{"id":5743,"date":"2026-08-05T05:17:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T09:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/?p=5743"},"modified":"2026-08-05T05:38:24","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T09:38:24","slug":"from-boss-to-leader-the-power-of-human-centered-leadership-with-marcel-schwantes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/2026\/08\/05\/from-boss-to-leader-the-power-of-human-centered-leadership-with-marcel-schwantes\/","title":{"rendered":"From Boss to Leader: The Power of Human-Centered Leadership with Marcel Schwantes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In this episode of <em>Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership<\/em>, host Alexis Monville sits down with Marcel Schwantes, a renowned speaker, executive coach, and author. With over two decades of experience helping executives transform their cultures, Marcel breaks down why the traditional top-down &#8220;boss&#8221; mentality is fundamentally broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<iframe data-testid=\"embed-iframe\" style=\"border-radius:12px\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/episode\/4xKcaQMTVRbugkSmjAGG47?utm_source=generator&#038;si=b5e43ab998234dae\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameBorder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Together, Alexis and Marcel explore what it actually takes to become a human-centered leader, how to foster deep psychological safety, and why practicing &#8220;love in action&#8221; translates directly to exceptional business performance. Whether you are leading a remote team, navigating the integration of AI, or simply trying to influence change within a rigid corporate structure, this conversation provides a practical roadmap for leading with authenticity and courage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"540\" data-attachment-id=\"5745\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/2026\/08\/05\/from-boss-to-leader-the-power-of-human-centered-leadership-with-marcel-schwantes\/le-podcast-quote-marcel-schwantes\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?fit=960%2C540&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"960,540\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Le Podcast &amp;#8211; Quote &amp;#8211; Marcel Schwantes\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?fit=960%2C540&amp;ssl=1\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?resize=960%2C540&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5745\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?w=960&amp;ssl=1 960w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?resize=300%2C169&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Quote-Marcel-Schwantes.png?resize=768%2C432&amp;ssl=1 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Authenticity doesn&#8217;t mean that you have a license to just tick people off. Authenticity is being emotionally honest about things, about people, about what&#8217;s going on in the business.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>What You Will Learn in This Episode:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The Paradigm Shift:<\/strong> The core differences between a traditional &#8220;boss&#8221; and a 21st-century &#8220;leader.&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Love in Action:<\/strong> What <em>agape<\/em> love looks like in a corporate setting and why it is a critical driver of employee engagement.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Removing the Mask:<\/strong> How to leverage vulnerability and emotional honesty as an untapped leadership strength.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Leading Through Change:<\/strong> Practical advice for maintaining human connection in remote\/hybrid environments and during the rollout of AI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Bottom-Up Influence:<\/strong> How emerging leaders can build human-centered micro-cultures that eventually transform the entire organization.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Connect with Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Website:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marcelschwantes.com\/\">https:\/\/www.marcelschwantes.com\/<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>LinkedIn:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/marcelschwantes\/\">https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/marcelschwantes\/<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Podcast:<\/strong> The Marcel Podcast<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Listen &amp; Subscribe:<\/strong> If you found value in today\u2019s conversation, please take a moment to share this episode with a friend or colleague on their own leadership journey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Keep learning, keep adapting, and keep leading!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Transcript<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> This is Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership. I&#8217;m your host, Alexis Monville. Today, I am joined by Marcel Schwantes, a speaker, executive coach, and author who has spent over two decades helping managers evolve from being mere bosses to true servant leaders<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> hey, Marcel how do you introduce yourself to someone you just met?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> I would say it like this. I&#8217;m a leadership coach who teaches leaders to become more human. And if you&#8217;re a CEO of an organization, it&#8217;s to teach your management team or your executive team how to [00:01:00] become more human<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Human leadership is more about being human than title or rank. In your observation, what is the biggest barrier that stops leader from making that shift today?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah, I think a couple of things. On on a, more, sh- on a more personal or personal interaction basis it&#8217;s, ego, We wanna be in control of our destiny, our outcome. And I think exter- externally is that we have so much pressure now to actually produce short-term results we are not thinking how to create an environment, whether it&#8217;s in, in your workplace in your [00:02:00] business, environment that actually is sustainable for human beings to do really good work. those\u2026 I think that&#8217;s the the, the, two reasons that I can think of. There are many, more, but those are the ones that really surface for me<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> So this is this is very interesting because what would that mean for people to do their best work in a sustainable way? What do they need? What kind of environment they need?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> I have tracked so much research, Alex, that that points to workplaces that are led by people that don&#8217;t put people first. So managers that don&#8217;t, value people as, as much as they should because the focus, the, the pressure to [00:03:00] please shareholders or other stakeholders who whatever business you&#8217;re in, if you&#8217;re government, education, private p- or, non-profit, you&#8217;re going to ha- you&#8217;re going to have pressures to to serve other people that may, write your check or pay your bills, right? And and so I, think that we lose sight of, We lose sight of what it means to lead in the 21st century. Leaders need to provide an environment where people are connecting with one another. I know this is a very, overused buzzword, but they have to create psychologically safe workplaces so that people are more open [00:04:00] and more open to collaborate and, more open to express uncertainty and and maybe even concerns about direction, and we&#8217;re not sure about this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So in these environments, these human-centered environments it&#8217;s safe for people to, know, their humanity in that sense, and that they&#8217;re not going to be reprimanded by a boss who does not welcome opinions feedback. And so for me, that, that is that&#8217;s really flipping the script on a lot of these toxic workplaces where people have no voice, they have no say, they are not heard, are not seen. And and I point, the all the reasons this is happening right back up to the top so that [00:05:00] we have to understand that it starts with leadership, right? Everything relies on having a strong leadership team that has a vision for putting their people first. And when you that in place, then you can create the conditions necessary for people to do their best work<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> And some people currently live in high-pressure environments with tough competition and all those things, and they, want high performance. Do you see that on the opp- opposite scale, or does high performance can coexist with all what you said before?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah, I think high performance can definitely coexist with human-centered human-centered workplaces because you&#8217;re not\u2026 Y- you&#8217;re still holding people accountable. You&#8217;re still holding them accountable to excellence and to performing at a high [00:06:00] level, right? But you&#8217;re not, at the expense of leaving them to their own devices and no- with- that without support and without being heard, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So I think that there&#8217;s a really good balance of leadership, and I&#8217;m borrowing from servant leadership, where you have the servant part of leading, which is to take care of the people first, but not at the expense of making sure that they are still held accountable for results. Because at the end of the day, we still want results, But I think that when you invest enough in people and, grow and develop them and take care of them, going to translate right down to their performance. And to me, know, that&#8217;s not the reason why you do it, but that&#8217;s gonna naturally create some really good business outcomes, I think<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Ellen&#8217;s, [00:07:00] You have you also, you are also the host of a podcast. Can you tell us the name of the podcast and why you picked that name?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah. And by the way there is a, a There is some news here because I just changed the name. So let me tell you the name used to be. So between 2019 and just literally a month ago, I hosted the Love Action podcast. So how do I get that name? Number three on the show was Ken Blanchard, who&#8217;s written a gazillion books on management and leadership and and, I asked Ken, he&#8217;s a big servant leadership guy, right? And I said, &#8220;Ken how, would you describe servant leadership?&#8221; [00:08:00] And I&#8217;ll never for- forget the line. He says, &#8220;Marcel, servant leadership is love in action.&#8221; That really stuck with me. And so I borrowed from Ken, I, I give him full attribution the name of the, the title of my, previous podcast. So I took Love in Action. And love in this sense for those of us that might, be misinterpreting what does that mean there&#8217;s no place for love in, the business world. Love here is borrowed from agape love, in the Greek sense of the word. It&#8217;s backed by action. It&#8217;s not a squishy feeling or emotion. It&#8217;s not love for maybe your partner, or your children or your dog or your favorite sports team, right? It is love that is backed by action. And so that I know I&#8217;m jumping forward a little bit here, but that&#8217;s the\u2026 that&#8217;s how I created the framework [00:09:00] for my book. Yes. So last month decided to rebrand the podcast, so now it&#8217;s just called The Marcel Podcast. But we still bring thought leaders, authors, scholars, and leadership experts to talk about love principles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Okay. Okay I didn&#8217;t pay attention to that, my bad. But I wanted to touch on love because for a long time I was trying to help people see that if they are reacting from fear, they are in survival mode they are missing those connection between people. They are defensive. They, want to prove their point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They cannot build together. They are alone, basically. And what, I was looking at is, okay, the opposite of that, what [00:10:00] it is. And in my head it was always, &#8220;Okay, that&#8217;s love.&#8221; That&#8217;s, what, wants to happen through you. And and when you are there, then you can be curious, then you can ask questions, learn about other people, learn about other perspectives, build shared results, and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But I was always afraid to use love in a business setting, so I was trying to go around that saying, &#8220;Ah, we speak about appreciation, appreciate what is here, and being curious.&#8221; and I was always a little bit shy about it. With some people they told me, &#8220;Oh, that&#8217;s love.&#8221; And I said, &#8220;Oh, cool.&#8221; With some people it does not work as well, so I was very curious how you get there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So that&#8217;s \u2026 Thank you for<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> yeah. And, by the way if you look at Amazon book titles there are close to now 50 books by business authors that about love as, love in, [00:11:00] business, love in leadership. So th- I think the topic is starting to enter the business lexicon, where people are less afraid to use the word love, and I think that&#8217;s great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That&#8217;s why we need to start, keep creating conversations like this to kinda also dispel fact from fiction. There&#8217;s a lot of mis- misconceptions and misinformation around leading with love, right? People jump to all kinds of different wrong conclusions and bring religion and, things that really aren&#8217;t applicable to the day-to-day environment in our workplaces,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> and so if we, are a few kilometers apart, a few miles apart, if you prefer in on two different continents how does it work for teams who are also remote or hybrid [00:12:00] when there&#8217;s no physical proximity? How they build that connection you mentioned before?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> In a remote sense, I don&#8217;t think the, I don&#8217;t think the I don&#8217;t think the the requirements for leading with love or becoming a more human-centered leadership changes because you&#8217;re working remotely. it just means that you may have to work a little extra hard to make sure the, conditions that you would to get high engagement and to make people feel valued in a face-to-face environment, you need to figure out how to bring that into a remote setting. But the point is to, of the distance and because we&#8217;re so dispersed geographically and things are so digital these days, n- never to [00:13:00] forget that human beings still need to be valued, seen, heard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They need to feel like they belong. They need to feel connected. Okay? know I&#8217;m giving you cliches, but it&#8217;s true. It&#8217;s true. We are wired, I believe, at the core of our humanity, to be around other people, to connect with others. So in a remote sense, how are you gonna make that happen, right? What kind of rituals and norms do you wanna start, practicing and implementing as as a culture to make yourselves unique when people are\u2026 I don&#8217;t know about France, but here in America, we have a really big loneliness problem, and here we are connected to our devices more than ever before, and yet we still feel lonely. We still have a mental health crisis. [00:14:00] And and so we need to reimagine what does it look like in a remote setting to actually not forsake humanity, but to bring humanity closer together when the only means to do it is over a computer screen<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Yeah. And I&#8211; maybe that&#8217;s also when you&#8217;re already distributed or remote, maybe you need to acknowledge that we will need time together in a physical setting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Oh, yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> that&#8217;s true. That&#8217;s one, one of those ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> They do get together. Absolutely. And they&#8217;ll have they&#8217;ll have their offsites three or four times a year. And that should be a requirement of the job for people to make sure th- that they know that you&#8217;re not gonna be hiding behind your screen all the time, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> One part of your work is, was trying to help people to go from boss to leader. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> [00:15:00] Yeah. So many of us are Boy, now I&#8217;m really gonna speak the truth here. There is, there&#8217;s a shortage in leaders rising to, know, rising to the top and moving up corporate ranks. Younger generations before me now are, we&#8217;re talking about the the Gen Z-ers and maybe young Millennials are less and less inclined to wanna be leaders. we&#8217;re gonna, in, in another 10, 15 years, we&#8217;re gonna be in trouble. So we need to start identifying leaders and developing leaders early on, not just we&#8217;re talking about developing leaders to understand what it takes to \u2026 What are the metrics of great leadership, right? You \u2026 We have the, [00:16:00] the business metrics that every leader is responsible for, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">You got top line, bottom line, customer retention, or whatever your metrics is that, for your business, your KPIs, that&#8217;s im- still important. But where we fall short is we are promoting individual contributors to leadership roles who don&#8217;t have the mindset or the typology even, to lead other human beings. And so you&#8217;ll, you might get an, a great individual contributor, a rock star promoted to a management role, and and then people systems start to break down, morale starts to go down, downhill, engagement goes downhill, right? And so I and that again, and so we have to look at, okay, who are we not only identifying, but what&#8217;s the [00:17:00] criteria that gets people to get promoted these days, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So we need to flip the script from boss to leader, because boss is no longer relevant or it&#8217;s, no longer sustainable in, today&#8217;s human-centered workplaces. Because bosses, if you look at bosses historically, they&#8217;ve been all about themselves, right? Do as I say. They&#8217;ve, been command and control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They&#8217;ve been micro-managers. They have been only thinking about the, the shareholders if, you&#8217;re in one of those companies, and at the expense of people. And so I think from boss to leader is really, revising your inner script of what you feel leadership is and what it [00:18:00] takes to be a good leader. Okay. So it&#8217;s a good balance. You still need management principles to succeed as a leader in the business world, but too many people have maybe the, the intellect, the drive or the charisma to and maybe that&#8217;s why they&#8217;re promoted to the job, to the role of a leader or a manager. then they, start to show their true colors and, that&#8217;s when you see sys- systems break down and the lack of engagement, et cetera, is the people side of the business suffers. And so we, need to develop the people side of the business in others to truly understand human performance, human development. I think that&#8217;s my very long answer to from boss to leader. We need to create less bosses and more leaders<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Yeah. And I [00:19:00] love that means looking at other things that, that simplification of what a business is, that is returning value to shareholders because it&#8217;s a simplification. It&#8217;s fairly new and it&#8217;s not what a business is about. A business is to create value to their clients or their customers and and probably to do that you need the people to be able to do their best work and to love what they are doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And, then the, the rest is a byproduct in a way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> It&#8217;s\u2026 And wouldn&#8217;t you agree, it seems like common sense, right? You wanna do y- you want your, business to do well financially and, have greater customer loyalty. Why wouldn&#8217;t you take care of the, your [00:20:00] people first who are doing the work that&#8217;s going to create more value for your customers and for your brand reputation, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Take care of the people inside first, because, And by the way, here&#8217;s a correlation, a l- research. You probably know this, that it&#8217;s a known fact that when you take care of employees doing the work, that&#8217;s gonna create more impact on the, customer retention side. So the experience is gonna be that much more, more positive, and that&#8217;s evidence-based.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The, the better the employee experience, the better your customer experience is gonna be. It&#8217;s dir- directly linked<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> So basically we are in a lot of organization doing things in the opposite direction, and we are basically&#8211; we want to get the best return. We want to get the best customer [00:21:00] experience at the expense of the employees. And, it&#8217;s basically taking the things completely backward<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Right. And then leaders wonder why is our turnover so high? Start with first who do you have as immediate managers and how are they treating their employees? And and sometimes it&#8217;s not the middle manager&#8217;s fault, right? Because they are being told what they&#8217;re getting their orders from above. So the whole reason why people systems and break down m- may be because of who&#8217;s sitting in the C-suite<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> But when you enter a place where the&#8211; this is not there, we are still with bosses and we [00:22:00] don&#8217;t have that kind of thinking how would you enter that space trying to<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Influence? I don&#8217;t know. I don&#8217;t know what is the right word, towards a more human leadership<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> yeah yeah. If you are oriented to, to be more of a human-centered leader and you happen to be in a, business environment where the people at the top don&#8217;t welcome that, you can start with your own team. If you have a team of three or five or 10, and you want to and, you wanna influence up, start being a human-centered leader within your own sphere of influence, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Your own team. And here&#8217;s what I found, is that it\u2026 I&#8217;ll just share with you one client organization that I coached. It was [00:23:00] exactly that scenario. Let&#8217;s say that I had that one manager that totally was bought in, belief was there that human-centered leadership or servant leadership was the way to go But nobody else bought into it because you had the wrong people at the top who were constantly fighting and pulling in different directions and only, thinking profit, not people. And and so I said, &#8220;Okay don&#8217;t wait for anybody. Go ahead and start being a human-centered leader.&#8221; So he did. And the r- results were very noticeable because his engagement scores went up, his retention went up. There was less absenteeism because people absenteeism is basically &#8220;I don&#8217;t wanna go to work today &#8217;cause I hate my job and I hate my boss,&#8221; right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;So I call in sick.&#8221; there was less of that because people wanted to be there and because they were, they appreciated [00:24:00] the environment they&#8217;re in, and there was synergy, engagement, right? And that&#8217;s because the boss, that one started the chain. And guess who took notice of his, numbers? When his retention went up and w- in his department were performing people in the executive team started to take notice, and they wanted to find out, why is this manager&#8217;s numbers so much different than o- other managers, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The and so they began to question and and then that created new conversations about, &#8220;Oh, what, what&#8217;s happening in that person&#8217;s department?&#8221; he does things a little differently.&#8221; And so senior leaders took notice. And and so talk about influence, right? Yeah, you influence the people around you, but about influencing people up? And and so that created more [00:25:00] opportunities for other departments to jump on board as well and welcome a human-centered approach. That&#8217;s because that one person that was courageous enough to start on his own without waiting for approval from the top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> This is inspiring. I, I love it, and I, have to admit it&#8217;s it&#8217;s inspiring, and it&#8217;s very important because as you said you spoke about loneliness, you spoke about mental health. You mentioned psychological safety earlier. Yeah, it&#8217;s probably can start with your&#8211; the, the people who are close to you in the organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">How do you approach those topics in the, in in, the organization you&#8217;re working with?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> How I approach it? Usually they come to me first. And, then so [00:26:00] have to be open to the idea of putting people first order to create value and results. And, so it becomes easier when the, the leader, manager, or CEO is already a champion for human-centered leadership. Because what you don&#8217;t want is having to convince somebody that is comp- oriented completely the opposite direction. Having to convince that person is to adopt a human-centered approach when perhaps they have been a boss of a top-down autocratic boss for so long, it&#8217;s a tough transition. Really tough transition. And I don&#8217;t, Know, I pick my clients carefully to make sure that they are&#8211; they have an understanding of what they&#8217;re getting into when they [00:27:00] talk about, &#8220;We wanna create a culture that is more human-centered.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Okay what does that mean to you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> \u55ef\u3002<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> And &#8217;cause I wanna be able to listen to to make sure that they really know what it&#8217;s gonna take so that this thing doesn&#8217;t blow up, right? they if, they have a misconception of what that is, right? Because a lot of times, know, you read about it in the media, and you listen to a podcast, you watch a, a TEDx Talk, and you&#8217;re like, &#8220;Hey, this is cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I&#8217;m\u2026 We need to bring this to our organization.&#8221; And yet inner orientation your natural tendencies is still to squash people, right? So it&#8217;s it&#8217;s like I wanna make sure that it&#8217;s not surface-level ideology<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Impressions that they&#8217;re having that competitor is a human-centered workplace, therefore we need to be as well. It takes [00:28:00] belief first, right? Why do you want to be a human-centered leader or organization? That&#8217;s the first question I always ask, and I really tune in to make sure that they that that they have the right priorities<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> It&#8217;s it&#8217;s, fascinating because the- then we have that idea of they need to believe, and they will probably need to change the way they behave. So as you mentioned before, it&#8217;s it&#8217;s not only about managing others it&#8217;s about, about managing oneself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So do you feel it&#8217;s it happens often that they realize that it start with them, or at least they are part of the picture, it&#8217;s not only the other people?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah, I think that once, once they realize that, [00:29:00] okay, what has worked in the past no longer sustainable. What I picked up from previous bosses no longer work in this this age of connection, belonging, and o- once they kinda get past that I, think it&#8217;s a, it&#8217;s an easier transition. These leaders point back to their values, their value system. And so many of &#8217;em realize that all the, their outer success, of the output no longer congruent with who they are internally, their inner, self, their values basically. And so that&#8217;s a real shift, and I&#8217;ve seen it. It&#8217;s it&#8217;s a big aha moment for a lot of leaders to realize, I&#8217;m no longer living or, working or leading [00:30:00] through my core beliefs and values.&#8221; And so they\u2026 That there is that disconnect. And so they begin to reinvent themselves through self-leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What does it look like for me to live through more honesty, more integrity? What does it mean to to work in places where I may have to be the bad guy because I&#8217;m speaking the truth to power, right? And it, may not be\u2026 I may not be the most popular person when I speak my truth, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And, that&#8217;s very human-centered, right? You like, you don&#8217;t beat around the bush, and I&#8217;m using all these American cliches by the way. You just have to your truth and people know where you stand, and this is where we&#8217;re headed even though it&#8217;s uncertain times, but I&#8217;m gonna be there with you every step of the way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We&#8217;re gonna figure this out together, right? These are all things that, that I think [00:31:00] brings you back to your own humanity. And and, so operating from your value system is really key to make that shift others. To to start leading yourself first, right? By your values in order to then make an impact on o- on others,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> so in a way some people realize that for some time, maybe years they were wearing the mask of the boss or the\u2026 And at some point they realize if they really want to shift the whole organization, they need to remove the mask and be themselves. That&#8217;s what you&#8217;re saying?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah, and it&#8217;s funny that you use that removing the mask I I use that a lot in my courses as well, because one of the, one of [00:32:00] the things I teach is authenticity. How do we become more as leaders? Talk about being human-centered. First you need to remove your mask, so it&#8217;s s- so many of us walk into a, a, a work- workplace, and we check our real selves at the door and put on the mask to portray somebody that may not be who we truly are. And and and authenticity doesn&#8217;t mean that you&#8217;re, you have now license to just tick people off and say whatever is on your mind and\u2026 No, that&#8217;s not authenticity. That&#8217;s being a jerk. Authenticity being emotionally honest about things, about people, about what&#8217;s going on in the business. So you communicate emotionally honest about good things that are happening so that [00:33:00] you celebrate as a team, also the uncertainties, the things that may bring people fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Y- you wanna be there to calm the waters and not, Don&#8217;t w- don&#8217;t, give all of these ambiguous speeches and messages. Tell people what&#8217;s really going on, right? That&#8217;s being authentic. They&#8217;re going to earn your trust, or you&#8217;re gonna earn their trust, I should say, much more when you just tell them what&#8217;s really going on instead of don&#8217;t know, f- for whatever reason, because you wanna save your reputation, or maybe you fear your boss that, &#8221; Hey, if we tell our people what&#8217;s really gonna going on, it makes us look weak.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">No. The vulnerability is a leadership strength that is untapped, [00:34:00] and if we can figure out, if more leaders can figure out how to exercise this authentic vulnerability, especially in times of change, transition, uncertainty, God forbid we have another COVID, but that&#8217;s when it happens, That&#8217;s when we need to rise up and become more authentic. And and even today there&#8217;s a lot of struggles going on, challenges going on, know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> I have one for you. I have definitely one for you. You will love it. Or I already know that. I will drop just two letters because you spoke about fear high expectations, AI. What does it mean for leaders, human-centered leaders? What does it mean?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah. We have to learn to embrace and adopt AI. [00:35:00] Absolutely, we need it. It&#8217;s here to stay. But we also have to empower the people with the technology. And so as we have more AI initiatives w- leaders have to understand that the people need to also\u2026 W- We need to take care of\u2026 If we&#8217;re, if we want them to use AI, you need to set the right expectations for why they&#8217;re doing it, and remove the fear that, oh gosh, my company&#8217;s bringing AI, there goes my job And i- if that&#8217;s your ulterior motive for bringing AI this is the wrong podcast to l- to listen to, okay?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So you&#8217;ve very Already made up your mind that you&#8217;re going to, you&#8217;re going to get, let go of 30% of your workforce because of [00:36:00] AI? Yeah. The human-centered conversation is worthless here. But if you&#8217;re going to bring AI, you&#8217;re going to have to help the people adapt to it, know how to use it and build this, idea that you&#8217;re not going anywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We just wanna make you more effective, make you m- make you more productive, and make you a better human being with the use of AI. gonna teach you everything that you need to know. We&#8217;re gonna upskill We&#8217;re gonna and even give you the freedom to create, experiment with prompts and and r- redesigning your own work if it makes business sense, and then tell us, teach us leaders, how do we do it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">How do we become more effective, right? So that that&#8217;s, creating, think, more value [00:37:00] and bringing humanity together with technology<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> And, we still have a lot of problem to tackle as, as human beings on the planet. There&#8217;s not a shortage of problems to solve, so maybe that, that&#8217;s a good thing. Okay, we are&#8211; That was my AI question. I&#8217;m not going back to it. What is one question I should have asked you that I did not?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> Yeah. I would say, boy, if I wanted to start a\u2026 If I wanted to build a human-centered and I&#8217;m a firm believer that this is gonna work, I wanna be a champion this, what&#8217;s my first step? That&#8217;s the question because a lot of leaders, and I&#8217;ll answer that in a minute, a [00:38:00] lot of leaders don&#8217;t fully know what we, get so caught up in strategy, big picture stuff we forget about what&#8217;s going on in the trenches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Are people experiencing? So the first step is to gather the data that you need to first understand your current reality. are people experiencing? Go ask them. your managers ask them. Bring in a consultant if you have to, one of us, right? And to, first understand here, okay, what are we dealing with? What are our barriers, our obstacles? Because you&#8217;re gonna find them. As soon as you start poking around, you&#8217;re going to get themes rising to the surface, and that&#8217;s your starting point [00:39:00] right there. &#8216;Cause now you can go from, &#8220;Oh, okay, yeah, here&#8217;s problems A, B, C, one, two, three. Now here&#8217;s how we create a human-centered culture to address those problems.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> I love it. Thank you for that really good question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> You&#8217;re welcome<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> And of course thank you Marcel for having joined the podcast today. I really appreciate it<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Marcel Schwantes:<\/strong> been a pleasure and I was looking forward to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Alexis:<\/strong> Thank you for listening to this episode of Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership. I hope you found today&#8217;s conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did. If you want to dive deeper into the topics we discussed today, you can find the full episode transcript and all the references by visiting alexis.monville.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Leadership is a [00:40:00] continuous journey, and it is one best shared with others. So if you took away something valuable from today&#8217;s episode, please take a moment to share it with a friend or two who might also benefit from these insights. This is really appreciated. Until next time, keep learning, keep adapting, and keep leading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I&#8217;m Alexis Monville, and this has been Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u200b<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this episode of Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership, host Alexis Monville sits down with Marcel Schwantes, a renowned speaker, executive coach, and author. With over two decades of experience helping executives transform their cultures, Marcel breaks down why the traditional top-down &#8220;boss&#8221; mentality is fundamentally broken. Together, Alexis and Marcel explore what it actually [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[811,1012],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-podcast","category-le-podcast-s06"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/Le-Podcast-Square-Marcel-Schwantes.png?fit=400%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paNjQG-1uD","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3326,"url":"https:\/\/blog-alexis.monville.com\/en\/2020\/04\/26\/jasons-thirteen-rules-of-a-team\/","url_meta":{"origin":5743,"position":0},"title":"Thirteen Rules for Building Strong Teams","author":"Alexis","date":"April 26, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Great teams are not defined by talent alone. 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