Ignition of Creative Collaboration with Biz/Dev | Ep. 139

In this episode of the Biz/Dev podcast Gary and Christie talk about the importance of creating a collaborative environment for creativity for your team. How do you translate that culture to your clients? How can you build a power house system of collaboration and cultivate a process of innovation? They tried to answer it all.

Links:
How to Lead a Collaborative Team
The Ideal Team Player: How to Recognize and Cultivate The Three Essential Virtues

___________________________________

Submit Your Questions to:

hello@thebigpixel.net

OR comment on our YouTube videos! - Big Pixel, LLC - YouTube

Our Hosts

David Baxter - CEO of Big Pixel

Gary Voigt - Creative Director at Big Pixel

The Podcast

David Baxter has been designing, building, and advising startups and businesses for over ten years. His passion, knowledge, and brutal honesty have helped dozens of companies get their start.

In Biz/Dev, David and award-winning Creative Director Gary Voigt talk about current events and how they affect the world of startups, entrepreneurship, software development, and culture.

Contact Us

hello@thebigpixel.net

919-275-0646

www.thebigpixel.net

FB | IG | LI | TW | TT : @bigpixelNC

Big Pixel

1772 Heritage Center Dr

Suite 201

Wake Forest, NC 27587

Music by: BLXRR

Transcript

[00:00:00] Christie: When we hired you, we didn't know we were getting stellar hairdo, awesome podcast commentary. We just thought we were getting mediocre graphic design.

[00:00:11] Gary: Hello and welcome to the Biz Dev Podcast, the podcast about developing your business. I'm your host, Gary Voigt, and I am joined by my co host today, Christy Pronto.

[00:00:21] Christie: Hello

[00:00:21] Gary: Today we have a special episode because David is away on vacation and we get to do whatever we want.

[00:00:27] Christie: As

[00:00:27] Gary: Which is going

[00:00:28] Christie: do whatever we want any other time anyway.

[00:00:31] Gary: true, but at least the conversation is going to be slightly different. And then every question is not going to be beginning with, so, and a look away.

[00:00:39] Christie: Indeed. Yeah.

[00:00:41] Gary: Little inside jokes. All right. Let's get started.

[00:00:42] Christie: Oh!

[00:00:44] Gary: So today we thought we would go a little bit different direction. It's still going to be geared towards small business and business in general, but we wanted to explore more of the teamwork and collaboration side of business instead of just owning, starting and running a business.

The reason we landed on this topic there was a couple of reasons, but the 1st reason we landed on this topic is because recently we've been hiring and Christie has been our go to person for that hiring process. Screening candidates, the job listing out there and then taking them through their initial 1st interviews and at big pixel, 1 of the main drivers of our team.

Team is culture and having a collaborative culture and just a culture where people kind of get along and have not the same mindset, but a similar mindset, or at least a similar,

[00:01:35] Christie: Values.

[00:01:37] Gary: values and personalities that mesh together well. And that's essential for collaboration. And so our topic today is going to be collaboration and Collaborative creativity.

[00:01:51] Christie: Alliteration. Love it.

[00:01:53] Gary: Yeah. I stole that from the article.

[00:01:55] Christie: Yeah,

[00:01:55] Gary: re we're going to reference an article where we got some of this stuff from, we'll put the link in the show notes,

[00:02:00] Christie: That's so funny.

[00:02:01] Gary: but to start off Christy in the process of going through candidates and hiring new people what are a couple of questions that you use or how do you kind of get an indication of if their personality is going to be a culture fit for us?

[00:02:16] Christie: Yeah, I think in hiring it's all about sort of getting an assessment or a base level of again, like you're saying who they are as a person. So finding out what's important to them or what they value is really important first off, because not everyone is similar in the sense that some really value just the paycheck and I'm here for the money, right?

And not the collaborative nature of things or to help my fellow coworker. And that's okay. That's not us, and that wouldn't be a good fit for us, but there's a lot of work environments where that is. So I really do start off, of course, going through the brass tacks of things with people. But one of my first questions always is, Look, we've all started a new job.

We're all looking, we've all had to look for a new job when you're doing it Outside of okay. It hits your pay marks. Okay, it's remote or not remote and those things suit you what's important to you? What are you looking for to get? From your management teams or from the culture itself that makes you feel comfortable and confident to not just do the work You need to do but feel safe to build on that and be creative that's one of the first questions.

Then you really get a hint in a sense for what is important to them. And then they start really talking to you more than just bullet points on a resume. But then they start going over what works for them, what doesn't, what types of environments, culture, talking to people, types of people, ways they like to work.

And that's a really good way to start the conversation in a very natural way that makes them feel like they can be honest.

[00:03:41] Gary: Does it give them kind of like an open door to be a little bit more about what they're talking about. In other words, if they are into teamwork, can you see a shift in the, straight professional interview to more of a conversational back and forth if

[00:03:54] Christie: Yeah, you definitely do. And I always try to, sorry, yeah, I always try to When I'm asking them to answer something like that, I always give my own feedback and feelings to write. So I always start off by, if you see them waiver or if they've said what's important to them, I say, one of the things I really love about working here is, this, that, or the other thing for me, I always say it's the autonomy that and the trust that's given.

Love teams. I love people. I love laughing and I can be very silly. But when it comes to work, I actually love just like putting my head down, doing my work and being able to be trusted to do it. And I love that we have that environment. And then you can see people will be really like, Oh, that's not for me.

Or Oh, yes, I love that. And I like doing this. I like doing that. And that gives you a chance that like you're saying to parlay into things that maybe they're more passionate about. And you can really start to see. Yeah. Because sometimes you interview people for a certain role and you find out maybe that's not the best role for them here, but they're a killer person and maybe we need to find someplace for them here, or maybe the way we thought of this role and how it could work is not the way it's going to work because this person brought something different to it.

So I think it's really important not to have just your own agenda or job description. At play. Is to sort of let the person shine through. When we hired you, we didn't know we were getting stellar hairdo, awesome podcast commentary. We just thought we were getting mediocre graphic design. And,

[00:05:20] Gary: pause for the still shot. Okay.

[00:05:23] Christie: and I threw in the dig for David. So there's a podcast that won't go by without a dig at Gary, but yeah, it's

[00:05:29] Gary: Actually

[00:05:30] Christie: be themselves.

[00:05:31] Gary: this leads into something else that I was going to ask when it comes to culture and collaboration, big pixel, when it started, it was David and then As they grew, he would hire contractors for jobs here and there. And then as clients signed on for longer term, contracts with him, the contractors would end up being more frequent and to the point where if there was enough work to sustain a full time position, the contractors were actually the first people that he would hire because he's already had

[00:06:01] Christie: Of

[00:06:01] Gary: experience with them and that.

Culture fit kind of seemed to work. So that same thing happened with me. I was a contract freelance designer for a while. And then as I kept working with the team more and more, then it just seemed like a natural fit eventually that I would join the team. So

[00:06:19] Christie: And now you're an integral part of it. And so that's so interesting that you say that is. Collaborative relationships can start in any sorts of ways, but it's allowing them to sort of take their path and support each other in what we excel at. But also equally as so, which I think we do really well here is supporting each other when we don't know, or if I don't know a topic.

Or if I have a question is Hey, Matt, can you help me with this? Is what I'm saying about this large language model, completely ridiculous, or does it make sense? And everyone is very willing to, even if they can't help in that moment, I, this is important to me because it's important to you.

And we always are very helpful.

[00:06:57] Gary: Yeah. And with a smaller team, like what we have and we're a remote team as well. So. The teamwork and the collaboration is super important, but it's also important that the ask for, help or assistance, and also the ability to give someone feedback and assistance pretty quickly without someone needing to be over your shoulder and asking for it or checking on you.

In other words, everybody's got to be able to trust each other in a way that if you get stuck somewhere, it might not be in your best interest to just go off on your own and try to figure something out for, six hours to. Two days, just because you're remote and no one's checking on you, but go ahead and ask, that question back to the team and see if, the group of minds can figure it out a little bit quicker.

[00:07:41] Christie: Yeah. That

[00:07:42] Gary: it comes to collaboration, I think that's a big thing is trust and willingness to ask for help. That's it.

[00:07:49] Christie: Yeah, I'm feeling safe having an environment where you feel safe to do that for sure. Yeah, that sort of leads me to someone in one of the interviews. I can't remember. I think it's the one of the final candidates. I really like she came back at me with, I was like goody gum dropping things a little bit because it was I was talking about something really positive, but she goes, okay, all of that's great, but you know, I missed a deadline or I have an issue or there's a real problem.

She goes, how do you overcome challenges as a team? How is your problem solving? And how do you do that? Especially in a remote culture? To sort of mitigate all of the different circumstances and people, and I thought that was a really good question for someone to ask. Is that not everything, especially in her particular role, which would be project management goes well, right?

See what was just spending several days last week, there's client stuff that comes up and we just all sort of have to put stuff to the side and jump in and help each other out. And how do you sort of overcome communicative challenges with each other when you don't agree or something doesn't go right?

And so not that she caught me off guard that I couldn't answer, I certainly answered but I thought that was a really good question to ask and something that if you are a startup or you have your own business and it's Especially a remote culture is make sure that not everything is just the goody, goody gumdrops of this is our plan, but make sure if the plan goes awry, you have a really strong structure to help with the obstacle overcoming right to that's equally as important so that people feel confident and safe to do that too.

Now recently, 

[00:09:23] Gary: A few of us here at big pixel read this book. I think it's called the ideal team player or something like that, but it's focusing around building a team of people that are collaborative and can trust each other. And there was three keywords that came out of it. I guess the three principles they branded were humble, hungry, and smart.

So the, being able to put your head down and go in and try to, work. Without direction obviously would be the hungry, but the being able to ask for help, or if you're not comfortable with, the people you're interacting with on a certain project, and you do need to go maybe find another way to resolve an issue or whatever, I think that's where the humble and the smart part comes in where, you could figure out pretty quickly. Just with your interaction between people, if someone is actually just against you or just maybe not fully understanding what you need from them or how they can help you right away. 

[00:10:16] Christie: I think that lends itself to, to like emotional intelligence and leadership. And that's again, something, I mean, you and I've had these conversations. I think it's so fascinating when you're building your team, especially as a CEO. And you know that David talks about all the time, having to give away certain things.

If you have to give away Some leadership or have certain areas given like for us, for example, in marketing and in design, that's really not a David thing, right? In the sense that he's not with us every day in the trenches, but then there does have to be conversations where we have to speak to each other and sort of blend the, where he's at, where I'm at, where you're at, and you're very good at those types of conversations.

And that everybody comes. With different perspectives and things equally as passionate, equally wanting to solve the problem at hand and then sort of putting that that connective tissue between it to be like, oh he's saying this and you're saying this and here it is and that's the way to do it.

I think that's really important is not to. Square peg round hole it. Do you know what I mean? If it's not working, you're right. Figure out why and sort of have the humility, which is 1 of our pillars of. 1 of our values at big pixels being humble and having humility and sort of understanding your place and things and just communicating better, which I think then helps.

Overcome those challenges and then also helps with the collaborative environment, which we then. To parlay things is what we then take to the client. Which is a whole, the other half of this conversation and creativity is

[00:11:51] Gary: Yeah. I was going to get to that.

[00:11:53] Christie: Yeah. It's

[00:11:54] Gary: You said it a lot better than I did, but yeah, for sure. And we'll.

[00:11:59] Christie: not at all.

Not at all. 

[00:12:07] AD: BigPixel builds world class custom software and amazing apps. Our team of pros puts passion into every one of our projects. Our design infused development leans heavily on delivering a great experience for our clients and their clients. From startups to enterprises, we can help craft your ideas into real world products that help your business do better business. 

[00:12:36] Christie: Let's do it. Let's start. So we've taken our amazing team, our collaborative team, our team of like amazing people, who can overcome obstacles. And now we have to deal with clients or, I mean, we get the privilege of working with clients. And so. What does that look like? It looks different, right?

Different than team communication for sure. It's a different environment altogether. But yeah, that's a whole other side of things for sure.

[00:12:58] Gary: Yeah. Sometimes collaborating with clients can go super well. And sometimes there could, it could be a little bit of a bumpy road in the beginning. A lot of times what we do is when we're meeting with clients about a new project, we usually have some sort of either exploratory or initial meeting just to talk about the project.

And during those meetings, whether it's one or two, we kind of get a feel for each other, not just goals, but personalities. And then, so from there, that's when we kind of try to take a guess at which one of the project managers would be the best fit personality wise for that client. And usually we're pretty good at that.

Sometimes we have to switch. You never really know until there's actual work that needs to get discussed, detailed and done. And in every situation with every client, there's always going to be something that's a little either needs more explaining, or it's not going to go perfectly smooth. So then if there's that bump.

That's your first chance to say, okay, there's a bump. Let's figure this out and get over it and make sure everybody's happy at the end. Or, unfortunately sometimes not here, but in other companies I've worked with when there's a bump, it's usually. Someone immediately takes a defensive stance of I'm right.

You're wrong. We'll do it my way. Not yours. I don't see that here at big pixel,

[00:14:14] Christie: I always struggle with

[00:14:15] Gary: a good way to cancel collaboration

[00:14:18] Christie: yeah, right away. Shut it right down. 

[00:14:21] Gary: Yeah. And in the long run, when it comes down to. But the collaborating with clients and building that relationship, the stronger, that relationship gets over time is going to be based on the, putting your best foot forward, being humble enough to make changes, change directions if you need to, and then constantly, reassuring them that we're in this together.

It's not too late. You versus me, or it's not us versus you, the project, the product, whatever your end goal is, we're a team in this together and you can lean on us and we're going to ask you questions. And as long as the humility is there and that process of overcoming those challenges goes forward, even though if there is a few more mistakes along the way, or, no project ever goes.

From A to Z with roses and flowers ever. It's never the happy path. Otherwise, business would be easy. Building apps would be easy.

[00:15:14] Christie: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:15:15] Gary: you do,

[00:15:16] Christie: too. Oh, sorry. Go ahead, Gary.

[00:15:18] Gary: I was gonna say, once you do have that foundation from, the beginning or close to the beginning of the project, the rest of the stuff along the way is going to be way easier.

To deal with and way easier to communicate about, and it's going to lead to better results on both ends. Everybody's going to be happy.

[00:15:36] Christie: Yeah. Having the foundation and the structure there for sure. I think it's valuable to, to sort of, to think of it like if there's, if whoever's watching us, if it's as a new startup or a new manager trying to manage a lot of different people in situations, I mean, things do not always go well with clients, right?

Like you're saying, and I think it is important to know that there is a lot of juggling there is that there's a lot of things to think about because you have to keep the morale of your client up. through what could be a tumultuous conversation or difficult. But then on the flip side, if the client's arduous, which sometimes can happen, it's an arduous conversation or the changes keep coming.

You also, as a manager and you're being collaborative with your team, you want them to keep their morale up because everyone's doing the best they can. And sometimes it's just the rub of just things not, Aligning in the exact moment that they need to. And so I think it's really important to have, like you're saying a structure for that in place as well is the.

If you don't instill in your team humanity and understanding from the get go, then really what conversation are we having? Sure, you can be collaborative and creative, but when, something hits the fan, it's, you're, you don't have anything to lean back on because you haven't created a team of people that can understand that everyone's human.

So I think that's really important for new business owners or people just that are managing people and leading people is to have all of that infrastructure. In place again for the worst case scenario, to have it in place for the worst case scenario, just always understand, like you're saying, we keep saying humility, but it's important.

It solves a lot of problems. Just stepping back and being like, yeah. Okay.

[00:17:13] Gary: this also brings up another question that might be a little bit more fun to explore. What are some red flags? That if you want to answer red flags that you see in possible new hires when it comes to a good or bad fit with collaboration and teamwork, and I'll bring a couple that have to deal with working with clients,

[00:17:34] Christie: Oh, good. That's a good

[00:17:35] Gary: give me a red flag for hiring and I'll give you a red flag for working with.

[00:17:39] Christie: Yeah, so pertaining to the newest hires in hiring our project manager, we do not prescribe to any type of methodology, agile or otherwise. And a lot of the candidates coming in do right, because they're, they see project management, and most of them are coming in certified and very 1 way or the other.

And so, when I was explaining that. This is sort of how we do things and people are different and you can deal with the client as you'd like, and there's certain base foundational structure, but everything else is really, be who you are. When I start to see people on the conversation starts to shift towards, but it needs to be this way and it has to be this way.

And there's a rigidity there where they're not able to sort of lean into change or growth or a different idea. Or we're all about lending new ideas. And if you want to run your meetings a certain way, by all means do it, but you have to understand coming into some place that people are used to working in a certain way, not that they can't change, but you have to have respect for the culture that is the work that is, and be collaborative and moving that forward or changing.

You can't be very rigid. And so a red flag for me is always when people speak in absolutes, it's never innovative or curious. Or anything like that. It's very black and white and it has to be this way that's, you're just running into trouble with that because it's in the end, everything is going to become persnickety.

[00:19:02] Gary: I think in that scenario too, had they come from a background where they did a certain way and they found success doing that certain way, and it might not necessarily be the way we do it now currently, there's still an opportunity for someone who is collaborative to kind of take their way that they've found success with and start to weave it into our way and see where it goes,

[00:19:23] Christie: Make a better way.

[00:19:24] Gary: it or if it, takes a wrong turn.

Yeah.

[00:19:26] Christie: Yeah, absolutely. You have to be open to do that. And if you're still black and white and closed off, you can sense that in people right away. It's Oh, or that's not good. Danger.

[00:19:35] Gary: Yeah. Very similar red flag when working with clients like. There's I'm not going to name any names or be specific about the project, but there was a certain startup that we were working for that in the beginning, they were just driven by, the passion they had for this one idea that they were going to make work.

And it was all they had in mind. It was a really good idea. And everybody around the project on both sides loved it. And. We were all in. So we did a lot of work. We got to a certain place where then this startup started bringing on other people to help because the project grew and as it grew in scope a little bit, and then some of the newer people decided that they had better ideas for the project.

[00:20:17] Christie: Of course.

[00:20:18] Gary: So while the project was heading in one direction in the beginning, now it's gonna splinter off into somewhat the same direction, but with many more.

[00:20:30] Christie: Right.

[00:20:31] Gary: way more revenue streams than necessary so each one of those streams then turns into its own project.

[00:20:37] Christie: Of course.

[00:20:38] Gary: And the person in charge of those projects, the project manager on that side that since, he was in control of the all mighty dollar we now work for him. You Not for the project, not for the startup, not for the idea.

We, we now are working for him and he dictates what we do.

[00:20:58] Christie: Yeah. And so is the red flag there a lack of hierarchy? A lack of what too much scope creep? What is the actual red flag there? Because there's a bunch. That's, that happens a lot.

[00:21:09] Gary: starts with the lack of. Humility a lack of respect for sure.

[00:21:16] Christie: Yep.

[00:21:16] Gary: And I think it's usually, it just boils down to someone with an ego and has something to prove. And is not willing to think that anybody else might have any input that's going to be better than theirs. So ultimately,

[00:21:27] Christie: Yeah. For sure.

[00:21:29] Gary: yeah.

But we also saw, we started to see that behavior, I guess you could call it, started to cause, ripples and waves within the company, not our company, the company we were working with. Yeah. So the, our client's company was starting to get a little bit weird too. And As we did our best to try to move forward and keep putting this project, on a pedestal enough because we knew the founders vision, and we wanted to make sure it ended up in that direction because we believed in it as well.

The more we try to do that, it seemed like the more we got sidelined. And the more power for lack of a better word, more control was given to Captain Revenue Streams. And

[00:22:11] Christie: Makes

[00:22:11] Gary: ultimately it, it just rubbed so many people the wrong way that the project was never finished.

[00:22:17] Christie: Yeah, I think you bring up a really good point you hit towards the end there too, which is a really key like tactic. For again, people, I know I keep saying if you're leading a team or if you're sort of basically our audience, whoever's listening to this is there has to be a unified vision from the get go, right?

So, yes, David comes and he has a lot of exciting ideas and those ideas are new. It could take you in a lot of different directions, but at the core of us. We know who we are, where we're going, what we want, what our values are. Yes, we know what the dollar and cents need to look like as a team, how we, he wants us to be leading ourselves and leading the clients.

We're very clear on that with each other. We have those conversations as a team together. So. What are my, what is his hopes for the company? What are our hopes for the company? We have those conversations. And so because of that, I don't think we'd run into having that particular situation happen to us, right?

There's not going to be a lack of respect of stepping on toes and taking something in 15 different directions, but that's because. You make the thoughtful, purposeful attempts to be communicative where you're going, not always collaborative as a vision as a leader. It's, we don't live in la land where we all get to say and how we get to run things.

We're very lucky here. A bit pixel specifically that we do have a lot of say and sort of what we hope to have happen. But at the end, at least there's that structure and that unified vision where you can feel confident that you're in your lane doing your thing. And if you want to. Like you said to me the other day I appreciate your hunger for this.

I'm still in my lane. I'm still doing a thing, but I'm participating in a way that maybe adds to that or gets us there faster. But I only am able to do that because we've created a situation where I knew you were going to take what I brought to you. Receptively and be like, oh, that's awesome. We may or may not do it, but that's really cool that you thought of that and wanted to do it.

Now. I've in other places may not have done that because I knew right away. It wouldn't have been respected or it would have been thrown away or not even cared about. So we create that dynamic here, which I think is important. For people to know that you really should take the time that, yes, it can be the dollars and cents and yes, it can be the revenue streams, but if you invest in your people, they will create those revenue streams for you because they feel supported in the idea and the culture.

And they're more willing to bring those to the table for you when they have an idea.

[00:24:44] Gary: Yeah. I agree with that. And by the way, your idea is good. It's just going to take a little time to.

[00:24:48] Christie: Yeah, it'll take a lot of time. It's just like building a whole term algorithm. I don't know a

[00:24:53] Gary: but to go into that when it comes back down to collaboration and team environment humble is one thing hungry. So the respect part, I think maybe we need to address that a little bit further. One thing that I found super, something that I really enjoy about working. Here at big pixel and something that I think is maybe not talked about a lot, but it's definitely apparent, like we seem to have people on our team that become experts in things, whether it's maybe not world renowned experts, but within our group experts in certain topics or even languages or certain areas in which we.

Create a product or sell our services. And so it's fun to watch the other people kind of, compliment and push that person forward into that direction that they seem to have a passion for. And then in doing so, that person is, loves to give that knowledge back to us because we were all supporting them in that way.

It's never really a head to head competition of who could do this better. It always seems to be a little bit more Oh, you, you like this too? Or, Oh, wow, you're good at that. Can you share with me?

[00:26:02] Christie: Yeah.

[00:26:03] Gary: Or, Hey, you're good at this. Can I borrow you to help me with this? Yeah.

[00:26:07] Christie: Yeah. A lot all of the time. And I don't think in a small company like ours, we wouldn't be able to be successful in the way that we're successful in the choice and we're allowed to make the choices that we make if we weren't. If we weren't that way, if we siloed everything and weren't there to do that with each other, it would take so much longer to get where we needed to be or for people to know who we are or for or for guests to feel, I just got an email the other day from a guest and they were like, I just felt really supported from the jump.

Like whatever I wanted to talk about, I felt really good about.

[00:26:40] Gary: Oh, are you talking about a guest that was here on our podcast? Oh,

[00:26:43] Christie: Yep. Yep. Like I felt supported from the jump and I looked at the previous episodes and like the things we could talk about and it got me going on to your website and I did that and they were just like, I didn't realize, you've been here all along.

We've been in business in North Carolina for what? 11 years. I didn't realize, but how could I have not? I felt supported. Everything was transparent and I was like that. It makes you feel really good inside. I'm like, Oh, that's awesome. Thank you very much because that didn't come from me.

It didn't come from you. It came from the top up and we all just sort of, that just is what it is. It's not hard to be collaborative and kind here. It's also not hard to have a hard day either. It's not hard, like it's a lot of work and people can get overwhelmed, but then that's where the grace comes in and the teamwork and the understanding.

And again, it's like a wash, rinse, repeat of all of those foundational frameworks that we've created.

[00:27:32] Gary: Usually we wrap up this podcast asking our guests, what are your top three pieces of advice for any new business leader or any startup? So since it's just you and me, and you're now the guest and the expert today, what are your top three benefits of working in and hiring for a collaborative team?

[00:27:53] Christie: Ooh, that's a very good question. So I think being collaborative is always the way to go. So what are the top three? I think one of the things that really comes from being collaborative in not only your communication but in your team settings is a lack of fear. It gives everybody in the group an opportunity to feel comfortable, to feel safe, And to sort of let the fear go.

And when you let the fear go, then innovation can happen because you're not held back by what's going to happen. Who's going to think this of me? Is this a crazy idea? It could be a crazy idea, but crazy ideas. Change lives every day. So I think one of the biggest benefits I'm always driven by emotion.

First is, I think, fear as I think it sort of what's the fear. Not all these go away. You should have a healthy fear of things, but it disseminates and then maybe the second thing is because of that fear being gone. I think your decisions are a lot faster. I think you're hemming and hawing over. Is this right?

Is this wrong? Is this the best step? Is it not? Should I take this leave? Should we

[00:28:54] Gary: Yeah. That makes sense.

[00:28:55] Christie: here? Or should we not? Now your decisions are a lot faster because you trust yourself, you trust the process, you lack the fear, and you feel supported. And then, I guess to tie that all together, then you're more productive.

The third thing is then you're more productive. You're productive in the mundane ways that just getting things done, but then you're productive in a way that adds more value to the company in the end, because you feel like if you were to do more than is expected or think outside of the box or want to bring something more creative or collaborative to the table.

The fear is gone. The time was there to do it. You're there with your decision and you feel sort of supported to do that. So I think it's just very cyclical in that sort of those top three things came together very quickly for me, I would say. And if you can lean on those as a cycle for yourself and business, then no matter what obstacles come up, if your team is feeling that way you'll innovate yourself out of the issue anyway, right?

Because the fear

[00:29:52] Gary: Yeah. No that's a big one to fear. I didn't, like you said it's an emotional benefit, but it's also hugely productive. To eliminate that barrier. That makes total sense.

[00:30:04] Christie: Yeah, for sure. Sometimes I make some sense. Not a lot always, but sometimes.

[00:30:08] Gary: Don't you always make sense? That's why I had you on the podcast that, and because you've complimented me a couple of times, and I just

[00:30:14] Christie: Yeah, see, I have to. But I get paid for that, don't I? Don't I? No. Oh, okay.

[00:30:19] Gary: that's the quarterly bonuses based on compliments,

[00:30:23] Christie: Yes, it's just a compliment, it's not performance.

[00:30:25] Gary: You're performing well in collaborating with compliments

[00:30:28] Christie: Ah, there we go. You're welcome. We

[00:30:31] Gary: if anybody else wants to take a look at this article that kind of gave us this inspiration, we'll put the link in the show notes below. But for that is the end of this week's podcast. So until next

[00:30:42] Christie: without David. It's just like my cold case files podcast. I survived this week. I survived without David.

[00:30:48] Gary: are you kidding? I'm enjoying without David.

[00:30:50] Christie: And that's where the music goes. 

[00:30:52] OUTRO: Hi, I'm Christy Pronto, Content Marketing Director here at BigPixel. Thank you for listening to this episode of the BizDev Podcast. We'd love to hear from you. Shoot us an email, hello at thebigpixel. net. The BizDev Podcast is produced and presented by BigPixel. See you next week. Until then, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Threads, YouTube, and LinkedIn.