Episode 76: F Words at Work - The F Words Human Resources Should Want to Hear
Welcome back, Improve it! Fam.
Today’s episode includes the good type of F-bombs (and we’re not talking swear words!). What does that mean? Our host, Erin Diehl deep dives into reframing this “F-word” and how senior leaders, women's groups, associations, emerging leaders, corporations, teams, entrepreneurs, and more can use it as a tool for success! Listen in to hear what these F words could be and how it can help you in the workplace!
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Connect with Erin:
Erin Diehl is the founder and Chief “Yes, And” officer of improve it! and host of the improve it! Podcast. She’s a performer, facilitator and professional risk-taker who lives by the mantra, “get comfortable with the uncomfortable.” Through a series of unrelated dares, Erin has created improve it!, a unique professional development company that pushes others to laugh, learn and grow. Her work with clients such as United Airlines, PepsiCo, Groupon, Deloitte, Motorola, Walgreens, and The Obama Foundation earned her the 2014 Chicago RedEye Big Idea Award and has nominated her for the 2015-2019 Chicago Innovations Award.
This graduate from Clemson University is a former experiential marketing and recruiting professional as well as a veteran improviser from the top improvisational training programs in Chicago, including The Second City, i.O. Theater, and The Annoyance Theatre.
When she is not playing pretend or facilitating, she enjoys running and beach dates with her husband and son, and their eight-pound toy poodle, BIGG Diehl.
You can follow the failed it! podcast on Instagram @learntoimproveit and facebook, and you can follow Erin personally on Instagram @keepinitrealdiehl here. You can also check out improve it! and how we can help your organization at www.learntoimproveit.com. We can’t wait to connect with you online!
Episode 76 Transcription:
Erin (00:00):
Are you a leader or change maker inside of your business, organization, or corporation? Are you looking for new, innovative ways to drive morale through the roof? Are you looking for fun and exciting icebreakers, team-building exercises, and activities that will foster team growth, friendships, loyalty, and completely transform your organization from the inside out? Have you been searching for a fun and unique way to create change instead of this same old dry, boring leadership books and icebreakers that aren't actually working? Hi, I'm Erin Diehl, business improv edutainer, failfluencer and professional zoombie who is ready to help you improve it. My mission in life is to help you develop teams and leaders through play improv and experiential learning. In this podcast, we will deep dive into professional development, team building, effective communication, networking, presentation, skills, leadership training, how to think more quickly on your feet and everything in between. We have helped everyone from fortune 500 companies to small mom and pop shops transform their business, their leadership, and their people through play. So grab your chicken hat. We are about to have some fun, welcome to improve it! The podcast!
Erin (01:35):
Hello improve it! Family it is me coming to you live from the podcast closet. One day I'll decide to audition for Broadway and until then, I'm just going to sit here in my sweat pants and talk to you. So I hope wherever you are, that you are having a fantastic day, whether it's the start to the day, the middle of the day, the end of the day, I'm just so grateful that you press play on this episode. And I mean I think you should be excited because we're about to drop some F-bombs okay. Left and right. And HR, I'm sorry, but you press play on this episode today. So I think that you are ready for some F-bomb drop in good vibe. Now I want to caveat a couple of things to some housekeeping items before we get into this episode. So I know it says F words, but if you have children around here is a spoiler alert, I'm not going to swear.
Erin (02:44):
So keep them around. You don't have earmuffs, let's go wherever you are. Turn me up in your headphones. Second. I want to let you know that something so exciting that is new to us. It is called speak pipe. Okay. And that's, it sounds like it's, it's like, it sounds, it sounds like it sounds Erin and what it is, it's this really cool recording device that allows me to hear from you. So what I love about podcasting is that I get to trap all the knowledge I have into your ear. However, you don't get to tell me what you like and less you respond to a social post. So what I want to do is I really want to gather some questions from you, my improve it family. And I want to do that through this really cool little old-school messaging device called SpeakPipe.
Erin (03:44):
So what you can do is you can go on our website, learntoimproveit.com/podcast, and right under the subscribe button, you will see send us a voice message. You can do that. Or in the show notes, we're going to make this link super big, all caps. You can click right there. And if you have a question for me or want to respond to anything you hear in this episode, or any episodes going forward, please do I really, really want to hear from you so we can create content that drives you. Now, I also want you to know that today's episode is a direct lift from our key note F words at work, which can be done virtually or in person. This is a one hour keynote for the large groups. So think hundred people plus 50 people. Plus it's a great engaging keynote for people in person or via zoom.
Erin (04:47):
It's great for senior leaders for women's groups, for associations, emerging leaders, corporations, teams, entrepreneurs, this message goes far and wide. So I wanted to let you know that before we dive into today's episode and the content, because I'm pulling all of that directly from our F words at work keynote, I built this keynote at the end of 2020, when this podcast was not the improve it! Podcast, it was still failed it!, And I was feeling like a complete and total failfluencer there on the rag, because if anything was a constant in my life at that time, it was the biggest F word of all failure. So if you're a longtime listener of this show, you might've been with us when we were the failed it podcast. Failure is our friend. So if you're new to the show, let me just say, welcome to improve it.
Erin (05:54):
We failed it at failing it. I guess you could say, however, we had a really great 50 plus episode run of the show being called failed. It, we changed in 2021, July of 2021, which is not that long ago to the improve it podcast, because it was just more in line with who we are and our messaging and the message we wanted to spread to you. So if you are new to this show and you haven't listened to episode 64 of this show, it's called from failed it to improve it over 26,000 happy participants and counting. So that is true. We have worked with over 26,000 people and that's number has grown even since then, but go back, check out that episode just to see the evolution from the failed at podcast to the improve it! Podcast. Okay. So let's dive into the first F word or the first F bomb failure.
Erin (06:59):
Okay. I just want to start off with this word and I want you to kind of gauge your body language when you hear this word failure. Okay. So I'm going to say it again and wherever you are. I just want you to gauge, did my stomach go up like I'm on a roller coaster at six flags. Did I want to throw up in my mouth or am I a cool cafe? And I've got this. All right. So I'm going to say one more time. Failure. What do you feel? How do you feel, think about it, think about the signal that that word creates in your mind and in your body language. And let's just start with that, that feeling of failure. Okay. What that feeling feels like when we fail, I'll tell you what I feel when I fail. I get that almost like I got gut punched by my two year old toddler feeling like I just went upside down on a roller coaster at six flags.
Erin (08:02):
And like, I just can't compete. I can't keep going. Sometimes there's a fetal position, rock back and forth on the floor. Sometimes I go cry alone in the closet. I have many different closets for things podcasting. I have a crying closet. I don't, but it would be nice if I did. So where I'm going with this is really recognize your feeling around failure. And then I did notify some things for you that you failed at. Let's not go way, way back. Let's start with 2020 and 2021. So let me go first friends. All right. So first and foremost, we had so many fails as a business. I had so many fails as a leader. We had pivot on pivot during our virtual workshops. We had a complete fail when we started the launch of what was the failed it! Podcast, because I had four episodes ready to launch.
Erin (09:05):
We were going to be batching things and be working ahead of the curve. None of those episodes mentioned COVID or the coronavirus, because we had no clue what that was at that time. So that was a huge fail. We had to completely scratch those and start over. We had failed revenue goals, and that was shocking and very hard because 2020 was supposed to be our best year yet. I failed to shower daily. I failed to wear real pants month, month after month. I can't even tell you, like I could probably count on one hand. The amount of times I wore jeans in 2021 hand. So that was, that was collectively a year ago. Let's just talk about the fails that you've had this month. What are the fails that you've had last year? And what are the fails that you had this month? Okay. We are in the month of October, I'll tell you some of my fails this month, thus far.
Erin (10:10):
So I, I've not been getting up as early as I want, which is a big start to my day. It really determines how I feel the rest of the day. I've not been eating as healthy as I want, which makes wearing real pants, very difficult friends. And I have not said no to as many things as I should. That is something I am constantly working on as a recovering perfectionist and people pleaser. So those are my fails. What are your fails this month? Now I want us to take it even to kind of a narrower. Let's narrow it down, take it in to a little bottom of the triangle if you will. So our funnel goes from year to month today. What are the fails that you've had today? So for me, I will say I did not brush my teeth and this is a podcast.
Erin (11:04):
So you are totally fine. Okay. And I'm fine. We're in the clear I did not brush my hair, which is, I don't know, maybe when I didn't get up with my alarm clock today. So those are the fields I've had today, today. What are your fails today? Think about them. Where are you in the day? If it's first thing in the morning, maybe you haven't had time to fail yet, but think about the fails that you've had today. Now the opposite of those fails, okay. Are where we want to listen and learn. So I said, I didn't brush my teeth today. Okay. Well, I have the ability to use running water in a home that provides me shelter. That's the opposite of not being able to brush my teeth. I'm able to brush my teeth, but I failed at doing that. But if I look at that silver lining, I've been able to brush my teeth because I have the means to do so.
Erin (12:07):
I didn't need as healthy. Well, that was my, my, my monthly fail. Let me take it back to the day. I didn't brush my hair and I didn't brush my son's hair. And the opposite of not brushing his or my hair is the fact that I have hair. And the fact that I have a son who, if you've listened to this show for a long time, you know, he is a miracle baby. And I am so blessed to have that child and to be able to have his little hair to comb. And then the opposite of not getting up with my alarm clock means, you know what? I have technology. I have a place to go. I have a job and a career that I love. I've got people to talk to Aku by improve it! Family. So take those failures. And I want you to reframe them.
Erin (12:59):
Failure means that we are trying failure is a part of this journey. We learn so much in this journey, not only about ourselves, but we learn about our own strength. And when we fail, we learn that we can only control two things. So if I look at 20, 20 and 2021, I'm like, oh my God, I couldn't control a single thing. It was so crazy. But the two things I could control where my attitude and my effort, we can't control when we fail, but we can control how we react to those fails and how we move ourselves forward. So this part of our keynote F words at work is so fun during this part of the keynote. I asked for participants to join me in activity called fail. Yeah. So this phrase is also lifted from the former improve it! Podcast, but we use this activity to get participants engaged.
Erin (14:08):
And it also allows people to start reworking and reframing the things that they've seen in their life as failures and reframe them in their own mind by celebrating them fail. Yeah. You know what I'm talking about. If you're a longtime listener of this show failure, I'm in my podcast closet and to my right, I've actually created a sign that says fail. Yeah. As just a reminder to just keep going, keep putting things out there, even if it's not perfect. So I want you to know we've done this keynote so many times over the past year, we did this at a conference with over 600 women over the summer. And this phrase failure was the most retweeted phrase out of the entire conference. And I know Twitter isn't normally the rage, but it was put on Instagram on LinkedIn. So it was just this two words that empower people. And the activity itself is so meaningful and purposeful and getting us to look at failure differently. All right. I'm about to drop yet another F-bomb okay. My improvement fam. And when I do, I want you to give me a big bill, wherever you are drop a mic, do whatever feels right. But I want you to get ready. Cause this F-bomb is coming your way. Here it is. Drum roll, please.
Erin (15:36):
Frequency. That's right. Frequency, all right, you heard me, right. You heard me, right. So what does this have to do with failure? The frequency at which we fail is important. I want you to get used to the question. What did I fail at today? I want you to ask your kids or your friends at dinner. What did you fail it today? I want you to write in your journal. When you go to bed, what did you fail at today? The biggest rule of improv comedy are one of, I should say the biggest rules of improv is there are no mistakes, only gifts. So ask yourself, what is the gift in this failure? I'm going to tell you straight up in 20, 20, 20, 21, beginning of 2020, I could not look at anything that was happening around me as a gift. We went from a completely in-person business to virtual and the middle of that, my mother had a stroke and literally almost died.
Erin (16:46):
We were moving across the country, which was a gift, but there were things on things on things, and it just felt like it kept compounding. When I take a bird's eye view into my own life, I'm now able to see those things as gifts, putting everything into a virtual space and creating virtual workshops meant that I could move to my dream location of Charleston, South Carolina, where I am coming to you live from my podcasting closet. It meant I could see my son learn to crawl, learn to take his first steps, say his first word, because I was home and not on an airplane. And I will tell you the plan for our business was to expand across the country nationwide. So I had plans to be traveling consistently in 2020 now failed revenue goals was hard and it was a really tough reality, but it caused me to evaluate our spending and then also reevaluate what we did not want to spend money on anymore.
Erin (17:58):
It caused me to look at the way we were conducting business driving leads. It caused me to really reframe and ask my clients questions so I can know what was important to them. So we could create it now failing to wear real pants and to leave. My house does seem gross, but it made me question the way I was showing up professionally. Why do I feel like I have to show up to a professional event in a pencil, dress and heels. Why can't I be more comfortable and wear flats and also wear things that are more comfortable in more me? I have gotten rid of so many of my teal dresses. Okay. If you knew me prior to this, that was my calling card. I have gotten rid of almost all my teal dresses, not to say I won't wear them again, but I'm changing the look.
Erin (18:50):
Okay. So this part of our efforts at work keynote is so special. To me, it's all about taking failure and doing it every single day. We talk about the concept of rewarding ourselves for failing. There is an entire story based upon a lottery ticket that I'm going to leave in case I see you doing this in person or virtually. That is honestly one of my favorite stories that I have that I tell it is so good. And it's all about rewarding yourself for taking risks. We do an activity called the golden ticket and you might've heard me talk about that on this show, but it really helps people hold each other accountable with their energy, with the way that they look at things. And so we talk about this, this notion of failing frequently as an opportunity to consistently hold ourselves accountable for failure. We even talk about FFF, your fail forever friends, not your BFF, your FFF, your fail forever friend, who that person is and how you can hold yourself accountable.
Erin (20:08):
By having a friend who you call when things get rough. And that person is there to remind you of this frequency of failure. We have FFF bracelets. Just kidding. No we don't. But we have this notion of FFF to make people feel like they are not alone in failure. And also to embrace this notion of failing frequently. Now I'm going to drop one final. F-Bomb are you ready? Here? It is. Get ready. I'm going to tell you fundamentals of success. What the heck does that mean? What effort are you talking about? Erin, hear me out. This means you are an F bomb troponin bedroom, slipper rock and failure, making frequency, taken, fail, mess, express who fails forward to their success. Ah, I love this definition because it is absolutely accurate. We talk about the full definition of what it means to be a failfluencer.
Erin (21:22):
So if you have not listened to any episodes of the failure of failed at podcasts, that's totally fine, but we do talk a lot about failfluence saying what that means. And in our keynote, especially I give you this really fun definition about what it means to failfluence. And then we also talk about this notion of failure parties, and we did an entire mini sewed on failure parties, why they're so important. I'm trying to find where that was when we started doing our minisode. I think it was the very first minisode that we did. And we'll take a link to that in our show notes here. So you have that, but we talk about failure parties, how you can give those to your team, how you can give those to yourself, why they're so important. And this virtual keynote efforts at work really helps people to redefine failure, to hold themselves accountable for failing frequently, to become a hashtag cause we're going to use a hashtag cause we're trendy, failfluencer to those around them.
Erin (22:32):
And then it also helps you to overcome perfectionism and embrace, failing your way to success. So we've worked with so many types of organizations and teams. We've worked with women's groups. We've worked with ERG groups, which is employee resource groups. We've worked with tech teams, C level leaders on this. Very very message. And we would love to drop some F words in your organization. So it's not your grandma's keynote. And it makes me so excited. Every single time trialing home. This notion of failure, plus frequency equals the fundamentals of success. It really gets people excited about failure. So improve it! Fam. I want to ask you, what are your current feelings about failure on a one to 10 scale. So I want you to think about that. One is I hate failing. Failure is not my friend 10 is failure to buy by my BFF.
Erin (23:44):
I've an FFF fail forever friend. I'm rocking. I'm rolling. Where do you fall on this one to 10 scale? How would you rate your comfort level with failure? And remember at the beginning of this episode, I asked you to think about your feeling with failure. Does that number on a one to 10 scale match that feeling? So if you rated yourself a 10, you probably don't feel that upside down, feeling that you get on a six flags roller coaster. When you hear the word failure, you're probably feeling pretty comfortable with it. Obviously the goal is to get you to attend. How do we get you there without listening to this keynote? And just listening to today's episode, I'm going to give you the low and the dirty. I want you for one week to celebrate your fails at the end of the day, celebrate the fails, not the wins, the fails, because those are the things that you are doing to put yourself in a position to succeed.
Erin (24:51):
Now, this is not toxic positivity. Try saying that three times toxic positivity, toxic positivity. That's a tongue twister. It is not toxic, positive, toxic positivity. There it is. This is real life. This is me telling you that if you can reframe failure in your mind, you will save a lot of brain power. A lot of sleepless nights, a lot of energy. If you can reframe the way that you look at failing in your head. Now, if you cannot have the real deal, pun intended, that's my last name with this F words that were keynote. Then I want you to send today's podcast to someone, you know, who needs to hear it and you don't have to share it. If you're not like, Hey, I'm on board with failure. You don't have to share it on LinkedIn or share it to your stories. But instead I want you to take a screenshot or take the link to this show and just copy paste it into a text to a friend and say, Hey, you know what?
Erin (26:01):
I know you're going through some hard times right now. I know things may seem like they're failing on top of you left and right. Take a listen to this. I know it's not going to hit home right now, but maybe in a few days, a couple of weeks after practicing this reframing of failure, you'll start to see what you're going through in a different way. Please do that. That is how we are helping each other during these times. That is how we are supporting one another. This message is from me to you. So I would love for you to pass that message on. And as I mentioned earlier, I want to hear from you, what questions do you have? What do you want me to on this show? Like I said, we're going to put this in big, bold letters in the show notes to the little recording device called SpeakPipe and that's on our website, but it's like, as I said, this old school radio call-in for 2021.
Erin (26:58):
This is old school radio for 2021 podcasting. We are hashtag tacky. There's me using a hashtag again because I'm hip. So all you have to do is click that link in the show notes and click on it, speak into your phone or your computer. And it's just like a voicemail. Just leave me a question, say hi, tell me your name, leave a question. And then I will answer that question on this podcast. In the next few weeks, I may even dedicate an entire show to answering it because that's what their show is about to improve it, whatever that it may be. So whatever your it is that you're having trouble with. If you want to talk deeper about failure, let me know, but just click that little link on SpeakPipe because I would love, love, love to hear from you. I appreciate you bringing me into your day, putting your headphones in or jamming out to this while you're cleaning out your closet, wherever you are.
Erin (28:01):
A lot of talk about closets today, but that's, that's where I'm at. So that's where I keep coming back to. But I just appreciate you improve it! Fam. I want you to keep playing. I want you to keep failing because that means you're trying, and I want you to keep improving because the world needs that special that only you can break. I'll see you next time. Hey friends, thanks for tuning in to improve it. I am so happy you were along for the ride. If you enjoyed this show, head on over to iTunes to leave us a five star review and subscribe to the show. So you never miss an episode. New episodes drop every Wednesday. Now, if you're really feeling today's show and you've improved it even just a little bit, please take a screenshot and tag me at keeping it real deal on Instagram and share it in your stories. I'll see you next week, but I want to leave you with this thought, what did you improve today and how will that help your future successful self. Think about it! I am rooting for you and the world needs that special it only, you can bring. See you next time!