Why People Don’t Change (And What Great Leaders Do Instead)

Episode 339:  In this episode, Vonda and Lori explore a surprising truth about leadership: knowing better doesn’t always mean doing better. Drawing from recent research on behavior change, Lori unpacks why people resist advice, struggle to adopt new habits, and often become defensive when faced with feedback.

The conversation dives into the role of empathy, psychological safety, cognitive overload, and communication in creating meaningful change within teams. Lori shares the BRIDGE framework—a practical approach to helping employees grow through trust, collaboration, accountability, and ongoing dialogue.

Whether you’re managing a flower shop, leading a team, or simply trying to influence positive change in others, this episode offers valuable insights into how people learn, grow, and ultimately transform.

Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

When people feel judged or at risk, parts of our brain literally shut down.

SPEAKER_02 0:15

Welcome to the Business and Pleasure of Flowers. We're your hosts, Vonda LaFever and Lori Wilson.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

And we believe that business and fun are a perfect combination. Kind of like us, Vonda.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Good morning, Vonda. Hey Lori, how's it going? It's going. It's going. Yes. We're just moving in a grooving, getting down to the wire. I am working on my presentation.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

It's a lecture. You're doing a lecture. I hate the word lecture. I know. My session. I'm going to call it my session. Okay, your session at AIFD. This is the one that I will have to say. I'm going to interject this because you've been asked to do this presentation at SIEF many times after you did it at NextGen. And then at several state companies.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

And my boss says no.

SPEAKER_02 1:08

I said, no, you are saving this, girl. You are saving this.

SPEAKER_01 1:11

Yeah, yeah. And I'm nervous because I'm like, what if just Ellie and you show up?

SPEAKER_02 1:19

Whoever shows up are the ones who are really gonna need to hear what you're gonna say. So I think that's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

It's fine. And I'm I did it at NextGen, and then that was three years ago. And I've grown, I've learned, I've changed, and things have changed. And so anyway, it's about empathy, but it's about empathy and leadership and communication and art industry and why it matters. And one of the things is one of the myths that we kind of talk about is the fact that a lot of people think you're either born with it or you're not, which is a misconception because I always thought that I was clearly born with it. And I kind of an abundance of it. Yeah, I was one of those people that was born with it. And I share a little bit of my story in my session of kind of a funny way of what I was known as a kid. But in doing more research, I came across a really interesting article last week, and it's a very intense psychological based, a lot of medical terms in it. But I've been taking a lot of notes because the biggest part of it is yes, we all can learn new things, but how? What changes our mindset? And you and I've talked about this so many times. Like, how do we change our mind? So we tend to think once you know better, do better, right? That's what our world says.

SPEAKER_02 3:00

Doesn't happen though, does it, Lori?

SPEAKER_01 3:02

It doesn't, because the examples they were talking about smoking. Clearly, we all know smoking, not that you and I smoke, but people still smoke. Exercise. We all know exercise is better for us. We all know that it's science-based. Like everyone knows exercise makes you live longer. We don't all do that. Healthy eating, don't drink alcohol, like all of the things. Yep, but we still don't do it. We still don't still even so evidence tells us do this, yet we still don't. So what did the research tell us? It's the way our brain works, and so I'm gonna start with kind of weird science, and then I'm gonna move to the fun part. Okay. So here's what the research got right. And that change happens in stages in our brain. It starts with pre-contemplation. Okay. We are thinking, I don't have a problem. Let's just say drinking. Pretend I'm an alcoholic. You and I both know I'm not. I don't really like alcohol, but we're gonna pretend that. I don't have a problem to contemplation. Maybe I should do something about this to preparation. Okay, I'm gonna try something. I'm gonna try Alcoholics Anonymous or whatever it is. Action. I'm actually going to an AA meeting. Okay. And then it goes into maintenance. I'm sustaining. I'm gonna continue in a minute. So it goes into all of this. So action-oriented advice to someone, giving action-oriented advice to someone, like my husband telling me, let's say the gym, let's say exercise. When I'm in pre-contemplation, I don't want to go to the gym mode. I don't need to go to the gym. And every day he's hey, I'm going to the gym. You want to go? That does nothing but piss me off. Gotcha. Gotcha. I hear you. Okay. So he doesn't know this. What I he doesn't know the science behind it, nor will he ever, because he's never not going to care enough. If I was in contemplation mode, maybe I should start doing something about my health. And he said, Hey, do you think first of all, I love you so much. I want you to be with me forever. I would love so much if you would want to go to the gym with me. Like that type of death. But I'm in pre-contemplation mode. So you want to go to the gym? Not only no, but hell no. Go away. I'm going to get super defensive and I'm going to rebel. My question became at from this morning. Okay, then where do you start? What creates movement between these stages? Contemplation, contemplation, blah, blah, blah. I'm glad you're that, Lori. What is that? What brings me from one to the other? What is our role in this? Okay, so now put your brain in the mind of a, I don't know, flower shop owner. There is a framework called Bridge, B-R-I-D-G-E, Bridge, like you walk over bridge, drive over bridge. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. Okay. And that is how we communicate with our employees, mostly is what I'm gonna really focus on. I would say also your customers, but I'm really gonna be talking about with your team. Okay, because that's what I'm focusing on in my presentation. I'm not going in depth with this framework in my session at ARFD because I don't have enough time in the day to go, but I do think it's really important. So this framework is all about how to communicate, to create movement within the way our brains work. If we want to create change within our team. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 7:21

So this is the suggested framework to get that stronger communication. And then I'm guessing part of that has to do with empathy.

SPEAKER_01 7:30

Yes, because empathy, you can have it, but how do you get someone to have it? Because they're like, I can't. I'm just not, I wasn't born that way. I wasn't born that way. That's where this all came from, right? You don't have to be born this way. But you have to want to be empathetic.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

That's the thing. You have to want and we talked about this before with Dr. Nicole Price, right? Because she is the one who was telling us, no, you you can learn empathy. You can't. Yeah, she did.

SPEAKER_01 7:59

Because she's she wasn't born with these natural tendencies. The biggest problem with that is, and that's with any kind of session like this, the people that truly need it are not the ones that are gonna show up. 100%, you know, because they're at this for what they're on to pre-conception. Yeah, I don't have a problem.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

I don't have a problem.

SPEAKER_01 8:22

The world just needs to get their pants on and get to work. They don't they don't care. So, anyway, so communication itself does not force change. That's number one. It doesn't force, but communication can help create the conditions where change is possible. Okay. Just by me communicating to you, hey, do this, again, hey, go to the gym. No, screw you, you go to the gym. But depending on how community, so here's the bridge. It is a model for how we travel. Number one, B you love it. B build psychological safety, psychological safety before everything starts here. It is the belief that you will be uh punished, shamed, humiliated, something if you speak up in a meeting, in a group for yourself. It is that fear that we can have if you say something in front of your boss, which I'm saying this because I don't have this, unfortunately. I probably need a little more of this.

SPEAKER_02 9:38

But like can I sideline this just a minute? Yeah. Just in our meeting last night at our shop talk for Flower Click, there was this example because someone had their main employees leave. And so this Susie said that she had these conversations with employees that were part-time and not key employees, and they were sharing all of this information that she's they would have not done that if somebody else was there because they felt safe now. And I think I've mentioned psychological safety.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

You did, but that was the perfect example. Yeah, yeah. And did you see how eye-opening it was for her? And it was so nuanced, she wasn't cognitively thinking, Oh, I'm creating psychological safety. No, no, she was talking about her two different teams. I'm gonna call them, and they felt because there's some sort of intimidation going on, sure, clearly, and that's just part of our world.

SPEAKER_02 10:39

But as an employer, you don't know that. Most of the time you'd have no idea, and then you have that light bulb go off, and you're like, Oh my god. And she was and she said she was able to build into them. Yes, and here's some great ideas.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

So here's your build, your that she built that psychological safety. Yeah, and it went on to say psychological safety is not just a oh, it'd be nice to have this, it is a neurological precondition. We all have this in our brain. Every single one of us, if you are human and you are breathing, there is a part of your brain that there is a situation, you will have this where you're like, oh, there's a time when people feel judged or at risk, parts of our brain literally shut down. And when I was reading about this, of course I've read about it multiple times, but I'm thinking of scenarios where I'm like, oh my gosh. And I'm visualizing times that I have actually done this in my life, my long life, like certain times. And the part that helps you reflect on maybe I'm going back to the gym thing, maybe I do need to go to the gym. Instead, what that part goes offline and what stays is I have to defend myself.

SPEAKER_04 12:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

The screw you, I'm not doing that, go away. Right. Isn't that crazy? So we just start performing and not engaging with the conversation. So if you were, because it's not a safe conversation, and you're just like, I'm just gonna just say what I have to get out of here. I think about teachers' meetings. Oh, and you have to go to and you're like, let's just do what we have to do, dog. Get out of here. Yeah. I don't even care. Most of that's just because I'm awesome. So here's an example. I was trying to type out, that's why I was late to this. I was like, I gotta try to do examples. So imagine a designer uses, I don't know, the wrong ribbon or something for a big casket spray or a standing spray. Pretend it had a misspelling on the name or something like that for a funeral arrangement, but the mistake isn't caught until delivery. That would be that's big. That would really suck. Instead of saying to them, like, you need to pay more attention. You have to be more attentive to this. You got a double check, like going in like that, saying, Hey, we just got a call and there was a misspelling. I want to walk through the process with you and figure out where this mistake happened to see how we can figure out how this doesn't happen again. Let's go through this together. Can you walk me through the whole thing to figure out how we prevent it next time? And when you walk along with them together calmly and allow them to share their story, of course, it is their responsibility, but going in straight for you gotta be more careful. I get, but you you gotta think big too. First of all, you need that designer too. And if you keep doing those kind of things, reacting and creating that type of environment, again, if this is their 10th mistake, that's a whole different situation, yeah, for sure. We're not talking about that, we're talking about a one mistake. It is your job. You're the manager or owner or whoever you are. It is your job to remain calm.

SPEAKER_02 14:38

Oh, 100%, 100%.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

I think you're like, how did that happen? Yeah, I get it. It sucks. Yeah. But you are the owner, unfortunately. You gotta do both sides here.

SPEAKER_02 14:51

Yeah, no, no, no. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think in that case, most shop owners would just obviously apologize. They would say, we'll be over with a new ribbon, we'll come over with the correction and then go to the designer and say, Okay, let's pull that order. What does it say on that order? Okay, let's look at that. Okay, let's create a new ribbon that we can take over to the funeral home now. Yeah, and then let's walk through let's walk through it together.

SPEAKER_01 15:17

Yeah. See, was there a mistake on our end? Let them figure out. And mistakes happen, right? We all do them. Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:25

But you're not accusing them, which no, it just was an unfortunate yeah. It's like you said, it depends on if it's the first or second time or if it's the tenth time, then you got a problem.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I think for me, whatever that conversation is, it has to be open dialogue, not just you need to be more careful, you need to watch what you do and walk away.

SPEAKER_02 15:50

And I know you're going in deep on this, but Lori, I don't think that's a problem in most shops, unless you're a huge shop and you have a lot of this. I think that this is something that is a normal thing. If you're a small business owner, you know how to communicate those kind of things. And you know you don't want to throw your designer under the bus. And you have to have those communications, that clear, calm communication. Otherwise, you're not gonna have anybody working for you. Let's be honest.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

You know a hundred percent, a hundred percent. Okay, R it's a big one. Recognize the cognitive load. I'm gonna say it again. Recognize the cognitive load. Okay, so working memory, our working memory, we each have a different level of how much information we can retain. Right. When those limits are exceeded, our brain calories, right? They shut down. Right. You might joke about that, but it's real, it's saying, and it's not that the person isn't trying anymore, it's that their brain's like at full capacity, sure, and they can't do it anymore, so they cannot hold any more information. I wrote down a couple of things here. It's a the signal that we might see as them resisting is often misconstrued be as overwhelmed, like they're overwhelmed. And I think about my youngest adult child who has some learning problems, and we did not know they were learning problems, and I thought he was just being late. I'm like, sure, he's resisting, he's resisting, and this was early on, like in grade school, and I would be helping him with his homework, and I'm like, he does not learn the same way other kids are learning, and he would just but it was overwhelmed because his brain wasn't working the same way learning the same way other kids, right? And so I also thought of sales prep school. Now, hear me out for the example. When we created our 2.0, when we revamped it, one of the things that you and Ellie and I talked about, and I was just sort of like, we have to organize this into days because we talked about making it up quick boot camp or a dude this, and and it is so important you don't do it all in one day. Yeah. And so when I had those conversations with people purchasing it, I'm like, listen, I can't tell you what to do, but please don't do this in all one day because no one's gonna retain that amount of information. Right. I created this and I can't even retain it all in one, like I don't even know what it all says. Yeah. Like you have to do a little and apply. Do a little and apply. Unless you're Albert Einstein brain, it's not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_02 18:52

Right. No, that's really good. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 18:55

Oh, and the other little bullet point I put trusting that the one clear thing is genuinely understood and does more than 10 accurate things on a list that you're hoping that they grasped one of them. Yep, just the one. Give me one thing that's the most important, right? An example of that was like the week of Mother's Day, crazy time, busy time. Instead of saying something like, you know, you're supposed to ask for this or this on the phone, maybe saying, Listen, I know there's a lot coming at us right now. I've laminated this list. Here's what we're doing, like those kind of things. Which again, we do. We set them up for success, basically. Avoid information dumping. Yeah. I think about our photo shoots and how they just keep getting better and better and better as far as the process instead of everything all at once when I first get there.

SPEAKER_02 19:57

Yeah, we've had to do that for you, Lori, because it was an information overload. It's information overload.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

The thing is, you guys have been working on you know a little bit of more because I'm not in on that, nor do I ever want to be. So when you get there in the information overload, and my brain's gonna be exploded because I don't even know the starting point. Right, right. And so instead of everything has to be done today, big thing, it's here's what we're gonna focus on today. Let's do this. So, anyway, I is invite collaboration. We talked about this. This was in the next gen coffee chat. We talked about this, which was so wonderful. When you arrive with a plan fully formed and present, all you're asking for is compliance. Right? Here's what we're gonna do. Here's what I've decided, here's how Mother's Day is gonna go, here's our specials. I just need everybody to say yes, ma'am, and we move on. Right. That's collaboration. No, right?

SPEAKER_02 20:58

No, and then you got to get a buy-in.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

So, anyway, you understand what that is. The example shop is struggling with order accuracy instead of announcing a new process, have a little team meeting. And you know what? Here's the thing, there's been a couple of errors, no big deal, but I've just noticed that I would love everybody's input on a new process, have parameters, and then the new solution becomes everybody's solution, not just the manager. D is distinguish impact from intent.

SPEAKER_04 21:33

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 21:34

So we tend to judge ourselves by our own intentions, but we judge others by their behavior. So I read this for a while. Yeah, I was gonna say that one's a tough one. It is, but I get it. So I can say, Oh, I didn't mean to do that. My intentions were We're right, but if somebody else does something very similar to maybe what I did, I was like, that was so mean. Because I don't know their intentions, but I judge them for what they did. But I know my intentions. It was human nature.

SPEAKER_02 22:14

Sure, sure, if that makes sense. Judging people is just who we are. And we're not listening.

SPEAKER_01 22:20

We're not hearing what the intention was. So when something goes wrong, we know the complexity behind our choices, like why we did what we did. We also love to just say I did this, because you did, because you, because whatever. We assume others acted for simpler, less generous reasons. It's how our brains work, which is quite embarrassing. But we're all we all do.

SPEAKER_02 22:49

The older you get, the less you are like that, because you know I agree. I we're more self-aware. Yeah. Oh, totally. We're more self-aware. We know we do that. When we know others have so much on their plate that you're just seeing what's going on, you're watching the actions, as you mentioned. But you you know that something's causing that because that doesn't usually act that way, or something's swinging one way or another. Yeah. As we age, we get that. But younger people know what are they doing? Me, me, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:22

Me, I don't do that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:23

Learning to be able to separate what happened from why it happened. Yeah. Because sometimes as a business owner, you're like, we just got to deal with the what and solve it. Right. I don't really care about the why or who did it. Yeah. This is priority. We just gotta get it done. But it's hard to have those kind of conversations. It doesn't assign blame. I think that's something that the older we get to and the more we know, the more we educate ourselves. Or like assigning blame doesn't really help things in so many situations. Yet a lot of people, that's like the first thing they have to go to whose fault was that? Wasn't my fault, wasn't my fault, wasn't my fault? Yeah. Okay. But the what was it? Let's just solve it. Just let's just solve it and move on. The example, I thought this was a good example because I actually had to have Chat GBT help me with this one. Because he helped me with an example. Said a designer is trying to be helpful and quickly rearranges another designer's work before delivery. Their intent, I was just trying to make it look better because I didn't like the way it was. The impact how do you think that made the original designer feel? Undermined, frustrated, less competent. So the manager might say, I understand your intention was to help, and I can appreciate that. But at the same time, the impact that Sarah felt her work wasn't trusted. Let's talk about how we can offer feedback in a way that would have supported her. And she could have done the work. So communicating, I understand your intent because we have to take her words for what they are. We're not over her intent. Yet you can't do that. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 25:17

How would you have I think the challenge with that one, that example, is that the designer who did the rearranging, who's probably the one who is in charge of quality control before it goes out the door. And there was maybe was a time limit on that. That they had to get it done before it went out. It's oh my God, we cannot have this go out to see our cut to our customers. This is not the quality of our shop. So the designer rearranges it before it goes out the door. Now Sarah sees that happening. Yeah. And is very hurt by that. And I understand that. But that's a really fine line, Lori, because now it's the reputation of my flower shop with this going out the door because that is not the quality that we can send out. And the person who's doing the rearranging or fixing it, that's her job to make sure quality control goes out. And so a lesson needs to be.

SPEAKER_01 26:22

And you need to keep that design. You need both designs. Totally. If that's a hard one, that isn't right. That's why I was like, dang, chat GPT, you can't. That is a hard one.

SPEAKER_02 26:31

Because then I would go, okay, can I hold the delivery person? Do I have time? Or they have to be out within a few minutes. So here would be my question.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

My question from the outside of this would be from a communication standpoint to make sure Sarah understands hey, if that is a quality control designer, like this can happen. Set her up. Set her up. This might happen to some of them. But if quality control Jane is doing this, I want Jane, if I'm the owner, I want her taking notes for later.

SPEAKER_02 27:18

Absolutely. She needs to have that conversation now with Sarah after that happens, because Sarah's seen this happen. Now she needs to go with Sarah and say, listen, what I had to do. I had to do this and this and this. And so let's look at your next design and see if you're executing this in the same way or what can we do to make it better.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

Yeah, yes. So it's all about communication.

SPEAKER_02 27:39

Yeah, 100%. Just like everything, Lori.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

But it's the letting them know, listen, I don't want you to be offended. Or maybe even not that is even could be defensive, but figure out a nice language to say this is her job. It's very similar to in our graphic marketing world, Ellie has me create drafts all the time in Canva. And then she takes them and redoes them all the time. That's just part of the job. Exactly. And you realize that. But if I didn't know that, I would be going, uh, that was mean. Yeah. No, that's but I know that's the process, right? But anyway, all right. That is G. And then the last one is E. Establish ongoing dialogue. Simple. Keep it going. Keep it. And the back to what we were just uh saying, keep it going, not just a one-time Sarah, you did this wrong. It is we have a weekly meeting, weekly teachable moments.

SPEAKER_02 28:50

And if the person who's quality control, going back to that same one, sees that consistently, then she knows either she has to continue to build into Sarah or she needs to let obviously let the boss know and say, listen, we need a little bit more training here because she is a good designer. We need to get her from good to better, right? Yeah. I agree. Ongoing.

SPEAKER_01 29:12

Said for the E. Most people cycle through these stages multiple times before an actual change takes place.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Wow. That's like, ugh, we really don't like change. We really don't like change. It takes so much to make a change. Yeah. One last sentence I want to say, and then we'll be done. But this is just something I typed out. When you're working with somebody as a manager or communicating or trying to help somebody through change, and you do need to do the maintenance and the weekly check-ins, there is a difference between accountability and surveillance. And I think when I talk so much about mindset, I think we need to think about that. Accountability is like, hey, how are you doing? How are you doing with your design skills? Or how are you doing? How are you feeling about that? And the other the surveillance is I'm just waiting for you to mess up again. I'm just waiting for we talked about that. You did it again, or you've got to upsell again. There's a big difference on how we approach the maintenance part.

SPEAKER_02 30:27

Okay, that's interesting. Because I would have said surveillance is I'm just watching to see when I can come in and help you.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

But you're saying watching to see when I can come in until you're doing something wrong.

SPEAKER_02 30:39

Oh, wow. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 30:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:41

And we know there are some people who have coworkers who do just that.

SPEAKER_01 30:45

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But there are also some managers that are and they think they're helping. But what you're doing is you're going back to the first one and you're not creating psychological safety.

SPEAKER_02 30:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

Because they know they're being watched.

SPEAKER_02 30:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:00

Surveillance and accountability. Yes, hold them accountable with those meetings or those check-ins or whatever you want to call them. But don't just wait for them to mess up. Right. That's definitely not a psychological safe place. No, no, because then you're going to lose your employees.

SPEAKER_02 31:19

100%.

SPEAKER_01 31:20

Wow. That's my TED talk for the day. That is a lot.

SPEAKER_02 31:24

It is a lot. That's a lot to take in. So go back to the gym situation. So, how is Mark going to get you to go to the gym? That's not going to get me to go.

SPEAKER_01 31:36

I will go when I wanna go. I getcha. I getcha. I will go when I wanna. And the more he asks me, I'm gonna send him this article. Maybe that'll help him. He won't read it.

SPEAKER_02 31:48

He won't read it. All right. Till next week.

SPEAKER_00 31:51

Till next week.

SPEAKER_01 31:54

Thank you so much for listening to our podcast. We hope you enjoyed spending time with us because we enjoy spending time with you. If you did, make sure you hit that subscribe button or add the Business and Pleasure of Flowers to your Google morning routine or your flash briefing on Alexa.

SPEAKER_03 32:13

We look forward to seeing you next week. So please come back and join us in coverage.