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In this special '12 Days of Business' edition of The Business Owner’s Journey, host Nick Berry shares a segment from Brett Bartholomew, Founder of Art of Coaching, communication expert, and author. They discuss building trust in leadership and navigating the complexities of workplace communication. Brett shares actionable insights on avoiding missteps by “reading the room,” tailoring communication to different personalities, and managing power dynamics at work. Whether you’re handling difficult conversations or striving to improve team relationships, this episode equips business owners with tools to lead with confidence and clarity.
Brett emphasizes the importance of social agility, which he defines as the ability to adapt your communication and behavior to various social situations. For business owners, this skill is critical to connecting with diverse personalities and fostering trust within teams. Whether working with employees, partners, or clients, social agility ensures that your message resonates effectively.
One of the most overlooked leadership skills is the ability to “read the room.” Brett explains how observing body language, tone, and group dynamics can help leaders avoid common communication pitfalls. Missteps often happen when leaders overlook nonverbal cues or fail to gauge the emotional state of their team. Developing this skill helps create stronger, more aligned workplace relationships.
Effective leaders understand that there’s no “one-size-fits-all” approach to communication. Brett shares practical strategies for identifying personality types and adjusting communication styles to suit each individual. By doing so, leaders can improve team communication and navigate difficult conversations with greater empathy and clarity.
Power dynamics are present in every organization, whether we recognize them or not. Brett discusses how understanding and managing these dynamics is key to building trust in leadership. Leaders must approach conversations with self-awareness and intention to ensure they are fostering collaboration rather than unintentionally creating tension or conflict.
This episode is part of the 12 Days of Business mini-series.
Brett Bartholomew also appeared in a previous episode of The Business Owner's Journey: Brett Bartholomew: The Power of Effective Communication and Self-Awareness
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The Business Owner's Journey Podcast host: Nick Berry
Production Company: FCG
Nick Berry (00:00)
The Business Owner's Journey. I'm Nick Berry and I've got real business owners telling their real stories, sharing their real lessons and strategies so you don't have to figure it all out on your
Nick Berry (00:13)
I am wrapping up season one of the business owners journey with this special series, the 12 days of business. 12 days, 12 episodes with 12 of my previous guests from season one. This episode is a highlight from Brett Bartholomew's appearance where he explains what social agility is. And I love this segment because it just applies to so many real world situations for small business owners.
For example, when you need to have a difficult conversation with a staff member and you're considering the timing, tailoring the message to that person, gaining their buy-in, getting a good response, that's social agility.
When you're leading your team through tough times, maybe you've had to cut expenses or team morale is a concern. Social agility is where you're taking into account maybe how everybody is processing the news and how it might be processed differently from individual to individual, the different types of information that the individuals might need and like how the informal leaders on the team.
can affect morale and how that could be of help. Another example would be if you have an upset customer and when you're listening to what's really important to them, making sure that they're heard first and you're recognizing there's some customer who they need an apology first, other customers they the solution. Even recognizing that if a customer is, how much influence that they may have and what effect that might have.
Maybe you need to prioritize addressing something with them sooner. Those are all social agility. It's really your skill set for building trust, resolving conflict, and improving the human to human interactions that make up your business. And that means leading your team, handling partnerships, dealing with clients, anything that involves the humans,
He also explained there are three parts to social agility. He gives a great analogy for them. This is what really stuck with me. There's do as the Romans do, speak as the Romans speak, maneuver as the Romans maneuver.
And another thing that I really liked about this segment was that social agility really ties in with the leadership opportunities and intentions that I use. And I've done a separate episode on that and I'll include it the show notes, but the leadership opportunities and intentions helps you surface and prepare your upcoming leadership opportunities and identify your intentions with each of them. So there's a process for doing that.
The social agility skills that Brett talks about are really the tools that you would use to accomplish bringing those intentions to life. So it's a great episode. Brett's super smart. I love what he's doing with Art of Coaching. I think you're going to really like this. Remember, make sure that you are following and or subscribed so you get the entire 12 Days of Business series. I'll email them to you. I can get you the episode pages.
the episodes, the exclusive guest profiles, the resources, but those are things that are only going out through email. So if you want those things, you just need to go to nickberry.info slash 12 days. That's the number 12 days. Okay, enjoy the show with Brett.
Brett (03:34)
We don't teach people communication, we teach them social agility. So under social agility is three things. That's a big umbrella skill, kind of like financial health, right? We know that financial health comprises many things, right? You're gonna have certain amount of assets that are liquid, certain ones that are tied up in investments. You know that you even need to take some losses.
every year to offset capital gains, right? Financial health is multifaceted, right? So when we look at social agility, there's three main components. One is what we call contextual competence. Can you read the room? Right? So say somebody listening right now is like, hey,
we've had a lean year, we need to do some cuts this year and there won't be any staff bonuses. However, we're still gonna honor all other incentives tied to commission, sales, you know, whatever. And then imagine two weeks later, a staff member that was on that call comes up and asks for a raise. That is a lack of contextual competence. You're not, hey, listen and read the room. Or your buddy who decides he's gonna go to Europe, but he goes to Europe and acts like the most,
entitled American in the world, right? Hotel, give me six pillows, give me an extra large, where's a cheeseburger, you know, do as the Romans do. And a lot of people don't have contextual competence, so they end up offending people. They don't pay attention to the culture, the code, all these things. That's one. Am I clear on that piece for now? Okay.
Nick (05:03)
absolutely. Yeah. We all know that person who in the somewhere out in public that has to talk on their phone on speaker when they're the only person doing that.
Brett (05:13)
Right, yeah, and by the way, within contextual, because it's not just people that do that, like it's just, are you a self -aware individual? There's a lot of people that think they're contextually competent, but they're not, you know? Like, we had a great individual that worked for us and had all the intangibles teaching all that, but often couldn't be vulnerable. And it was a lack of contextual competence, because we would have people in the room that want to be vulnerable. So you need to create that vulnerability loop. Hey, share some failures. That's...
That's the nature of this event, right? Normalized failure, let's help people grow and deal with conflict. Wouldn't do it. And so I remember telling them, I was like, hey, this is a lack of contextual competence. You're letting your own lack of self -awareness and vulnerability get in the way of people. Like you've got to revamp this a little bit. So anyway, that's one. The next one is communication strategy, which this is, do you understand that there's different communication styles? Do you like, can you appreciate, like a lot of times people,
You know, let's say you and I are getting in a disagreement. There's so many things that can come into play. It could be timing, the environment, the medium in which we're interacting. There's so many components to communication. But at a base level, we're probably just not matching styles. You know, if you're my business partner, Nick, and let's say we had a down quarter and you're like, well, it's gonna be okay. We got, you know,
it's gonna be fine. And you're talking to me more of an inspirational tone, but you're not actually giving me details, right? You're not saying, well, we got this coming out and I've spec'd this out and this is likely to bring us in anywhere from 20 to $30 ,000 in that quarter alone. Here's why I think that, here's what's in the pipeline. That's how I wanna be talked to. If you just give me a bunch of inspirational nonsense, we're gonna have a little bit of a conflict, because I'm gonna be like, Nick, why? Give me an informed opinion here. Don't just BS me.
Nick (07:03)
Mm -hmm.
Brett (07:03)
So a lot of times people just, they're not matching the style. And it doesn't mean you give up your end. It just means like, hey, meet them where they're at. Meet them where they're at. And then the final one is just power literacy. And this is just the power dynamic side of things. Knowing that, okay, if contextual competence is do as the Romans do, communication strategy is speak as the Romans speak, right? Power literacy is see how the Romans maneuver.
So what I mean by this is everybody can do this right now. You can go into your workplace or you can even think about in your family. And there are certain people, let's use a workplace example first, that will lean on formal authority to get things done. I'm the senior manager, I'm the CEO, right? There's a formal title behind that, right? It's a legitimate title and that's what they kind of lean on this kind of coercion or this force.
There's other people that have tremendous power and influence because they're likable. They don't have to have any formal title. They could be nobody. They could be literally not like a peon in the mail room if such a thing exists anymore. But a lot of people like them and respect them. That's its own form of power. Then there are types of power that, hey, do you have a resource I need? Do you have access to information? Do you have this? So it's teaching people, hey, if you're coming up against resistance to change,
And maybe you've been trying to persuade somebody through rational techniques a lot or carrot and stick. And in reality, you need to be spending more time relating to that individual and building more of a connection and a friendship or vice versa, right? But it's getting people to kind of, what's the word I'm looking for, audit their approach. Now there's some keys here, Nick. A lot of times, analytical people and analytical communicators will try to persuade through rationality.
this is why we should do it, this is what the research says, this is what the numbers say. Well, if you're dealing with somebody that's more of an empathizer and values personal connection, you know, feelings of friendship, and they want you to move the emotional needle and they need a different level of trust, you're in the wrong, right? And a lot of people just don't see that. Everybody else is the asshole, everybody else is stubborn, everybody else is wrong, yet if they just sat and did like a 24 -hour food recall, if they did a 24 -hour...
recall like the types of persuasive strategies are using, they would realize that they're using the wrong gear for the wrong hill, the wrong key for the wrong hole. So it's teaching people that, hey, there's no perfect formula. This is a scientific method. Nobody's gonna come out right and tell you what they are. You've just gotta be able to do a combination of active listening, pay attention, and it's a skill like any other that you can absolutely pick up.
to learn how to navigate rooms, relationships, and everything in between.
Nick Berry is an accomplished entrepreneur and CEO, whose track record includes founding and leading numerous companies since 2002.
He is also a mentor and coach to other entrepreneurs and business owners who are looking for a trusted (and proven) advisor.
Among peers, colleagues, staff, and clients, Nick has been referred to as both 'The Business Guy' as well as 'The Anti-Guru', due to his pragmatic approach and principled leadership.
He shares his insights and lessons learned, along with those of his expert guests,
on his podcast, 'The Business Owner's Journey'.
