What's up, party people?

This is your host, Neal, and I'm pumped for today's episode.

Man, I'm so excited that you've joined us for another episode.

And in today, I'm going to be teaching you a principle that I learned years ago, but I believe it's a superpower in the area of communication as something I feel is so simplistic but profound that if you grab onto it, it'll transform not only you, it'll transform your teams, and it'll transform the culture of the entire organization you work with, if you employ it correctly.

Guys, I'm fired up for today, and I hope you are too.

Get ready.

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What's up, champion?

This is your host, Neal Reyes, and I want to welcome you to the Executive Perspective.

For years, I struggled to answer the question, what do you do for a living?

Why?

Because most people who ask only expect to hear one thing.

I am an executive with a deep level of understanding of business, operations, leadership, and technology.

I'm also the president and founder of a worldwide ministry and CEO of an executive coaching and consulting firm.

My number one passion is people, and I receive significant gratitude in life from sowing into others and encouraging them as they grow to achieve their fullest potential.

If you're a high performance individual like me, or you're simply ready to take your business leadership or inner potential to the next level, then strap in because I'm locked in and all in.

This is the executive perspective.

Hey, what's up, champions?

This is your host, Neal Reyes, and I want to welcome you back to the Executive Perspective.

Today, I'm going to teach you something that I learned years ago that I feel is extremely valuable in business settings, especially when you're working on cross collaboration.

That means cross collaboration with people within Your department, but people, especially outside your department, inner departments, working with other teams.

And it's something that I learned that really helps the improve the communication overall.

What I'm going to teach today is a principle that I like to refer to as the yarn ball.

Now, I know it sounds kind of funny, but yes, I said that, right?

Did he say yarn?

Yes, I said yarn.

The yarn ball.

So here's what I want to do.

I first of all want to frame a picture for you with my words.

And I want you to consider, like, if you've ever seen a rubber band ball.

You know, a rubber band ball is a ball, and it can be different sizes.

Small, medium, large, doesn't matter.

But it's a ball that's comprised of many different rubber bands going many different directions.

But put together, they combine to make a ball.

But when you look at it, you can see that it's composed of many different rubber bands.

Now, the key with it is you can't see all the rubber bands.

The only rubber bands you can see are the one on the outer layer.

However, sometimes it may look like there's multiple rubber bands on the outer layer that might be the same ones if they wrap around the rubber band multiple times.

But overall, the rubber band ball is made of many different rubber bands, but there's different layers to it.

You have rubber bands at the core of it at the very center.

And then as you work your way out from it, you have many rubber bands depending on the size of the ball.

Well, I want you to picture the same thing, but with a yarn ball.

And with the yarn ball, I want you to picture, like, if this yarn ball was maybe the size of like, a bowling ball, maybe it's like 8 to 10 inches.

Now, bowling balls may be bigger than that, but I'm just trying to paint a picture in your head of the size of this yarn ball.

But this yarn ball is composed of many different types of yarn.

There's different colors, there's different thicknesses.

In other words, there's some yarn that are real thick, but there's some yarn that are real thin, and they're all different colors.

In other words, they come in all different shapes and sizes.

Well, when I'm teaching this principle of the yarn ball, what I want you to understand is that this focuses on communication within an organization.

And where the principle of the yarn ball is especially effective is in the area of projects or cross collaboration.

You know, the organization that I work for.

I remember when I started there years ago, I came in and, you know, anytime I walk into a new environment.

I try not to make a lot of wholesale changes.

I've just learned that as a leader, it's good to kind of sit back and observe first.

Now, sometimes you come in with marching orders and whoever it is that's hiring you need you to step in and get to work right away.

So I'm not saying being inactive.

However, if you come in and make wholesale changes, big ones, right off the bat, you can unstable your workforce, it can cause culture issues, it can cause morale issues, and overall, you can throw off systems that maybe you didn't understand were there in the first place.

Now, oftentimes when you step into a new environment, you're going to see things that you need to change.

That's understandable.

But it's always good to understand why those systems and processes are in place to begin with.

Sometimes it's the ham hock story, other times.

And when I say the ham hawk story, I'll basically, I'll maybe in another podcast I'll dedicate that to another podcast.

But basically it's the hammock story.

Means you're doing it the same way you've always done it because of the fact you've just always done it that way.

Other times it's.

Well, it was like that way for a reason.

Because years ago we had a certain type of criteria around the company and that was the only way to get it done.

But we never worked to process and prove that situation.

But whatever it is, you have all different types of things that happen within an organization.

But when you walk into an organization, whether you're new or not, what I challenge you to do the next time you walk into a conference room or the next time you're in a meeting that's involving a project, especially one that you're leading, I want to encourage you to begin to see projects and items of cross collaboration, like a yarn ball.

Sometimes you have a small yarn ball, sometimes you have a big yarn ball.

But treat it like a yarn ball with your teams, and treat your teams how to treat it the same.

Now, here is where the secret sauce of understanding the principle of the yarn ball makes a giant difference.

Remember I said at the beginning that this ball of yarn is composed of different sizes and different types of yarn and all different colors.

Well, when you're looking at a yarn ball sitting on a table, sometimes you think you can see and understand all the aspects of the yarn ball.

But what you don't see is what's at the center, what's at the core, and what you don't see is which piece of yarn has the most to do.

In other words, you don't see who has the biggest part.

And so a good way of looking at the yarn ball is if you picture grabbing the yarn ball and lifting it off the table to where you can look underneath the bottom side of it.

Underneath the bottom side of it, Picture that this particular yarn ball, maybe they don't all look like this, but this particular yarn ball, when you pick it up off the table, has a bunch of little pieces of yarn dangling from the bottom.

When it's on the table, you can't see it because it's hiding it.

But when you lift it up and look below the surface, what you recognize is that there's all these different little strings dangling from the yarn ball.

The difference with these strings, though, is that each of these different strings are different lengths.

Some of them are a short length, some of them are a long length.

Some of them may not be real long, but they're a thicker piece of yarn.

And some might be long, but they're a thinner piece.

But what the different types of yarn, and they're all different colors, what the different types of yarn represent within this scenario is each piece of yarn represents a different party.

In other words, they either represent a different department or they represent a different person.

Because when you're working with projects, especially cross interdepartment projects, or if you're collaborating with other departments, oftentimes there's many pieces to that puzzle that you're trying to put together.

And what the yarn ball represents and the different colors is each piece of string represents a different person.

Now, here's where the secret sauce is that helps so much with the yarn ball methodology or the yarn ball principle, where the ball of yarn is important, is that when you pick that thing up, if you're just examining the yarn ball without picking it up, you may try to look for what the dominant color is in there.

Maybe there's a red string and you see a lot of red.

And maybe to you, it looks like there's more red than blue.

So in your mind, on the surface, you might be thinking, whoever's team Red or who, whatever person the red string represents, that's the person who's the most dominant within this project.

But yet when you pick that ball of string up, that ball of yarn up off the table and you look underneath, there may be a red string dangling.

But what if it's only a short little red string, but there's a really big blue string and a really big Green string dangling.

Well, what that represents to you in that scenario is that blue and green have a larger part to play with that project than red does, because their length from that string represents how big of a role they have to play.

But remember, if you're judging that project by the surface and you're only looking at the yarn on the outside, you may see a lot of Rick.

But at the core of that project, you might have a whole lot of blue and a whole lot of green that are holding the core of that project up.

But if you're only looking surface, deep on the surface, you primarily see red.

That's why picking that yarn ball up and examining those strings that are dangling from the bottom, the different length of those strings, help to determine who has the most important part.

But more importantly, and understand this, because this is, I'm telling you, this is so significant.

Rather than viewing that only the long strings are important, your goal is to see all the strings that are dangling, Whether if it's a short little string or a long string, doesn't matter.

What each string that is dangling from that ball of yarn represents are all the different pieces and players that must come together for the project to be a success.

So picture that you're going to schedule a meeting.

Maybe it's a kickoff call for the project, if it's just starting, or maybe it's a milestone meeting and you're in the middle and you want to give an update to all the different stakeholders.

Well, when you pick that ball of string up, let's say you're 75% through with that project and you've just been looking at the surface of this thing and you think you're almost done and you're getting ready to celebrate that that project's almost complete.

What happens if you pick that ball of string up, that ball of yarn up, and you find there's a giant blue string on there and all the other different color strings, the yellow ones and the green ones and the red and the black and the brown and the white and any other colors that might be in there.

Orange, all of those are real short strings.

But there's this one big long blue one that's dangling.

What would that represent?

That might represent someone who has a very important part to play within that project, but nobody remembered to include them in the conversations.

Man, I'm telling you, there are people who are having light bulbs coming on right now listening to this thing.

What happens in that situation?

Well, this project that you thought was 75% complete, you may have found you missed one of the most core components of this project by leaving out a person or a department or just a whole different section of this project.

And if you do that, you may find that that project cannot be built without that component.

Let's say that you were building a home, and when you went to frame the home, you put all the pieces together.

But what if that blue string represented the nails you needed to nail the frame together?

How sturdy do you think that home is going to be if you're balancing all the studs against each other for the frame, but they're just leaning against each other and they're not fastened because you didn't use any nails?

Well, that's not going to be a house that's going to last very long.

The moment you start building some other things and trying to hang some walls on there, you're going to run into some issues.

Well, this is the way projects work in many, many companies.

You know, I will tell you that in my experience and time of working management and at the executive level of companies, I've seen this over and over again in different companies.

I will also tell you that it's largely a culture thing.

And my consulting services, through my consulting business, of my executive coaching and consulting business, oftentimes I'll get called into an organization and I see this thing all over again.

In other words, it's like it's almost not discriminatory against the company.

It's just something that exists in business.

Now, there are some businesses that are much better than others, and the businesses that can be very effective are the businesses that learn this principle that I'm teaching you.

This is a repeatable thing.

This is a wash, rinse and repeat type of success thing that I'm teaching you.

Meaning it's something that once you learn, you can wash, rinse and repeat.

Meaning you can train someone else to see it like that.

And the moment they get good, they can train someone else.

And once you train people across your culture, the company, to see it like this, the yarn ball, you have now shifted a culture of an organization that can now become highly effective in the area of projects, at least within this piece of communication.

I'm telling you, this is a massive unlock for people who are out there.

This is big stuff that I'm teaching you today.

The other thing I will tell you is that oftentimes when I go into organizations in a consulting manner, the projects that are holding them up, it's usually something like this.

Other times, what you'll recognize in organizations is you have two different Departments that are kind of pitted against each other.

Maybe the leader of one department doesn't like the leader of another department.

Or sometimes you have it to where the department itself, the workforce that's within the department, they don't like working with Department B.

You know, maybe one workforce of Department A, they think they work really good with department C, but anytime they got to work with department B, they don't like working with department B because department B always leaves them out of the important stuff Department B treats them like as if they're not important.

Well, what's Department B doing?

They're probably forgetting to pick up the ball of yarn and recognize that department A has a large part to play because they got a long string attached to that thing.

So this is how the ball of yarn can help you.

It's a simplistic way of viewing projects or interdepartmental connectedness.

Now, will it solve all your problems?

It will not solve all your problems.

However, if you get the right people talking to each other in the right rooms and the right meetings and on the right things, you will shift your culture because you'll at least be working forward in a whole new way.

The other thing I want to clarify is when you have departments or department leaders that are pitted against each other and don't like each other, don't get along, while the ball of yarn can help a lot of that, that may not necessarily solve their differences in philosophy or their differences in personality or character.

Sometimes people don't like each other because they just don't like each other.

However, people don't have to like each other in order to work well with each other and be effective.

Now, do I believe that the better people like each other, the more effective they can be?

Or at least the more copacetic they can be with each.

In other words, the better they get along.

Maybe they don't have to be friends, but the better they get along, the more effective projects can be 100%.

But I also know that people don't have to like each other in order to work well with each other.

But you know what people do have to do in order to work well with each other?

They have to have respect for each other and they have to be able to respect what the other ones bring into the table.

And if they turn around, one great way of building respect is by saying, hey, I was looking at this project the other day and I think you have a large part to play, but I'm not sure if you've been communicated.

And I want to invite you to the table to have a conversation.

I will tell you, I've seen this over and over where people have looked across the conference table at me and said, Neil, thank you so much for doing this.

I can think of early on when I started with the organization I'm with now and people looking at me and telling me, neil, thank you.

We've never had this in this organization.

We've never had anyone that thinks like this.

And so oftentimes we're left out of important things that we need to be included in because no one thought to connect with us or contact us.

You know, maybe they sit in a different part of the building that you don't walk by too often.

If you're in a multi storied building, you know, maybe they work on floor four or five of a five story building and the people you work with are primarily on 1 and 2 and those are the people you see often.

And so you don't think about the people at the top or vice versa.

Maybe you have people on the floor four or five, but they don't think about people who work down in the basement, the subfloors or something of that nature.

It can be so many different things.

But I will tell you that your greatest success will come through open communication with others.

Because it's always easier to communicate or even over communicate with someone and by inviting them to a table to have a meeting with others and after 30 minutes or 40 minutes or an hour, if they look at you and they say, well, that was very informative, but I don't really have a big part to play.

So thanks for inviting me, but I don't need to come back.

You're still the winner in that situation.

Because even if they don't have to be at the table for the future, at least they have awareness of what the company is working on.

At least they have awareness of the initiatives you're trying to push forward and it brings awareness to them.

Or maybe what they'll tell you is I'm going to have a part to play here, but it's too early in the game.

You need to get a hold of me later on, but don't forget me.

Maybe that's important, but for the department or for the person that has a real large part to play, they're going to be so grateful that you brought them to the table.

Because by bringing them to the table you made sure they were part of the conversation and part of the influence of that project to make it a success.

I'm going to tell you that if you learn to embrace this simple principle of the ball of yarn, you will become a winner within your organization.

You will become someone that people feel champions the results of the organization by knowing to include others.

And I'm going to tell you, one of the things that I've done with my team is to picture every project, every major task, every major endeavor.

Treat it like a ball of yarn.

Who has a string connected to that thing?

But you'll never know what it is unless you grab the ball of string and pick it up so you can examine it from the bottom.

And if you do that, you will learn who are the important players.

And when you do that, you'll create so much chemistry with other departments.

Because what I've trained my people to do is to understand the different parts of the organization and what they do.

In other words, if you were to consider the organization like your body parts, like a body.

Well, the hand is never going to do what the foot's going to do.

The hand and the foot do two different things.

And the big toe, the big toe can never be a nose and it can never be an earth.

You know, maybe big toe says one day, well, I want to be an ear.

I want to be an ear.

I don't want to be a big toe.

I was meant to be an ear.

How funny would you look if you had a big toe sticking off the side of your head where there's supposed to be an ear?

I know it's kind of silly, but that's not going to look too good.

Not only is it not going to aesthetically look good, what's the function of the ear to hear?

And if the function of the ear is to hear, but you replace it with the big toe, not only are you going to look funny and it's going to be out of place, the big toe is not going to be able to do the job that the ear is supposed to.

And because it doesn't have the ability to hear, however, the big toe, if you replace the ear with the big toe, well, whether you recognize it or not, the big toe is not just to give you pretty cute little feet.

It's also to give you balance.

And if you have an ear in the place where the big toe is supposed to be, well, the ear may not be able to support the weight of the body.

The ear may not be able to stand on its feet all day.

The ear may not be able to provide the proper support for the rest of the body.

Because the ear wasn't built to be a toe, The Ear was built to be an ear.

Now, that's a simplistic example I'm showing you.

But when you look at parts of a team, parts of a team are just like parts of a body.

Now, I will tell you that maybe you have one part of the body that wants to grow and aspire to be a different part of the body.

But it's okay to be a big toe, it's okay to be an ear, it's okay to be a hand or a foot or an arm or a leg.

But what's important is, is understanding the role you play, understanding what you bring to the body.

Because if you have a body that's missing parts, while it can still function, it'll never function at its peak performance, it'll never function at its full capacity, it'll never function to its top ability, it'll never fulfill its potential if it's not whole and complete.

Now you certainly, if you're missing an important part, you can compensate with others and be extraordinary still.

But it's easier to be extraordinary with all your parts when they're in balance, when they understand their role and function, and when they're trained accordingly to perform the way you need them to perform.

This is how a healthy body works.

Well, the body of an organization is much the same, no matter whether you have a little team or a big team.

If you have a small organization and you have don't only have a.

And let's say you only have a few employees, well, guess what?

That's even more important than ever because those employees may have to wear multiple hats.

And when you're in a big organization, sometimes you still have to wear multiple hats, but you also have to have balance.

You have to have communication, you have to have healthy synergies to be able to work with each other.

And one of the best ways to do it is to teach your team what the other parts of the body are and what the other parts of the body do.

And that's what I've done with my teams and have found significant success.

I have taught my teams who all the different parts of the body are.

In other words, who are all the different parts of the organization.

I've taught my team what do those other parts do?

Why are they relevant?

Why are they important?

For example, if I have a marketing team.

Well, if marketing is in charge of all the copy that comes out of our organization, they're in charge of all the main communication that comes out of our organization to our client base.

Well, when someone's wanting me to create A website or something for them so they can communicate out.

Well, I need a loop in marketing pretty quick because marketing is the one who has to approve the copy.

Marketing is the one who's going to want to provide me with the correct graphics.

Marketing is going to be the one who wants to set the CTAs.

But who else do I need to include?

Well, I probably need to include accounting in that or finance.

Why?

Because it's the accounting department that's going to want to track where the money goes.

That's going to be them who wants to determine what accounts it hits when they hit shop and they hit buy now or pay, whatever.

So you have to understand those things.

But when you understand who the different parts of the organization are that do those, that's the equivalent of being able to pick up that ball of yarn, look at the bottom and see who has a part to play.

And when other departments begin to catch on that anytime something goes to you and you're guarding the gate, so to speak, where you're saying, I'd love to help you with that, but did you contact accounting already?

Did you contact marketing already?

These are the examples I'm giving you from this example.

Now, if they're like, nope, I didn't know I need to, that's okay, I got you.

I'll bring them to the table.

And when you reach out to accounting and say, hey, you know, Department C, they have a project that they need to work on, but it looks like it's going to involve a little bit of your department, maybe your department A for Accounting, anyways.

And so you turn around and you say, hey, Department A, can you come on to this meeting that I have?

Because department C has something and I think it's going to relate to.

Well, if they get there and they find out they only have a little bit of instruction to do or direction to them, great, but you still included them and it's a success.

But if you find out it's a very large project for Department A, you don't want them to find out later on that you knew about it, but you didn't bother to include them.

That's how you burn people.

That's how you burn relationships.

And if you burn people and you burn relationships, sometimes those are hard to repair and sometimes they don't get repaired at all.

Guys, I hope you found this example of the ball of yarn or the principle of the yarn ball helpful to you today.

I'm telling you that this can help you in business, it can help you in projects, it can help you with all your teams through communication.

Whatever you got major tasks you got going on.

The moment you begin to see items like a ball of yarn and you remember to pick it up and don't just judge it by its surface, but look at all the strings hanging beneath the amount of success you will have.

There is no ceiling for it.

You will begin to grow and cultivate healthy relationships with others and the amount of trust you will build within that organization.

They won't just begin to see you as a lead for your department.

After a while you will be seen as a lead for the organization as a whole.

You're a go to player.

In other words, well, high performer.

I want to thank you for stopping by today.

Now I want to remind you as always to go by our website@neal Reyes.com because you can find all of our materials on there for you to be able to learn and grow from.

But until next time, I want to remind you that I believe in you.

I believe in you and I want to encourage you to go out and live and connect with your best life because I believe in you.

It's so important to know that people believe in us and I want you to know that I believe in you and your potential.

Thank you for showing up today and have a blessed day.