Take the Guesswork Out of Growth with Bill Flynn

In today’s episode of Entrusted to Lead, I sit down with Bill Flynn, a leadership coach, author, and expert in business growth. Bill has worked with hundreds of companies and was a VP of Sales eight times, a CMO twice, and a GM of a $100 million IT service company before transitioning to coaching in 2015.

We unpack the principles from his bestselling book, Further, Faster: The Vital Few Steps That Take the Guesswork Out of Growth. Bill shares insights on leadership, team development, and why courage and vision are essential for lasting business success. Whether you’re leading a company, church, or nonprofit, this conversation will equip you with actionable strategies to drive sustainable growth.

Key Takeaways:
✔️ Leadership isn’t about authority; it’s about gaining trust and influence.
✔️ Vision and courage are two of the most critical elements of effective leadership.

✔️ Teams, not individuals, drive business success—learn how to build high-performing ones.
✔️ Systems thinking is the key to scaling any organization.
✔️ Leaders must be both courageous and compassionate to sustain success

Bible Connection: “Where there is no vision, the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18).

Resources & Links:
📖 Get Bill Flynn’s book: Further, Faster
📩 Join our Entrusted to Lead community
🔔 Follow us on Instagram: @EntrustedToLead

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hey friends, welcome to today's episode of the
Interested to Lead podcast.
I'm joined by Bill Flynn.
He embodies his core purpose,which is simplified servanthood.
He's a coach and author and hasworked and advised hundreds of
companies, including startups,where he has a long track record
of success spanning multipleindustries.
He was a VP of sales eighttimes, twice a CMO and once a GM

(00:29):
of a division of a $100 millionIT service company, before he
pivoted to become a growth coachin 2015.
So I'm excited today for you toget to hear his wealth of
knowledge, and he's talkingabout his bestselling book
Further Faster the Vital FewSteps that Take the Guesswork
out of growth.
So grab your cup of coffee andlet's get started.

(00:50):
Doing things alone is entirelyoverrated.
We all need a community tothrive, and that's why I'm part
of an online community ofwriters and speakers, podcasters
and entrepreneurs called CultCreatives, and I love it.
In the years since I joinedthis community, I've launched
new ideas and I finally executedthe dreams that sat on the

(01:10):
shelf for years, seriously, andI was able to do this because of
the outstanding group ofmentors, exceptional training
and encouraging mastermindgroups with my new friends who
did, and continue to give meinvaluable feedback.
Oh, and not to mention all thefun, because we have had lots
and lots of fun.
Have you ever said I want towrite a book or do you want to

(01:34):
use your voice for the excitingworld of podcasting?
If so, cult Creatives is yourbest resource for
up-to-the-minute industrytraining, expert advice, live
coaching and peer support.
Like no other Best-sellingauthors and speakers, allie
Worthington and Lisa Whittlelead this community with a
no-competition mission and itshows.
So join my friends and I in thecalled creative community.

(01:57):
Head to my show notes,danitacumminscom slash podcast
and click the link to get allthe details to join.
I promise you won't regret it.
I look forward to seeing you inthe community and watching you
grow.
Hey friends, welcome to theInterested to Lead podcast.
I'm Danita and today I'm joinedby Bill Flynn.
I get the privilege of sittingand learning from him today.

(02:19):
I hope that you enjoy thisconversation just as much as I
do.
I think saying that Bill has awealth of experience in business
coaching and startup cultureand scaling and leadership is
probably an understatement, andI don't typically say that very
lightly.
But I hope that you'll hearfrom him today just the wealth
of information that he has andhis heart for coaching and his
passion to help organizationsthrive.

(02:41):
So, before we dive in, bill,thanks for joining me today.
How are you?

Speaker 2 (02:44):
I'm doing great, Danita.
Thanks for having me Lookingforward to it.
Hopefully I will deliver on theexpectation you are set no
pressure.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
No, that's so good.
If you and I met at a dinnerparty, we'd never had a
conversation before.
How would you introduceyourself to me?

Speaker 2 (02:57):
Personally, professionally, all the above.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
Yes, all the above, because we're all whole people.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
If you were to ask me who, I am many things, but
first of all, I am a father.
That is how I mostly identify.
And I have lots of other things.
I'm an iconoclast, I'm amusician, I'm a friend, I'm a
writer.
I'm all these other things, butfirst and foremost to me, it's
about my daughter and thatrelationship.
If I were to answer itprofessionally, what I say is I

(03:24):
help leaders take the guessworkout of growth by teaching them a
framework that is based uponmanagement science, which has
been around for 100 years or so,that most people don't follow,
which I think we're going to getinto a little bit in a little
while.

Speaker 1 (03:38):
That's right.
That's very true.
I love that Sometimes we gostraight to the resume and we
miss the human person standingin front of us, and I think that
when we get into the topics ofleadership and helping ourselves
and others grow, that we bringall of ourselves to the world
every day.
So I love that you started withfather, because that's my heart
too.
We have four kids and a bigpart of our life is spent in
raising humans.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah, four kids.
I had one, that was good.
She's flown, she's 24.
She's mostly on her own.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
I love.
Being a parent of grownups iswhat I say.
I love them.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
Problems are different.

Speaker 1 (04:08):
They are hard.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
They are harder.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
That is exactly when I talk to parents with younger
littles.
I'm like littles are hard andthen they get big and their
problems get bigger.
So yeah, that's so good.
Okay, so we'll dive into allthe work stuff now.
So you've worked with some ofthe biggest names in business,
like Steve Jobs and others, butwhat lessons did you learn from
those experiences that haveshaped your approach to
leadership and business growth?

(04:31):
And you can start with eitherside first, which I assume
they're connected but what haveyou learned?

Speaker 2 (04:36):
Sure.
So I know Alan Mulallypersonally, or did not know
Steve Jobs.
I have met Steve Jobs, but Iwas in a work-related situation
and I'm glad you picked thosetwo people, because there are so
many different ways to come atthis.
But those that know each wouldsay that they are great leaders.
Yet they are very differentpeople.
Alan Mulally is extremelyhumble.

(04:56):
Steve Jobs was not.
Alan Mulally has tremendousintegrity where Steve Jobs
didn't have this, you know hehad his moments.
Alan Mulally is all about hisfamily.
I know about his five kids.
I've only met him three or fourtimes, but I know his kids and
what he did and his growing upwith his parents.
I know these stories wherewe've seen through movies and
other things where Steve Jobsdidn't necessarily pay a lot of

(05:18):
attention to Lisa, except toname a computer after her.
Yet if you say, are they greatleaders?
Yes to those who decide right.
So what I learned is thatleadership is something that you
become because others decidethat.
You can't say I'm a leader.

(05:38):
You could say I'm a boss, I'mauthority, I'm in charge.
That doesn't mean you're aleader.
A leader has followers.
Followers choose their leadersbased upon whatever criteria
they have.
Right Could be force ofpersonality, could be vision,
could be whatever, but we chooseour leaders and we choose
differently, depending onwhatever strikes us as the thing

(05:58):
that is important to us.
So that's a main thing thatI've learned is that and I steal
this from someone else butleadership isn't a thing, it's
not.
You can say, hey, if you dothese things, you'll be a leader
, because there's so manydifferent types of folks.
Like I said, you can be humbleor not, which is Malali.
Bill Gates was not very humble.

(06:19):
You can be charismatic, whichis Herb Kelleher from Southwest,
or not, which is Warren Buffett.
You can have empathy, likeJacinda Ardern out of New
Zealand, or not Jeff Bezos.
There's all these people thatare considered tremendous
leaders, but they're sodifferent.
The only thing that I've seenthat I would say they have in
common, there are two things.
They have one attribute incommon and one other thing in

(06:41):
common.
The thing they have in commonis there's something about them
either their vision or whateverit is that people say, yeah, I
want to help you do that Right.
And the other attribute theyhave is courage.
They all seem to have some formof courage, and the courage
comes out in multiple ways Ifyou're a really good leader.
Your courage is to give away thebusiness.
Your job isn't to run thebusiness.

(07:01):
Eventually it's to have otherpeople run the business, and
that takes courage because,especially if it's your baby,
you have to have the courage tobe vulnerable.
You have to have courage togive autonomy to people to allow
them to do that.
You have to be patient.
You have to realize that yourjob is to help others be much
better versions of themselves.
Right, it no longer becomesabout you and sort of to be a

(07:23):
leader that people will followand continue to follow and move
in that direction.
Those are sort of the keylessons I've learned.
There are other certain lessonsas well, but that's the top
thing that leaders are all verydifferent and that's okay.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
And I think the thing that I really love that you
said about that and theconnection to business growth,
scaling organizations we startwith vision, right?
We say without a vision thenpeople won't get energized.
I work in bivocational ministry, so half my time is spent in
the corporate defense sector,helping businesses grow, and
then the other side of my lifeis spent in a volunteer based.

(07:56):
But the vision requirement isthe same.
Over the years I've seen thatas I work with different
companies or founders orbusiness leaders and they're
trying to grow or scale or startnew things, you have to have
vision first, like you said, soyou can accelerate, ignite,
energize people to comealongside you.
But there's also that otherpiece about the courage.
I just love that.
Vision and courage.
I think those are great.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, people, when asked what do you want from your
leader, they want lots ofthings, but the same two things
often come up as the two bigthings that they want.
They want to know whatever youtell them is true.
They know that sometimes youcan't tell them everything.
Right, there are certain thingsthat you have to keep to
yourself, especially if you're apublic company or whatever,
because trust arrives on footand leaves in a Ferrari.

(08:39):
So as soon as you lose thattrust, then it's really hard to
get it back.
So you have to say things thatare true, and if you're caught
in saying things that aren'ttrue, then it becomes more and
more difficult to have themcontinue to follow you.
The second thing is what youalluded to, which is they want
to know where are we going andwhat does it look like when we
get there.
Your vision it's not a statement, it is a picture.

(09:02):
It is so vivid that they cansee it in their mind.
When you describe it in words,as if it's already done, that's
a vision.
It's not one sentence thatwe've watered down and said this
is our vision to help peopleand be better people and have
their lives be better andwhatever.
Most visions are these watereddown statements that could be
any company.
A vivid picture is somethingyou really want to do, and if

(09:23):
you could do that, they're like,yeah, I want you.
They can see that.
And they're like oh, now that Iknow what it is, guess what.
They will help you in ways thatyou couldn't even imagine had
you not shared it in that levelof detail.

Speaker 1 (09:35):
And I love the part that you said about the courage,
because I see that on bothsides too, we get founder
syndrome.
Right, you've started somethingand it is your baby, creation,
your heart, all poured out intothe world in this unique thing.
But then there is this legacyplace where we struggle because
we're all human and, at the endof the day, everything comes to
an end.
There's a lot of insecurity,there's a lot of fear, there's a

(09:57):
lot of doubt, but I love thatyou said that, knowing what the
end is, where you're going, butthen also knowing that you might
not always be the person thatgets it to the end.
And how can you create asustainable organization that
outlives you as a person, whichis hard as an identity thing,
right, because we're allstruggling with our own legacies
as we're going through life.
So in your book, further Faster, you emphasize this importance

(10:19):
of focusing on the vital fewsteps that take the guesswork
out of growth.
First question is what arethose steps?
And then how can leadersimplement them to drive business
success?

Speaker 2 (10:31):
Yeah.
So there are three main areasthat I've come to believe are
the most important, and thoserevolve around not doing
everything within those threeareas, but figuring out what the
vital few things are thatmatter the most, because most
things don't matter, but thosethat do matter tremendously, and

(10:52):
that's in life or in business,right, and your job as a leader
is to figure out what thosethings are.
So the three areas that I talkabout in my book and that I take
from my learning and otherthought, leaders is so.
People are important, but outof people, individual people,
teams and culture, which iseverybody.
Team is the most importantbecause most things get done by
a team.
You have a sales team, amarketing team, an operations

(11:14):
team, whatever.
It's rarely one person that ishaving a significant impact on
the business.
It can happen, but it's rare.
So understanding those fewthings of how to attract, create
, build and then develop a teamif you can have that skill, that
is an amazing thing to have.
Most people are not good at it.
We are not good at beingleaders of teams, again, because

(11:39):
we don't really know what itmeans to lead a team and what
your job is.
Often and we see this inespecially in Western culture.
We see people leading teams bytelling them is Often and we see
this in, especially in Westernculture we see people leading
teams by telling them what to do.
Right, they get together, youdo this, you do that, you do
that, and they make thesedecisions as quick and as
deliberate and whatever.
That's actually not a greatteam leader.
That's called the genius with athousand helpers.
Right, you want to createautonomy within a team.

(12:02):
You want to give direction, notinstruction.
You want to say hey, ourcontribution to the company, our
team, is this.
This is what it looks like.
Again, back to vision.
You can have a vision that'ssmaller than the overall vision.
Right, the vision of our teamwhen we're doing this is the
impact we're making.
This is how we're helpingwhatever other teams that you're
helping, or the company ingeneral, and then your job is to
then understand the componentsof the team and then put the

(12:24):
right people in there that havethe best chance of being
successful with those and thosethat will work together well.
And, by the way, that's not easy, because often you want
different kinds of personalities, different skills and knowledge
, et cetera, and you wantconflict is good, healthy
conflict is good.
Right, you want people todisagree, you want people with
different perspectives, so thenthe best ideas win, as opposed

(12:46):
to the loudest or the first tospeak, and that's what we often
see.
It's like whoever speaks upfirst they're good, they're
leading.
No, they're in front and Iguess that's a form of leading,
but that's not really leading ateam, right, and I see these
things on linkedin or whatever,and you have to do things first.
You have to fill the waterbottle.
I'm like no, that's yes, youcould do.
No, that's yes, you could dothat, but that's not really
being a leader.

(13:13):
Being a leader is understandinghow the team affects the overall
system that they're in, andthen how to put together the
pieces and have them work welltogether so they don't need you.
Right?
It's very much being like aparent, like we talked about
before, right.
A really great parent is notsomeone that their child calls
up and says I'm in trouble, fix,talked about before, right.
A really great parent is notsomeone that the child calls up
and says I'm in trouble, fixthis for me, right?
That's not great parenthood,right?
Because eventually, as you said, we're all gone at some point.

(13:33):
And if they're reliant upon you, what happens when you die or
you're sick or whatever.
You want a child to be able tobe autonomous, to be able to
they can learn from you andlearn from their environment,
but create it so they're theirown person, they're thinking for
themselves, they have thosemuscles and things to do that,
and we don't see that as theexample.

(13:53):
One of the reasons I like aboutAlan Mulally and Steve Jobs is
almost everyone knows who SteveJobs is.
Even now he's been dead forwhatever 10 or 15 years.
Hardly anyone knows who AlanMulally is.
I ask people all the time doyou know who Alan Mulally is?
I ask people all the time doyou know who Alan Mulally is?
And, like I don't really know,he's a Ford guy and to me he is
the epitome of.
If I were to say if you want tobe a leader, it's Alan Mulally,

(14:16):
because he did two things thatwere amazingly different than
anyone else.
He turned around Boeingcommercial aircraft in the
middle of 9-11, where they cameout of 9-11 better than they
went in.
Then he did the exact samething at Ford through 2008 and
the Great Recession.
No leader that I know of hasdone that twice in a lifetime.

(14:37):
I don't know many people who'vedone it once in a lifetime.
Yet no one knows who he isbecause he's super humble, he
doesn't want to be well-known,he's not on magazine covers,
it's not important to him.
I've talked to Alan and he'sbeen asked by two presidents to
be in their cabinet and heturned it down.
He wanted to spend more timewith his family.
He's in his seventies now he's.
I don't want to.
I don't want to do that.
I want to hang out with mygrandchildren and do these
things.
So, understanding how to dothat he team.

(15:09):
The next thing is understandingyour business as this one big
system.
If you think of your businessin terms of systems, one big
system that's really satisfyinga client, creating a consumer or
a customer, and that's yourultimate job as a company is to
create customers.
But you also have subsystemsunderneath.
You have subsystems of strategyand execution and culture and
all these things, and you haveto understand that those things
all fit together and there arecomponents in each of those.
But if you think of it as asystem, like in any system, not

(15:30):
everything has to work perfectly.
Some things may work betterthan others which will
compensate for that.
So, for instance, I do it inthe terms of metaphor of a house
right In a house, the biggestsystem in a house is what's
called the envelope, meaning theheating and air conditioning
right, so keeping the climate ina house.
That's one big system right, andthere are components of the
system which are windows andthere's insulation in the walls

(15:50):
and there's floor and there'sceiling and there's all this
stuff.
If you have a lot of windows,then that has a lot of heat and
cooling leaving the house versuswalls, so you have to have a
better heating and coolingsystem.
But if you have fewer windowsand a lot more what's called R
factor in the walls, which isthe thickness of the insulation,

(16:10):
then you need not as good as anair conditioning and heating
and ventilation system.
So you have to think of that asyour business.
Some parts of your businessmight be really great.
You might have a killerstrategy right which are just so
much better than everyone else.
So if you execute okay, youcould still do pretty well.
Or if you have really excellentexecution and okay strategy,
you can still kick people'sbutts.

(16:31):
Microsoft is an example of that,especially when Bill Gates.
They're not known for theirstrategy.
They were always behind, right.
There was always a joke.
You have to wait for versionthree of whatever they make to
actually have it make work.
But their execution was good.
They dominated their industry,but they didn't have a great
strategy right, it was like justbe a laggard and figure it out

(16:52):
quickly.
So understanding that and lastly, is if you're going to really
understand your business by afinancial metric, it should be
by cash, not revenue, not profit.
Cash should be the financialmetric by which you judge your
business, because if you'regoing to grow your business, you
have to invest in it.
You generally have to invest infront of it, and that costs
money.
So understanding how you'regoing to generate the cash you

(17:14):
need to do, the things you wantto do, is super important, and
most businesses don't do that.
A lot of them brag aboutrevenue.
Even profit is fine, but youcan make up profit or you can
have gross profit but not a lotof net profit in cash, because
you're paying a lot of loans orwhatever it might be, and then
you're not able to pay people.
You're not able to hire betterpeople, which are generally more

(17:34):
expensive.
You're not able to do thewonderful things to keep people
happy in terms of healthcare andother things, mental care all
that stuff.
You just can't afford it, soyou just don't do it.
So those are three things.

Speaker 1 (17:43):
Team business as a system and then cash as your
financial metric.
That's the essence of that.
Yeah, that's so good.
I love the systems engineeringpart because I gravitate to
systems thinking and I love thatwhen you say systems aren't
linear, even though we wouldlike them to be, especially if
you get a complex system.
We in our mind try to layeverything flat and then they're
too complex at times for us tolay them on a piece of paper and

(18:05):
see where all the levers are.
I'm pulling a marketing lever,but my culture lever over here
is stuck, or vice versa.
It's really hard to zoom out asan organizational leader
regardless of your skill sets, Ithink and be able to see all
that.
It's almost impossible.
So you talked a little bitabout the things that we do
wrong.
Why do you think that theystruggle?
So why do you think thatbusinesses struggle in those

(18:28):
areas?

Speaker 2 (18:29):
It's insidious, right , it happens over time.
It happens typically out of ournotice.
We do things wrong, but wedon't do them completely wrong.
We do nothing completely wrong,we just do it a little wrong,
but then it adds up.
It's like it's the wholemetaphor of those little grain
of sand in your shoe right.
It just starts to wear andeventually becomes more and more
painful.
So you don't hire very well,especially at management level,

(18:52):
and then they hire badly.
That becomes worse.
You haven't quite thoughtthrough your strategy and you
haven't continued to honestrategy and make it better and
better.
That's an issue.
There are so many things.
There's innovation, there's.
We do meetings badly.
As a world, we don't know howto run a meeting right.
Most meetings are done badly.
Most people in meetings saythat they're not very good.

(19:14):
There was some stat I read thatin the US in one year we waste
$37 billion because ofunproductive meetings.
I ask all the time with myclients I said how do you run a
meeting?
And first they look at me likewhat do you mean?
Do you have a framework for ameeting?
Here's how we do meetings.
If you walked into Intel andyou still walk into Intel now

(19:38):
and I've been there, so I'veseen it.
In every meeting room there isa piece of paper on the wall
that says this is how we do ameeting, and there are like
instructions right, do you havean agenda?
Are the right people in theroom, whatever all these things
right?
So, whatever that is that youknow runs a really good meeting
for you, then you should havethat, but we don't do that, and
so we have a lot of really badmeetings.
People hate meetings, theydon't want to go to meetings, et
cetera.
We do change wrong.
We just do so many things wrong.
One of the things that reallybothers me and I've been in

(20:00):
arguments with well-known peoplefor this is we have this
wonderful desire that you mustgive people feedback and in
order for them to grow, theymust be told when they're doing
something wrong.
Right, because typicallyfeedback is a negative thing.
Right?
There is a joke that says thefive most feared words in
business are can I give you somefeedback?

(20:20):
And I'm a bit of a neurosciencegeek and I've learned that
feedback actually gathers athreat response in the brain,
which means that you get nervous, you start sweating.
Even if you ask for it, youdon't want to hear it because
it's going to be something bad.
Right, it's almost always goingto be something bad, and I've
had.
There are people who havewritten radical books about
feedback and such, shall we say,that I've argued with, and it's

(20:42):
because we don't understandthat the basic thing is that
feedback isn't the goal.
The goal is growth.
There are lots of ways to helppeople grow.
Now I will put a disclaimer.
So feedback for a skill isimportant, right?
Teaching someone how to dosomething, you have to say try
it this way, do it that way,don't do it this way, whatever.
That's different.

(21:02):
But typically we're givingfeedback on behavior and such,
and one of the stories I heardonce is in a book that I will
not name is, but it was aboutSheryl Sandberg and this author
of the book and she worked forSheryl and this woman was in a
meeting and at the end of themeeting, sheryl said to this
woman hey, did you know that yousay in a lot?
And she was like no, and hesaid do you know that you sound

(21:26):
stupid when you do that?
And, by the way, she wastouting that this is good,
because there was.
It was said with love.
One of the best definitionsI've heard of feedback is most
often you talking about you inthe presence of me, and I have a
story myself.
I used to be a speaker to agroup called Vistage, which is a
peer-to-peer advisory, theirworldwide company, worldwide

(21:47):
organization and I did about 40or 50 of these things and I was
doing something with some of theVistage chairs who run these
meetings.
It was a sort of a consolidatedunderstanding of what I would
do in a workshop and at the endone of the gentlemen who I know
came up to me and said hey, doyou know that you say right a
lot when you speak?
And I didn't, and it's anervous verbal tick that I would

(22:08):
do.
And he said can I give you somefeedback on that?
I said sure.
He said do you know why?
That's not a good idea?
And I said to me it would be.
I wouldn't want people to bepaying attention to me.
When is he going to say rightnext, so they're not hearing
what I'm saying, which ishopefully of some value?
And he said well, do you knowwhat else?
I said no, I said what couldthat be?
He said you sound condescendingwhen you say right, like you're

(22:29):
saying I'm smart and you shouldbe paying attention to me and I
said that's not my intent, so Iwould hate for that to happen.
And the magical thing happenedwas about two months later I was
doing another visage talk andsomeone came up to me and said
do you know that you say right alot when you speak?
And I said you know what I doand I'm working on it, but thank
you for pointing it out.
And then he said of course, doyou know why that's not a good

(22:52):
thing?
And I said I've heard.
Why do you think?
He says because you soundstupid.
So in one case I'm a geniuswho's condescending the other
one, I'm an idiot.
So which one is right?
That's typically how feedbackgoes right.
So we do these things wrong andthen they just add up and the

(23:14):
business becomes harder andharder to run.
So if we can just do some ofthem a little closer to right
and not the way Bill says it,I'm saying most of what I teach
is not me.
It's Peter Drucker or EdgarSchein or Michael Porter or Amy
Edmondson or these thoughtleaders who have done science to
say here's what typically turnsout to be the best version of
doing this particular thing.
And that's really all I'mteaching.
I'm just teaching managementscience, right, I'm just a

(23:34):
professor, basically, of thesethings.
So that's what I think happensis that we just do a whole bunch
of things wrong, just a little,and they add up and just as you
get bigger they become more andmore problematic.

Speaker 1 (23:44):
I love that and I think it gives a lot of grace or
a lot of hope for theorganizational leader who might
feel that it makes things harder.
I imagine this like walkingthrough mud because you're right
, you get all this stuff andthen you're trying to be agile
and flexible and innovative andall these things like we like to
say in the world and iterateand minimum viable product and
bring it to the world anditerate fast and fail fast and

(24:06):
all the things that we seem tohear every time we turn around
today.
But then it's really hard foryou to do that when you're
holding on to all these otherthings.
We don't have to do everythingand I think that's really hard
to compartmentalize for lack ofa better word, but I guess the
better word would probably beprioritize.
You don't need to have 10 pilesall equally the same size.

(24:26):
What are the three main thingsthat you have to do today when
you do coaching?
Do you have tools for leadersto try to get clarity on that?
I would assume that a startupcompany these are the three
things you need to do versus anestablished organization, you
might have a lot of boxes tosort through, right, so those
approaches might be different.

Speaker 2 (24:47):
So I've done 10 startups already and I help
people scale non-startups.
I have experience from scale-upto startup.
Right, a scale-up is a verydifferent company than a startup
.
Actually, a startup is not acompany.
The best definition I've heardof a startup is by this
gentleman.
His name is Steve Blank.
He's considered the godfatherof startups.
He's written a bunch of booksFour Steps to Epiphany and

(25:08):
whatever.
His definition of a startup isa temporary organization in
search of a business model.
Until you have a business model,you are not a real company.
Almost everything I teach toscale-ups I would never teach to
a startup.
You don't need to worry aboutculture and strategy.
You don't need strategy.
If you don't have a businessmodel, strategy will come right.
And, by the way, you only needto do two things as a startup

(25:28):
you need to solve a problemworth solving in a way that
people will pay you real moneyfor it and don't run out of
money.
And more than one person?
Yeah, more than one.
So a startup, you don't know howbig the market is, right, we
say the market and we go to theVCs and we say there's a total
market.
I forget what the threeacronyms are the TMO and the SMO
and whatever viable market andwhatever.
We have no idea how big themarket is because we don't

(25:51):
really know what problem we'resolving yet.
And once we figure out ourproblem then we can say okay,
how big is this market?
How many people need this thing?
If someone tells you they knowthe size of the market at the
beginning, then they're totallysmoking their own stuff right,
they're just diluting themselves.
Now I know you have to say thatto get money and all this stuff
, but if you look at people whenso I work for 10 startups, I

(26:12):
would say only one or two ofthem actually ended up being in
the market that they started in.
So they raised money for onething and then they actually did
something else in another way.
So it's really hard to figurethat out.
But we don't spend the time todo that.
We have an idea and we wanteveryone to love our idea.
You call it the foundersomething.
I call it founderitis.
Right, as you fall in love withyour idea.
You shouldn't fall in love withyour idea, because your idea is

(26:33):
very likely wrong.
But if you fall in love withthe problem, you'll have all
sorts of ideas on how to fix theproblem and you'll go from
there.
If you hear the origin storiesof most startups, the founders
will tell you that, yeah, we'redoing something completely
different than what we thoughtwe were going to do.
The guys at Airbnb used to sellseat cushions.
That was their first business.
And then we did Airbnb.

(26:57):
It was a slightly differentbusiness model than it was now.
It was based upon conferences.
It was an air mattress, now thereplacement for hotels.
That was not the originalbusiness model.
It was have people live withyou, share your knowledge of the
area so they can enjoythemselves.
It's a completely differentmodel now.

Speaker 1 (27:12):
That's exactly right.
That's your two things forstartups.
What about the scaling?
We go back to those threepieces that you had before.

Speaker 2 (27:18):
Yeah, team systems, which is really mostly strategy
and execution, and then cash.
Those are the three main thingsthat you need to get.
If you got good at those threethings, you would be in a much
better shape than almosteverybody else.

Speaker 1 (27:30):
This good to great.
Jim Collins has put the rightperson on the bus.
We say that a lot, but I alwaysstruggled with that as a leader
in organizational growth andjust thinking like there is the
good to great model just get theright people on the bus first.
But then how do I know who theright people are if I don't know
what skills I need or if Idon't?

Speaker 2 (27:47):
know where we're going.
That's an iceberg statement,right?
He's telling you the tip of theiceberg, but there's a lot of
stuff underneath that you don'tsee, that you have to have in
place to do that.
Right?
And, by the way, I thinkthere's no one model to success.
There are people that arelike-minded, who don't really
know what to do, but they knowthey want to do something, and
then they work together to tryto figure out.
Then they say, okay, which oneshould we pick?

(28:08):
And then you go there.
But often a startup team isvery rarely the team that then
scales the business, becausetheir interests and motivations
are completely different.
Right, some people just get acharge out of starting something
new and getting it going.
They like the hard problem tosolve.
And some people are like Idon't want to do that at all,
let someone else figure that out, I'll make it better.
I'll be what's called the BASF,which used to be a commercial

(28:28):
right.
We don't make the carpet, wemake it softer.
We don't make this, we make youknow you're making it better,
which is typically what I do,right?
I'm more of a operations guywho comes in and makes something
better.
I don't have very few originalideas and such.
The Jim Collins thing is lovegood to great.
I read it in the nineties.
I thought it was wonderful.

(28:49):
It was one of the reasons why Istarted to really start to do
what I love to do was I'm likeoh yeah, there's like a, there's
a reason for stuff, right.
If you look, why are theysuccessful?
As opposed to looking forward,having a hypothesis and proving
a hypothesis.
It's a wholly different model,right?
His statement is you get theright people on the bus doing
the right things, right.
So you have to have a lot ofthose things underneath to do

(29:10):
that.
But I said to Jim, you neverexplained how do you know which
seat is the right seat?
And he never said it and it wasfunny so he never answered me.
Someone on staff answered meand he wrote a book really a
long time ago with another guy,james, something called BBE,
beyond Entrepreneurship, andthen he came out with B2.0.
And in that he finally sayshere's, at least in his opinion,

(29:34):
how you know what a right seatis, which I thought was funny,
which was 20 something yearslater, which is a pretty
important component to miss inthe equation of put the right
people in the right seats doingthe right things right, if you
don't know what the right seatis.
So it's what you said.
This is what I mean.
We do things just a little bitwrong.
Like you said, fail fast thatin and of itself is a little too
glib, right?

(29:55):
It's not fail fast, it's firstunderstand what you're trying to
do, do it, fail and learn andthen iterate again.
It's not just fail fast.
You got to do a little review.
What's your after action review?
What are we trying to do?
What did we miss?
Whatever?
Okay, now we do it again.
And yes, I totally agree withthat experimentation, especially
these days.
These days, it's more thingsmove too fast, it's less
routinized, it's more resilienceand things as opposed to a plan

(30:19):
or a map, right, or it's reallymore of a plan.
I think a map is relativelygood because a map can then give
you.
But if you just do one route onthe map, which is what a plan
is, there's nine ways to getfrom here to there and,
depending on the weather or ifan earthquake happens or
whatever, you got to be able tofigure out what you're doing.
We used to be able to do thatright, because things would take

(30:39):
forever to happen.
And what is interesting, I think, is that if you look at the
data, I think like the Fortune500 up until 1955 or whatever.
At the data, I think, like theFortune 500 up until 1955 or
whatever it was about 60 to 75years was the lifespan of a
company on the Fortune 500.
Now, 2017, it's 15 years.
Things just move too fastbecause we're not building

(31:00):
resilient companies, we'rebuilding too rigid of businesses
and then they get squashed likeBlockbuster and Xerox and
Polaroid, and you have to buildcompanies that can move and work
within a framework of what'scalled.
It used to be VUCA.
There's also one TUNA I like,which is Turbulent, Uncertainty,
novelty which I think is moreimportant than I forget what AA

(31:23):
was, because things are muchmore novel these days and the
only way to handle novel is tobuild resilience into your
business, because you don't knowwhat's coming, but you can
build something that can quicklyadjust and that's what great
companies do now.

Speaker 1 (31:36):
I think so too.
I worked for the majority of mylife in the military complex,
the defense ecosystem, which isnot inherently innovative and
agile, but certain elements ofit right it is.
Now We've learned a lot ofstuff from them.
We have learned a lot, that'svery true.
I had the beauty of, later inmy career, working in the

(32:00):
special operations community andreally seeing what that looks
like.
Crisis hits here and in fourhours we're doing X, y, z.
So the military componentsbuild in all of that agility and
flexibility and they'redesigned for complexity and
unknown variables and theyadjust on the fly.
But what I've learned about thatis those people, even those
teams, those special teams.
They practice without fail.
They're always training,they're always practicing and

(32:22):
every single person on the teamknows his or her position.
They can do it in their sleep.
So even if they don't knowwhat's on the other side of that
door, they know that the guy orgirl standing next to them is
going turn left and they'regonna turn right.
And it's a dance, it's abeautiful, it's just amazing to
watch it when it happens.
So I think there's that balancethere between it too.
You can't have one without theother.

(32:43):
So there is that planning forunknowns and having that built
in and being able to react.
But it's with intention and ittakes a lot of time in the right
people.

Speaker 2 (32:52):
Mortality focuses your mind.
The military is a life anddeath profession and you're
always trying to make sure thatyou're coming out ahead.
There's a lot of stuff that Iteach my clients that started in
the military.
One of the best people who runsteams or teams of teams is
Stanley McChrystal, and he's gota book right and he talked
about how they had to completelychange JSOC in order to deal

(33:13):
with Afghanistan and Iraq,because it wasn't an enemy like
before.
It was this dispersed,distributed thing and you can't
do command and control becauseby the time the information got
to you, the thing changed.
So we had to flip it on itshead, right, and that's
generally how you run reallygreat teams is you flip it on
its head.
Your job isn't to be thedecision maker and all the
things.
Your job is to push decisionsdown to where the information is

(33:35):
.
Give them autonomy, give themthe ability to be wrong, so
they're okay, but give themenough so they're wrong very few
times, and then, when they arewrong, teach them and get them
better.
I think the after action reviewis one of the simplest and best
things you can do after youmake a big decision or do
something, and that's a militarything right.
So I think there's a lot ofstuff we can learn from folks
like that.

Speaker 1 (33:56):
That's very true.
I did work at the command foryears.
There are some beautifullessons to learn.
I see a lot of thoseindividuals that came from the
command who served under MarkCrystal during his days in
McRaven, and a good portion ofthose military leaders are in
industry today and I have thechance to see them work in
innovation in defense tech.
They went into that space andthey are working really hard to

(34:21):
bring those lessons into themarketplace, which I love, and
so it is like you're saying it'sa beautiful kind of thing to
watch, but they are, they'rebringing that in.
There's a lot of stuff with MIT, different lessons and
leadership, technology, designthinking all those kinds of
things that the military, atleast at the Special Operations
Command, has taken and they putit in part of their just

(34:41):
standard training, designmethodologies in the Army and
stuff.
So yeah, I was thinking aboutthat Jim Collins thing today for
some reason and that came upwhile you were talking.

Speaker 2 (34:49):
I'm a big fan of Jim Collins and I think he's helped
a lot of companies get betterBecause again, he uses science
right.
Science is what happened, andstudying, looking at the
outcomes and then figuring outwhy, versus most businesses.
A hypothesis that then youprove, which we have so many
unconscious biases and cognitivedissonance and motivated
reasoning, all these things thatwhen you do it from a

(35:10):
hypothesis forward, you missstuff.
You just ignore things thatdon't go along with the
hypothesis and especially ifyou're creating a product or a
company, your customer will letyou know, unfortunately well
after the fact, that you arewrong, because they don't care
what you make.
They only care what you makedoes for them, and if you're not
making their lives better orsimpler or whatever, then

(35:34):
they'll find something else.
Mike Tyson says a plan is greatuntil you get punched in the
face.
And your customer will punchyou in the face.
They just won't buy from youand you'll hate it.
But it happened, right.
It's happened to music, ithappened to photography, it
happened to Blockbuster, it justhappens right.
We're not doing it on purpose,we're just like, oh, this is
better, I'm going to go do this,this is wonderful, I'm going to

(35:55):
try this new thing and then,all of a sudden, you're out of
business because you haven'tpaid attention to your customer
and the problem that they'retrying to solve and all the
different ways you can solve it,which is again, as I say, it's
a shame because it's totallypreventable.
No-transcript your business,but I can tell you how the best

(36:25):
businesses are run and there isa continuity across them.
You're going to do your versionof it or whatever, and that's
cool.
Like, for instance, I say yourversion of it or whatever, and
that's cool.
Like, for instance, I say, yourversion of decision making is
your version of decision making,as long as you have one.
Here's how we make decisionshere.
Here's the framework, here'sthe five steps we do to make
decisions.
That's yours.
It works great.
Someone else might have sevensteps.
You've thought it through,you've done those important

(36:47):
things, those foundationalthings, and you've done them
well.
So then again, you can buildthat resiliency into your
business.
The example that I'd like togive is neuroscience Create a
brain-friendly company.
Most people do not do this.
The brain does not do what wethink it does.
It is working against us allthe time.
Why?
Because it was not designed todo what we're asking it to do
and it's making all yourdecisions for you.

(37:08):
How is it doing?
It's using information outsideyou and inside you to make
decisions.
It uses 20% of your resourcesand it's only 3% of your body.
It's a very highly intensiveresource.
It's very smart but tries touse very few resources.
It doesn't want you to doanything new.
This is why feedback sucks.
It doesn't like change right.
Status quo is good.
It's easier to do status quo.
Your brain doesn't like whenyou first learn how to ride a

(37:31):
bike.
So it changes and it chunksthings together so you can ride
a bike without thinking about it.
But when you first startedriding a bike, it was super hard
.
Our brain is designed to predictthreat or reward, because
reward is good.
Calories, safety, whatever.
Threat is bad.
Saber-toothed tiger, whatever.
That is supposedly, accordingto some neuroscientists, what it

(37:53):
does on a regular basis,Supposedly five times a second.
Our brain is saying threat orreward, friend or foe, safe or
not safe, and it doesn't knowthe difference between a social
threat and a physical threat.
The same parts of our brainlight up when you're in physical
danger versus just socialdanger, so it acts the same
exact way.
Which is run right.
You start sweating, your heartstarts beating, all those things
start happening to you, andit's because you're in the

(38:15):
outgroup.
Because, guess what, when youwere in the outgroup you were
dead when you were on thesavannah right, because without
the tribe you couldn't survive.
So we don't create abrain-friendly environment, and
the example I like to give isthe same one, because it's
perfect and it happens to almostall of us, or we've done it is.
So we're in a meeting, danita,you're my boss, I'm running the
meeting for one of the teamsthat you're responsible for, and

(38:38):
the meeting went OK and youwant to help me, right?
You want to give me somefeedback.
Now, one of the ways you coulddo it, which is what most people
do, is they'll tap me on theshoulder and say hey, bill, can
you walk me back to my office?
And I want to talk about thismeeting, what, what happens to
me as soon as you do that.

Speaker 1 (38:52):
I just hold my breath .

Speaker 2 (38:54):
I am now in threat mode.
I'm like, oh my God One, youput me in the out group because
not everyone left and you saidfollow me back, you're in
trouble.
Come to the principal's office.
That's bad.
I'm walking next to you and I'mcatastrophizing.
I'm like what did I do wrong?
Am I going to get fired?
What your job?

(39:19):
So by the time I sit down inyour office, which is a status
symbol and you sit behind yourdesk, which is another status
symbol, and I'm sitting in achair open, my brain is on fire,
right.
And so, no matter what you saynext, I probably won't remember,
because all of the resourcesfrom the front of my brain are
going to the save the body partof the brain.
I'm in amygdala hijack, as theycall it.
I probably can feel the beat ofsweat floating down my shirt
right.
I can feel my part racing.
I probably can't even hear you.

(39:40):
This actually happened to meonce and I can tell you later if
you want.
So that's one way to do thatright.
The other way to do that iswait till everybody leaves, sit
down next to me and say hey,bill, how do you think that
meeting went?
And if I'm not delusional, I'mgoing to say it was okay, there
was some really good parts andwhatever.
And you say I think so too.
So let's do this.
Let's meet next week before thenext meeting and you bring two

(40:01):
or three things that you thoughtwent really well in the meeting
.
Maybe we can brainstorm on howto make them even better.
Bring one or two things thatyou thought could be better.
I'll do the same thing andwe're going to work together
every week until you and Idecide this is the best version
of this meeting.
Outcome is supposedly the same,right?
All we're trying to do is makethe meeting better.
Completely different approach.
No status certainty.

(40:22):
I have autonomy, I'm not in theout group, and that sounds fair
to me.
Our brain may not be in rewardmode, but it is not in threat
mode, right?
We don't do that as leaders.
We are constantly unwittinglyand unknowingly right.
We don't do that as leaders.
We are constantly unwittinglyand unknowingly putting people
in threat mode on a regularbasis, and you can't do that.
You will not get the best outof someone if they're constantly
in threat mode.
So that's science, right?

(40:43):
I say if you don't understand alittle bit about the brain,
then you're always at a deficitas a leader.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
It's like 21st century things you need to know,
and that's one of the thingshow the brain works.
I feel the same way aboutemotional intelligence.
It's so much a part of who weare and why we feel the way we
feel.
How do we feel?
We don't even know.
We don't even know how toidentify how we feel.
Half the time, we can't evenname a feeling right.
It doesn't even get a label.
We don't even know how todefine it, and so then how am I

(41:09):
even supposed to unwrap it orfigure out why I felt that way
or what was the cause?
Like you're saying, all I knowis I'm breathing heavy and I'm
in the office and I feelirritated and I'm frustrated and
I go home frustrated, but Idon't even know why.
And that's a intentionaljourney, I think, as we go
through life.

Speaker 2 (41:26):
And that's great science is there's science of
emotion.
There's a wonderful author Ican't remember her last name,
it's Feldman and she's beenstudying emotions for 20 years
and she wrote a whole book onhow emotions are made and she
basically says look, emotionsare a construct of a human.
There are some folks that saythat some emotions inside us are
inherent, they're justhardwired.
But most of them are not.

(41:46):
Most of them we make up.
In science, especially inpsychology, is we used to say oh
, you need to talk about thatthing a lot, right, if you're
struggling with emotion.
Actually that's wrong because,again, your brain doesn't know
anything.
So it thinks, when you thinkabout it or talk about it, that
it's happening.
So if you continue to talkabout the thing, it actually
strengthens that particularthing for the brain.

(42:07):
So you will do it again.
If you're having a bad emotion,then you probably want to try to
avoid it.
So, for instance, the sciencesays the best thing to do is
name the emotion.
So having a vocabulary isreally good, right?
If you just know anger and youdon't know irked or bothered or
all these other versions of it,that's not good because there
are gradations of being angryand whatever, right.
So name it and then say okay,how can I avoid doing that next

(42:29):
time?
Work on how to fix it.
If you keep doing that, thenyou're teaching your brain to do
the new thing and you'recreating a channel for that
thing Next time it happens andyou automatically respond, you
respond in the new way insteadof the old way.
This is cognitive behavioralscience and other things, but we
didn't know that for the last10 years or so.
We thought you need to talkabout it all the time and we

(42:50):
actually found out that talkingabout it makes it worse, believe
it or not.

Speaker 1 (42:53):
I have a friend.
She is a therapist and shetaught me every feeling is valid
.
So I teach this a lot at thecenter and even when I do work
coaching.
Emotions and feelings we justlet them walk around, we're not
judging them.

Speaker 2 (43:04):
And sometimes that works right.
I'm pretty even keeled and Ilearned about belief systems 30
years ago and I understood thatmy beliefs are mine and I could
change them when I want.
The action of that person saysmore about them than it does
about me.
I can respond any way I want toalmost any situation.
Right, that's the stoicism,which is almost stoic.
And once you understand thatyou have this power, I have no

(43:24):
power over your emotions, I onlyhave power over mine.
No one can make me feelanything other than physical.
That's my choice.
If you slowly do that, then youcan observe yourself and that's
why I reacted that way, andthen you say, okay, the
likelihood of that happeningagain doesn't happen, so you can
change that, so you don't getupset.
That's what leaders need tounderstand.
So you need to understandthey're in charge of creating an

(43:46):
environment that people are attheir best and that involves the
whole person, as you said.
And if you don't understand alittle bit about the brain,
you're not able to do that aswell as you possibly could.

Speaker 1 (43:55):
Yeah, I love that.
That's so good.
I think that goes to.
The last question I had was howcan leaders cultivate a culture
of compassionate productivityin your organizations?
That's pretty much right alongthe same line, right?
Do you have anything else thatyou would think?

Speaker 2 (44:08):
That's a super easy answer.
You have to model it first.
So whenever I work with myclients and we're doing
vulnerability or whatever, theleader always goes first.
You have to get comfortablewith.
I don't know, I was wrong and Ineed help.
When you model that you're ahuman being and you're flawed,
then it gives permission toeveryone else to be the same way

(44:29):
.
It's okay to be a flawed humanbeing.
It's not okay to treat peoplebadly and whatever.
But if you do something and youfollow the values of the
business and you're trying toget to help the business be
better and your intentions weregood but you failed, then that
is a way to help them grow andbe better.
Right and say, yep, that was ascrew up and whatever, but good
thing you failed, you tried.
Now let's fix it, let'scelebrate the failure and then

(44:52):
get better at it.
There's this thing that SimonSinek says most people have the
second job at work, which is thelying, hiding and faking,
because they don't want to beseen as difficult or that they
don't know something.
So they're constantly trying tofind ways.
That's a lot of energy spent onsomething that could be going
to something more productive.
So you have the leader.
As Amy Emerson says, you haveto create a psychologically safe

(45:14):
environment where people canfeel like they can screw up or
say crazy things and not getlaughed at, because, by the way,
if you say something nutty,someone might say we can't do
that.
But you know what?
That sparked an idea in me whatif we did it this way?
And that might spark a wholegreat place that solves
something way better than wethought we could If you hadn't
said the crazy thing, becauseyou were safe and you felt okay.

(45:36):
So this is really nutty, butlet me just throw it out there.
It's amazing how many greatideas are spawned from other
things.
Right, that's one wonderfulthing about our brain it can
make connections, it can haveinsights because it gets
information and allows it to beinsightful.

Speaker 1 (45:50):
Yeah, and I think all that goes back to trust.
When you go back to thebeginning, where we started,
it's like you have to trust thepeople standing next to you.
You have to trust that theyhave the organization's best
interests at heart.
And then there is that personalvulnerability piece that you do
genuinely care.
Do genuinely care, bill, if youhad a bad day.
Or I do genuinely care if youhave an ailing parent or got

(46:14):
stuff going on with your.
Whatever it is, we do genuinelycare because we are humans and
we are carrying all that stuffeither way.
I think it's that olive branch,or, like you said, the leader
goes first.
I love that, I'm going to writethat down and then the fact
that it's OK to say you don'tknow.
In my experience, that's what Ifound too, like the best leaders

(46:41):
that I worked with and for inthe military space, mostly the
ones that were the humble, I say, but they were really.
It wasn't even humility, it wasmore, more so, vulnerability.
I just remember sitting acrossthe table from these phenomenal
warriors, heroes and legends.
I call them, but they wouldnever call themselves that, but
I do.
I know all the things that theywere a part of and they would
still sit there at that side ofthe table with their kind of
head in I do, I know all thethings that they were a part of
and they would still sit thereat that side of the table with
their kind of head in theirhands.
I don't know how to do this.
I can't, I don't know, and thatwas just such an amazing

(47:01):
opportunity for me to see.
It is really hard, and it'sokay that it's hard and it's
okay that the answers are notclearly mapped out, because
we're trying to do things peoplehave never done before.

Speaker 2 (47:10):
A good leader describes the outcome, Say for A
good leader describes theoutcome, Say I don't know how to
get there.
I would like it to be this wayI have no idea how to get there
and we get to do it together.
Because, if you again, that'sabout leadership, right, that's
creating a vision and helpingpeople say oh, follow me to this
thing.

Speaker 1 (47:23):
Yeah, please help me.
Help me get to this thing.

Speaker 2 (47:25):
Yeah, I need help.
Right, we could do thistogether as a team.
You don't have to have all theanswers, but you said something
really important, which is trust.
So there's three kinds of trust, according to some.
One is ability, the other isintegrity and the third is
benevolence.
We've been talking aboutbenevolence.
So ability is will they get thejob done?
Do they have skills andknowledge?
Can they?
I trust they have competency.
Integrity is I trust that whatthey mean is what they say and

(47:47):
they'll do what they say andthey say what they mean, right.
And then the other isbenevolence.
Right, and we have tounderstand that there's three
different ways of creating thattrusting environment.
As a leader, right, you want tohelp the people to get the
skills and knowledge so they aretrusted for ability.
And if you hire for fit and notskill, then your job is to fill
them with the skills.
Right, teach them, train them,whatever it might be.

(48:08):
Integrity is more of aninternal thing.
Right, that's more of a value.
Right, it's hard to teachsomeone integrity.
Their parents did it, theirfriends did it, whatever.
Right, integrity is generallyis a trait.
Traits are hard to teach.
You can teach them.
It's usually expensive.
You can't make someone honest.
They are the only ones who cando that right.
So that's the other.
And then the benevolence,because what you said is two

(48:31):
things.
One is the lead.
So when it comes to showingvulnerability and creating a
psychological environment,leaders go first, but they speak
last, and you didn't ask methis, but I'll add it.
So the best leaders, I think,also have curiosity and
compassion right.
So they're not trying to givethe compassionate, they're
always trying to think aboutwell, where's he coming from?
What did she?

(48:55):
What might she have meant bythat?
Let me see if I can play backwhat I thought I heard to make
sure that we're on the same page, as opposed to we can't do it
that way because da-da-da-da,and then the person says but I
didn't mean it that way, nowthey're also.
Those are traits that make youan even better leader.
There are gradations ofleadership that are better.
In the early part of theconversation I was doing just

(49:17):
the basics, right.
Leaders are just vision andcourage, but I think better and
better leaders have curiosityand compassion, right.
Alan Mulally was the mostcompassionate leader I've ever
heard of and he would tellstories that when he came into
Ford there was one guy who saidI don't want to do what you're
saying we want to do, alan.
And he said that's okay, youdon't have to, but we're doing

(49:38):
it.
So I'm going to help find you acompany where you can do what
you want to do, but it's nothere.
And he actually helped the guyfind a job.
That's compassion, right?
That's really.
That's empathy with action.
He didn't just say then fine,leave, I don put his arm around
the guy and said let's help youdo you right.
And it's just not here.
And he did that all the time,right?
He was all about we get rid ofpeople.

(49:58):
We do it with compassion.
They're human beings, they havelives, they have people that
rely on them, et cetera.
Just because they don't believewhat we believe and want to do
what we want to do, doesn't meanwe treat them any differently
than if they were in our tribe.
If you can have those twothings, you're well on your way
of being a tremendous leader,but we're not taught that, by
the way.
That's the problem.
We're not taught that thosethings are valued.
We're taught about havinganswers.

(50:19):
The people who have the answersare the best.

Speaker 1 (50:21):
That's so good.
And results answers and resultsright.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
Yeah, you have to have results Eventually.
You'll get fewer and lesserresults Eventually because you
can't have all the answers andyou can't do everything.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Yeah, you can't do everything.
Yeah, you can't do everything.
That's so true.
What are some of the big thingsthat you're working on right
now?
If you want to share anythingthat's new or anything that
you're excited about what'scoming up?

Speaker 2 (50:40):
I'm mostly fine with what I do.
I'm not out to save the worldor whatever at least not in a
big way.
So to me it's about clients orbeing able to help someone.
So I have a couple of newclients coming on, I'm doing
some giving away of my time andwhatever to help other people as
well.
So those are the things thatI'm really focused on.
I'm not really a writer.
I'm not going to write anotherbook.

(51:01):
I might, but it's expensive towrite a book.
I have to pay other people towrite it because I suck at it
and I don't really enjoy it.
So that's expensive.
I have other things I want todo, but that's pretty much it.
I think it's a shame thatreally good ideas, really good
people and really goodbusinesses fail or struggle for
completely preventable reasonsand I want to spend until I
can't do it anymore helpingwhoever would like my help to do

(51:21):
that.

Speaker 1 (51:22):
That's so good.
Okay, we'll link the book andyour websites in the show notes
so everybody can reach out toyou.
It was such a blessing and I goback to the beginning Like I
learned so much.
I'll probably have to listen tothis episode three times
because I didn't get to take allmy notes, but for me personally
, bill, it was a huge blessingto meet you and thank you so
much for sharing.
Hey friends, thanks forlistening to the conversation

(51:42):
with Bill.
I hope that he provided yousome really great information.
Jump over tocatalystgrowthadvisorscom, which
is his website, and you canfind additional information to
take the guesswork out of growth.
His executive coaching fromstartup to scale up services
should help you find clarity,alignment and competence in your
organization or team success,so make sure you check out those

(52:03):
resources.
Also, don't forget to subscribeto the Entrusted to Lead
newsletter, if you haven'talready.
Jump over to dannydecommonscomslash podcast so that you can
get the latest updates on ournew episodes.
Have an amazing day.
Don't forget to keep showing upevery day, even when it hurts,
because you matter.
All right, friend, I'll see youlater.
Bye.