August 13, 2025 • 34 mins
Do you realize how much greatness lies within you? In this episode, Kevin talks with Dave Durand about the mindset and virtues necessary for leading others effectively and ethically in today’s complex world. Dave describes the concept of giants, those we lead who have incredible potential, and stresses that leading them involves creating an environment that promotes autonomy, impact, and growth. He shares his four core virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance. He clarifies that these are not outdated ideals but timeless strengths that help leaders make better decisions, act fairly, demonstrate courage, and maintain self-control. They also discuss building a strong leadership pipeline, succession planning, and why the goal of any great leader should be to become irrelevant.
Listen For
00:00 Introduction and episode overview
01:10 Flexible leadership and guest introduction
03:10 Dave’s journey to leadership
05:01 Defining a giant
06:20 Leadership and influence
09:21 Four virtues as leadership superpowers
12:06 Prudence
13:53 Justice
15:13 Fortitude
17:29 Temperance
19:34 Building a deep bench
24:44 Why are we working overtime
27:44 Optimizing personality for leadership
30:06 What Dave does for fun
31:03 What Dave is reading
32:05 Final thoughts and encouragement
Dave's Story: Dave Durand is the author of Leading Giants: A Leader’s Guide to Maximum Influence. He is a 9-figure founder, keynote speaker, bestselling author, award-winning CEO of Leading Giants, and Executive Chairman of Best Version Media. He has over three decades of experience in leadership and entrepreneurship. He has built and sold multiple businesses, which have collectively done over one billion dollars in sales. Dave is also a trainer of over 150,000 individuals, ranging from Fortune 500 executives and CEOs to small business owners and sales representatives. His leadership culture and focus on humility have earned recognition from major organizations, including Glassdoor, Fortune, Great Place to Work, and Top Workplaces USA.
This Episode is brought to you by...
Flexible Leadership is every leader’s guide to greater success in a world of increasing complexity and chaos.
Book Recommendations
Like this?
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
The titleof this episode is Maximizing Influence,
which we will help you do,but I like to hope that you will find
like you find it most episodes here,that we will do much more than that.
So buckle up, grab a pen and paper
because there will be plenty of takeawaysfor you today.
If you are open to them.
Welcome to another episodeof the Remarkable Leadership Podcast,
(00:30):
where we arehelping leaders grow personally
and professionallyto lead more effectively
and make a bigger positive difference fortheir teams, organizations and the world.
If you are listening to this podcast,you could be with us live in the future
on your favorite social media platform.
You can find out where those
episodes will be, can be foundand when they will take place.
(00:51):
And so then you can join us to do that,you can join our Facebook
or LinkedIn groups
where you will get all of that info,plus some other occasional inside scoop.
Just go to remarkable podcast.com/facebook
or remarkable podcast.com/linkedinfor all of those details.
And whether you do thator not, it's important for you to know
(01:13):
that today's episode is brought to youby my latest book, Flexible Leadership.
Navigate Uncertaintyand Lead with Confidence.
It's timeto realize that styles can get in our way,
and that following our strengthsmight not always be the best approach.
In a world more complex and uncertainthan ever, leaders need a new perspective
and a new set of toolsto create the great results
(01:35):
that our organizationsand teams want and need.
And that's what flexibleleadership can provide for you.
Learn more and order your copy todayat Remarkable podcast.com/flexible.
And with thatI'm going to bring in my guest.
He is ready to go and I'll introduce himand then we'll dive in.
His name is Dave Doran. He is a six.
Excuse me.
(01:55):
He's a nine figure founder, a keynotespeaker,
a bestselling author,an award winning CEO of leading giants,
and the executive chairman of Bestthe Virgin Media.
He has over three decades of experiencein leading and entrepreneurship.
He has built and sold multiple businesses
which have collectively done over$1 billion in sales.
He's also the trainer of over150,000 individuals, ranging ranging
(02:18):
from fortune 100 executives and CEOsto small business owners and sales reps.
His leadership cultureand focus on humility
have earned recognition from majororganizations including Glassdoor,
fortune, A Great Place to Work,and Top Workplaces USA.
He recently releasedrecently released his new book, Leading
(02:39):
Giants A Leader'sGuide to Maximum Influence, which will be
the basis of our conversation today,at least to start with.
Dave, welcome.
So glad that you're here.
Hey, Kevin, it's great to be with you.
It is a pleasure indeed to have you.
And as you can see, I have read this book.
I've marked it upas I try to do for every episode.
And so I've got some stuffI want us to get to.
(03:00):
Maybe even Dave.
I'll ask you about some stuffthat no one else has asked you about.
But before we get there,
tell usa little bit more about your journey.
And here's what I mean.
Like, I gave the high level overviewalready, but the question that I would ask
is, is this where you are today?
And what you do is
probably not what you expected or thoughtwhen you were, I don't know, eight.
(03:23):
Right.
So like, tell us just a little bitabout how you end up in this spot.
Today.
Well, I, I grew up with some kind of,
like, heavy achievingolder brother and younger brother.
I'm one of five, but,you know, they were like, you know,
4.0 students and, all conferenceathletes.
(03:44):
And I was a good student,and I was an okay athlete.
But I really didn't reach my primein academics
or in athleticism until I was in college.
And one of the reasons for thatthat stands out is because when you're
a young person, you start to formwho you really think you are at that time.
So I don't really see myselfas a top performer at all.
(04:04):
But then I started to accomplishcertain things when I was in college.
And I started to realize, hey, wait,maybe there's something actually in there.
And at that point,
I also realized I'm a little bit differentthan the rest of my family
who are more inclinedto be like engineers.
And I had this entrepreneurial thingabout me.
And so I just kind of appliedthe whole concept of, wow, you know, what?
You can actually domore than you think you can do,
(04:26):
or at least according to what you thoughtwhen you were younger.
And if you have a placeto actually direct it,
you're going to get good things done.
But then, you know,the journey and path are so extensive.
And I have nine kids.I have nine grandkids.
And the things that you learn throughlife, just through all sorts of things
like that.
My relationship with Godhas been waived over time.
But, when that, becomes solidifiedin your life, too,
(04:48):
that gives you a particular lens
into what it is that you're doing andgives you a further meaning as well, too.
So it's a kind of a long journey in thatit's helped by it also means,
I think, the ability that you haveto provide, counsel of people.
Oh, I think that's for sure.
So one of the lenses that you useis actually the title of this book,
which is Leading Giants,which isn't the title of the show.
(05:10):
I took the subtitleto make the title of the show.
We'll get to that in a second.But I want to take this idea of giants.
You have a very specificmeaning for what you mean by that.
And you want us to think about that bothfor ourselves and for those that we lead.
So we should probably get thatout of the way.
What do you mean, Dave?
By a giant? Well,you can use a lot of words.
And of course, you havewhat I have there in the book.
(05:31):
But I think that the way that we have tolook at this is, is one of the ways
you can know something that's,you know what?
It's not and it is not like a nano.
It's not a person who thinks smalland small ways to do small things, but
it's a person who leads big in a big wayto lead big people to their greatest.
And so when you're going to do that
sort of thing,you basically have to begin by saying,
(05:51):
If I'm going to lead giants,I have to lead with the perspective
that this person I'm leadinghas a certain amount of potential,
and that's the potentialthat I'm here to maximize,
not necessarily my own,because that'll take care of itself.
But if I'm leading this organization, I'mgoing to lead giants.
They have they're going to have a big dietand they're going to need
a lot of room to roam, and they're goingto need to be like self agents.
(06:14):
And so I have to providethat environment to them and to allow them
to do great things.
One of the things
back to the to the stated end goalor topic of the show around influence.
One of the things you say, and I think it's even in the introduction,
I'm just going to read itbecause I think I can find it instantly.
To a large degree, the words leadershipand influence are interchangeable.
(06:37):
I completely agree,
but I want you to tell us why you say thatand what you mean by that.
So if you're going to leadsomebody, you're going to lead them
for the purpose of influencing them.
I mean, you know, a lot of peopledon't understand leadership.
And the most basic level, if you were tosay to somebody what makes a great leader?
Most people are going to say things like,well, somebody is not a hypocrite.
(06:58):
Somebody that is a servant.
Oh, they're going to say these thingsthat they're good.
There's no there's not that they're wrong.
But that's not ultimately it.
What makes a great leader,
a great leader is that they take a personwhere they need and want to go.
At the end of the day.
Give me a
pilot who is maybe a little bit rudeand crass,
but safely takes me to the destinationI desire every time.
(07:22):
And that is better than a really nice guybehind
the oak who's going to crash a planeor take me to the wrong place.
Now, all things equal,I want a really nice person
flying the airplanethat takes me where I'm supposed to go.
So that ultimately is the end ofthe story, is that leadership influences.
It says, here's a destination.
I think this destination is good for you.
It's good for the organization.
(07:42):
We're all going to go there together,and you can either be a good influence
or a bad influence.
And the reason that I saythat it's by and large
the same thing is it'snot exactly the same thing.
There's a lot of influencers
online who literally havethey don't make consequential decisions.
They're not literally influencers.
In fact, it's a funny name that we sayinfluencer online.
It's more like a marketer onlinethan it is an influencer.
(08:05):
And yeah, and so I think it'sreally important for a person to be able
to say, if you're leading somebody,you actually have skin in the game.
There's a there's a consequence to thedecisions you're actually going to make.
And that's true leadership.
It's not somebody who's just going to likewhimsically say, hey, I think we should
all like, you know, rally after this causeand not be steeped into it
or to be saying something just thinkis popular at the time.
(08:27):
That's going to get him ratings,
but not constructing somethingactually real of goodness.
And then selling to Kevin is like,
I'm not willing to train peoplehow to maximize their bad influence.
There'sgood influence and there's bad influence.
I'm willing to help people influencepeople the right way for the right cause.
And somebody might say,well, it's a little arrogant, Dave,
(08:48):
for you to be the one who tells me that,but it's not me.
We all understand that there is goodnessand there is other.
And if a person disagrees on what is goodcompared to something else,
it is usually malformation that gets themthere, or a lack of understanding.
And with further explanationfor their understanding.
We're all pretty collectivelygoing to be together.
(09:09):
Like, you know, hey, leadingpeople to murder is a bad idea, okay?
But a just war might not be a bad wayto save your country.
So, you know,these are generally universally understood
things that nobody's going to debate.
So one of the things
I don't want you to take this wrong,and I don't think you will.
But you talk about this book is largely
(09:30):
based on the idea of being, virtuebased leadership.
Lots of books written about skill basedleadership, behavior based leadership.
And these three words are connected.
But you specifically talk about virtues,and you talk about four of them
as superpowers.
Yes. And, and I want tohave you unpack them in a second.
But here's here's the thingthat I don't want you to take wrong,
like these four things, everybody
(09:51):
that you're about to hear about thatthey've called superpowers,
are not the kinds of thingsyou would normally hear on a podcast.
They are not the kinds of
words or virtues that
are in vogue,at least not the words that you've chosen.
And so I'm opening withthat meant as a compliment, right?
(10:15):
Because I think one of the thingsthat we're completely together on is that
the world is changing,
and we as leaders must understandthose changes and adapt and adjust.
And I would say flex.
And yet most of leadershipisn't and hasn't changed.
And I think these four superpowerspoint to that fact.
So, I'm just going to let you
(10:36):
I've got for those watching,I'll put them on the bottom of the screen.
Dave, but just talk about thesefour things briefly to give people
a sense of whereyou where you stand on these things
and how they can be valuableto the rest of us.
So they're very valuable,in two different ways.
I'll name them in a moment.One way that they're valuables.
(10:59):
Almost like if you know, Kevin,you've had, like, a dial on your car.
Dash. And you didn't know what it was.
And some of these,you're always looking for certain things.
Okay? It's right there.
And just the discovery of it,
the knowledge that it's theremakes it very accessible and usable.
Yeah, these are that way for some people.
Just like, wait, I hadn't thought of that.I'm going to apply that.
But then other times though,it's a little bit
(11:20):
more complex, like,hey, there's an app for that cab.
So you open up the app and you're like,you know what?
I need training on how to use it.
So these very things sometimescome a little bit more obvious
and then sometimes more training.Another is old is dirt.
Aristotle talked about them, and they're the cardinal virtues.
The word cardinal is actually a Latin termfor hinge, meaning that
the rest of the virtueshinge upon them, and they are.
(11:43):
They're in vogue by way of practice,but not intentional.
And that's what I help people to do,is to make these things intentional.
Right? Yeah.
So nobody would ever say,
what I love about workingthere is nobody can make a decision
to save their life, right?
Nobody would ever say, what I love aboutworking there is everybody is a quitter.
They wouldn't say.
What I love about workingthere is that they were totally unfair
(12:03):
and nobody has self-control.
Well, the opposite of these thingsare the cardinal virtues.
Prudence also calls it calledwisdom is the mastery of decision making.
And. Okay, have you ever had somebody sayto you, something that was like,
frustrating, especially when you're young,you didn't know how to do it?
I couldn't stand it when people say, Dave,you need to believe to achieve.
When I was young, man, I was like,but I don't.
And like, you know, like.
(12:25):
Thank you for playing.I don't know what to do with that. Right?
Yeah. Whatever. Like.
You know, grunt harder and believeI still don't.
So how do you do it?
So if somebody says to you
you need to make better decisions, butthey don't tell you how that's difficult.
But the cardinal virtuesand the understanding of prudence
is actually a lesson for that.
There are three simple steps.
Desire what is good.
Because if you don't desire what's good inany circumstance, you can't get it done.
(12:47):
Do you know what's good at workor what's good in your marriage?
If you don't say what's goodwhen you get in the car to drive?
Or in fact,
if your Uber driver doesn't desirewhat's good, you don't want them around.
You have to know what's real.And this is where most people mess up.
They have a difficult timejudging circumstances.
And that's the second step to prudence.
But you have to make a judgment. Yes.
And in order to do that, we have to getrid of the bias that we have
in our mind, or the self-justification,which is super powerful motivator.
(13:11):
And the last thing we have to do if we'remaking good decisions is act on them.
And that's how,you know, if you're around a person
who's practice prudenceis, they have a shrewdness about them
where they can actually act pretty quicklyonce they've made the decision,
and they measure the speed of the decisionto the way to the issue,
whereas an imprudent person is going to belike at the work day, you're like, hey,
you know, want to have some lunchor the like, how or where should we go?
And they take 20 minutesto think about where to go.
(13:31):
And then they get there
and they think about 15 minutesabout what they're going to eat.
And as opposed to like, you know,what's a workday?
Let's just eat this and go.
That very person who, who makes the longterm decision to eat lunch
will whimsically buy a car on the weekendwithout giving it any thought.
So it's like you have to measure
the speed of the decisionto the weight of the issue.
And that's really what prudence is.
The second of the four is justice.
(13:54):
Yeah. Talk about justice.
Well, you'd say that we're talking today.
Yeah.
You can't bejust if you don't have prudence
and the cool thing about thisis that these things build.
So if you know a person who,doesn't really have a sense of justice,
you can almost tie it back to the factthat they have no prudence.
Now, we have kind of thesesubjective virtues within things,
which means that you might be a personwho has self-control
(14:15):
when it comes to not eating ice cream,but not self-control to something else.
Right?
So there's kind of this like, sub,
you know, really a subjective applicationto some of them.
But by and large, you can't have justiceif you don't have prudence.
So that is to give each their due portion.
If you imagine having a judge,you're sitting there and being tried
and you know you're innocentand the judge is about you to,
(14:36):
you know, they don't they don't careabout what's good in the circumstance.
They don't know what's real,and they're not going to act on good.
Those arethe things that make up prudence.
How can they possibly provideyou a just measure?
And so that's
why it's important that we build prudenceso that the person understands justice.
Which
leads to as we're buildingthese up, these superpowers.
(14:58):
The next one is fortitude.
Yeah.
And, you mentioned in passing earlier
that we that none of uswant the opposite of this.
And yet I don't think this word likethe others gets used enough.
No, like, as I was reading this, I'm like,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Why don't I use the word fortitude more?
Because I think it's just so powerful.
(15:18):
So talk to us about what you mean here.
Well,I think the reason we don't use it is
because we have the words that actuallykind of mean it, and they're pretty good
that way, like courage or stickto liveness, these different things.
The problem is though, when we use themthese other terms is
we don't use what would be consideredlike a regulator on them.
So most people have to understandthat virtues are on a bit of a spectrum.
(15:41):
And you need to optimize them just likeyou need to optimize your personality.
In fact, it'sone of the things I talk about a lot.
And so what does that mean if you have twoif you have like this,
what would be perceivedas an excessive fortitude or bravery?
It's kind of nuttiness.It's crazy actually.
So if you were like a, you know,
27 yearold guy who's married with two kids
(16:02):
and has a lot of responsibilities in life,you've been mildly uncoordinated
your entire life.
And you decide one weekendyou saw base jumping video.
You want to start base jumping, okay,that's jumping off a cliff at a low level.
And then, you know, having a shootcome out.
Well, that's not a lot of people go, wow,what courage.
What? That's not that's craziness.
Why is it crazy?
It's crazy because you're probably goingto get killed.
(16:23):
It's audacious.
It would be completely unjust
to leave your wife widowed and your kidsto be orphaned because of that.
And you don't desire clearly at allwhat's good in this circumstance?
You certainly don't know what's real,you uncoordinated idiot.
And you're going to act upon somethingthat's poorly justified.
But that's not about base jumping.
I mean, if you're, you know, 21 years old,you're very coordinated.
(16:43):
You've taken a lot of risks,and you're kind of a daredevil.
And Red bull is going to give youa $2 million sponsorship.
You don't have kids. Go for it. Sure.
Or if you're 85 years oldand all your affairs in order,
I mean, the grandkidswould probably think it's cool
to watch grandpa go out that way.
So it's not about base jumping, it'sabout where that fits into the prudence
and the justicerelated to the circumstance.
(17:05):
And that's what I would calllook at our context. Right.
When you talk about, knowing what's real,
likewhat's the context really not like what
you want it to be, but like,what's really happening here?
And often that we try to treat thingsas if it's clearer than it really is.
There's more uncertainty and complexitythan we might want to.
(17:25):
Right. Yeah.
The fourth of the four thingsis temperance.
Yes. Temperance for just a second.
Well, so if you have,
prudence, you desire what's good,you know what's real.
You act uponwhat's good, you have justice and fairness
and you have fortitude,but you lack the last thing
you can take yourself out of the game.
So we have seen people who build greatcareers,
(17:47):
have lots of success, even buildgood relationships.
But you know what?
She looks pretty hot over there.
Oh, no, no, no, you're a married manand that is a resistance you need to have.
That is it.
You have to temper that temptation, okay?
By having the resistance of it.
Or you know what,
you're about to have a heart attackand you need a certain diet because of it,
(18:09):
and you just can't resist the foodthat's going to kill you.
We need to have temperance.
There's that one thing
that you just want to say to this person,but you have to hold your tongue.
So we've all had the experience of nottelling somebody to go stick it right.
And sometimes we have the experiencemaybe telling somebody that
and it was unjustifiedor maybe justified at a certain time,
but we misplayed it. Why?
(18:31):
Because we had temperance.
We paused for a moment,we thought about it
and we use our self-control.
So it's very important thing to have.
And it basically tops the things off.
Now, the great thing about it, Kevin,is that if you are practicing
prudence, justice and fortitude,you are so strongly inclined
to naturally have temperancethat it's going to be likely.
(18:52):
But if you're not doing those things,you're going to have, like I said,
the subjective virtue of temperance,which is to say,
I'm very disciplinedin what I do for my body
because I want to have a beach body,
but I'm not very disciplinedin my relationship.
Okay, well, that's
not really.
Situational temperance, is it? Well,it's really it.
It is. Yeah.
So I found myselfI am talking everyone with
(19:14):
if you just came in late for some reason,Dave Duran, the author of,
among other things, of the new bookLeading Giants A Leader's Guide
to Maximum Influence, and we're talkingabout some of the ideas in the book.
And, Dave,
one of the things that you talk abouta good bit,
and I know it's one of the thingsthat you like to talk about, is the idea
of, as a leader in an organization,building a deep bench.
(19:35):
And I'm sure youyou hear this all the time when you're
working with clients and coaching leadersthat people are talking about succession
planning and having a benchand worrying about losing a key person.
And I love that in this bookyou spend some time
talking about building a deep bench.
What are a couple of thingsthat maybe people
(19:56):
don't think aboutor don't connect with the idea of having,
a lot of strength on the benchthat we ought to talk about.
Well, I think what happens is thatthey're building for the short term.
So, when I build things,I want them to be around, and,
you know, I've started a lot of companies,but, you know, I the companies
that I started for the most part,unless they were just a one off, you know,
(20:18):
small consulting companywhere I was the only consultant in it.
And I wrapped up the phase of that.
If I started a business, it's,for the most part, still in existence.
Most of them are, once I got past MVP.
Okay.
And the only way that was possible was onday one to say, how do I replace myself?
And my goal always when I builda business is to make myself as irrelevant
(20:40):
as I can possibly be,as swiftly as I can possibly be
irrelevant, so that it's not builton a cult of personality.
So when you have a leaderthat says something
like, well,if I left, everyone would leave.
Well, that's a bad leader.
In fact, that's not a reallythat's not a leader you should follow.
And a lot of timesyou'll have like a mid-level manager
in your organization or a vice president
if you're a president or CEO,and they'll kind of allude that to you.
Well,you know, if I left, everybody leave.
(21:01):
I literally if somebody on my teamever said that, I did.
And leave now
because you have built the worst teamin your department
that you could possibly build if you left,if everybody else would leave,
that means that they are herein a cult of personality.
They're not here for their own reasons,their own motives or the overall mission.
They're here because of you.
That's just a bad idea.
So immediatelyyou have to start to say to yourself,
how do I make myself irrelevant?
(21:22):
But our pride gets in the way.
Generally speaking, we're like, well,I want to believe that I'm so important
that if I weren't here,this couldn't work out.
I want to feel that importance.
And if we can just free ourselvesfrom that idea and build something
to last by empowering the other peoplein the organization, I.
Kevin, I almost look at itas kind of like hogging.
So I think you would have read thisin the story,
(21:44):
but I remember when I was like maybe21 or 20, I don't remember how early 20s
there was a guy who I worked withwho was about,
I don't know how many years my senior, andhe he said, what'd you do this weekend?
I said, I mowed my lawn,
and he said, I can'tyou don't seem like that kind of guy.
And I said, what do you mean?
He goes, well,you don't seem like the kind of guy
who would steal from the neighbor kidor your family.
So what are you talking about?
(22:05):
And he goes, well,if you're not paying the neighbor kid
20 bucks to mow your lawn,
you're stealing the 20 bucks from himthat he should have gotten.
And if you're not spending
that time with your kids,then you're stealing the time from them.
So why don't you pay the neighbor kid20 bucks,
give him the job that he could have,and be irrelevant there.
But go be relevantwhere you should be with your family.
By the way,there's a lot of wisdom in that.
(22:25):
It's certainly flawed in certain degrees.
I mean, it's kind of catharticto mow your lawn, and it's not.
Like if you like to mow your lawn.
Not only that, it's not bad for your kidsto see you doing that type of work.
But but the essence of the storythat he gave,
while I continue to enjoy mowing my lawn,was something that I did not forget.
Okay.
And and it really appliesto what happens in the workplace.
(22:46):
So I look at a lot of CEOshog their spot for way too long.
And and they just, you know, they're,they're blocking opportunities
for people to, to have, advancementopportunities, the organization.
Maybe it's because this is the only thingthey've ever built in their life,
and they don't knowif they're going to build something else.
And for that reason, maybe it's not a badidea to stick around a little bit longer.
(23:08):
I mean, we all have a choice to do that,especially for entrepreneurs.
But, it should be carefully considered,
because the the better offyou're doing it something,
the quicker you are to be replacedin fact, this is another way I'd say it.
The bigger you build an organization orthe the higher you rise an organization,
the greater your responsibility,but the less your responsibility is.
(23:31):
And so as a result of that,if you have less responsibilities
but a greater responsibility,
it does give you a little bit moretime to mentor somebody.
And to shiftsome of that responsibility to them.
Yeah.
Agreed.
I agree with that.
And so what I want to do is I'm lookingat the time that we've got left
and I know, I already know, like, well,maybe this is ego.
(23:55):
Everybody, like, I always feel likeif I'm really loving this, that probably
all of the, all of the listeners are,which I suppose could be incorrect.
But I'm confidentthat we could spend a long time
and I've lots of stuffthat we could talk about.
I really wanted to getto the four habits in the book,
but I'm just going to tell people, listen,you got to get a copy of the book
Leading Giants by Dave Duran,and then he can tell you all about
(24:17):
you can read all about the four habitsI want to talk about.
One of the thingwhere we are completely in alignment.
Okay.
Which in your book you talk about is, why are we working overtime?
Yeah, we are in complete alignmentabout this, in so many ways.
But let's talk about this
because there are so many leaders,whether you're an entrepreneur,
whether you're a manager
in the middle of the organization,doesn't matter where we feel like,
(24:42):
the more time we put in, the more valuablewe become.
Let's talk about time a little bit.
So most people that are stuck onthis have a false virtue.
They are justifying themselves by workinga lot because they hear no pain, no gain.
You've got a sacrifice.But let's just look at it logically.
And just because everybody always talksabout Elon, by the way,
not politically right now,but they talk about Elon
(25:02):
because of how many businesses he's builtthat are massive. Right.
And that he's the CEO of simultaneously.
Well, if time were the way thathe accomplished that, he could only be,
you know, three times more effectivethan a person that works eight hours a day
because there's 24 hours of working,
which is physically impossiblefor human beings.
So he's got to be doing something else.
And certainly he's intelligent,but he uses leverage.
(25:24):
And that's what influence is.
Influence is to say that the very thingthat I'm trying to influence
right now,I need to delegate to somebody else. Why?
Because I don't want to lead a normal.I want to lead a giant.
So if I'm going to be effective, I'mgoing to stop and think,
what is it that I'm doing thatsomebody else could do right now?
And how could I give them the authoritythat I have to make that happen to now
basically have a shockwave of influenceand other people.
(25:47):
But as long as we start thinkingto ourselves, well, gosh, you know,
it's a badge of honor for most people.
It is a false virtue.
It's like, oh, I work so much.
And like, you know, that's how I justify.
But people say to me all the time, hey,I know you're so busy.
So, I mean.
I'm at home for dinner, like 430while I'm building the company
to hundreds of millions of dollarsin sales.
And why?
(26:07):
Well,because everything that I could have done
when I stayed later,I just made sure somebody else could do.
And by the way, just this important point,because I've been criticized.
Oh, is the CEO you went home like that?
Everybody elsemust listen in any of my companies.
If you were there past 430,you were burning the midnight oil.
I mean,
I did not build a culture for peoplethat way.
It was a work.
When you want, where you want, wheneveryou want culture with no limited vacation
(26:30):
time, it was you have a job to do,get that job done.
That was it.
That was how we did it.
And so some people were really efficientwith that.
Some people took a little bit longer,but I was like, listen, something
I'm never, ever going to ask you to dois to lay down or sacrifice
your family or your faithor your health for this business.
Those things come first.
(26:51):
Now, at the same time,
hard work heals family relationshipsand physical health and finances.
So it's a part of the solution,not the problem.
So don't look atas an enemy of those things.
But let's not miss prioritize it.
I've been sayingfor years that busy is the most dangerous
four letter word in the English languagebecause it's focused on the wrong thing,
which is another way of sayingwhat you're saying.
Let's focus on what we need to accomplish.
(27:13):
Yeah, what about the timethat's taking us to accomplish it?
I love your point about it.
You know, if itif you only look at it on an hour basis,
the most some anyone could be compared tosomeone else is three times better.
And we know that that's really notthat's a that's a really limiting thought.
I want to shift gears for a second.
(27:34):
Well before it before we do that,let me ask you one other question.
Is there somethingwe didn't talk about day
that you really hopedwe would, or that's come up in your head
as we've been talkingthat you'd like to share?
Well, I have been working on somethingthat's a culmination of 35 years
worth of, of this sort of journeyand have, you know this right?
When you've consulted with people,they say to you that, well,
(27:57):
you know what, things aren't working herebecause our marketing plan is off.
Our finances were off, we couldn'tget product, our production was off.
We couldn't get investors and the economywas off, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Yeah. Very true.
For most of the thingsthere's there's a component of those,
but almost every one of those thingsis tied back to the person.
You can't get the financingbecause nobody trusts you.
(28:17):
Your marketing plan isn't working
because you won't look at statisticsand data accurately.
You self justify everything.
The reasonpeople don't like you as a leader
is because you're talkingtoo much, or whatever it might be.
So we would be able to sayabout everybody in their life,
I like them,but I wish they were a little bit more.
Well, I like them,but I wish they were a little less.
(28:37):
And if we're honest,
we have to be able to say the same thingabout ourselves,
because everybody in our lifecould say that same thing about us to
for sure, whatever that more or less thingis, is a part of our personality.
So I'm building a program to optimizepersonality, to help people more, more.
I know it sounds bold,
okay, but we're building a toolthat I really believe
is the most powerful tool ever builtto help people optimize their personality.
(28:59):
Because it it takes a very, very complexlook at it in order to
diagnose the circumstance which providesthe deficiency that they have.
The suboptimal deficiencyor the suboptimal excess,
like we talked about with braveryor cowardice. Right.
You really need fortitude instead.
And how to pinpoint itand what prevents them
(29:19):
from being able to do itso they can build that,
as a character traitor a personality trait.
And so that's something people build
by the time they actually comes out on apodcast. I think that tool will be ready.
And where will they be able to find it?
They will be able to find that online.
And I'm going to have to give that to youas a note so that when that is available,
We'll make sure we get it in the shownotes.
(29:40):
I love. That.
The bleeding edge and not seriously, Dave,you get it to us, that to us.
We'll make sure we get it in the shownotes for the show, whether it's available
when the show first comes out or whateverit is.
We'll make sure that we do that.
I've got a couple other things for usbefore we wrap up.
Dave, I want to know,it's very clear that you love your work.
It's very clearthat you care about the work that you do.
(30:02):
And I'm curious what you do for fun.
Oh my goodness.
Well, because I have nine kids,nine grandkids.
Most of my kids are married.
Just had two daughters, graduatelast night.
Familytakes up an enormous amount of time,
but we also just love to dolots of different things.
Like,you know, I'm an old man now. I'm 56.
And so when it comes toI was a martial artist,
(30:24):
throughout most of my life,but now I'm just kind of an older one.
But I still do that.I still dabble around a little bit.
I, I'm a I'm, I'm about dangerous enoughthat I could take on a toddler
pretty safely. Outside of that, though,
I'm probably going to get injured,but I still enjoy it.
You know, as a family, we ski, we get outhere, out on the beach as well too.
So a lot of a lot of a lot of good times.
And, I love to read, too.
(30:45):
And my,
my faith is important to me too,which is not a hobby,
but it is something that I spend my timewith because it's important.
And ultimately speaking,at the end of the day,
retiring isn't just about pickleball,but it's about the eternal retirement
that we have.
And I want to spend some timeinvesting in that too.
I love that.
So you mentioned reading.
You knewI was going to ask you this question.
What are you reading these days?
I read a lot of books,usually simultaneously.
(31:07):
I go back to some good classicslike, ethics.
You know, I'll always dive back into,you know, some sort of,
Aristotelian or a platonic, type of reading.
At the same time.
I'll read some more contemporarypeople, too,
you know, some good classics,like Daniel Kahneman's work,
if you know anything about that,you know, thinking fast and slow and,
(31:30):
many different types of things,like that.
And I usually have about,
I don't know,
5 to 7 books that I'm readingsimultaneously that I'll churn through in
about a 2 or 3 month period of timeand, enjoy that.
We'll have thinking fast and slowin the show notes, as well as, links to
(31:53):
Dave's new book, Leading Giants MaximizingAI Leaders Guide to Maximum Influence.
So, anything else that youany place else, you want to point us
or tell us about what you're up tobefore we go.
Now, you know, I'm just doing the grind,and enjoying every single day of it.
There's a lot that,we can all give to the world.
(32:14):
And I want to try to do two thingssimultaneously, provide
whatever I can to influenceanybody I can for the better.
But also, really, I want to help themdo the same thing, too, because most
people, Kev, as you know, don't knowhow much greatness they have in them.
A lot of people think that pride isthe biggest problem with the world today,
and there's an enormous amount of pride.That is very true.
(32:35):
But there's a lot of people right nowwho have been basically given a false,
understanding of themselves
to believe that they don'thave the self agency to become great.
And every one of us is to,
at least to our own vocational calling,meant to be great within that.
That doesn't mean great the same way.
We're not all going to be,
you know, famous athletes and, you know,actors and actresses and politicians.
(33:00):
But in her own way,like my second grade teacher,
who I believe is one of the all timegreat people out there in the world,
but nobody's going to know her name verymuch outside of her, a little influence.
She is a tremendously great person,as is my mother
and father and, and, and,and we have that in this.
But it takes discipline.
It takes hard workand a commitment to do it.
(33:21):
So before I thank Daveand we finish up the show, I'm going to do
what I do for all of you listeningand watching every single episode.
I ask you this two wordvery important question.
Now what what are you going to dowith what you just learned?
Maybe, you learned something about
are asking yourselfif you're hogging your spot.
Maybe you learned somethingabout the industry
and responsibility and responsibilities.
(33:42):
Maybe I don't know what it was for you.
My question isn't, my point is not to tell you what to take.
My question is for you to decidewhat you're going to take
and what you're going to act onas a result of being here,
because if you don't take action,it won't have made any difference.
(34:03):
And so I hope that you will do that.
And, so, Dave,thank you so much for being here.
Is a pleasure to have you.Thanks for being for joining me.
Kevin, thanks so much for having me out.
And everybody,if you enjoyed this, tell somebody else.
And if you enjoyed this,make sure you're subscribed
so you don't miss any episodesbecause we'll be back next week.
Guess what? Next week, episode number 500.
We'll see you then.
(34:23):
Have a great day.
And remember,as always, you are a remarkable leader.
The titleof this episode is Maximizing Influence,
which we will help you do,but I like to hope that you will find
like you find it most episodes here,that we will do much more than that.
So buckle up, grab a pen and paper
because there will be plenty of takeawaysfor you today.
If you are open to them.
Welcome to another episodeof the Remarkable Leadership Podcast,
(00:30):
where we arehelping leaders grow personally
and professionallyto lead more effectively
and make a bigger positive difference fortheir teams, organizations and the world.
If you are listening to this podcast,you could be with us live in the future
on your favorite social media platform.
You can find out where those
episodes will be, can be foundand when they will take place.
(00:51):
And so then you can join us to do that,you can join our Facebook
or LinkedIn groups
where you will get all of that info,plus some other occasional inside scoop.
Just go to remarkable podcast.com/facebook
or remarkable podcast.com/linkedinfor all of those details.
And whether you do thator not, it's important for you to know
(01:13):
that today's episode is brought to youby my latest book, Flexible Leadership.
Navigate Uncertaintyand Lead with Confidence.
It's timeto realize that styles can get in our way,
and that following our strengthsmight not always be the best approach.
In a world more complex and uncertainthan ever, leaders need a new perspective
and a new set of toolsto create the great results
(01:35):
that our organizationsand teams want and need.
And that's what flexibleleadership can provide for you.
Learn more and order your copy todayat Remarkable podcast.com/flexible.
And with thatI'm going to bring in my guest.
He is ready to go and I'll introduce himand then we'll dive in.
His name is Dave Doran. He is a six.
Excuse me.
(01:55):
He's a nine figure founder, a keynotespeaker,
a bestselling author,an award winning CEO of leading giants,
and the executive chairman of Bestthe Virgin Media.
He has over three decades of experiencein leading and entrepreneurship.
He has built and sold multiple businesses
which have collectively done over$1 billion in sales.
He's also the trainer of over150,000 individuals, ranging ranging
(02:18):
from fortune 100 executives and CEOsto small business owners and sales reps.
His leadership cultureand focus on humility
have earned recognition from majororganizations including Glassdoor,
fortune, A Great Place to Work,and Top Workplaces USA.
He recently releasedrecently released his new book, Leading
(02:39):
Giants A Leader'sGuide to Maximum Influence, which will be
the basis of our conversation today,at least to start with.
Dave, welcome.
So glad that you're here.
Hey, Kevin, it's great to be with you.
It is a pleasure indeed to have you.
And as you can see, I have read this book.
I've marked it upas I try to do for every episode.
And so I've got some stuffI want us to get to.
(03:00):
Maybe even Dave.
I'll ask you about some stuffthat no one else has asked you about.
But before we get there,
tell usa little bit more about your journey.
And here's what I mean.
Like, I gave the high level overviewalready, but the question that I would ask
is, is this where you are today?
And what you do is
probably not what you expected or thoughtwhen you were, I don't know, eight.
(03:23):
Right.
So like, tell us just a little bitabout how you end up in this spot.
Today.
Well, I, I grew up with some kind of,
like, heavy achievingolder brother and younger brother.
I'm one of five, but,you know, they were like, you know,
4.0 students and, all conferenceathletes.
(03:44):
And I was a good student,and I was an okay athlete.
But I really didn't reach my primein academics
or in athleticism until I was in college.
And one of the reasons for thatthat stands out is because when you're
a young person, you start to formwho you really think you are at that time.
So I don't really see myselfas a top performer at all.
(04:04):
But then I started to accomplishcertain things when I was in college.
And I started to realize, hey, wait,maybe there's something actually in there.
And at that point,
I also realized I'm a little bit differentthan the rest of my family
who are more inclinedto be like engineers.
And I had this entrepreneurial thingabout me.
And so I just kind of appliedthe whole concept of, wow, you know, what?
You can actually domore than you think you can do,
(04:26):
or at least according to what you thoughtwhen you were younger.
And if you have a placeto actually direct it,
you're going to get good things done.
But then, you know,the journey and path are so extensive.
And I have nine kids.I have nine grandkids.
And the things that you learn throughlife, just through all sorts of things
like that.
My relationship with Godhas been waived over time.
But, when that, becomes solidifiedin your life, too,
(04:48):
that gives you a particular lens
into what it is that you're doing andgives you a further meaning as well, too.
So it's a kind of a long journey in thatit's helped by it also means,
I think, the ability that you haveto provide, counsel of people.
Oh, I think that's for sure.
So one of the lenses that you useis actually the title of this book,
which is Leading Giants,which isn't the title of the show.
(05:10):
I took the subtitleto make the title of the show.
We'll get to that in a second.But I want to take this idea of giants.
You have a very specificmeaning for what you mean by that.
And you want us to think about that bothfor ourselves and for those that we lead.
So we should probably get thatout of the way.
What do you mean, Dave?
By a giant? Well,you can use a lot of words.
And of course, you havewhat I have there in the book.
(05:31):
But I think that the way that we have tolook at this is, is one of the ways
you can know something that's,you know what?
It's not and it is not like a nano.
It's not a person who thinks smalland small ways to do small things, but
it's a person who leads big in a big wayto lead big people to their greatest.
And so when you're going to do that
sort of thing,you basically have to begin by saying,
(05:51):
If I'm going to lead giants,I have to lead with the perspective
that this person I'm leadinghas a certain amount of potential,
and that's the potentialthat I'm here to maximize,
not necessarily my own,because that'll take care of itself.
But if I'm leading this organization, I'mgoing to lead giants.
They have they're going to have a big dietand they're going to need
a lot of room to roam, and they're goingto need to be like self agents.
(06:14):
And so I have to providethat environment to them and to allow them
to do great things.
One of the things
back to the to the stated end goalor topic of the show around influence.
One of the things you say, and I think it's even in the introduction,
I'm just going to read itbecause I think I can find it instantly.
To a large degree, the words leadershipand influence are interchangeable.
(06:37):
I completely agree,
but I want you to tell us why you say thatand what you mean by that.
So if you're going to leadsomebody, you're going to lead them
for the purpose of influencing them.
I mean, you know, a lot of peopledon't understand leadership.
And the most basic level, if you were tosay to somebody what makes a great leader?
Most people are going to say things like,well, somebody is not a hypocrite.
(06:58):
Somebody that is a servant.
Oh, they're going to say these thingsthat they're good.
There's no there's not that they're wrong.
But that's not ultimately it.
What makes a great leader,
a great leader is that they take a personwhere they need and want to go.
At the end of the day.
Give me a
pilot who is maybe a little bit rudeand crass,
but safely takes me to the destinationI desire every time.
(07:22):
And that is better than a really nice guybehind
the oak who's going to crash a planeor take me to the wrong place.
Now, all things equal,I want a really nice person
flying the airplanethat takes me where I'm supposed to go.
So that ultimately is the end ofthe story, is that leadership influences.
It says, here's a destination.
I think this destination is good for you.
It's good for the organization.
(07:42):
We're all going to go there together,and you can either be a good influence
or a bad influence.
And the reason that I saythat it's by and large
the same thing is it'snot exactly the same thing.
There's a lot of influencers
online who literally havethey don't make consequential decisions.
They're not literally influencers.
In fact, it's a funny name that we sayinfluencer online.
It's more like a marketer onlinethan it is an influencer.
(08:05):
And yeah, and so I think it'sreally important for a person to be able
to say, if you're leading somebody,you actually have skin in the game.
There's a there's a consequence to thedecisions you're actually going to make.
And that's true leadership.
It's not somebody who's just going to likewhimsically say, hey, I think we should
all like, you know, rally after this causeand not be steeped into it
or to be saying something just thinkis popular at the time.
(08:27):
That's going to get him ratings,
but not constructing somethingactually real of goodness.
And then selling to Kevin is like,
I'm not willing to train peoplehow to maximize their bad influence.
There'sgood influence and there's bad influence.
I'm willing to help people influencepeople the right way for the right cause.
And somebody might say,well, it's a little arrogant, Dave,
(08:48):
for you to be the one who tells me that,but it's not me.
We all understand that there is goodnessand there is other.
And if a person disagrees on what is goodcompared to something else,
it is usually malformation that gets themthere, or a lack of understanding.
And with further explanationfor their understanding.
We're all pretty collectivelygoing to be together.
(09:09):
Like, you know, hey, leadingpeople to murder is a bad idea, okay?
But a just war might not be a bad wayto save your country.
So, you know,these are generally universally understood
things that nobody's going to debate.
So one of the things
I don't want you to take this wrong,and I don't think you will.
But you talk about this book is largely
(09:30):
based on the idea of being, virtuebased leadership.
Lots of books written about skill basedleadership, behavior based leadership.
And these three words are connected.
But you specifically talk about virtues,and you talk about four of them
as superpowers.
Yes. And, and I want tohave you unpack them in a second.
But here's here's the thingthat I don't want you to take wrong,
like these four things, everybody
(09:51):
that you're about to hear about thatthey've called superpowers,
are not the kinds of thingsyou would normally hear on a podcast.
They are not the kinds of
words or virtues that
are in vogue,at least not the words that you've chosen.
And so I'm opening withthat meant as a compliment, right?
(10:15):
Because I think one of the thingsthat we're completely together on is that
the world is changing,
and we as leaders must understandthose changes and adapt and adjust.
And I would say flex.
And yet most of leadershipisn't and hasn't changed.
And I think these four superpowerspoint to that fact.
So, I'm just going to let you
(10:36):
I've got for those watching,I'll put them on the bottom of the screen.
Dave, but just talk about thesefour things briefly to give people
a sense of whereyou where you stand on these things
and how they can be valuableto the rest of us.
So they're very valuable,in two different ways.
I'll name them in a moment.One way that they're valuables.
(10:59):
Almost like if you know, Kevin,you've had, like, a dial on your car.
Dash. And you didn't know what it was.
And some of these,you're always looking for certain things.
Okay? It's right there.
And just the discovery of it,
the knowledge that it's theremakes it very accessible and usable.
Yeah, these are that way for some people.
Just like, wait, I hadn't thought of that.I'm going to apply that.
But then other times though,it's a little bit
(11:20):
more complex, like,hey, there's an app for that cab.
So you open up the app and you're like,you know what?
I need training on how to use it.
So these very things sometimescome a little bit more obvious
and then sometimes more training.Another is old is dirt.
Aristotle talked about them, and they're the cardinal virtues.
The word cardinal is actually a Latin termfor hinge, meaning that
the rest of the virtueshinge upon them, and they are.
(11:43):
They're in vogue by way of practice,but not intentional.
And that's what I help people to do,is to make these things intentional.
Right? Yeah.
So nobody would ever say,
what I love about workingthere is nobody can make a decision
to save their life, right?
Nobody would ever say, what I love aboutworking there is everybody is a quitter.
They wouldn't say.
What I love about workingthere is that they were totally unfair
(12:03):
and nobody has self-control.
Well, the opposite of these thingsare the cardinal virtues.
Prudence also calls it calledwisdom is the mastery of decision making.
And. Okay, have you ever had somebody sayto you, something that was like,
frustrating, especially when you're young,you didn't know how to do it?
I couldn't stand it when people say, Dave,you need to believe to achieve.
When I was young, man, I was like,but I don't.
And like, you know, like.
(12:25):
Thank you for playing.I don't know what to do with that. Right?
Yeah. Whatever. Like.
You know, grunt harder and believeI still don't.
So how do you do it?
So if somebody says to you
you need to make better decisions, butthey don't tell you how that's difficult.
But the cardinal virtuesand the understanding of prudence
is actually a lesson for that.
There are three simple steps.
Desire what is good.
Because if you don't desire what's good inany circumstance, you can't get it done.
(12:47):
Do you know what's good at workor what's good in your marriage?
If you don't say what's goodwhen you get in the car to drive?
Or in fact,
if your Uber driver doesn't desirewhat's good, you don't want them around.
You have to know what's real.And this is where most people mess up.
They have a difficult timejudging circumstances.
And that's the second step to prudence.
But you have to make a judgment. Yes.
And in order to do that, we have to getrid of the bias that we have
in our mind, or the self-justification,which is super powerful motivator.
(13:11):
And the last thing we have to do if we'remaking good decisions is act on them.
And that's how,you know, if you're around a person
who's practice prudenceis, they have a shrewdness about them
where they can actually act pretty quicklyonce they've made the decision,
and they measure the speed of the decisionto the way to the issue,
whereas an imprudent person is going to belike at the work day, you're like, hey,
you know, want to have some lunchor the like, how or where should we go?
And they take 20 minutesto think about where to go.
(13:31):
And then they get there
and they think about 15 minutesabout what they're going to eat.
And as opposed to like, you know,what's a workday?
Let's just eat this and go.
That very person who, who makes the longterm decision to eat lunch
will whimsically buy a car on the weekendwithout giving it any thought.
So it's like you have to measure
the speed of the decisionto the weight of the issue.
And that's really what prudence is.
The second of the four is justice.
(13:54):
Yeah. Talk about justice.
Well, you'd say that we're talking today.
Yeah.
You can't bejust if you don't have prudence
and the cool thing about thisis that these things build.
So if you know a person who,doesn't really have a sense of justice,
you can almost tie it back to the factthat they have no prudence.
Now, we have kind of thesesubjective virtues within things,
which means that you might be a personwho has self-control
(14:15):
when it comes to not eating ice cream,but not self-control to something else.
Right?
So there's kind of this like, sub,
you know, really a subjective applicationto some of them.
But by and large, you can't have justiceif you don't have prudence.
So that is to give each their due portion.
If you imagine having a judge,you're sitting there and being tried
and you know you're innocentand the judge is about you to,
(14:36):
you know, they don't they don't careabout what's good in the circumstance.
They don't know what's real,and they're not going to act on good.
Those arethe things that make up prudence.
How can they possibly provideyou a just measure?
And so that's
why it's important that we build prudenceso that the person understands justice.
Which
leads to as we're buildingthese up, these superpowers.
(14:58):
The next one is fortitude.
Yeah.
And, you mentioned in passing earlier
that we that none of uswant the opposite of this.
And yet I don't think this word likethe others gets used enough.
No, like, as I was reading this, I'm like,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Why don't I use the word fortitude more?
Because I think it's just so powerful.
(15:18):
So talk to us about what you mean here.
Well,I think the reason we don't use it is
because we have the words that actuallykind of mean it, and they're pretty good
that way, like courage or stickto liveness, these different things.
The problem is though, when we use themthese other terms is
we don't use what would be consideredlike a regulator on them.
So most people have to understandthat virtues are on a bit of a spectrum.
(15:41):
And you need to optimize them just likeyou need to optimize your personality.
In fact, it'sone of the things I talk about a lot.
And so what does that mean if you have twoif you have like this,
what would be perceivedas an excessive fortitude or bravery?
It's kind of nuttiness.It's crazy actually.
So if you were like a, you know,
27 yearold guy who's married with two kids
(16:02):
and has a lot of responsibilities in life,you've been mildly uncoordinated
your entire life.
And you decide one weekendyou saw base jumping video.
You want to start base jumping, okay,that's jumping off a cliff at a low level.
And then, you know, having a shootcome out.
Well, that's not a lot of people go, wow,what courage.
What? That's not that's craziness.
Why is it crazy?
It's crazy because you're probably goingto get killed.
(16:23):
It's audacious.
It would be completely unjust
to leave your wife widowed and your kidsto be orphaned because of that.
And you don't desire clearly at allwhat's good in this circumstance?
You certainly don't know what's real,you uncoordinated idiot.
And you're going to act upon somethingthat's poorly justified.
But that's not about base jumping.
I mean, if you're, you know, 21 years old,you're very coordinated.
(16:43):
You've taken a lot of risks,and you're kind of a daredevil.
And Red bull is going to give youa $2 million sponsorship.
You don't have kids. Go for it. Sure.
Or if you're 85 years oldand all your affairs in order,
I mean, the grandkidswould probably think it's cool
to watch grandpa go out that way.
So it's not about base jumping, it'sabout where that fits into the prudence
and the justicerelated to the circumstance.
(17:05):
And that's what I would calllook at our context. Right.
When you talk about, knowing what's real,
likewhat's the context really not like what
you want it to be, but like,what's really happening here?
And often that we try to treat thingsas if it's clearer than it really is.
There's more uncertainty and complexitythan we might want to.
(17:25):
Right. Yeah.
The fourth of the four thingsis temperance.
Yes. Temperance for just a second.
Well, so if you have,
prudence, you desire what's good,you know what's real.
You act uponwhat's good, you have justice and fairness
and you have fortitude,but you lack the last thing
you can take yourself out of the game.
So we have seen people who build greatcareers,
(17:47):
have lots of success, even buildgood relationships.
But you know what?
She looks pretty hot over there.
Oh, no, no, no, you're a married manand that is a resistance you need to have.
That is it.
You have to temper that temptation, okay?
By having the resistance of it.
Or you know what,
you're about to have a heart attackand you need a certain diet because of it,
(18:09):
and you just can't resist the foodthat's going to kill you.
We need to have temperance.
There's that one thing
that you just want to say to this person,but you have to hold your tongue.
So we've all had the experience of nottelling somebody to go stick it right.
And sometimes we have the experiencemaybe telling somebody that
and it was unjustifiedor maybe justified at a certain time,
but we misplayed it. Why?
(18:31):
Because we had temperance.
We paused for a moment,we thought about it
and we use our self-control.
So it's very important thing to have.
And it basically tops the things off.
Now, the great thing about it, Kevin,is that if you are practicing
prudence, justice and fortitude,you are so strongly inclined
to naturally have temperancethat it's going to be likely.
(18:52):
But if you're not doing those things,you're going to have, like I said,
the subjective virtue of temperance,which is to say,
I'm very disciplinedin what I do for my body
because I want to have a beach body,
but I'm not very disciplinedin my relationship.
Okay, well, that's
not really.
Situational temperance, is it? Well,it's really it.
It is. Yeah.
So I found myselfI am talking everyone with
(19:14):
if you just came in late for some reason,Dave Duran, the author of,
among other things, of the new bookLeading Giants A Leader's Guide
to Maximum Influence, and we're talkingabout some of the ideas in the book.
And, Dave,
one of the things that you talk abouta good bit,
and I know it's one of the thingsthat you like to talk about, is the idea
of, as a leader in an organization,building a deep bench.
(19:35):
And I'm sure youyou hear this all the time when you're
working with clients and coaching leadersthat people are talking about succession
planning and having a benchand worrying about losing a key person.
And I love that in this bookyou spend some time
talking about building a deep bench.
What are a couple of thingsthat maybe people
(19:56):
don't think aboutor don't connect with the idea of having,
a lot of strength on the benchthat we ought to talk about.
Well, I think what happens is thatthey're building for the short term.
So, when I build things,I want them to be around, and,
you know, I've started a lot of companies,but, you know, I the companies
that I started for the most part,unless they were just a one off, you know,
(20:18):
small consulting companywhere I was the only consultant in it.
And I wrapped up the phase of that.
If I started a business, it's,for the most part, still in existence.
Most of them are, once I got past MVP.
Okay.
And the only way that was possible was onday one to say, how do I replace myself?
And my goal always when I builda business is to make myself as irrelevant
(20:40):
as I can possibly be,as swiftly as I can possibly be
irrelevant, so that it's not builton a cult of personality.
So when you have a leaderthat says something
like, well,if I left, everyone would leave.
Well, that's a bad leader.
In fact, that's not a reallythat's not a leader you should follow.
And a lot of timesyou'll have like a mid-level manager
in your organization or a vice president
if you're a president or CEO,and they'll kind of allude that to you.
Well,you know, if I left, everybody leave.
(21:01):
I literally if somebody on my teamever said that, I did.
And leave now
because you have built the worst teamin your department
that you could possibly build if you left,if everybody else would leave,
that means that they are herein a cult of personality.
They're not here for their own reasons,their own motives or the overall mission.
They're here because of you.
That's just a bad idea.
So immediatelyyou have to start to say to yourself,
how do I make myself irrelevant?
(21:22):
But our pride gets in the way.
Generally speaking, we're like, well,I want to believe that I'm so important
that if I weren't here,this couldn't work out.
I want to feel that importance.
And if we can just free ourselvesfrom that idea and build something
to last by empowering the other peoplein the organization, I.
Kevin, I almost look at itas kind of like hogging.
So I think you would have read thisin the story,
(21:44):
but I remember when I was like maybe21 or 20, I don't remember how early 20s
there was a guy who I worked withwho was about,
I don't know how many years my senior, andhe he said, what'd you do this weekend?
I said, I mowed my lawn,
and he said, I can'tyou don't seem like that kind of guy.
And I said, what do you mean?
He goes, well,you don't seem like the kind of guy
who would steal from the neighbor kidor your family.
So what are you talking about?
(22:05):
And he goes, well,if you're not paying the neighbor kid
20 bucks to mow your lawn,
you're stealing the 20 bucks from himthat he should have gotten.
And if you're not spending
that time with your kids,then you're stealing the time from them.
So why don't you pay the neighbor kid20 bucks,
give him the job that he could have,and be irrelevant there.
But go be relevantwhere you should be with your family.
By the way,there's a lot of wisdom in that.
(22:25):
It's certainly flawed in certain degrees.
I mean, it's kind of catharticto mow your lawn, and it's not.
Like if you like to mow your lawn.
Not only that, it's not bad for your kidsto see you doing that type of work.
But but the essence of the storythat he gave,
while I continue to enjoy mowing my lawn,was something that I did not forget.
Okay.
And and it really appliesto what happens in the workplace.
(22:46):
So I look at a lot of CEOshog their spot for way too long.
And and they just, you know, they're,they're blocking opportunities
for people to, to have, advancementopportunities, the organization.
Maybe it's because this is the only thingthey've ever built in their life,
and they don't knowif they're going to build something else.
And for that reason, maybe it's not a badidea to stick around a little bit longer.
(23:08):
I mean, we all have a choice to do that,especially for entrepreneurs.
But, it should be carefully considered,
because the the better offyou're doing it something,
the quicker you are to be replacedin fact, this is another way I'd say it.
The bigger you build an organization orthe the higher you rise an organization,
the greater your responsibility,but the less your responsibility is.
(23:31):
And so as a result of that,if you have less responsibilities
but a greater responsibility,
it does give you a little bit moretime to mentor somebody.
And to shiftsome of that responsibility to them.
Yeah.
Agreed.
I agree with that.
And so what I want to do is I'm lookingat the time that we've got left
and I know, I already know, like, well,maybe this is ego.
(23:55):
Everybody, like, I always feel likeif I'm really loving this, that probably
all of the, all of the listeners are,which I suppose could be incorrect.
But I'm confidentthat we could spend a long time
and I've lots of stuffthat we could talk about.
I really wanted to getto the four habits in the book,
but I'm just going to tell people, listen,you got to get a copy of the book
Leading Giants by Dave Duran,and then he can tell you all about
(24:17):
you can read all about the four habitsI want to talk about.
One of the thingwhere we are completely in alignment.
Okay.
Which in your book you talk about is, why are we working overtime?
Yeah, we are in complete alignmentabout this, in so many ways.
But let's talk about this
because there are so many leaders,whether you're an entrepreneur,
whether you're a manager
in the middle of the organization,doesn't matter where we feel like,
(24:42):
the more time we put in, the more valuablewe become.
Let's talk about time a little bit.
So most people that are stuck onthis have a false virtue.
They are justifying themselves by workinga lot because they hear no pain, no gain.
You've got a sacrifice.But let's just look at it logically.
And just because everybody always talksabout Elon, by the way,
not politically right now,but they talk about Elon
(25:02):
because of how many businesses he's builtthat are massive. Right.
And that he's the CEO of simultaneously.
Well, if time were the way thathe accomplished that, he could only be,
you know, three times more effectivethan a person that works eight hours a day
because there's 24 hours of working,
which is physically impossiblefor human beings.
So he's got to be doing something else.
And certainly he's intelligent,but he uses leverage.
(25:24):
And that's what influence is.
Influence is to say that the very thingthat I'm trying to influence
right now,I need to delegate to somebody else. Why?
Because I don't want to lead a normal.I want to lead a giant.
So if I'm going to be effective, I'mgoing to stop and think,
what is it that I'm doing thatsomebody else could do right now?
And how could I give them the authoritythat I have to make that happen to now
basically have a shockwave of influenceand other people.
(25:47):
But as long as we start thinkingto ourselves, well, gosh, you know,
it's a badge of honor for most people.
It is a false virtue.
It's like, oh, I work so much.
And like, you know, that's how I justify.
But people say to me all the time, hey,I know you're so busy.
So, I mean.
I'm at home for dinner, like 430while I'm building the company
to hundreds of millions of dollarsin sales.
And why?
(26:07):
Well,because everything that I could have done
when I stayed later,I just made sure somebody else could do.
And by the way, just this important point,because I've been criticized.
Oh, is the CEO you went home like that?
Everybody elsemust listen in any of my companies.
If you were there past 430,you were burning the midnight oil.
I mean,
I did not build a culture for peoplethat way.
It was a work.
When you want, where you want, wheneveryou want culture with no limited vacation
(26:30):
time, it was you have a job to do,get that job done.
That was it.
That was how we did it.
And so some people were really efficientwith that.
Some people took a little bit longer,but I was like, listen, something
I'm never, ever going to ask you to dois to lay down or sacrifice
your family or your faithor your health for this business.
Those things come first.
(26:51):
Now, at the same time,
hard work heals family relationshipsand physical health and finances.
So it's a part of the solution,not the problem.
So don't look atas an enemy of those things.
But let's not miss prioritize it.
I've been sayingfor years that busy is the most dangerous
four letter word in the English languagebecause it's focused on the wrong thing,
which is another way of sayingwhat you're saying.
Let's focus on what we need to accomplish.
(27:13):
Yeah, what about the timethat's taking us to accomplish it?
I love your point about it.
You know, if itif you only look at it on an hour basis,
the most some anyone could be compared tosomeone else is three times better.
And we know that that's really notthat's a that's a really limiting thought.
I want to shift gears for a second.
(27:34):
Well before it before we do that,let me ask you one other question.
Is there somethingwe didn't talk about day
that you really hopedwe would, or that's come up in your head
as we've been talkingthat you'd like to share?
Well, I have been working on somethingthat's a culmination of 35 years
worth of, of this sort of journeyand have, you know this right?
When you've consulted with people,they say to you that, well,
(27:57):
you know what, things aren't working herebecause our marketing plan is off.
Our finances were off, we couldn'tget product, our production was off.
We couldn't get investors and the economywas off, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Yeah. Very true.
For most of the thingsthere's there's a component of those,
but almost every one of those thingsis tied back to the person.
You can't get the financingbecause nobody trusts you.
(28:17):
Your marketing plan isn't working
because you won't look at statisticsand data accurately.
You self justify everything.
The reasonpeople don't like you as a leader
is because you're talkingtoo much, or whatever it might be.
So we would be able to sayabout everybody in their life,
I like them,but I wish they were a little bit more.
Well, I like them,but I wish they were a little less.
(28:37):
And if we're honest,
we have to be able to say the same thingabout ourselves,
because everybody in our lifecould say that same thing about us to
for sure, whatever that more or less thingis, is a part of our personality.
So I'm building a program to optimizepersonality, to help people more, more.
I know it sounds bold,
okay, but we're building a toolthat I really believe
is the most powerful tool ever builtto help people optimize their personality.
(28:59):
Because it it takes a very, very complexlook at it in order to
diagnose the circumstance which providesthe deficiency that they have.
The suboptimal deficiencyor the suboptimal excess,
like we talked about with braveryor cowardice. Right.
You really need fortitude instead.
And how to pinpoint itand what prevents them
(29:19):
from being able to do itso they can build that,
as a character traitor a personality trait.
And so that's something people build
by the time they actually comes out on apodcast. I think that tool will be ready.
And where will they be able to find it?
They will be able to find that online.
And I'm going to have to give that to youas a note so that when that is available,
We'll make sure we get it in the shownotes.
(29:40):
I love. That.
The bleeding edge and not seriously, Dave,you get it to us, that to us.
We'll make sure we get it in the shownotes for the show, whether it's available
when the show first comes out or whateverit is.
We'll make sure that we do that.
I've got a couple other things for usbefore we wrap up.
Dave, I want to know,it's very clear that you love your work.
It's very clearthat you care about the work that you do.
(30:02):
And I'm curious what you do for fun.
Oh my goodness.
Well, because I have nine kids,nine grandkids.
Most of my kids are married.
Just had two daughters, graduatelast night.
Familytakes up an enormous amount of time,
but we also just love to dolots of different things.
Like,you know, I'm an old man now. I'm 56.
And so when it comes toI was a martial artist,
(30:24):
throughout most of my life,but now I'm just kind of an older one.
But I still do that.I still dabble around a little bit.
I, I'm a I'm, I'm about dangerous enoughthat I could take on a toddler
pretty safely. Outside of that, though,
I'm probably going to get injured,but I still enjoy it.
You know, as a family, we ski, we get outhere, out on the beach as well too.
So a lot of a lot of a lot of good times.
And, I love to read, too.
(30:45):
And my,
my faith is important to me too,which is not a hobby,
but it is something that I spend my timewith because it's important.
And ultimately speaking,at the end of the day,
retiring isn't just about pickleball,but it's about the eternal retirement
that we have.
And I want to spend some timeinvesting in that too.
I love that.
So you mentioned reading.
You knewI was going to ask you this question.
What are you reading these days?
I read a lot of books,usually simultaneously.
(31:07):
I go back to some good classicslike, ethics.
You know, I'll always dive back into,you know, some sort of,
Aristotelian or a platonic, type of reading.
At the same time.
I'll read some more contemporarypeople, too,
you know, some good classics,like Daniel Kahneman's work,
if you know anything about that,you know, thinking fast and slow and,
(31:30):
many different types of things,like that.
And I usually have about,
I don't know,
5 to 7 books that I'm readingsimultaneously that I'll churn through in
about a 2 or 3 month period of timeand, enjoy that.
We'll have thinking fast and slowin the show notes, as well as, links to
(31:53):
Dave's new book, Leading Giants MaximizingAI Leaders Guide to Maximum Influence.
So, anything else that youany place else, you want to point us
or tell us about what you're up tobefore we go.
Now, you know, I'm just doing the grind,and enjoying every single day of it.
There's a lot that,we can all give to the world.
(32:14):
And I want to try to do two thingssimultaneously, provide
whatever I can to influenceanybody I can for the better.
But also, really, I want to help themdo the same thing, too, because most
people, Kev, as you know, don't knowhow much greatness they have in them.
A lot of people think that pride isthe biggest problem with the world today,
and there's an enormous amount of pride.That is very true.
(32:35):
But there's a lot of people right nowwho have been basically given a false,
understanding of themselves
to believe that they don'thave the self agency to become great.
And every one of us is to,
at least to our own vocational calling,meant to be great within that.
That doesn't mean great the same way.
We're not all going to be,
you know, famous athletes and, you know,actors and actresses and politicians.
(33:00):
But in her own way,like my second grade teacher,
who I believe is one of the all timegreat people out there in the world,
but nobody's going to know her name verymuch outside of her, a little influence.
She is a tremendously great person,as is my mother
and father and, and, and,and we have that in this.
But it takes discipline.
It takes hard workand a commitment to do it.
(33:21):
So before I thank Daveand we finish up the show, I'm going to do
what I do for all of you listeningand watching every single episode.
I ask you this two wordvery important question.
Now what what are you going to dowith what you just learned?
Maybe, you learned something about
are asking yourselfif you're hogging your spot.
Maybe you learned somethingabout the industry
and responsibility and responsibilities.
(33:42):
Maybe I don't know what it was for you.
My question isn't, my point is not to tell you what to take.
My question is for you to decidewhat you're going to take
and what you're going to act onas a result of being here,
because if you don't take action,it won't have made any difference.
(34:03):
And so I hope that you will do that.
And, so, Dave,thank you so much for being here.
Is a pleasure to have you.Thanks for being for joining me.
Kevin, thanks so much for having me out.
And everybody,if you enjoyed this, tell somebody else.
And if you enjoyed this,make sure you're subscribed
so you don't miss any episodesbecause we'll be back next week.
Guess what? Next week, episode number 500.
We'll see you then.
(34:23):
Have a great day.
And remember,as always, you are a remarkable leader.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.