Leadership as part of the Employee Benefit Package: A Conversation with Bob Gaydos, CEO of Pendella

Bob Gaydos, CEO of Pendella, proposes a very compelling idea. And one that I am fully on board with.

Bob suggests rethinking the traditional employee benefits package. In addition to helping offset the cost of medical and dental, Bob argues for earmarking money for annual employee professional development.

Why?

This can help employees enter leadership roles earlier in their careers and ultimately, enhance the culture and likely, the output, of an organization. 

Until next time, communicate with intention and lead with purpose.

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Transcript

Dr. Leah OH: 0:00

Today on the communicative leader Bob Dido's, the CEO of Pendella explores whether the prospect of leadership should now be offered as part of an employee benefits package. We chat about providing extra training to help staff enter leadership roles earlier in their careers. And as Bob puts it, considering how to create a benefits package that your partner will brag to the neighbors about. Just think about a workplace that not only says it values leadership, but actually provides funds to every employee at every level for professional and personal development. Hello, and welcome to the communicative leader hosted by me, Dr. Leo Lillian Hodges. My friends call me Dr. O. I'm a professor of communication and leadership communication expert, and the communicative leader. We're working to make your work life what you want it to be. Bob, thank you for joining us today in the communicative leader. And before we dive into the ins and outs of your view of leadership. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself specifically, what brought you to your career and this passion for leadership?

Bob Gaydos: 1:15

Well, I've always been a little bit of a crazy entrepreneur, starting early in life. And you know, if you're going to be an entrepreneur, you've got to persuade people that the crazy vision in your head is a reality. Right. And by definition, that means you've got to lead people. And as you started leading people, you realize that you need to teach leaders because you need people to be able to, you can't do everything yourself. Right. Now, you know, I've done Believe it or not, I've been involved in 17 startups in my life. That's incredible. Yeah. And along the way, I found a way to get married, have four kids have 12 grandkids, be a coach be a teacher. So leadership, and teaching leadership just became a part of who I was really, you know, through the 80s and 90s, as I was building some of my first businesses. And especially when I became a coach. When you're becoming a coach, you've got to figure out, you know, who can do what on the team who can contribute? Where can they contribute? How should they contribute? Who's the leader of the team, who's the captain of the team? But you know, also maybe who's captain of a part of the team? Yeah. So it's been a hell of a journey that has taken me to where I am. And it's kind of kind of crazy to look back at and think of it, but that's how I got here.

Dr. Leah OH: 2:45

Yeah, thanks for sharing that. I was I was just thinking while ago that I've learned as much or more about leadership after becoming a parent than I did in my masters and PhD. So if those faculty members aren't listening, but like you say, yeah, the Little League coaching for sure, all these different personalities and parents as well and figuring out how to navigate that.

Bob Gaydos: 3:10

Because no question that being a coach, I spent probably 10 years of my life coaching and all the way to varsity level and you programs. I was a catechism teacher for 10 years. When you're coaching and teaching, and you know, trying to get groups of individuals to pull themselves together and accomplish something, you really are learning how to teach leadership, how important leadership is how to find out a whisper in their ear to tell them this is when asked to step up to the plate now.

Dr. Leah OH: 3:42

Yeah, and role modeling the whole time even, it's not so easy. Oh, thank you. So we know about your background in this clear passion and experience and leadership. Can you help us to understand your idea of leadership being offered as part of an employee benefits package? What is it Why do you see this as being important?

Bob Gaydos: 4:04

Well, the biggest reason I think it's important is, look, all things follow demographics. And there is a massive demographic change underway in the United States and unprecedented you'd have to go back into the early 1900s, the emigration to find the demographic change as big as what's underway. Certainly, you can look at it just from age demographics. And you can see that, you know, we have 74 million boomers, and there's only 50 million Gen X. And then there's about 75 million millennials and about 70 million Gen Z. Well, that just creates a problem from a business aspect. Okay, which is that there are simply not enough Gen X to replace the boomers. Now, by definition, your veteran leaders are probably in your probably boomers because they've been in your business or they've been in their trade or in their skills for 3040 years. And that's how they, you know, they did it they mastered it. So if you're not going to be doing deliberate about trying to figure out how you're going to fill the void when they leave. And then a lot of times, they don't want to leave, they just want to go to part time, you're gonna have a problem. Because there's not enough people in the Gen X to naturally come up and replace, right? So really grew out of that. And I've been spending a lot of time, a lot of what I've done actually, last 20 years is kind of built out of the anticipation of what was coming, and the 20s and 30s when this happened. And that gets compounded when you, you know, not a lot of people talk about when they talk about demographic change. And it really, there's also the fact that a lot of the immigrants who have now are coming, right, and their children, you know, I was the son of an immigrant family, right? My grandfather barely spoke English, and I didn't know how to speak Slovak. And that's underway here. And what does that mean? And are we just gonna, as business owners, depend upon the schools to do it? Well, that's not going to happen. Okay. Are we going to recruit leaders? Are we going to train leaders? And so recruiting a leader is an expense, and it's risky. They might not fit your culture, they may not be who they thought they were. Right? Wouldn't it be easier to just train leadership? Wouldn't it be easier to just look down to, especially with millennials and Gen Z that are coming up, and I find that millennials, especially fascinating, because they have been through hardships, they, they've been through 911, they've been through the financial crisis, or 2008, they've been through COVID. And they should be really good leaders. Okay, because of the hardships they went through, if you look at Gen X, they want to know, hardships. You know, they grew up in the 70 days in 90, which was pretty much cruise control life, nothing. I can't even think everything went bad in the 70s 80s and 90s. Right. So don't just stand still. And, you know, manage what's happening, this is definitely a massive demographic change. You've got to take action. And if you're an why not look at it, like a benefit. And what I mean by that is, if I train you to be a leader, I have given you a life time benefit. I have given you a skill that is with you for life. If I give you a dental plan, not with you for life, yep. Okay. And so that's really where it came from. There's all of that thinking. Yeah,

Dr. Leah OH: 7:32

I love the incredible foresight and looking at demographic shifts, decades before, we've, you know, encountered this, which I think is pretty common to say, Oh, oops, we're here. Now, what do we do, and in train to ever think of organizations as dinosaurs, in some ways, because they're hard to move that can be really slow, and reactive, and to that idea of training within, and I know, we're going to talk about this, but when we're, we're teaching leaders when we're helping them to grow, that has a direct impact on the culture and how it feels to work in that organization.

Bob Gaydos: 8:11

100% Think about the positivity that comes

Dr. Leah OH: 8:13

directly. Yeah.

Bob Gaydos: 8:16

First of all, you're connecting, let's say you've got a Boomer and a millennial, or even a Boomer and a Z in the business. Yeah, you're connecting them. Yeah. And in a way that they're going to learn from each other. Mm hmm. I can only have a positive effect on them and on the culture of the business and and on the productivity of the business. Right. Because by default, that Boomer is going to give skills down to that person, right? That are going to benefit the business and of course, benefit that person, and really have an immensely positive impact on culture, no doubt about it.

Dr. Leah OH: 8:54

Yeah. And all, I think, to the organizational knowledge that stays within the organization, instead of walking out and going to competitors, or other industries, as well.

Bob Gaydos: 9:04

Well, I'm gonna dive in there for just a second. Yeah, I think a lot of businesses don't spend a lot of time using that term organizational knowledge or institutional, corporate Corporation and existing company, it's a living entity it has, it has an intellect to it, it has a knowledge to it, that is just happening, right? It's just happening. And a lot of times, if you don't focus on it every day, it ends up just kind of becoming a bunch of bad habits. And, you know, it's like one of the things I have from a coach is look, every your life is nothing but a habit. The only question is did you choose, choose the habit or choose? Okay? Again, by doing this by deliberately instilling leadership programs, and I realized that everybody's gonna want to be a leader, and everybody's supposed to be a leader, and so maybe there it's more skill training, whatever. You're giving an opportunity for the kids but it has to ask itself why it's doing what it's doing, which is the best question it can ask every single day of the week. And that, yeah, that not that knowledge is being transferred. It's also being questioned. Okay, when I would go be business owners along the way, I did a lot of business consulting to along the way it was. I just love to ask them the question, why do you do that? Even in packages, they would say, well, we pay 50% of everything. Why? And they would. They didn't know why. Because there was some decision they've made 20 years ago.

Dr. Leah OH: 10:31

Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah, so true. It's about my next question. We've kind of hit on this. But for you, either in your experience, or kind of the way you're conceptualizing this, what do you think organizations and workgroups? What might they look like? If all employees had consistent access to leadership training while they were a member of that workplace?

Bob Gaydos: 10:57

Well, first of all, it would have, it's got to be a very deliberate, they gotta build this, okay. It has to become just part of what the company is as to become an all in one thing, this is part of we're gonna, our we're going to like, actually, we'll start as this I would say, I'll get down to your part of the question in a second. But one of the things I used to say to the top people running any company was I need you to tell me exactly how much money you're spending on every single employee, not their wages, how much money you're spending on the employees on everything, everything you can think of, from from the and couldn't. Okay, yeah, I need you to go do that. Because then I need you to dedicate a piece of it to something that is really structured and positive. Okay, that is here forever. And is done all the time. Not once a year? Yeah. Okay. So that's where you got to start. There's a line item, to be able to build the program and market the program, right. Like, one of the things I tell people is, you could have an awesome program, let's say you build the most awesome leadership program. But if you're not promoting it, it's not going to happen. You need to promote it. Sometimes employers are afraid to brag about the positive things that they're doing. Right now. Some employers are great at it. Yeah. Not all. Okay. It's like, you need to brag about it. Okay. But it would be very structured. Okay. There would be funds dedicated to it. There's the opportunity for individual coaching. So you'd have a contract with a coaching company would do individual coaching, coaching, okay, you would tell them, hey, you get to spend four hours a month inside of this, okay. There's a curriculum you'd literally would build? Yeah. One of the things I would say, though, is to them is this is about return on an investment. Okay? Because if, if you get if you tell me everything you're spending money on the employees on there's a lot of things you're spending money on that have no return, like zero return, you do because you have to. Yeah, okay. Like I want to put health insurance in that category. No, Wayne and health insurance, a stop looking for a win there. There's not it's a social contract, you gotta meet it. No matter what you do, they're gonna hate it. It's gonna be a win. But it's got to be structured, structured and marketed and embedded into the company, and a habit of how you onboard people, habit of how you review them. Okay. So it's kind of a long winded answer to your question.

Dr. Leah OH: 13:35

No, I love I love that structure aspect because they think leadership is one of these words like health, like it is very ambiguous. It means something slightly different to all of us. And I think an organization many organizations say, Sure, come here, be a leader. But if you're not able to tell me what that means, or on the flip side, if you say, you can have a coach Lea, you can meet with this coach every month, I would, I would sign up, I would like to be a part of that organization.

Bob Gaydos: 14:06

I think it's a great recruitment tool. There should be a lot of times people say, Well, what if I teach them to be a leader and and they just end up leaving, right? They're gonna leave just so we're clear. Yeah. There's no such thing as a golden handcuffs anymore. There's no such thing as a lifer anymore. They're gonna leave in the next two to four years anyway. But usually when people leave, it's because they don't feel appreciated. Actually, not about money, necessarily. And so if anything, this is a good investment and appreciation. Okay.

Dr. Leah OH: 14:38

I agree. Yeah. And having employees feel valued and seen and invested in and you know, all of the research is suggesting that's what we're looking for at work. So, but we've talked about this idea of integrating leadership into an employee benefits package. So to you personally, what do you see as a good Employee Benefits package now in 2023?

Bob Gaydos: 15:04

That's a great question. One thing I see evolving, and I like it, and it kind of fits into this whole idea. You know, there's, the names have not established, but I'm gonna go with the lifestyle account. You know, 20 plus years ago, I was a founder of an innovator early on in the industry of carrot counts, when HRA is an HSA. He's an FSA is just right. And as we learn how to move that money through those accounts, we were just absolutely chasing tax deductibility. Now, those companies are realizing, well, wait a minute, maybe we can let them have funds and spend those funds and dedicate those funds to anything, and it doesn't necessarily have to be something that is, you know, I'm gonna like say, well, here's $2,000. And, you know, you can spend X amount of money on whatever, and maybe there's a tax effect, and just let me know, or whatever. So I really like where that's evolving. Because what it's what it's doing, it's breaking the insurance thought process. I, you know, we have spent in this country, way too much time thinking that employee benefits are insurance. Okay. And then the amount of mental effort inside benefits that goes to health insurance is absurd. Okay. So I like this idea of lifestyle accounts or breaks the mentality and it makes the employer then say, okay, you're it gets them to the point of what I was talking about earlier, which is I got to think at a budget, as soon as I say lifestyle account, the employer is forced to think of a budget, this was the thing of the budget, then you start thinking about allocation. And as soon as you're thinking about that, then you can go, okay, yeah, it does make sense to allocate some of that money to leadership. And it doesn't make sense. So let me give this other money and let them do what they want with it. Right. Maybe it's important for them to, to spend it on daycare or to spend or whatever. I spent on the gym. And before I wasn't let go and do it because I was worried about the tax deductibility. Who cares about the taxes? Just build that into the budget. When I buy a car, I don't worry about the fact that it's got a tax to it. I just put the tax and the payment. Exactly. Yeah, I'm gonna buy this car because it's got 6% tax. Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's what the industry was doing for is every well, we won't do that, because it's not tax deductible. Okay, so I love the movement towards lifestyle accounts, you have these companies that are doing it. But a lot of the CARICOM companies are not following that path. I think that has a lot. And it's breaking the employers mind away from insurance and moving it towards budget, which by definition moves it towards return on investment.

Dr. Leah OH: 17:52

Yeah. Yeah, that's incredible. When you were talking about that, my, my favorite benefit I had from a previous job, it was a service called Best upon request. And they were I was working in a large hospital, then I was doing my PhD at night. And you could go in and ask them to do anything. Say, here's my syllabus, can you buy these books for me, and they'd have my credit card on file, or here's my dry cleaning, I didn't do this, or I'm at work in this meeting, to go let in the service person into my condo. I mean, it was a game changer. And certainly Dental is great and medical, but to have someone assist me in that way. And the organization is good at saying this is how much it costs us to provide this tool. It was not a small fee. But it was something that greatly improved at least my work life balance ability, then

Bob Gaydos: 18:48

go into why does an employer do what they do? Is it supposed to be an employee benefit? Yeah. Was supposed to be employed. Okay. And so it's this kind of innovation, what you're just talking about the lifestyle account? Yeah, it's making the employer rethink the money and the return. I mean, you know, for years, I would tell employers, let me tell you the worst investment on the planet health insurance. There's no return. Yeah, I'm not telling you not to do it. That's not what I'm saying. Yeah. But you keep plowing all your money into health insurance and then wondering why nobody likes you. Yeah. Yeah. Don't start there. Yeah. someplace else. Okay, pick a number 1000 $2,000 out of that budget, and go, What can I do to give them something or let them have the money and do something that makes them feel appreciated, that has a return that is truly a benefit? Okay. And by the way, by definition then has a fixed expense. No, it's not subject to three times the rate of inflation. Yes.

Dr. Leah OH: 19:54

Exactly. Yeah. So you're thinking about ways of disrupt Doing and rethinking approaches to employee benefits. So, with that in mind, Have you received any pushback or criticism maybe from other senior leaders, HR, other stakeholder groups, that

Bob Gaydos: 20:13

really early, you know, as an innovator, you know, it's like, I had a business partner with me 20 something years ago who said, you know, Bob, you're such an innovator that sometimes you're the scout that's so far out in front, you look like the enemy. And there's no question that I'm very early with, right? And the immediate pushback is, is actually always the same, which is, well, I'm just training them for a skill set that will have them leave me. Right. And you have to say to them, yeah, that they're gonna leave. Yep. Stop picking it up and keep these people forever? That's not the question. The question is, how can you make them feel appreciated while they're here? Can you make sure they contribute to the company while they're here? Yeah, positive way. This is a fabulous way to do that. And then you just end up with a budget issue at that point. Now, you're only talking money, because at that point, it makes perfect sense. Now we're just okay, how do we do this?

Dr. Leah OH: 21:15

Huh? Yeah, I like that. So really, pragmatic way of looking at that. So of course, I'm on board with this idea. I'm a leadership communication scholar. But I've been thinking about that very transactional employee, the employee, my dad was one of these, and this is why I was thinking about this. Because like, Leah, they call work work for a reason. You know, he would punch in at nine and punch out at five. And that's how he saw work. So what would your messaging be, to employees with this mindset?

Bob Gaydos: 21:48

Well, that's why I think in a way, it probably is best to put leader maybe find a way to put the leadership into a lifestyle account approach, because then it's an option that you're going to just sell really hard, because you want them to have it, right? Look, you can't some people are afraid to be leaders. And that's perfectly fine. Some people maybe don't want to be the skills, some people that the job is truly just a job, not a career, and that's fine, you're happy to have those people's, you have to have those people. Okay? And you can't make them feel forced to be doing it. So if it was inside of a lifestyle menu of like, Here, here's $2,000, we're going to dedicate and the are the five things you could do with it. But one of them is this program, hey, if you choose this program, we're going to take $500 from your account, because what you're doing is you're just subsidizing it that way. And you're making it appear that they have a choice. Oh, I don't, I don't want to do leadership program. But I can take that same money and go do something else with it. Yes. Okay. So I think it needs to be in this lifestyle account.

Dr. Leah OH: 22:50

Yeah, I think you're right. And I'm we're tapping into employee autonomy and agency, and all of these things that make people feel valued you. You are giving me the opportunity to make my own decision with this. I mean, that's phenomenal. Right? Yeah.

Bob Gaydos: 23:06

Well, there's no question. I mean, look, one of the things I think, in the world right now, when you're hiring employees, and you're running a benefit program, we're doing anything. Personalization is a big part of it. I mean, we live in this world where everything is now being personalized to us. So if if you're not bringing that personalization aspect into the benefit program, then you got a problem. I think, I think that, you know, the HR world wouldn't call the HR people, it's probably more than technology is significantly behind on its ability to do this. You know, I said to somebody yesterday on this exact topic, retail and banking are so far out in front on understanding that that data is how you personalize the experience to that consumer. Well, that data is how you should be personalizing the experience to the employee. Yep. And so suddenly giving them choice, convenient choice, personalized choice is actually part of the package. Right? And, look, I know that, you know, we were obsessed with health insurance choices when the ACA passed, but that really has never panned out to the way it was supposed to be. So stop thinking that that's where the choice is going to be. It's got to be someplace else. Right? But giving them the ability to personalize the benefit plan to them, too, because we all come in different shapes and sizes. You know, are you a 30 year old single mother, are you a 50 year old? empty nester, right. I mean, who are you and giving the ability for them to personalize as part of that?

Dr. Leah OH: 24:42

Anything especially that loops back into your forward thinking with the different demographic groups? You know, that millennials and Gen Z's it is look at who I am. Acknowledge that you see me and that individual approach speaks directly to that.

Bob Gaydos: 24:59

Yeah, that's gonna be You just absurdly true as Gen Z comes into the market, having grown up, you know, and I would even say they grew up with technology. They've grown up in the social, they've grown up in a social media world. Technology was a given. Yeah. Okay. And your ability to personalize your world inside of social media is absurd. Right? Yep. And, and all the borders go away. Yeah. You can decide that, you know, hey, I love this particular thing. And then you can find 1000 Other people across the world that want to talk to you about it didn't work in the past, because there's only one guy in town that had the same thought you have. And there's no more borders. And this is the world they've grown up in. Yeah. Right. And they're gonna come in, and they're gonna come into the workplace, and they're gonna expect that same thing to be there so differently. And it's a funny story is like, years ago, when my, my daughter graduated from college, this is quite some time ago, and she took a job someplace, and she sent me a picture of her phone of the computer. It was they were still living in Dallas. Oh, wow. And I was like, I think I took the wrong job. Yeah. rethink the point of the story is that they're going to arrive at your business. And they're going to very quickly establish whether or not this is the culture and world that they expect. They live in. And if you're, if you haven't seen this coming, and you haven't started the adaptation, you know, it's the great Peter Drucker line, I use this one too much. It's absurd, which is you can't manage change, you can only get in front of it. So you got to get in front of this, or you're gonna lose because those talented there of course, we all want to bad mouth is younger generation. Of course, there's talented people out there. And they're not going to come work for you

Dr. Leah OH: 26:53

know, exactly, yeah, yep. These are not the conditions in which I work, right. So with that in mind, let's think about retention now. So we know like you said, there isn't the golden handcuffs anymore. And we would be silly to think about lifers. But how do you think that employee retention might be impacted when we integrate leadership options or lifestyle options into a benefits package?

Bob Gaydos: 27:22

It has to help. And again, it goes back to we kind of talked about earlier, which is appreciation, feeling things, feeling valued? Right? I think that that's the biggest thing you can do to retain an employee right now. It's, we've spent a lot of change in the way that people think about their jobs now, from a way that COVID made us all realize we could live virtually that way, I don't need to live in San Francisco to work in San Francisco, live in Iowa. And get out of that. And I think that so it's not you know, it's it's no longer necessarily about the money, it's no longer necessarily about the benefit package of insurance. Okay, I think that retention is very much about that they feel valued, feel appreciated, of course, they share the mission of what you're doing, they can feel that you're in the mission, what you're doing. And so, again, having the situation where the people that have been there for 10 years, or have 40 years of talent are now engaged, people that are 20 years old, don't have that experience and talent only only thing that can come out of that as a positive. Right? You know, when I put together the current company, I deliberately mixed veteran talent with younger, inexperienced people. Because I saw the value in both things. I needed the veterans, because they understood the market, they understood the game, they understood the product, how it works. But I needed the people who were young and had no idea what the game was, because they would see it differently. Right. And that that was where it would come together and make change. Right? And but if I'm gonna put an internal leadership program and involved that, okay, then that's happening, I'm actually creating a culture of having the guy who's, you know, 22 years old and one year out of college and doesn't know much about the industry at all, interact in a really meaningful way with the veteran who's been in the business for 30 years.

Dr. Leah OH: 29:43

Yeah, that idea of mentoring. And I think to what happens if we don't if we're not intentional with making these connections is we have all these little silos which we know emerge naturally. But that's a way to break through those to get rid of Some of those artificial boundaries and again to spur innovation. Yep, exactly. So we've looked at employee retention and Obama, how do you see satisfaction and just the general work environment being impacted by these lifestyle accounts?

Bob Gaydos: 30:18

Well, again, I see nothing but positive, but then again, you know, I'm going home. Okay. I just think some of the reason I think it's nothing but positive is that the past is just not that good. I spent an enormous amount of my life, banging my head against the traditional Employee Benefit wall of health insurance, dental and vision in life or whatever. And I really, you know, I started thinking, probably as early as 2008, this exam, okay. There's just no way that this is the future of Employee Benefits. I understand we can't abandon them, because we don't, you know, we don't. It's a social contract. And ACA didn't work out the way it was supposed to work out. But this is not in any way, shape or form. It's all it is, is a complaint problem. Yep. There's no one. Very rarely are people thanking their employer about an employee benefit of insurance. Right. Yeah. So finding anything else that you can give them? Yeah, that makes them say thank you. Yes. Yeah. Yep. Okay. And I don't think it takes a lot of money. In comparison, this is kind of funny. You know, man, I've been in this business a long time. Back 30 years, if you were spending $3,000 a year on an employee benefit package, you thought that was way too much? Yeah. Now, we're spending 20? Yeah, maybe 30 or so telling them to take two or 3000 of that 20 or 30,000. And do something innovative? Hard, you know, a number grew so big. Yeah. And, you know, if I said to take, if I told you 20, even 20 years ago, take 10% of the money 10% wasn't that much? Need to take 10% of money? It's a lot. Yeah. And you can do something significant with it. That is going to make them feel valued, make them feel appreciated, make them say thank you. I used to one of the lines, I used to tell the peoples we were trying to innovate. And we were innovating with consumer driven 20 and 30 years ago, I said, I want to make something. I want to create a benefit that makes my wife tell the neighbor about it. Yes. Yeah. My wife can't will never tell you anything positive about the health insurance. Division. Oh, yeah. I want to benefit. She goes and says, Man, you should see this new benefit.

Dr. Leah OH: 32:43

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Does that we've won. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that is a really neat way of thinking about it. And very tangible tools that we want to go share. Yeah. Because there's pride then too, right. And identification. And you know, which loops back we've been thinking about retention and how it feels to work in an environment. So. So Bob, I have two final questions for you on the communicative leader. We like to leave our listeners with leadership or leadership communication tips, and very pragmatic, what can we do now or think about now, in order to make our work life what we want it to be? So what is one tip or suggestion you have for those who are formal titled leadership positions?

Bob Gaydos: 33:29

Well, I've said it a few times, but I'm gonna say it again, commit the funds. But just not the more important than that. Okay. Just do it. Don't tell me that you can't find$2,000 Doesn't Don't tell me that. Yeah. Okay. I used to say things like this to the employer sometimes and the leadership. You just told me that you pay 70% of the health insurance. That defaults to make it up $50 a week to the employee health plan? Yep. Face 65 Mm. They don't even know you pay 70 or 65. Was the payroll deduction is and whether that payroll deduction is 50 or $55. They're still gonna hate you. Yeah, exactly. Yep. So you might as well make it 55. Yeah, you have the $2,000. Yeah. dedicate to a quality benefit. That gives you a return. Mm hmm. Yeah. Commit the funds, just do

Dr. Leah OH: 34:26

it. Money talks. And then the last question, so we think a lot about formal title leaders want to think about employees of all ranks across industries. What are a tip or a few tips that are related to being a leader, whether they're titled or not, that you would, you know, you would like all employees to be mindful of?

Bob Gaydos: 34:50

It's probably what I used to tell players when I was coaching. Now that I used to say to them, leadership is actually a sign and not granted. Okay, if you've got the skill set just step up, yeah. Okay. When you walk into that room, and there's 10 people, eight of them are waiting for you to take the leap. Okay? Don't wait for somebody to give you leadership, behave behave that way. Even if they even if you don't get the title, behave that way. Yeah, look, you got to do it in a good way. You can't be a jerk about it. You've got to learn how to be persuasive and follow that. But leadership is not granted. It's assumed. Yeah, yeah. Even as the top leader in a company, when you suddenly realize you need a leader, what do you do you look around the room and try to find what is me acting like a leader? Yes,

Dr. Leah OH: 35:54

exactly. Yes, that is I love how you think about that, because I always coach people that your communication is the yardstick that others use to make sense of you as a leader, right, your abilities as a leader, and that ties directly into that

Bob Gaydos: 36:13

question about it.

Dr. Leah OH: 36:14

Well, Bob, thank you so much for joining us today on the communicative leader. It's really been a pleasure.

Bob Gaydos: 36:20

Well, thank you for having me.

Dr. Leah OH: 36:24

All right, my friends. That wraps up our conversation today. Until next time, communicate with intention and lead with purpose. Looking forward to chatting with you again soon on the communicative leader.