Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of Maximize Your Career. I'm your host, Stacy Mayer. And super excited to be here with you again this week, as always.

So I was giving a big presentation this past week and it inspired the conversation that we're about to have today. And I have a webinar that many of you may have seen, and it is Get Promoted to the Executive Suite Before Your Next Performance Review. And if you haven't seen this webinar, you can check it out at StacyMayer.com/GetPromoted and get an instant download to this webinar.

So I was presenting this webinar to a group of women as part of the organization called WIE Suite: Advancing Women and Gender Equity in the Workplace, and it was a great conversation.

I have presented this webinar many times and this question keeps coming up. And that's why I wanted to talk about it on today's podcast. Because if I haven't said it on here before, I haven't said it enough times. And it's about the concept of getting out of the weeds. And you've heard me talk about this. It's in the beginning of my book. I talk about how in order to get promoted into higher level executive positions, you have to be willing to stop doing what you're good at. To pull yourself out of the weeds. To stop relying on your subject matter expertise. Because that is not what's going to get you promoted into those higher level executive positions. But the idea of getting out of the weeds runs deep. And that is because many of us at work are a bit overwhelmed and overworked. And this is exasperated by the great resignation.

So I actually had this conversation with a woman inside of my Leadership Table, my advanced coaching program. And she said to me that it's actually the massive resignation. She's lost over half of her team in such a very short amount of time. And we're all having that happen to us.

And first thing I want to tell you is, as a powerhouse corporate woman, you have choices right now. And this is why I encourage you to sign up for Executive Ahead of Time yesterday. If you haven't signed up already and you aren't already a part of this amazing community. Because in that program, I teach you how to interview how to set yourself up for that next level of leadership so you can actually go out and get those opportunities. If they're not happening for you inside of your organization, you can go out and get them for yourself. So I want you to know that that is available to you inside of Executive Ahead of Time. And in the program, you receive weekly group coaching from me. So we'll make sure that we're actually able to apply everything that I teach to your specific situation.

Go to www.ExecutiveAheadOfTime.com. That's www.ExecutiveAheadOfTime.com and just register. Because registration is open and we need you in a higher level leadership position so that you can start doing the work that you really want to be doing in the world.

So I mentioned you have options. If half of your team is leaving as part of the massive resignation, then that also means you could leave if you wanted to. So we have more opportunities available to us right now. And the sad thing is, is because we are so overwhelmed, we're so in the weeds ourselves that we can't even begin to imagine seeking out other opportunities. And this is why I felt like this podcast episode was especially important with what we're all going through right now. And the question that was asked at the we sweet presentation that I gave was how do we start to pull ourselves out of the weeds if we're literally too far in the weeds? What do you recommend that we do?

And I answered that question in the sense that getting out of the weeds is not about time management. It is about communication.

So I'll say that again. Getting out of the weeds is not about time management. It's about communication.

And so what we're doing when we're getting ourselves promoted into those higher level executive positions is we're shifting perception. We want to show them that we are already the Executive Ahead of Time. That we are capable of leading at executive level. So right now, if you're getting pretty decent performance reviews, but you're not actually getting the title or the recognition or the salary to match, it's often because they don't see you as an executive leader. They see you as that subject matter expert.

Now you might be a vice president or a senior vice president and still be seen as a subject matter expert. And that happens because we are so far into the weeds. So this question that was presented to me was presented to me very much as a time management problem. I'm so far into the weeds. I can't possibly pull myself out of the weeds. So does that mean that I'll just never get promoted?

And here's what I said. If you focus on this as a time management problem and let's say you do pull yoursel "out of the weeds". So for instance, you hire a team or you hire an extra person, which seems to be near to impossible for people these days because it's just really hard to fill the roles that we do have available. And let's say you do fill the role you're able to start delegating and you do technically pull yourself out of the weeds. Say that you get 20 percent of your time back for that week and you feel like: Oh, I'm actually starting to feel better. My my head is out of the water and I could maybe block out my calendar for more time for strategic thinking.

I just feel better. So from a stress standpoint, I feel like I'm getting my life back. You can do all of that and still not get promoted. You can technically get yourself out of the weeds and still not get promoted. And here is what is actually happening. You're getting yourself out of the weeds from a time management perspective, but you're not actually communicating any different with the executive team. You're still communicating with your boss in the exact same way that you used to be communicating. So I answered this question in the sense that go ahead, try it. Get your stress levels down, please. I beg you. We need to get ourselves technically from a time management perspective out of the weeds.

But what I'm talking about when I say, get yourself out of the weeds I'm actually talking about in terms of your communication. So this person who's drowning in the weeds and spending 60 hours a week working can start to shift her communication instantly, instantly. So we don't have to wait until she actually gets out of the weeds to start shifting her communication. And the other thing that's going to happen for you is, let's say that you're a newer manager, you're a manager or a senior manager, or maybe you're still an individual contributor, but you're looking to transition into leadership positions. Let's say that your actual job is having an intention to details. Your actual job is meant to be kind of "in the weeds" all of the time. Not overwhelmed. But your job might be a technical position. And so then I'll get those women to ask me: Well, what if my job is actually supposed to be in the weeds and how do I pull myself out of the weeds? And the answer is the same for them. It's communication. So I'm not asking you to change your job or change the work that you're doing in a given week. But I do want you to start shifting your communication.

So in today's episode, I'm going to show you how you can start doing that right away. But that's the first thing that I want you to realize is that getting out of the weeds is not actually about time management. It's about how you're communicating with the executive team.

Now, before I get into the How-To, I want to give you an example of one of the corporate badasses that I've been working with actually for a couple of years. She got promoted to senior director, from director to senior director. And when I first met her, she was very, very much in the weeds. And she was highly overwhelmed and couldn't figure out a way out. And she had been asking her boss for a very long time for direct reports. That she needed a team. That she could not do it all. And she just kept talking to her boss like: I need a team, I need a team. Help me get out of the weeds. This is not working for me. And her boss would listen to her and say things like: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We see it maybe next year. And not actually nothing was really happening about it.

So then we were coaching, and I'm not coaching her on delegation or her time management. I'm coaching her on how she's communicating with her boss. So the first way I told you she's going to her boss, she's saying: I'm overwhelmed, I'm overworked, I need a team. I need help. So I want her to start shifting the way she's communicating with her boss. And what we start to do is instead of talking about what you're not doing well, what you're overwhelmed about, what we do is we start to talk about the vision, the strategy, what's the work that she's working on? Why is she doing what she's doing? How is she doing it? And so then she is not in the how, as in the bigger picture how. Why does it matter to have her have a team? Not just because of her stress levels, but because she has more important work to do for the organization.

And then this magical thing happened. And I don't really believe... I do believe in magic. I love magic. But I don't believe that it's magic as in it's not within your control. Because everything that I teach is that all of this is accessible to you right now. This is one hundred percent within your control. So I say the magical thing happened to her, which is that one day her boss just said: You know what? You need some direct reports. Almost as if she had never even asked for it and it was she was like: Stacy, you're not going to believe this. I'm getting two direct reports next month. And of course, I was like: Yes, I can believe it because you've been shifting your communication. And what she did essentially is show her boss that she could handle direct reports. If you're showing up as somebody who's constantly overwhelmed and overworked and in the weeds they're not going to be inspired to give you two other employees to manage. It seems so obvious to you, but it's not obvious to them that you can even manage to more people because you can't even manage yourself.

So it's really, really important that we start to see getting out of the weeds as a communication challenge instead of a time management problem. Now here's the beautiful piece, and this is why anybody and everybody can start implementing this today. I want you to start shifting your communication by five percent. That is it.

Ask yourself: how much of my conversations, whether they're in meetings, in the executive team, in meetings with my boss, how much of those conversations are in the weeds? How much of those conversations am I talking about the details, the work I'm working on, responding to problems, checking-in things like that where I'm just going into the weeds about a particular situation. How much of those conversations am I waiting to be asked what I'm doing. Not even what I think, but what I'm working on. That the only time I raise my hand is when I have an answer to their question. Versus a compelling question to ask the room. Which would be more like this is how I think versus this is what I'm working on.

So I want you to put a number on that first. Is that 90 percent, ninety five percent is that eighty five percent, whatever that might be for you in the last couple of weeks.

And then you're going to shift that number by five percent. So this is just made up numbers. But what I want you to realize is that five percent is actually quite small. So you're just going to shift it in tiny, teeny, tiny ways. We're not going to change everything about your one on ones with your boss. We're not going to change everything about how you're showing up and management team meetings. We're just going to start to shift it by five percent.

What is it that you can do to shift communication by five percent and you can do that next week? So I've already given you a couple of examples of things that you can start to do. Now I'm going to share how you can do that and exactly what you're going to say by pointing out what the executive team needs to hear from you, what they actually want in terms of you as an executive leader, what is actually going to start to shift that perception that you can lead at that higher executive level?

Harvard Business Review did a survey of CEOs asking CEOs of Fortune 500 companies what they valued in their executive team. So they're C-suite officers, what did they value in their C-suite officers. And all of these CEOs came up with, they basically narrowed it down to four main areas.

So in their top executives, the CEOs valued trust. Now this is really important because many of you think of trust as trust that you can do the job. But what they were referring to was trust that they could lead at the executive level. Ok, so that's where the difference is. If you're communicating in the weeds, then you're showing them trust. You're trying to build trust as like: I'm the expert, I'm the subject matter expert vs. I can lead at an executive level.

The second thing that CEOs valued in their executive team was alignment. Did they understand the organization's mission and were they making decisions accordingly? So executives say wanted the executives to be on board with the vision of the organization.

The third thing was that these executives had a long term vision. So the executives that they valued most made decisions about where the company was headed versus the immediate impact that it was going to have.

And the fourth thing that CEOs valued in their executive team was thinking outside of the status quo. That they weren't just yes men. That they were able to offer suggestions. Offer different ways of looking at things. That they felt like their top executives were the ones who could challenge, who could push back and think outside of the status quo.

So these four areas that CEOs valued in their executive team was trust, alignment, long term vision, and thinking outside of the status quo.

Now these same traits are what your executive team wants in you as an executive leader. So if we're starting to shift perception that we are ready to lead at that higher executive level, we are going to do it in these four categories.

And here's the other thing. How does the CEO know whether or not their executive team has trust that they can lead at the executive level alignment with the company's vision, that they're making decisions from the long term vision versus the short term gain. That they're able to think outside of the status quo? How does the CEO know that their executive team does these things? It's because they tell them. They tell their CEO they use words. That's what they're doing. They're communicating these things. How do you know if you have alignment, you communicate what that vision is of the organization and the work that you're doing, how it ties in to the vision of the organization? That's how you communicate alignment. You don't communicate alignment by being in the weeds. That doesn't matter. That just says I can do my job.

So we're trying to shift perception that we're ready to lead at the higher executive level and the way that you're going to start to do it with this little five percent communication. So just pick one. If we're only doing five percent, this doesn't have to become your job. So just challenge yourself and ask yourself: how can I start to build trust with executive leaders? Maybe, perhaps schedule 15 minute ally meetings with other executive leaders across the organization that will start to show them the work that you're doing that you can lead at this higher executive level. How can you show them that you are in alignment. And the first place to start there is repeat the company's mission. Repeat your boss's mission. What does your boss care about? Repeat that that shows that the work and the decisions that you're making as a leader is aligned with what your boss is working on. How do they know that you have a long term vision? And one of the processes that I teach is three Xingu the vision for your career so you can start to 3x the vision for whatever it is that you're working on.

What is the goal? What's the outcome? Why are we working on this project? And all you would have to do is at the beginning of a one on one, you could just start with one or two sentences and talk about the long term vision, what the goal is and then move into the weeds. And I I welcome you to move into the weeds for the rest of the conversation just to start shifting that one or two sentences and you are going to notice that you get feedback right your boss. This has happened time and time again, where corporate bad assets inside of Executive Ahead of Time say they did this shift and their boss is just like: Wow, that was one of the best one on ones that we've had. This happens over and over again, and to the corporate badass, they're like: Oh my gosh, why didn't I do this sooner?

Now here is where the real beauty of all of this work kicks in. So I have laid out for you a process that's very, very doable. You can start to shift the way you're communicating with executive leadership right now. You don't even have to wait. You can shift it by five percent. And here's the magic. The real magic is when you start to shift the way you're communicating, you begin to pull yourself out of the weeds.

From a time management perspective, you feel less stressed. You're able to see what's actually important. You're able to delegate the things that don't matter. You're able to spend time leading your team in this way. To bring up these types of conversations with your team so that you can focus on the bigger picture and do more and more and more of that.

So it works a little bit in the reverse. We end up working on time management at the end of the day. We do end up decreasing our stress levels. But we're doing it by focusing on that long term vision. By focusing on: how are we communicating with executive leadership? Am I communicating in the weeds or am I communicating as a senior executive leader?

I don't care where you're at. You can be an individual contributor or a senior vice president. You can begin to communicate like an executive leader today. And it's incredibly empowering, I think, for women to meet some of the vice presidents and senior vice presidents who are challenged in the same way inside of Executive Ahead of Time. Because we have a lot of women that come in and they're like: they're already at those higher levels. And I think for people who are in the senior management or director level, for you, you think: Well, once I get that title, once I get that position, then I'll be out of the weeds.

No, you won't. Because you'll just bring your same crap with you. You'll just scale all of your bad habits with you. So this is why no matter where you're at, it's important to start to pull yourself out of the weeds, not just because you want to get those promotions, higher salary, because that's how they're going to start to value you as that executive leader, but also so that you can be successful. Because I want you to be a successful vice president or a senior vice president. I want to see you excel at those higher executive levels. I don't want you to keep doing what you're doing. I want you to start to do something different. And hopefully from this episode you're able to see that that's something different can happen right now.

So go out there, give it a try. Let me know how it goes. Connect with me on LinkedIn. Send me a direct message. I respond personally to all of my own direct messages, so I would absolutely love to hear from you. Let me know you listen to this podcast episode and even more so, let's celebrate inside of Executive Ahead of Time. Module one is all about getting out of the weeds, and I am happy to coach you on it personally on our weekly group coaching sessions.

All right, everyone. Have a fantastic week. Take care. Bye.