Lead with Virtue | Shanon Stallard

Jim Jansen

Today's episode is brought to you by Faith & Family Life Catholic Ministries, FFLCM. Their Pathways Formation suite of resources offers lifelong family-centered faith formation. Go check 'em out at fflcm.org Shannon Stallard, welcome to the EquipCast. How are you, sir?

Shanon Stallard 01:55

Very good. Thank you, Jim, and thank you for the invite, having me here today.

Jim Jansen 01:59

You are welcome. So Shannon is in New Zealand. We got to be friends I don't know, like about a year ago now. We were in a coaching class together and you are how many hours ahead? I don't know how many hours ahead, but it's tomorrow. It is the next day in New Zealand which is a little disorienting when you're trying to schedule something.

Shanon Stallard 02:19

Indeed.

Jim Jansen 02:20

And the seasons are different. We're talking about that too. The seasons are different. You're just starting spring, and we're, at the time we record this, we're just starting fall here in the States in Nebraska.

Shanon Stallard 02:29

It's probably one time of the year where maybe it's slightly similar because we're in between seasons and the weather doesn't quite know what to do, does it? It feels some days it feels like autumn and some days it feels like winter and summer, and I think autumn and fall and spring are a little bit like that, aren't they?

Jim Jansen 02:45

Yeah, it's like the only overlap. 'Cause we were talking about this, like all of the liturgical calendar tends to subtly maybe presuppose a European or Northern Hemisphere schedule. But you're like gonna celebrate Christmas in the summer.

Shanon Stallard 03:02

That's right. Yeah.

Jim Jansen 03:03

You celebrate Easter in the late fall.

Shanon Stallard 03:05

In the fall. Yeah. Easter is supposed to be about new life, that springtime, isn't it? So maybe we should swap it around. Maybe Easter should be in December and we do Christmas in uh, April, May, around that time. How does that sound? The church needs to flip it.

Jim Jansen 03:18

Put a memo on that, see if we can get Pope Leo to like... I mean, it is funny. I think you could make a case for Christmas maybe with okay well, Jesus was probably born in the spring, right? That's when baby lambs are born. He's the Lamb of God. That's why the shepherds are out in the field. They're watching over their flocks giving birth. We could start a real controversy here talking about like adjusting the liturgical seasons and schedule to accommodate for our New Zealand brothers and sisters.

Shanon Stallard 03:44

But what's different for us is that Christmas period is our summer holidays, yeah? And it's in the middle of our summer holidays. And so for us, that's the time of family coming together, barbecue, people have multiple weeks off, like your summer holiday period. So that Christmas time and that holiday period is a real family time where it's an anchor to that summer holidays for us.

Jim Jansen 04:05

Oh, that's beautiful.

Shanon Stallard 04:06

People talk about the Christmas holidays being the summer holidays. They're called the Christmas holidays.

Jim Jansen 04:11

Man, that's really beautiful. And you guys aren't celebrating the 4th of July in the middle, so there's plenty of space. Do you guys have watermelon for Christmas? What are like the New Zealand Christmas food celebration?

Shanon Stallard 04:22

We have a famous dish called a pavlova which is like an egg white beated-up kind of a hard, like a meringue with a soft inside with cream on top, and then strawberries or kiwi fruit which you might just call kiwis on top of that. So that's the traditional dish, which by the way, Australians kind of stole, and they talk about it being their traditional dish . But it's a Kiwi thing.

Jim Jansen 04:47

That sounds so much better than fruitcake. Okay, i just need to come visit New Zealand sometime.

Shanon Stallard 04:51

But the other thing we have, Jim, is because we're coming at the end of spring, we have new lamb. So a tradition in my family, 'cause I grew up on a sheep and beef farm, is a leg of lamb rotisseried on the barbecue. So Dad would kill the lamb a couple days before Christmas . Butcher it up, and we'd have a fresh leg of lamb for Christmas Day.

Jim Jansen 05:11

Wow. Okay, so have you ever had like... 'Cause, you know, pork is often a bi- a big thing for pork and turkey for like American Christmas which I don't know if is seasonal. Yeah, I feel like we just need to go on like a food tour.

Shanon Stallard 05:23

We don't so much have turkey. Turkey's not a big thing in New Zealand at all. We don't really farm turkeys or have turkeys, so just have old chicken. But ham is quite big at Christmas too. So cold ham, sliced cold ham.

Jim Jansen 05:35

But cold. Oh, that's hilarious. Wow. Okay. Shannon, Tell everybody a little bit of your story here.

Shanon Stallard 05:40

Thanks Jim. Where to start? I'm very blessed to be born into a wonderful, loving family. My dad's a third-generation immigrant from England Anglican in faith. And my mom's a third-generation immigrant from England and Poland and is Catholic in faith. So my Catholic faith hails from Poland. And I've got four brothers, two older brothers, two younger brothers, and so being the middle child, you're either the neglected one or the spoilt one. And we grew up on a sheep and beef farm in the middle of nowhere really. We lived at the end of a no-exit road. And had a very blessed, peaceful upbringing with wonderful, loving parents.

Jim Jansen 06:19

Wait your home was the end of the road.

Shanon Stallard 06:22

Yeah, end of the road. The last kilometer of the road actually our farm was on both sides so, , you know, it's kind of like was our road.

Jim Jansen 06:28

Did your, ancestors, you said third generation immigrant, did they emigrate to farm?

Shanon Stallard 06:33

Yeah so, they both immigrated to farm. And , on my dad's side it's just been over 100 years. In July, last year was 100 years since they came, and so they sold up in England. So this is my dad's grandfather sold up in England and came to New Zealand and actually did a whole lot of odd jobs. The land that my father farmed on, my grandfather purchased post-war. Coming back from World War II, and there was a time where the men coming back from the war were given opportunities to buy into farming. And so he had farmed, but it was the first time he'd become a sheep and beef farmer. Was mainly spent time dairy farming doing milk. And my mum comes from a farming background of milk farming. So the kind of family traversed from dairy farming and to two generations of sheep and beef farming. And sadly , you got five sons, you think one of them would stay and take over the farm.

But our parents grew us up to go and see the world. So my eldest brother lives in France. He's married to a Polish woman, has five children. They are very connected to their Beatitudes Catholic community. So they've got a beautiful story because he was discerning to become a priest, she was discerning to become a nun. They met, and it was like The Sound of Music, ran away and got married. And then my second eldest brother lives in Australia, in Sydney. He married an Australian. And then I got two younger brothers that are in Wellington in New Zealand all married with kids so no one's left to take over the farm, so unfortunately the parents sold the farm and moved to some smaller land close by to where I live here in New Plymouth.

Jim Jansen 08:04

There's some rhyme. I think about my own story, just not that dissimilar, just immigrants, German, not Polish, but, coming to the heart of the States and homesteading and starting off. Shannon, what about your story? We know you're not a farmer.

Shanon Stallard 08:17

No, no, No. So I actually when I was 10 years old, my eldest brother joined the army, and he came back with all his army gear, and I thought, "Wow that's cool, man. I'm gonna, I'm gonna join the army." And then my second eldest brother, he went to university and studied law and commerce. And I was like, "Man, university sounds pretty cool, too." But I was like, "I don't know if I can join the army and do university. I have to make a choice here." But the recruiters in my last year at high school came to school, and they said, "Oh, we've got this officer selection thing where we'll send you to university." So I went into this officer selection board. I absolutely hated it and didn't wanna be selected, but they selected me. And so I was very blessed. I was sent to university with the army. I spent three years doing officer training in the officer cadet school, and then got commissioned an officer.

And I spent 12 years in total in the military in a number of different leadership roles and mainly in maintenance, support, and logistics. Towards the end of my career, I also got involved in recruitment, and I was the one going to schools and recruiting into the army. Towards the end of my army career the army had established an army leadership center, and that came off the back of A lot of exit surveys they were doing, people were saying they were leaving because of poor leadership. And that was a bit of a shock to the army because the army prided itself on good leadership, on leading people.

And so the army did a little bit of a study into this and said, "Look we realize that we train people to be leaders when they first join through Officer Cadet School, and then we just expect them to lead and know how to lead, and we don't really effectively train them post that." And so the establishment of the center was to help ongoing development of leaders. Towards the end of my career, got involved in this like helping deliver workshops and do some coaching around lead teams. And part of the reason why I went to recruiting and I did this is 'cause I started getting pretty serious into triathlons, and I'd started racing triathlons at a age group level. And then decided to take the leap to go professional, and the army was very gracious in supporting me to do that. But eventually that led me taking release from the army to pursue the professional career, and I spent two seasons racing in Germany, in Southern Germany, in a little town called Sigmaringen.

I raced for a club there, and then I did two seasons in the USA. I was based in Boulder, Colorado, and I traveled around different cities racing triathlons. One of my best results was in Ironman Canada where I placed fifth, and I represented New Zealand at the world champs for the 70.3. That's the half Ironman World Champs in Las Vegas, which was like the big show, which was pretty cool.

Jim Jansen 10:47

Wow, that's awesome. So the Army just recognized, your career as a triathlete was helpful for recruiting guys into the Army. They were supportive of your career 'cause they're like this is great. Now we've got a recruiter that has just a little bit of celebrity because you're a professional athlete, you're succeeding in triathlons." Shannon, I know, 'cause we've had some conversations, that some of the challenges you ran into as a triathlete were pretty impactful in shaping your views on leadership, changed a lot of your own trajectory. Can you share some of that?

Shanon Stallard 11:23

Yeah well, when you go professional all of a sudden what was a hobby now becomes your profession. And that's quite a significant change, and I didn't deal with that very well. I started looking around what everyone else was doing. Just being based in some place like Boulder, Colorado, where at the time many of the best triathletes in the world were based, you all of a sudden start to think you're not very good.

You can't keep up with them in training. How are you gonna be able to compete with anyone in a race? You forget that you're the 1%, you're the sharp end of the spear, and there's everyone else where you're not even the 1%, you're the .01% best in the world. You're placing 13th in a race, and that's not good enough. Often when I was doing the sport, it was like top 10, top five is where you needed to get to be in the prize money. And so I kinda started struggling with the mental side of the sport and the pressure I was putting on myself. And so, like I would with my swimming, biking and running, I had coaches to support me in that, and I was like I need a coach to support me with this mental game. And so I saw a sports psychologist and started working on the mental side of the game and got really interested in sports psychology. Then I started studying psychology myself, 'cause while I was doing the triathlon sport I'd spend five or six months overseas and then five and six months in New Zealand.

In New Zealand, I actually started doing a little bit of contract work in leadership development for an organization that had helped design the leadership framework for the army. It was a person in there had heard about me and said, "Oh, I hear you're, you're doing triathlons now. Would you like to do a little bit of work for us?" And so they trained me up in the Hogan suite of personality profiles and so I started doing some work around that. And so that got really interested in studying psychology, and so I studied psychology while I was doing the sport. And then that really led me to see that, man, there's a strong correlation between psychology and leadership.

And in many ways, being a good leader is partly understanding people, understanding what's going on with the mind. You first need to be able to lead yourself well. In order to do that, you need to understand what's going on with yourself in order to lead others well. And so a good leader needs to be a kind of psychologist 101, in many ways have an understanding of people. And so that pursuit of kind of I wanna understand psychology for myself and my sport lead me back to leadership and back to leadership development

Jim Jansen 13:57

Yeah. I just can't help but notice how... there's something incredibly objective about the leadership crucible that is being a triathlete. You're either able to perform your best or you're not and there's no like, "Well, it was good enough." I mean, It's just like, it's, it's, it's an intensely quantitative exercise in self-leadership. And this formed a lot of your convictions as well as the military too. I wanna talk a little bit more about some of the projects you did for the military, but maybe just at the outset here, for those who may not see the connection, I think there's a pretty strong connection between what church leaders can learn from the military because there's more similarities than it might seem.

There's a very clear central mission for the church, right? Make disciples, salvation of souls. There's usually a clear mission for the military. You could make the case to say the military is really high stakes. It's life and death." But I don't know if you get higher stakes than, like, all eternity. There's a lot in common. Obviously, there's some organizational hierarchical structure in common. Not in any way denying that there's some differences. We'll give our life for the mission. We don't take life for the mission. So I get it, there's differences. Shanon, what are some of the similarities that you see, and then what do you think the church can learn from the military?

Shanon Stallard 15:25

Yeah. Beautiful, Jim. God created nature and, we know grace perfects nature. And when you bring a group of people together the military's discovered, through war and trauma and turmoil that this is the best way to structure and do things. And I think in many ways we have a similar experience in the church.

Jim Jansen 15:45

Right. maybe what the military discovers in this, time of conflict intensity, the church has discovered over centuries. And we also had the advantage that the Lord just kinda set up the structure for us and handed it to us. But there's a wisdom there. These are tested structures, tested cultures.

Shanon Stallard 16:04

I guess the bit that I'd like to hone in on is the concept of leadership, yeah? And I think often people who aren't familiar with the military may get their familiarity from watching movies, and often it's not a full reflection of the reality of what it's like in the military. At the heart of leadership in the military is service and to be a servant to others. And as a leader you are serving a master and so there's a requirement for obedience to follow orders. That can be challenging at times, but there's a real humility in understanding I do not understand.

Jim Jansen 16:48

Hmm.

Shanon Stallard 16:48

Other people know more than I know, and I have an order, and I need to follow that order. And so there's a real humility of self in there, which can be very challenging at times, and sometimes that's not right and people need to listen to that and stand up against that. But in many cases it is that requirement to follow orders and to be obedient. And I think the reflection of that in the church is so similar. Yeah I don't understand this teaching of the church but I'm called to be obedient and to follow that teaching. And so I could educate myself to try to understand but I might be like St. Augustine who was trying to understand the Trinity and, was walking along the beach and the little kid taking the sea and trying to put the sea into a little hole in the beach, and he said, "That's impossible." And he said, "Just like you trying to understand the, the Trinity is impossible." We have limited capacity, and God may gift us with the ability to understand some of the teachings of the church, but I think sometimes we just need to be obedient to, to that teaching. So that's the first, I think, is that servant nature and that obedience.

The, the second is a little, is more in the case of how do we develop as leaders?

One of the lessons that New Zealand Army really learnt through their research and their formation of their leadership strategy and their leadership framework was how historically leadership development looked like. Look at this general, look at this colonel, look at this man and do what he did. Lead like he led, so we look at this kind of great man theory and said be like that. And so yeah there's wisdom in that. We can learn a lot about those particular leaders and what they did well. However, it's often difficult to translate what does that mean for me in, in my life right now?

Because often a lot of these great leaders lead in a particular time for a particular thing, and so it's hard to translate some of those principles to me. And then also at the heart of it, it's well- I often get drawn to great leaders who are like me, yeah? And, and so what happens is my strengths get strengthened to the point where they become my weakness. When, When in reality I should be studying great leaders who are nothing like me at all, and I should be trying to become more like them. And so this is something that I think that the military now is doing really well is helping people understand how do you develop versatility in your leadership?

And this is the ability to lead differently in different settings with different people because great leaders are versatile leaders. They understand the context in which they are leading in. They understand the people that they are leading and leading with. Because, no man's an island. We don't just lead a team and by itself. It's connected to something. And understanding that and then understanding what is required from me right now to lead these people in this situation. And that means in order to do that well, I need to make it not about myself because leadership's not about me. Leadership's not about the leader. And so it's about the others doing what needs to be done. And so when I've got particular personality or preference or traits, that's gonna lead me to lead in a particular way which I find comfortable and I like doing.

Jim Jansen 20:21

But it may not be what's needed.

Shanon Stallard 20:23

It may not be what's needed, yeah? And so in the military, and leading in the Army or the Navy and the Air Force you have a span of different situations which you lead across. Maybe more than any other profession because there are times where you need to be very direct. You need to be very straight, candid, say it how it is, and give orders. And there are times where you need to be listening, and you need to be empowering, and you need to be slow and compassionate in the way that you lead. There are times where you need to be really strategic in your leading.

There's times that you need to be really tactical in your leading. You need to be good at all of that to be a good leader. Now, there are times where your strengths might align with a really challenging situation where you are called to lead and you can lead well into that. That's actually quite rare. Those moments are rare. Most of leadership is needing to adapt to that situation and then having that good situational awareness to know how I should be leading, and then being equipped and having the ability to do that with good awareness of self and knowing myself well enough, knowing my own preferences.

Then to be able to use that but also know that this isn't gonna serve me well right now. Like a, a real crude example would be, if my personality, my preferences, my nature lead me to like, lead like a hammer banging in nails. That's I was really comfortable doing that, yeah? And most days I go to work, and what I need to do is bang in nails. And people love it. "Shannon's a great leader." Bang, day after day. And then one day I go to work and a bit of two-by-four comes along and I've gotta cut it in half. And in that change of that situation I'm a bit stressed. And because I'm stressed I'm like, "Man, what do I do?" I'll just grab the hammer tighter because I'm good at using this hammer, and I'll just beat it in half, yeah? Right At the point in time where I needed to put the hammer down and pick up the saw. And I needed to lead in a different way, which is gonna be a bit awkward 'cause it's not natural to me, but I could saw that in half and that's gonna be way more effective.

Jim Jansen 22:21

Awkward sawing is better than aggressive hammering for cutting a board any day.

Shanon Stallard 22:27

Yeah. And the more I do that, the more I can learn to do that, the better I'll get be at it, yeah? And so this is where leadership development happens is about where do you need to develop. You know your strengths. Let's harness them. Let's get good at the hammer. Let's keep on, let's not lose that. And let's also at a more holistic level where should you be leading to utilize that strength, so there is a gift in there. But actually don't neglect these other parts 'cause you're gonna need them. And so part of, the work that I do now is helping people identify this. Because that development requires you to find an experience to seek that out. And we call these heat experiences. Like, where would I need to lead.

Jim Jansen 23:08

Wait, sorry, what do you call the experiences again?

Shanon Stallard 23:10

A heat. They're a heat.

Jim Jansen 23:12

Okay.

Shanon Stallard 23:13

'Cause there's an intensity to them, yeah? And that, it's like there's an uncomfortableness. There, there's a degree to which I could fail, and there's consequences to that, yeah? And that's where development will happen, and that's where we'll get better. And when we say that, we pray, "Oh, God, help me with this certain situation," maybe it's gonna be a difficult challenge and you're gonna need courage. We know that God's often His answer to that prayer is to put us in situations where we need courage.

Jim Jansen 23:37

Yeah. And just like, but can't I grow in courage without, being afraid? It's like, no. Can't I grow in patience without somebody being annoying? No. Oh, Shannon as you talk about all this, my mind is I'm drawn back, to the great man theory of leadership, just look at what this great person did and emulate them. There's value there. We see that in like the lives of the saints presented to us in our spiritual lives. But yet at the same time, there's a diversity of saints that is presented to us.

Like we don't just get to focus on our own favorite saint that kinda reminds us. When we see the diversity, it helps us start to recognize how, in this case, sanctity can manifest in so many different circumstances, in so many different situations. And there's this kinda principle, the principles of sanctity, the principles of faith are rounding out the examples. And I think about like our parish leaders, how many different circumstances they face. You think about like our clergy just to give like the obvious example. Like priests are like, okay, they're in the room with people dying, they're preparing couples for marriage, they're overseeing the fundraising for the new building, and they're overseeing, the closing of the facility that we can't staff anymore. And, they're leading the celebration, they're leading the funeral of grief.

And just on and on, the diversity. They're having to manage staff, they have to set a vision. And now even more, I would say in a time of change where the circumstances have changed so dramatically that we're no longer living in a culture that supports our faith. We're living in this kinda Western world, post-Christian culture where the diversity of skills needed to effectively lead in the military or in the church, I'm hearing a lot of rhymes there.

Shanon Stallard 25:35

You got it, Jim. I mean, I'm very blessed to be able to support a number of priests with leadership development and leadership coaching. As a form of leadership, it has to be one of the most difficult because the requirement for them to be strategic, like here's a parish. Lead a parish. Have a vision, a mission. Where are we going as a parish? At the same time, they are the most tactical person. They are sitting, hearing confessions. They are doing mass. And so you got a leader here. Think of a general who also needs to dig the latrine.

Jim Jansen 26:11

Or like a radar operator, because the technical responsibilities to be a radar operator, you have to stay proficient. You have to have a lot of repetitions. You have to kinda study. There's a technical skill akin to, in this case, hearing confessions, preparing a couple for marriage. There's a lot of technical skill which would be like... A priest would be like, "Okay, in that case, they're in a technical technician space," but they're also like the general looking at all the big picture stuff.

Shanon Stallard 26:40

Yeah.

Jim Jansen 26:40

It's hard to do both things.

Shanon Stallard 26:42

And then the other challenge is like some priests are blessed to have, staff, permanent or part-time staff, but most of the people who are doing work are volunteers. And leading volunteers is one of the most challenging forms of leadership because at any moment they can go, " Oh , I'm not doing this anymore." And so often, there are ways to motivate people and people are often driven by purpose. And they may be able to overcome poor leadership and have a degree of compassion and to lead through it. But that's no excuse for poor leadership. And so good leadership is so important because we are trying to encourage and lead volunteers to give of their time in the service of the parish and the church.

Jim Jansen 27:29

Let's pause right here for a quick break to share a resource with you. We'll be right back. So speaking of leadership, if you're leading in sacramental prep or religious education in your parish today, I wouldn't be surprised if you're a little bit tired. You're working harder than you never worked, but you're feeling a little overwhelmed by all the disconnected programs, the volunteer shortages, and the drop-off after sacramental prep. You see, traditional classroom models of religious education often leave parents out of the equation, and the result is a disconnected, fragmented faith formation across all the different age groups.

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To find out more, go to fflcm.org. Go explore the Pathways Formation Suite and schedule a conversation with the FFLCM team to discuss bringing the mission to more of your families, and tell them I sent you. All right. Let's get back to the conversation. What did you find in your research? What are the kind of the principles, the practices that started to rise to the top?

Shanon Stallard 29:59

I guess I'll draw back to what I talked a little bit before and maybe expand on that, Jim. If good leadership development is not just about studying great leaders, that's part of it, but that's not the completeness of it, part of it is about how does someone understand themselves well enough to be able to lead themselves well? So at the heart of good leadership is to lead themself well. There was some research done by Hogan and Warren Felt in the USA. They did a meta study of leadership competencies, and they discovered four domains of skills that leaders need to be proficient in.

And so the first domain is technical and professional skills. Like wherever you are leading you need to have a degree of knowledge, technical, professional at a first line of leadership. That's quite hands-on, if you're leading a van of carpenters, you're gonna need to know stuff about carpentry, but if you're a chief executive, of a carpentry nationwide firm, you probably don't know much about carpentry anymore, but you know how to run an organization. So those technical and professional skills are the first domain. The second domain is leading a team skills, leadership skills in a sense of how do I bring a group of people together to work together?

And so there's an element of how do I recruit people, how do I retain people and how do I understand the different people and be able to get them working together? Uh, that's similar across different domains of work. The third domain is what they call how we relate. It's called the interpersonal skills. Our ability to understand other people. And so at the heart of that is we can have empathy to the degree of which I can see what's going on for you, and I understand what's going on for you. And so then with that empathy, I can predict what you need. And then with that prediction, I can adapt my behavior to meet those needs, and then I, the fourth bit of that is I can do that consistently.

I don't give up on that, yeah? And so in many ways, every good relationship is built on that. Empathy, I can predict what you need based on my understanding of you. I can then adapt my behavior to match yours, and I can do that, and I don't, "Ah, I've had enough of you." I maintain that. And so those we need to have, leaders need to have good interpersonal skills, and that's now with individuals, yeah.

So when leaders know their people well. And then the fourth domain here is what they call intrapersonal skills, and this is how we as a leader behave. And this is about the ability for us to know ourself to have self-mastery to have resilience to have virtue. And the way that this model works, these four domain works--

Jim Jansen 32:30

can you list them again, Shannon?

Shanon Stallard 32:32

So I'll start backwards. So the intrapersonal, which is the leading self, knowing self, leading self. And then the interpersonal, which is the relationship with others. And then the leadership, which is about building and leading a team. And then the professional technical, which is the skills we need and the field that we are leading in. And so then the research was like, okay if we need to have good leaders, we need to be able to lead, develop leaders across all four of these domains. And when we think about where do we spend most of our time developing and going on courses, training, and going to university, and politics and it's like it's the professional technical.

We spend a lot of time training in that. Often because that's actually the easiest domain to train, because it's the one domain that doesn't involve other people. And there's a method to it that we can train. And then as we step into the leadership domain again that's actually easier to train too. Because there are methods and leadership tools and structures to follow. Like in the military we have order formats. It's called GSMEAC, which is about the ground, the situation the mission, the admin and log and stuff. And so if you follow that, you can lead well. But the interpersonal and the intrapersonal are the more difficult ones. And often we do this little activity when I run leadership workshops. I get people to think of a great leader. And maybe your listeners, maybe we could do this with your listeners now, jim. Shall we do a little activity with them? How does that sound?

Jim Jansen 33:54

Let's do it.

Shanon Stallard 33:54

Well what I want you to think about is I want you to think about all the different leaders that you've had throughout your life. Maybe, think back to time in school, through your working career. And I want you to choose one of those leaders who you identify has been great for you. That you think, "Man, i'd follow them again." And I want you to write down what are the three or four reasons. What is it about them? Three or four reasons you would follow them again. So just jot those down. Pause the podcast if you want to do that.

Jim Jansen 34:23

Yeah.

Shanon Stallard 34:24

Now I'd like you to go through all those leaders again. I would like you to identify one who you think was a poor leader and you wouldn't follow them again. And the same thing, like why? What was it about them that made them a poor leader? Write down three or four things. Again, pause this podcast, write them down, and then come back to us. And now once you've done that, I want you to have a look at those lists of attributes and allocate them to one of those four domains.

Is this a technical professional skill? Is this a leadership skill? Is this a intrapersonal skill, or is this a interpersonal skill? And what we find when I do this in leadership workshops is a predominance of the attributes sit in the intrapersonal, interpersonal and very little sit in the

Jim Jansen 35:18

too

Shanon Stallard 35:19

and technical. Yeah. Yeah, you too, Jim? Yeah.

Jim Jansen 35:22

Tell me if this rings true to you, but when you are an upper-level leader, your ability, to go back to your earlier metaphor, your ability to swing the hammer isn't so much in the spotlight. What's in the spotlight is your ability to gather people together, help them work effectively, and even more, to manage the fear and uncertainty and confusion that you feel, to manage the fear, uncertain, confusion that the person that's in front of you feels. And when you can't empathize, you can't manage your own emotions, you can't respond healthily to other people's emotions, oh gosh, it just, that's, that is, that's what's happening all day long. For better or for worse, right? That's what you do all day long as a leader. You're not swinging hammers anymore.

Shanon Stallard 36:11

Yeah. And so this is what we discovered. And in order to develop the leaders in the military well, it was like we need to start with their ability to lead themselves. And it's so funny, like I think in early days the military did that and then it maybe left that behind and it was about cookie cutter type thing. Back to like actually good leadership development is individualized. Like what you need and what you need are two different things because you're two different people. And what you need to lead yourself well is you need to be more forceful in your leadership. You need to be more compassionate and enabling in your leadership. You guys need two different things. And if we gave one form of leadership to you, it- we're just enhancing a strength to turn it into a flaw and it wouldn't help you at all.

Jim Jansen 36:55

Okay, so this is a great setup because part of what we both do is we coach leaders, lay leaders, clergy. And there's a place for group training. We're both kinda like workshop nerds. Yeah, get people together, let's talk about worship. Let's talk about leadership let's have a workshop. I love that stuff. But at a certain point, it falls flat if it's also not accompanied with a one-on-one coaching conversation to help take the principles, the practices that have been taught, and translate it to that individual. Shannon, you've done a fair amount of leadership coaching. In fact I love it when, again, in another conversation you related to me, you're a young guy, you're in the military, and you're, like, an executive leadership coach for a bunch of old sailors. Talk a little bit about what you've learned as you've been able to accompany leaders individually in their growth in this coaching context.

Shanon Stallard 37:51

Yeah, beautiful, Jim. It was such a privileged position to be in when I'm doing leadership coaching of some pretty senior military personnel as a relatively young man compared to them. But by the grace of God he'd equipped me for it. And I was reflecting to you earlier if anything from this conversation I'd like to encourage your listeners is to Take a step. If you see the need for leadership don't look around. Often when you see that needs to be changed or that needs to be done, there's a real challenge or a flaw. We can go to someone, often the parish priest, and say, " Father , this needs to happen." But Christ often puts that on our heart for us to do it.

Jim Jansen 38:44

Yeah.

Shanon Stallard 38:45

And we often don't do that because we think I'm not equipped to do it. I don't know how to do that." And so there's fear in that. But have courage. Step out, because in stepping out, God will equip you. And in stepping out you'll find that people will come beside you and be with you. And so maybe sometimes you need to do first and seek permission, and seek... Yeah, what is it? What is it? Apologize.

Jim Jansen 39:11

Seek forgiveness later.

Shanon Stallard 39:12

Yeah, yeah. Sometimes you need to have some wisdom in that, and maybe ask the parish priest, "I'd like to do this," as opposed to saying to the parish priest, "I want to do this." For me, I guess that's a number of moments in my life where I felt really unequipped. Like God had called me. I've made a number of times in my life where I've made decisions where I think the world would look at me and say I'm foolish. Even when I left the military to pursue a professional sporting career some senior officer said to me, "Oh, you're a fool, Shannon.

You're never gonna make it in triathlons. You've got a great military career here." But I had more people tell me that what a great opportunity. Go and do it. The military will always be here. You can come back to it. But there was other times when, for example, during the COVID pandemic time when I was a leadership coach for the military and I through discernment decided not to get the COVID vaccination and that was a challenging time.

And I really got a bit lost in trying to work it out myself. I went to mass during the week and the father gave a little homily. The gospel was the rich young man. And Father just gave a really short homily saying, "Maybe it's not wealth that you need to give away, but someone else to follow God. What is it? Give it away." And I felt this massive sense of freedom in my heart because I'd been trying to work out should I or should I not get vaccinated when clearly God had put on my heart, "Shannon, don't get vaccinated." But it's like there's all these consequences if I don't get vaccinated.

I'm gonna lose my job. And in that moment I felt this real sense of peace beyond understanding- That, okay, God, I'm not gonna do that. And so I didn't and I lost my job because I got, mandated out from my job. And again, like I had a great job coaching and developing senior military leaders. But God took that away from me. But that was a push that I needed to set up my own business that I do now, Lead With Virtue, and have my own clients and now been able to do also Petross Catholic Leadership Development. So Petross Catholic Leadership Development is a business with Gemma Brunton, my business partner and I.

And we bring leadership development into the Catholic Church, and we currently have the contract for the Archdiocese of Sydney in developing leadership development of the priests, running a 10-month program that involves leadership coaching. It also meant that, I was in New Plymouth. I established here. Because I was here It was Easter Sunday mass, and this beautiful woman sat next to me. And I said hello. And then a number of years later she became my wife and we got married at the start of this year.

And we are-

Jim Jansen 41:57

between there though, right? It was like, "Hello." Did you say a little bit more?

Shanon Stallard 42:01

Just a little bit more. Just a little bit. More. Yeah. Yeah. But we are, we're three and a half weeks away from our first child being born the, the grace of God when you say yes to him, even when it's, when the world just goes, "What are you doing? This is ridiculous." And you even think to yourself this doesn't make rational sense." But on your heart in prayer and discernment, you know that this is what Christ is calling you to. And when you do it, he will equip you.

Jim Jansen 42:28

Right.

Shanon Stallard 42:29

And he'll bring people around you.

Jim Jansen 42:30

And you're actually back to the beginning, right? It's like it's obedience. I don't totally get this, but the Lord is saying, "I want you to take this step. I want you to turn left here. I want you to turn right here. I want you to, say no to this so you can be free for..." And sometimes He doesn't finish His sentence. Sometimes you don't know what the next thing is. You just know, "I have to let go of this and trust that there is something better," even though that better hasn't been explicitly promised yet. Man, Shannon, this is so good. I wanna give you a chance to talk a little bit about, your organization, you mentioned it, is called Lead With Virtue.

So much of what we've been talking about here, there's so many parallels in, military and church leadership and the principles of leadership, but there's something else in the church when you can integrate leadership with virtue. Talk about the difference that makes.

Shanon Stallard 43:25

This was a gift from God that he gave me right back when I was in the army and I first got invited to be involved in the leadership development that the army was doing and I got invited to a Train the Trainers 'cause they wanted to train people to deliver this new form of leadership development. And I've still got, the notes from it. And I wrote on the back of that the virtues. I wrote the theological virtues and the cardinal virtues, and I wrote a question: How does this, how do these relate to leadership? And so it's funny, that was probably 20 years ago.

And then 20-odd years later, here I am with a business called Lead With Virtue. And a seed that was planted many years ago. The connection in this, is the gift that was there that God had given me to start this business to help leaders in a post-Christian world to be able to lead well. And, in my experience I've found that many leaders can find it difficult in corporations to lead coherently with their faith. and because it's not just the values, that are no longer aligned.

It's the, the culture that's going on. And so how do I lead true to myself and be coherent with my own faith at the same time as I can be a, as a good leader in a corporation which is very secular? But even in the church, because even in the church, like the culture leaches into the church. And so wolves can be dressed in sheep's clothing and it kind of looks and sounds good, but like something's not quite right there. So how do I lead well there? And I think at the heart of this is to be able to l- to lead with virtue. And here's the connection to the military and the triathlons into leadership because, what is virtue?

Like physical fitness virtue is also a fitness, it's like the fitness of the soul. It's the fitness of the mind and it's the formation of character. It's leading with character and those cardinal virtues and those theological virtues are very much the compass that we can use to lead well to make decisions. And as I mentioned before, when we talk about our own particular temperament we can't let our temperament lead us, yeah? And so the formation of character over our temperament is what we're trying to develop. And so our character is really is in a form of our virtue, yeah? And so we understanding ourself well and our own emotions and our own preferences, and we develop our character so we can lead out of that. And so therefore , we know ourself well, yeah? St. Augustine said "Lord, help me know thyself so I may know you..." and knowing ourself well--

Jim Jansen 45:57

And they're connected.

Shanon Stallard 45:58

we can know God well, and then in knowing God well we know love. And then if we can love well, we can then lead well, yeah? Because the heart of leading well is in the virtue of love and loving others. And it seems contradictory here, yeah? Because it's like we need to know ourself really well to lead ourself really well, but isn't that so kinda self-centered, it's kinda I'm making it all about me and really understanding me, yeah? But You need to do that so that you don't make it about you. Because if you don't understand your self well, it becomes about you without you realizing it.

Jim Jansen 46:30

Yes. Oh, that's so good. Yes.

Shanon Stallard 46:33

Other people realize it, but you don't .

Jim Jansen 46:35

and there's nothing worse than having to labor or serve under a leader who has made it all about themselves and doesn't know it.

Shanon Stallard 46:46

Doesn't know it. Yeah, and it's so common, Jim, so common. And so a lot of the work I do was helping when does that happen for me, like, without me knowing? And the concepts here and these are, the English languages can be confusing sometimes because we use a word to mean--

Jim Jansen 47:00

Wait, did you just say the English languages? Like American English and British English and New Zealand English?

Shanon Stallard 47:06

I, I think just language, but languages Is probably true because a word could mean something in New zealand.

Jim Jansen 47:11

The English languages, yeah.

Shanon Stallard 47:13

Yes. There's probably more. ' Cause Australians, they've got something different to us. So two words here. So one is identity and one is reputation. I just need to define what I mean as, for those words. So by identity I mean what we think about our own behavior. And so that's, we're gonna call that identity. By reputation, what I mean is how other people perceive us. And so that's not the negative connotation of people have reputations. It's not the identity that we might have as our identity in Christ, so kind of two different things.

So identity is what, my thinking about my behavior, and then reputation is how other people perceive me. Good leaders have good alignment between those two. Poor leadership often happens when there's a misalignment. I'm thinking one thing, what other people are perceiving is something completely different. And that's because I don't know myself well. That's often because of a strength overplayed. A strength is like a double-edged sword. I can use it to lead well, but it also can cut me if I don't know how to use it well. And so understanding, for example, you know, a common personality trait, extroversion, introversion. And a, a good measure of personality won't tell you if you're one or the other. A good measure of personality will put you on a normal distribution curve. Because personality, like every human trait, follow God's fingerprint of the normal distribution curve or the 80/20 principle. There's in the middle and there's out to the end. And so it's the same with personality.

If we're gonna measure personality, and you're gonna measure introversion, extroversion you kinda need to know where you sit on a distribution curve in relation to others. Now you might want to, what's called here when you're doing distribution, there is a norm. So there's a norm group that you're measured against. And that norm group, again, if you're measuring height and it's a bunch of horse jockeys, that's gonna be different to a bunch of NBA players. And so who are we norming against? You can get a global norm, or you can get a norm based on who you're working with. And so any good measure of personality will put you on a normal distribution curve, not put you in a box or give you a color.

If you do some personality trait like that, run away a mile. There's a little bit of helpfulness in it but it's a little bit flawed because you're not gonna understand this identity reputation that... Because when you measure yourself and you get to a particular extreme on a distribution curve, there's likely what people are gonna see is a real strength in you that relates to that, but there's a real risk that you could overplay that strength.

For example, at the outgoing end of more extroversion, there's a real strength that you're likely gonna be talk more in relation to other people. You may be more of an external processor. So people are gonna see you talking a lot, sharing stories, telling stuff in a meeting inputting, saying stuff. And they're gonna say, "It's great. Shannon's awesome. He's always sharing his thoughts, what's going on, telling us things. He's connecting, he's very social. It's, we really appreciate that." But if I'm not aware of that in relation to others, and I aren't versatile in my leadership, I can put the hammer down and pick up the saw and act like someone at the other end , people are also gonna say "Man, Shannon just tells us way too much.

It's w- overwhelming. We have a meeting an hour long. He speaks for 55 minutes, and the last five minutes he says, 'Anyone else got any points?'" When if we look at the other end, if I score down the more introverted end, like, being a little bit more reserved, so a little bit more independent in the way that I do it, might be a little bit more intuitive in the way that I think what people experiences is someone who's probably a little bit more quieter.

They think about what they say before they speak. And so I see, like, when they, "Oh, Shannon's gonna say something. Oh, it's probably... He's thought about this and there's some real wisdom in what he's gonna speak." So his Words have value to me, which as someone at the other end sometimes don't. It's like, "Oh, words." And now your words have value to me. But the real risk here is that what you just said should've been said half an hour ago. We were on a completely different topic. That was last week's meeting that you're bringing up today, or worse It's not even at the meeting, it's at the water cooler after the meeting and you say that to one person, and that one person goes, "Hang on. Why didn't you share that back there?" And so do we even understand ourself well enough in relation to others? Because if we don't, there's this risk that our identity and reputation is not aligned, and then what people experience from us in our leadership is not what we think. And so part of this is really helping leaders get alignment between know themselves well enough so that they can lead themselves well, and then know where I need to develop.

Jim Jansen 51:34

Oh, Shannon, that is so good. Our time has really flown. I'm trying to think about those who are listening to this and they're like, "Oh, gosh, I need to grow in my leadership." What would you offer in terms of an encouragement, first steps for those who are feeling convicted by this? They're realizing it's like, "Man, there's some holes in my game. I need to grow in my self-understanding and my team leading and my, intrapersonal, interpersonal," all the things. We've covered a lot of ground here. For those who are feeling convicted but they're not quite sure where to begin, what would you say to them?

Shanon Stallard 52:10

if you feel like, "Man, I need to understand myself better in order to lead well," there's really only three ways you can do that it's called strategic self-awareness. I'll work backwards from the least effective to the most effective.

Jim Jansen 52:24

Okay.

Shanon Stallard 52:25

The least effective way is to do a good form of psychometric, which is designed to predict reputation. And so there's a few out there that you can do which the idea is, is you do this assessment online and it gives you back a report and says, "Here is potentially how you're likely to be seen by others. This is the strengths in leadership and here's the risks and here's some sort of development that you might need to do." So that's the first thing. The least effective, yeah, because it's a prediction and it's an algorithm. We're human beings. It's probably gonna be a little bit wrong.

Jim Jansen 52:56

It's not gathering data from real people. It doesn't know you yet. But there's some value.

Shanon Stallard 53:01

It's a good tool, yeah. The second way more valuable is you are gathering data from other people . Ask people like what's my strength in my leadership? Where do I need to work? Where do I overplay my strengths?" Now, there's a counterintuitive thing here because often when we are more vulnerable as leaders and saying to people, " there are some times I do things and I lead well, and there's some times I don't." And if we've got a little bit of understanding of that and we can talk to that, and we think that's probably gonna mean people think I'm weak as a leader. It's the opposite happens, yeah? Because the virtue of humility is at play, and people already know that more than you do. They go yeah. We know. We see it." Now that you're saying that, we're like, yay."

Jim Jansen 53:50

Yeah. like I can finally like exhale. It's like, "Oh, good. He knows. He's gonna work on it.

Shanon Stallard 53:53

Yeah. He knows. Yeah. And because often people find it difficult to give feedback about a strength overplayed. The reason is because day in, day out when, Shannon, you're using the hammer, it's great. So I don't want you to tell you to stop using the hammer because that's how I want you to lead. But actually in that situation, I need you to lead differently. But I don't know how to tell you to do that without you stopping the hammer at all. So I'll just deal with it. I'll deal with you banging that four by two and a half, that bit of wood when actually you should be picking up the saw. But I don't know how to give you that feedback. But if, as leaders, we open the door to that, all of a sudden people are gonna feel equipped and empowered to tell us, "Oh, Shannon, in that meeting just before, when you said that, that was..." Oh, thank you. Now, often our natural defense is always to explain our intent. But I was... It was because of..." And if you open the door to this and you're receiving feedback, whenever someone gives you this gift, breathe, and then say to them, "Tell me more."

Jim Jansen 54:57

Ooh.

Shanon Stallard 54:58

Get them to talk to you. Get them to tell you- the situation, what they saw you do. Was it my voice? Was it my tone? Was it my, how I looked? What did I do with my body? Get them to explain so you understand, and then just say thank you. You don't need to defend yourself. This is their perspective of you in that situation, and say thank you. Because the more you get that sort of feedback the better you're gonna get to understand where your reputation and identity is not aligned, and where you think you're leading a particular way but people are experiencing something different.

So that's the second. You know? And that's quite powerful. And the third, which is the most powerful, and in many ways the first two should always be taken into this third one. A gift of the Holy Spirit is self-knowledge. And so prayer and praying about, "Lord, help me understand where I do not understand myself." Lord, where am I leading in a way which is not aligned to how people are seeing me and I myself, and I need to grow and lead differently? Lord, help me to know where fear is holding me back from leading in different ways because I'm just holding on to the strength, this gift you've given me, and just solely using that when you've actually given me these other gifts which I'm just not watering.

You've given me these tools, but I just use one. And I'm just comfortable in doing one and all these other tools I've just buried in the garden, and I need to go and dig them up, and I need to use them and not just leave those talents hidden. And so the feedback, any feedback that you get you should always take into prayer because unfortunately not everyone is good in their feedback. Some people are manipulative.

Jim Jansen 56:45

Right. Or just wrong. They're just a little bit... their exaggerated, feedback could lead you astray if you don't take it to the Lord.

Shanon Stallard 56:53

Yeah. So at the heart if there's one thing I'd do if you feel this calling to lead something and you don't feel equipped I'd say just take it into prayer and say Lord, equip me. Lord, where do I need greater awareness of myself?" So I may know myself, so I may know you. And in knowing you, I may know love and therefore be able to love others well, to be able to lead well.

Jim Jansen 57:21

Man, thank you, Shannon. Shannon, we are going to link to your website, leadwithvirtue.org and petrosleadership.com. Thank you for sharing your story. This was such a fun conversation. I mean, so much just... , the parallels between leadership, in the military and the church, just the role of virtue. There's a lot. You gave us a lot to chew on today. Thank you.

Shanon Stallard 57:46

Thank you, Jim. My pleasure. I mean, it's just wonderful talking to you, and thank you for having me on your podcast. And, and to your listeners, I just... , pray that you enjoy this conversation that Jim and I have had, and just ask that, the Holy Spirit be upon you in anything that we spoke about that has encouraged you. I just ask that the Holy Spirit come upon you and to be with you and to lead you to wisdom, to enable you to be able to lead with virtue.

Jim Jansen 58:16

Amen. Amen. All right, everybody. You know somebody that needs to hear this conversation. Maybe you wanna listen to it again yourself. So when you are in a safe place let the Lord bring to mind who He wants you to share this with. Share it out with a friend and maybe listen to it again with them. Today's episode was brought to you by Faith & Family Life Catholic Ministries, FFLCM. Their Pathways Formation suite of resources offers lifelong family-centered faith formation. So go check 'em out at fflcm.org and tell 'em I sent you.