Rebel Podcast: Life and Work on Your Terms

RHR 150: Own Your Executive Presence with Dr. Claire Muselman

May 03, 2023 Kyle Roed, The HR Guy Season 4 Episode 150
Rebel Podcast: Life and Work on Your Terms
RHR 150: Own Your Executive Presence with Dr. Claire Muselman
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Dr. Claire Muselman is the Principal of CM Advising, bringing passion-filled purpose & energy with a dose of glitter & sparkles to risk management through fragmented CRO work. 

Dr. Claire’s prior experience includes almost two decades in insurance, being a game-changer & thought leader in workers’ compensation. She created the first-ever Workers’ Recovery Unit, designed the first Workers’ Compensation Center of Excellence, co-hosted ADJUSTED - a claims podcast, co-founded The Transitions, & is a weekly contributor for Featured News on WorkersCompensation.com, a monthly editorialist for The Experts View on WorkersCompensation.com, & a monthly contributor Captive.com. Dr. Claire has her own column with WorkCompCollege, Claire’s Corner; her own column with BLOOM, Coffee & Conversations, where she shines light into sparkly parts of life twice per month; & is Editor-in-Chief Extraordinaire of the BLOOM hard copy magazine. In her free time, she can be found pouring into students as an Adjunct Professor at Drake University with a focus in Management, Leadership, Business Strategy & Public Speaking.

By combining a solid business foundation with her passion for creating a better experience through emotional intelligence, empathy, & customer-centricity, Dr. Claire inspires others to ultimately make good things happen for people. Dr. Claire also believes it is her duty & responsibility to add seats to any table she is invited to participate. She is an Ambassador for the Alliance of Women in Workers’ Compensation, Board Member for Kids Chance of Iowa, Advisory Board Member for WorkCompBlitz, Advisory Board Member for WorkCompCentral, Board Member for the Claims and Litigation Management Alliance (CLM) – Workers’ Compensation Advisory Board; Dean of Workers Compensation for CLM’s Claims College, Faculty for Work Comp College, & Advisory Board Member for the Paramedics Program at Des Moines Area Community College (DMACC).

Dr. Claire speaks nationally on a variety of topics: leadership, self-development, workers compensation, & risk looking to change the industry one professional at a time. “Those with whom we are empowering today will be the decision-makers tomorrow. Advocacy is not enough, we need empathic, emotionally intelligent leaders who understand the bigger picture of helping employees feel seen, heard, acknowledged, & valued; returning injured humans to functional, contributing members of society; & more importantly, making sure our colleagues are able to return to their families & lives. The ripple effect matters.”

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Dr. Claire Muselman:

So we need to figure out how to do a better job of amplifying those really great ideas and teach people how to be more outspoken. So he and I talked afterwards and I was like, Hey, I totally understood what you meant. If you would present it in this kind of capacity. It's going to come across more concrete and more bold, where people are going to hear you and so giving people are honest feedback, I think is really important to why did they hear you but they didn't hear me.

Kyle Roed:

This is the rebel HR Podcast, the podcast where we talk to HR innovators about all things people leadership. If you're looking for places to find about new ways to think about the world of work, this is the podcast for you. Please subscribe your favorite podcast listening platform today. And leave us a review revelon HR rebels Welcome back HR rebels. We are blessed to have a wonderful guests with us today. Dr. Claire muscleman, I had the pleasure of watching her at disrupt HR Cedar Valley rock the stage, we're going to be talking about all sorts of amazing things today, everything from executive presence, to leadership to her expertise, which is workers compensation. She is the principal of cm advising. She brings passion filled purpose and energy with a dose of glitter and sparkles to risk management. She's also a leadership expert, keynote speaker does all sorts of awesome things, and maybe most importantly, possesses the best LinkedIn handle that I've ever seen glitter and sparkles. So check that out on LinkedIn. All you HR professionals. Claire, thank you so much for joining me today.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Thank you, Kyle, I'm happy to be here.

Kyle Roed:

Well, I am I am super pumped to have you here. We just talked for like 30 minutes about all things pop culture. And but you know, I don't know if I'm going to be able to work in like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, or American gladiator into the conversation. But I am going to do my best today. So

Dr. Claire Muselman:

try and work in Lars and Lars.

Kyle Roed:

Is it Lars or laser? We never figured that out. I

Dr. Claire Muselman:

think both that the left.

Kyle Roed:

If there's any 80s kids out there that loved American Gladiators, and knows if there was a large or a laser, send me an email, let's figure this out. And let's settle this debate.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Yes, yes.

Kyle Roed:

Well, I really again, I sincerely appreciate you spending some time with us. And and it's just been been wonderful to follow some of your content on LinkedIn. And, and, you know, I just I love your approach to the world of of, of all the things that you're focused on, which is, which is a lot. But I want to maybe start with with just talking a little bit about the content that you shared at the disrupt HR event, because I think it's going to be, you know, really, really important for many listeners to this, this podcast, and something that, quite frankly, many of us struggle with, at times. And that is really, really executive presence. So I think maybe I'll start with the first question, what inspired you to focus on that topic? For disrupt HR?

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Sure. So executive presence means it's really meaningful to me because I had a CEO, who when he entered a room, everyone stopped and paid attention. Like you just knew when this gentleman walked into a room, the energy that he carried the aura, he had the confidence that he had just captivated everyone, everyone would turn. And look, you didn't even have to physically see him walk into a room, you felt it. And I've never met somebody that had that type of executive presence before. And I had the opportunity to be personally coached by him because my leader at the time had ended up leaving and going to another job, or another organization. And so he took me under his wing for a while and really helped coach me on this, about what does that mean to like, show up as your best self to walk in with this type of competence to walk in, you know, unapologetically you but doing so in a way that's there to benefit everyone else. Because in that moment, everyone that's in that room, also feel seen, heard, acknowledged and valued. And the CEO was just amazing. He ended up passing away in June of 2020. And it was a really sad moment for a lot of us because he had made such a big ripple effect to all of our lives. And so that was where I wanted to take that and run with it. Because that is something that nobody had ever sat down and spent time to teach me. And so I was like, Oh my gosh, if everyone could crack this code into what that means, it's like, it's not about faking it till you make it because it's an energy and an aura. And it's like how you show up as your most as your best self. I think that there's like an elegance that goes into it. And I think as we continue to move into a more digital age and a more tech space, the power of human connection, and those pieces of when people are physically together are really really really important. And so I do I like talking about this, like writing about this topic and love being in front of children the most when we talk about this because children need need the executive presence even though you're not going to call it that with them. But it's something that you start innately giving people like almost a stage presence when they're little and help them grow through this. And people forget about it, or they don't understand what's going to separate them apart from getting a leadership role or having that power and influence. And so the more that we can talk about it, and really break it down, and give these like cheat codes to people to help them, take this and do what they will, is the best way that I feel like I can honor our former CEOs legacy, and really help make people better by helping teaching them confidence in a different way, helping them show up in an unapologetic space, but also really taking that whole concept of faking it till you make it but instead turning it into how do you own who you are, and make something awesome happen with that. Because if you can't stand up, you can't stand for something, if you don't know how to stand up for yourself, and get people to buy in to whatever that is, from an initiative to objectives for the year to try and to look at social impact and responsibility, you know, social justice, all of these things that are flooding us right now with what's going on in the world? And how do you do that effectively? And all of that stems back to what kind of presence do you have when you enter a room to get people excited about what's coming next?

Kyle Roed:

I think that it's really, it's a really powerful way to think about it. And for anybody that's that's interested, we will put the link in the show notes. So you can you can check out the disrupt HR talk and and and connect and definitely put the LinkedIn connection there. But you know, I, I mean, I came up in this and then I was told fake it till you make, ya know, from literally from my mother, by the way, who was like coaching me. She was like a school to work coordinator. She was like, coaching me how to be like a, like a true corporate shill. Yeah. Tell you make it here's, here's how you dress professionally. Here's what business casual means, you know, all these sorts of things. And, and so many of us got that advice. Yes. Yes. So what is the what is the fallacy of fake it till you make it? And how do we counteract it?

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Okay, so I think, twofold. You want the fake it till you make it is really interesting, because I think that there's twofold into this. We can dress for the part like this is what business casual is, this is how you behave, etc. And there's an elegance. And I like the word elegance, because it's not about being classy, it's not about being above the top, it's just holding yourself in a space that demonstrates elegance, which is a respect not only for yourself, but for the people that are going to be around you that you can add your own flair and your own. Like I always wear a statement necklace with dresses, it's kind of my my tribute to RBG when she used to have the doily, like so I wear a big statement necklace, I think like they're everybody's got their thing, whatever that's going to be maybe it's a power color or whatever. But you can use that. Incorporate and incorporate it into how you're showing up as yourself. The reason that I don't think fake it till you make it truly works is because your energy tells people whether you know what you're doing or not. So, you know, if you really want to get a reality check, go spend some time with some, you know, children, whether they be elementary, middle school, high school, and you're gonna get your ego checked real fast, because they sense energy. And so that's where we I think there is something to that. But then I think there's also these confidence codes that we can help cheat ourselves and help rewire our neural pathways in our brain to believe that we do know what we're doing. I hate the term imposter syndrome. We all know way more than what we think we do. And I don't buy it. I think it's a cop out. And it's an excuse. I'm sure that is, you know, not a fun thought for people to think of. But trust yourself, you know, way more than you think you do. It's what I say to people that are going to take on mentors, and they're like, oh, I don't know, like I've done enough in my life to be a true mentor. It's like, yeah, yeah, you've made it to this far and you failed a lot. And if you haven't learned through your failures, what are you really doing but teach somebody else that so that they don't go down the same road again, let them go down a different road because you were able to provide them some feedback about here's the pitfalls that i i absolutely ran through tripped fell skin many multiple times. So don't go this way, go this way. And we think about it from like, those standpoints of how do you really embrace what you've learned in life so that you can take that with you and know that you truly do understand a lot more than you think you do.

Kyle Roed:

Absolutely. I think that's it's a really powerful shift in thinking. And, you know, I'm guilty of I used to tell people fake it till you make it right, you know, but to absolutely, I guess you know, my Yeah. My other question, like that whole approach, if you like, and I think it's really fascinating that the whole world of like authenticity, and like being yourself and psychological safety and some of the research behind you know why you have to be yourself at least, it to a certain extent. or, or you'll burn out and those sorts of things. But I also think like the fake it till you make it thing like, you are assuming that you know what others want you to act like in that context as well as you and you're assimilating into an assumption, really, right. When much of those assumptions and like the, like the perception of what you what you're supposed to fake comes from the societal construct that has, you know been in existence IE, you know who's who's in power and how do they act and so you should act like, you should act like Bob, you know, the, the 65 year old baby boomer white guy CEO, when in actuality maybe your organization doesn't need to be that way. Or we've always

Dr. Claire Muselman:

done it this way, Kyle?

Kyle Roed:

Way, my language.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

What you know, and I think that there's like, when we take that whole, like, fake it till you make it, I think it's a lot more. So first of all, one of the most freeing things that I've ever had someone say to me, was I was had to reprimand somebody in a company at one point for just ill behavior. And she said to me, You know what, Claire, it is none of your business what I think about you, she was like, You know what, she, you are absolutely correct. So if we start out like this, and we think, okay, faking it till you make it, it's none of your business, what people think about you. So at the end of the day, why are you trying to fake something that might not be prevalent, but I think a lot of this ends up starting with how we talk to ourselves, and how we say like, when you look in the mirror, what do you say to yourself, I worked with a woman, two companies ago, that every time that she would pass her reflection, she'd be like, Damn, girl, you are sexy, and she would vocalize this. Every time we walked somewhere. And I stopped her one day, I was like, I love this so much. What are you doing? And she said, If I can't love me, for me, who I would I expect somebody else to think highly of me as well. She said, so every time I look at myself in the mirror, or I see myself in a reflection, I remind myself that I know who I am. And I'm proud of that person. But she would like vocalize it. So you'd be walking with her having a chitchat conversation, and she walks by herself. And she's like, Damn, girl, you look good. And it just cracks me up. But so I did a lot of research behind this, because this is my, my research nerdiness that comes out. And it's amazing that you can really rewire your brain, and you can reestablish neurological connections to these neural pathways that actually help you start seeing yourself differently. And in order to do that, that helps build your own self confidence so that you're no longer faking it. So there's like tons of these things. Mel Robbins, talks about the high five, how like, if you give yourself a high five in the morning, like in the mirror, it can actually help start helping you like really amp yourself up for the day, because regardless of language, most humans and brains understand like a high five as a symbol, that means something great, it's like, Yes, you did something. Well. Other things that I've read about or have tried myself are alarm affirmations. So when you wake up in the morning, what does your alarm look like? Does it say alarm? Or is that I'm gonna go have an amazing day. And so what does that look like? Because most likely, literally, if you pull out your iPhone, or your Android and you go to your alarms, most of the time, it'll just say alarm 5:15am. I encourage people to take out alarm, put something fun for yourself. If you want, you can add a jazzy song, maybe an 80s Ballad or whatnot. It's a half out of bed, and you're like I'm taken on today, do this. But then there's other things like I call it to toothbrush talks, when you're brushing your teeth. You give yourself three attaboys for your appearance, because we are the most critical on our appearance. And this is where the stuff gets really important when you're working with like children because these guys were going to grew up this way. So if we can help set their brains right early on, like what are those things or when you're washing your hands, give yourself a quick look in the mirror. Tell yourself something that you're proud of. You know, a lot of people do these memory jars like at the end of the week or something great that happened. You put it in the notecard you throw it in a jar you review and when you're in a less than desirable headspace, but there's a lot of things that are like that, because words matter. So the words that you say to yourself are the most important, like, for example, over the holiday. You know, a lot of people want to say that they were lazy and that they didn't do anything they binge watch shows. I prefer to say that I was intentionally rejuvenating myself or like I just think about I'm not going to tell myself that I'm lazy. I wasn't being lazy. I was being intentionally restorative because I needed to refill my take so that I can come back out and refill other people's. And so when we think about those type of scenarios, or those type of verbage that you use, your brain hears you every single time and so you can't expect other people to show up for you. If you Can't pick those words and show up for yourself in that capacity. And so these are the things that if we could start teaching these things younger and applying them throughout our life, you don't, you no longer have to fake it. Because you know that at the end of the day, if you're sitting on that branch, and the branch breaks, you got yourself, you'll just fly away and everything will be fine. And so it's a lot of like coping skills, self confidence, coaching, you know, just a lot of different things that are skill sets that when we look at investing in human capital, how do we actually start doing this and then leading by example, to take this into like the next wave of human capital development?

Kyle Roed:

I love that. Yeah, I want to I want to do this exercise the next time that a manager comes to me and says, This person is lazy. I'm going to ask them, Are they just being intentionally restorative? The look that I get on my, like, my production supervisors face I think, I'm gonna do that. Yeah, I gotta find I gotta find a way to work that no conversation.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

I guarantee they're being intentionally something. They're wanting to be lazy. Like, you're absolutely just, I don't know, what is the quiet quitting? I swear, that's like on my link.

Kyle Roed:

Oh, my gosh, okay. You don't like the imposter syndrome thing. I hate quiet quitting. I just think it's just somebody. It's just a headline, grab whatever, you know, it's just it's called people that just don't like what they're doing or Yeah, call it active. disengagement, whatever. It's like, yeah, this has been happening since you know, people decided they didn't want to, you know, paint this on the cave wall. Yeah, just because, you know, just because Joe told me, I gotta paint this woolly mammoth on this cable. I don't do this.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Yeah, it was nice to just call it rip retired in place. Yeah, no matter what you think not being age wise, or generational demographic at all. It was just, there rip. Got it. And now, it's a new trend. It's a trend to your word, it's

Kyle Roed:

trendy or it's words matter? Words matter? I think it's, you know, I think that's, you know, inherently something that for me, especially earlier in my career when I was, you know, I didn't know what I didn't know. And, you know, I didn't realize how important words were, I didn't really understand the true ripple of, you know, if I say it in this way, or if I use this context, it whether I'm talking to myself or talking to another person, how big of an impact that can make. And then sometimes the wrong intention of impact. So I think it's really powerful. I do want to, I want to maybe circle around on that a little bit, because because you've talked about, you've talked about energy, a couple different times. And I think, I think that's kind of that's hard for people to grasp sometimes, right? It's like, but we all know it. Oh, absolutely. So how so as we're self reflecting, and we're thinking like, yeah, I want to be that, I want that energy, I want to walk in the room and take up a bunch of space in the room, you know, I want people to know I'm there. Or, or I want to be that. I want to be that calm in the storm that people know that. Like, you know, I know that my daughter is driving this car for the first time, the person that's staring. This might be a real real world example. But and I am I am going to be the calm in the storm. But how like, how should we go about thinking about like, how do we actually define that? Like, how do we think about that in a way that I can like, really understand, this is the energy I have today. This is the energy I feel like I should have or this is my natural energy, and it's not coming out, like how do we? How do we think about that? How do we actually define that and kind of work towards those? Yeah.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

So I love this question. So when I teach students, so I ended up having I usually have a lot of freshmen sophomore in college, when I started to teach like, technically, it's a business communications course, that is public speaking, like, how do you actually like, learn how to do sales, pitches, interviews, etc, stuff like that. So I don't have to worry as much. And then this is very my experience and mine alone. But gender wise, men just do a better, like, they just come into a room and I don't tend to have a lot of athletes. So athletes have a different presence when they walk in. But a lot of it starts with your body mechanics, how you feel about yourself says everything from how you show up from a physical standpoint. So if you think about like, to our listeners right now, check your poise right now, I guarantee you almost all of us are slumped over. So I'm gonna ask you to take your shoulders, roll them back and down. Now, why do athletes tend to have a better job with this because they lift and if you lift weights, you've done weights with shoulders back, etc. And you lift your body tends to be more open in the chest area, and you're not always that concave, because we sit over a desk all day and you're curved, where your energy comes from. I think it personally comes from like that mid heart area, your mid chest or region. There's your word for the day. Why did you show up with your shoulders open back and down, you're giving off a different like, you're actually giving out energy to people more so than this closed off effect. And if you think about it from a standpoint, if you if you can see someone or not, they look more inviting, when they have an open chest from like that energy standpoint and how you see someone, if they are all closed off, they're trying to make themselves small, your energy fields aren't going to be in the same way. And this is kind of when we talk about aura, and you've got like the seven different chakras, energy cycles, like there is a true science behind the energy that actually comes off from your body. So if you are hunched over and trying to make yourself small, that's going to be received very differently than somebody that's got an open chest, etc. So I encourage people to lift weights, because it makes a huge difference in how your body physically holds itself. And that is always step one. Because, you know, when you look at, there was a Netflix documentary that I watched over the holidays called Shell salts. And it's where Jonah Hill interviews his therapist, and he talks about how to mitigate depression, because a lot of people were dealing with a lot of mental health. And he says that 85% of it is your physicality. So how you show up what how much water you put in your body, your nutrition, and how much you move your body. So a lot of our energy absolutely comes from that physical body. So how how you're holding it, what you're doing for it, that's going to change a lot of how people receive you, then when we look at it from that standpoint, it's also what is your facial expression, I guess people are going to decide whether you are a safe person to talk to, or an unsafe person to talk to within a third of a second from the moment they see you. This goes back to our homosapien brain when we would have different tribes and when you would approach another tribe, are they going to be friend or foe, you had to make a decision very quickly. And then you move on to that next level. So as we talked about psychological safety, a lot of this stuff is super hard wired so far back that it's better to understand than to train change, really like the science of evolution from that standpoint. But like, it makes a huge difference. So if you want to be approachable, you know, standing there with a scowl on your face is probably not the best way to do that. But walking in, you know, we know people who have those bright eyes like little glittery that exists in their eyes, where they're like, hey, that's, that's somebody I want to go talk to that person looks approachable, they look kind, I like to call it Iowa nice, because you know, if you're pulled over with, you know, a flat on the side of the road, we're gonna pull over next to you and help because we're Iowa nice, we're approachable. And those things end up making a big difference purely in how you show up. Now, we haven't talked about even uttering a word yet. But a lot of aside from body mechanics, when we talked about like how you dress, if you're not comfortable in the clothes that you're wearing, it doesn't matter if you're wearing a like a lot of people used to say like a burlap sack or a suit, if you're not comfortable in whatever it is, you're not doing anybody any favors. So this is kind of where when we keep our clothes that are too small for us, we try to squeeze into them. And then we're super uncomfortable all day. Everyone else is uncomfortable too, because your energy changes. So again, how you show up for yourself, how do you dress to make yourself feel good? What is that going to look like? Do you feel better in the color green? Do you feel better in the color blue, paying attention to all those things that make yourself feel good, is exactly how you start sharing that with the world. Because when you feel good about yourself, you're less likely to be in this fake sense, this fake mentality, projecting a different type of energy based on how you are showing up as yourself. So again, body mechanics, your body language, your facial expression, and how you hold yourself from a physical standpoint when you enter a room. Also, get off your phone. Number one, simple most people get awkward when they're going to enter a room. And the and I think we've all done this. Okay, so like flashback to when we were kids, and you're walking into the lunchroom. And it's like, Oh, where am I gonna sit? Oh, can I sit with today? Well, nowadays, everybody walks in and they're on their phone, I encourage you the next time you walk into a restaurant or a store or whatever it's going to be don't be on your phone, walk in with your chest, open, shoulders back and down and walk into that room like you are meant to be here. Most people these days will instantly be on their phone and looking down and they're not engaged. Most people aren't gonna want to engage with you right away. So when you're able to walk into a room and take a moment and look around, that's a very different type of energy and confidence that you are possessing when you do that versus floundering around on your phone trying to look busy, or whatever that might be to try and detract from you actually being physically there. So those are some things that when I look at trying How would I describe energy I think all of those things really play into it.

Kyle Roed:

I love it. It's actually like there's actually something to do about that. Right? Yeah. I think that's

Dr. Claire Muselman:

talking about, you know, our X Men if whether whatever your favorite thing was, and they these other be excellent in there, and they had their stance, or the Ninja Turtles, others dance. Like, again, that is a very different perception when you walk in again, that is also showing that open chest. Obviously the X Men look like they worked out. So did the Ninja Turtles, those guys were pretty ripped. But it's not necessarily about that. It's just again about how you hold your physical body. And when you enter a room, what does your poise look like? What does your stance look like? Women tend to stand there and cross their legs and shift their weight back and forth. No, keep your shoulders keep your feet hip width apart and walk in and just be comfortable. It's always fun for me when we're working with people and how to get them comfortable speaking people don't like to either they have no idea what to do with their hands. Or they feel really awkward if you just leave them down by the sides, and they get really uncomfortable. Even though it doesn't look uncomfortable to the audience. Like the audience isn't really paying attention to that. But the person standing on stage is freaking out because they feel seen. Think it's just those little moments that you think about when you're looking at presence and energy walking into a space.

Kyle Roed:

So yeah, all that. I mean, I think that's really, it's really fascinating to think about, you know, the, like the perception of energy and what and how people feel about that. I do, by the way, just to kind of nerd out a little bit. Like I'm a big like chakra, meditation and all that kind of stuff. So like, Yeah, we could that we don't have time for that podcast. But I do think like there's, there is some science in it. There's some science around energy, it's a little woowoo if you're like, like, I need to see the data, but but it exists, it's just we just don't necessarily have the mechanism to measure it all the time. Right? Like it's but it's there, I'm with you on that.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Here's a good good. Here is a good tool that you can use. If you want to know if you can psychologically, safely trust someone, if you stand, whether it be near someone or animals are really good at this to your body will either pull you towards them or push you away. So it is really, really, really fun to try this out. And now people are gonna get all weird and go like stand in front of their spouse and be like, pushing me away. They display there's like this internal hole and push that it's yourself or whatever. Like I like to call it my inner goddess and I still have her dress just like my high school cheerleading self and she's in there like, No, this person is bad, stay away from them. Or no, you can trust this person, this person is good. And you can actually like if you pay attention. And again, this is like quieting the mind and making sure that you're actually aware, self aware in this process. You can feel the pull towards people or you can feel yourself kind of get on that pins and needles where you're like this does not feel good. So it's very if you want to take pay attention to the people that you surround yourself by you will start to be able to feel those energy balances when you put yourself in that space. Now, I want to caveat this and say please don't go to your in laws house and say, Well, Dr. Claire told me you are pushing me. I don't need to be around you. Because I'm not here to fight with you and your in laws. I'm just here to make you aware of how you feel when you're around certain people. But that's an easy one to go to.

Kyle Roed:

That's fascinating. I've got all these notes now like and this is an audio podcast. But if anybody could see me as she's like describing the synergy, I'm like I'm, I'm like, Oh yeah, I'm kind of slouched over I need to get. Yeah, yeah.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

But there are interesting things that we don't touch on enough in life, because I feel like we get into such a checkbox mentality of like, okay, this is how you grow into a leader, you do these things? Well, we don't ever talk about like, what are those outliers that set people apart? And these are a lot of those outliers? Like how do you effectively communicate? Because words are so powerful? How do you showcase like an aura in a way that you are being authentic to yourself? How do you pay attention to energy levels within a room? If you know an energy level is going down hill in a row? How do you how do you amplify it? How do you again, teach self confidence so that people we know we've got a great wealth of knowledge that exists within this world and a lot of people that don't know how to articulate it. I was on a call yesterday for a panel that we're going to do for a worker's compensation conference. And we had a quieter gentleman that gave a couple ideas. And I tend to be very bold and outspoken. So I reiterated what he said, and just said it in a different way. And they're like, yes, that's a great idea. I was like, Well, that was that was his idea. He's just quieter. So we need to figure out how to do a better job of amplifying those really great ideas and teach people how to be more outspoken. So he and I talked afterwards and I was like, Hey, I totally understood what you meant. If you would present it in this kind of capacity. It's going to come Cross more concrete and more bolts where people are going to hear you. And so giving people that honest feedback I think is really important to have. Why did they hear you? But they didn't hear me?

Kyle Roed:

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I think

Dr. Claire Muselman:

that's the other thing. Everyone can weigh in this. This is not a, because Because Kyle and Claire are doing this. They're great. And because Joe and Shayla aren't doing this, they're not like everyone can win in this space. I think that's something else that we haven't ever focused on

Kyle Roed:

before. Absolutely. That abundance mindset, right? Yeah. And that's, yeah, again, that's probably another plug. So we've got like, three podcast series at this point, but one pop culture. What about, you know, chakras? Yeah, but, but I do think, you know, and especially, you know, the, the audience listening to this, like, in human resources we get, we deal with this a lot. You know, a lot of times we're just because, because the jobs we do, it's not just, it's not always, it's not always fun. A lot of times we're in a meeting, that's not very, very positive. A lot of times we are the one that's like, taking notes in meetings or or like, we're, we're on our phones, trying to try to find answers to questions that are that are getting thrown our way. And, and it's easy to forget that, you know, that we should have some level of executive presence, especially in the role that we're in. And we should be mindful of the energy that we're bringing to our organizations, because a lot of people are looking to us to be kind of an example of, of what good looks like, right? I mean, that's kind of, that's kind of what you know, right? Wrong are different. That's just, that's just the nature of our jobs. And so I think all of this is, is really important. And I think really, really powerful stuff. And I have like a list like 20 things I gotta go do now. But

Dr. Claire Muselman:

I think you use this common vernacular all the time it takes a village to raise a child, well, it takes a community to help people grow. And so what are we going to do to make that community feel seen, heard, acknowledged and valued, so that you can help people grow? Because again, when we look at the development of human capital, it is now a such a crucial time with, you know, every industry has got a talent crisis at the moment, we've got such a big disparity among tech from the different generations of understanding. Even when we look at the whole socialization, I think sociology moving forward is just going to be fascinating, with just such a big disparity from a technological standpoint. And so when we look at all of those facets, how do we really bring it together so that it is a community instilling growth among everyone that's a part of it, versus it trying to be these pieced up landscapes that I think that we have historically been developed in and how, like, this is how you grow in a ladder, versus now looking at it from a community helping everyone grow through a lattice effect, where people just can, you know, navigate throughout the process and continue their own growth and development to help everybody again, going back to like, abundance, growth mindset. But I think at the end of the day, if you're not growing, you've got the ladder, and I don't believe that humans truly want that for themselves, or the people that they surround themselves with.

Kyle Roed:

Right? 100%? Absolutely. And it's none of your business what people think about you, I love that

Dr. Claire Muselman:

isn't that amazing? I suppose. She's like, well, that's kind of Oh, that's right. Like, yeah, I had some, actually, it was screened at me. And I remember sitting with our HR representative, afterwards, I was like, you know, she's right. And our editor representative was like, you know, I'm going to take that one away. I'm gonna take that one home and say, That's my children. You know, you we joke afterwards. But in the moment, I was like, You know what, you are absolutely correct. It's the most freeing thing anyone has ever said to me before.

Kyle Roed:

Love it? Well, I had I had aspirations to talk a whole lot about workers compensation, which is also an area of expertise. But we aren't we're close to the end of our time together. So I, I think maybe the next question, I do just want to give you an opportunity to maybe talk about your approach to workers compensation and and and what you're doing to really foster a little bit of a growth mindset and, and change management within that industry,

Dr. Claire Muselman:

sir. So workers compensation, I am the self pronounced glitter bomb of work comp, because this is a very dreary topic in most people's minds. When we think workers compensation, it's rules, regulations, people are cheating the system. I don't want to have to deal with this and I like to think of it as people get injured. It's either gonna go under personal health insurance or it's going to be under workers compensation insurance. The one thing that we can do, especially on the employer side, and from the HR landscapers, we can help people have the best possible outcome. And we get to control that because it's workers compensation, and so we can help people through this process. And so I've designed claims models that that ended up focusing really on how do we focus on empowering the individual that's been injured, to have the most optimal recovery possible. So that is being really being intentional with our words and how we talk about recovery, giving them options, because in the workers compensation system, it is so heavily regulated with compliance and regulations and jurisdictional mandates, that there's not a lot of choice. And so we kind of depower humans, and we really do human, we really dehumanize our employees in workers compensation, because we slap a claim number on them, employers kind of don't get involved, really, it gets kicked over to an insurance carrier, or a third party administrator. And we let those human elements go. And so what I've tried to do over my two decades in worker's compensation, which feels like it was just yesterday that I started, is really take about like an empathy approach to alright, what has happened to this person? What's the ripple effect? It's not an individual, it's a family. It's impacting a community, and what do we do to better understand their psychosocial issues, and figure out what is their fear of the unknown to alleviate it. And so my initiatives this year are really to help train HR and how to better understand workers compensation. So you can use it as a forte in your human capital investment. And also how do we start training our leadership teams to be well equipped for Hey, you still got to talk to your person when they're outside of work. Because having a relationship with that injured worker, and their direct leader, whatever capacity it is, having that continue throughout the workers compensation claim is one of the best predictors for somebody having a good outcome. One of the other things to think about when we talk about workers compensation is everybody always wants to slap fraud on it. I have 15 research studies that can now tell you, workers compensation fraud produced by an employee, filing a false claim is one to 2%. So we got to stop blaming the people, we asked that there's been so many studies done on this template and the people, it's what we do once they've been injured, how do we take care of them? And really looking at it from that standpoint of what do we do from the employer side of how do we get those direct leaders engaged? How do we make sure benefits are getting issued correctly, and following up to follow through to make sure our people are getting like, Hey, here's what we're going to do for you, this is what you need to do for us keeping those lines of communication open. And really teaching people it's not a scary system, we just need to do a better job of, of navigating it.

Kyle Roed:

I think it's really important. I wish I would have had that 20 years ago, when I was trying to stumble through this comp claim as a, as an, you know, as an HR professional that maybe it was like, like chapter six in some textbooks somewhere, you know, in school, and then suddenly, you're supposed to be an expert. And and I just think you're so correct that the minute that you take humanity out of it, you've already lost your you're fighting uphill. And you know, going back to what we talked about earlier, they're going to be able to sense that energy, if they are now an enemy. Or the or it's a point of conflict, or there's questioning around fraud, typically from an insurance company. What an awful approach to make sure that somebody feels like you're taking care of them.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Yeah. And this system is, you know, there's so many parameters that go into this that are very jurisdictional driven, they're very jurisdictional driven. So you know, the states are going to mandate what they're going to mandate, but we can help people better understand that. So when we see people I hate when I see people send letters that are like, under Iowa code, you know, at 539, this is what you qualify for. And it's like, Okay, what does that mean? Because I can tell you like, I've had a look, I've had a couple of Workers Compensation Claims freak accidents in my life. And I've gotten that set. And I've been in this space. And I'm like, What is that supposed to mean? Like, there's no way that we learned to write for consumption. And we're supposed to write between like a sixth and eighth grade level, I guarantee you those statutes are not written in a six to eighth grade level. But we've got to think about, like, who's your intended audience, and if you really start exactly, executing your programs, with a compassionate lens, helping that person feel seen, heard, acknowledged and valued, and that they genuinely genuinely want them to be back part of your team. It makes all of the difference. And I personally believe based upon all the research that I've done, and the companies that I have been privileged to work with one bad worker's compensation claim can absolutely destroy your organizational behavior and your organizational culture within your environment, whatever that is, because you can it's just you know, he's shown me the five people that that person hangs out with it. I'll show you where your next workout claims coming from.

Kyle Roed:

Yeah, I think you said it. You said it really well. When you said it's a family. Yeah, that's that that could be work family. That could be their family that could Yeah, there. There's a ripple that I've seen it unfortunately.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

And when we treat people with respect and kindness and do what's best for that, and Injured human being. Amazingly, they get back to work faster, they heal quicker. I mean, it's just amazing. If you treat people the way you would like to be treated, and we go back to kindergarten and playing in the sandbox, amazing costs go down. I mean, it's litigation, droughts. It's amazing. Absolutely.

Kyle Roed:

Is Yeah, we'll have, you know, I encourage anybody that deals with workers comp or has dealt with this and wants to deal with it better in the future, you know, check, check out some of the work that Dr. muscleman has done. And it's, I think it's, it's the way that we should be thinking about these things. And it certainly fits the premise of putting humanity back in the workplace. So with that being said, we could keep talking for another couple hours. I'm sure. We've got to record those next three episodes, but I'm gonna shift gears and we'll go into the rebel HR flash round. Are you ready? I'm ready. All right. Question number one, where does HR need to rebel?

Dr. Claire Muselman:

I think HR needs to rebell and really pushing human capital, human Yeah, human capital development forward by focusing on the soft skills to create leaders within and leaders within the followership because while we're gonna have these different designs in different hierarchy or whatnot, we all know that by in is going to be important to really move Organizational Behavior forward and whatever organization that you're in. And so if we can start investing in some of these soft skills, focusing on putting humanity back teaching these competence skills, going back into how do we teach people to stand up for themselves so that they can challenge the status quo, they can be a rebel or an instigator, but in doing so, because they're challenging the way we've always done things before, creating these psychologically safe environments by letting people be authentically them. And I think that's where this rebellion comes in, where just because we've always done it this way, doesn't mean it's the right way to do it. And does it definitely doesn't make it helpful moving forward. And I did say this, when we went into the pandemic, if you were not an empathic leader, going into the pandemic, and you shirt, short one, when you were coming out, you weren't going to make it like you. Absolutely, if you do not have empathy, as a leader of any capacity, you shouldn't be, you shouldn't. I mean, if the If we learned anything throughout this process, it is really trying to seek to understand what we can do to help people thrive, wherever they're at, and then how do we help them grow and move forward?

Kyle Roed:

Absolutely. I couldn't agree more, I think, you know, in a, maybe a, maybe a weird silver lining to the pandemic is some of those leaders got exposed? Yes. And now that the and now that's kind of like you shone a light on that, and how in how critical that is. And I think, you know, like you said, if you learn and grow and learn from that as a as a leader, and make efforts to improve, you know, you'll be fine. But if you don't, you know, good luck to you. Yeah, I don't want to work for you.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

And you know, the best part about I think all of this and all these shifts that have occurred is that it's really come down to the I don't want to work for you. I won't. So here's my two week notice about for him and a few if you get that anymore. I don't know if people are

Kyle Roed:

still so it depends. It depends.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

And I think that we will continue to see that in the younger generations. I think that Gen Z is definitely Oh, you're not going to do this. Okay, well, bye. And it's much lower than the two to three years that you've seen Millennials being in their positions.

Kyle Roed:

Yeah, I would agree with that. I think it's like it's just where we're at. It's kind of the new normal. Yeah. All right. Question number two, who should we be listening to?

Dr. Claire Muselman:

So my doctoral dissertation, I had one of the best content experts I could possibly have. And she actually runs LinkedIn hrs behind the scenes on that name is Dr. Chris wildermuth. Highly recommend you follow us and she's always on the front learning lines of adult learning and organizational development, always has some really cool things I've learned so much from her. And that is absolutely somebody that I would be giving a follow up to. I'm sure they helped me understand employee engagement, because that was what the that was what I wanted to understand. I wanted to understand why people stay in jobs that I could never do. My dad as an end loader operator has been since he was 18 years old. He's 7273. For still working, doesn't want to retire. Because he he has a sense of community with his people. And I was like, I want to dive into this. I want to know why he's so engaged after all these years. Like, what makes you get up and want to go to work in the morning. And so that she helped me really dive into that research.

Kyle Roed:

That's awesome. Yeah. Awesome. All right. Last question, how can our listeners connect with you and learn more?

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Sure, you can absolutely hit me up on LinkedIn. I always like to share a lot on LinkedIn. I also have a website, Dr. Claire muscleman.com. You can always email me at Claire at Dr. Claire muscleman.com And I look forward to hear Any questions, comments, feedback, you got it?

Kyle Roed:

Absolutely will have. So we'll have all that in the show notes. We'll have some other content and resources in the show notes, open up your podcast player. Check it out, certainly worth a follow. And again, glitter and sparkles on LinkedIn. I mean, come on. That's just so it's just been an absolute joy. Appreciate the opportunity to spend some time with you and, and really appreciate the content that you shared with us today. Thank you so much.

Dr. Claire Muselman:

Thank you for having me thing. Great. Thanks.

Kyle Roed:

All right. That does it for the rebel HR podcast. Big thank you to our guests. Follow us on Facebook at rebel HR podcast, Twitter, at rebel HR guy, or see our website at rebel human resources.com. The views and opinions expressed by rebel HR podcast are those the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any of the organizations that we represent. No animals were harmed during the filming of this podcast. Maybe

(Cont.) RHR 150: Own Your Executive Presence with Dr. Claire Muselman