Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Houston, Texas. It’s time for Houston Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Trisha Stetzel: Hello, Houston Trisha Stetzel here bringing you another episode of Houston Business Radio is my pleasure to introduce you to today’s guest, Carrie Kemper Allen, estate planning and probate attorney and founder of the Law Office of Carrie Kemper Allen. Carrie has been serving families in the Houston and Pearland area for more than 20 years, helping them navigate estate planning, wills, and probate with both expertise and compassion. With a background in business and finance from Texas A&M and a law degree from South Texas College of Law, she brings a practical, real world approach to protecting what matters most. I’ve actually had the privilege of working alongside Carrie since 2020, and what sets her apart is how she shows up for her clients, often meeting them where they’re at, creating a space that feels comfortable and supportive during what can be a very emotional conversation. She’s deeply rooted in family, community, and service, and truly cares about helping people create peace of mind for themselves and their loved ones. Carrie, welcome to the show.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Thanks, Trisha. I’m excited to be here today.

Trisha Stetzel: I’m excited to have you on. I know sometimes it’s a little overwhelming to hear all of those beautiful things about yourself, but I wanted to make sure that people knew really who you were from where, um, where I’m coming from. And I’d love for you to tell us a little bit more about you, Carrie.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Sure. Yeah. So, um, I’m a mom. I have, uh, two boys. One of them is 20 and one of them is 17. He’s graduating from high school this year. Uh, I’ve been married for 26 years. Coming up soon. Um, I love dogs. Um, I love to travel. Um, you know that, um, and, um, I, I like my job. You know, I like what I do. It’s not always the thing people want to talk about. It’s not always the time in their life that they’re excited about, but like, it’s a good fit for me. Like, I like to be the supporter and it’s a good fit for me. So I think it’s a good I like it.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, I love that. Uh, and she adopts dogs or, uh, fosters dogs. Yeah, I do, I do.

Carrie Kemper Allen: I currently have a foster dog who’s been with us for a long time. So she’s part of the family for a while.

Trisha Stetzel: Well, and as long as you continue to call it a foster, it’s not failed. It’s not failed. That is correct. Still a foster.

Carrie Kemper Allen: And the dog trainer does say that our other dog has adopted her, not us. So technically, she is not a foster fail.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay, so that feels so much better. It really does.

Carrie Kemper Allen: It does.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay, so let’s start with the basics. Um, some people probably have their own idea of what estate planning means and what probate means. So let’s start with estate planning. Give us a little summary of what does it mean when you think about estate planning or when you engage with clients for estate planning?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Sure. So the biggest misnomer that I get from people is, well, I don’t have an estate because I don’t have a lot of money. Um, and that’s just not true. Everyone has an estate. If you own a home, if you have a car, if you have a bank account without a beneficiary on it. If you have a child. Um, everybody has well, not everybody, but most people have something in that category, right? So most people have an estate of some kind. Um, maybe you have a life insurance policy through your office or, um, you know, you’ve inherited something from, you know, a parent or a family member that’s part of your estate. And most people don’t consider those things because they hear estate and they think, oh, big picture. I have to have a lot of money to have an estate. And that’s just not true.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay. So that’s very helpful. Um, as parents, should we be thinking about that? I know when our kids are younger, obviously we need to be thinking about that. What if we have grown children, children, kids that are turning 18 or even older?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Yeah, absolutely. That’s been a huge thing. Um, in the last, I would say five years. Um, and when, with, with all the HIPAA regulations and the privacy laws that we have, it is very unlikely that if someone has a child that’s over 18 and they need to help them with a medical decision if they’re in a car accident. Um, if they need to help them with banking because they’re having financial issues, something of that nature. Um, even just something as simple as, um, for, I’ll use my son as an example. Um, he takes ADHD meds and they’re controlled substance. So I couldn’t pick up his prescription at the pharmacy, um, because he’s an adult. Right. And, and I didn’t have that permission. Um, so I had to deliver his paperwork up to the, to the, to the pharmacy. Um, kind of a silly thing. But, um, I’ve had friends whose kids have been in car accidents up at college and, um, you know, they couldn’t talk to the nurse to get an update or anything like that. Um, so it’s definitely really important these days to get those medical power of attorney, um, statutory power of attorney attorney. That’s the non-medical one. So that’s the everything else document. Um, it’s really important for parents to get those two documents, um, for their children because first of all, an 18 year old doesn’t know they need them.

Carrie Kemper Allen: So we’ve got to guide them, right? Hey, I know that you don’t want me just to cut you off and throw you out. Um, you still want me to help you grow up and manage school and things? Um, what if they want you to help them pay for it? What if you’re helping them pay for school and you need to talk to the college? Um, you know, all those little things that we don’t think of as a big deal. And, and they may not really and truly, in the grand scheme of things, be a big deal, but because of privacy laws, they are a big deal. Um, so I just suggest to those parents, let’s get those kids, um, a medical power of attorney. Let’s get them a statutory durable power of attorney and let’s get them a HIPAA letter that says you can access their medical records. And then let’s explain to them why we’re doing this. This is not so mom can take over your stuff. This is not so. Dad can micromanage you. This is so if you need help. We can help you without having to jump through a bunch of legal. Whoops. Whoops.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that. So estate planning something we need to go and take care of. So that if something happens to us that everything is in order and taken care of. And on top of that, some other paperwork that we need to do as our kids are aging, they turn 18 so that we can still be involved and gosh forbid you have to go pick up a prescription for them or talk to the school. You don’t have access without this paperwork. That’s so important.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Oh, and I’ve seen a couple of colleges lately who, um, have started putting out their own forms. Um, and I had a client actually call me and say, hey, I got this form from my daughter’s school. Um, it’s a medical power of attorney. They want you to sign it so that the kid can go to the medical facility on campus. Um, I mean, I thought that was a great idea. Um, because where, where’s your kid likely going to go if they’re living on campus and they get a fever or something, you know, that’s probably where they’re going or to the minute clinic. Um, so I’ve really seen a big uptake in universities and colleges doing things like that. Um, and I’m sure our friends out there will have noticed there’s all kinds of ads for that stuff online. Um, and you know, the discounted services that you can find online to do that. Um, and I have told a couple of people, you know, you’re welcome to get those, those documents online, just like you’re welcome to get them for yourself online. Um, but the issue that I see as a, as an attorney on the back side of that is people don’t understand what they’re signing and they have questions.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Okay. The that form, it can’t explain that to you and the form doesn’t also also doesn’t know all the nuances with your family situation. Um, so I always suggest to people, yes, you’re welcome to do that. And sometimes in a pinch, those are really the only option you have. Right? Um, but if you can, it’s always good to sit down with a professional, whether it’s me or any other, you know, legal professional who can explain to you why you need the document, what permissions it gives, how you can limit it or make it more broad. Um, because those are things that, that, that’s why we’re here, right? To, to help explain those things. Um, and then one of the things I like to do with the kids is I always kind of give them the, if I’m, if I’m here and available in the office, I’m not always able to do it, but just give them the, hey, look, here’s my card. If you get into trouble. Don’t talk right. Like, remember your, you know, remember your right to silence, right? Remember your right to an attorney. Those those aren’t just things that we say. Those are real things.

Carrie Kemper Allen: And, and, you know, take a picture of my card and stick it on your phone. If you need to call me first, I’ll call your mom for you. It’s fine. You know, just so that they know that there’s somebody on their side. That if they screw up real bad, you know, it’s not the end of the world. And we can help them. But if you screw up, you don’t want to compound a mistake, right? Like you, you’ve already screwed up. You’ve already made. You’ve already had an error in judgment. Let’s make good, good choices going forward from that point so that we can avoid the worst long term, you know, consequences. And I always like to do that because I feel like that’s one of those things. I was a good kid. I didn’t get into trouble, but I had friends and nobody ever told them that. Nobody ever said, you know, we were always taught. And I’m not saying it’s bad. You know, the police officers are the helpers. And I totally agree that they are. But if you are the one who is being questioned at that very moment, they are not the helper. Um, so yes, I.

Trisha Stetzel: Tried to get to the bottom of the problem.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Right? Right. So if I need help with a problem, I want them. Um, but if I am the problem, I need to protect myself.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah.

Carrie Kemper Allen: And then again, reminding the kids, please don’t be the problem. Right? Like make good choices. Yeah.

Trisha Stetzel: This is, this is not a good excuse.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Right? And there’s value in having someone who’s not mom tell you that. Right?

Trisha Stetzel: Of course.

Carrie Kemper Allen: And give you a safe outlet.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. For sure. When I, I guess I, you know, for me, Carrie, just thinking about wills and all of those things, it’s and estate planning, it’s all for leading up to my demise and making sure that my family is taken care of. But there’s so many things that we need to think about while we’re still here that are very important. So for all of my friends out there who are my age, who do not have wills, can you tell us what happens, especially in the state of Texas, if you pass without a will?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So in Texas, the answer is it depends. Um, and, and we kind of have two buckets, right? Like are you a married person? Are you a single person? That’s kind of our first starting point. So if you’re a married person, then we have to decide, do you have kids? Well, do you have kids? Do you have kids with your spouse or do you have kids from a prior relationship? Oh my goodness. Sorry. You know this.

Trisha Stetzel: I know the routine. It’s okay.

Carrie Kemper Allen: You do. And I even have my lamp on today. I know.

Trisha Stetzel: So for those of you who are not watching and only listening carries lights go out after a certain period of time. So it went dark in our office. We’re back.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Okay. Sorry. Just. It’s not every time. Ah. Um, so we have to decide kind of where your family fits in that and in our, you know, traditional 1960s nuclear family, that’s not such a big deal because it does go to the spouse and then to the kids because the kids are of the marriage, but not that’s not our families anymore, right? Like our families are blended these days. And, and, you know, we may be on a second marriage or we may have kids from another relationship. Those things all come in to set out how Texas determines your property passes without a will. So the number one rule is if you want to decide how your property is passed, you need a will. If you’re okay with the state of Texas telling you how it gets passed, they don’t get to keep it, but they get to decide how it gets passed. If you’re okay with that plan, you don’t need a will either. But I’ve, you know, it’s very, very infrequently that I find somebody who’s like, yeah, I’m okay with that plan because it’s just awkward. It cuts out the surviving spouse a lot of times. Um, and we, we have so many families where the surviving spouse. Yeah, it may be the second spouse, but maybe they got maybe they’ve been married for 40 years. Um, I had one a couple of weeks ago. They had been married for over 40 years and all of their children were children together.

Carrie Kemper Allen: But she was not the first spouse. Um, you know, so it just kind of throws a little wrench in there, right? Um, and they had, he had a child from his earlier marriage that was an infant that she raised, um, you know, really unfortunate situation with a tragedy that started that, that second family for him. Um, but that was his wife and the only mother that child ever knew. Right. Um, so that family obviously is treated a little differently than a blended family who came together with all grown up children and married late in life. But the law doesn’t see any difference in those two families. Wow. Um, so I, I definitely recommend you got to get a will and, and in Texas, we have this great provision, um, that allows us to do handwritten wills. So if, you know, budget is an issue, which I totally understand, it always is. And, and, and you can’t swing it to make it to work with a professional handwrite a will, a handwritten will is better than nothing. Don’t type it up and sign it. Do all those things because that’s where people get into errors. Uh, because we have certain ways it has to be signed to make it official. Just handwrite it, handwrite it until you can meet with a professional and then meet with a professional.

Trisha Stetzel: Absolutely. So speaking of meeting with a professional, Carrie, what is the best way? Because I know people are already like, oh my gosh, I really need to talk to Carrie. What’s the best way to reach out to your office if they have questions or want to pursue getting their estate planning done?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Of course. So they can always go to our website, it’s k.com. Um, there’s an inquiry button on that website. Um, but if they want to reach out directly to either myself or my amazing paralegal, Marla, um, you can always email us directly and we have an intake email and it’s I n t a k e intake at callen-lorde dot com. So either one of those are great. Um, we certainly don’t mind if you want to email us directly. That’s not a big deal. Um, but if you want to use the inquiry form on the website, that’s great as well.

Trisha Stetzel: Perfect. I love that shout out to Marla. She’s amazing. She is amazing.

Carrie Kemper Allen: She is.

Trisha Stetzel: Alright. I want to tackle what I find most important because as you know, I have gone through this recently and it has been such a learning experience. I’ve told everyone that knows me, I’m going to write a book about it because what I didn’t know, I didn’t know, and now I know some, but I didn’t know everything. I want to talk about probate. So at a very high level, tell us what probate means. And then I’m going to ask you some questions because I’m still curious.

Carrie Kemper Allen: So if you have a will, the will doesn’t pass anything legally until it’s admitted to probate in Texas. So probate is really just the, the process of taking the will to the courthouse and getting it approved by the probate court and admitted to probate. There’s a whole bunch of different kinds of probate in Texas. Well, I won’t say whole bunch. There’s more than one. Um, and, and some of them require us to do a little more work after we get to the courthouse. And some of them don’t require as much work getting to the courthouse. Um, but probate is that process of making the will authenticated, proving that it’s legit, putting it on the record. Um, and then at that point, allowing it to be used for the official transfer of property.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay. So can it only be probated after the person passes?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Yes. And I get that question a lot. You. There is a way to put your will on file in the courthouse. I don’t see anybody doing that in the last, like, ten years or so. Um, it seems like one of those things that we used to do before we had word processors and the will was like this big sacred piece of paper. Now that we can reprint it, if you want to change something all the time. It’s, it’s not as big of a thing. Um, but yeah, we, we don’t take it down there until you pass away. And then it depends on the type of probate that we do. As to your extensive, your involvement with the court after that process and again, in in probate in Texas, it’s not always scary. Um, you know, you have a will you take it down to the courthouse? We have a hearing. Uh, Marla and I file a bunch of pleadings for you on your behalf. Uh, we go down to the courthouse, we have a quick little hearing. Sometimes it’s a Zoom hearing. Um, and, you know, and, and then we help you with the back end of what needs to happen, but nothing can legally transfer until that will is officially probated and there’s an executor. It’s just not effective. It’s just a piece of paper until we get it admitted to the court.

Trisha Stetzel: Yes, yes and yes. And oh, by the way, y’all, even if you have like full power of attorney when your person is still alive, uh, when they pass away, you don’t have any authority any more until the will is fully probated and done. All of the stuff in court absolutely carries. Amazing. By the way, I’m just shout out to Carrie and Mala. Uh, and we did, we did Zoom. Uh, and it wasn’t scary. It was not scary at all. It was just I didn’t know what I didn’t know. And so between the time that my grandmother passed away and we got the will probated, I had no control over any thing. And I’m the executor for her will, by the way, you guys. So that’s why I had full power of attorney to begin with, but it was it was just really, really interesting to me. Now, you and I were having a conversation not that long ago about something called Lady Bird, I believe is what you called it. Can you tell me what that is again?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Sure. It’s another kind of one of those buzzwords that’s floating around out there a lot, but for good reason. It’s a really great option for a lot of families. So as families, you know, age in their estates simplify. And I mean, I’m not talking about we age like to 90. I’m talking about we like retire and we start consolidating our assets. We just don’t have as many things out there anymore. So many of our assets are, um, beneficiary designated, right? So I have a bank account and it says all to my husband on it or it goes to my kids after, you know, I pass away, that’s a beneficiary designated asset. Those items don’t go through probate. Um, so the things that go through probate are like, um, assets that don’t have a beneficiary designation. So you forgot to put one on your 401 K because. Whatever reason you did or it happens so often. Um, but your house is generally your biggest non profit, your, your biggest asset. And it’s generally along with a retirement account, the biggest asset that people have. Um, so you’ve got this valuable asset that has to go through probate in order to be transferred. So you have two options for avoiding probate. You have a trust, um, which is complicated and not always for everyone. Um, and then you have a deed, um, which is called a lady bird deed and a lady bird deed is, is a transfer on death deed.

Carrie Kemper Allen: They’ve been around for a long time. The lady bird deed is a Texas specific document. It’s, um, it’s created by an by, uh, case law and not by statute, if I remember correctly, the terminology. Um, and so it does a very same thing as a, a very similar thing as a transfer on death deed. But the cool thing about it is. You sign it when you’re alive. Um, and it basically allows your property to stay in your name and you own it and you can do whatever you want with it until you die. And then when you die, it goes to whoever you put on there. Um, so it’s really, really nice because, um, let’s say I, I, I age and I need to move out of my home. Right? But I’ve already lady bird deeded it to my kids. Um, that’s okay, because if I don’t own it when I pass away, doesn’t matter. I can still sell it. I don’t have to have my kids permission to sell it. Um, it’s kind of its own very special little, I don’t know, surprise. I really like it. It’s a really great option for so many families because if all of their big assets, their bank accounts and, and their retirement are, are going to go directly to their, to their beneficiaries.

Carrie Kemper Allen: The only thing we have to probate is their house and some cars, and there’s some really easy ways to handle our cars. Now, of course, this is not for everyone. If if you’re telling me your family is going to fight tooth and nail over everything you have, this option is not for you. Um, you know, and if you have a, a gazillion assets, you know, we have some, some clients come in and they have a hundred, a hundred toys, right? You know, they have boats and RVs and, and all these fun, great things, which I’m so glad that they have. Um, but then we have to change title on, you know, 15 things, you know. So we’re talking about a simple estate, right? That’s got a house that’s, or maybe a car. That’s really their only thing that’s not going to have to go through, that’s going to have to go through probate. Um, and it’s a really good option for those people. Um, it’s, it’s definitely a lot less than the cost of probate. Um, and they’re, really popular right now. Everybody’s everybody’s talking about them. Um, but for good reason. It’s a good option for sure.

Trisha Stetzel: And Carrie, can you help people with that as well?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Absolutely. They’re, they’re relatively easy to do. We pull up your legal description. Um, most of the time it is not affected by whether you have a mortgage or not. But most of my clients that are asking for these, you know, they’ve paid off their home, you know, they’ve lived in their home their whole life. We’re not talking about people that, um, generally I don’t see that being, you know, I don’t see clients doing that when they have a mortgage, you know, because if you have a mortgage, there’s more complications right after you’re after you pass, somebody’s got to pay that off, somebody’s got to sell your house and that kind of thing.

Trisha Stetzel: So yeah, we went through that. Um hum. Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. Right, right. I understand completely. Like I said, I’m going to write a book. I didn’t know what I didn’t know and I still don’t know at all. I’m still learning.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Well, I don’t claim to know it all either. I mean, I’ve been doing this for 20. It’ll be 23 years this year. And, um, I mean, they used to joke with us when we were in law school and even when I was a young attorney. You know, it’s the practice of law, like practicing medicine, right? Like you, you’re, you’re always practicing to be better at it. And I definitely feel like there’s still things I learn. Um, I definitely am not an expert. I would not claim to be an expert. Um, but I do like what I do and I’m pretty good at it. So, you know, I mean, yeah.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that. Okay. I know our time ran out so fast. This was amazing. So I know some people who are listening, Carrie already want to connect with you. They’re like, I gotta do the thing because it’s really important. And I know and I understand and other people are even more confused than when we started because they just don’t know where to start. So if someone listening knows they need to get started and get their estate in order, but hasn’t hasn’t even started yet. Yeah. What’s the first step that they can take right away?

Carrie Kemper Allen: They need to make an appointment with a professional. I mean, it just you don’t know what you don’t know. And you’ve said that several times, you know, during this. You know, you don’t know what you don’t know. And if you don’t know how the law is going to affect your family, you can’t make the right decisions. Um, now you can always start out by handwriting a little will not a problem. Go ahead and do that. It doesn’t hurt anything. Um, but again, you don’t know what you don’t know. So. So find a professional, even if all you’re doing is just consulting with them to get an idea of where to go, what needs to happen. It’ll give you clarity on where you need to go and what steps you need to take, because there are steps you can take on your own.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. Y’all don’t wait. Please take action because if you don’t, the state gets to make all of the decisions for you after you’re gone. And no one no one. I shouldn’t say no one. Most people don’t want that.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Well, and the other thing, Trisha on that too, and I’m telling people this all the time, it costs three times more and takes three, four times as long to do it, you know? So leave the plan. Have the peace of mind for yourself and for your family. You know, it just it’s it’s worth that, right? Like having that peace of mind and knowing I took care of my business. Yeah. It wasn’t the most fun thing to talk about. It’s not what I want to meet up on Saturday and chit chat over, you know, the game. But it’s important and it’s important for the people we’re leaving behind.

Trisha Stetzel: It is absolutely true. And, um, so from me to all of you who are listening, invest in that now. While you can still make those decisions, it will make all the difference in the world.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Absolutely, absolutely.

Trisha Stetzel: Everything that comes after that. So carry one more time. If people want to engage with you or reach out to your office, what’s the best way to do that?

Carrie Kemper Allen: Yeah. So they can go to our website, it’s K Allen law.com. Um, or they can email us directly and it’s intake I n t a k e@law.com. Perfect. And you.

Trisha Stetzel: Guys, I feel like it should be Halloween, like we should tell ghost stories because Carrie’s office went dark and.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Light.

Trisha Stetzel: Went off again. Here it comes. It’s all good. Carrie, thank you so much for spending the time with time with me today. Um, I really, really appreciate you helping build some clarity around estate planning and probate and even some of the other programs or things that you’re doing for people and you’re amazing. Your office is amazing. And I love that. Not only do you treat everyone in your office as family, but you treat your clients like family too. So thank you.

Carrie Kemper Allen: Yeah, I appreciate it. Thanks for giving me the opportunity today. Trisha. It was really fun.

Trisha Stetzel: Absolutely. All right, you guys, that’s all the time we have for today. If you found value in this conversation that I had with Kari, please share it with a fellow entrepreneur, veteran, or Houston leader ready to grow or that sandwich family that, you know, that has growing kiddos at home and is caring for aging parents and grandparents. Also, be sure to follow, rate, and review the show. It helps us reach more bold business minds just like yours and your business. Your leadership and your legacy are built one intentional step at a time. So stay inspired, stay focused, and keep building the business and the life you deserve.

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Houston, Texas. It’s time for Houston Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Trisha Stetzel: Hello, Houston Trisha Stetzel here bringing you another episode of Houston Business Radio. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to today’s guest, Joshua Berry, CEO and co-founder of Econic and a nationally recognized author, speaker, and facilitator of change. For more than two decades, Joshua has worked with fortune 500 companies and high growth startups to help leaders rethink how performance actually happens, shifting from command and control leadership to team led results through Econic. He’s helped organizations like John Deere, Procter and Gamble, U.S. Bank, Blue Cross, Blue Shield, and others build culture. Cultures rooted in learning, experimentation, and shared ownership. Joshua is also known for his dare to be naive philosophy, challenging leaders to test bold, counterintuitive ideas that unlock innovation and momentum in uncertain environments. Joshua, welcome to the show.

Joshua Berry: Thank you. Trisha.

Trisha Stetzel: Super. Yeah, I’m super excited to have you on. I think that there’s a lot in what I just said about you that we’re going to talk about today, which is going to be fun. So before we get started, Joshua, tell us a little bit more about you.

Joshua Berry: Sure. I think it all starts with the fact that I’m a father of four. Uh, it’s birthday season, so they will soon be 12, 14, 16 and 18. Married to my high school sweetheart, also named Trisha and spelling it the right way of T r I s h a. I live in Lincoln, Nebraska. That has been a great home base for over 25 years, but has allowed me to do work in over 40 different countries while still having a great place to raise a family.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that, thanks for being a great dad. I have the opportunity to be on a podcast called Girldad. I’m really excited about that, so you should take a listen to it.

Joshua Berry: I will.

Trisha Stetzel: It’s going to be fun.

Joshua Berry: I love two of mine are girls, so I will check it out. Thank you.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that you’re welcome. Okay, so Joshua, I think I’d just like to dive right into, um, the way there’s there’s so much happening in the world right now. Lots of change, a lot of, um, uncertainty, things that are happening around us that we can’t control. And I know you have some thoughts around how we view work and ways that we can use our work to You shift the way we’re doing things, whether it’s inside of the work or outside. So tell me a little bit about I’m going to call it the sandbox. So tell me more.

Joshua Berry: Yeah, I love to think of work as a sandbox. If any of the listeners are probably like you and me, we still have to work for a living and therefore we’re required to show up and, and do work, and we get a choice of how we want to use that time. And I view work as a phenomenal sandbox for us to be able to practice more of the behaviors that we need in society, right? So it’s like a bonus, like we have to go do it. Many times we’re put into situations with people we wouldn’t normally hang out with or talk to, and we have to figure out how to make something better together. And so when I think again about all that we need in society in terms of, of better discourse, more trust, more resilience, uh, Ease your ability to to change our mind when new thinking and new facts come about. Um, these are all things we get to practice at work and get paid for it. And so I just love again, the work that I’ve done for the last couple of decades has always been at the intersection of business performance and people and trying to create these spaces for people to practice those types of behaviors.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that. So, Joshua, can you give us an example of something where you’ve been able to use that sandbox?

Joshua Berry: Absolutely. Uh, some of our early work at Econic was helping build innovation labs and incubator programs within large companies. And oftentimes, uh, the issues that some of those innovators or entrepreneurs would run into were their own limiting beliefs about, I can’t try this thing because if I do and I fail, uh, then traditionally I’m not going to be seen as a high performer. And yet that’s exactly the type of behavior that we needed to instill in them and coach. And so a lot of our programing and workshops weren’t just teaching them. For instance, how to experiment or how to build rapid prototypes of new ideas. It was working on their own inner work, what I call groundwork, in terms of what voice is telling you about your worth when you fail at something. Now that’s a phenomenal sandbox, because just imagine if we had more people who are a little bit more thoughtful about saying, I really want to try something new in work or in life or at home or whatever it might be. But what will people think if I fail? Well, these incubator programs and innovation programs we got to build gave people routine practice on exactly those types of behaviors. And what they began to see is that when they embraced some of those things and they started to realize, oh, I tried this, it failed. I’m still okay. Um, they actually were a little bit braver in other aspects of our lives, too.

Trisha Stetzel: Mhm. Yeah. Wow. I love that I picked up on a word that you used that I really like, which is, which is entrepreneur. Yeah. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?

Joshua Berry: Sure. It’s it’s a $2 word that we use when we’re talking about people who have been designated for more innovative or entrepreneurial work within an organization. And so we typically refer to them as entrepreneurs. Um, and there’s a lot of, we can fill a whole episode on what you need to do to be a successful entrepreneur. Set the system up for it. But that’s what I mean.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. I love that you talk about embracing bold and, and, and counterintuitive ideas in your dare to be naive work. So what a powerful, naive hypothesis you’ve tested that actually accelerated outcomes.

Joshua Berry: Yeah, yeah, I’m I’m known, uh, in the speaking world and others is that naive guy. Uh, and it is, it’s, it’s, I’m not completely, willfully ignorant about the world, but I do believe that so much more is created if we believe in what can happen and the optimism and the beliefs that are driven from that. And so a concrete example of it is, you know, most organizations say, uh, our people matter and the growth of our people matter. But a naive belief that I have is the growth of the people matter even more than the business growth. Um, both are important. We need both of them. But at the end of the day, uh, people growth, even over business growth is kind of a naive hypothesis. And a story I like to tell about it is there was a manager named Michael, uh, who we were working with, who gave me a call and he was looking for a mentor for one of his teammates high potential, high potential person. And he asked if I knew someone who could mentor him. I racked my brain a bit and realized that there was somebody I could refer. But this person worked for their competitor down the street and I said, uh, I’ve got someone I could introduce you to have that person meet with the competitor.

Joshua Berry: And he paused for a bit, and Michael eventually said, okay, let’s set that up. Now, what was fascinating was like traditional management logic would say, why would you ever send one of your star performers over to meet with a competitor? But Michael, when I asked him later why he did it, and I had a hunch right as he said, I win either way, right? If I care so much about his growth and development that I’m willing to do something that might be perceived as risky. He’s going to know that I cared that much about him, and his growth was more important. And the counterintuitive thing that happened is the loyalty of that high performer actually grew because there was there was factual evidence, right, that Michael cared so much about his growth and development. And so that person went, he learned from this other mentor and continued to be a high performer at that business. But it was kind of the when push comes to shove, like actually showing your actions back up your words in terms of your belief and your employees development.

Trisha Stetzel: Wow. That’s amazing. And just thinking about the culture that you can build with this, um, we’ll call it, these are your words, strategic experimentation and learning, right? Strategic experimentation, even being naive and trying things, right. Uh, even some counterintuitive ideas. How, how do you build that kind of culture in a business?

Joshua Berry: Uh, yeah, you have to, you do have to have great leadership who have done their own groundwork, their own inner work to be able to understand that there might be other ways. And you mentioned this during the intro. That’s hard. If the culture is is stuck in this idea that you need to command and control everything. I think the best organizations and the best leaders have understood that change is happening too quickly for everything to be prescribed and controlled. And and nobody wants just their team members sitting around waiting to be told like, hey, what do I do next? Uh, so the future from our research and our understanding is what we call team led results. And to build a culture that is focused on team led results, you can’t just jump into that experimentation that you mentioned. You actually have to do a couple of steps before it. And it’s what we call groundwork and we call alignment. The groundwork is, again, what’s the inner work for the team, helping them change their relationship to change? And, uh, specifically how you can do that is create space for teams and individuals to be able to work through where maybe some of their limiting beliefs are related to the work or what’s needed. Once some of that work is done, then you can do alignment. Alignment is about just getting clear on things like what are the expectations for my role? What are our expectations for growth? What are what are the unwritten rules that I see people, uh, behaving as if they were truth that we need to call out. And, uh, once teams have the trust and are able to work through some of those things, then all that experimentation, then all of the progress and the things people used to hire us for right away, like start to fall into place.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. So I want to you brought in something from your bio, uh, around the command and control to team lead. We’re right now in our workforce, um, generationally, we have lots of, lots of ages still in the workforce, Absolutely right. Where when I was growing up in these bigger brands, it was very much command and control. And what you said is what needed to get done and the team executed. And we did that over and over again, where the culture and business has shifted a lot to team led. So what are your thoughts around this very broad age range of people in the workforce and everybody, you know, kind of shifting their mindset?

Joshua Berry: Yeah.

Trisha Stetzel: Together.

Joshua Berry: Yeah. To your point, generational differences are real. Um, there’s a reason why stereotypes exist because there is some truth to those things. But what I invite for organizations and we just did, um, we’re about eight months into a 12 month leadership program with about 180 leaders. And they specifically wanted to focus some of the content on the communication styles of five generations in the workforce. So this is near and dear to my heart. And one of the first things that we said is we need to help all people in the workforce, regardless of age, get to a space where they understand that they have agency to either be defensive or open and curious. Yeah, we’re not going to change the history and experience in the decades of experience that brought you to here and some of that preprograming. But we all have agency. Diana Chapman and a couple of others wrote a book called the 15 Commitments to Conscious Leadership and Commitment. Number one. I see you nodding your head is that there’s a line and we have a choice every single day. Do we want to stay below the line where we’re defensive and we’re committed to being right? Or can we flip above the line and be open to learning and committed to learning, even if it proves that we’re wrong. And so the first step, regardless of age, experience, whatever it might be, is can we own that we have agency to be able to make that, that that shift back up because we’ll always drift down like we’re too busy. We make assumptions, all these things. We’re always going to be defensive first, but can we start to create space where we can pause for a moment and get back above that line?

Trisha Stetzel: Oh my goodness. Yes, I have so many more questions for you. But before we go there, I know that there are some folks who are listening today who already want to connect with you to have a conversation or learn more. Where is the best place or how is the best way to connect with you?

Joshua Berry: Yep. Best places. I put out new content on LinkedIn. That’s the best place to find me. You can search for Joshua Berry and Econic there, or we’ll put that in the show notes. My email address, I love to respond to personal emails from people. So that would be Joshua at Econic e c o n I c.co. And then for more information either on our work. It’s Econic or my personal speaking. And, and oftentimes the topics that I’m most interested in, uh, that’s at joshua.com.

Trisha Stetzel: Love it. Okay. Joshua, I’d like for you to tell me a little bit more about the work that Econic is doing. I know that we’ve, we’ve put some of that in a little bit here and a little bit there, but who are you working with and what kind of work are you doing?

Joshua Berry: Yep. It’s across all sorts of industries. We have some higher education clients now, some insurance, financial services, retail, manufacturing. The only common thread is that they are leaders going through some sort of change, uh, or organizational initiatives. And they’re curious and open. Like that’s the common thread. We also rarely work with people who are completely failing and and they need some sort of silver bullet approach, right? But those organizations who are good trying to get even better, and the type of work that we’re doing with them is everything from custom training and development programs to help them practice more of the behaviors that they need within their organization to executive facilitation work, which might be strategic planning or other initiatives. Um, and then more and more of it is around what we talked about previously, which is the idea of team led results. So more, more talks and workshops and virtual programs, specifically helping team leaders, managers. Move past the stage of burnout where they’re feeling like they have to carry everything themselves. And what we help them do is shift mindset and get some new tools to be able to help their teams lead the results. So it doesn’t feel like you’re constantly like pulling and pushing and, and coercing people to get buy in, to get stuff done. But you’ve, you’ve created the steps and the environment so that the teams actually want to almost like pick you up and carry you forward.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay. So just thinking about that particular scenario and a leader saying, well, my, my team is not getting the results they need. So I do have to carry all of the weight of the team and do everything that, uh, everything myself, right? Um, and some of those leaders are even saying that they empower their teams to do the things that need to get done, but the behavior doesn’t always match. What are your thoughts there?

Joshua Berry: Yeah, one of my first thoughts is, um, it’s the reason why we start oftentimes with senior leadership teams is, is they say the words empowerment, but then they, their actions don’t actually represent that they’re empowering people. The classic example someone comes in for a one on one and they’re bringing you a problem or an issue and, um, and you adopt a problem solving type of mindset instead of a coaching mindset, right? Well, and what would you do in this situation and what else? And, you know, there’s, ah, I’m not a pro in this. You are a master leadership coach. I see. Um, but there are a lot of great books out there and great resources that help leaders become better coaches. And I already established we have four kids. Oftentimes it’s the same thing as as in parenting. Like if I did everything for my kids, I can’t, I shouldn’t be surprised if they become teenagers and they still want me to do everything for them, right?

Trisha Stetzel: Then you have a bunch of 30 year olds living at home, right? Absolutely.

Joshua Berry: No judgment.

Trisha Stetzel: No judgment.

Joshua Berry: There’s there’s bad luck in life, right? But we have agency. We have control over those things. And so if you feel like you are carrying everything for people, the first thing you need to do is to look at some of your practices and understand this is back to groundwork again. Um, is there something that is causing some sort of immunity in you of giving up that control? And oftentimes these leaders have built their success on being the one with the answers and being the one who their value was based upon solving things. And unfortunately, they then get stuck into these repeating cycles and loops where they just keep reinforcing those things. I was, I was working with an engineering group, um, yesterday speaking at their event, and we got into this conversation around heroic efforts. And I said, heroic efforts in your organization should be the exception. The moment we start to celebrate always these heroic efforts, what you’re doing is you, you’re celebrating the wrong thing. Because now you’re rewarding a behavior and not always rewarding the fixing of those systems or processes or other things that make it so that you shouldn’t have to rely on heroic efforts. And it’s a counterintuitive idea, but if you have too many heroic efforts, you probably have some systems and process problems that you need to step back and be able to address. And so again, that comes back, though, from leaders having to be honest and serious about what type of culture that they want. And if they truly want to empower people, like what does that mean for them?

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. I want to ask you a little deeper question, if that’s okay. What what drives you or what drove you to this work? Why is this work important to you?

Joshua Berry: I believe people have so much squandered potential. Trisha. I believe there are people within organizations that are just going about life and work and everything, and either they don’t have or they’ve given up maybe some of the dreams that they have for the type of life that they could create. And then we’ve created work systems that further drain that from them. And, um, that’s why I’m passionate about this shift that we get to make now, to be able to fully unleash people, quite honestly, into the work that they were made to do and use work as that sandbox to be able to help them practice more of those things to get better. Um, yeah, that’s what drives me.

Trisha Stetzel: Okay. Yeah. You circled us right back around where I wanted to take us, right, was to sandbox and really thinking about it. Like, I know that some of what we have talked about today resonates with someone out there who’s listening around. How can I create or have this sandbox to really help my people who I know have potential?

Joshua Berry: Yeah.

Trisha Stetzel: Get where they want to go, right? Yeah.

Joshua Berry: So what’s what are some things they can do?

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah.

Joshua Berry: Yeah. The first is, is you, especially if you, you phrased it in a way of a team leader, like you need to be able to know where each of those people want to go and be able to have the type of relationship with them, like Michael mentioned, where you’re okay, even if that’s not in your team, right? Like, and that sounds so crazy. Half of half the people just shut this off. But, but you have to have people who care enough about you and, and they know you care enough about them that they’re willing to have that conversation around. What do you want to learn next? What do you want to do next? Obviously, you need a successful business to create opportunities for people to grow. But if your story is a little bit wider And they could grow over there. They could grow over there, whatever it might be. And all of a sudden, you have a lot more abundance and a bigger sandbox to play in. So I think the first one is the relationship. The second piece of it is are you setting the example for yourself? Right. Um, there are a lot of leaders who say these things for their team members, but they don’t actually talk about it or live it themselves. There’s this one sales leader I was working with, who in private, he would tell me that he couldn’t wait until he reached a certain age.

Joshua Berry: So he finally had enough saves so he could actually go do what he wanted to do. And, uh, and I said, have you ever shared that with your team? He’s like, no, why would I ever do that? There might be some of them that would have that same thought. And what I challenged him on was they probably already have those thoughts. You just don’t know it. Just like you already have this thought. And so, uh, you have to start to model some of those things for yourself and being honest. You know, people you mentioned about generational differences, I know there’s differing levels of what people feel is appropriate to share and disclose within the work environment, but I found very few people who don’t value authenticity and value people just being real and sharing those things, even if it doesn’t align with their normal way, you know? Full circle on the naive naivete thing and being naive. Part of my research in that book showed that we we got the word naive kind of wrong a few hundred years ago. Naive actually just means natural or innate or that thing which you’ve had from the start. And so sometimes when you have a naive belief or naive thing that comes up within you, it might actually be something that is worth listening to because maybe it was coming from a deeper source than you’re giving credit to it.

Trisha Stetzel: I wish we had so much more time together. I’m really enjoying this conversation. So, um, as we get to the end of our conversation, just one, one more thing and I’d like to get your thoughts on someone who’s listening today who doesn’t have that relationship with the people that they work with or who report to them, whatever hierarchy you want to look at or level playing field, how do they, how do they get started when it’s it feels so uncomfortable to get to know their team members at that level so that they can start to work together in this sandbox.

Joshua Berry: Yep. A couple quick ones. Um, one would be just being able to have open conversations about what’s working and what’s not working in the role and then doing something about it. Um, another is, uh, if you use an employee engagement survey, actually do something with the results because oftentimes people are sharing some of these things and then the organization takes way too long or they don’t ever act on those results. So you may already have some of this content there. You’re just not doing anything with it. And then I think the third thing is, is, again, if you are the individual who, let’s say it’s completely blocked and you’re not getting this at work at all, great. Find some other part of life where you can do it, whether it’s at a nonprofit or volunteering for a board or some other places where you can continue to explore and try out things that you might normally not have a chance to do at work.

Trisha Stetzel: Wow. Thank you so much for your time today. This is, um, this is the best conversation I’ve had all week.

Joshua Berry: Thank you. Thank you. Trisha. I’m flu. I’m flu.

Trisha Stetzel: I, I love this. I took so many notes and I love when you talked about the two agencies of being defensive or open and curious. I love that that’s so simple. It’s so simple. Just write it on your wall. Right?

Joshua Berry: Absolutely. And it’s again, not mine. 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership. Great book. Go check it out.

Trisha Stetzel: I love it. All right. Joshua, thank you again for your time today. This has been wonderful.

Joshua Berry: Thank you Trisha.

Trisha Stetzel: All right, you guys. That’s all the time we have for today. If you found value in this conversation that Joshua and I had, please share it with a fellow entrepreneur, veteran or Houston leader ready to grow. Be sure to follow, rate, and review the show. Of course, it helps us reach more bold business minds just like yours and your business. Your leadership and your legacy are built one intentional step at a time. So stay inspired, stay focused, and keep building the business and the life you deserve.