Managing Uncertainty Podcast: Episode #21 - I hope you dance

We’re asked a lot about how to interact with senior executives – how do you make the elevator speech, for example. It’s not at all unusual for us to come in and make exactly the same points that an internal team is making to their executives, but the executives listen to our point of view, because we’re the outside experts.

In this episode of the Managing Uncertainty Podcast, Bryghtpath Principal & CEO Bryan Strawser and Senior Consultant Jennifer Otremba talk preparing for that executive conversation – the need to have the elevator speech ready, but more importantly – having the courage to have the conversation that you really need to have when that moment of truth arrives in your career.

In other words, I hope you dance. Don’t be the wallflower.

Episode Transcript

Bryan Strawser:                   My first one on one with the CEO at our former employer … so you walk in there, and there’s this expansive office and a beautiful view, and he was grumpy, which I think he was grumpy most of the time.

Jen Otremba:                        Fancy suit.

Bryan Strawser:                   Fancy suit, but anyway, we sit down and we do the nicety thing, and we’d known each other from some previous roles that I was in. But we get into this … we start the … I should say he started the discussion about the reason I was there, and his first question was, “I don’t really understand this business continuity crap, and I don’t understand why we need to invest money in it.” And I, to this day, don’t know if that was game or if that was for real, but at the moment, it felt pretty real.

Jen Otremba:                        There might be some realism in it.

Bryan Strawser:                   There might be some realism in it.

Jen Otremba:                        I mean-

Bryan Strawser:                   But he looks … and then he just looks at me. So here I am in the moment of truth, right? And we’ve talked … you hear about this situation all the time, the elevator speech, the coffee meeting where you have five minutes to talk about whatever. But this was real. This was real life. I had a grumpy CEO who basically just told me that one third of my job responsibilities he didn’t see any purpose in.

And I looked at him and said, “So, there was this labor strike, labor issues in the port in Asia that was on the front page of the Wall Street Journal yesterday.” He said, “Yes, I read that.” “I bet you didn’t know that our principal competitor, who also gets 80% of their product from Asia, just like we do, has an exclusive deal with that port that this labor strike didn’t interfere with the loading of their containers on ships.” “I didn’t know that.” “Well, wouldn’t you like to be in that situation instead of them?” “Well, goddamn right, I would.” “Well, we’re not, because we didn’t even know that.”

And then, I walked through here’s the continuity. Part of the continuity strategy is you’ve got to look upstream to your supply chain, and the ports are part of that, and blah, blah, blah, blah.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah.

Bryan Strawser:                   And then, we got onto more friendly conversation from there, but I think it was an eye opening experience for me from the standpoint of the interaction, but I think it was an eye opening experience for him, because nobody had ever had this conversation with him before.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah. So what we’re getting at here is we get a lot of questions at Bryghtpath about, how do I interact with executives? How do I sell my programs?

Bryan Strawser:                   How do I sell my program?

Jen Otremba:                        How-

Bryan Strawser:                   How do I get what-

Jen Otremba:                        How do I help?

Bryan Strawser:                   How do I get what I need?

Jen Otremba:                        How do I help them understand the importance of what we’re doing here and what’s really needed to have a well functioning business?

Bryan Strawser:                   And usually, where this conversation starts with is, of course, as typical consultants, we use the Socratic method, and we turn this around into a question of, “Well, what have your interactions with executives looked like previous to this?” And what we typically learn is one of two things. There isn’t any, which is probably the most typical answer.

Jen Otremba:                        Step one.

Bryan Strawser:                   Or, “I met with them, and I explained my credentials and why they should listen to me,” and I just laugh. And I’m like, “Well, that’s not going to work,” because-

Jen Otremba:                        No.

Bryan Strawser:                   They don’t care.

Jen Otremba:                        Everyone has credentials at some level.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right.

Jen Otremba:                        It doesn’t matter.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right, and I think to some extent, while we believe in professional certification-

Jen Otremba:                        Absolutely.

Bryan Strawser:                   And we hold numerous professional certifications.

Jen Otremba:                        We’re not discrediting that.

Bryan Strawser:                   We’re not discrediting this at all. That is definitely more of a qualification to get you in the door to a job or a certain job.

Jen Otremba:                        That’s an HR discussion.

Bryan Strawser:                   It’s … yeah. Waving that at your CEO is not going to work.

Jen Otremba:                        Right.

Bryan Strawser:                   If you had had that … If I had used that as, “Well, you need to listen to me because I’m a master business continuity professional,” I probably would’ve been shown the door.

Jen Otremba:                        Right. While that is a valid-

Bryan Strawser:                   While that’s a valid-

Jen Otremba:                        … certification.

Bryan Strawser:                   Absolutely.

Jen Otremba:                        And that’s great.

Bryan Strawser:                   Edit out Bryan slamming the coffee mug into the microphone.

Jen Otremba:                        While that’s important, to have that certification and to understand that and the importance of that, it’s not what’s going to have that conversation with your CEO. That’s not what’s going to lead that discussion.

Bryan Strawser:                   So what happens at this level, I think important to think about, is if you’re the one having this discussion with your executives, your senior … your C-suite folks, then you are probably the lead subject matter expert and leader of your program.

Jen Otremba:                        And he probably … or she probably already knows that you have a certification.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right.

Jen Otremba:                        Or a master’s degree or whatever.

Bryan Strawser:                   Or what have you.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah, credential spread.

Bryan Strawser:                   Hopefully you’re on their radar screen in some way, shape, or form.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah.

Bryan Strawser:                   In a positive way. But what we’re really starting to look at here is this is the interface between the Smee and the business leader, right? So you have to start this conversation before you even get to the conversation by understanding your business and how your business of business continuity or crisis management or crisis comms intersects with the strategic objectives of the organization that you’re a part of. So what is your company trying to do? Where’s your growth? What’s the mission? What are the key initiatives, and where does your subject matter expertise fit into supporting those overall business objectives? Because that is the connection to your senior executives.

Jen Otremba:                        And I think even beyond that, because every executive may have their own set of goals and objectives-

Bryan Strawser:                   Absolutely.

Jen Otremba:                        … that align with the company’s.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right.

Jen Otremba:                        But understanding what that specific leader is looking for to reach what goals that they’re looking for and understanding how you can fit in with that is going to help you, as well.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right.

Jen Otremba:                        Not just the big company.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right.

Jen Otremba:                        But that individual person.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right, but if you can’t translate what your team does, what your program does to that overall business strategy, it’s probably not going to be a very good conversation for you. You have to really show the connectivity and understand how to speak the business language of your business in order to make those connection points, because if you’re talking about something crazy and you’re in the nuts and bolts of your BC program, and you’re talking to your CEO or CFO or COO, that … I’m not sure that conversation’s going to go well.

Jen Otremba:                        So ultimately, what we’re saying is do your research.

Bryan Strawser:                   Do your research.

Jen Otremba:                        And be prepared, right?

Bryan Strawser:                   Right. I mean, you want your program aligned against business objectives.

Jen Otremba:                        Yes.

Bryan Strawser:                   So this should already be happening, but if not, then you really think about what that connectivity looks like.

Jen Otremba:                        And so what if that conversation is just had … and we talked about this a lot at our previous employer. You’re in, say, an elevator, or you just happen to be in a walk-by conversation with that leader. I think you should always be prepared to have something that you can talk about that will further drive that conversation.

Bryan Strawser:                   Yes. Recent initiative, new strategy-

Jen Otremba:                        They call it the elevator speech.

Bryan Strawser:                   The elevator speech, sure. I mean, honestly, you just never know when this stuff is going to come up, and I think that you want to constantly be postured to take advantage of that accidental run-in that allows you to do something, because you’ll be surprised at how many people are not prepared for that conversation, and this helps makes you stand out.

Jen Otremba:                        Right, and we’ve talked about this before, so it’s real easy to do this during a crisis, right? So-

Bryan Strawser:                   I’m bringing an incident to you.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah.

Bryan Strawser:                   I’m operating within my expertise. I’m hopefully explaining the crisis in terms of the overall business and the impact on the business, but I have a purpose to speaking to you, so I’m probably confident and I’m probably feeling pretty good about what’s going on, because I’m running a great program, and that’s great.

Jen Otremba:                        Doing good things, and-

Bryan Strawser:                   Those are easy. It’s a lot harder to go in and ask for stuff.

Jen Otremba:                        Especially when that stuff costs money in a world where money is tight for everyone right now.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right. I remember early in my tenure at our last employer that we’d identified a risk with some data centers, and there’s some things we needed to do in terms of better disaster recovery strategies. But it was expensive. It was very expensive, and we went in and asked for the money, and we got blown up. I mean, it just … we didn’t get out of the initial screening committee. And that’s okay. To be fair, there were other priorities, and maybe this wasn’t the right one to pursue at that particular year.

And then, six weeks later, we had a major incident occur involving this actual risk. And I had the random encounter. Like, we knew about this, and we knew … we were working through the process of dealing with this problem. But I had the random encounter with our general counsel, which is who we brought it up to later that day, who said, “Hey, Bryan, I just heard about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Any idea what we should do to mitigate that from happening again?” Well, yes. Here’s what we had proposed that got shot down, and this was the cost. And just real high level, but that solves the problem by doing this.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah. Probably not a good time to say the “I told you so.”

Bryan Strawser:                   Nope. I never once-

Jen Otremba:                        Me either. Also not a good idea.

Bryan Strawser:                   Okay, maybe I brought that up after we got the money to other people.

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah.

Bryan Strawser:                   But I was ready for this, because I figured, as bad as this incident was that occurred, somebody’s going to either formally or informally ask me about this. And I just ran into him near the elevator, and we walked to get coffee, and I walked through this in about three minutes. We got all the money. I mean, how could you not?

Jen Otremba:                        Right, at that point.

Bryan Strawser:                   The whole thing just kind of fell apart on us.

Jen Otremba:                        Right.

Bryan Strawser:                   But that’s … I think that’s the idea of … you have to be prepared, and you’ve got to be ready for that conversation at any point. It has to be couched in a way that goes back to, “How do you support the business?”

Jen Otremba:                        Yeah.

Bryan Strawser:                   In those conversations.

Jen Otremba:                        Yep, and sometimes, it is just fostering that relationship between you and your execs and building that trusting relationship so that they do look at you as a subject matter expert and they do look at you as the sort of voice of knowledge in a certain area.

Bryan Strawser:                   Right. I think it also goes to that there’s this idea that I think we’ve heard before that credibility’s like a bank account, and you always want to be making deposits in that. It’s the same thing with your executives, that your credibility with them is a constant process of building upon that credibility by making deposits, by telling the truth, by being direct, by making sure your team performs. And you lose … you take money out of that kind of credibility account when you do dumb stuff as a leader.

Jen Otremba:                        And don’t do dumb stuff.

Bryan Strawser:                   Don’t do dumb stuff. But like, waving your certification at an executive is an example of dumb stuff. I mean, it will cost you significantly in that credibility bank account that you have.

Jen Otremba:                        Yep. Not telling the truth, not telling the whole truth … all of those things will also do that.

Bryan Strawser:                   Well, I think just being … I think we had a leader at our last employer a while back that I thought, for all of his faults, was really accurate about the fact that you just got to keep it real.

Jen Otremba:                        Yep.

Bryan Strawser:                   And what he meant by that is, just be direct about your observations and findings and your advice on what should happen. You’re going to be surprised how many people walk into your CEO’s office and blow smoke up their rear end. That’s not what they’re looking for. They need people hopefully like you that are going to go in and be honest and direct about what’s going on, and they need that. They need that source of truth that will be honest with them.

Jen Otremba:                        Yep, and I think understanding you may not get what you want right up front, like you experienced that.

Bryan Strawser:                   I never got what I wanted.

Jen Otremba:                        Of course.

Bryan Strawser:                   Not up front.

Jen Otremba:                        But if you are open and honest and direct, eventually, it will come around. But you have to build that relationship.

Bryan Strawser:                   So hopefully, here, we’ve given you some advice on how to deal with executives. Be up front. Be prepared. Be direct. Make it about the business. Tie your business back to the strategic objectives of the company and just be yourself. These folks come in. They get dressed the same way you do in the morning. They’ve had the same hiccups and burps and accidents and missteps throughout their career as you have, and you’d be surprised at how big of mistakes some of these folks have made before they got to where they are.

Jen Otremba:                        And we can help provide advice around this area, and we have with many, many clients, so-

Bryan Strawser:                   We do. Good luck.