Financial Advisor Success Ep 161: Cultivating The Right Firm Culture With A Reality-Based Leadership Approach with Tessa Felix
Jan 28, 2020
Tessa Felix, HR and operations lead at PWL Capital who built her firm’s culture using reality-based leadership. She discusses cutting workplace drama and boosting accountability. Short routines like weekly CultureCast updates, monthly GIG one-on-ones, and tools for feedback keep teams aligned. She also shares her shift from peer to manager and how growth creates new career paths.
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Culture Is About Cutting Emotional Waste
- Reality-Based Leadership reframes culture work as reducing "emotional expensiveness" so staff spend less time in drama and more on productive tasks.
- Tessa cites Cy Wakeman's research estimating 2.5 hours/day lost to drama, equating to ~816 hours/year per person.
Coach Five Competencies Every Day
- Teach and coach five competencies: personal accountability, reality-based thinking, organizational alignment, capitalizing on change, and driving for results.
- Use these competencies daily as coaching prompts to shift conversations from blame to ownership.
Keep Perks But Pair Them With Accountability
- Pair culture perks with clear accountability so perks don't create entitlement.
- Use one-on-one coaching moments to convert sympathy into empathy and drive employee ownership of problems.
