The Wize Way

Episode 143: Leadership Lessons for Firm Owners: The Three C's Framework To Become a Better Leader

• Wize Mentoring for Accountants and Bookkeepers • Season 1 • Episode 143

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“The best leaders talk about the elephant in the room and have the courage to face problems head-on.” - Jamie Johns

In this episode of The Wize Way Podcast for Accountants & Bookkeepers, Brenton Ward and Jamie Johns dive into the Three C’s of Leadership: Courage, Candor, and Communication. 

Discover practical strategies to lead with authenticity, build trust, and inspire growth in your team. Whether you're scaling your firm or improving your leadership style, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you create a thriving business.

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PS: Whenever you’re ready… here are the fastest 4 ways we can help you fix and grow your accounting firm:

1. Take the Wize Accountants Scale Scorecard – Find out your potential to scale and the next steps you should follow – Start Your Scorecard

2. Download our famous Wize Freedom Strategy Map for FREE - Find out the 96 projects every firm owner must implement to build a $5M+ firm that can run without them - Download here

2. Need to Hire right now? Book a 1:1 FREE discovery call with our WizeTalent hiring coaches to help find your next team member the Wize Way – Click Here

4. Book a 1:1 Wize Discovery Session – Spend 30mins with our Wize CEO, Jamie Johns, a $7M firm owner who is ready to give you his entire business plan to build a firm that can run without you – Find out more here

Brenton Ward:

From Wize Mentoring is , a show about accounting and bookkeeping practice owners and the many stories, lessons, and tips from their experience of transitioning from a time- poor practice to a business that runs without them. I hope you enjoy and subscribe. G'day, Jamie. Welcome to another episode of The Wize Way Podcast for Accountants and Bookkeepers. How are you?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, good Brent, how are you today?

Brenton Ward:

Doing great. Thank you, that's good. In today's episode, we're going to talk about a topic that you've been pretty passionately coaching on for a long time, but leaning into quite a bit recently, which is all around the people side of the business and how to become better managers and better leaders, and one of the frameworks that you've been teaching recently is all around the three C's. So before we get into what the three C's are the specifics of each of those and how they can help us grow our firm, why don't you give us a bit of context and a bit of insight from your experience as to why you believe this is such an important topic to talk about and also such a critical topic for firm owners to hone in on if they're looking to grow their firm?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, well, I think it's you know, Brent. I think in terms of the topic it's all about, you know leadership. So in terms of you know really what are the three probably best trait s lots, coaching and mentoring, and even with my own team at Sky Accountants, on that leaders would have? And so I've been sort of working a lot what I call courage, candor, and communication. And if you look at those three things, you know courage is sort of doing things anyway when you're fearful of them. Probably the definition of courage, when you're fearful of them, probably the definition of courage and candor is just, you know, basically being honest, having integrity and you know, walking your talk, in that sense. And then great leaders are good communicators as well. They often over-communicate and don't under-communicate. And if you can sort of really articulate those three characteristics in your firm, it will help you be a better leader, um, and you know you don't always have to be liked, but ultimately I think you'll find that you'll be respected if you follow those the three C's, if you like.

Brenton Ward:

Yeah so sometimes it's easier for us to understand some of these principles when we look at it from the opposite direction and maybe some of the symptoms of doing what the opposite is that you're talking about there on the three C's. So if we were to take a minute just to look at what is the opposite of each of those C's and how might that be showing up in your firm at the moment and some of the problems around that?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, well, I mean, if you look at courage, for example, the opposite of that is probably, I would say, shying away from problems. I think the best leaders that I've ever dealt with have had the courage to talk about what the problem is and to go further. You know, they've looked at the problem around facts and results, and having the courage to do that allows you to focus on facts and results, and so it makes the courage easier where, if you don't have facts and results, or you don't have, you know, evidence-based type of discussions, it's easy to make it quite personal. So if you're going through change management and obviously you know you're the leader of your firm or the owner, you might shy away from trying to make improvements if you feel like you know someone's going to take your communication as a personal attack. So there's a lot of aspects around courage and finding courage, you know, both at a personal and a professional level.

Jamie Johns:

But you know courage is one of the things that you need to solve problems, um, because if you, it's like the old saying that you know good leaders will often talk about the elephant in the room, you know, and so having those hard discussions, um, is absolutely crucial of how you conduct yourself there's a book called Crucial Conversations and you know there's a lot of books written around this and how to sort of raise topics that are difficult. And you know, do you raise difficult topics with everyone there or do you sit with each person individually and sort of communicate in that sense? So, yeah, courage is a very important aspect um of leadership, but you also need, I would say, tools that allow you to have the courage, you know, so that you don't push people away from you when you do raise difficult you know difficult questions or want to talk about problems in your firm.

Brenton Ward:

So that's going to show up quite often when someone like the firms we work with at Wize want to go on this journey of transformation.

Brenton Ward:

wise want to go on this journey of transformation and you know often that journey of transformation comes with quite a few changes and, as we know, people you know a lot of people don't necessarily like change, and it's not that they don't like change. They fear what's on the other side of that change because they don't know what the change is going to bring. So, um, that courage piece is probably very important in firm owners who are looking to to grow and scale their firm, because big decisions, or not even big decisions, just a lot of decisions have to be made, don't they?

Jamie Johns:

And I think like I think at that point, Brent, to the courage is also about firm owners and leaders being vulnerable. Like, if you're vulnerable, people then will open up to you and say, oh, hang on, you know, Jamie's only human. You know, and often as a leader, you know sometimes the most important words. You can say, hey, sorry, you know, I was quite reactive to that, I didn't mean to do that, you know. So sometimes as a leader, you have to be vulnerable, um, to build trust as well, and not sort of put yourself up on this sort of ivory tower where you're unapproachable. I think the best leader is Simon Sinek, says the great leadership guru, that you know, great leaders have the courage to be vulnerable.

Jamie Johns:

So if you're listening to this and you know, you own your own firm, sometimes the best conversation to build bridges with people and to develop those relationships is having courage around your own lack of leadership and to put up your hand and say, hey, look, I'm not perfect, but together we can do this better. You know, um, and that really instigates the teamwork. So you want to bring all these barriers down, Brenton, and so when you first say the word courage you might have, you know visions of. You know assertiveness and power, and you know go, let's do this. But in fact, for what I've found over the years is the more vulnerable that I've been, the more buy-in I've had from you know, the team and the crew around me say, hey look, Jamie's not so much different to me, but together we can reach the goal. How do you define courage? And if you bring the walls down, that takes courage and recognise that you're only human. And then you have you know, you have empathy with people and that's what you want.

Brenton Ward:

Yeah, so let's talk about the second C, candor. I wouldn't use candor in my vocabulary that much, so I don't really fully understand it, other than being open and honest and frank about things. So, for the context of the conversation around leadership, what does it mean to you? And, yeah, how does it show up?

Jamie Johns:

Well, I think candor is for me, um, it just represents authenticity. So you're candor, you're honest, you're open, you're transparent and you have a level of authenticity that perhaps others may not have. And you know that's associated with courage, because you know a lot of people will be thinking a certain thing, but they won't be candour about it. They won't, I guess, be truthful and tell you what they really think, for fear of offending you, for fear of hurting others or whatever. So I think just candour is really around integrity, and for me, integrity is walking your talk None of us are perfect but trying to do what you say, trying to do what you say.

Jamie Johns:

So if I can give you sort of a practical example, Brenton, is, if you organise like a monthly or weekly, it is one-on-one with your team members and you don't turn up to the meeting because you're too busy, you know, your integrity just drops, you know. So it's just a classic example if you set meetings and yes, you might have hiccups from time to time but if you continually don't show up, it's just a lack of integrity and you know it undermines your character is sort of another word for it. I suppose another C word undermines your character. And so, you know, having that candour, having that character, and following through on what you say, I think as a leader is really, really important. You know, and I guess the definition of integrity for me is just walking the talk.

Jamie Johns:

You know, walking the talk, so that's the key, because you know, it's every touch, moment, every interaction that you have with every team member, colleague or peer.

Jamie Johns:

It either builds the emotional bank account or it reduces it. And so you've got to be aware, you know, and in this sort of area, you know, in this area of candour, you've got to build into that self-awareness. And it's difficult because, you know, lots of times we're very busy, we don't time to reflect and say, oh, you know, debrief, or might say, oh, how did that conversation go? Could have I done, you know, could have I acted better, could have I communicated better? In that sense, so you know, self-awareness is another sort of key attribute around leadership that probably fits into that integrity or candor piece. Because if you're not self-aware, you know you're not going to take people for you on the journey. You know you're not going to be in alignment because I'll be thinking one thing and then you'll be thinking the other. You know you want to be self-aware of how you have an impact on others and that's as you're talking there.

Brenton Ward:

The word candor reminded me that one of the entrepreneurs that we follow, Alex Hormozi, who's an American entrepreneur, was very successful at a young, young age in his own right, one of his core values is candor and it just reminded me of it. Then I was asking ChatGPT to tell me what Alex was saying about candor, and it was literally what you were saying there around radical transparency.

Jamie Johns:

Radical transparency. There you go, yeah.

Brenton Ward:

And one of the things that bubbled to the surface as you were talking about the self-awareness piece, there was the art of debate within a firm, and you know Ed Chan has often talked to us in firms about, you know, healthy debate within a firm, which you guys have embraced over the years at Sky as you've grown. So does that resonate with you? Does that have the ability to embrace debate? Does that fall into that candor piece?

Jamie Johns:

absolutely. You know candor's unreserved honesty and you know if. If you don't know what someone's thinking, or if you don't know what their problem is, how can you fix it? You, so you sort of came away from the meeting, you know, not knowing what the underlying issue for a person is. So you know, if someone's not candid with you, you can't fix the problem. So you know. So, as you're building a firm and you're developing the, you know your key people around you. It's important that you educate them to be honest with you, even if they disagree with you. That's where the magic happens because I've always found that. You know, one of my favourite sayings is hey, Brent, let's get together because I believe two heads are better than one. I love always saying that People say oh yeah, I believe two heads are better than one. I love always saying that yeah.

Jamie Johns:

People say oh yeah, I'm happy to have input into that. So, yeah, absolutely, you've got to create an environment where people feel safe to express their opinions without being belittled either. So you know, and always focus on the result what's the? What are we trying to achieve? So you know, great leadership is unreserved honesty and sincere expression.

Brenton Ward:

You know, without having the wherewithal to take to not take it personally as well, because, just reflecting on my own journey, when this, this, you know, the concept of the debate was introduced, I found also I had to look inward and, you know, focus on my own private victory because I would be taking things personally. As you know, my partners yourself or Ed didn't agree with what I was suggesting. It would be like a personal thing. But then the penny dropped one day and it's like actually no, if we just are candid with each other and, you know, openly debate this, everyone wins because the result's better and I don't need to take it personally so that self-awareness piece is huge, isn't it?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, and that's what that's why the importance of your meetings is, because, at the end of the day, you know, Brenton has an input, Jamie has an input, Ed has an input. Three heads are better than one, and, at the end of the day, you might find that a third of what you are thinking is right, a third of what Jamie's thinking is right, and a third of what Ed's thinking is right, and so, you know, the sum of each individual ends up being, you know, greater than the whole if you like, as they say. So, yeah, three heads are always better than one, and, like that's happened to me at Sky Accountants time and time again, getting the other guy's input has just been game-changing, you know.

Brenton Ward:

So I just want to go a little bit deeper on this for a second, because a lot of people listening to this, a lot of people won't be listening to this because they're just not on a journey of personal and professional development, right, and that's just a reality that we've.

Jamie Johns:

Yeah not a lot of people. Yeah, it's soft skills really.

Brenton Ward:

Like you know, as accounts and bookkeepers, we're all technical, technical, but what we're talking about here is soft skills for that one firm owner that has, you know, a team and they're listening to this, and then what they're actually wanting to embrace this and go on this journey and, you know, improve the culture and improve the communication and everything within their firm. Do you have any suggestions on how you drip on your team members to get the concepts that we're talking about, because they are all quite personal and personal development- based?

Jamie Johns:

Absolutely.

Jamie Johns:

You know, and it's a good segue into the last topic here you know the third characteristic of a great leader is communication, right.

Jamie Johns:

So to take that practical step, brenton, that you said and you can listen to don't just listen to me on this, listen to Simon Sinek about this that great leaders speak last.

Jamie Johns:

I don't know if you've come across that, but you know, next time you're in a meeting with someone and you've got three or four or five people or whatever in the room, you know, as a firm owner, practice speaking last, right, and that might be quite profound for you if you're listening to this. But let everyone have their say, let everyone air their opinion, and don't interrupt them and just listen. You know, not even listen to reply, but practice the art of empathetic listening and then speak last, and then people will then, you know, unconsciously, sort of move towards you, because the good thing is, once you let everyone else speak, you've sort of got all your facts you know, you've got more of a picture of the truth, what in the room, of what everyone thinks, and it gives you a great base um of understanding of you know each individual, but also the group dynamic and and the atmosphere in the room.

Jamie Johns:

And I love what. I love what Dr. Stephen Covey says about communication. About communication, he says that the highest wish of the human heart is to be understood. Like you think about it. We all love you now. Like when we have that really good conversation with someone and you just click and you say, oh, I feel like I've known you for years, you know, you understand where I'm coming from, you know, and you can only do that by. You can't do that by talking 80% of the time, can you?

Brenton Ward:

You know that's right. I think about those conversations where you walk away from that conversation. You go geez, they're a good person or geez, that was a great chat, and you realize the whole time.

Jamie Johns:

And they were asked, just asking you questions you can't forget this, and I've read a thousand books on my journey, Brenton and another saying is that listening is ultimately giving. It's the old saying, you know. It's more blessed to give than receive. And if you want a practical application of this, just practice listening and speaking less, you know, and then just sort of confirming what people say. Oh so, Brenton, did you feel like this? And you'll say, oh yeah, Jamie, I felt just like that, and so you're building that connection, you see, but, as you know, you and I, you know, we've coached a lot of people over the last six years and we've seen some discussions where leaders come in and they say, no, no, you need to do it like this, you need to do it like that, you've got to follow this process like this and you've got to meet the budget because of this, you know, and so you're really alien, alienating, um, the person that you're talking to. So you want to sort of start the opposite and ask a lot of questions. You know there's such a great book it's the six. I've actually got it here on my desk.

Jamie Johns:

Everyone Deserves a Great Manager. The Six Critical Practices for Leading a Team by Scott Miller. Leading a Team by Scott Miller, you know, and if you go to, I think it's the second, you know, critical factor, it's about having one-on-ones. But the book's great because it guides you through the type of questions that you should ask in your one-on-one and it goes through, you know, personal questions from a career perspective, then team questions, then manager questions, and so it's all about questions. So if you're sort of looking at it in that context, have a guess what you have to do if you're asking questions Listen, listen, like, listen.

Jamie Johns:

So you know the third factor there of great leadership is great communication. And from a practical aspect, you know, the third factor there of great leadership is great communication. And from a practical aspect, you know, speak last in your meetings, reinforce, you know, did you feel this way? You know and reinforce how they felt and focus on feelings, you know. And then, and only then, you can really build those bridges and those interpersonal relationships with each of your direct reports, and then you'll notice a change towards heading, towards, you know, the bigger vision for the firm, because you'll be reinforcing what each individual wants to achieve and how they're feeling, reinforcing your understanding of their place in their career and the firm. And if you can do that and then tie that in with where the firm is heading as a whole, um, you'll get, you know, you'll get a lot more alignment and goal alignment and they'll get a lot more career satisfaction as well, because, you know, because their leader understands them.

Brenton Ward:

Yeah, often on this journey of implementing these things and you know, taking away something from today and and practicing it, we fall back into old habits pretty quickly, and then we can tend to, as humans, beat ourselves up when we fall into those old habits. So what do you say to that? Looking back at your own journey of transformation and looking at the Jamie firm owner 10 years ago versus the Jamie firm owner now, what advice would you give on that journey?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, I think, just honouring your calendar first. So what I mean by that is if you currently if you're listening to this and you currently don't have any form of one-on-ones with your team members, that's a real wake-up call. So, and what I mean about one-on-ones, you may be having one-on-ones, but it's all technical. I'm not actually talking about that. I'm talking about one-on-ones where you come in with a series of questions and say you know, how are you feeling about your job this month? How are you feeling about your career? How can I support you better? What do you see as the biggest stumbling blocks in your current role? How would we fix them?

Jamie Johns:

These are really questions, open-ended, that really get people thinking about how to prove their role. And also, you know, the firm as a whole. So the key takeaway here is to you know, grab your calendar, grab your diary right now scheduling your one-on-ones. You know, know, grab the book. You know, grab if you're not a wise member, grab the information we've got and the templates on how to have one-on-ones, and then start changing. But, you know, honour your calendar first. If you don't turn up to these meetings, it will just undermine your leadership and people will then think, oh, I'm not important to such and such. So you know, really, probably the one-on-ones Brenton really encompass those three things courage, candour, and communication. And funny enough, it all comes back to people, doesn't it? Yeah?

Brenton Ward:

Just to speak to the one-on-one piece quickly, because I know a lot of people will be listening and going. Hang on. I have 15 team members. Like I'm busy enough as it is. I've got 150 emails coming in a day, clients calling me left, right, and center. How the hell am I meant to fit 10 one-on-ones in? You know a week with my team? What' s the secret source there?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah well, that's where you need to. You know you really need to look at your with my team. What's the secret sauce there? Yeah well, that's where you need to. You know you really need to look at your firm's organisational chart. You need to sort out, you know whether you've got teams or not, how your direct reports are organised, and you know whether you've got, you know, I guess, a wide and shallow team where everyone reports to you. So at another consultancy level, you really need to sort out your org chart. You need to sort out who reports to who. So there's a lot more sort of consulting that you would require.

Brenton Ward:

I'm not going to open that can of worms in this podcast, but we've certainly got episodes around the deep and narrow team structure which is what I think you're alluding to there, and team design that's right.

Jamie Johns:

You shouldn't you know, you shouldn't have any more than really five direct reports, because after that your management leadership ability starts to dilute, and it's a good podcast for another day yeah, perfect.

Brenton Ward:

Well, Jamie. The three c's have been enlightening. I think there are a lot of practical takeaways from them and I honestly believe you can easily implement them and easily practice them, that's right.

Brenton Ward:

So I hope everyone listening has taken something away from that conversation and if you'd like to know more about the three C's or you'd like to lean into more of your leadership development, reach out or give us a comment on this episode and we'll happily send you in the right direction. But, Jamie, thanks for sharing that. I know you're really passionate about this at the moment. Have been for a long time, really, but really peeling back the layers on it, so looking forward to some of the episodes that will come out of your experience on this now irons Brenton.

Jamie Johns:

Good, I'll look forward to the next episode cool.

Brenton Ward:

See you soon, bye! Thanks for tuning in. If you like this episode, please remember to subscribe and leave us a five-star review for more practical, wise tips on how to build a business that runs without you, head over to wizementoring. com/ podcast to download a free copy of the Accountant's 20-Hour Workweek Playbook. We've included a link in the show notes below. See you in the next episode!