The Art of Asking Questions: Using Inquiry to Drive Leadership Development

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We have J. D. Peterson, CEO of Matheson hanging out with us, JD, welcome to the show.

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[00:00:27] Dr. Jim: It's always a good idea. There's never a bad time to sign up for a podcast.

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[00:00:31] Dr. Jim: So I appreciate you hanging out, and I know that we're going to dive into that discussion, and I'm especially interested in getting your perspective as a multiple time startup leader who's facilitated some high growth organization, some scale ups. So that's going to be an interesting lens that you bring to the conversation.

But before we dive into the discussion. I want you to get us familiar with your background how you got to where you were, some of the work that you're doing at Matheson.

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And it really worked my way up through various leadership roles in different parts of the organization. I feel very blessed. I've been able to play parts in. Kind of lots of different functions and domains in the company and in the different spaces that my companies have been in Ultimately landed in the HR tech space in 2017 when I was the chief growth officer for One of the leading employee experience engagement companies did that for a bunch of years and then now I am at Matheson Which is in the DEI space and I'm playing the CEO role Over here at Matheson and we are a DEI focused tech startup We are trying to bring technology and data to really help people figure out what to do when it comes to DEI and ultimately measure and track progress.

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Philosophy [00:02:00] going forward.

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And just the importance of where a customer and their voice sits in the organization has always stayed with me, no matter what role I'm in. What area I was leading or playing a part in a company, always making sure we were paying attention to that customer voice has stayed with me, from that job for sure.

I think in my time in that role though, too, and that was really where I had my first experience moving from a frontline employee into managing and leading a team. Being curious and asking questions was like the number one thing that I think really helped me stand out and maybe get to that opportunity.

customer at the heart of it, [: 00:03:00

[00:03:01] Dr. Jim: A lot of leaders in a lot of organizations talk about customer obsession. And I think it's an important philosophy to have in place and actually bring to life. With your early career being so customer obsessed or customer focused, how did that bleed into your talent strategy and how you built and developed teams?

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Where they had to deal with customers. Maybe they were a waitress or a waiter or, or a customer support rep like me or those sorts of things, but really trying to understand people's perspective of helping serve somebody else on the other end of a transaction. A lot of it comes back to just that idea of serving others. And I think that no matter, again, like really what role you're playing in this world of especially B2B, but also B2C companies and building products, it's ultimately about serving the customers on the other end.

s down to. So I want to both [: 00:04:00

[00:04:13] Dr. Jim: Let's get into the what everybody's waiting to hear your thoughts on. And that's getting people ready to leave. Yeah. And I set this up in the beginning of the conversation where, you've had a lot of experience at startups and scale ups, and you've grown some massive organizations.

So I want you to think back to those experiences and identify some of those key best practices that helped you smooth out that leadership transition. Getting people from an IC to a manager, from a manager to a director, from a director to a VP. What are those best practices that shorten that learning curve?

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I've got to make sure they're [00:05:00] getting feedback Both before they step into leadership while they're learning to step into leadership and even once they're in that leadership role No one's gonna improve. Nobody's gonna learn unless you're telling them what they're doing what they're not doing well, and so really Getting good at helping people, helping them learn through giving them feedback is important.

But feedback is also, and especially in leadership, it goes the other direction too. They have to also be good at giving feedback, not just the receiving. So I've got to give them feedback to help them, again, what are they doing well, what are they not, in their journey. But I also want them learning how important it is for them to give feedback.

So I really want to get and tease out of them. Give me feedback, . How am I leading you? How are you seeing other leaders around the organization and really trying to get them embracing that idea of a culture of feedback and a way of working where feedback is constant. And I'm not just talking about, although they're important things like performance reviews and classic or, standardized, formalized forms of feedback.

he moment,. When something's [: 00:06:00

I think some people have this idea that you know If I go take some leadership training and once I get the job and I am a leader then I'm done I'm a leader I've done it but that's not what leadership is and I think you and I know and I've been quote unquote a leader for a good chunk of my life now You But I'm learning every single day, and I still feel like I have a long way to go to be the kind of leader that I want to be.

And the only way you can do that is to embrace this idea that it is a practice, and it's something you have to continually practice to get better at. When looking at people to, especially ICs, to grow them towards leadership roles, practice comes in the form of, how can I give them opportunities,.

ities to trial and error, to [: 00:07:00

And how do I set up an environment where people get the opportunity to practice those things? Third one I'll come to just real quick and I'll round it off. There is a support system. And I think a support system is critical when somebody steps into a leadership role for the first time. And by support system, what do they have around them?

Just aside from just their direct manager that can help support them in that journey. Peer group is important. Mentorship is important training and resources that they can, tap into are important. Giving feedback, creating that idea of constant practice and then building a support system around or three things that I've seen really help people success, get successful on that journey.

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I think what would be [00:08:00] helpful is for you to talk a little bit more about what good feedback actually looks like. So when you're trying to structure feedback, and this is especially important for those new leaders. What does good feedback look like? You can't just tear the bandaid off, so give us a walkthrough of that.

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And everybody likes to receive feedback in different ways. What is the way that's going to best resonate with that person. There is no one size fits all, I believe, when it comes to feedback. So it's really understanding who the person is on the other end and how they're going to respond.

I actually like things very direct and almost harsh, myself. But I've certainly realized through the years that not everybody embraces it the same way. So one, I think, is really personalizing feedback. Understanding who the individual is and how they want to hear it. I'm a big fan of questions as well.

dback, giving them feedback, [: 00:09:00

Ultimately the other thing too, is like I said, it's not just waiting for those. Formalized moments of reviews or even your one on one. It's delivering feedback. Hey, at the end of a meeting,. It's pulling somebody aside in the middle of an activity or an exercise and giving them direct feedback on the spot.

When you see something that, Hey, they might've done that in a different way, or maybe that wasn't the most effective way or the opposite. Maybe, Hey, that was brilliant. The way you set that thing up or the way you delivered that information. It was really, I appreciated it really helped me do my job.

Those types of things.

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You mentioned earlier that you need to be aware as a leader of the support system that exists around you. Part of that support system in terms of getting people ready to lead is the building, the relationship that gives you the space to have those conversations. So I think that's a, that's worth mentioning too.

So I know we're just scratching the surface on this entire conversation. If people want to continue the conversation, What's the best way for them to get in touch with you?

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I keep my email pretty open and answer. It's just jd. peterson at matheson. io. You can also find me on most of the social medias, jd underscore peterson on Twitter. I guess that's X now. You can find me on LinkedIn as well pretty easily. And I'm always open to chat with people there. Yeah, those are some of the ways.

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You talked about coming up in the world in your professional world. As a customer service rep first and being customer obsessed. We need to take that same obsession and apply it inwards to our organizations and the people that report into us, because that obsession about our people is what's going to get them to the next level and what they're seeking to achieve.

So it's critical that leaders take that obsessive mindset about development and bring it inside the organization and move forward with that, with the intent of serving their constituency and their report. So really great stuff. I appreciate you hanging out with us. For those of you who have been listening to this conversation, if you like the discussion, leave us a review.

hen tune in next time, where [: 00:12:00