The emPOWERed Half Hour

If You Love Them, Shove Them: Human-Centered Leadership with Author and Leadership Expert, Joshua Roberts

• Becca Powers • Season 1 • Episode 99

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Leadership is not just a position. It is an inner practice.

In this deeply human and heart opening episode of The EmPOWERed Half Hour, Becca Powers and leadership expert Joshua Roberts explore what it truly means to lead with presence, compassion, and self awareness, especially when life has brought you trauma, loss, and moments that reshape you from the inside out.

Key Moments You Won't Want to Miss:

  • Joshua’s raw reflection on the pressure to “grind” through grief and trauma, and his redefinition of resilience.
  • The story of a young Airman whose actions revealed the consequences of emotional neglect and lack of connection.
  • Becca’s insights on assumptions and missed opportunities for checking in with loved ones.

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Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Joshua Roberts: In my lifetime, I have gone through tragedy after tragedy, after tragedy, including losing my son, including. Being raped by two different men. You don't bounce back from losing a child and you don't bounce back from getting raped or sexually assaulted. You don't bounce back from watching your entire squad get wiped out.

Those aren't things that you get bounced, you can bounce back from losing your job. When I lost my son within six weeks, I got sent to Korea by myself for a year, and I got put into a position of leadership and it was the highest level of leadership I had been put in. And the fact of the matter is I wasn't ready because I hadn't even started healing.

I did what a lot of people do and they made themselves busy, so they didn't have to think about any of the consequences of what just happened. My son passed away. My wife was just in a state that she couldn't, do some of the things that needed to be done. Josh goes into fix it mode, and I handled all the arrangements, and I handled all this stuff, and then I had to get ready for my deployment.

I was not in a place that I was either fit. Ready to lead other human beings because I couldn't lead myself. 

Becca Powers: Welcome to another episode of the Empowered Half Hour, and I have with me a friend and colleague Joshua Roberts, who is a leadership and mindset. Expert and coach and he's also author of Leadership Level Up.

And I always like to tell you guys how I find the people that I bring on the podcast and we belong to a coaching community, empire Partners. And I've gotten to know Josh and his work through that program and I thought he would be a really excellent resource for you, in the areas of expert of life Coach, not life coaching, but life and leadership.

My. Words are getting tied today, guys, but it happens sometimes. But Josh, welcome to the show. 

Joshua Roberts: Thank you. Can you hear me? We're good. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. 

Becca Powers: Yeah, I hear you again. So let's get into the first question. I am very happy to have you on the show because I have gotten to hear your story behind the scenes.

I know how powerful it is. I know your career background is very impressive too, but you know, we all go through a journey of. Life and leadership, don't we? And I think you've done a very good job of kind of summering summarizing your experience, your expertise, and then bringing that back around in a way that can really help people live more masterful lives, more pleasant lives, more joy, joyful and fulfilled lives.

Really love your work. The book was excellent. So let me ask you the first question. As an author myself too, I know when I sit down to write, there's a reason I sat down to write. There's a story behind it. There's something that made me want to share. So I'm curious, like what's your backstory to writing your book and wanting to share that message with people?

Joshua Roberts: Well, so I always, I was always fascinated by reading. I grew up, my parents were religious missionaries in Mexico, so I didn't have a lot of tv. And so I read, I was just a voracious reader. And I always had aspirations of wanting to write and I thought I was gonna write historical fiction, but as my life took a different turn, I joined the military.

 you know, I had a lot of experiences between deployments and being a drill sergeant and all these other things that I saw that I guess I just kind of stored away. And then when I retired from the Air Force in, 2022, it's like that was the first time I really had a chance to think like about. All these things that I had learned.

Then my son joined the Navy and he progressed very quickly. And so for me, I wanted to write a book that would share with him all the things that I wish I had known. And if you read it, you'll see like I highlight seven different character traits that I think will help a leader go from good to great.

But I do so in a way where I highlight how I made a mistake in it because. It's not to glorify my mistakes, but it's to show that when I retired, there are a lot of people that told me, you're the best leader I ever had. But the fact of the matter is there's a lot of people out there that carry the scars of my leadership, that's a really humbling thing to have to say.

And so for my son, I wanted to give him, I guess, a step up and write a book in language that he would understand. I didn't write this for the John Maxwells and the John Gordons, those guys. They're way elevated leaders. Right. But I did write it in a way that even a seasoned leader would be able to read it and be reminded of the foundational pieces of what leadership really is, which is ultimately being somebody worth following.

So, 

Becca Powers: yeah. You know, I really appreciate so much of that, and that you even shared that you, wrote it from a place of like showing where, you know, there was some flaws or errors in your movements that cost. The cost went to someone else, right? Not just yourself. And there's a part of your book where you're starting to talk about that and it talks about the cost of indecision.

And I thought that was a really powerful section of the book. And I don't know if you would be open to sharing a little bit of your thoughts about the cost of indecision, because I do believe as leaders sometimes we pause. For good intention, we maybe need time to observe more or playing politics in our head.

How does that affect my upline, my downline? Maybe we need more information or maybe we're just flat out afraid to make a decision because. We might get a pow pow from upper leadership, or our team might not want to adapt to it. So I think there's a whole bunch of different reasons that the pause may happen, but I realize that you put a cost to indecision because I have learned that too over time, that sometimes the indecision was the cost.

And if you're open to talking about it, I'd love to hear your perspective on that. 

Joshua Roberts: Yeah, I mean. I think all of us, when you're in a position of leadership, you want to make the right decision no matter what. Right? 

Becca Powers: Sure. 

Joshua Roberts: I think the opening example for that chapter was Eisenhower. Mm-hmm. On D-Day, right? Like he had a small window and he, he had to make a choice, and either way, men were gonna die.

So the question is, his decision goes wrong. Men die for no reason. He makes the right decision, men are still gonna die and he still has to carry that weight. And he just had to make a choice. And I think there's something in all of us that when we have people following us, we wanna do the right thing.

But sometimes that hesitation turns into paralysis and paralysis is always bad. And there's a guy named Craig Gelle that does a leadership podcast. He's incredibly, he's a pastor and I was listening to his podcast once and he was saying he gives himself a drop dead day. Like I have to make a decision by this time.

He gives himself a couple days to pause, to think, to gather counsel, but then ultimately you have to make a decision. And you know, you'll see a recurring theme in my book and I sell t-shirts with, it says everybody wants to be a gangster, so it's time to do gangster shit. That's the part of being a leader that people don't like.

 if you don't want to have to make decisions, then don't be the boss. Don't be in charge and don't be a leader because that's ultimately what you're there for, is to provide clarity and direction. And sometimes your choices will be unpopular. Sometimes the results will be a c plus. Yeah, but one of my favorite quotes ever, I'll just paraphrase it, is by Theodore Roosevelt and he said The best thing that you can do in any given circumstance is make the right decision.

The next best thing you can do is make the wrong decision. And the worst thing you can do is make no decision at all. And I've seen this in combat and I've seen it in the military where a leader freezes up and it's rarely him or her that pays the price for it. It's usually the people below them that are following them that are like, what the fuck are we supposed to do?

And nobody knows. And it's your job to tell them. And so I had a friend that was a, he's a combat leader in Fallujah, and they're lieutenant and their master sergeant both got killed and he was an E five and he had to make a choice very quickly. Do we stay on the street or do we go in that house? And there there was risk either way.

If you go in the house, that may be where the Taliban was. If you say on the street. You're under fire. And so he just had to make a choice. And ultimately he made the right one. He got his men undercover. They were able to treat wounded, but it could have gone catastrophically wrong. But at the end of the day, like a choice had to be made because where they were sitting, they were certainly all gonna get killed.

And so he just had to make that choice. And you know, in the business world, maybe the consequences aren't as high, but I think you're seeing right now. In our nation, what happens when people can't make a choice, when people can't make a decision and it's affecting hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions.

And so I think it's critical. And it's funny because that chapter keeps getting brought to my attention as one of the most impactful, and it, I didn't think it would be. Yeah, I didn't, I love it. I really did. I really, because yeah, 

Becca Powers: I was just gonna say like, one of the reasons I love it too is 'cause I, I specialize in leadership as well, and I have.

Go through it from a nervous system lens, but I have this saying that dysregulated leaders create dysregulated teams and paralysis analysis paralysis is one of the things that will dysregulate a human being. If we stay in overthinking, over analyzing too long, we'll start to shut down.

We'll go into a freeze state. And as a leader, if we do that, we're putting our team into the same. Freaking state. So then you have a whole bunch of dysregulated humans trying to run businesses, trying to run teams, trying to make important decisions, and it's just not good. So, from like my nervous system nerded me, I was like, that chapter's really good.

Joshua Roberts: Yeah. I mean, you know, at the end of the day, leadership boils down to you lead people and people need, people need a decision to be made. And if you can't be the person to do it, then get outta the way because somebody has to make a choice. That's all there is to it. 

Becca Powers: I agree so much so. I wanna ask you another question, kind of changing topics a little bit.

 so what was like, as you were writing the book and you were thinking of like what lessons to bring forward to people to either empower them or shift their mindset or something like that. was one that really stood out to you in terms of, it could be a story within it, or one of the seven things, but what, what was like an aha or again, something that stood out to you that you might wanna share with the audience that you feel is really important?

Joshua Roberts: Probably the hardest chapter for me to write was resilience. 

Because in the military we have resilience days and they bring in resilience experts, and now it's all this bullshit about, it's the bouncing back from difficult, whatever. Well, in my lifetime, I have gone through tragedy after tragedy, after tragedy, including losing my son, including.

Being raped by two different men, right? Like, so like you don't bounce back from losing a child and you don't bounce back from getting raped or sexually assaulted. You don't bounce back from watching your entire squad get wiped out. Like those aren't things that you get bounce, you can bounce back from losing your job, okay?

But when it comes to resilience to me, I don't know that I went into this depth, but when I was really thinking about it, when I lost my son within six weeks, I got sent to Korea by myself for for a year. I got put into a position of leadership, and it was the highest level of leadership I had been put in.

And the fact of the matter is I wasn't ready because I hadn't even started healing. I did what a lot of people do and they made themselves busy, so they didn't have to think about any of the consequences of what just happened. So my son passed away. My wife was just in a state that she couldn't, she couldn't do some of the things that needed to be done.

And so Josh goes into fix it mode. I handled all the arrangements and I handled all this stuff, and then I had to get ready for my deployment, and I was not in a place that I was either fit or ready to lead other human beings because I couldn't lead myself. And that chapter really hit home for me because I had to be very humble writing it.

Like I tried to approach resilience from a different direction of like, sometimes resilience is having the guts to say, I need to take a knee. And I cannot do this right now, and I think a lot of leaders, and you know, you told me who a lot of your listeners are, there's this weird psychology that you have to grind a hundred percent of the time.

Cool. Enjoy your burnout and enjoy losing your passion and enjoy losing your purpose and maybe even your family and maybe your self worth, and you ultimately, maybe even your life. When you 

Becca Powers: be divorce, debt, disease, death, like all of it. Yeah. 

Joshua Roberts: Yeah. So resilience for me, like, and I'll just, I'll try to summarize it.

 when I retired, you know, I have seven traumatic brain injuries. I have all of my disability total came to 680%, i had severe PTSD. And there are days, Becca, that I don't wanna wake up. And there are days especially that I don't want to get out of bed. I lead a nonprofit, I have my own business.

and I don't wanna have to deal with this sometimes. so my resilience journey starts by making the decision to get out of bed and go to the gym because I know that that one discipline is gonna start my day. 

right

Joshua Roberts:  I guess I just, I put it this way. I get out of bed, I walk over, I pick up my pickaxe, and I go to this tunnel that I've been tumbling through since I lost my son.

And I swing. And some days I hit granite and I go this far. some days I hit limestone. I go that far. But either way, there's still rubble that has to be cleaned out. And by that I mean. The mindset work, the perspective work, the opening up, and sharing how I'm feeling with the people that truly matter because tomorrow I'm coming back and I'm swinging again.

And you know, you may spend your whole life in that one tunnel. I don't know that I will ever be through over losing my son, but a 

Becca Powers: chance. 

Joshua Roberts: There are other things where maybe one day you swing and there's a pinhole of light and you've reached the other side. You know, that's amazing. But to make people feel, what really happened to me was I started to feel guilty that I hadn't recovered and bounced back from losing Jake after 10 years, I couldn't hold babies.

I couldn't. It just gave me like this overwhelming sense of like anxiety. And finally somebody just had the wisdom to look at me and go, shut the fuck up. You're never gonna be over losing your son, Josh. And so it really started this whole journey into like, what is resilience? And so that chapter in particular was an aha moment for me because I think I realized as I was writing it that I still held myself hostage to expectations that I should be over something.

And I don't like the word get over 'cause it gets this. Image of like you get to the mountain top and now you're over it. Now it's all downhill from here. Yeah. You never gotta think 

Becca Powers: about it again. It 

Joshua Roberts: doesn't work that way. Right. So, yeah, 

Becca Powers: very similarly, like I'm the sole survivor of my family. Right. And you don't ever get over that.

Joshua Roberts: Nope. You don't ever get over that. 

No. I would say for your listeners, like take a deep breath, do an inventory on where you're really at. And sometimes resilience is having the wisdom to say, I can't lead right now. Hopefully you've done your job and developed leaders under you so that they can step up and backfill and support you and maybe even do a better job than you did.

But that ultimately is the job of a leader anyway, right? Is to create leaders so that if you have to step aside, those people can step in and lead your organization or lead your team or your family. I think that chapter was really, I wondered how it would hit, because I think people were expecting a different angle and I tried to approach it from sometimes resilience is saying I can't.

Becca Powers: Love that. And I think people need more permission to think of resilience in that manner because sometimes it is, the resilience is in the rest and in the honoring that actually keeps us going forward. So very wise. 

Joshua Roberts: Sorry, I went really emotional in there. Sorry. But like, it just emotion, I got really teary and 

Becca Powers: I was like, I, I can do this.

No, it's very deep. you know what's cool about it though? Not about what happened to either one of us in our stories, but what's cool about the vulnerability shared is that everyone has significant. Issues loss or things are going through, or, you know, a lot of the listeners that I have now are kind of like middle aged and maybe they're raising a family and or maybe they have aging parents.

So I think that it's really relevant to talk about loss because, you know, middle age is when you experience both ways, you know, unfortunately, and it's just a real part of life. So I appreciate the rawness there. There is another topic from your book. There's so many things. I mean, we could probably have like a two hour podcast still be going, but we have about 15 minutes left.

So I wanna go into another area of the book that I love duality. I'm a Kundalini yoga teacher and I also got certified in, I Geek Out and Shadow Beliefs and one of the, correlations. and when you do, when you. Become aware of shadow beliefs. I don't know if you've ever gotten into Debbie Ford's work or anything like that, but basically the theory is, that a quality, like empathy for an example, is neutral and there's always a positive and a negative charge to any quality or a shadow side and a light side, and so.

When I really started to understand that, and there's a lot of you can unpack about that. 'cause when you have a charge against something, like my life has made me an over responsible person. So I used to judge the hell outta somebody who is irresponsible, like how dare you? But there's a gift to irresponsibility and that would be, they get to relax, you know, they get to breathe.

You know me, I'm like. Go, go, go, go, go. I don't even know what relaxing's like sometimes, So it's this idea that equality is neither good or bad. It's good and bad depending on how you leverage it. Yes. So when I saw your empathy chapter and I saw that duality, I was very excited to talk to you about it.

'cause I thought you did a, a great job presenting that. So to you, Josh, let's talk about the good sides and the bad sides of empathy and leadership. 

Joshua Roberts: You know, empathy it's an interesting word. Because I think by definition it's ultimately trying to put yourself in the place of another to kind of feel what they've, I mean, I think that's kind of the dictionary definition, but what I would say about empathy is, you know it when you see it, but there is a cost to it, that tends to be if you're too empathetic, without having the discipline to set boundaries for that empathy as a leader, you will ultimately either over share.

People's feelings. And sometimes as a leader, you have to be able to make hard choices that regardless of what the reason was why somebody did something, if they broke a standard, you still have to hold them accountable. Right. And then the other, I think the other part of it is, the other part of it is you can very quickly edge into burnout, because if you're carrying the weight that was not yours, I call them guilt bricks that you put in your backpack, like you're carrying all these, you're carrying all these bricks that aren't yours.

Suddenly now, like, like this happened to me, like I'm the president of a nonprofit that we train service dogs. And if I were over empathetic with every veteran and first responder that we serve, I would not be able to get out of bed because their stories are awful. And sometimes they have to be held accountable to commitments that they made to our organization as well.

You know, I mean, and so as a president, sometimes I have to be like, listen. You're not meeting standard, you're not showing up for training, you're not doing the things. And so I just think there, there is a duality. Empathy is, especially in the military, it's probably one that we lack or we don't focus on.

 I mean, my nickname was the Soul Reaper, like, trust me, I get it. like it's hard. But what I also saw was, and the example I think I gave in my book was. I just went in on people sometimes without even asking why, and then you find out their reason and it's like, okay, that doesn't excuse the breach of discipline.

It doesn't excuse, you know, not meeting standards. But it does give me better insight into Helping bring you back into standards because ultimately that is the point of discipline anyways. It's not to punish, it's to bring people back into standards. And when you understand their why and why they made a decision and why they made a choice.

Now as a leader, I can better shape my response to help address that. But if I just go in like, well, I didn't even touch the reason why they made that choice in the first place. And so that was completely Yeah, 

Becca Powers: and you might shut them down more than bring them over the bridge, right? 

Joshua Roberts: Yeah. 

Becca Powers: So. I think that's really fascinating.

 I love hearing stuff like that too, because it's just true. Like if you don't ask why like. Where I'm going with this is I believe that high standards are a must in business, right? And as a CEO and running my own business too, right? You're present. Like I have to have high standards. We have high goals, high standards, but that doesn't mean that I don't care about my people.

That doesn't mean that I don't want insight into why a deadline was missed. And I wanna understand because if I understand, if I sneak to understand before I act. I often find out a lot of things I need to know as a leader also. 

Joshua Roberts: Yeah And you'll sometimes find out that the reason they made that decision is because of failure on your part to set clear expectations.

Clear and give clarity. 

Becca Powers: Did you see my face. I'm like, and that's like that idea of like extreme ownership. I'm just like, when something lands really poor, I do take that self-reflection of like, how did I roll this out? What was missed? I definitely wanna check my communication. So I think that's a really good point too.

Joshua Roberts: Can I give a, I'll try to give a really quick example. So during COVID, like, you know, we are in a military base, obviously you can't just come on base, you have to have a pass. So we had this kid that's three separate times smuggled his girlfriend into base in his trunk. So like when his car would come through, the security forces guys would just open the trunk and there she'd be.

And so finally we were like, okay, obviously you're not getting it. Like that's a breach of security. That's a huge deal. So we bring him in and I'm ready to just rip his face off. I was like, why the fuck would you think that that's acceptable? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And this kid just had this look on his face.

And so me and the commander both just kind of stopped and he goes, because nobody checks on me and she's the only person on the earth that cares about me. And I was lonely. Alright, leaders, they're so focused on COVID that maybe we, failed to make sure that our young airmen who are away from their families for the first time and were feeling the direct results of COVID and maybe had lost family members to COVID.

And we're lonely because they're sequestered in their stupid dorm rooms and we hadn't checked on them. So yeah, there was a breach, but it was also a moment for he and I after he left to go, okay, we do have to discipline. You can't do that. But at the same time, like it was a real moment of reflection.

Like, what could we have done better make sure that our people felt cared about? You know what I mean? Like you have the discipline, but you also need to understand like he made that decision partly because we failed. To do the proper checking in. I mean, people can, nitpick that all they want.

That was my experience, but that was what I walked away from that situation with was if we had done a better job of checking on them and making them feel cared about, maybe he wouldn't have felt the need to, you know what I mean? Like, does that make sense? 

Becca Powers: It makes complete sense and that's like I am pausing because I'm listening, but I'm pausing also because I'm thinking and I'm like, I'm really hoping that the listeners are hearing the message within this, because I think there's so many times whether we're leading teams or we're leaders in our house, right?

Too in our households, like again, I am very conscious of, I talk about raising family a lot because that was an active role for me. But I'm also very conscious that now middle Ages are also taking care of their family. And it's really something to bring into your personal awareness too, of like, are you stopping to hear what's going on when things aren't being met at home or both sides, whether it's kids or parents or stuff like that.

'cause I realized. Some of the recent experiences I've had over five years that I was assuming a lot of things. And I think sometimes you take the people you love the most for granted, and I realize that there is a lot of opportunities for me to like truly check in. And so that's, you gave me a personal self-reflection moment.

Joshua Roberts: Well, when I do my leadership coaching, before we even get into leading at work, the whole first several months are, are you leaning yourself? Then in a situation like ours where we do have a family, my hierarchy goes yourself, your family, then you can lead at work. But if the first two are, an absolute shit show, I guarantee you, I guarantee you number three will fall apart.

And that's why you have pastors, basically sacrificing their integrity. That's why you have leaders addicted to opioids. That's why you have, people in public office that are cheating on their spouses. Because they're not leading themselves and they're not leading at home, and so it will eventually leak into number three.

And so I love that you, you also touch on that because people are like, why am I doing mindset work? Why do you think you are? that's the whole point. Like you have to lead yourself before you can lead other people. So 

Becca Powers: a hundred percent air five 

Joshua Roberts: there we. 

Becca Powers: So, all right, let's go into, kind of like wrapping this all in a bow.

We got to talk a about a lot of really cool principles and I truly didn't even know we were down to like four minutes. I'm like, oh my God, I'll come back. Yeah. If we were, since the show is the empowered half hour, how would you kind of just take everything that we've been talking about and wrap it into an empowering message for the listeners?

Joshua Roberts: All right, so since you brought me on, I guess as a leadership guy, I have a saying if you love them, shove them. One of the stands is for when people feel seen, heard, and understood, it makes them feel valued. And value given frequently turns into value, replicated, right? So like if you go to a store and you get great customer service, you want to tip that person well, or you want to leave a five star Google review at work, when you're leading people.

How do you make them feel seen, heard, and understood when you're talking about your family and your children and the way that you do that, you learn their love language. And I think everybody has a love language at work also, right? Like I had one guy that had never, he'd been in, he'd gotten in a lot of trouble, and so I asked him, I said, if you do excellent job.

How do you want me to reward you? And he's like, what do you mean? And I was like, like, how do you want to be rewarded? And he is like, I've never had anybody ask me that. Okay. Well, in the same way, like my giving love language is, I perform access service for people, but I receive love through words of affirmation.

Your employees and your subordinates and the people that follow you have the same thing at work and at home. So for him, the most important thing was because he had made a huge mistake, him going on stage in front of his family and receiving an award. Everything. Mm. This he wanted his two boys to see that you can rescue yourself, right?

Like you can build back. I had another guy that had deployed five times in seven years, so guess what? He valued time with his family. So it was very easy for me on Thursday to walk in and go see you Monday. And he'd be like, sir, it's Thursday. I'm like, yeah, don't you have a baseball game tomorrow?

Go to like, yes sir. I'm like, bye. you know what I mean? Like that was easy. And then a third guy. He just wanted to be told he was doing a good job. So it was very easy in front of my people to say, we are kicking ass right now. And by the way, because of that technical sergeant right there. And you could watch his chest lift and he's still a little taller, right?

Like everybody has that. That's how you make them feel. Seen. How you make them feel heard is you ask questions that matter, right? Like, don't just say I think everybody should, for the record, be doing like an initial feedback where you learn your employee or you learn the people that follow you before you start telling them what you expect.

But ask questions like, if you're doing a great job, how can I reward you? Conversely, if you're not meeting standards, what's the best way for me to approach that with you? Because some people are just like, just tell me. Other people, like, send me an email. Other people are like, let's go on a walk and you can share it.

But like, getting to know your people and, and saying, so what I hear you saying is you appreciate when people do this. Okay. Now they feel heard and understood. I think. a combination of both of those, but it's taking the time to get to know your people, and when you do that, they feel valued.

So that's kind of the mantra I use is if you love them, shove 'em. And I do it with my kids and I do it with my friends because at this point I've recognized when you give people value, they want to return it. And so if you want the best experience with your employees, if you want the best return on investment with the wages you're paying and the benefits you're giving, nobody will stay when they don't feel valued.

But people will stay and work for less money if they feel like they offer value, right? So like it's not about the wages. And I saw that here. There's a lady, I went to a little print shop and I was like, how long have you worked here? And she's like 32 years. And I was like, you could easily go to Office Depot and make a lot more money.

And she's like, why would I do that? I'm part of the family here. And that like shook me. 'cause I was like, I need to figure out what's happening here. She was, she felt valuable, and so she never even contemplated going anywhere else. Right. in a world where it costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to replace, rehire, retrain, 

Becca Powers: absolutely.

Joshua Roberts: If you, if you wanna keep your people, you make 'em feel valued. And as a leader, you do that making 'em feel seen, heard, and understood. if you have an employee that is struggling, I mean struggling, maybe take a second to ask why, instead of just coming at them with cold, hard standards and make them feel heard.

You never know. It may be just one little tweak that you have to make that suddenly they become your star, star guy. You know what I mean? Or star Lady. So that would be my empower is as a leader, you are empowered to make people feel seen, heard, and understood. And when you do that, it makes them feel valued and they will in turn want to give that back through their.

Becca Powers: That is awesome. And what a good way to wind down today's episode. Josh, please tell people where they can find this book. 

Joshua Roberts: Okay, so that is on Amazon. I self-published through Amazon. So if you type in leadership level up, it should be the top book. you know, you can also buy on my website, it's Fuse well strategies.com, F-U-S-E-W-E-L-L fusel strategies.com.

You can get, there's a link there. They can also follow me on social media, but I greatly appreciate this incredible opportunity. I absolutely love you and your guys. I have a little present for you that I got to bring down you. Hey, you 

Becca Powers: picked that up. 

Joshua Roberts: But, I appreciate you highlighting my book and giving me an opportunity to share my heart a little bit.

Becca Powers: Yeah, no, absolutely. It's an absolute pleasure. Again, like being able to see you talk about your work and your leadership. it was a perfect alignment for us to bring you on. Anyways, friend, good to see you. Thank you for being a guest.