Leadership Traits Decoded
Leadership is shifting - and so are the demands on today’s leaders.
Join Cynthia Kyriazis and Andrea Martin as they spotlight a core leadership trait, exploring how it meets the evolving challenges of today’s workplace.
Through candid, practical conversations, they unpack how each trait influences culture, drives development, and creates the conditions for growth and performance in modern organizations.
Learn more at www.plllab.com.
Leadership Traits Decoded
Purpose Drives Performance - Decoding the Misunderstood Trait of Hunger & Drive
Is ambition always about climbing the ladder or can it be about mastering where you are?
In this episode of the #LeadershipTraitsDecoded Podcast, Cynthia Kiriazis and Drea Martin unpack the often misunderstood trait of hunger & drive - the internal ambition to achieve, improve, and push beyond expectations with relentless energy and proactive ownership.
They explore:
- Hunger/drive as a constant push for progress and self-fueled motivation
- Why a 50th percentile score means “average,” not failing — and why that’s often enough
- Vertical drive (pursuing advancement) vs. horizontal drive (mastering your current role)
- How personal purpose shapes the way hunger/drive shows up in leaders
- Why leaders should ask about their team’s passions to better understand motivation
- Why drive should be evaluated against role needs, not arbitrary standards.
The conversation highlights how personal purpose shapes drive, how leaders can better understand what motivates their teams, and why matching the right level of hunger and drive to the right role is essential for both satisfaction and performance.
Ready to explore your leadership traits? Connect with us on LinkedIn or visit www.plllab.com to see how we transform leadership intelligence into return-driven action.
Welcome to Leadership Traits Decoded. I'm Cynthia Kiriazis, Chief Experience Officer at the Culture Think Tank.
Drea Martin:And I'm Drea Martin, Product Owner of the Crucible. We are collaborative partners at Performance Leadership Learning Lab, where we transform leadership intelligence into return-driven action.
Cynthia Kyriazis:Today, we're unpacking the leadership traits essential for building, investing in and scaling successful companies. Our insights come directly from data-driven metrics within our platform's solution. So let's dive in Drea. How are you? Yeah, doing well. How are you? I'm good. I got several new little items in my office to make it more efficient and make it more streamlined, instead of feeling like I'm in the library somewhere. Oh, that's great. So I'm feeling pretty good yeah that's great Optimizing.
Cynthia Kyriazis:Love to hear it. And I sat down and I looked at our traits list and I wanted to go over something that I found somewhat intriguing as a title, so I'm hoping that our audience finds it that way also. And it is the trait of hunger slash drive. I would love to hear how you define it, what it's about, how it leads itself to challenge and non-challenge. The brains behind it go.
Drea Martin:Awesome. Yeah, hunger slash drive is an interesting one. It's really referring to that internal ambition to achieve, improve and push beyond expectations, in other words, kind of a relentless energy, which is interesting, because I know we have other traits in this one where I'll use the words and they'll all overlap a little bit, but I promise we'll try to be clear about how they're different. Hunger and drive is about the constant push for progress. It's proactive ownership, I'd say. It's like taking initiative without waiting for some permission or direction perhaps, and kind of this self-fueled motivation. What do you think about that? Does that resonate? Any questions on that definition?
Cynthia Kyriazis:No, I think I like the very first thing you said. I'm happy to hear about all three of them, but the proactive leadership, ownership, ownership, ownership. The proactive ownership is something that I think would be cool to expound upon, but so were the others.
Drea Martin:Cool, yeah, it's just really about action and momentum. I'd say hunger, slash, drive.
Cynthia Kyriazis:So hunger slash drive, action and momentum. But is it action and momentum to climb the corporate ladder or to get something that you think you can't get, or is it something that you feel is within your reach but you don't want to give up?
Drea Martin:That's a good question. I mean, I think there's aspects of it that apply to either of those. It depends what your goal is, but I'd say this hunger slash drive is this constant need or desire to continue, whether it's achieving or improving. So it can be applied to this corporate ladder aspect if that's an environment that you're in and you want more, and you want more and you'll keep going for more. Or if it's just a simple how you show up every day ready to take on whatever challenges come up and kind of keep going with this momentum that you're driving forward, with this internal ambition that you have.
Cynthia Kyriazis:Okay, I get it. The thought that cropped up for me is when you use the words hunger, slash, drive. To me it resonates with someone who wants to climb the corporate ladder, somebody who is looking to become a C-suite person, someone who is looking to become the CEO. It's this constantly upward momentum right to something they want that they're not in now. Is it also true, or can it be true, of individuals who have hunger and drive and are happy where they are, but have that hunger and drive to get the project to be the best it can be, to get the relationships with their team members to be the best it can be, to be the best player in that role without necessarily seeking to join the C-suite?
Drea Martin:It's a good question. I think that's interesting. That might be where you find people who are more middle tier, hunger, slash, drive, especially since our scores are percentiles right. So you'll find people probably around that 50th percentile, maybe that second third quartile so 25th to 75th that are maybe in that space of. They have hunger and drive. They want to improve processes, systems, make sure every project that they touch is the best. But if you don't have some of that push of like constant drive for more, I'd be surprised to see a score in that top quartile, so like above 75th percentile, because it means you have more hunger and drive than 75% of the people in our norm set, which means you're part of that population that wants and that's going to take and drive forward with that action and energy to get what they want.
Cynthia Kyriazis:So this now leads me to a question about what happens when you see someone, at whatever level in an organization and any type of organization, in the 50 percentile. What happens, or what feedback or what can be done with an individual, or does anything have to happen with that person? That's a great question what happens, or what feedback or what can be done with an individual, or does anything have to happen with that person? That's a great question what's the? Profile of that.
Drea Martin:Yeah and this is a common area actually that we face misconceptions, especially some of our partners, who will fall into a trap of seeing scores like executive search. They'll see a score that's 50th percentile and they'll think, oh, 50 out of 100, like terrible, when, if you think about it, it's a percentile score, which means a 50th percentile score means they score better than 50% of the people in the norm set. They are average or median is kind of the statistically correct where they fall. But it's an interesting thing because it's so easy to see some of these scores and feel like we're back in grade school where an A is good and a B is okay and everything below. That's something that needs fixed and that's not how percentiles work.
Drea Martin:So when you see a 50th percentile score in an area like hunger or drive, it's important to look at how necessary and this is with every trait, right, but it's how necessary or important is this trait to this person's situation?
Drea Martin:And then recognizing 50th percentile means they are totally fine. They're maybe not the person in the room you'd lean on for this, because somebody probably has a higher score, but they're sitting in that in-between where they're doing better than 50% and worse than 50%, or 49.9, so on and so forth. But they're in that in-between and it's a good moment to reflect and say does this person need more for what they're doing? And if so it's an area for development. And if they don't, then great, they have a healthy amount. But maybe it's not an area to focus on because they have enough. Meanwhile, if they're bottom quartile, I'd say give it attention, unless it's really unnecessary for a role. And if it's anything above 50th they're doing pretty well. So it's just about how much that person truly needs and how much their role and their organization and their group of people kind of necessitates them to step up in that area or not.
Cynthia Kyriazis:If I try to kind of assimilate what you've said, what comes up for me is someone can have a lower quartile or have a lower number, but if the amount of hunger and drive they have is helping them create and sustain a position that they excel in, but may not wish to go to an upper level, seek a promotion, maybe they're happy doing what they do and they do it very, very well, then their hunger and drive is healthy in terms of their perspective and what they need. They're driving for what they need and the organization is benefiting. Then there are the other individuals who have hunger and drive and want to climb some type of ladder, so to speak. Right, and they're giving their all as well. It's just the hunger and drive is driven by something a little different than what the first example I gave. Right, it's just different focuses, but the action of the hunger and drive is within it and maybe some passion, which we'll talk about in another episode. Now Do I have it close?
Drea Martin:Yeah, and it's an interesting one because it's like when we talk about leadership in general, leadership is important because everybody in an organization, no matter what level they're at, has leadership. But there are people who are in positions where they are in leadership roles, where they're managing other people and they're taking on more initiative, more opportunity, more strategy, more of kind of driving your organization in a certain direction. There's that distinction between the people who want to be that one leader in the room maybe managing the entire team versus the people who want to be members of leader in the room maybe managing the entire team versus the people who want to be members of a team and thrive within that structure but don't want that extra responsibility or accountability of being that one person. And it's tough.
Drea Martin:I actually was just talking with a friend about this yesterday because she works for a huge corporate organization and we were talking about how she's kind of bored right now with what she's doing and it's because she's that person who wants to be that top leader.
Drea Martin:She wants that seat and there's someone else in the seat above her. She is a manager and that manager has a manager and that manager has a manager and it means that her upward mobility in this organization isn't the way she wants it to be. Meanwhile, if she was in a small organization, maybe they wouldn't have those seats already developed or the company would grow and she'd be able to grow with it. And there's all of that opportunity that she craves, that some people don't crave Like. She has a coworker who is totally content, loves the work that they're doing, but she doesn't want to be or have that same responsibility that this friend of mine really wants. And that's the difference, I'd say, between that super high hunger and drive for this area and that could be, of course, different areas that they focus on or kind of mid-level hunger and drive. They're going to do their best, they're going to thrive in their work, but they're not sitting there thinking how do I get more, how do I achieve, how do I overachieve and excel further and further?
Cynthia Kyriazis:Okay. So that's interesting. I'll tell you one thing that it made me think about, yeah, is when you retire, when you make plans to retire, the thing that you hear repeatedly is well, you have to determine what your purpose is. What is your purpose, right? For years, this meant absolutely nothing to me. I didn't understand the word purpose until somebody said well, what are you good at and do you like doing it? Then do more of it. So when they reframed it for me that way, I was able to say oh yes, this is my purpose and I can go after that purpose because I have an emotional connection to it, right, right.
Cynthia Kyriazis:So for some people, their purpose may be their family, their family's education, their vacations, whatever that is, and their content with that. That is what drives them, because that is what they love, right? And for others, it's what drives them because that is what they love, and for others it's I'd like to climb the ladder, I'd like to see the world, I'd like to show what I can do for this organization about, you know, using my own skill sets. So for them it's a little different, but the hunger and drive is still there.
Drea Martin:Definitely. Goes back to what's your purpose for me Right.
Cynthia Kyriazis:That makes any sense to anybody listening, but for me that made sense. Thank you, that's interesting insight, and thank you for explaining something that I think is somewhat difficult to conceptualize until you start to hear a little bit of both sides of what that looks like and what that could be and what it is not. Right, right, do you have any one takeaway for this?
Drea Martin:Yeah, I think I mean I wouldn't be the role that I am if I didn't say that this notion of percentiles is really cool to learn about, and remembering that a 50th percentile score means someone is middle of the pack and that they're strong in that area already is something to remember. That'd be my make sure you understand that good takeaway to keep with you. But I think as a whole, it was definitely interesting to hear about, yeah, reconciling what hunger and drive means in part with what your actual goal is. What is that purpose? What is that thing that you strive for?
Cynthia Kyriazis:And I will kind of dovetail on that from a cultural aspect. One of the things that the feedback leaders get, one of the things is this communication that we've talked about communication and trust and I would just say recommend. I would just remind leaders. It might be interesting to ask those who are direct reports from time to time why do you do this? What is your passion? And then they say it's my family or it's my personal drama or whatever it is. It's not a trick question. It's we're trying to learn a little bit more about that person that works for you, learn a little bit more about their purpose and what they love, what they love to do.
Drea Martin:Definitely.
Cynthia Kyriazis:Okay, interesting insights on a somewhat challenging topic. Definitely yeah, okay.
Drea Martin:Well, thanks Andrea.
Cynthia Kyriazis:We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening to this episode of Leadership Traits Decoded. You'll be able to find all our episodes on the Performance Leadership Learning Lab website at wwwplllabcom, or you can listen on your favorite streaming platform.
Drea Martin:We'll be back soon to explore the next essential trait. Until then, feel free to connect with us on LinkedIn if you have any questions or ideas.
