Remote Feedback Essentials with The Leadership Consortium’s Kristin Smith - ep. 082

Join us for an engaging episode of the Remotely One podcast as Kaleem Clarkson sits down with Kristin Smith, Director of Business Development at The Leadership Consortium, live from the Transform HR conference in Las Vegas, where they share valuable insights around feedback in a remote work setting.

Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, Kristin's journey from retail executive to leadership development expert has been nothing short of remarkable! With extensive experience at Nordstrom and Saks Fifth Avenue, Kristin's transition to a fully remote work environment posed unique challenges, particularly in providing and receiving feedback. She shares insightful strategies for navigating remote feedback, emphasizing the importance of clear communication and leveraging various platforms beyond Zoom.

Discover how Kristin's Leadership Consortium is revolutionizing leadership development with its interactive remote programs, featuring top-notch professors from renowned institutions. From live interactions to peer coaching sessions, the consortium offers a comprehensive approach to leadership education.

Learn how Kristin fosters connection and collaboration within her remote team through innovative initiatives like co-working spaces and daily stand-up meetings, underscoring the significance of intentional connection in combating isolation and enhancing productivity.

Don't miss out on the fun as Kristin shares a surprising chapter—her stint as an undercover police operative during her high school days! Join us for an insightful conversation filled with valuable tips, inspiring stories, and a touch of humor as we explore the evolving landscape of remote work and leadership development.

Learn more about Kristin:

• Kristin’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristin-smith-tisdale-8b615389/
• The Leadership Consortium: https://www.theleadershipconsortium.org/

Transcript

Kaleem: 0:35

All right, so we're here in the booth. Back here at Transformer in the Tandem booth. Shout out to Mel and the team for bringing everybody here. Shout

Kristin: 0:43

out Mel! I know, I got the tattoo and everything! Aw, she's tatted, baby!

Kaleem: 0:47

She's tatted up! So, um, our guests today. Our guests today, they're originally from Cleveland, Ohio. Shout out to LeBron from there. That's, you know, shout out to the Browns. Shout they currently reside in Brooklyn. Shame on you. We need step. Sorry about that. Can't help it. But she currently resides in Brooklyn. She's a graduate of the Ohio State University.

Kristin: 1:14

let's go.

Kaleem: 1:16

In her previous career, she was an executive in resale retail stores. What were some of the retail stores that you worked at? Guest?

Kristin: 1:24

Oh. Two, two big retailers. The one who taught me everything I know today is Nordstrom. Um, And then I would say had the pinnacle of my career at Saks Fifth Avenue, leading the flagship store. It's just a

Kaleem: 1:35

little department store. No big deal. No big deal today. They are the head of. business development for the leadership consortium, which is a leadership acceleration program. So you have to check that out. Last but not least. She used to do a little undercover police work, but we're gonna talk about that a little bit later. So listeners and viewers, please give a warm welcome. To Kristin Smith! Let's go! Woo!

Kristin: 2:08

I just heart you so much for that. We had

Kaleem: 2:10

to get the intro. We had to do it. It's what we do. It's what we do. You did it well. Well, so much for doing this, Kristin. The first question that I would just love to know. We're in a tandem group. Yes. So we gotta give a shout out to tandem. We have to ask the question about so you like remote work has impacted your ability to give feedback, for the better or for the worse. What are some challenges? I mean, what are some tips?

Kristin: 2:35

Yeah, I certainly was on the challenging side. As you know, is being retail. We're face to face always right on. And so for me, I have spent most of my career. In person with all of leaders, my director reports. So getting feedback was so crucial to our success and it was always immediate and it was likely always in person. And so transitioning to the leadership consortium where we are a fully remote team, it was challenging for me because I think I was yearning for constant feedback. And so feeling this energy. Yeah.

Kaleem: 3:13

So you're definitely. in person,

Kristin: 3:16

give it to me. And like, I also feel like it was important for me to take ownership to that. I needed to take ownership and understanding with my boss and saying, Hey, I need this feedback. That

Kaleem: 3:27

is called responsibility. It's the R in tree and the remote employee experience. Responsibility. Thank you. And that was not a setup. She did that on her

Kristin: 3:34

own. Well, it was important to me, right? I, you know, there was a, I always say it's the owner's manual. So I think, especially in remote hybrid, or I should say in remote work, you need your owner's manual. And my owner's manual, especially for feedback, was that I needed it. And then I also learned of the ways I needed to deliver it as well. So, I don't think it always needs to be on camera. I don't think Let's talk some more about

Kaleem: 3:58

this. Because everybody feels like cameras have to be on. I feel like sometimes it's great, but talk a

Kristin: 4:04

little bit more about that. Yeah, I feel like some of my best conversations, especially with my leader, was when it was on the phone. He picked up. You know, maybe after something happened and it was quick and it felt more authentic than having the camera off and be like, let me deliver feedback to you. I can still feel her authenticity coming through, during the phone conversations. And then I think also when you are in a fully remote team, the moments you go in for co working and the moments you go in, that's when you can really deliver some probably more meaningful, maybe impactful feedback where you can get that in person. But I think leverage all the different ways. You know, whether it's zoom or whether it's on the phone, but sometimes I think zoom, you can read too much into people's body language at that time.

Kaleem: 4:52

You're actually trying extra hard because you're like, Oh, I need to. To get some of this body language that I'm not getting in person. So you're really kind of analyzing it. Sometimes when you analyze it, you're closing off. Yeah.

Kristin: 5:04

You're not listening, noting you're not listening, you're not receiving it. And sometimes when you're just listening to someone, you can feel the authenticity coming on the phone. So I don't, I don't just say that it has to be on Zoom. We need to be watching, we need to like put it on 15 minutes. I need to give you feedback about X. And I also would say is positive feedback should be frequent, you know, really reinforcing the behaviors that you see. Well. Frequently, right? We call them at TLC Scooby Snacks. So how often are you giving people Scooby Snacks and reinforcing the behavior that you have? But how important is

Kaleem: 5:35

the reinforcement and the frequency in a remote setting? Is it, do you feel like it's even more important or less important?

Kristin: 5:42

But I think that goes back to like the owner's manual. Like for me, if you're going to tell me like, Hey, that was great. Let's do more of that. Or, Hey, let me redirect the behavior. That motivates me. That gives me direction for. It forces me being in a silo and not having to rethink what I might have interpreted to be the wrong way. So I think feedback is important. I think it could just be in multiple different forums. You know, whether that's email, whether that's on the phone. I think, I mean like, you can obviously tell a quick phone call goes a long way. It

Kaleem: 6:14

goes a long way. Meetings. We actually have done some walking meetings. We get the walk. You can turn the camera on your phone and walk around. I've been to conferences before. Shout out to Michaela Pietro, where they had a walking session. So interesting, right? It was a

Kristin: 6:33

walking session. It gets you thinking. It's creative. You're less stagnant. You're not on defense mode. You're in that receptive mode to receive the feedback, too.

Kaleem: 6:43

So, that's such a good nugget. Not very many People have talked about turning the cameras off. So with that said, what is it that you're trying to do over at the leadership consortium? Could you kind of talk to our audience about what is it that the organization is doing?

Kristin: 7:05

Yeah. The leadership consortium is a leadership accelerator program that focuses on three exact leaders. So we work B2B with organizations. I'm really leaders in three specific in teams and leading the content. We do live inter um, Multiple different professors from different areas, but largely from, I would say top notch schools we bring in Francis Frye, founders. Shout out t Um, so Francis Fry and her partner, Ann Morris, they have a podcast called Fixable. I listen to it every single Monday. Yes. Check it out. And so they started it with the idea to help accelerate people specifically from historically underrepresented groups. So our content is to give the education. So we bring Amy Edmondson, many different, um, leaders to our program. And then we do a community piece. So those organizations who bring their leaders to our program, they also get like a mini, peer coaching with one another. So they workshop current issues that are hitting their desk today. They do speed networking, and many of our participants experience one on one coaching as they're going through our program. So leaders of our program. more confident. They're getting everything they need to know about finance, everything they need to know about operations, how to create safe spaces in the workplace. So, yeah,

Kaleem: 8:36

wow, that's fascinating. We gotta check this out. Harvard teachers get a chance to work with them. So since March 20, most of the world has experienced some part of how has remote work and workplace flexibility impacted ability to teach people?

Kristin: 8:53

Well, our program is fully remote. So, all of our participants meet us via zoom. So it is a virtually taught interactive experience that they're having. We have always been a fully remote team. So at the start of it, obviously since the professors don't meet us in person, it is fully remote. I think personally, from my experience, I was running stores, I was in person, so for me. Transitioning personally to a fully remote team was challenging. I used to be in person connecting with people and now I am in a zoom box. I am in my home. And so I had to personally adjust. So now,

Kaleem: 9:31

do you, do you personally take on the responsibility for connections? Do you personally take on, cause you're right, you know, you have to adjust, you have to notice maybe that there's some, maybe some isolation, you're not connecting as much. So what is it that you kind of do to help alleviate some of those challenges? Because I can tell you're a connector.

Kristin: 9:51

Yeah. So what do you do? I mean, you know, one of the things I think our CEO does really well is create spaces where you all can come together. So we do co working spaces, which sounds weird, but we just come together and we just work next to each other.

Kaleem: 10:08

There's probably not even talking, not even talking, just sitting next to each other. Just killing it,

Kristin: 10:13

but it's cool, but it's really cool. And it's like nothing on the agenda. It's like, It's really for us just to reconnect, and it's nice to just recharge. So, as you meet humans, you really enjoy, like some of my colleagues are like introverts, and they're like, this is a lot of energy that I have to produce. And I'm like, oh my god, I want to meet with all of you guys. Tell me more, tell me more. And they're like, please stop. We're done with people. But it's good, and it's a good balance. And then it's also finding the times where, we have a touch base every single day. We commit to, we call it our stand up. So we meet for 30 minutes a day. Well, I should say 30 minutes a week. Every three days. And then one day a week we have a, which we call a family dinner where we all come together and like really have an opportunity to workshop ideas that we're working on. So we always kind of have that, that togetherness, you know, no matter what, whether or not I have something to present or not present, I always have an opportunity to see those, those humans.

Kaleem: 11:06

You got it. You got to build connections, intentionality, and it sounds like the CEO is very intentional with that. So last but not least, the most important question, how did you get involved with this? Undercover police work. Okay. Now you got to tell our audience, like, give us a timeline, however you were, you were doing this and what did you do

Kristin: 11:25

specifically? I don't know, but you've already labeled me as a narc.

Kaleem: 11:29

That's not true. Kind of. Maybe. All right.

Kristin: 11:32

Here's a short story. I was, um, a junior in high school. Okay. We had these undercover cops come in and they were like, this is a This is what we do and what, what person does not think it's undercover cop is super cool. It's super cool.

Kaleem: 11:45

You're like, Oh my gosh, I want to wear a leather jacket.

Kristin: 11:48

So we had this program where they got a grant from the state and they would leverage underage children. To go into the convenience stores and retailers and buy cigarettes. And then if they did not card us and they sold us the cigarettes, they would go in afterwards and cite them. All those small

Kaleem: 12:12

businesses in Cleveland, Ohio.

Kristin: 12:20

I don't know what the win is. You're like, yes, I want to come back and make the cops proud, or like, yes, convenience store for Cardi B and not giving it to me. I don't, I don't know and I will not give you the stats on it. Listen, you

Kaleem: 12:31

know what? You know what? You did some great work for our society. You know what I mean? You did great work for the public, so so much. And you're doing great

Kristin: 12:39

work, continuously. Thank you, yeah. And you are as well, too. Thank you,

Kaleem: 12:43

Well, thank you for coming. Really appreciate it. And come back anytime. Awesome.