Ep 058: Success is a Dynamic Force with Jaleh Zandieh

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:00:08

Ever wonder what success actually means? How do you get it? And how do you keep it?

Theresa Lambert: 00:00:14

We all want it yet sometimes it feels only some of us get to have it.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:00:18

Hi, Teresa and Blair here we are to badass entrepreneurs, best selling authors, coaches and business mentors, who have had success, felt success, questioned our own success and reclaimed it. Let's be real for a hot minute. 2020 has been a roller coaster ride, and many of us to start to wonder if they'll lose the things that made them successful. So we got curious, Ron real about what success is truly about?

Theresa Lambert: 00:00:44

Can you put it in a box?

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:00:47

How can you get it?

Theresa Lambert: 00:00:48

Can people take it away? Or are you the one with the power?

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:00:52

Does it mean the same to all of us? Or are we the ones that create it?

Theresa Lambert: 00:00:56

From PGA golf pros to doctors, CEOs, entrepreneurs and spiritual mentors. We get together to meet with successful people from around the globe to dissect success for vibrant conversations and interviews. Make sure you click the subscribe button on the app store because each week we will drop a new episode to bust through the myths around success and dissect its true meaning.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:01:26

Welcome back to another episode of dissecting success. I'm Blair capital Venables. I'm here with Teresa Lambert. And I'm also here with jealous and yay. I just say her name like that because it just needs to be said like that. She's a global leadership expert, a seeker of hidden gems and passport stamps, a tea connoisseur. She helps service driven leaders from entrepreneurs to UN directors transformed stress into strengths so they can upgrade their confidence and take their impact to the next level. Her 19 year research based framework helps teams discover and unblock blind spots, utilize their values, vantage points and voice authentically and sustainably, sustainably sustainably. Who has a tongue tie Twister, me anyways, her foundational philosophy is diversity is meant to nourish and help us flourish. She has a book coming out which we're going to talk about. And you know what when she's not jammin and making a difference in the world, you can find her frolicking on the beaches in Portugal hanging out with her husband and having tea dates with me on Zoom. Jaleh Zandieh, welcome.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:02:39

Thank you so much. I love RTDs thank you so much for having me.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:02:43

Oh, my God, martinis have actually progressed because I'm in Canada. She's in Portugal, we met through one of our coaches. And we've been friends for about a year and our tea dates have now progressed from WhatsApp messages to even I message so. So you know, it's like me and Theresa, we progress from business besties to besties. I love it. It's so special. So thank you so much for joining us today.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:03:08

Oh, thank you for having me on. I'm so happy to be here. Amazing. You both.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:03:13

Okay, so let's dive right in. Jealous. Andy. I just want to say your name like that forever? What does success mean to you?

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:03:26

Love these questions. Thank you so much. I, for me, I continue to learn from a lot of very smart people who I always think learn from people who are much smarter and more experienced than than yourself. And I think I've just always made it my business to put myself with other people much smarter, and just doing incredible things. And one of the things I continue to learn of just observing them and then getting to work with them and collaborate is successes actually this very dynamic force for doing good not only for our own lives, but for elevating the quality of life for others. So I think success is this reciprocally beneficial process that is nourishing our strengths and and our capacities and our gems of talents and also activating and polishing and refining the gems of others. With the spirit of joyful service.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:04:25

So special, you know what we should do before we go any further. Let's talk about gems. Tell us tell us about gems.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:04:35

Oh, I love that. Um, so I I've raised been raised by two very different parents. One is Persian and one is American. And they both had this this really special belief in humanity that comes from their, their I think spiritual faith. And there was incredible line that says every single person is a mine rich and gems of inestimable value. And there was this painting of that particular quote in our living room. And I saw, I think, growing up with that piece of philosophy, since I was really little, I was always being encouraged to see the the gems in myself, as well as the gems and other people. And I think gems in that respect is those qualities that allow us to be the best version of a human being as possible. So our capacity to be generous and thoughtful and conscious and thinking of others as we walk through our day, and noticing opportunities to make someone else's moments a bit brighter, or healthier, or more united, or more understood. So I think it's this ways to connect, and ways to communicate and ways to understand and to express and to, to lead, lead our lives from a place of service that's actually becoming better versions of ourselves, as we're doing good for others, and then receiving the blessing of that as well. I think gems are these ways for us to be worthy of the name human, like it's our humanity being polished. Wow.

Theresa Lambert: 00:06:16

I just need to take a moment to like, take in, you know, what you just shared? And what a timely message for humanity to think about. Like, what a timely message for humanity to think about, at boiling point, you know, to I love this to how this philosophy around the gems that you were taught on and that this philosophy that you grew up with, ties so beautifully into this definition of success, being this dynamic force to not only good, do good, and elevate your own life, but that of others. They to to make the time to not just show up and make our gem shine brighter. But to acknowledge and seek opportunities to do that for other people as well. And their experiences. So powerful. You don't even know what questions to ask. Oh, I have that sink. You know, I love it.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:07:31

Well, I How does Jellison Yeah, so anyway, I just feel it rolls off the tongue. Um, so how do these like the gems, you know, you've created these nine leadership styles, you you're writing a book that's coming out this year? Do these, like how do these gems tie into that? And like, can we talk about those leadership styles?

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:07:54

Yeah, for sure. Thank you. Um, so yes, so since so for about 20 years now, since graduate school, I was really interested to learn how do people who care about others, how do they not burn out? How do they sustain their love for humanity? How do they sustain their joy in service, and keep being incredibly impactful? At the same time. And so I didn't think that, at the time that I was starting this, that it would be a 20 year research project that just keeps building into a framework I just wanted, you know, to pass research in my grad school class. But my professor kept encouraging me to keep going with it. And so as I, as I continued to go to different countries and live in different places, I kept being able to connect and become friends and collaborators with people who are from very different walks of life, very different cultures and backgrounds and native languages. But there was this golden thread that kept connecting people. And it wasn't that we looked the same, or we checked all of the external boxes that made us such aligned friends and kind of start to call ourselves family, where we don't look like each other at all. My skin tone was completely different. hair texture was completely different. But we start seeing each other as family members. And I was like, how does that happen when we're so different? And so I started realizing that there are different there's a lot of diversity that happens as we show up as as an individual, but we also have all of this internal diversity, the way people see themselves that way they see reality as the way that they see possibility to improve conditions around them. So there was this vantage point that I noticed that even though people were very service driven and really focused on taking care and taking good care and wanting to contribute something positive to other people that there was all this uniqueness in under the umbrella of being a service hearted person. So I started realizing, oh my gosh, I think there's different vantage points. Each vantage point comes from a very different set of strengths. And we cover each other's blind spots. So at first, I thought there were three leadership styles. And then I realized there were six, and then I realized there were nine. So there's nine distinctive leadership styles. And each one is designed to be highly harmonious with all the others. So they're never meant to be in competition or compete for the spotlight or compete to be right, they are all each correct, because they're helping to support or close the gap on a incredible need that each individual has. And then also society as a collective requires in order to be thriving, and healthy. So the Oh, sorry. So your question was about the the nine leadership styles themselves? Yeah,

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:11:05

well, you're you're answering it like we you know, how you got there is brilliant. I love that this has been a two decade project, your book is going to be probably a game changing for the world of business, for anyone who's in leadership. So I'm excited about that. And yeah, I would love to dive into like, what are the nine leadership styles?

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:11:26

Awesome. So there's what I call the some of the telescopic vantage points. So their, their vision for humanity tends to be very innovative and expansive. So innovation and creativity is one of those leadership styles. So they care very much and see the potential and everything they see the big bright possibility, or other people might see that it's too challenging or too difficult, or there's too many obstacles, they tend to see obstacles like an x ray machine, they're like, oh, that's porous. We can go around that we can break through that. They're they're highly innovative, and they get so much joy in actually navigating a path that takes us to the next milestone, and then then milestone after that. So, so innovation and creativity fun. Then there's humanity and noble actions. So also very telescopic, big, bright visionaries that really wants to create processes that help individuals or teams or groups or communities, tap More into their innate goodness, and know how to express it in very practical ways. So those are two of the telescopic ones. And then two of the more microscopic leadership lenses are just as important and just as visionary, but they tend to look at some of the nuances that are often missed. So for example, elevating experiences and memory making are is one, one team of leaders. And they're really excellent at finding the processes that are kind of becoming sort of just the traditional way to do something. And there's all this potential through their vantage point to make things more joyful, brighter, more memorable, they care very much about the the quality of the experience, because the quality of the experience leads to better memories, and more joy and feeling alive in our lives. So they care about not just living a life, but living a life that is worth talking about. And recalling these incredible moments. So they they're excellent at helping to kind of recalibrate what we see as the possibility for an experience that may have just gotten a little bit mundane or methodical. So they're creative in that way. And then another microscopic lens is improving the quality of the environment with a space. So they're extraordinary at either a virtual space or an in person physical space, they're extraordinary. And yet, realizing that underneath, everything that we do in the day, the quality of the space is where a lot of the magic is kind of festered from the that kind of lamp of creativity, we need a space that fosters creativity, or learning or growth or rest or healing. So they're the first thing that they see it in terms of all of the leadership styles see the importance of everything. But where we need to begin is usually through our vantage point, we can't start talking about writing better articles unless we figure out the best way for the author to have an environment that fosters that, that power of expression. So expression is important. The space is important, but each leadership style will see we have to start here this is the drop of the stone in the pond. And then the ripple of impact continues. I'm not pleased. So those are those are four of the, of the nine.

Theresa Lambert: 00:15:09

So interesting. I love this. I mean, I was listening and I was like, innovation and creativity sounds like my leadership style. But is there a like? I'm like curious, like do leadership style mix? Like, have you found that people could like hold more than one leadership style? Was there like a dominant leadership's? I love this, I just want to like, I'm just really curious to like, you know, learn more around like, how, how does that show up in different teams? And what have you noticed in terms of dominant, or are they mixing or? So cool? Yeah.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:15:53

That's a great question. So I've worked with teams of people who are each very confident, very strong, very talented, very smart. Each member of the team is bringing their you know, whole arsenal of of experiences and talents and education. But they're also each of us are bringing our leadership lens to the table, whether we know what it's called or not, the thing that we can do and see with obvious clarity tends to be an expression of our leadership lens, or leadership style. So it tends to be just one like we each have our primary leadership style. It's how we see the world, it's how we see ourselves, it's the first thing we notice, when we step into a space, it's the first thing we see that's missing, in order to make a situation improve. But we also have a, we have all of the needs that each leadership style covers. So whether or not it's our unique leadership style, we'd actually don't have to have all nine leadership styles because that would be exhausting. When we try to cover all the bases all at once, I think that's one of the things that causes overwhelm. It allows us to feel isolated, or just exhausted, because we think we have to be covering all the bases all the time. So I've found that a lot of the teams I've started to do these trainings with about 10 years ago, that when we know that we can trust ourselves, and we know how to express what we see. And we're able to also create a space or a culture where we're encouraging other people to express what they see with HD clarity that seems so obvious, but it's not. It's some other person's blind spot. So the best teams are knowing what they see with HD clarity what their strengths are, according to their leadership style, but then it also creates this incredibly nourishing space and culture where everyone's voice is needed. Everyone's voice can be right everyone's voice can actually cover someone else's blind spot. And it's not in a chaotic way it can actually be like nine different instruments playing in tune with themselves but can harmonize to play a melody together with others because each person is being in tune with their own instrument so we can surely harmonize well you know

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:18:23

I'm picturing I'm picturing like all the leaders with like their their instruments marching in a marching band on a field

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:18:31

and which is like super personal to me because I was actually in a marching band when I was in middle school in high school and it's a very, that's very close to my heart. Some of the best times in high school is Battle of the Bands. Grambling and Grambling State and a lot of the historically black colleges and universities are being instructor would take us to see them because playing playing music and dancing with 100 other people is such I think it was like planting the seeds for my my leadership framework where it's, we're not competing, like even if someone is playing a solo, no one's trying to add outmatch or outplay the soloist, it makes everyone sound better when everyone's instrument is playing in tune.

Theresa Lambert: 00:19:15

I love it. I think that's such a progressive way, you know, to look at leadership and for my experience, like managing a large team, I was a hotel General Manager prior to becoming a business coach. So I used to lead a large team and one of the things that I really, you know, found from just hearing you speak and having you know, it is like building teams, to me always had a little bit of an art behind it. And this recognition of other people's strengths and allowing them to act and move within this strength and see yourself as supporting an areas where they don't was such a huge piece that I focused on and I did some personal education, like growth work with creative problem solving. And it's all about how we take in, like inflammation and how we deliver information and how we learn. And so it was really cool when I brought that to the team. And I feel like as you're sharing this, these different leadership styles and learning for the band to play together, there's so much power in allowing anyone and everyone on the team to be their own shiny pride gem, you know, and removing this hierarchy from teams, I feel like is such a big thing that is a shift that's happening in the workplace. And I've, I've seen it, but still, it's so rooted in how we built organizations and structured them for the last, you know, hundreds of years. So I find this so fascinating. And it's so progressive. And I agree with what Blair said, I feel like this book, and what you're bringing to the table is going to be a real like, game changer.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:21:13

Thank you so much. But in so much coming from you, I so appreciate your, your reflection, I'm, I'm so excited to share it because it always it brings my heart more more joy and steadiness. Frankly, when when I know what I'm good at, I know what I can actually confidently say, and I can trust myself, as I'm leading my life, and I can help them, other people trust themselves. And remember that we don't have to be the same, in order to be valuable, we don't have to be the same in order to be included or have a sense of belonging, that there's there's actually very different facets of a gym, for the purpose of reflecting light from every angle. And I think that's what we as human beings can do for each other, we can actually just keep reflecting more wisdom, more experience, more insight, more possibility, more, more ideas, more solutions. So we each get to be part of humanity being raised up and we lift up each other together. And then it's an easier lift than elbowing each other out of the way to try to, you know, lift up something that's incredibly hard and sort of counter intuitive to physics. A harder struggle.

Theresa Lambert: 00:22:35

Wow, wow, wow. So much. I mean, I feel like I could like, I would have lovely tea sessions with you. I'm a big tea fan, oh my gosh, I'm iced out. And like matcha make their make.

Theresa Lambert: 00:22:52

I feel like let's have a tea day. Because like, I'm like, I could like I feel like I could talk to you for hours. But you know, you pleasure. I feel like, Um, one thing that I've seen and and I'd love sort of your perspective around this is that is particularly in the last couple of years in the environment that we're in with what we're going through as a collective. What I've seen is separation, becoming bigger and bigger and bigger, and just what you're presenting today, what you're talking about today, your mission, your vision, and like I get so much energy from your around this, it's really about not saying you're right, you're wrong, or I'm right, and you're wrong. It's like we're both right and our own way. And how can we find ways to hold space and compassion and acceptance and understanding for the other person and their way off, being in this world, maybe even their beliefs, their thoughts, while at the same time honoring our own. So I, it screams this incredibly huge message have come together. And notice what you can V change when we work collectively in a group and an all I can think of right now is like ants, you know, working together to lift rocks that are like, I don't know, like 1000s of times heavier than them, but because they're collectively doing it. They lift it effortlessly. And so, you know, you probably didn't intend your book and your message to take on such a grander scheme but like to me, it's also it sounds like the leadership that you're calling humanity to step into. Sorry, maybe I've just made it bigger than it is but it did that just that's what's Oh,

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:25:03

thank you. So no I, I'm I was, I've been putting off writing this book for years. Like, for years, people were like, you should put your framework into a book like this would be so great as a as you know, people can talk about it or have book clubs. And it's like, oh, no, it's, you know, I'll just keep it to my small community and my clients. And I didn't really see it as that important because it was just something that helped me throughout my life. And, you know, the kids I would work with, or the people would mentor my clients, you know, leadership consulting and subroutine building. So it didn't feel important to me to like, share with so many people other than the people who are inviting me to speak on it, or go to a conference or something. And then, and then with the pandemic, and just a lot of the things that humanity has faced, individually, we each have a different experience of it, of course, depending on our country, depending on where we live, or socio economic background, or, you know, the community we're in or the, you know, there's a lot of variables. But there's also this collective experience that we're all having as one human family, on one globe, spinning, you know, we're all sitting on the same earth together. And two of my clients kind of pulled me aside and said, If you don't write this, like, who's gonna write it, because this is, you've done, you know, 4000 interviews, like you've, you've done this like framework for 20 years. And so I started to see like, maybe it could help a few more people than I thought, or maybe it could just add another tone to the conversation that's currently being head. So I I humbly, like, receive what you're saying. And it's, it's not me, I think it's just this collection of spending a lot of time with incredible leaders around the world. And I'd love to just keep telling the stories of these heroes, and patterns that I've noticed that keep giving my heart a lot of hope in humanity, because we can also see a lot of the contrast when, when there's difficulties when there's fear when there's criticism when there's pain, when there's grief, we don't always know how to act in our highest selves, when we are struggling, when we're confused when we're hurting. And when we're just frankly, terrified. Like there's there's just the fear that every single human being can feel, whether we want to admit it, if it's fear, or not. But we got we have fear. And it's often what brings us together is the things that can also create more cracks and division and the Power of unity, which was another thing that I was taught about by my, from my parents that bahala said about the Power of unity, not the power of sameness, but the power of people bringing their, their hearts together and their their gems together. And their focus on solutions together, The Power of unity is so, so powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole earth. And as a seven year old, I didn't really know what to do with it, but I was always picturing like a big bright light. And I was like, oh, people holding hands and like doing nice things together. And like, you know, little kids skipping and like, you know, having snack together and Oh, you want my peanut butter crackers here has my jelly beans or unity was always for me this like little thing that kids do very naturally, they don't really care if someone looks different. But if you have a nice snack, or if you're nice to me, we can get along and be best friends. And so I think how we can hold space for a lot of strong triggers and emotions, especially that these last two years have had for so many people like how could it not, is asking really good questions. And I when I lived in China for two years, I met a 92 year old doctor, I feel better about him. And he he helped me so much I actually had a heart condition and he helped me heal from that and also just helped me come back to life, like seeing life in a new way and trusting myself. And he said, Whenever I would ask him a question he's like, that's a that's a bad question, ask a better question. Whenever it was limited whenever it was based in scarcity or based in fear, he's like a bad question, ask a better question. And he kept like he was kind of training me to ask questions that lead us to the solution. So I think if you're ever experiencing someone who's maybe having a different opinion, or something that is a little too triggering even actually see them through this lens of

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:29:51

they're getting triggered by something that maybe I've also been triggered by or they're experiencing something that I never had before and I don't understand what life looks like through their lens? Not saying it's wrong, it's not my truth, it doesn't feel right to me. But it's obviously something is real for them. And I can actually ask and not assume that I know what it's like to have lived in their shoes. But I can say, what do you need in this moment? What would help you feel more ease in this moment? What would give you a sense of being able to breathe deeply in this moment, because I may not be able to solve the solution, or solve the problem that's triggering them. But sometimes just asking what people might need in order to be able to take a deeper breath and know that they're not alone. Because in this moment, maybe they just don't need to be alone in their fear. So sometimes just asking a better question, not from a triggered place, but from if the solution was already going to be present. And the solution was going to come and things were going to get better. What could I ask to, like lead to that reality. And trust that it's possible, think trusting that things can get better, even if it sucks sometimes, even if it's devastating, sometimes, sometimes it's, we don't even want to get out of bed sometimes. Because it's like, why bother? This is just too hard, like life is just feeling kind of a heavy load of nonsense. And I'm trying to keep my language but I want to say other things. But you know, sometimes it's, it's just very difficult, like we come through very difficult things. But if we can be met with some shared humanity, and not not be assumed to be wrong, but actually like, what if my wrongness can be a part of the solution? What if my wrongness is actually just a veil that I haven't seen the light yet? I haven't had that light bulb turned on yet. But what if it's possible? What if we help each other turn on the light bulbs?

Theresa Lambert: 00:31:57

I love that I wasn't sure if it's like, I feel like glove is going to like, chime in. But that was, Oh, my God, so much wisdom, jelly on so many different levels. And I feel like leaders that are in organizations, also, the last two years have gone through a lot to show up. And so you know, looking at our differences and asking more powerful questions and opening ourselves up to new possibilities. I feel like that is just such a powerful, powerful way. So as we wrap up this conversation, and I know we could like talk, literally talk to you forever. So I'm sure we will have you back on this podcast, maybe after or around when you publish your book so we can find out more what's been happening since and get an update for you. But I would love to know if you would have to give just one piece of advice to somebody who is on their path to success on their path to becoming this dynamic force to do good, and also elevate others, what would you what wisdom would you share with them?

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:33:08

That's a beautiful question, then thank you for all these amazing questions. And I'd be extraordinarily honored to come back anytime. Just let me know. I feel that one of the things that is been a marker for success in my own life, and every single person I've ever worked with who really defines this like service driven leadership, like the heart of true, truly joyful, sustainable people from from all over the world in all walks of life. They all talk about values. Like know what you stand for know who you stand for know why that is such a valuable thing for your work for your life for your projects for your time and energy to be focused on. So know what you value and also remember that you are valuable, that you have something that is so precious and noble within you that actually wants to come out and wants to be polished it wants to have a voice to express itself. And third thing is I think value people who value you value people who appreciate you and care about you and encourage you and want you to succeed and want you to be healthy and happy and can reciprocate the care that you give them. I think value people that value you is a huge benchmark for an impactfully joyful and sustainable life. It's it's um it's sometimes they're rare people to find but when you find them like love on them, keep nourishing those relationships because they're they're very precious.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:34:54

Amazing. Well, thank you Jaleh Zandieh one last time. Everybody now, come on. Man, you're amazing. Thanks for coming on.

Jaleh Zandieh: 00:35:08

Thank you both. Thank you for this podcast that you've created and for being such wonderful friends to each other and brilliant, brilliant besties in business also, I think what you're creating is so, so timely, and I'm so grateful to have been here with you.

Blair Kaplan Venables: 00:35:25

Well, I'm glad to scalpel for dissecting successes in your hands. And thanks for tuning in to another episode. Peace.

Theresa Lambert: 00:35:38

That's a wrap for another episode of dissecting success. enjoyed this episode. Make sure to subscribe to black Hebron, Venables and Theresa Lambert's podcast dissecting success on the App Store.