Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hi, it's Steve Vindig at sport law. Leave me a message. I'll get back to you as soon as I can.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Hey, Steve, it's Dena. You aren't going to believe what just came across my desk. We need to chat. Give me a call.
[00:00:35] Speaker A: Welcome to the latest episode of Sportopia. We're so excited to share our knowledge and have conversations about healthy human sport.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: Today, Steve and I are digging into a topic near and dear to us, and that is how to fuel cultures of trust. We know that so often when trust is low, everything slows down and the cost goes up. When trust levels are high, we can travel faster together and the cost goes down. So there truly is an economic impact to provide an incentive for all of us to both measure and invest in high trust environments. Before we get to that, Steve, what is coming across your desk this week?
[00:01:15] Speaker A: I want to talk about some of the things, Dina, that we don't talk about, and that's our pro bono work. I got an email this morning from a young woman who. Who came to me in 2017 and said she wanted to start a business. And she was 17 years old, and I helped her out, and I think, I'm quite sure it was done on a pro bono basis because I was very impressed with her desire to get into the corporate world and start a business at a young age. And she reached out to me this morning to say, just wanted to let you know I still think about the help you gave me, you know, six, seven, eight years ago. And I'm now really quite successful in my business, and I need a little bit more help. So I just wanted to talk about some of the things that maybe we don't publicize as much or we don't at all, and that's intentional. But we are always out there to help people and organizations that need it in a particular situation and circumstance. But right now, we have a few pro bono clients that I have a meeting with this week. And now the second one from eight, nine years ago, reached out, so really happy to have helped them and then see the gratitude in which we received months. And now, years later, I can see.
[00:02:41] Speaker B: People can't see you, but you have this really sweet smile, and I'm wondering, what is it about giving back that makes you feel so happy?
[00:02:49] Speaker A: Steve, I just like seeing people succeed. I don't really care what the context or the medium is. I just like seeing them succeed. And sometimes taking on certain projects or ideas is complicated, and it's scary because we don't know what we don't know. So if we can help them out and be successful, that's very. Provides a lot of joy to me.
What's new with you, Dina?
[00:03:13] Speaker B: Well, thanks for sharing that. I think mine kind of feels the same.
This was the first ever, uh, experience that I had, and. And I want to share it here. So what came across my desk is I spent a couple of days in Dieppe, New Brunswick, and I have to say, it was. It was extraordinary, the people there, the host. Just the vibe, you know, people are so kind and compassionate, and. And I did. I was doing all my interactions en, which is always makes my heart sing. So, what I loved about this is the city of Dieppe actually hosted me, and it was a full day legal and leadership and true sport workshop. Right. And we were talking about hosting, you know, hope on the horizon. And what was really remarkable is it wasn't just sport organizations that were invited, because it's such a small community, you know, upwards about 30,000. I think it was really quite powerful to bring different association volunteers together. So we had soccer and we had swimming, but we also had a group that focuses on LGBTQ two rights and services, and we had a group for the elders. We had pickleball, we had scouts. We had all these different groups that were rubbing shoulders and learning together and realizing that, oh, your problems are my problems. So it was.
They launched this initiative to help support the associations and wanted us to be there to kick start it. And the bar has been raised like, it was just so extraordinary to feel the gratitude and the appreciation for that knowledge sharing and transfer.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: Steve, let's just say with regards to today's topic, you started to build a little bit trust within that little town, that little city. So let's talk about trust today and talk about the systems of trust. How high is the trust meter in sport right now? Dina, with respect to integrity, intention, capabilities, and results, I know I have my own experiences and thoughts about this, which I'll speak about shortly, but where do you see and why are we talking about trust today in the sport world?
[00:05:45] Speaker B: Well, I think trust has been allowed to erode, and when we. When we look at the system of sport in Canada, let's locate it there, I think we can maybe look at it from a place of empathy and understanding. When we recognize there are people plus or -34,000 clubs, associations, organizations across the country whose mission is to focus on sport, and when we recognize that the vast majority of people that are making sport possible are volunteers, and those volunteers are humans who have other obligations and family obligations and are trying to navigate a very complex world. It helps us soften, right. To be able to look at the system right now and recognize that the system that was designed in the seventies isn't the one we need now to resolve the complexity, to be able to navigate all of the hopes and dreams and aspirations that we want, right. For the children and youth who are participating in sport. So as someone who is a student who did, you know, I did my masters on cultures of leadership supported by management, by values. The one thing that I ask clients, especially when they bring me in to negotiate sticky situations, Steve, is just generally what is the trust between you and that other organization? Or sometimes if it's individual against an individual, I'll just ask them a question around. On a scale of one to ten, how much are you extending trust to this person? It's really revealing because here's what I share with people. If your trust meter is in the toilet, so it's between zero and three, everything has to slow down, right. And so the cost goes up both in terms of our capacity and our capabilities, as well as the speed, right. It's going to take its toll as we go up with our trust meter, our ability to co create, to be open and receptive and not know goes up as well. So this idea of getting people, Steve, to identify what is the trust that I have between myself and this other organization, I think that when we do that, so much more is available to us. What do you think, Steve?
[00:08:10] Speaker A: I mean, my mind's going to change. And what I mean by that is change management.
We get involved all the time in employment changes, HR reviews committee, the establishment of committees, changing board compositions, changing membership fees, changing, lots of change, let's put it that way. And that's one of my big questions too, Deana, is when we get approached about, let's just talk about bylaws and changing a board from twelve to nine, or allowing the board to assign portfolios instead of the membership. Really. Sometimes let's say it's taking away a benefit or a right of membership and giving it back to the board. I always say to them, the drafting part is the easy part. But what's the level of trust with your members that when we present this, is it going to be a complicated educational session or is it going to be we buy in and we believe you and we trust you and we believe that these changes are in the best interest of our sport.
And with the COC good governance code being around now for the last couple years, we've assisted a lot of national sport organizations in adopting the code. And one particular client that came to us and said, can you update the bylaws to comply with the code? I said, sure, no problem. And we do the work. And literally two weeks later, he sends me a note. He says, unanimously approved by the members last night. Can you file with the Industry Canada? Wow, quite impressive. Yeah. And then other organizations were on town hall meeting 14 and trying to explain to the membership why we're doing this and why it's good governance and why it's going to help move your organization forward. And when I start getting past meeting number one to try and explain this, then I know trust is low, and that's the hard part. And I could go on and on about this topic, and maybe I will for a minute, where you talk about fundamentally, and I've said this before on other podcasts, we are not everything for everybody. So one, recognizing what the NSO does, what the PSO does or the PTO does, what does the community do, what does the district do, what does the region do? And having a clarity on everybody's roles and responsibility, we'll start creating that level of trust. And on a positive note, I remember one client telling me that their national sport federation was asking for an increase in membership fees, and they put their hand up and said, yes, we believe in what you're doing. We believe in the roles and responsibilities that you have in the sports system, and we're going to support that. And I just love the way it was framed from that perspective. So, you know, trust is so fundamental, Dina, in everything we do, from complaint management to governance, to employment to HR to committees and everybody in between. I'm sure you have something to add to what I just said.
[00:11:16] Speaker B: I really appreciate that Steve, and I feel like these, being able to evaluate the current environment right now and appreciate how difficult it is, makes it harder for us maybe to extend trust. And so a question I often ask people is, how do you know you can trust someone? And you often get the pause, right? And everybody's like, oh, and it's different. But, you know, Stephen Covey junior, his work around the speed of trust is one way, right? And that's some of the teachings that we offer at sport law. We help equip the individuals with the capacity, right, the competencies to be able to lead, manage, coach compete from a place of high trust.
And so I want to read this quote from Stephen Covey Junior, who wrote in his book the speed of trust. He says, trust is the glue of Life. It's the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It's the foundation principle that holds all relationships. So, as you think back, Steve, over your 20 plus years in sport, how true does this statement feel for you?
[00:12:30] Speaker A: Well, I think it's fundamental, and I'm thinking about my own personal relationships, Dina. When I meet somebody or I'm working with somebody, how do I define whether I trust them right away, or am I going to give them the benefit of the doubt, or am I going to be a little bit more cautious? And there are some key cues that I use. One, of course, is how do we jive personally, on a personal level, not necessarily professional? And can we have. And we're going to talk more about this straight conversation. Can we talk to each other bluntly? And I don't mean that to be saying we need to be rude, but can we say what we want to say without offending the other person or having it misconstrued the wrong way? So trust is something sometimes that I'll give right away, and other times, I'll be a little bit more cautious, based on my initial gut feeling, to say, I want this relationship to evolve a little bit more before I put my absolute trust in that person or in that organization.
So it's. It's a moving target.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: I hear you, and I know one of the things that you do, if you don't know someone, what's the first thing that you do?
[00:13:38] Speaker A: I'm gonna say, listen, pull back. Would you agree?
[00:13:41] Speaker B: Well, you do. Yeah. And I. And I hear you kind of, like, evaluating, but I also, I think one of the things I appreciate about you, when you don't know, I see you googling, and you find out a little bit more about this person. So why is that? Why do you take the time to go and, like, check out the people if we're going to work with them?
[00:14:01] Speaker A: I'm an objective thinker, so I like to have information. I like to have to be able to process that information. And the more information I have, I think it helps me frame my mindset. Absolutely. How do you judge people, Dina?
[00:14:15] Speaker B: I'm more.
So, yes. So maybe I don't usually go and, like, google them. That'll come after.
I need to feel it in my bones. So I'm listening for, is there congruence between what they're saying and what their body is communicating? A tone really matters to me, so someone could be saying something, but if their tone doesn't mesh with my worldview, I stop listening. I get into maybe a defensive way of being so I think, you know, knowing ourselves is so key, knowing what am I looking for to extend trust to this other human? Because it could be unfair, right? If I don't know what I'm looking for, it does come back to our biology, right. We tend to still be, as humans 1ft in this fight, flight, freeze, faint kind of mode where we're evaluating is this a friend or a foe? And we also know because of the complexities, if we bring it back up to a system right now, the system itself generally, and this transcends sport. When you ask people what is your trust level between yourself and the institution that you're working in, right? So I'm thinking healthcare, politics, the legal system, police generally. Now there's much less trust the system. And if we can be humble towards that, if we recognize that these systems often that have been privileged, right, you've just granted them trust because, for instance, my husband's a pilot. So you're trusting, you're placing your well being and your welfare and that of your loved ones into the hands of someone who has stripes on their shoulders. You're trusting that the institution has got all the policies and the procedures in place to ensure the safety of the people that are like step forward into this plane and then end up 30,000ft high, right? So that's like we grant people trust. And I would say now generally there is MLA's, there are people that are not only allowing though that to be true, they want proof or evidence that you are trustworthy. And maybe that's where we can step into next. Steve is like, how do we know that people deserve our trust?
[00:16:46] Speaker A: I think we learn that through communication, through experiences.
And that communication for me is probably key. And again, I think telling people we're not everything for everybody and we can't do everything that every single person wants us to do is fundamental.
But how often we communicate the way in which we communicate?
Do we allow others to be heard? I mean, when I do governance work and we do these town hall sessions and we'll say, okay, we want to move the board from twelve to nine and somebody 100% of the time will say, why? Why are we doing this? And I usually am prepared for that answer, having done it million times. But also hearing that person as to why they don't think nine is a good number and twelve is a better number is important too. So the process in which we engage people for me is really fundamental. And one of the things one of our long standing clients did recently, trying to get some governance changes, took them years to try and change their board composition. And one of the last steps they did was the. The fundamental people who are voting no actually brought them onto the governance committee, which I thought was brilliant. Don't just say no. Tell us why and tell us how you see us fixing that. And, you know, after that happened a year later, they were able to get the change through because, of course, now the naysayers or the no votes were part of the process to create the answer.
[00:18:25] Speaker B: I love that.
It's very much like, you know, the keep our enemies closer kind of mindset. San Suzuk, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And yet I think we need to evolve beyond that. Right, and take ownership and accountability for our contribution to the dysfunction in the relationship. And I often ask leaders that very question when they come to me. They usually come to me because they're really struggling with an HR matter. It could be they're struggling because they're depleted. Often. These things really important for people to understand that we have downloaded systemic issues onto the shoulders of the individuals, and that has to stop. The system itself is dying. It needs to die. As we've shared before, the sky has been falling on the canadian sports system now for over well over two decades. And so if we keep. I think it's a special kind of torture to keep expecting the individuals to restore health in a fractured, broken system without the support of a modernized system.
[00:19:41] Speaker A: In 2017, Dina, you started the sport leaders retreat, where you spent a weekend with leadership, with leaders in the sports system, providing some coaching, some Nova profile to enhance their capabilities in building trust. What did you discover? And I'm also curious about, how did you feel comfortable sharing yourself and your experiences with, you know, in short, some people who just showed up on a Friday, it was.
[00:20:11] Speaker B: Thanks for asking that second part of the question, Steve. I was really. I remember feeling really nervous, actually.
And I think it's because, you know, we started with this right at the top of the hour when we were revealing what's coming across our desk. I care so deeply about the canadian sports system, and I think that really comes across. So at that very first sport leaders retreat, and we've done several since then, I remember feeling, like, nervous because I was going to be connecting with all of these leaders who I cared deeply about. Right. It was the first cohort, so I was nervous. I was feeling very humble. And it was an extraordinary experience, so much so that it equipped us with the courage to be able to offer this over and over again. And since then, it's been actually researched about. So we still haven't published the findings, but we've partnered with an academic institution to look at the impact of the design of this very novel experience where we brought leaders through a journey, right? And we even offered it during the pandemic. We've tested it with coaches as well as athletes and leaders. So we know that the ingredients, I think, of restoring health in a broken system is first we have to start with our own self and recognizing what are my competencies and capacities and what are my values and what is my awareness of myself so that I can be more mindful, more strategic, more thoughtful when I'm faced with things that don't, you know, mesh with my worldview. And that was the gift of this sport leaders retreat where we talked about the 13 behaviors of trust and many of which we've talked about today, right? So, talking straight, demonstrating respect, creating transparency, the capacity to write wrongs, right. Showing loyalty, delivering on results so important, right? Am I going to actually do what I say we were going to do? Getting better. This philosophy of Kaizen or continuous improvement, confronting reality. So, like 1ft in what is actually happening, but also this capacity to dream big and move into maybe what you and I would call Sportopia. To be clear, you know, Brene Brown talks about clear is kind. So clarifying our expectations, practicing accountability, our capacity to listen first, which you shared earlier, keeping our commitments and then the 13th is what is our capacity to extend trust. And that requires vulnerability. Steve and most of us in sport have been conditioned to actually not demonstrate our vulnerability. And in my recent social justice course at the university, we're actually reframing vulnerability as our superpower.
If we can actually, heart to heart, allow myself to recognize that I can't do this alone and that I'm perfectly imperfect. I'm a flawed human being, and I can show up in front of a group of people and say, I'm a little bit nervous, which is what I did at the first sport leaders retreat, because I care so much about all of you and I want you to have this extraordinary experience. You know, you can feel people relax into that. That's the kind of modeling I think we need to do more of in sport.
[00:23:41] Speaker A: My mind's going to Deena as we talk about organizations, whether it's a local club or a provincial, territorial or national sport body and the reputation that precedes it. Oh, that organization is dysfunctional. That organization doesn't know what they're doing.
But organizations, you know, a corporate entity can't be dysfunctional. It's the people within it. So if that trust is low, is it a change in people? Is it a change in which we work with those people? And, you know, that's where my mind's going. As you're reading those 13, those 13 targets to create a better trusting environment for trusting culture is we have to look more granular at the people making the decisions. And I don't know what the outcome is. Again, is it change in personality or the way in which we talk and communicate and own up to what we did or didn't do? For sure, that's part of it. Or maybe it is change. Maybe we do need change. Maybe those people that unfortunately have been around, we need to change. I don't know the answer, but I like the conversation about my mind was going again to that identification of a particular sport or organization. Oh, they're dysfunctional, but it's not. It is the people within the entire system, the ones saying it and the ones maybe potentially creating it.
[00:25:10] Speaker B: Well, and as my son says, you know, two things can be true at the same time. So the system itself needs to, we use the word modernize. It needs to, maybe a better word is evolve, right? Like dynasties die. And if we don't allow for that to be a truth, that we weren't designed to be the same system into perpetuity, we're going to get stuck, right? And so as we just allow ourselves to evolve into something different than what we have been, it means that maybe we don't have the right people, you know, in the right seats in that bus going in that direction. And so often I'll speak to, and we talked about it this weekend, actually with, with our friends from Dieppe. You know, we talked about good practices in governance, like having terms. And one of the participants said, but what happens if they leave? Like they're one of the good ones? And I said, well, they don't have to leave forever. They can go to a different association, learn and hone their skills, or they can go down to a committee. But when you have terms, you create structure and you avoid then that the same person is going to start to kind of bleed into the attachment they have and are starting to create these cultures where everything is embroiled with their own way of being and their own vision. So having these structures in place to allow people to do their best work, be their best self for a certain period of time, I think is something that really helps. I also think, you know, Steve, when we were talking about what can we do to foster higher levels of trust for me, it always comes back down to how self aware am I?
Leadership development 101. Right. We use the Nova profile. We have a whole bunch of other tools, but we have found that the nova in sport is accelerating. We've done well over close to 700 now. Debriefs with leaders from across this country, coaches, athletes and leaders, to help them become more self aware of their behavioral preferences. Right? Am I more extroverted, introverted? Task focused, relational for them to understand their motivation. You and I, the doorway through which we often connect is our altruistic motivation. Right. We're very different in many important ways, complementary. But how we've negotiated any tension is to come through that doorway of a shared motivation so much easier than to establish cultures of trust and relationships of trust. If I know your bottom line, motivation, right. And then you said it earlier, communicate transparently. I often will share with people in low trust cultures, and I will say, anything less than seven, you've got to slow down and you have to tell people what you're going to tell them. Tell them, tell them what you told them. And then repeat as often as required, which in today's date is like almost daily. We have to remind people of where the information is. I also think that this trust meter, it's really easy, right? It's a little tiny tool that I share with people. Draw a little barometer and ask yourself, what's the level of trust between you and your PSO, between the two clubs, between you and this individual? And if anything is less than seven, we got some work to do to repair. Often there's some restoration, right? We got to apologize for past harms. We have to acknowledge truth. You know, there's. I'm doing some work right now, Steve, on truth and reconciliation. Right. For one of my essays and spending time looking at five of the call to actions of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that is dedicated to sport. And what the research is showing is that national sport organizations are, like, failing. It's a failing grade right now. It's almost a decade, right? Nine years ago, in 2015, the commission came forward with 94 call to actions, five of them for sport. And we are failing.
There's really important restoration work for us to do, but we can't get to the fun reconciliation until we acknowledge the truth of the situation and actually start doing the work.
That's where trust is going to be seated. So that's just one example of being able to invest in and create and fuel these cultures of trust. What about you? We're coming down to the end of our conversation. Curious what you're thinking.
[00:30:05] Speaker A: The work that I do, Dina, and where trust is important, again, is really on that change, whether it's governance or the establishment of a new committee or the change of an employment structure.
In order to get to that point, I always say, can we tell a story? What did we do to get from point a to point b? So you engaged a consultant or a lawyer. We worked with your small working group. We worked with your board. We engaged the membership. They had two or three months to provide feedback. We answered all their questions. We had one or two or three or up to my record is 14 town hall meetings to get something done or to get a change across the finish line. And really, again, the level of trust will dictate how much work has to be done to get us to completion.
But that communication, and I was laughing while you were talking about, communicate, communicate, communicate. And then I was going to add communicate again, and communicate again, because we want to be able to stand in front of that room when we're asking for a vote on a change to ensure that people feel like they've had the opportunity to be heard and that we cared about what their response was. So I really see being able to tell that story about how we engaged our community to make a change is so important.
To extend trust, to create trust, and continue to allow it to continue as we move forward.
[00:31:41] Speaker B: Perfect, Steve. And you got me thinking about communication, of course. So what is my capacity to speak clearly, to not let things fester? Right. To not be ambiguous with my expectations. These are all muscles. These are leadership muscles for the 21st century. The old days of command and control jump, how high? Those are long, long, long behind us. And so for leaders who are listening, our hope is that you understand and appreciate that leadership is an evolution. We're never there yet, right. We can hone our leadership skills through experiential things, like what we offer at the sport leaders retreat. You can become more self aware, do your Nova profile, and then you can have shared language. That's the gift of this individual work, is then you can then work with your teams to have shared language. We have examples of Caroline Wallet and Julie Chu, who won, again their championship in hockey, and they cite the work that they've done with Loren to build a culture of trust amongst the leadership team and the coaching team and the athletes. So we know what's possible. We know, we like to say at sport law, Steve, that trust is the one thing that can change everything. And maybe that's the beautiful invitation for our leaders who are listening is in what ways are you going to evolve your practice, your leadership practice, so that you're working on trusting yourself? That's job number one, being able to extend trust and be vulnerable with the people that you're leading and companioning and working alongside. And then what is your role to work on the system? Because I would offer that despite all the efforts that we're individually making, the system itself has to be modernized so that the individuals are able to thrive. Right now, if people are thriving, it's absolutely in spite of the system, not because of it. So we need to collectively kind of link arms and say we're ready for a more modern system. These commission on the future of sport, I hope will be a way for us to signal all the ways that we need to become more accessible, creating cultures of belonging. And I think if we do that, we'll be well on our way to a more modern, humanistic and high trust system for canadian sport.
[00:34:11] Speaker A: Thank you as always, Dina, for your time and having these little chats with me.
[00:34:16] Speaker B: So much fun.
[00:34:18] Speaker A: In the episode notes below you'll find some sport law blogs where you can find more information related to our conversation today. Thank you so much to our listeners. We are so grateful to share our vision of Sportopia with you and to help elevate sport.
[00:34:33] Speaker B: As always, to have your say in Sportopia, email us at Helloportlaw, CA or on social media to let us know what you want to hear about next. Until then, be well and stay tuned for the next episode.
