In today’s episode of Leadership is Feminine, Kris Plachy explores the profound responsibility that comes with leadership and the undeniable influence leaders have—whether they realize it or not. Leadership isn’t just about making choices; it’s about understanding the weight of those choices and the impact they have on the people who follow.

Kris challenges both leaders and followers to reflect: When was the last time you revisited your values? Are you making decisions based on your own beliefs, or simply following someone else’s lead? She urges listeners to take a step back, dig into their core values, and ensure they’re aligned with the people and organizations they choose to follow.

But leadership doesn’t exist without followership. Kris dives into the often-overlooked responsibility of followers, emphasizing that it’s just as crucial for them to understand their own values. “It is as incumbent upon followers to know what their values are, as it is for leaders,” she says. Too often, people look to leaders for direction without first identifying what truly matters to them.

“If you assume a role of leadership, you have a tremendous amount of responsibility,” Kris reminds us. People naturally seek guidance, and as a leader, you set the course—whether for a team, a business, or a community. This episode is a call to step into leadership and followership with clarity, intention, and a strong foundation of personal values.

Key Takeaways From This Episode

1. Understanding the Responsibility That Comes with a Leadership Role: Discussion of how easy it is for people to be placed in leadership roles based on the followers around them.

2. Leaders Can Influence and Shape People’s Actions and Decisions

3. The Importance of Clear Values for Both Leaders and Followers: Self-awareness and clarity about one’s values.

4. The Challenge of Different Interpretations of Shared Values

5. Values in the Workplace: Understanding the values of your organization and your leaders.

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Transcript

Kris Plachy:
Well, hello hello and welcome to this episode of Leadership is Feminine. I'm so glad that you're here. And I had just returned from Hawaii. I was in Hawaii for over three weeks in January. Which, you know, it's funny how the world works or how, I don't know, magic works. Last year, I was in, I was in Hawaii for, I think, almost three weeks, but it was kind of not on purpose, but it worked out that way. And so I kept saying to my husband, I want to spend three weeks in January in Hawaii next year. I loved it.

Kris Plachy:
And he was like, okay, but that's a long time. And we have puppies now. And, like, I don't want to be in Hawaii for three weeks. He has a business. So it was sort of one of those, like, sounds nice, but how really? And then as it just worked out, it's so funny. I ended up going to a personal writing retreat, right the first full week of January, and then I didn't want to fly home because I had another retreat at the end of January.

Kris Plachy:
So I ended up spending three weeks in. In Hawaii. And it was amazing. And also realized they don't like spending three weeks away from home. So, you know what? Here's the good news. I figured that out. So now I'm home. Took a minute to get us home.

Kris Plachy:
We got caught in a really big storm in Hawaii, which always sort of reminds me of that, that moment when you realize, oh, I'm on an island in the middle of the Pacific. I can't get out of here. Right. It's kind of an interesting feeling. You know, as you have been listening to me for a long time, you know I have a lot of thoughts and opinions about leadership and what leadership looks like and what it doesn't. One of the things that I know is absolutely true, and it doesn't really matter who you are, what role you're in as a leader, whether we're talking about you as a parent or you as a school teacher, or you as a business owner or a manager of a team, if you are a social, like a community organizer, and you're in an appointed leadership role anywhere, you have, have influence because people are looking to you to make decisions. What I know for sure is that.

Kris Plachy:
So. So I'm going to back up. So we had this storm in Hawaii, and we waited at the gate for, like, I think three hours, and then they finally-for the plane. Then the plane got there, and then they finally got us on the plane, and that was great. The flight was hardly full, which was great, too.

Kris Plachy:
It's going to be a very comfortable flight. I was traveling with my kids. They came out, visited with me. Two of my three kids came, and they had lots of room. And so we were sitting on the plane for about 20, 25 minutes. And it's funny because one of my kids texted me and said, like, it smells on here. And I agreed.

Kris Plachy:
It smelled like, I thought wet feet. My daughter thought it smelled like wet, just plain. Like the fabric in the plane got wet. So after about 25 minutes of being on the plane, they deplaned us. That's only happened to me one other time. That's fun. You gotta pack up all your stuff. You have to get off the plane, as you know, and then you sit.

Kris Plachy:
So we sat for another almost two hours. They came on and said, we're just waiting for the green light to reboard you. And then literally within 10 minutes, they came on and said, sorry, the flight's canceled. And I think it was canceled because we weren't going to land in Sacramento on time. I think it's because the airport was closed, but I don't by the time we were going to land, I'm not really sure. So nonetheless, the lady who was running the PA for the flight made an announcement. Nobody really understood what she said, but basically we all heard, go to the, Go to the desk. That's what she said.

Kris Plachy:
So, you know, I don't know how many passengers there were, but let's say it's a couple hundred, maybe it's 100. It was a big plane, but it wasn't full. So anyway, everybody's now in line, and we're like, I'm assuming that's where they're going to give us hotel vouchers because they canceled their flight. And that I figured would be what was happening. And then she came back and sort of talked to the line and said, if you want to make new flight arrangements, you need to go to these other ticket counters and pointed far away from us. So at that point, people were really confused and, and I. Somebody said, what'd she say? And I said, if you want to change your flight, you need to go over there. I believe this is for a voucher.

Kris Plachy:
You know, I didn't know I, I, I was making it up. I really was, because that's what I assumed it was. Right. Well, then I don't even know how many people were like, what do I do? What do I do? To me, like, what do I do? What am I supposed to. How are we supposed to get our new Are. Are they giving out new tickets? Are they going to automatically rebook us? And one guy, so cute, he came up to me and my kids. He's like, how do I get out of here? I've never left an airport. Anyway, it was.

Kris Plachy:
It was an exercise of leadership because. Or of followership, maybe, is the better way to say that. These people just decided. Because I made one statement with probably some relative confidence, like, no, no, you need to go over there. That's what she said. Now, somehow I had all the answers. And this one lady in particular kept saying to me, I don't understand. Are they going to rebook our flight? And I looked at her like, I don't know.

Kris Plachy:
I don't know. It was such a powerful reminder of how quickly people want a leader in a time of distress, fast. Like someone who looks like they know what they're talking about, people will follow them. And I was wrong. They were not giving out hotel vouchers, as it turns out. So lesson learned. These were all very grown, in many cases, older adults who were very quick to believe me because I had confidence. You know, I say all the time that I think that if you assume a role of leadership, I think you have a tremendous amount of responsibility.

Kris Plachy:
And I don't think everybody wants that. I certainly didn't want it in the Hawaiian Airlines line. I'm going to tell you that right now. I did not want to be in charge. I was upset, too. I didn't know what we were doing either. Right. I thank God, have an assistant who was on the back end over there trying to figure it out for us, like, find us a flight.

Kris Plachy:
We're going to stand in this line, right? Then we had to find our bag. So I just. Please be careful. So. So this is twofold. So the reason I'm calling this podcast, It's Time to Value UP, is because we're in a really tumultuous sort of time in our country, in our economy, in our communities. And what I know is true, because now I just, I hadn't seen this in a while.

Kris Plachy:
And what I know is true, because now I just, I hadn't seen this in a while-I don't really spend a lot of time in crowds-is people want a leader. They just want someone to follow. They want someone to make it easy for them. And if that person shows up, it is so easy to manipulate them. I could have told these people anything. I could have said, oh, you need to go downstairs to the right. And they all would have gone, how terrifying is that? Like, it's so interesting. So as a person who is not in a leadership position, in a lot of parts of her life.

Kris Plachy:
Right? Like my life, I have that. My business, I have that. I don't have that in my community, I don't have that in my, in my state, I don't have that in my country. I don't have that in the industry, if you will. Right. Like there's a lot of places where all of us would agree. We don't.

Kris Plachy:
We're not sitting in a leadership role. So then you're a follower, theoretically, Right. Or you're at least a potential follower. It is as incumbent upon followers to know what their values are, as it is leader. So you need to know what you are for. Right? And I talked about this before. What are you for? What are you for? Not what are you against, what are you for? Because if you don't know what that is, it's going to be easy to convince you to be against something or for something if you have not gotten clear. And what has become evident to me is I don't really think we spend enough time curating, nurturing, defining, and then actually living by our values.

Kris Plachy:
I think a lot of people look for other entities to show them what their value should be. Maybe it's your culture, maybe it's your religion, maybe it's just the family you grew up in. These are the values. These are our values. And so when we adopt the values that others created to serve out their vision, their desire, their needs, but we adopt those values because they're already done. And that's so nice. And now I just know the values I'm supposed to have. Guess what we see? We see people who don't embody the very values they say they believe in. Because you know what? They're not their values.

Kris Plachy:
Years ago, during COVID I did a podcast about values, and I talked about that. One of the things that I really learned through that experience is that we can say that we have the same value, right? So let's say we have the same value of family, like family. One of my key values, core values, is the love and care of my family. We can both agree to that and both say that that is our value. But then the expression of that is completely different and sometimes actually conflicting. Right.

Kris Plachy:
So is there a right or wrong in that? I don't think so. That's the problem, right, is we want, I want my way to be the right way. You want your way to be the right way, but there isn't one, Especially when it's through value. The person who says, "What is the right way?" is the person who is in a leadership role at the time. And so you have to really be clear about what you are for. And if you are in a leadership role, the same is true.

Kris Plachy:
When was the last time you dug back in and looked at what your values were? What do you hold dear? Really? Not what sounds pretty. What are those silent attributes, attitudes, thoughts, things that you believe in your core that are driving your decisions and your behavior? We all have them. We're human beings. And unless you are a sociopath, which, that does happen, you, you do have value. And your values are governing how you are leading. And I think that people who sign up to work with you to quote, unquote, follow you deserve to know what your values are. Because here's the best news, then they'll know if they should. But that also means that if we are followers, if you, if you aren't a manager right now, if you are not a business owner right now, if you are not leading your own organization right now, and there's a lot of you I know who listen to this.

Kris Plachy:
So that means that you are saying yes to a leadership person. Do you know what their values are? There's so many people who I watch on the interwebs who are furious with the companies that they work for. That's because their values are showing. Are yours? Are you willing to stand behind your own values? Are you willing to walk away based on values? Is it important enough? Because, you know, I've said this for years, right? Like, if you walk through the door today and say, "Yes, pay me for this day", then you have said yes to whatever that leader stands for. So it's a, it's a challenging time because I think that even values can be forged, faked. It's hard to know if you're not paying attention. But the thing that's great about values, I will say, is that they always leak out.

Kris Plachy:
So I don't pay much attention to things that people say. I watch what they do. I watch how they perform and show up in the world. And that's not just leaders of companies and leaders of politics and all that. It's also people I know, quote, unquote, friends I might have. They show me their values too. And so it's time to value up. It's time to take a minute, have this conversation with yourself, have this conversation with your family, have this conversation with people that you love. What do we value? What are we willing to do based on what we value?

Kris Plachy:
Because I think without clarity around your values, it's very easy to say yes to things that ultimately hurt you. And it's also very easy to get people to follow you if they haven't done the introspective work of understanding what they value, not what they were taught to value, not what they're told to value, not what they say they value, but what they actually value. How many more times can I say the word value? I hope this makes sense. I just think if you don't have a rudder, right, a ship or a boat without a rudder is going to take it in whatever direction the wind blows it. And sometimes that means right over capsize. We need rudders, babes, and we need our rudders to be strong and clear so that we are steering our own ship. And if that means we're steering in a direction that most other people aren't going, okay, those of us who are doing that, we can be together.

Kris Plachy:
All right. Thank you for tuning in. I'll talk to you again next time.