast, Andy Hite, founder of Scaling Minds, shares his unique journey from a career in musical theater and production to becoming an executive coach for CEOs and leadership teams. Andy’s story is a testament to resilience, creativity, and the power of personal transformation.
We dive into Andy’s experiences with leadership—both good and bad—and how they shaped his approach to coaching. He discusses the psychological and emotional aspects of leadership, the critical role of self-awareness, and how to empower teams to achieve their full potential. Whether you’re leading a small team or a large organization, Andy’s insights on navigating challenges, fostering alignment, and overcoming blind spots will resonate.
Tune in to hear how Andy blends creativity, strategy, and empathy to help leaders thrive in a competitive, ever-changing world.
Mentioned in the Episode:
- The transition from musical theater to executive coaching.
- Insights into empowering leadership and addressing blind spots.
- Tools for fostering alignment and growth within organizations.
- GROW Model
- Immunity to Change X-ray
Links:
Connect with Andy Hite:
- Website: https://www.scalingminds.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-hite/
For more episodes, visit: https://unfoldingthought.com
Join the conversation by emailing Eric: eric@inboundandagile.com
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Unfolding Thought podcast. My name is Eric Pratum. Today, I speak with Andy Heit, founder of Scaling Minds. an executive coaching practice dedicated to empowering leaders and transforming organizations. In our conversation, we explore Andy's transition from the stage to the boardroom, his insights into leadership and personal growth, and his perspective on how coaching can unlock untapped potential in leaders and teams.
Andy's Journey: Theater to Coaching
00:00:36
Speaker
And now I bring you Andy Haidt.
00:00:40
Speaker
Well, Andy, thank you for joining me. Would you mind giving everyone a little bit of your background here? Sure. Thanks for having me. Let's see, how far do we want to go back? Let's just take the professional, go back where we started professionally. So after graduation, I was actually in the world of theater. but I graduated from college and I so moved to Chicago.
00:01:06
Speaker
I was a professional actor for about five or six years, and then I transferred over into producing theater, which I did for, gosh, maybe 15 years. From that work, I really became enamored at the concepts and the practice of leadership, really started working with an executive coach myself, took a lot of that.
00:01:28
Speaker
what I was learning, because let's be honest, the environment that I was in was not a very healthy leadership environment, um not a great set of models for good leadership. And in fact, I i felt like I was having to often insulate my team.
00:01:46
Speaker
from upper leadership. So that really got me really interested in what is healthy leadership? How do we build high functioning teams? How do we build a culture, even if it has to be a subculture of an organization? um And through that, I just started working with people on my team and it started to be folks outside my team. And it just got me into this executive coaching world. And maybe five, six years ago, I thought, I really want I've always wanted to make an impact. And it felt like we did in theater. um But I felt like this would allow me and afford me the opportunity to make a bigger impact directly one on one with people. And then
00:02:31
Speaker
as the practice evolved, more with teams and organizations. So all the way starting as an actor, here I am, I don't know, 25 years later, and have an executive coaching practice.
The Birth of Scaling Minds
00:02:44
Speaker
And the name of your business and website, just so everyone can hear it?
00:02:48
Speaker
ah The company is called Scaling Minds. The website is very similar, www.scalingminds dot.com. OK, you went right into theater. Did you study theater and or intend to go into theater? um Good question. So I grew up as a kid. My dad was a singer in a band. And I just thought he was the biggest rock star in the world. I remember being like five, six, seven years old, like being on stage with them.
00:03:18
Speaker
They'd give me a dummy mic and I could rock out with them. So I became really enamored by the stage. I started out as a singer. And once I got to college, I studied. I got a music education degree. um Had to have that thing to fall back on, you know. So I've always had the the stage in my blood. And I did know before I was even in my first play or musical that I wanted to be a Broadway actor.
00:03:43
Speaker
And so that was going into college, coming out of college. That was my goal at the time. When you went into theater, was there any certain kind of theater? Were you doing musical theater? Was it a mix? I was a song and dance man. I have musical theater almost exclusively. I did a couple of plays but just love the, you know, because my background was in singing, right? So being able to use that art form translated into theater was was a passion for decades.
Leadership Insights and Influences
00:04:13
Speaker
Okay. So you, uh, I think you said song and dance band sort of, you know, that's in your blood acting was coming along with that was beginning to produce shows. Is that a fairly natural progression? I think yes and no. Having, I don't think most people trans transitioned from being an actor to producing or that kind of thing, but I,
00:04:40
Speaker
I always like to control things. So to be able to step back and help orchestrate. an entire production just seem natural and fun to me. But I don't think it's necessary. There's not a lot of folks who go from acting into producing. Quite frankly, too, there's just not that many positions. One could one could start their own theater, they their own production company, but that's it's a pretty heavy lift, especially today after COVID and how the arts have have changed and how people consume entertainment.
00:05:18
Speaker
But yeah, for me, i I literally beat down the door for them to give me the job. Well, you said at some point you became enamored by leadership. Did that, you know, come to you at some point? Had you always been interested in leadership? where When did this develop, I guess? How did it develop? Yeah, so I've always been infatuated with personal growth. and then professional growth. It's been a ah huge part of my life. When I was working in the theater, I became... really curious about leadership because I was experiencing some really bad leadership. I was suffering as a result of it. My team was suffering as a result of it. My relationships with the leaders that I was interacting with was suffering as a result of it. So I got really curious and started to dive in to the literature, the thought leadership of of those who are at the forefront of good leadership.
00:06:26
Speaker
and just started implementing a lot of that for myself, for my teams, and i yeah it made a huge difference. Is there or was there a certain book or coach or person, resource, anything like that that you remember stuck out to you at first?
00:06:48
Speaker
a particular one. and I mean, probably the work of Simon Sinek, right? He's one of the most out there thought leaders in terms of leadership. So I'm sure I went in that direction, start with why, you know, and then just went down the rabbit hole of, of really important people that have made an impact on me.
00:07:12
Speaker
Now, you certainly don't have to name names or anything if you prefer not to, but I think I recall from your background that There was an and unusual situation with your theater that your theater was owned by a business that is generally not in theater. Is that right? And so did that contribute at all? And I, you know, you can describe it or give details however you like, but did that, did this situation also contribute to the leadership challenges that you were facing, perhaps?
00:07:45
Speaker
Yes and no. So the theater that I ah helped to run was the Marriott Theater, which is outside of Chicago. It was owned by Marriott International.
00:07:56
Speaker
right Fortune 100 company, Fortune 500 at least. And to no fault of their own, they don't know theater. They'd be the first to raise their hand and say, we have no idea how to run a theater. But the challenge was there, um not necessarily just a leadership challenge, but it did cause leadership issues. When you're running a Fortune 100 company, there is a way that very for-profit businesses run.
00:08:26
Speaker
which is distinctly different to the typical not-for-profit theater organization. right And so we were a theater that was for-profit that had to in some ways answer to, I'm putting up air quotes for those that can't see and are just listening to the Wall Street type of reporting, right? One quarter to the next, 3% more the next year, which was very difficult in the world of theater because you don't quite know how something's going to hit every time you're producing a new product, right? We're not just like Procter & Gamble.
00:09:00
Speaker
reiterating on the toothpaste. Every single thing we did was a brand new product and it's very difficult to predict how that's going to land because there's so many variables. so That was an amazing education, especially from the business front for me, because I work with a lot of business owners, because there was the sort of corporate speak way of relating to business that Marriott and just ran on. And also we had to be very entrepreneurial because they had no idea how to support us or help us. or So that was very, very unique.
00:09:38
Speaker
I think what you're alluding to, well, that that's the one part. the The leadership challenges were quite frankly, just a people problem. the The folks at the top were just frankly, not great leaders, good managers, right? They knew how to create a profit in business, but they didn't really know how to lead people.
00:09:59
Speaker
and create a culture where people were excited and bought in that kind of thing. And that's what really got me interested in this leadership journey.
Path to Coaching: Personal and Professional
00:10:09
Speaker
and Okay. So if we have the time, I think I might want to come back around to
00:10:17
Speaker
Your perspective on not just those, you know, managers, I guess, but also people that have similar struggles because I'm guessing that these people had the best of intentions and all that. But before maybe coming back to that at some point along the way, you were.
00:10:37
Speaker
ah getting interested in leadership and then eventually this evolved into coaching. Did you tell me that you had a coach yourself? And then did that evolve, you know, one to 10 years later into, hey, I think I might be able to do this for other people. And and if so,
00:11:01
Speaker
How did that roll out? A hundred percent. It's so interesting. Probably 15 years ago, I was working with a therapist and she also knew kind of my struggles with my day job, air quotes again. And at one session she sort of leaned in and she goes, I think you'd be really good as a therapist.
00:11:23
Speaker
You understand um how people tick. You really get the concepts and the insights that of what you're working on. Just throwing it out there. I got really excited by that. and i And just the idea of helping people one-on-one that way. But I went away and I started to look into what it would take, the advanced degrees, quite frankly, looking at the average salary.
00:11:46
Speaker
And that leap would be very difficult for me. So I, I tabled it fast forward several, several years later, working with an executive coach. I just fell in love with the work. Both in terms of how I was learning about myself, how I was growing as a human, how I was growing as a leader. And then I just started to transfer a lot of how I was being coached and how I was growing to my team and the people around me. And it was making a difference.
00:12:16
Speaker
and it just sort of evolved from there. I think at one point I did have this inkling because they were someone who offered to pay me for this service. I was like, really? and Me?
00:12:28
Speaker
and i just had this pull, well, maybe this is the universe telling me that this is my path. And that just sort of started the snowball effect of moving to create the business. And here we are. Okay. So did you, you know, when you had a career transition, if I could call it that,
00:12:53
Speaker
Was it? Did you start coaching, you know, let's say part time around your theater work or your production work or did you go work for someone else's coaching business? How did that work out to, you know, where you are today that my understanding is you've been running your own business now for quite a few years.
00:13:15
Speaker
Yeah. Kind of coming from that person offering to pay me, started doing it a little bit on the side for maybe six months ah before we burned the bridges and and created the business. It was a pretty abrupt, I don't necessarily know that I would recommend it for everyone. You gotta have some appetite for enormous risk. But yeah, I just walked away from the career, the the salary, the benefits and said, we're going to do that. What was your life like at
Entrepreneurial Challenges and Mindset
00:13:50
Speaker
that time? Did you have enough work lined up that you felt like, Hey, you know, okay. And, uh, did you have family that was relying upon you? Did you have a spouse partner, whatever it is that was helping pay the bills at the time? What was, what was the risk that risk profile, let's say?
00:14:10
Speaker
it was stupid high risk i think at the time i look back at this maybe a year ago when i first started i made like thirty five thousand dollars as a coach which. That in and of itself is a data point doesn't necessarily say yes go support a family of four on one salary with this this data my wife was working maybe part time at the time.
00:14:34
Speaker
I did spend some time kind of creating my plan. So my plan was I borrowed from our investments. I had to have a runway. I borrowed from investments. I borrowed a little bit money from from family. And with that, I knew I had X amount of time as a runway to get the business up and running. And I hired kind of a more experienced mentor type executive coach.
00:15:01
Speaker
I wanted somebody who was really doing what I was doing, who had done it for years to support me while I went out to build the business. Now that was a huge, huge outlay of, but that first coach was 50 grand. And so just started building the business. My first two months, I made $0.
00:15:25
Speaker
When you say that, you're saying income from coaching, you had no paying clients, or whatever are you saying net zero? I had had, so I think I've mentioned up to that point, I had made maybe $35,000 and I might've had like one or two coaching clients carried over, but for the first two months, I signed zero clients for $0. But I always knew, like I just knew it was part of the process.
00:15:55
Speaker
i had a mentor want to tell me and this is somewhat i think conventional wisdom you know three years it takes to to build a business if you don't have three years in you. That kind of risk that kind of appetite it might be difficult so i always just knew like i had a longer horizon we're gonna go through this methodically.
00:16:15
Speaker
Do you think that there was anything about your theater experience or your upbringing or just your constitution that predisposed you to entrepreneurship or made you less risk averse or made you know prepared you to to take this leap?
00:16:38
Speaker
That's a good question. I've thought a lot about it. I think a lot of it comes from my upbringing, my father. My father was an entrepreneur. He was in the construction world. he I remember a number of times thinking, man, that decision is risky. That decision is risky. and He would always just tell me, hey, we'll figure it out. We're going to win some and we're going to lose some. look We're going to figure it out.
00:17:04
Speaker
so Even while I was acting and while I was producing, I had a bunch of side gigs, because I just liked creating things. I had a website, when I was acting, I had a website business, I had a painting, a residential painting business. While I was producing, I taught theater a lot, taught acting, which was directly translated into the coaching. What's really interesting about acting
00:17:35
Speaker
is one has to get out of the way in order to just be a, this is gonna sound cheesy, but like a vessel for the art. Oftentimes people will get on stage or in front of an audition and well they'll get in their head.
00:17:49
Speaker
Right? What do they want? How do I do this? Will I hit the high note? Will I remember the lines? And just like in life, those thoughts, those things get in our way of succeeding. And so I think just coaching that a lot helped the very premise of what we do in coaching, which is how do we get out of our own way?
00:18:06
Speaker
I wanted to come back around to you mentioning therapy.
Therapy vs. Coaching: A Distinction
00:18:13
Speaker
What are the similarities or dissimilarities between coaching and therapy?
00:18:20
Speaker
Oh, excellent question. There's similarities, but they are distinctly different. Therapy's role is essentially to heal past wounds, to heal trauma, to heal mental illness, right? Remember, it's a medical methodology and philosophy. And so therapy typically looks from today into the past.
00:18:43
Speaker
right That's why a lot of people become frustrated because they think it's, I'm putting up air quotes again, I'm an air quote guy, a lot of talking, which is true. right Because we in order to look back, in order to know where we are, looking back is super, super helpful. So again, it's it's it's a it's a methodology in which to heal. Coaching is different. There's lots of healing actually that can come from coaching, but in coaching, we look from today and into the future.
00:19:13
Speaker
What do we want to create? How do we get into action to create new skills, new ways of being in order to to achieve that thing or to become that person? right I equate it a lot to the gym of life. Let's just get out and work out these muscles. Try and try and try again until we become, hopefully, a new version of ourself that allows us to do and be bigger and better things.
00:19:40
Speaker
Okay, so yeah, definitely some similarities and there are, you may very well have some similar personalities that are drawn to do that kind of work. And you may even have similar needs or at least mindsets, you know behavior patterns, whatever it is, of people who would seek out either therapy and or coaching.
00:20:09
Speaker
But if I can describe it in this way, there is a different use case, perhaps. Yep. and And in fact, it is not uncommon for a client that I'm working with in coaching. There's been a number of times where I have recommended that they also get therapy in tandem. you You know, because a ah typical, a particular thing continues to pop up, a particular theme, a particular fear, a particular mindset that might be better supported through therapeutic means. Right. So if I can set up a ah fake scenario here, there could be something like, I think your words were the the gym ah ah of the mind. Gym of life. Gym of life. There we go. So you have a you have a coaching client that needs to do something that I'm going to equate to running a 40 yard dash.
00:21:07
Speaker
need to do the equivalent of a physical performance. And more than likely, this is for a job. you know They need to be a better leader, manager, coworker. ah They need to be more responsible, whatever it is. They got to do it day in and day out. and And so it sounds like you might get into a situation where, hopefully, you're able to say, hey, Eric,
00:21:33
Speaker
you're You're on the path. Whether you're moving quickly or not, you're moving in the right direction. However, you have these things that are weighing you down. They're getting in the way. They're, otherwise, you know, they're slowing you down.
00:21:46
Speaker
And there's this other approach, you know, therapy in this scenario that I'm setting up that you, our work here might actually benefit from you going and working on that thing. That's maybe in your past in sort of the way that you put it. Is that correct? Yep. A real life example that I've seen work with coaching and also need therapy. You know, we are programmed versions of what our parents and, um,
00:22:18
Speaker
communities have created us to be, to a certain extent. right When we're young, we are somewhat programmed by our parents and the way they see the world and how they interact with the world. Our our religions, our cultures, they all play a role. right I've had folks who've gotten negative messaging from parents that make them doubt themselves, that we can just work with in coaching and and you know getting out, disproving a lot of those things is all is needed to create some momentum ah to move forward. And there have been folks
00:22:54
Speaker
who've had similar things, but the messaging more traumatic and actually causes injury, right? That needs to be healed. That person then needs to go to therapy and actually work through a lot of that trauma messaging. So very similar things, but some might need different approaches. Okay. So now ah one of those threats tying back to therapy from coaching,
00:23:21
Speaker
You know, you were saying when you're in theater, a common challenge is kind of getting out of the way, you know, being the muscle or whatever. And.
00:23:34
Speaker
I would, I'm curious to get your take on this, but I recall somewhere coming upon the statement that there's a very high correlation between ah essentially anxiety, you know, on the on the big five scale neuroticism. But for those of you listening, if you're only familiar with Freud's version of neuroticism in, you know, the big five personality or behavioral traits, neuroticism is effectively anxiety.
00:24:07
Speaker
It's not the sexual neuroticism of Freud. I seem to recall coming upon someone who said that there's a very high correlation between neuroticism or anxiety and thinking about oneself.
Anxiety and Performance in Leadership
00:24:21
Speaker
And I may not characterize this perfectly, but for the sake of illustration, if I have social anxiety, then there's, I think, a pretty good likelihood, a pretty high likelihood that when I walk into a social situation and I've never met you, Andy, and I'm feeling anxiety, the voice in my head is saying, what's he thinking about me? Is he thinking I'm acting weird?
00:24:50
Speaker
that there's a characterization of my thought processes here or my in inner dialogue that is really, Eric, you're really just focused on how you feel about this. Now, right or wrong, when, but one, that sounds correct to me, but I'm not a person who deals with a lot of anxiety, so I don't want to misjudge people who do. When you say to me,
00:25:18
Speaker
the It's a common challenge to for actors to just kind of get out of the way and you know let the let the music, let the writing, whatever, have come through them. It sounds very similar to me, like, Andy, don't worry so much about how you think the show is supposed to be or how you think this is supposed to sound. you know You need to present the best art that you can. But is it fair for me to characterize it as The less that you try and spin this, you know the more that you just try and be true to the music, be true to the writing, the more that the audience is going to enjoy it. Yes, I think all anxiety, stress, is ah one's reflection on themselves. it's It's there to keep us safe, right? it is It's a built-in survival mechanism.
00:26:11
Speaker
for us to look out in the future and see what possibly might go wrong so that we avoid that thing. Right. um So that it is a looking at me. How do I protect me? You see it in theater, right? If you're on stage and you don't want to be ah humiliated because your partner is there, your parents are there or somebody, you're thinking about how do I protect myself from this embarrassment? The same thing happens in the workplace, right? I don't know how to put myself out there as a thought leader because I might mess up. I don't know how to have a kind of tough conversation with my boss because
00:26:48
Speaker
It might feel unsafe. All of these things are what get in the way of us being true to ourselves, and they're just beliefs. They're just old programming that we've carried into our lives and continue to perpetuate.
00:27:05
Speaker
I really appreciate you know one of the first things you said about anxiety as well because I know plenty of people who are high anxiety and some some people much more than others. And you know when you're real extreme on something, in particular something that often Comes along with fear or shame or guilt it's really hard not to not just have those a negative feelings but then feel bad about having those negative feelings and I've talked with plenty of people of course more so to the people who are very close to me but I've talked to plenty of people about
00:27:47
Speaker
You know if you're if you're above the 90th percentile on some scale or another or you're below the 10th percentile then and you know let's we can we can change those numbers when you 8515 whatever but if you're at one end or the other.
00:28:04
Speaker
then there's probably a sort of dark side of this thing that comes out where if you're super high anxiety, you know, you're in the 95th percentile. There are probably real problems that come along with that, but if you're in the, I don't know, you're above average, you're in the 60th percentile or 70th percentile or something, are there negative aspects of that? Yeah, but you're in sort of like the, in the the central portion of the bell curve,
00:28:34
Speaker
And so you're acting out things that have served human beings well for a long time. And now me, I'm very low anxiety. I forget my numbers, but when I've done a big five assessment before,
00:28:50
Speaker
I think I'm second percentile or something like that for anxiety and I might be wrong but I think the negative aspects that I can see in that are that I will take a risk.
00:29:06
Speaker
but I don't have a healthy level of anxiety to then protect you as a person or your money or your career or whatever. And so there are negative aspects and there are positive aspects too, but there there are negative aspects on being out at the extremes. And so you stating it like that, that anxiety and many other things, behavioral traits and all that are there for a good reason.
00:29:33
Speaker
they are. And you you bring up a really interesting point that having the anxiety of the stress can create guilt and shame just the fact that you have it, because we paint a picture of it as being bad. You know, a lot in in my work and in therapeutic work, it's when those things come up, we actually want to Not to get too cheesy, but to welcome it. It is a part of who we are. It's not a bad part. It's not a ah negative part. The thing that we want to do is put it in perspective. And to understand, you know, a lot of times with clients, especially in business, I'll sort of paint it like, imagine you're the CEO and the stress, say financial stress, is just your CFO raising a hand and saying, we there could be troubles ahead.
00:30:24
Speaker
Right? The CEO's job is to just take that counsel. Not necessarily to feel the CFO's fear. But to take it, to look out into the the future, see what can or should be done, and then move on, right? It is just a ah raising of the hand saying we we should look out for this, not something we have to take on as a feeling or as a negative. And the more that we reframe that, we can begin to separate ourselves and to have more space between that anxiety, that fear, that guilt, and not always taking it on as as reality.
00:31:03
Speaker
I love that and I don't want to sound you know like for the Star Trek fans out there, like I'm advocating that we would all be dispassionate, logical Vulcans or in business that, hey, it's all just business, right? Like don't take it personally. I'm not trying to sound like that. And yet anxiety, a sense of opportunity, anger, whatever it is, if you are a person like me, I'm i'm not a very patient person.
00:31:31
Speaker
and a feeling of impatience, if I can step back for a second, should be a data point and and it can be a signal, but it's not always a signal, either just about me or just about the world or the person that I'm talking to. It could be a data point or signal about numerous things, but I really like that characterization of ah you know the CFO and the CEO,
00:32:00
Speaker
sort of, you know, this, this signal has come in, this data point has come in. Okay, what are you going to do about it now, basically, is what I hear you say. Because it gives us choice then. And we're not necessarily, you know, letting that CFO fear or anxiety get into the CEO seat and just control things.
00:32:18
Speaker
I want to come back around to that you know bigger coach
Coaching Challenges and Solutions
00:32:22
Speaker
that you hired. however ah To continue on this real quick, what do you deal with with some of your clients? you know Over time, you've had plenty of clients in plenty of different situations. What kind of conversation do you get in with your clients when they're struggling with, they're getting caught up in, it's it's not just a data point or just a signal there.
00:32:45
Speaker
internalizing. it It may not be anxiety. you know therere and I'm guessing some of your clients, they take on one of their direct reports responsibilities because they're just forgetting, hey, you gotta empower people to do their job or whatever. So what's what's a common sort of situation you deal with with your clients? And and what do you tell people? you know What are the most common challenges and and solutions? If you just knew this or if you could just do this exercise, you would solve 60% of your problems.
00:33:20
Speaker
It's a really good question. The presenting conversations are incredibly varied, but typically they all do come back to some amount of you know it whatever the presenting thing is, it creates some discomfort, it creates some friction, it creates an obstacle.
00:33:39
Speaker
And oftentimes it comes back to a limiting perspective, a blind spot of something that they don't really know what is driving them and why that thing is happening. It could be some sort of unspoken fear that is just presenting itself in a way. You know, I just put up a post on LinkedIn today from a woman who came in, this is maybe three, four months ago, and she was frustrated that she wasn't reaching her goal for the second year. And one of the things we came to was there was actually a competing commitment, a competing fear, because she, while was could be very successful and was very successful, she was limiting her success because the more she became successful, the more it required her to be in the spotlight.
00:34:29
Speaker
the more it required her to be depended on. it It had so many more, in her words, expectations of me that it was a blind spot that she kind of would shy away from certain opportunities or self-sabotage. She'd get in her own way and find a way not to get over that hump of success.
00:34:51
Speaker
So that in and of itself is a bit of a fear that she never even thought was there. When you say that, it hadn't occurred to me to ask you this, but first of all, specific to the story, you're using language that to me is evocative of immunity to change. And so for anybody that's not familiar with it, Robert Keegan and Lisa Leahy, I believe is her name. And they wrote a couple of books. One of them is How we talk can change the way we work, I believe. And another one is, was it in everything culture? Something like that? And there are probably others. There's also immunity to change. That's the one that really sits in my work. I love the immunity to change x-ray. I think for anyone that's out there, I do recommend looking it up. It's something that you can do
00:35:40
Speaker
on your own, but of various coaching practices or or ah exercises or whatever that I have done over time, I do find that This is one of the more difficult ones for me to do alone. To self-implement, yeah. I can do grow, for example, alone. For anyone out there, you can just look up grow coaching, and you'll find that. Grow, I can do alone. When I'm not sure what should I do in this situation, I'm really conflicted. Immunity to change, it's not impossible for me to do a alone. but
00:36:15
Speaker
It's really easy to to get wrapped up in the details of the story that I'm telling or how I feel about it. And it's kind of helpful sometimes to ah have someone keep me on track.
00:36:32
Speaker
and say, okay, I hear what you're saying, Eric, but you just talked for 10 minutes about, you know, step two, can we move on to step three? Or you didn't answer the question or something of that nature. So, okay, so you, this is one thing that's in your background, but the thing that you reminded me of is, are there certifications, methodologies, anything like that that are part of your background or your approach to coaching? Yeah, so, I mean, when I first started, I got a very basic sort of life coaching certificate. It was by sort of entree into the world of coaching. Since i've I've certainly got certifications, I really have more dove into real life experience and working with mentors who sort of teach and mentor in real time.
00:37:22
Speaker
I think this actually ties into the thought that I had about, okay, you made the leap to start your own business and you hired your own coach.
Mentoring, Coaching, and Personal Growth
00:37:32
Speaker
It wasn't cheap. I really appreciated when you said that because I really value coaching. I really value a good manager, a good parent, mentor, whatever it is. And I've spoken plenty of times at conferences, not just about coaching, but also about things like organization. You know, lots of people deal with things like distraction or you and I have a conversation that sparks an idea for me, I don't write it down. And then three months later I realize, oh man, I didn't do that thing and it was a brilliant idea.
00:38:08
Speaker
And the specific thing that I'm thinking about at the moment is I was in Houston just a few months ago so speaking about an organizational model, a personal organization model that I developed. And the one of the fundamental premises of this model is that.
00:38:28
Speaker
We are easily distracted human beings are easily distracted and there's a gentleman in the room who had I think a very worthwhile challenge to me, which is you're assuming here that our challenge, you know your audience.
00:38:43
Speaker
is that we're easily distracted. And I kind of said, well, yeah, because that's what I believe is that human beings are easily distracted and we want to feel valued and we want to be productive and all that. But Andy, you and I talk, i have we have a brilliant idea or I say, I'm going to do something. I don't write it down or I don't take action on it immediately. And then I don't follow through. And how much more productive could we all be?
00:39:10
Speaker
if we got things out of our heads and into a place that was easy to go back to. And i I tell this very long story because you look at professional basketball players, professional musicians, you know, look at the CEO of, I don't know, Marriott. I bet you in a very high percentage of these cases, these people who are the highest performers in their space in the world still have something like a coach. And if Tom Brady needs a coach, for example, and maybe Tom Brady, when he was playing, of course, had multiple coaches. Now that he's commentating, maybe he has different types of coaches, I don't know. But if he has that type of awareness or humility or whatever it is,
00:40:00
Speaker
I think it's reasonable to assume that even though Andy, it's not your highest priority all the time or my highest priority, like I'm not going to spend my entire income on a coach.
00:40:10
Speaker
that there is some value that coaching, mentorship, management, parenting, you know, some input feedback can give you. And so I really appreciate it when you said you started your business and you, I'm putting words in your mouth, but you felt like that was a priority. You know, there's something that someone else can give me that's going to take me to a better place faster or because I couldn't get there on my own.
00:40:40
Speaker
Definitely. I mean, I think the data is is out there and pretty conclusive around the effectiveness of coaching. I think it's over the course of the last 20 years or plus, it's really gained momentum mainly from ah corporate America, Fortune 500, and how those executives have seen that the use of a coach has created just bottom line, top line results. It's interesting you bring up Tom Brady. Tom Brady talks openly about the therapy he's received, the outside coaching he's received, and how
00:41:22
Speaker
it It's made him a better athlete, person, human. So I'm curious, you've been running ah your own business for a few years.
Scaling Minds: Self-Awareness and Leadership
00:41:31
Speaker
What type of people are you typically dealing with? Do you specialize in certain industries, verticals, ah stages in people's career? And if you don't specialize,
00:41:43
Speaker
What are the most common types of people, if I can put it that way, that you're coaching in your business? I mean, our sweet spot is, and this is part of the elevator pitch, small to medium sized, privately held businesses and not-for-profit organizations. We're industry agnostic because we're We're not necessarily working on the marketing or the strategy or the finances of the business. We're not business coaches and I'm not a business coach in that way. Tony Robbins says success is 80% psychology and 20% skill, which I am a firm believer of that. And we coach, we we focus on the 80%. And so to to answer your question about the similarities, it's not so much a demographic, it's really a psychographic.
00:42:30
Speaker
that is the similarity. Someone that is self-aware enough to know that who they are and how they show up is a major determinant to the level of success that they can create. And so that person is, first and foremost, the the folks that we end up talking with.
00:42:53
Speaker
you know It could be frustration with how a team their team is functioning and they realize that themselves as a leader have to improve and grow in order to be able to manage that team. It could be a ah small business owner, like, how do I get out of my own way and take the risk needed to create the thing that I want? um But it is that person that realizes they are in control of their own destiny, so to speak.
00:43:19
Speaker
For your business, do you find that there are certain types of people or situations that someone might come in and talk to you or one of your coaches for a short timeframe? I don't know what that might be, but let's just say three months. And then there are other situations or types of people where you're with them for two years at a time. yeah Is there some difference sometimes?
00:43:47
Speaker
yeah so what we're mainly looking for in the work that we do. are bigger and more long-term problems. There are occasions where we'll create an ah an engagement of like three months. Let's just get over this one little hump. But that's not kind of what we're most interested in. We're we're most interested in big change, systemic change, long-term transformation. And so the majority of our clients are with us a year up to three and some longer. but
00:44:21
Speaker
the The average sweet spot is maybe 18 months to two years. I'm guessing that the people who stick with you for the longest are people who have acknowledged I do have a need, you know rather than me going to my spouse and saying, you need to go see someone. And then she just gives in, right? Probably more so the mid-level manager in one of these businesses who says, I i think I might need some coaching.
00:44:54
Speaker
that's That's probably the kind of person that's going to stick for longer and then probably also make progress. Does that sound right? Yeah, ah most often we're working with the the CEO, the business owner, and oftentimes that will grow into working with them and their leadership team or them and their COO, their right hand, really creating alignment within the team.
00:45:21
Speaker
You have within scaling minds, you have a handful of other coaches, so it's not just you. And I think, am I recalling correctly that you also have some specialties? like so You have some different focuses of ah your people, am I recalling that correctly?
00:45:40
Speaker
Ish the the way in which we kind of grew, which was just organic, folks would come inquiring about life coaching or other types of coaching. And that just wasn't what I was most interested in. So we started to grow because I brought someone on to take those types of clients. Okay. So yeah, we do have someone on staff that basically just does life coaching. The truth of the matter is it's all the same.
00:46:07
Speaker
Okay, so somebody's out there, whether they're, you know, they've tried coaching before or not.
Coaching as a Response to Frustration
00:46:16
Speaker
What's a situation that someone might recognize themselves in or of a feeling or something? And, and hey, listener, if you're in this situation, this is when you call Andy.
00:46:28
Speaker
I mean, our sort of tagline is we help folks move from frustrated to free, feeling of freedom. If a feeling of frustration has been around long enough that One is ready to do something about it, right? Like the example that I gave of the client who wasn't getting the results a second year, that kind of thing. If you are a business owner and your relationships so around the team aren't helping move things along, and things that cause frustration within a leader and an organization, that's where we can come in and and help remove that. help shine a light on what's happening, the role that everyone's playing, and kind of help lay the groundwork to to move beyond it. Okay. You could tell me if I'm wrong, but I think that, again, while there are plenty of other priorities in life, and any one priority that I have today might not be my priority tomorrow or a year from now, I so i definitely think that
00:47:38
Speaker
It helps to have. an outside party if I can call a coach that at times to reflect back to you. These are the words that you said to me, or, hey, do you want my opinion here? um Now that you've given me 20 minutes on what's been going on this week, do you want to hear what I think about that? Or whatever the the need is at the time, I think that we all have things that we want to improve upon or that we need to improve upon.
00:48:10
Speaker
And that for some percentage of people who aren't getting that input, having a coach is actually a worthwhile investment. And to just try it out is probably a good thing for some people. I'm not saying call Andy and have one session and then be and then go, ah, it ain't for me. What I'm saying is just to, there are probably a lot more people out there who don't have a coach therapist whatever it is, mentor, who really could benefit and then they could be more for their careers, for their families, for their colleagues.
00:48:46
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's an opportunity, I believe, for everyone, but not one that everyone is ready or feels like they need. And so it is there for the taking, for those that would like to take things into their own hands and create something new. Okay, so we're recording this at the end of 2024. Things have been good for scaling minds in 2024.
00:49:12
Speaker
Sounds like things are looking pretty good for 2025. Is there anything that, you know, before we wrap up is worth hitting on or worth sharing places that we should point people to so that they can come and benefit from what you share or from your coaching Andy?
00:49:31
Speaker
Yeah, going into 2025, we're just looking to continue to make a positive impact, not to sound too cheesy, but it actually is what what drives us. So to to continue that, you could find us at our website, www.scalingminds dot.com. I'm also pretty active on LinkedIn. You can just search Andy Height. There's not many of us.
00:49:53
Speaker
I think my handle is actually Andy S. Height, but yep, share a lot there. Share a lot of behind the scenes coaching, people asking questions. Here's read real leadership advice. I started this new things, session notes, which is detailing things that actually happen in a session. So come on over and explore.
00:50:14
Speaker
Andy, I appreciate you joining me. i I think as everyone has heard, I see a lot of value in getting guidance and a coach is an appropriate way to do that in many cases. ah You and I have talked a couple of times over a number of years and I think really click in some of our interests around development and coaching.
00:50:41
Speaker
So I appreciate you joining me here. I will have links in the show notes in case you anybody didn't catch it. And Andy, thank you again for being here. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate the conversation.