Leadership Tea
The Leadership Tea podcast is where powerful leaders share their journeys, insights, and triumphs through informal conversations about what it takes to reach the executive level. Join us every other Wednesday to be inspired by the unvarnished stories of amazing executives who know what it's like to be "the only" at the table and who have succeeded regardless. They have proven leadership experience in their respective fields, from international affairs to the private sector to academia, and want to help others create their own success stories.
Leadership Tea
Brewing Mentorship: A Conversation With The Uncles
Join us as we discuss the unwritten rules of effective mentorship with our 'uncles', Ambassador Harry Thomas and Ambassador Teddy Taylor. Drawing from a combined 73 years of public service, our 'uncles' opened up about the power of genuine connections and the commitment required to guide and uplift others. This episode is a masterclass on the nuanced dance of mentor-mentee relationships, where honest feedback and active listening lead to personal and professional growth.
Our conversation with Ambassadors Thomas and Taylor unravels the delicate balance of providing support with a discerning eye and rooting earnestly for the success of those we lead. Are you seeking to enrich your understanding of what it takes to nurture talent and the selfless nature of mentoring? If so, this episode offers profound insights that will ignite a transformative spark in your approach to guiding others.
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I would like to remind people that when you're leading, you have to understand that it's just a little more than something to do. You have to be vested in everyone's success.
Speaker 2:Hey family, this is Shelby. The month of April is going to be unique for the Leadership Tea podcast because we are featuring different voices, voices of a few men who are dear to me and Belinda. And this episode is special because we are chatting with two mentors who have been there for us, whose leadership examples we have tried to emulate and who keep it real Between them they have 73 years of public service as US diplomats Before they retired a few years ago. They served the American people with distinction and class Combined. They have been accredited as US ambassadors to six countries. They have led teams throughout the globe. They are our lifelong mentors, who are affectionately known as the uncles. They are Ambassador Harry K Thomas and Ambassador Teddy B Taylor.
Speaker 2:In this episode you're going to hear some State Department jargon, phrases like post, which refer to overseas assignments, or the assignment season, which is the time frame and process when Foreign Service officers try to figure out where they will go next. But this episode has something for everyone, because our guests share advice on mentoring, how mentoring is folded into being a great leader and how sometimes, when that water is boiling, you can't save everybody. One anecdote from our guests that also rings true for me is that leadership is a full-time commitment. It's not something you pick up like a casual game of basketball. It's about being vested. But don't take it from me. Let's get into it and sip on this wisdom from the uncles.
Speaker 3:So we wanted to begin by talking a bit about what your mentorship in particular meant to us and why we call you our uncles. And when we were reflecting on that before this call, you know, I was telling Shelby that for me my uncles are. You know, I'm very close to my uncles on both sides of my family and they are people I can call and bounce my dumb ideas off of and they'll be like that's a thing, but you could go in this direction. They're the ones who I can kind of, who always set me straight in ways that I didn't necessarily invite, want to or whatever, but it's always coming from a place of good right. They provide that clarity and honesty. They're just another part of the village and I don't know, shelby, if you have anything to add to that.
Speaker 2:Like you, there was definitely a familial connection. I definitely remember meeting Teddy when he was in charge of orientation division and I instantly was like oh, division? And I instantly was like, oh, he looks just like Uncle So-and-so or somebody you know from the church or you know whatever. But there was an instant connection and, of course, when I approached him it was all good, it was all love, and so that relationship started in 1999 and has continued over the years. You know that bond has only gotten stronger over time and so, like you, belinda, it's a term of endearment, but it also is reflective of the type of relationship that we have.
Speaker 2:And the same goes for Harry. I remember him telling me a long time ago stop calling me Ambassador Thomas, I'm like, all right. Well, I got to put a modifier or something, because I was raised where you don't just call people, you know, by their first name. You got to put you know had an impact on my career, you know, in terms of being somebody that I could go to with real issues out of comfort and out of that familiar. Again, the familiarity has been clutch.
Speaker 3:Great, and I think for both of you. I am constantly quoting things that you have told me over the years. Right with people that I'm offering advice to, I modeled the way that I led teams and the way that I connected with my teams, on the ways that you all interacted with us. You have impacted us in more ways than that, and so maybe that's a good place to start with this idea of what do you expect of yourselves as mentors, like what are, in your view, what are the responsibilities that you have to people that you are trying to shepherd in the workplace as you kind of develop those relationships? And we can start with either of you. Go ahead, h.
Speaker 4:Actually, thank you, Belinda. You made me a better mentor because some years ago you told me why you used to like to come to see me to listen, to have, more importantly, to have somebody listen to you, your ideas, your thoughts, the challenges that you were going through. So I changed to someone who wanted to listen to the mentee first before I dispensed ideas, or thoughts or or or wisdom. So thank you for that, Thank you.
Speaker 2:Uncle Teddy, what about you?
Speaker 1:In a lot of ways, you're the wall and you're the ball and you're trying to and you're bouncing the ball off of the wall. Your mentor and my job is to just kind of bring it back to you Different angles, because if you've ever hit a tennis racket, tennis ball, against a wall, it never ends up in the same place on each stroke, unless you're a professional, okay, and so, as a mentor, I'm there to listen, absorb and then react at times, and react in a way that you may not like, but if you're going to survive the mentor-mentee relationship as a mentee, you have to, at some point in time, come to grips with the fact that you need somebody to be honest, whose only interest is your success.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you touched on something there that we wanted to have you both elaborate on, because one of the things that I think Belinda and I have struggled with with some of our own mentees is this lack of relationship. Sometimes we only hear from people when they need something or when they're in trouble, and there is this lack of appreciation for, hey, we're in a relationship Like if I'm investing time in you as a mentor. There there are certain, certain expectations, and so we wanted to ask you both you know what, what do you expect out of your mentees? You know what, what makes a good niece or nephew? But? But more importantly, you know what? What are your, your true expectations of the people that you mentor?
Speaker 1:expectations of the people that you mentor. I guess in a lot of ways it's consistency. All right, You're, and no one expect at least I never expect expected a mentee to be in touch with me. I certainly never expected to hear from you all all of the time Okay, Because I understood you had a career and you both had lives to lead, and that part of being a mentor is, you know, there's some folks that you're only going to hear from come assignment time when they're looking for a recommendation and, depending on who that is, sometimes you are unaccessible, Sometimes you're unaccessible and sometimes you do it, but you do it in a way you know, but you're vanilla in how you approach whatever it is you're being asked to do.
Speaker 1:Also, how receptive you are to what we say sometimes. How receptive you are to what we say sometimes. Why should I continue to make time to get in a relationship with you when all you do is move in the opposite direction and put yourself in positions where you need my assistance to get a job? One of the beauties of being a niece or a nephew is you can get the job on your own because you've developed your own professional circle of relationships and perhaps my involvement is maybe a cherry on top.
Speaker 1:Most of the times when you all came to us, you all were going to get the jobs. You just needed somebody to make a telephone call for you. They really didn't object to you. There was somebody that they needed to hear from to say, yeah, they were okay, but you had a reputation behind you that merited the telephone call and I knew if I made the call. I was making the call because you were someone that I heard of. I heard from consistently and I was able to kind of follow you. We had developed a relationship. That's how you become a niece, that's how you become a nephew. It's more than once a year, or twice a year. It's hey, I'm back in DC, love to have coffee love to have coffee.
Speaker 3:Well, it's also just having, like you said, the performance and conduct to back up to make it possible for you to be able to pave a way right. And you know, what I think about a lot is how there are maybe three buckets of what mentees maybe sometimes bring to the table. Right, there's the people who have great performance, great conduct, and they just need help charting a path or getting focused, and that's one kind of conversation. There are people who maybe have some challenges with either performance or conduct, but they can be coached to kind of go the right direction. Right, you're willing to like I can take some time and walk you through this issue you're having with your boss or conduct, but they can be coached to kind of go the right direction. Right, you're willing to like I can take some time and walk you through this issue you're having with your boss or whatever. Whatever, you didn't come to me once everything had blown up. Right, there's still hope.
Speaker 3:But then there's this last bucket of people who have either a performance or a conduct issue and they are unwilling or unable somehow to take the feedback, take the advice, make the adjustment, and you see them.
Speaker 3:You spend time, you spend hours of your time trying to course correct and you see them making the same mistakes, often over and over over the course of like you know their career.
Speaker 3:They come back to you. They only come to you when it has blown up mistakes, often over and over over the course of like you know their career. They come back to you. They only come to you when it has blown up Right. And these are those are the cases that I really struggle with and they think that they can, that I can come fix this and I can come save them and I really struggle with and those are often the people who it's most difficult to communicate to. That I can't actually save you Because if I'm at the table, I'm in a folding chair, right, and so I really struggle with. I've had a couple of occasions where there are people who thought that I was really there to be able to save them and I could not challenging kind of navigating through that emotionally and professionally, and I would love to hear about, maybe your advice for mentors trying to try to navigate those kinds of situations.
Speaker 4:Not Jesus Christ I could save everybody. That's not you. You can help people that want to be helped and, like you, in my younger, more naive days, I thought I could help people. So some people are just failures. Others are just human. You know, they think that a mentor is something they must have, but they can't connect with this particular mentor and they only contact you when they need you, and that's. You see that across all demographics and not everybody's a star or a superstar there's, you know, there's Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, but then there is somebody else who's very good but not in Michael Jordan's class, those that have unrealistic expectations.
Speaker 4:You're correct in this day and world, you have to be very careful about what you say, because it will get back to people. Sometimes doing a favor is a mistake. When I first joined an organization, I did because they were mentoring kids in DC at two public high schools and they learned who were B to D students, not A and F, and they offered scholarships. That wasn't enough. They had to spend time with these kids and then they realized, wait, a second ninth grade wasn't enough. We had to do seventh and eighth grade and then we realized we had to have two mentors, plus our spouses, because it takes a lot To others. I only ask them that they do that in the future. I can't owe them to that because I'm gone, but those with unrealistic expectations will always have unrealistic expectations. Those that blame you for their failures will always do that. But you know the deal Just like I could.
Speaker 4:There's a new movie out, maestro, about Leonard Bernstein. I love his plays, music and I'm as a New Yorker. I can go tomorrow to the New York Philharmonic and I could get up there with those sticks and just start doing the orchestra. You know they play well, they're professionals. But they know I'm not Leonard Bernstein. You know it's the same, it's the same thing. So don't beat up on yourself.
Speaker 1:But the majority of folks you can help or guide, and then they're human. But what you said, it is always a folding chair. Most people you can help, there are some that just won't take it. I've been eliminated from Christmas card lists. People no longer speak to me. I mean, when I say no longer speak to me, would see me on the elevator, let the door close, let it go and get on the next one, all right, because they felt I had betrayed them in some way. All right, people like to forget. People often forget.
Speaker 1:We have professional reputations too. You've got a professional reputation to maintain and when you are going out on a limb for somebody, you, as someone trying to maintain your professional reputation, have to be mindful of the fact that if this person screws the pooch, it's not one person that's in trouble. There are now two people that are out. Okay, yeah, so you know you have to make those calculations. Most people get it, some don't, and I mean I can remember us having conversations about people that you know we were jointly cutting loose. All right, because there's nothing you can do.
Speaker 2:Why'd you cut them loose?
Speaker 1:or a combination thereof, that let you know that this person was never going to be successful and was always going to be a problem because they never accepted the advice that was given, or they accepted the advice, but when they entered into that situation it was always the same kind of problem. It was a pattern, One after another, after another, after another, after another. At some point you know you have to do some self-assessments. That's the job of a mentee. You have to be willing to look hard at your own self.
Speaker 3:That's a really good point.
Speaker 2:So we're wondering. I mean, based on both of your long and distinguished careers, there must've been a time where you stuck your neck out for somebody and it didn't go well. It went sideways. You regretted it. We don't like having regrets, but I'm sure there's been at least a couple of occasions where something didn't go well. I'm just wondering if you wouldn't mind reflecting on an experience like that and what you learned from it.
Speaker 4:I would say the vast majority of people that we tried to help excelled. There were some people, like I said, when you were younger, you feel the guilt, complex feel. Oh, I got to try to help everybody and you would help this person know full well this person was going to continue that behavior that Teddy talked about. Just give a start starting talking and sooner or later they return to whom they are. That's who they are. So it makes you not always want to go out on a limb in the future. But what I did do is I would ask other people who might this person might have been coming to see me because of my job title or grade, but I didn't necessarily know. And the first impressions. So in this world you can ask a lot of people whether through email phones I don't like to use email, but one of the things we did learn if you did email or WhatsApp somebody and you didn't get an immediate response, then you need to stay away from that person. But nobody's perfect.
Speaker 1:If you're going to be in a leadership position, people are going to come to you for help. Because you're in a leadership position, it comes with the turf of being a leader. You're going to be asked to make assessments of people, make judgments of people, and others are going to base their judgments of your judgment based on the people you try to help, and a lot of times it's about the language you use, how passionate you are, how enthusiastic you are. There are degrees of assistance, but you have to be able to go home, play with your kids, have your life and feel good about what you did. You know that's your business. You know I'm like Michael Corleone. It's not personal, sonny, it's just business. It's business, it's business.
Speaker 3:No, and that makes sense.
Speaker 3:That idea of like and that's something that's always been hard is you're being judged on your judgment, and I would often think to myself when trying to, like, help people or coach them through something whatever, like, yo give me something to work with here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, seriously, you know what I'm saying. I'm up here, I'm in these streets trying to help you, I'm trying to talk to you and talk you through some stuff, and you're just not getting it or you're not hearing it, or sometimes people would right, like, obviously. And so it's like yes, you're making it easy, it's easy to make the case for you when you've given me something to back up, right, yeah, right. So I think that that is a really, really critical point, and I, too, have had people that I've been like I've given you, I've opened a door for you and you walked through it, and then you did something real crazy and I'm like oh, I didn't know it with that, and then I've opened a door for you that opens up a whole new career path for you or opens up more opportunity. I've got a couple people who I opened doors for without realizing that, oh, you had more baggage than I could see through the peephole.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my bad.
Speaker 3:But now you are here, we done left, we're not on flying commercial. You are here on a are here, we've, we've we done left Like we're not on flying commercial. You are here on a private jet, we rolling, and there's nothing I can do to stop it. It's just my bad. I'm discerning in the future. No, it is what it is.
Speaker 2:It is what it is.
Speaker 1:It is what it is.
Speaker 3:It is what it is, but look, as we get ready to kind of close today, is there any just general advice you'd like to offer to potential folks who are out there leading and mentoring? What would you like to share?
Speaker 1:I would like to remind people that when you're leading, you have to understand that it's just a little more than something to do. You have to be vested in everyone's success everyone's success. I learned a trick years ago from a supervisor that always asked each of us for our own professional development to-do lists and he would include that in our work requirements statements and he would always support our efforts to get training based on our to-do list. And it gets back to the point about listening to do so. We can try and craft a direction jointly that will lead you to achieve the goals you set for yourself Not that I set for you, but that you set for yourself for the duration of the time that you're at this assignment. And if it's a relationship that grows beyond a specific assignment, then you broaden the goals to fit the relationship. But immediately it's the job that's being done there and how they can better themselves professionally and personally at this post or in this office.
Speaker 1:But you have to be vested and in order to be an effective leader, you have to care about the person. It's the people that make it work, it's not. You don't need machines. We've got plenty of machines, and history and current day shows us that if the people operating the machines aren't functioning at proper capacity themselves, the machine will never function in proper capacity. It's about the person, and you have to be willing to vest your own self. It's not easy being a mentor.
Speaker 4:Fully endorse that. I think, first of all, as a leader, you have to deny yourself Because, as you both said, you're always being watched in a precarious position. Position and as a mentor, I think, especially with this coming generation, as I said earlier, you really have to listen to them, see what they want in life, be a guide, understand they have rights, unlike we did and see where they want to go. But you also have to and you hope that they're willing to listen to candid advice. You tell them the truth and it doesn't have to be harsh. It can be general and they don't accept it, then it's on them. But if they do accept it, they'll become better, they'll get more opportunities. Doesn't mean they won't have setbacks.
Speaker 4:But I also learned the last thing you want to really talk to them about initially is their career. You want to talk about their person, their family. Get to know them. That actually makes you better Because, as Teddy says, if you don't, you may not know they got divorced or they have child support issues and why their performance is being affected or what their future should be. So always try to get to know the person. And as a mentor we talked about mentees who didn't contact but, as a mentor, contact them on easy these days with texts on holidays, birthdays, all of these things and I learned from so many other people. Those things touch people. Not only will make you a better leader, makes them a better employee, they'll run through the wall for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, got it.
Speaker 4:And lastly I want to say I think just we're so proud of the two of you for how well you've navigated your professional and personal lives and been examples for those under you. It's more difficult for women in the Foreign Service Black women, let's not kid ourselves. And, belinda, you now know the shocks of the private sector, which I have learned, but I would never say that the private sector is better than the experience I had in the foreign service.
Speaker 3:Great Well, look, I want to thank both of you for joining us today. I think that our listeners are going to get a lot out of this episode, and we just appreciate everything that you had to share, shelby. Any final thoughts?
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you. My biggest takeaway is being vested. It's just a good reminder. You both reflected on everything that it takes to be a good mentor the time and the effort and just being vested in others' success is what it's all about, and we thank you for being vested in ours. We couldn't have done it without you, so thank you.
Speaker 1:I hate to do this because I know you're closing. An example of when you're vested is what I just experienced with the loss of my spouse. My family and friends were just amazed that I had these nieces and nephews from the Foreign Service. People's names they had heard, you know, because we talk about you all to our families, okay, especially the ones we're proud of, okay. So these were names they had heard, maybe never associated a face, and they just were so taken aback by the outpouring of love. So that's what you get as a mentor in return.
Speaker 3:Thank you, that's real. It takes a village.
Speaker 1:It takes a village.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we'll always be here for each other.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Without a doubt, without a doubt.
Speaker 3:Hey everyone, this is Belinda. No matter where you work, that episode had universal nuggets of information with relevancy for everyone. Did you catch Uncle Teddy's comment comparing the mentor-mentee relationship to a game of tennis? A mentor helps their mentee improve their aim and their reaction time, just like a coach would do in sports. Your role as a mentor is to listen, absorb and help to direct your mentee's professional growth. I love a good sports metaphor and this one hits home.
Speaker 3:Uncle Harry's mention that you can't save everybody also resonated with me. This one has been a hard lesson for me to learn. In almost every leadership role, I've encountered at least one situation where I really wanted to help someone but due to some circumstance my own lack of influence, their lack of performance or conduct, or maybe just an unwillingness to take tough advice things just didn't work out. Unwillingness to take tough advice Things just didn't work out. Those were tough moments, but they're opportunities for us as leaders to continue to stretch and grow. There's a lot to think about. I think I might even give this episode another listen.
Speaker 3:As always, shelby and I appreciate your ongoing support. Please check out our website at wwwstirringsuccesscom or join us on Instagram at leadership underscore T. Every other Sunday, we will host Instagram live events, so please keep a lookout for more info about that on our IG page. Please continue to share our podcast with your network and don't forget to follow and review us wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks again for joining us. See you back here soon for more of the Leadership Tea Podcast, where we are sipping wisdom and stirring success. Bye.
