On this episode of the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast, Craig Johns speaks with Jack Skeels about Unmanaged, collective intelligence, and fostering positive and collaborative workplace cultures.

We also dive deeper into leadership vs. management, traditional views of management and how to avoid over-managing your teams.

Jack Skeels –   Unmanaged

Jack Skeels is a former senior analyst at RAND who has successfully transitioned into the role of CEO at AgencyAgile, achieving double Inc-500 awards, and author of the book, Unmanaged. He holds a Bachelor’s in Industrial Engineering/Computer Science from Northern Illinois University and an MBA with honors in Entrepreneurship and Finance from the USC Marshall School of Business. His dynamic presence extends beyond the boardroom, making him a sought-after speaker, writer, and educator, gracing stages at prestigious industry events such as Ad Age, Digiday, and Advertising Week.

With an extensive career spanning managerial and leadership positions in renowned companies like Rand, Sapient, Global Gaming League, and Modulant, Jack has firsthand experience in the intricacies of project success and the pivotal role of the team behind them. Jack Skeels is not just a successful startup entrepreneur and agile transformation consultant but also a think tank management scientist, dedicated to fostering positive and collaborative workplace cultures.

Jack Skeels talks about:

• Growing up in a small university town in Illinois under parents who were both college professors
  
• Working at RAND
  
• Unmanaged
  
• Asking questions gets people thinking and harnessing collective intelligence
  
• Managers should lead with questions to empower their teams
  
• Traditional views of management from the industrial era see workers as commodities to be managed
  
• People are smart and capable, and managers should avoid over managing
  
• Managers should focus on getting people to think, not doing the thinking for them
  
• Promoting high performers into management roles often decreases their productivity and the overall performance of their teams
  
• Management is a separate skill set
  
• Diversity and acceptance in the workplace
  
• Labels and the need to belong
  
• Intrinsic bias in behavior in the workplace
  
• Companies need innovation and technology to remain relevant
  
• Fostering positive and collaborative workplace cultures
  

Tweets

“I believe it’s a big internal journey to become a great leader as well. To become what the authentic leader is really about. And you, if you’re in the leadership business, I think it’s probably more about understanding yourself and the leader that you can be, than trying to be like a Jack Welch or a Steve Jobs or something like that.” Becoming a great leader with Jack Skeels on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

“We don’t want to be labeled, but we like to be labeled as this. People still feel like they need to belong. I’m wondering how we can shift this space to help people feel like they belong without having to be part of a group or feel like they need to be labeled as something to just be more comfortable being who they are.” Jack Skeels talks about labels and belonging on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

“I think diversity is great. I think we need to applaud, everything, whatever, neurodiversity and every every form of diversity. I think the idea is a good thing for those who accept it and unfortunately now not all accept it. But the real way to break down those barriers and the like is through action. And in the workplace, the challenge of sort of intrinsic bias in behavior is quite large.” Diversity and acceptance in the workplace with Jack Skeels on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

Resources Mentioned in this show:

Jack Skeels www.agencyagile.com
Jack Skeels LinkedIn
Craig Johns www.craigjohns.com.au
Craig Johns craig@nrg2perform.com
Craig Johns LinkedIn
Craig Johns Facebook
Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast
NRG2Perform www.nrg2perform.com

Book

Unmanaged