The Magnetic Leader

Roberta Matuson: Well, the book is for both. It's for anyone who wants to increase their ability to attract top talent that will stick around, and we know that those leaders who really excel at this are the ones that are promoted more rapidly than those who don't. If you look around and you see the people who are moving up in the organization, it's those people that have a strong group around them and those people are willing to go above and beyond the call of duty on behalf of their leader.

Rachel Salaman: Now, at the beginning of the book you say that one of your goals is to make the workplace more human. In what ways are workplaces not human at the moment?

Roberta Matuson: Well, you know, everybody today has so many tasks and so many responsibilities that leaders today, they're just trying to get through their day. And they forget that the people that are helping them get these tasks done, and getting the results that they need, also are human, and that they're not machines, and that they need that human touch.

They need to know that their boss values them. They need to know that they are contributing to a higher purpose. And so we've got to this place where you could just replace them at a moment's notice, and that's not really working well for the average employee.

Rachel Salaman: Your book, as I mentioned, is called "The Magnetic Leader."How do you describe magnetic leadership?

Roberta Matuson: Magnetic leadership is when you become so irresistible that people come to you. And so when you have a job opening, you make an announcement on LinkedIn™ or you tell your friends, within hours you've got a group of people reaching out to you, saying, "Hey, we hear you're hiring, we'd love to have a conversation." And so it is really those people who make it a point to have a strong personal brand and are extremely visible, and people like them.

Rachel Salaman: What are the benefits of being a magnetic leader for the leader themselves, and for his or her team and for the organization as a whole?

Roberta Matuson: Well, if you think about it, unemployment in many parts of the world is at record lows, and if you are trying to fill any job right now it's incredibly difficult to do that. And so my advice is spend a little more effort on your retention, because it's just crazy how hard it is to find the right people to staff your organization. And if you don't have the right people in place then you as a leader are not going to be able to achieve your objective. And it's not going to look great as far as you being a leader if you're not achieving the objectives that you have agreed upon with your company.

Rachel Salaman: And it can get expensive as well, can't it, for the organization if there's a lot of churn?

Roberta Matuson: It's extremely expensive. In fact, on my website, matusonconsulting.com, I have a free employee turnover calculator that your listeners can go look up and put their own numbers in and see exactly what it costs every time somebody leaves.

Rachel Salaman: So this is really important. In the book, you make the point that people aren't born magnetic leaders and it's something we can all learn. But isn't it true that some people have a natural bent towards some of the traits you're taking about and so, by extension, some people may find it more difficult to develop those traits?

Roberta Matuson: Yes, but some people find it more difficult than others to learn how to ride a bicycle, but eventually they master the skill and they go on to race professionally. So it is something that if you really want to do it, you can do it, you just have to be fully committed.

The first area that I see the most difficulty in is when we promote people into leadership roles who really don't want to be in a leadership role, and they feel like they have no choice but to say "Yes" when they're tapped to be a leader. You know, you cannot teach people desire and if they don't want to be in that job, no matter how much training you do, they are not going to be an effective leader. And you should let them know that it's OK if you want to be an individual contributor, it's OK, we've got a spot here for you, and then move on and find somebody who really wants that job.

Rachel Salaman: One of the striking ideas in your book is that leaders should have term limits. Could you talk a little bit about that?

Roberta Matuson: I think it's really important because a lot of times people get burnt out, and they stay in the same job and they are no longer creative or innovative, and they are no longer giving it 110 percent. I think it's great when organizations have rotational programs where they move their leaders into different positions in the organization so that their people can grow, and it becomes a much more energetic organization than some place where you've had the same leader for 20 years.

Rachel Salaman: Now, if I was an HR manager I might say, "Yes, but think of the extra work, moving people around every seven years," or whatever it is. What do you say to that?

Roberta Matuson: I would say that it is a heck of a lot more work to keep filling those jobs of the people who are leaving that manager who has basically, you know, is on remote, he's doing the same thing, he's on autopilot.

Rachel Salaman: Fair enough. You also believe that employee engagement programs don't work. So what kind of thing were you thinking of, and can you give us an example?

Roberta Matuson: Well, I see the problem is trying to treat everyone the same, and equal is not fair. You have people on the team who are giving a heck of a lot more than others, yet when it comes time for raises they're all getting the same percentage, and so in our effort to be fair we're treating people in a way that isn't fair.

You really have to figure out what your people want specifically, what's going to speak to them in their heart in order to really fully engage them, and we don't do that.

So here's an example. It's very common to give away sports tickets at companies – the Red Sox game, the Patriots. Well here's a news flash – not everybody likes sports. So taking the time to figure out that my employee loves the theater, why don't I give him or her two tickets to a Broadway show that's coming into town. That would really mean something rather than two tickets to a football game that he doesn't want to go to.

Rachel Salaman: OK, so you would just seek to reward individuals on a personalized basis?

Roberta Matuson: That would be one thing, yes.

Rachel Salaman: And what other ways – let's say you were looking to engage a team of 10 people. What are some good ways to do that?

Roberta Matuson: Well, I think it depends on the team and what they're seeking. What happens in organizations today is that people really lose sight of what their purpose is and why they're there and why the company is in business, and as leaders we really have to connect the dots.

We have to demonstrate to them that if we went away tomorrow, if our department didn't exist, if our company didn't exist, that it really would matter. So it's really again that personal element and putting the puzzle pieces together so that they feel like their work is meaningful.

Rachel Salaman: There's a section in your book about the open office and the problems of so-called "cube farms." You say you'd like to see them abolished. What would you replace them with?

Roberta Matuson: I would replace them with private offices, or I would replace them with allowing more people to be able to work from home. All these companies are putting their managers out in the middle of this chaos, and you can't have a private conversation with one of your employees and if you go into a conference room to have that conversation, the rumor mills fly.

It's just crazy, I don't know how anyone gets work done. Everybody wears headsets so that they can concentrate, yet the whole idea of these open office environments is to stimulate conversation and innovation, yet we've all got our headsets on.

Rachel Salaman: I suppose it was also about saving money, because you could have a smaller space. If you gave everybody individual offices, you would have to have a bigger office, wouldn't you?

Roberta Matuson: I don't know, I'm not an office designer, but I completely agree with you, it is about the money and I get really agitated when the CEOs say, "Oh, we want people to work more collaboratively and more..." No you don't, you're trying to save money. And then in the meantime you have managers leaving because they are like, "Oh my gosh, I can't hear myself think, there's loud music playing." It doesn't work for most organizations.

Rachel Salaman: Let's take a closer look at the seven traits of the magnetic leader that you go into in some detail in your book, starting with the first one, which is authenticity. Now this is a word we hear a lot about these days, but doesn't the value of authenticity depend on the leader being a good and fair, generous person? If someone is critical or self-absorbed or even lazy, he or she would surely benefit from revealing less of their true self, not more.

Roberta Matuson: Well the way I define authenticity – and I interviewed dozens of people that I thought were magnetic leaders – I asked them, what do you think differentiates you and other magnetic leaders? And it really came down to being who you are.

So, for example, let's just say you are a little prickly, you're a tough boss but you're fair. Well, if you're consistent people will appreciate that, they won't have to worry, "Well which version of Rachel is showing up today? Is it the nice woman or is it the woman who is going to hold our feet to the fire, who's showing up?" And so, when you're authentic, people know what you stand for. They're never wondering, "Well what does he really mean?"

Rachel Salaman: So even if you do have traits that people find difficult, at least they know it's you and you're consistent and it might even be justified.

Roberta Matuson: Exactly, and if they don't like it, they'll go work for someone else. But you do have people who will stay because they like the fact that their boss doesn't BS them, they know exactly what's going on.

Rachel Salaman: The second trait is selflessness. Could you give us an example of what you mean by that? What does that look like?

Roberta Matuson: Well, they put their people before themselves, they give their people opportunities and don't worry that maybe one of their people is going to pass by them as they move up the organization. They don't worry, "Oh if I do this and I give John this money, I'm going to have less of a bonus." They take care of their people first.

Rachel Salaman: And in all your work that you've done with executives, how common is this trait, selflessness? Do you see it a lot?

Roberta Matuson: I do, I do, because when I do executive coaching I usually get to work with the top echelon. I get brought in to work with leaders who are pretty darned good but they want to be better, and so I get to see how, day in and day out, they are willing to put their own needs aside in order to help their people grow.

Rachel Salaman: Your third trait is strong communication. What does this look like, and how much does it vary with the size and the type of organization?

Roberta Matuson: I don't think the size of the organization impacts a leader's ability to be a strong communicator. I mean you could be a strong communicator at a company like HP or you could be a strong communicator at a start-up. I mean it's the person's ability to communicate clearly and to speak to an employee in a way that works for that employee.

You know, we've got five generations in the workplace right now. I just did a course for Lynda.com, LinkedIn Learning, on the generations in the workplace and I was talking about the fact that we do have five different generations and that the communication styles do differ.

So, for example, I'm a baby boomer. I'd rather just, if you want to have a conversation with me, pick up the phone. If we're not in the same building, pick up the phone, stop with the texts already because we could have resolved this issue in like one minute. Whereas a younger person, a millennial, they're like, "Why are you calling me, I don't answer my phone, send me a text." So you have to figure out what is the style of communication that works for the people on your team.

Rachel Salaman: So could it be, for example, that you have one message and you find yourself doing perhaps five different kinds of communication just to make sure that it gets through in the right way to the members of your team? So you might be doing a video message, you might be sending emails, you might be doing a face to face meeting.

Roberta Matuson: I think you might vary it, but I'm the boss, so I'm not communicating five different ways. In my book "Suddenly In Charge: Managing Up," I talk about how you, the employee, are going to have to adapt your style to your leader. Eventually you are going to have to figure out, maybe you love the text but I'm not going to send you texts every time, sometimes we're going to have these gatherings that we call meetings.

Rachel Salaman: Am I understanding from you, then, that there's a little bit of give and take, so on the one hand the leader may adjust, may add to their style of communication, but on the other hand they expect a little bit coming back from the employee to adapt as well?

Roberta Matuson: Right, and a strong communicator would say to an employee, "Listen, I get the fact that you love texts. I'm going to tell you right now that is not the way I communicate so I am going to need you to check your emails once a day," that kind of conversation, because I will be sending them and I will expect that you will be reading them.

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Rachel Salaman: The fourth trait of the magnetic leader is charisma. What tips do you have for people who may not consider themselves to be particularly charismatic?

Roberta Matuson: Well, I think they may be more charismatic than they think, and so I would ask a trusted advisor, a coach, a close friend, for some feedback: tell me what you think I do really well. I am trying to increase my charisma; on a scale of one to 10, where do you think I am right now?

Let's say they say a six and then you're like, "OK, well what would it take for me to be a 10?" And they'll give you some feedback, "Well you know, if you stop talking about sports all day, that would be good, or maybe if you read the Wall Street Journal and you were a little more worldly, people would be more interested in what you have to say."

Rachel Salaman: You must be quite brave, don't you, to ask for that kind of feedback?

Roberta Matuson: I'd sure as heck rather hear that from someone I trust than to have my boss sit me down and say, "Listen, we've got a problem here."

Rachel Salaman: So you just have to identify the right person who can perhaps give you that really important feedback, but in a tactful way that isn't too painful to hear?

Roberta Matuson: OK, so now you have the information, right? I'd rather have that than walk outside with an outfit that I think is fabulous and everyone's like, "Oh my goodness, this is so not the right look for you." I'd rather have somebody tell me privately before I show up at an important event thinking that I'm dressed as a 10 and I'm like a four.

Rachel Salaman: So then comes transparency. Could you spell out the difference between transparency and authenticity, because they are somewhat related, aren't they?

Roberta Matuson: They can be. But transparency is when you're in a situation where suppose you know that your company is going to be going through a major reduction in force, and you have an employee who comes to you and says, "I am so excited, I finally found my dream home."

I've had this happen to a friend where she went to her boss, who was the owner of the company, so he knew what the finances of the company were, and she said, "I'm going to buy a house, I'm so excited." And he let her buy that house, and two weeks later he let her go because he didn't have the money to pay her.

He could have easily said to her, if he didn't want to open up the can of worms, "You know, why don't you wait a few weeks? My sense is things aren't as stable as we hoped." I mean you can signal, you can send messages in a different way so that that person doesn't make a commitment that is going to impact them for years to come.

So that's the kind of transparency, just being really open and honest. Yes, I get the fact that you can't say, "You know, we're going to lay off half of our staff next week," but you could say, "You know, I'm kind of advising members of the team to not make any major purchases until we get through this next quarter because, well, you never know."

Rachel Salaman: Another trait of magnetic leaders is vision, which is something a lot of people struggle with. What are some ways for leaders to develop their vision for their organization? What have you seen work for people?

Roberta Matuson:I think you have to surround yourself with the kind of people who are visionaries. You have to attend events where you're meeting people who could perhaps become a mentor to you, somebody who is known in the industry for thinking big, and you have to let go of some of your self-limiting beliefs, like, "Oh, I don't have a lot of vision." You have to stop saying that and you have to start looking ahead and seeing what's out there and educating yourself so that you can be in front of things rather than behind.

Rachel Salaman: And should the vision always be coming from one person or is it sometimes a team effort?

Roberta Matuson: Well, I think it's tied together. It's sort of like, here's the vision for the organization, here's the vision for my department, here's my vision for you. I mean it all has to be integrated. We've all seen organizations that are floundering because they don't quite know who they are, and you don't see people jumping from their jobs to go work for this company, for a company that's in chaos.

Rachel Salaman: Yes. So the seventh trait that you pull out in "The Magnetic Leader"is resilience. What are your favorite and most effective ways for leaders to build resilience?

Roberta Matuson: You know what, you are going to have your ups and downs and I think every time you're down and you pick yourself up, you build resilience. I think at the end of the day you must charge through, I mean if you want that job. Sometimes you're going to get to the place where you think, "I don't want this job any more," and that's when you have to step up and go to your boss and say, "I don't want to be in leadership any more, what else have you got?"

You know, you've got to understand that if you look at some of the top leaders in your own organization or in others, they're resilient. When they have a bad quarter, they don't say, "Woe is me!" They're like, OK, let's get the troops in alignment here and let's move ahead full force. And if you get one bad performance review, OK, great, now you know what you need to work on. You can't go into your corner and cry and go, "Oh my gosh, it's the end of the world." It's like OK, now I know what I need to work on, I can only go in one direction.

Rachel Salaman: So in your view should leaders attempt to develop all seven of these traits simultaneously, or what's the best process to follow?

Roberta Matuson: You know, I'm a huge advocate of moving one or two things forward a mile rather than seven things forward an inch. So, I would take the one or two things that I'm pretty darned good at, that I could be really, really great at and I would start there. I would get myself up to the great level and then after I'd mastered that, then I'd go back and say, "OK, what are the next two things I want to work on?"

When I coach people, we don't go through these seven things. It's like OK, let's pick the one or two things where you have the most potential for growth and let's work on that.

Rachel Salaman: In the book you talk about the importance of developing a personal brand. What exactly does that term mean? In other words, what's the difference between a leader with a personal brand and one without?

Roberta Matuson: It's really a reputation: what is your reputation in the marketplace? I'll give you an example. Last night a woman who I have a ton of respect for, who is the VP of communications for a very well-known company, posted on Facebook – because we're friends – that she had gotten a call yesterday from the White House to go work in the White House.

She said "no thank you" in a very nice way, you know it's an honor to be asked, but I'm really happy where I am. The point is: oh my gosh, what an honor to even get a call from the White House. So she has built her personal brand, people know who she is, she gets calls every day to go and work for different companies.

Rachel Salaman: Without going into specifics, how would you say that she and others like her, have done that?

Roberta Matuson: She's very articulate, she has executive presence, she does a lot of media, she does a lot of television, she has this unbelievable style, she's really a magnetic leader. You think, "Oh my gosh, I'd love to work for her." She's very authentic, she'll tell you exactly what she thinks, she doesn't BS.

Rachel Salaman: Right, I see, so it's kind of like you say, it's about reputation and that can be built the usual ways?

Roberta Matuson: You have to toot your own horn to be heard in a sea of cubicles, and what's remarkable about this woman is that women in particular have a really tough time doing that, you know, getting noticed and letting everybody know how great they are. They rely on the fact that their work will speak for themselves and it never does, or rarely does.

Rachel Salaman: Now you point out that once a leader has developed his or her magnetism, that it's really important to sustain it. So what are some ways to do that? I suppose this links in with the previous question.

Roberta Matuson: Well, you sustain it by mentoring others. You sustain it by being out in public, by offering to speak at an industry event, speaking on college campuses where young people can see you as a leader and will reach out to you in a year or two and say, "Hey, I saw you speak at our marketing luncheon, we'd love to come in and talk to you about an opportunity to work with you."

You have to remain visible, you don't just become magnetic and then disappear. You get quoted in the media, you write articles. I mean today you can publish on LinkedIn, anybody can publish, anybody can write an article, so there is no excuse. You can't be like, "Oh I've never written, no one is going to publish my work," as there are so many places now that are in need of content that for free, anyone will take your work.

Rachel Salaman: We've covered a lot of ground in this discussion. What, to you, are the one or two most effective takeaways for leaders who want to become more magnetic, starting today?

Roberta Matuson: I think it's really hard to do this alone and when I say that, it's like right now I can't see what the back of my head looks like. I mean I hope it looks great but I have no idea, and so I would highly recommend you either find a trusted friend, engage with a coach, somebody who can gather some feedback on your behalf, and can show you what you are doing really, really well and highlight those areas where you could use just a little bit of tweaking.

Rachel Salaman: Roberta Matuson, thanks very much for joining us today.

Roberta Matuson: My pleasure.

The name of Roberta's book again is The Magnetic Leader: How Irresistible Leaders Attract Employees, Customers and Profits. You can find out more about her work at matusonconsulting.com. I'll be back next month with another Expert Interview. Until then, goodbye.