Welcome back to The Daily Mastermind, George Wright III with your daily dose of inspiration, motivation, and education. And I'm joined in the podcast virtual studio with Ryan Crittenden. Ryan, how are you doing? I'm doing great. I'm so glad to be here today with you, George. Yeah, I'm excited because you're in a field and an industry that I have a passion for and that I'm excited about and leadership and everything else. So I'm going to give a little bit of an intro for you and then we'll get into your background. But for those of you that don't know Ryan, he's the founder of Excel Coaching and Development. And we're going to talk today about a lot of different things. So I want you to get a broad brushstroke of his background. Not only is he the founder of this company, PhD in industrial and organizational psychology, Army vet, Clifton Strengths Certified Coach, John Maxwell Coach, author of a new book, Becoming the Compass. but he's got 15 plus years of leadership experience working with executives and teams. And he's, from what I really have found, a very mission-driven leader. So I'm really glad to have you here today. And I think you have a lot of things going on in your schedule, so I'm glad we were able to coordinate it. Why don't you, Ryan, just give us a little bit of your backstory, just so we can get people set up for where you came from. Yeah, I'm happy to do that. I really think a lot of things started to happen in 2009. And I won't go into too many details to bore everybody, but I had some reflection. I was not even quite 21 yet. And I was like, man, what am I doing? So I joined the army thinking that would be my 20-year career, how I'd spend my life. So I joined the Army, 2010, basic training. Then I get to the station at Fort Carson in Colorado Springs, Colorado. And I very quickly realized this ain't going to be my thing. And I actually- Not what you thought? Not what I thought very early on. And so I choked with folks when people were like, yeah, I'm doing 20. I did 20 years and I'm retiring. And I'm like, congratulations. I was done after 20 minutes. But I didn't. I did the best I could, learned and observed and during my time in the army. And as I got out, I started reflecting again, okay, this was not for me. What, what were those bad times? What contributed to it? And then what made things really great and leaders always made the difference. And so when I got out, I got to thinking of, okay, what, not only what kind of like leader do I want to be, but what kind of person do I want to be? reflecting on these experiences from the army. So I got connected with the John Maxwell team and they are like phenomenal public speaking coaches, trainers and all this kind of stuff. And, and I had went for like public speaking and went for the leadership training. And I thought coaching was like this thing on the side that just seemed weird. And I was like, like, whatever, I'll do that training later. But then I'm in the certification time, like in person where you're there with all these other people learning to be leaders and coaches and speakers. And I loved the coaching sessions. And I started to just really just dive in more than I thought I ever would. I started integrating it into leadership roles that I had. And it really had changed my life and changed the way I approached leaders that were in my, on my team. And so I started seeing just really great results. And, and so then from there, I kind of had a boss who I think was intimidated by me and the success that I was having in my little world and team and just really started bringing the heart hammer down, got really burnt out. It was just, and this was three or four years after I left the army and, and so I felt defeated. And I was in Montana where I'm originally from and moved back to Montana and I had this role that I was excited about. And I was like, man, I don't even know. Like if that was leadership, I don't want to be a part of that. So I moved back to Colorado. I got reconnected with some folks and they actually were starting a strengths-based coaching company. Oh, right on. And I was like, and I'm overhearing them talk about this. And I say, wait, what are you guys talking about? And so they tell me more about it. Hey, we're starting this company and we're working with this team and we want them to know that they have unique strengths. We want them to grow on their strengths. We want them to have joy when they come to work and all this stuff. And I'm like, even talking about it now, I'm like getting goosebumps. Yeah. And Everything you wanted to hear for sure. Everything I wanted to hear. And I'm like, okay, can I help for me to be a part of what you guys are doing? Even if I'm just the janitor, I just want to be around what you guys are doing. And he said, we don't need a janitor, but what else can you do? And I'm like, I've been coaching and I have leadership experience. And they said, come talk to us more. And so I experienced how they approach strengths coaching, which is very similar to what I still do today. And it really, even though I was like defeated, showed me that I had unique contributions and that I had always had something to add. Even if other people didn't see it, I can now see it and then express it. I love that. I love that you came from the experience of it. You said something I actually wrote down I loved is leaders is what made the difference. And I think in most organizations, most companies, most everything, leaders do make the difference. But I love how you address coaching because I think a lot of people have seen coaching as just a kind of a buzzword out there. And I know coaching is, I've always talked about it because like anything, any professional athlete, a coach is someone who's got the experience, can help you hone it in. But they give you a perspective. So I love you actually experienced it. And that's what kind of pulled you into that because now you have a passion for it. But leadership and coaching sometimes aren't necessarily hand in the conversation. So that's one of the things that drew me to want to kind of interview on the show. So what would you say is some of the differences in where you've gone down? Because this is a very general topic of coaching and how it can affect your life. And I like strength based, but really leadership as well. And what does that mean? And how do you approach this concept, both from your own experience and also to help like our audience, which is entrepreneur, business owners, CEOs that are both trying to strive to be leaders and we obviously benefit from that perspective that coaching does. Yeah, I think, so I answered that, but I think it's probably good also to define some terms. Yeah. So four terms that I like to define First mentoring And we and in my book we maybe talk about this too but in my book the main character Alex has a mentor the entire time throughout the whole book and mentors are great they tend to be older than you they tend to have the experience that you want and they tend to give advice yeah which is great because they hopefully you there's you see something in them that you respect and you value their advice and then a consultant is someone who has industry experience and you hire them to give you great strategies and be able to look at your situation say this is what works and then before you get to coaching we'll get the therapy so therapy a therapist being trained to help someone heal from the past but they and i should say not everybody's a therapist there's a trained licensed right exactly that that can help someone go back and deal with issues so then they can go forward and then a coach broad strokes may not need industry experience but what a coach would do is they know the coaching process and so when I when I say I'm a coach I'm actually adhering to the international coach federation standards of coaching yeah so there's a coaching process of really identifying on what the client wants to work on either through the whole coaching relationship or the coaching session and then helping the client take ownership so a coach in my context is not really going to give the strategies but it's going to help the client help pull out of the client of what they assuming that they are already they're healthy whole and resourceful pull it out of them so that they can take ownership. Yeah, I think that's a great distinction with all of the brands and leaders and coaching and individuals I've worked with over the years. I think that's a great distinction. Usually these are individuals that have, they're working with somebody that has an objective and they need to have the path to get there and they need some accountability as well. But there's all of that involved. And so coaching is a very specific result driven type of deal. So how do you approach knowing that this is the layout that we've given individuals? And let's say there's somebody that's got, they're either struggling or maybe they're doing amazing, or maybe they want to level up because most people need to get past that area they're comfortable with or break through new boundaries. What are some of the things you recommend based on what you're doing and all the certifications you have that make things not only just a little bit different, but what is the main focus that you like to put with individuals that you're working with, that you've seen results with? Yeah. So my clients that have the best results, whether it be in like a personal individual contributor form or leading a team and then even their team is we go through strengths foundations is what I call it. So we really look at the CliftonStrengths assessment, even those that that are like really familiar with it, get a ton out of this process because it is it's intentional and it's focused and it's uniquely to them because everybody's so unique. For those that don't understand it though, can you explain what is the CliftonStrengths? Yeah. So the CliftonStrengths assessment helps identify 34 areas of talent. Okay. And then talent is the foundation for strengths. So the great part about working with a coach and part of what I do is we're going to identify your signature talents those that are really you 24 7 yeah you're supporting talents the things that you can do and then at the bottom of the assessment is the non-patterned talents and those are not you but we want to be aware of those i love that the talents are what lead to the strengths and i've also noticed over time and maybe you could comment on this a lot of people think they know what their talents are but they don't necessarily it's hard to identify that yourself. Wouldn't you agree? Like how, what have you found? Yeah. So personally for me, I, like, I knew I had, you know, I focused, like I loved relationships and I liked teaching and I liked doing these things. And, but I couldn't identify why, like what was unique about me until I took the assessment and I had a coach. Now, Peter Drucker actually said, and I'm paraphrase his quote, which I can just can't quite remember, but if you asked Americans what their strengths are, we respond with book knowledge and experience. Those aren't strengths. So being able to actually really identify, Hey, like my number one talent on the Clifton strengths assessment is the talent of futuristic, which means I like to cast vision and look into the future and see what, how things can be better. Yeah. Before that, I knew I did it innately, but I couldn't verbalize it. I couldn't communicate. That's a huge point. If you can't actually pinpoint it, how do you build it and grow it or leverage it? 100%. I'm curious though, this may be redundant, but what's the difference between a talent and a strength? One leads to the other. And so if I'm listing off things I have, I might be listing off talents. I might be listing off strengths. What's the difference there? Yeah. So a talent is a natural way of thinking, acting, or behaving that's just naturally occurring. but then a strength is being able to perform a specific task and near perfect performance consistently i love that so are you saying the talents are natural abilities so would strengths be the things that you would develop or do you still feel that most people have a kind of a natural strength that they lean to that they should just focus on or do you like to focus and helping people develop their strengths around their talents? So the talent leads to the strength. So the assessment is identifying the talents. Then you take the talent and you develop that talent into a strength. Got it. Yeah. So it's where you're able to do that. You do that talent near perfect performance. Now, I should say there's a lot that goes into this. So just because if you're looking at the assessment, it ranks on one to 34. number one is where you're thinking about like it's drops and drops in a bucket okay your number one has the most drops in the bucket number 34 has no drops in the bucket got it so you're ranking so basically got it yeah and it's based on your answers and it's really we could talk about the psychometrics and all that another time because that's boring read other website and look at it wait so yeah just because number one that your number one is doesn't mean it's a strength it just means it's a talent. You have to develop that. But then there another point is are you emotionally mature around it Or are you an immature person And so that Brian Smith Explain what you mean by that yeah really basic if you an immature in your strengths it when everything is about me got it okay and when you more mature it's when there's a we there's a community around your strengths that one you can pour into and you let them pour into you too and then are you how are you exercising your strengths are you growing in that. Yeah, that's a self-awareness, right? Being able to know what you're doing. And that's sometimes we can't do that on our own. And I like your analogy of are you mature or immature around these strengths as well? What do you find most people struggle with? You've worked with a lot of people. You've worked with leaders, organizations, business owners. What are most people struggling with when it comes to doing this kind of work or doing things that will help them to go to the next level. Yeah, I think the hardest thing is probably consistently is helping them, helping. How do I want to word this? It's when it's that first part of let's work on this, let's do this. Is it the commitment level or just their ability to identify it and get started? Yeah. Some of it's that ability to get started can also just be like, I don't, I have strengths. I'm good. I got it. But then it's, can you identify it? Sure. I took the assessment. Okay. But let's take some time and, and work through it. So I've had this a few times where it's the, the busy professional won't slow down enough just to work on themselves. And that's the hardest part being like, Hey, you can be leading a high production team. And that's awesome. We want to keep doing that. But if we want to take it to the next level and we want it to grow, you actually need to slow down and work on yourself. And this, my strengths foundation coaching package or part of the package isn't long and it, but it does take a little bit of effort to, to slow down, to be intentional, to, to, then the great part is, but to actually think about yourself so that you can incorporate the we part. Yeah, it's, it is counterintuitive to say, slow down to speed up, right? Or, or slow down to go next level. But I think it's like anything else you could be running on, you could have a eight cylinder engine running on two cylinders and go on crazy and you'd be better off just backing up and making sure you're fully operational for your, your own self mastery. So I think that's a really great example. And I do think there again, that's the kind of stuff you don't, you maybe don't see in yourself. Like I'm a go, go guy. And sometimes now I'm a little more self-aware because we have a personal development company and stuff like that. But, but even myself, I got to step back sometimes and say, in order to level up, it's that pruning process. You got to step back a little bit to move forward. And, and so that is really huge. I like that. What about identity? Is identity a big thing that people struggle with? Is that some, because I've seen that a lot with business owners, whether or not they're struggling to figure out what their identity is or that they don't feel like they're enough in their identity, because they're trying to create this life that's bigger than they have. And obviously, if they were there, they would be there. And so they have to be this person that they're not yet the future version of themselves. We talk about unleashing your potential. How do you handle that? What do you and how often does that come up for you? Yeah, it comes up. It's come up. As you were asking question. I was just thinking about when I had first started to learn about strengths and kind of like I said, we focus on our strengths, but we also want to know who we are not. Yeah, good idea. And we talked about the rank ordering. And when I was sitting there with my coach, who's a good friend of mine, had breakfast with him today, still eight years later. And I looked at my top five and I said, this is how I've gotten hired for every job I've ever had is because of these top five and there's, and then I actually enjoy my six through 10 a lot more in reverse to strengths. But then I got to realize when we were looked at the part of who I am not, so I can clearly identify who I am not. I realized that job that I got so burned out on is my boss wanted me to be that very bottom line assessment while still being the people person at the top. And that's what you feel as was burning you out is he wanted you to be something that You're not naturally, right? Yeah, 100%. And then, and then I leaned into it too, unknowingly. And hindsight is always 20-20 and we just do a little bit better every day. But then I realized when I looked at that, yeah, that's, I'm not that. Now, there are people who are like that. And I really like being on the same team as them. Yeah. Yeah. Because it's great. But it's like, yeah, when you're just pretending to be who you are not, that is what there's a misalignment that can lead to that burnout and honestly like for me if I was trying to be that I would be a shell of a person and I'd be just I wouldn't be me it's most people though right most people are just moving through that path they don't have clarity on who they want to be so they just adopt the identity of their boss and their leg and what everybody else wants them to be and they become that person and they wonder why they're not fulfilled. They wonder why they're not passionate about what they do. Totally. Yeah. And that's, and that creates that misalignment in this life. And then maybe also, I would say, are you the same person at work? And then are you at home? And obviously like there's different, different personalities and stuff. Like hopefully you're, you're more relaxed at home or like you can rest with it. There's those types of things, but it's almost like a certain level of hypocrisy too. You're just, you're different. You have different faces no matter where you are. It's hard for people to be authentic nowadays, but it's not if you want to create the life you want to live. 100%. Yeah. And kind of like you were asking, so what about that professional that may have some sort of self-awareness, but they are trying to create a life of that's bigger than them and they're leading companies and stuff. The biggest advice and what I've seen from like research and experience myself is really know who you are, be able to identify it and lean into that because then you'll actually start to create that life you want and it'll be genuine and it'll be from who you authentically are. I love that aspect because obviously I've heard some of these things before, but the way you put it with aligning around your strengths innately should help you not only feel more aligned and more fulfilled, but it also will make you feel more confident because people, there's obviously a difference between confidence and self-esteem and self-worth and all that. But when you're aligned around what you know, and you believe to be your unique talents, and you talk about abilities and talents, that's got to drive more confidence for people to be outside their comfort zone, wouldn't you say? Yeah. And I know personally, when I get out of my comfort zone, I am leading with my strengths because that the way I grow Like we always say You always always grow outside your comfort zone Yes absolutely But you also really only grow in your strengths Yeah So you have to go confidently with your strengths. So I love how you put that by the way, because carrying your strengths out. In other words, people, when they're seeing their life, they're actually thinking, I don't have the skill yet for that. But your strength is not the skill you got to develop along the way. Your strength is your ability, no matter what the situation to go through it. And so I really like how you put that you carry your strengths through your comfort zone, because then with that, you don't feel like you have to have the skill because you'll develop along the way. I love it. Yeah, definitely. Like you can, every job, every task, everything is, can always be done. No matter the strength, you just have to know, you know, who you are in that moment. So I'll say I like presenting and I like communicating with folks and they probably, people probably notice, I say a lot and it happens. I'm not a skill. Like it's not natural. Like after this recording, I have it scheduled to relax for a half hour because, because I just, I don't get energized by it. I love it, but it doesn't like innately energize me. I do have to take some time to relax. And it's one of those things to know. But I lean into my other strengths to help me hopefully do a really great job with who I'm doing the recording with. No, I love it. I love that a lot. So where do you see, before I ask you, I had a question to ask you. But before I do, what do you do differently? Coaching, personal development, leadership development is a pretty crowded space right now. And I'm curious just because we don't have the opportunity to go through some coaching examples. What do you feel separates you? What do you do differently with your clients that you feel is unique and that you, and I know that everybody's unique because of their experience, but what do you find helps you with your clients when it comes to the coaching and leadership development? Yeah. So there's a number of things that I, or just at least one or two things that I like to think I do differently is I do have a really systematic approach initially to help people understand really what their strengths are and where their genius zones are. and we want to really focus on that and so i use those and leverage leader 360 surveys and so we do that identify where we want to work on but do it intentionally from a strengths and i'd say genius zone two perspective got it and then we go then we enter into a more formal coaching relationship where it is more focused on international coach federation standards of coaching where we're going to identify the clients going to identify hey yeah this is what i want to work on this is what i feel more where i'm going to get the most results and then we start the coaching process of really hunkering down on it creating an awareness of why that is important and then co-creating a action plan. So everything's goal-focused, future-oriented. Nice. Future-oriented, goal-focused. Something like that. Yeah, yeah. I think a lot of it without direction, without a destination of what you're trying to do, it makes it really difficult to assess your growth. And I love that because I think progress to perfection, right? It's not all about the destination journey. you've got to be able to have some goals around that. So let's say that there's individuals that are kind of looking to say, all right, where do I need this the most? Where do I start? Like if somebody's trying to start getting an idea of where they need to go, I'm imagining your suggestion is going to be to get the tests and assessment, but where do they start? How do they know if coaching or personal development, leadership coaching is something that they should implement in themselves and their teams. Yeah. So I would say it's needed all the time. So if you're wondering, I've solved it for you, you need it. But I would say, don't just start with the assessment. I'd rather make sure you have a conversation with me so I can help set you up for success. I like that because then people may just be having questions or wondering. And the only reason I say that is because the goal of our podcast is to help people to become more self-aware, but to level up and to go to the next level. And to do that, if you had all the answers, you'd already be doing it most of the time, no matter what level you're at. So that's why I bring individuals like yourself on the show that have had experience and background and leadership and all kinds of scenarios. Because you mentioned, I see you've got a little bit of that mentoring as well as coaching because you do have the experience. You've been further ahead of the path than a lot of people. And so I really like that. What piece of advice would you give? We're out of time here, but I want to just ask you for business owners and individuals in general, Is there a certain piece of advice or thought you'd like to kind of leave them with? And then we can talk a little bit about how they can connect with you. Yeah. So I'd say my advice is get to know yourself more, even just a little bit better than you do right now, but then really know and understand the people you have on your teams. And then you'll be able to one, one, hopefully have a great business environment that everybody can succeed in. I actually, that's a great tie down that I really am glad you did because how can you really truly get to know your teams if you don't know yourself and just going through this process for yourself will give you that experience like you, you went into coaching. It'll give you that experience to put out to your team as well. And if you're a business owner, entrepreneur, you're trying to grow your business, it is all about leadership and growing a team. And so you got to start with yourself. So I really love that. what's the best way for people to get in touch with you? Because we didn't have a ton of time to dig into the book, but I want them to be able to check out your book, Becoming the Compass, as well as some other things. Should we just put in the show notes a link to your website? Is that the best way for them to connect with you? Yeah, absolutely. So if you connect with me at xlcoaching.net and book a call and you can schedule right on my calendar on a time that works good for us and we'll go from there. Perfect. Yeah. So listen, if you're listening to this show, I'll put it in the show notes. I'll get his website, some of his background and bio. But really, listen, here's the point. I do believe everybody needs coaching. I believe everybody needs that perspective you can't get by yourself. And so if this is a resource you feel I'll help you, jump into it. But I ultimately want to just double down and really make sure that no matter who you are listening to this, no matter where you are, it's never too late to start creating that life that you are meant to live. The one that you want, your best life, the one where you're happy, fulfilled, you're focused on your strengths. And take some action. Do some things today that are going to help you take things to the next level. And do me a favor and share the show. If you share the show, other people will learn and grow, and you'll be helping everybody out. I'd really appreciate it. I appreciate you spending time with us here today. Hit me up on The Daily Mastermind on Facebook, Instagram, and I'm glad you spent time today with Ryan and myself. We'll talk with you soon.
