Horse Whispering for CEOs: Why Leaders Should Listen More with Nico Van de Venne

Dear listeners,

This will be the last episode of this podcast for the time being. Other aspects of business have caught my attention, and I would not be myself if I were to focus solely on quantity instead of quality.

Since my time is limited, I will focus on the other project for the time being.

Thank you, as a listener, for the loyalty and to all the guests for their wisdom and humanity.

Remember to jump from your head to your heart, and listen to the beat within.

Stepping into leadership shouldn't be a default promotion for top performers – it requires intention, self-awareness, and a genuine desire to serve others. Nico Van de Venne, premium confidant for high-achieving CEOs and entrepreneurs, pulls back the curtain on what he calls "CEO disease" and "founder syndrome" in this eye-opening conversation.

Drawing from 25 years of experience across nuclear, legal, IT, telecom, and sales industries, Nico challenges conventional wisdom about career progression. "There's no logic in humanity," he reminds us, pushing back against the assumption that moving up the corporate ladder is always the right move. Instead, he advocates for honest self-reflection: Do you genuinely want to lead others, or would you thrive more as an expert individual contributor?

The most memorable moment comes when Nico describes true leadership using a powerful metaphor: imagine horses pulling a carriage. While managers sit atop giving orders and demonstrative leaders run ahead showing exactly how things should be done, the servant leader moves invisibly among the horses, listening to each one's motivations and gently aligning them toward a shared goal. This invisible leadership style turns the traditional organisational pyramid upside-down, positioning executives as supporters rather than directors.

Nico's approach as a confidant centres on creating absolute trust – a space where leaders can speak candidly about their challenges without fear of their stories being recycled. "Sometimes listening to your own voice is the key to finding solutions to all your problems," he sha

Sponsored by Nico Van de Venne CommV

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Nico van der Veen
• 3:10 The True Turning Point
• 10:00 Leadership vs Management
• 14:06 Creating Trust and Confidentiality
• 18:15 Pain as Growth in Leadership
• 22:55 Final Leadership Wisdom

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Well, hello everybody, and welcome to another amazing episode of Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight. I am your host, Jacqueline Strumminger, and today I have the absolute pleasure of speaking with Nico van der Veen, and you're going to love hearing from him. We've just had a great pre-show conversation. He is not here in the United States, he's actually over across the pond in Belgium.

Speaker 2: 0:25

Yeah, I was like wait a minute. Pond in.

Speaker 1: 0:27

Belgium.

Speaker 2: 0:27

Yeah, I was like wait a minute in Belgium, in the country, I was like wait a minute where are we?

Speaker 1: 0:34

We were just talking about a few different countries, anyway, so let me just tell you a little bit about Nico. He is a premium confidant for high achievers, successful CEOs and founders and entrepreneurs. His journey is a masterclass in professional evolution, stretching over 25 years in diverse fields such as nuclear, as a nuclear industry, legal, it, telecom, sales, and extensive experience has culminated in a deep understanding of fulfillment beyond conventional, conventional success metrics, which obviously really tend to bring in great leadership, because when you have vast experience, you can learn so much about leadership. So, nico, welcome to the podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:14

Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 1: 1:16

No, it's my pleasure. So you know, I'm really curious. You know you have all this great experience. You know experience and across all these different depths of of professions, and if you could say, like, what was the, what was the turning point for you in this? That you were like you know what, now I want to go out and help other people.

Speaker 2: 1:45

Well, I think that part has been there the whole while. Why otherwise do you go into leadership to guide people towards good goals and wonderful dreams and so on? But if I would go to a point where a decision was made to do it as an independent person, that might be a very big switch is when I saw a couple of symptoms in a large company which is called big blue, but I'm not going to name the car, the company in itself. Uh, when one of the things was like excel sheet management, um, leadership, micromanagement, um, you know, paralysis in change, all those wonderful things. I've started to name those things as a disease. You know, ceo disease and founder syndrome.

Speaker 1: 2:32

It's like.

Speaker 2: 2:35

I've noticed the same things happening to entrepreneurs who are good leaders, but sometimes you know letting go and stuff like that does not really work for them Because you know, first you started on yourself, then you have to go to the next level by letting go. But to answer your question honestly, I think about 2020 would have been the key year. 2019, 2020 would be the key years that I actually decided to jump into the pool of reaching out to a more individual aisle level story.

Speaker 1: 3:08

So all right. So a couple of things that you said I just kind of want to kind of touch on. You know, as you said, you know when I was asking the question, you know most people step into leadership because they have the goal to help people. But I actually want to challenge you on that, because sometimes I think people get into leadership not because they have that in a. You know. They want to help other people. It's because they've performed well at a company and somebody has helped them rise up into that spot.

Speaker 2: 3:40

Yeah, I always chuckle when I get this kind of question because it's so very prevalent these days. I see it happening so many times. You know, the one expert who does a great job you know, gets in early, stays in late, you know, gets all these things done becomes the next leader of a team mistake that a company can make, by the way. That's my opinion. To be completely honest, you have your exceptions. Indeed, I'm going to actually talk to myself here and be advocate of the devil, because I actually recently put somebody in that position, but I was able to prepare him for leadership, which is a big difference, and that's that's what happens. A lot is that you have a lot of people you know they're experts and they're great in what they do, and you have to make a distinction between is somebody a leader or individual contributor who is an expert and in a company?

Speaker 2: 4:33

I also work in learning and development and I see these things happen look for two distinct trajectories One is getting them into leadership and the other one is giving them the alternative to become an expert for their team being, you know, a sidekick of a leader. Not not as in they need to. You know, manage people, because usually they're a bit awkward in managing people for one one part, or they just don't have the talent for it, and you can learn leadership up to a certain extent. Funny that I just flashed through my mind that my whole career has become falling into leadership, one time after another, just by being somewhere, by acting with people and so on. So some kind of inherent talent that was within me.

Speaker 2: 5:22

But I've seen other people who just jump into being the expert the whole time. You know, they just know things, they find the problem and they solve it, and nobody ever asked for it in a certain way. But yeah, I see what you mean and indeed it's something that sometimes needs to be avoided, to just push somebody in that direction. You're right, you're right.

Speaker 1: 5:44

You know, and as we're talking, you know, one of the things that I find that's really fascinating, what you, you know, just sharing is that you know. You said like either giving somebody that ability to say, as you shared, you know, you, you just help them get ready for it key thing, get ready for it right, and you know. So you put it in and you know, but before you help them get ready, you gave them a choice. You ask the question, right, you know, is this some? You know, do you, is this something that you want to do? Do you see yourself as a leader? Is this something that you want to do? Do you see yourself as a leader? Is it something that you want to grow into?

Speaker 1: 6:27

Right, and or you know again, asking those questions and I think that's actually you know, when I think about the one of the quintessential things about leadership that's that tends to happen is that you know the person going into it. You know they. It's more like oh, I want to go, that's my, it's part of my trajectory, I, I know I go here and my next step is to be like the assistant blah, blah, blah. And then it's to be the the director. And then you know and you have this ladder, but nowhere really along the way is somebody really asking and saying like, or asking the question what do you really want to do? We just know, right, like I want to climb the ladder, but is it really what we want?

Speaker 2: 7:23

good question, right yeah it's.

Speaker 2: 7:26

It's. It's very, very, um, very difficult to answer because you have to be honest. You're going to be honest not with the person who asking the question. It's going to be, you know, getting up in the morning seeing that mirror and saying what do I really want? Do I want to get on this next step on the ladder, or do I want to sit where I'm sitting right now and just be better at what I do? And at the point that we were discussing his jump, it was only like six or seven months ago and he had the opportunity to really go into a very technical oriented direction or into this. And I had discussion with him and I asked him that question and and he was really kind of baffled, looking at me, he's like, yeah, but it's the logical next step? Like no, no, no, no, no. There's no logic here. This is about feeling and knowing and understanding who you are as a person, Because as leader, you need to know a heck of a lot about yourself before you start leading people.

Speaker 1: 8:24

If you don't, there's a lot of stuff that you're going to meet along the way that you don't want to meet yep because all your people are reflections of you and they're gonna just rub it into your face when you're doing something wrong and you're gonna have to tackle that and it's better to tackle beforehand instead of really in your, in your role right and it's so important, like, yeah, you as a leader, you really do need to know who you are, you need to know your values and what you stand for, and you know, and something that you said again I'm just going back to this is is is helping.

Speaker 1: 8:57

You know, as you said, you know it's about helping people and I don't and I think this sometimes forget that part. Like the word lead is not tell right, and so, if we think about what leadership really means, it is, you know, and I'll go down to like we were talking before about that being like on a farm, right, you know you have the. And I'll go down to like we were talking before about being like on a farm, right, you know you have the person who's leading a flock, you're bringing people to a point, you're moving people, and so I think we forget that. And so I want to ask you, as you know, as you're working with people, how do you help your clients and how do you help people? Kind of like, take that step back and say how do you lead?

Speaker 2: 10:03

Well, first of all, I'd like to make a comparison as well. What I see what leadership is's this old image of you have a horse and carriage and the. The comparisons is the horses are your team and the carriage is the the product or service or whatever you're, you know, moving into the world of odds or outside of the world. Now you have different kind of leaders. There's the manager who's sitting on top of the world. Now you have different kinds of leaders. There's the manager who's sitting on top of the carriage telling people where they need to go. Then you have the leader that is in front of all the horses showing them how to need to do it and expecting all of them to do the same. And then you have this one person that's somewhere there in between that you don't see. He's wandering around between the horses and listening to all the horses and trying to understand why that one horse wants to go left and the other one goes right. And you try to compare them and ask them. You know why are you doing this and bringing them back together in that same direction? You know putting the noses in the right direction.

Speaker 2: 11:04

To me, leadership in my core is that guy who is invisible, but who is there to only support their environment instead of directing them, micromanaging and all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 11:17

So how I help my clients in that story is by purely listening first to what's going on with them. There's a lot of leaders out there who are in very specific positions and I would say executives or C-levels or founders or entrepreneurs, who are managing a flock that is so diverse that they meet a lot of different stories and they need to be able to tell somebody those stories, but they're not going to be able to do that to their employees or their team members. I'm the one who is listening to their story in full confidence and I will not spread it. That's the first thing creating the trust environment of you can tell me your story and it will not leave the room. That is apparently. That's the feedback I get is that it's very exceptional. Even though people go to therapists and coaches and so on, their story is being recycled and reused for other other means. They might put another name on it and this and that, but in some point they're reusing it and it's. It's not okay to do that, basically.

Speaker 2: 12:25

You know, if somebody tells you something in confidence I don't have any, for instance, I don't have any specific witnesses or anything like that that will tell you about my services. I do not want that. I don't care about it. It is. I do what I do and people come to me for that reason. So that's, that's. That's why I have the possibility to tell them a little bit more and a little bit deeper on who they are. Because they're telling me their stories, their deepest threats, their deepest fears, their deepest concerns. I can tackle those deepest fears and concerns and threats more deeply, kind of saying a lot of deep here.

Speaker 2: 13:09

But yeah, it's really what's happening. And the thing is they come out of this as a totally different person, because it's what I said earlier, you meet your reflection in your team. You meet your own pains in your team. If somebody is not performing, it is really a reflection of you. You're not performing in a certain part of what you're doing long as necessary that you yourself see what's what's, what's going on. What are you doing wrong? I've had this experience in this in the in the past myself. I was, I've never been a writer. You know procedures and all those documents. It's not my thing. Yeah, I, I love ai for it these days, it helps me.

Speaker 1: 13:53

I call her luna oh, I love I, but anyway, yeah, helps a lot.

Speaker 2: 14:01

But somebody in my team as well was always complaining about the fact that she didn't know what she needed to do. And, of course, if you don't have any standard operating procedures within your department, you're effed. Forget my French, but I started understanding, like there's a big hole there. What's the hole? And eventually I had a big hole there. What's the hole? And eventually I had a mentor within the company who really rubbed it into my face and he said so how do you know every day what you need to do? Well, actually, I opened up my email and that's where he said oh yeah, you're turning out fires. You're not solving problems, you're turning out fires. Where are your SOPs? Where are your standard operating procedures? What are you doing? Where are your SRPs? Where are your standard operating procedures? What are you doing? And oh okay, so yeah, and I started realizing these things and and it solved the person who had the issue suddenly knew exactly what she needed to do and her day was much better, her life was much better, and so on. And then you come to the layer where you become the foundation of your team, where you are at service, and that's where I I want to reply to the question you have about helping as a leader. You are not there to be what a lot of people think as being the boss, which makes me think about the 80s episodes, uh series, of who's the boss, um, where you never know who's the boss, basically, but indeed you're there to service them.

Speaker 2: 15:22

And a couple of months ago I went to a company and I saw a perfect example of how an infrastructure structure or organizational structure looks like, what it looks like when you're, when you're helping the right people, and they had it upside down. Basically, if you know, you're a classic, classic structure and organizations is pyramid. They turned the pyramid upside down and they said you know, everybody executive is supporting all the rest of the teams, they are supporting the sales guys and so on, and it just they're there to provide you with the necessary funds to do that event, to do the customer attraction solution and so on, and they're not there to tell you what to do. They're the expert. And I love saying this to my team.

Speaker 2: 16:03

When I come into a meeting I'm like listen, guys, I'm the dumbest person in the room right now. You're going to tell me what you need me to do to get your stuff moved forward, and that's what they love. You know, keep them in the place where they are the best. That's their expertise. So that's how I see leadership and helping and so on. I hope it gives you an answer to the question.

Speaker 1: 16:26

And actually it's so it is, it's you know. So, listeners, I really want you to like think about this too, like this is a really you know we're always talking about you know key insights, and I really think this is something that you know. You may have heard it before, but you know it is turning that pyramid upside down and we are here to serve people, the people that are. They're on your team and you are. You're not telling people what to do. You know, if you can think a bit about it and the sense of like the conductor right, the conductor is helping people, you know is like helping people figure out what notes to be playing so that the other people who are playing other notes can come together in a beautiful melody so that they can work together. He's not dictating. You know who's doing, what he's, he's conducting Right and so, as a leader, we're doing that Like that's. You know you're not dictating to your team. You're there to help the team thrive and just, and.

Speaker 1: 17:33

But the other part, too, is also really getting to know your team, right, so that you know that. Oh, I know Nico. Nico wants to go here. Like his vision is for him to do blah, blah, blah, like five years from now, what do I need to do as the leader to help raise Nico up to that? Whatever that is, and what you said in the beginning was it's like do people like you know? I think that's why I think, sometimes people fall into leadership and they forget Like, at the end of the day, we're leading people. Like, at the end of the day, we're leading people.

Speaker 2: 18:24

So get to know your team and their values, as you were sharing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's easy to see where you're going if you're not being mindful of the effects of where you're going. You know the next step is a logical step. It's not the next. No, it's not it's. There's no logic in in humanity. Humanity does not have logic, life does not have logic. Um, it's.

Speaker 2: 18:47

It's so funny that also, you know my kids. Uh, they're turning 15 and 13 this year and and it must be horrible to have me as a dad because I can be so very you know, right on the dot and like no dad, you know these things. And why are you telling us? And I prepared him for a lot of things and I said you know, pain is something that's part of life. Don't run away from it. It's something that's part of life and you're gonna have pain in life, but it's a good thing. Pain gives you, teaches you, and it brings you to a point where you find your limits and your, your boundaries, and you go from there and you find those and then you break through them and in comfort and so on, and that's something where a leader as well needs to understand the pain of their team. And it's a bit what you're saying of somebody's evolution. You know that they're in pain because they want to get somewhere else. So how can you solve their pain? It's by listening and going through the pain, either with them or for them, or just understanding how you can move away the wall that they also tend to walk into.

Speaker 2: 19:54

But one of the biggest things there and it's so prevalent with children, with your team, with whatever you do it's letting go. It's really letting them do it and trust in their ability to get through that pain and that wall and they will achieve. But just be there to. You know, pick up the pieces if they don't. That's one thing as well that I've learned. I've seen people jump into a role that they thought they were ready for and they were not, and they had to come back and, you know, embarrassment was very prevalent. You know they crawled into a shell and I was there to break through that shell again and say you know, nothing's changed in your expertise. You are still good at what you do. You just tried something and you failed, which is amazing to do. You know, fail forward is one of the best things I ever learned, and pain is part of that, and you have to understand all those things. And yeah, it's so much fun being a leader.

Speaker 1: 20:58

Yeah, right, right, right. And I and listeners, this is a really big, this is a key thing, is is, and I think, something that you just said. I think it's it's, and it's beautiful to be able to say to somebody it's okay, you, you, you took a step. Maybe it didn't, it didn't come out the way you wanted it to, but that's okay, you're learning from it and the next time you step, you can step bigger because you can know, but as long as you, the leader, can help that person grow, as opposed to you know there's two different ways. You could, it could happen right. You could shun the person and make them feel like shit, you know whatever right and not make them feel good, and they don't. Or you could help them thrive, and so you know you have to decide.

Speaker 2: 21:52

What kind of person do you want to be? Well, the quick question is do you want to keep them or not? Because that's what happens. You make those choices, that's clearly what happens. One goes, the other doesn't.

Speaker 1: 22:03

It's as simple as that and I talk to people about this a lot of times too is that people and I'm sure people have heard it a thousand times, but it's a key thing to remember Nobody ever leaves a company because of money. They may say it's money, but they really leave a company because of money. They may say it's money, but they, they really leave a company because they don't feel that they are appreciated, they don't feel that they have been, that they're, that they, they don't feel worthy or that the, the leadership doesn't make them feel good about themselves. And if you can help people feel good about themselves when they walk into that room, god, that's just like beautiful, right?

Speaker 2: 22:38

you want. It's like a drug, it's like right it is.

Speaker 1: 22:43

It is so like a drug, um, all right. So, nico, I could talk to you for hours, but so tell me, like, what is like the one thing? If you could give people like you know one thing to walk away with, what do you want them to know?

Speaker 2: 22:55

Oh, there's so many.

Speaker 1: 22:59

Let's shrink it down to pure leadership.

Speaker 2: 23:05

If there's one message that I would bring out, there is find someone and it doesn't have to be a professional, but find someone who is 100% trustworthy and I don't take that word lightly. 100% is something that I really, really emphasize Someone who is 100% worthy of your confidence and your trust. And speak to them openly on what is going on within your leadership role and ask them before you even start. Do not give me any solutions, do not ask me any questions. I just want you to listen, because listening to your own voice is sometimes the key to finding a solution to all your problems. It's the same thing as writing down a problem is solving it halfway, because every solution that you're looking for for a problem is within writing down, because every solution that you're looking for for a problem is within writing down and within the problem. So that's one thing that I would, yeah, send out there oh, I love that.

Speaker 1: 24:06

That is so important and so true. Um so how can our listeners connect with you and learn more about you?

Speaker 2: 24:12

and well, the quickest way is linkedin. I'm always active on linkedin, so I publicize, uh, a weekly podcast as well, the Everlasting Fulfillment Podcast, where I discuss CEO disease and founder syndrome very explicitly with executives and C-levels, and on the other side, I do the L&D and the confidant story. That's the other thing. But LinkedIn find me on LinkedIn or just type in my name, put a com right behind there and you'll swim overseas under the ground to a wonderful country called Belgium, and that's where you'll find my website.

Speaker 1: 24:47

Absolutely fantastic. Well, Nico, I so appreciate you being a guest on our podcast. This is the Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight Podcast and again, I'm your host and Nico, thank you so much for being an amazing guest. And again, I'm your host and Nico, thank you so much for being an amazing guest. And please, listeners, reach out to Nico and connect with him Great, amazing wisdom and insight. So thank you so much.