Leading Healthy Teams: Reflections From Leadercast 2019

Earlier this month, the team at PHOS had the privilege of leaving the studio for a full day to attend Leadercast 2019.

Leadercast is an all-day, immersive leadership development event held annually in Atlanta, Georgia. The live event is simulcasted to several host sites worldwide, including our hometown of Gainesville, Florida.

The mission of Leadercast is to develop leaders worth following. Every year, speakers representing a wide range of industries take the stage to present their insights and experiences. From doctors and chefs to journalists and global business leaders, there were several lessons to learn.

Leadership is one of our core values, and quoted below is our definition:

Continuing our focus to build into that core value, 2019 marked the fifth time the PHOS team attended Leadercast.

Leading Healthy Teams

The theme of this year’s Leadercast was Leading Healthy Teams. It explored topics such as:

• Self-regulating your thoughts
• Leading with authenticity
• Managing team productivity
• The importance of humility

In this article, our team members share their big takeaways from Leadercast 2019.

Mike

My biggest takeaway from Leadercast this year was Andy Stanley’s points about identifying the What, Why, and How of your goals. I think this point goes beyond just the business environment and is good life advice in general. To know where you’re going (and how you’re going to get there), you need to clearly define WHAT you’re doing, WHY you’re doing it, and HOW you’re going to reach that goal.

Bailey

This year’s theme, “Leading Healthy Teams,” included so much more than just “how” to lead a team. I thought Andy Stanley’s quote, “It is easier to educate doers than to activate thinkers,” really rang true. To serve your team in the best way, you have to be motivated and willing to go the extra mile. This coincides with Patrick Lencioni’s teachings of the ideal team player: humble, hungry, and smart.

Derrak

My greatest takeaways from this year’s Leadercast center around the idea that I cannot lead well if I am not pouring into myself. This idea crystallized around three concepts:

1. Self-care is critical to success in life. If I’m not putting in the work to understand my underlying motivations and to process my experiences, I’m not only shortchanging myself but also my team and company. When I have a healthy interior life, I position myself to be the best version of myself for everyone in my life.
2. Developing impulse control is a keystone habit. When done well, this creates a margin in my workflow, which allows me to be more creative and productive.
3. It is always better for everyone around me if I am my authentic self. This is the best version of me, and the one people in my life benefit most from.

Hendrik

One of the more relevant topics for me as a developer deals with objectifying my creative process when it comes to features, styling, and more. Juliet Funt noted that in between the first and the final idea of anything, there should always be a certain amount of white space for objectivity. After all, only because I think I coded a feature particularly well, doesn’t mean the client shares that sentiment or even the need.

Chad

The speaker that stands out most in my mind from Leadercast was Carla Harris. Carla has led an extremely successful career on Wall Street and currently serves as vice-chairman, managing director, and senior advisor at Morgan Stanley in addition to being an accomplished gospel singer. The part of her speech that impacted me most was about leadership being intentional. While the idea might seem obvious to some, it was a great reminder that leadership is a behavior and not a position. Carla discussed what we must focus on to develop influence within our teams, which also line up with our core values at PHOS.

Sierra

Dr. Caroline Leaf emphasized the importance of mindsets at Leadercast 2019. If you breed negativity, that is all that will you exude. She explained that while “you can’t always control what happens to you, you can always control how you react.” If you catch yourself falling into a negative mindset, take a few moments to re-evaluate, focus on the positives aspects to your life, and the accomplishments you’ve made so far. According to Dr. Leaf, the ability to self-regulate your thoughts can have lasting impacts, including increasing overall creativity, efficiency, and productivity. Though it may be challenging at times, choose happiness so you can be a light for those around you.

Jenelle

Carla Harris’s topic on intentional leadership summarized that being a great leader isn’t about you being a great (insert job title here), but how you encourage and inspire others. Quoting from Patrick Lencioni, “Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.” Both speakers were great reminders to be intentional and others seeking rather than always focusing on ourselves.

Jena

Listening to Ginger Hardage, who formerly served as senior vice president of culture and communications at Southwest Airlines, challenged my perception of company culture and the impact it can have. She highlighted the contagiousness of culture, whether it’s good or bad. Ginger explained that defining culture isn’t one person’s job responsibility at a company, it is everyone’s job and a requirement of leaders. For a team to function at its highest capability and to be profitable, all employees must embody the company values as individuals and they also must have the freedom to live those values within their position. I plan to focus on incorporating company values into my work at PHOS to continue building the culture we have as a team.

Leading a Healthy Team at PHOS

Whether it’s within our team, within our industry, or with our clients, every member of our team is committed to being a leader worth following.  We strive to honor our core value of leadership by attending events such as Leadercast to improve our skills and abilities for serving others as leaders. At PHOS, we seek to bring on team members who embody leadership and our other core values as a company. Learn more about why we hire for core values and how it helps maintain our amazing company culture.