March 12, 2024 • 43 mins
Pick up your book: The Retail Leader's Roadmap! HERE!
What's up, my friend? You're in for a real treat with this episode featuring Brian. We're going deep into the nitty gritty details of his proven blueprint for accelerating your career growth as a retail leader.
Right off the bat, Brian opens up about the profound influence his father had on instilling that insatiable drive to outwork, outlearn, and outlead everyone around him. The dude exudes an unwavering determination that's truly contagious.
He breaks down the strategic planning process that allowed him to systematically climb the ranks - mapping out long-term goals, identifying key experiences to pursue, and executing with laser-focus. This isn't just talk, it's a tangible game plan that you can apply.
But what really sets Brian apart is his mindset around leadership character development. We're talking about the grit, humility, and emotional intelligence required to inspire teams and become that leader people want to follow into the trenches. He's lived these lessons.
By the end, you'll have a revamped perspective on owning your leadership journey - crafting a personalized plan, embracing growth opportunities, and developing that unshakable sense of purpose. This dude lays it all out there with experienced-based wisdom.
So brace yourself, it's about to get real with a heavy dose of motivation, strategy, and battle-tested insights for senior retail leaders truly craving their "Best Next". Let's go!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome to Retail Leadership with Steve Worthy,
where we go well beyond thecorporate playbook to unpack
major opportunities, hiddenchallenges and critical issues
that senior retail leaders faceevery day.
If you're ready to get theinsights you need to elevate the
impact you have on your team,increase the profitability of
(00:28):
your stores and level up yourretail career, then keep
listening, my friend, because Isee a lot more success in your
future.
So let's get started right now.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, brian man, I gotta tell you I'm super excited
to talk to you today, and ourinitial conversation was long
overdue and it was quiteinteresting because you were
talking a little bit about yourdad and where he got started and
you threw up a couple of storesthat just kind of like threw me
(01:04):
back into my teenage years,when we get into the role that
your dad played for everybody.
Just tell everybody about Brian, and we're gonna, of course,
talk about the book, we're gonnatalk about the principles of
your books, we're gonna talkabout all of that.
So save some of that foreverybody.
(01:26):
So tell everybody a littleabout yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
No, yeah, yeah, no, I appreciate that.
Yeah, chess game goes quite aways back.
Huh, sir, you know I'm aretailer.
You know I like to tell peopleI'm a retailer.
You know it wasn't accidental,it was a choice of mine.
My father was a retailer,grandfather was a retailer.
If you look at my last name inGoogle you're gonna find
manufacturers and retailersdating back to the 1800s, so
it's just in my blood.
(01:50):
So I was privileged growing upto see my father corner office,
you know VP, taking the MetroNorth train into the city every
single day.
So I knew what I wanted.
Once I realized my baseballcareer wasn't gonna pan out and,
you know, started, you know,focusing in on retail.
Started focusing in on mycareer at a very early age.
You know, started working on Iwas 12, paying taxes at an early
(02:10):
age, primarily because my dadwouldn't pay for the Jordans
that I wanted.
So in order for me to get thoseJordans, you know had to earn a
little bit extra on top of theKmart prices that he was willing
to fund.
So, yeah, started out that wayand, you know, 35 years later,
you know achieved the corneroffice a couple different times
and now looking to see how I canhelp other people achieve what
(02:31):
their outcomes need to be.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Excellent, Excellent.
So did I hear baseball?
I didn't you know, in ourentire conversation that never
came up, so can we talk aboutthat for a second?
So talk about that part of yourof what happened here's what
I'll tell you.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
I thought I was going to be a professional baseball
player all the way until I was15.
And then, when I turned 15, Igot distracted by all kinds of
stuff and my baseball career wasover at that point and retail
was number one.
But what I will say is Ilearned probably some of the
most valuable lessons in myretail career and my life and my
leadership journey when I waslike 10, 11, 12, playing
(03:09):
baseball just with coaches.
I got lucky to have some reallygood coaches.
You know things like run thefirst base as hard as you can
regardless, like simple littlethings.
You know that just stick withyou and it's fun watching my 10
year old go through it.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
No, my baseball career ended at 15.
Yeah, yeah, running out.
Running out, that's what theyuse, because when I play
baseball, that's my coach'sresult.
Run it out Doesn't matter, it'sa ground ball, run it out.
I love that.
I love that.
All right, so I think this thesecond place I wanted to start.
You sort of alluded to it, yourdad and the thing that we, when
(03:44):
I talked about in the openingwhere you had mentioned chess
king and for those who, here'sthe thing if you are not
initiated and if you don't know,like I don't know how far you
go back in retail, I just got tosay that if you don't, if the
word chess king or oak tree,like, does not ring a bell, I'm
(04:04):
not particularly sure how faryou go back in retail.
I'm just saying talk a littlebit about that and the impact
he's had.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yeah, I'll do you one better on that before.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I do that, so I was with.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Justin, when they got bought by Mary go round too, so
I was a part of that.
Mary go round.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Come on, come on, come on.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Oh, you got a lot of fun.
I love that.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I love that I love that I'm telling you.
If you don't, if you okay, I'mnot even gonna go in here.
That's a whole nother show man.
That's a whole nother show.
Talk about your dad.
Talk about your dad.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
All right.
So I call it living with myidol.
You know, I tell people all thetime I was lucky enough to live
and grow up with my idol, youknow, and I tell people like, be
careful to not have your idolsbe people that you don't get to
engage with an Iraq on a dailybasis, movie stars, athletes,
those kind of things.
I was lucky enough.
I had a role model that set theexample for me at an early age
on how to be a husband, a fatherand a hard worker.
(04:58):
So I really want to pay thatprivilege forward and that's
what this book is about.
That's what my career really hasbeen about is trying to figure
out how to help folks that maynot have been as privileged as I
was in that sense to grow up ina household with a father like
that, with an idol like that.
And you know he taught me froma very early age.
You know you got to grind itout, you got to outwork folks,
(05:18):
which is the absolutely veryfirst practice in my book.
You got outward folks.
So from an early age, I like tosay from the age I was able to
sit at the dining room tablewith the family, I was learning
about leadership and I waslearning about careers and I was
learning about how to progress,because those were the
conversations that we had.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
So, okay, I'm going to go back to young Brian.
Right, and you're sitting atthat table.
I remember part of our initialconversation was around you know
college, and you were like thisthis, this wasn't for me, and
your dad gave you some advice.
Do you remember that piece ofadvice that he gave you?
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You were like this isn't for me.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
This isn't for me, and I want to do something else.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Well, I went to high school for three years.
I graduated in three years, notbecause I was super smart,
because I was creative and Itook two Englishes.
My senior year got enoughcredits and so I was ready to go
to college.
I got my syllabus.
I decided after getting mysyllabus that it wasn't what I
wanted to do, because I realizedit was going to impact my
ability to earn during theholidays ADHD and, you know,
(06:25):
instant gratification, all thatfun stuff that's me.
So I talked to my father aboutit.
Okay, here's the deal.
Like you're an adult, at thatpoint I was 17.
You choose what you want to do,but you better be where you
want to be in three to five.
So you either go to school,graduate, you have your diploma
and you start working where youwant to work, or you, in three
to five years, be where youexpect to be.
(06:47):
And so I wanted to be a DM.
It was plain and simple.
I knew the route because I hadseen my father ascend, so I knew
district, regional, like headof stores, chief operating, like
.
I knew what the roles lookedlike.
And so I had to work backwardsand say, okay, if I want to be
somewhere in three to five years.
What do I have to do?
And put together my owneducation.
And the last actually the lastchapter in the book around build
(07:09):
your plan is retail universityand it talks about how you can,
in retail, achieve success inany level, any role, in three to
five years.
If you pay attention, call it365 days a year for three to
five years.
That's plenty of time to becomewhat I would say is close to an
expert, or at least best inclass at what you do 100%, 100%
(07:30):
of it's, almost it's I, I, Iliken it to love what you just
said.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
I liken it to that idea on a 10,000 hour rule.
Right, we all heard, you know,malcolm Gladwell kind of talk
about that whole idea around.
You know, 10,000 hours it getsyou, you know, gets you to be,
you know, an expert, I Would say, in retail.
You know that's, um, you know,we can probably cut that, cut
that in, cut that in halfbecause of the intensity,
because of the intensity of theindustry and what we have to and
(07:57):
what we have to go through, um,one of the things that you,
that you often talk about isresults stem from, from the
right attitude.
We're gonna get into the bookhere in a second and there's
probably some parts of the book,but, um, you know, one of the
things I enjoy Is that, you know, almost every day, I think I'm
gonna say no, I'm saying almostevery day, but every day I'll
either go to Instagram and I'llsee my man walking, I see this
(08:20):
guy, here's a, here's a.
If you haven't seen Brian, thisis, this is Brian right here,
walk, walk in and talk it andhe's dropping, and he's dropping
some knowledge.
And Can we, can I talk a littlebit about that for a second,
like when did that start?
And I Gotta tell you, I, I, youknow, I think a lot of people
(08:44):
are like myself, we start ourday with, with, with listening
to that.
When did that start and whatwas the inspiration behind that?
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Yeah, it's funny because I don't.
I don't run like unless I wasrunning from somebody I don't
run.
And so during COVID I waslistening to a video and Goggins
got me off the couch like I waswatching one of his
inspirational videos, cursingleft and right, all that good
stuff.
And I just got up and we wereliving at the shore in Jersey at
the time, so I went to theboardwalk and I just ran.
(09:13):
I think I made it a mile and Iwas proud of myself.
From that point forward I juststarted running and I wasn't
posting anything.
And then I decided, when I wasstarting to write the book back
in April of last year, that Iwas gonna start to Share a bit
more of what my journey waslooking like and try to help
some folks in the way thatGoggins got me off the couch,
got me running.
I've always worked out, I liketo say.
(09:34):
I picked things up and put themdown, but I never did any kind
of cardio.
And If he could get me off thecouch and get me running, what
can I do for more folks in ourfield that are trying to achieve
their success and put betterfood on the table for their
families?
And so I started the videos,you know, and just started
getting more comfortable with itand you know I would run for a
mile, walk, a quarter run for amile, and in those quarter mile
walks is when I would kind of domy my thing and Try to share.
(09:58):
Initially it was just veryorganic and it still is organic
in a sense, but now it's a bitmore tied to trying to, you know
, obviously market the book andmake sure people pick the book
up, because I do believe it'sgonna help a ton of folks, but
it it motivates me as much as Ihopefully motivates others, and
the book and In podcasts andthings that I'm gonna do.
Next, I want to be content thathelps.
(10:18):
You know, I kind of like to saylike motivation lights the
flame, but content is what'sgonna sustain it, and so my hope
is that the videos help somepeople get up in the morning to
get moving.
But I want to deliver somecontent that can provide some
some quality results that aresustainable for folks excellent,
excellent, all right, so let'smove into.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Let's move and talk to talk about the book.
One other thing that we, we, wehave in common, based on our
conversation, was was Jack Welchright?
You know we, you know we, wegrew up in the in the age of
leadership, where you knowbottom 10% got to go and and how
that really impacted you know,I think, us as a leader, when
(10:58):
you think about you know yourbook right and the idea around
the book.
When did when did it start?
When did it occur to you to sayyou know what?
Hold for a second.
I need to take all this thingsthat I've learned and actually
put it into a book.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
It's interesting because I would say my very
first year as a district manager.
I was 21 years old and Iinteracted with a general
manager and that general managergot promoted a year later and
that general manager had a realtough time.
She struggled mightily in herfirst couple and it bothered me
and I realized back then that Iwas an example set, or people
(11:35):
just followed my lead and I justdelivered, but I didn't know
how to articulate it, I didn'tknow how to explain it to people
, and so that day I learned Ihad to start to operationalize
things.
I had to start to be able toarticulate things in a way that
I could Pass on the other, sothat they could be successful
when I wasn't around.
So that was the beginning ofthe journey.
And then I would say again,back in April, when I started to
write the book probably about ayear prior to that I started to
(11:57):
think about it and mostlybecause I want to try to find a
way to help the masses and notjust individuals within one
organization.
I've worked for a couple oforganizations to three actually
for extended periods of time andI've enjoyed developing the
talent within thoseorganizations.
But I believe that there arethere are a tremendous amount of
(12:18):
people right now, today thatare stuck in their careers
outside of the organizationsthat I chose to work for and I
want to be able to find ways tohelp them, and so this book is
meant to hit the masses andreally meant to help folks
either start their career theright way with that three to
five kind of plan, or getunstuck and rewrite that outcome
.
But yeah, I would say I knew along time ago this book was
(12:41):
needed, and I just needed about35 years of content building to
put a pen to paper.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Yeah, it's interesting how, when you think
about everything that you'veyou've learned kind of
throughout your, throughout yourcareer and a lot of times it
becomes muscle memory right whenwe are having conversations or
we're interacting or we'reengaging with, you know, with
with leadership teams, and wedon't understand Maybe we do to
some degree, we understand theimpact that we're currently
(13:09):
having and then when you startthat book writing process,
you're like, oh man, I didn'trealize I was actually doing all
of this.
The title of the book is theretail leaders roadmap and you
you break down three strategiesand three, three steps and could
you, could you highlight theeach one of them and then kind
(13:29):
of what I want to talk abouteach one of them as we, as we
move forward?
Speaker 3 (13:33):
Yeah, absolutely so.
The first pillar is build yourcharacter.
Second pillar is build yourconnections and the third pillar
is build your plan.
The first pillar is reallyabout the character.
Right, it's about the hardskills, it's about your
foundation.
I like I liken it to.
It's like the foundation ofyour home.
You know, hurricane comesthrough.
You want that home to stand onits own.
You need a strong foundation.
(13:53):
We talk about out working, wetalk about out learning, we talk
about being the example, beingaccountable, being disciplined,
and those five practices are thecore of your foundation, the
core of your character, and theyset you up for success.
I look at that as kind of yourunderclassmen years, kind of
like that first and secondfreshman sophomore year.
You have to kind of take thoseclasses to be able to take the
next round.
Build your connections isreally where other people start
(14:16):
to become a part of your successequation, right, you start
developing talent.
You have to enhance yourcommunication and you have to
improve your influence skills.
You know those influence skills, you know I put at the very end
, because who cares if you caninfluence folks?
If you can't communicate well,if you can't develop folks,
you're not going to be inposition to get involved.
And then the last pillar isreally build your plan.
Now that you know you have tohave strong character and you
(14:38):
have to have strong connections,now you have to have a plan
right.
And there's two real bigsections in the build your plan
that people are going to be ableto take and put pen to paper on
five piece of performance, andthat's how you win at your day
job.
And then the retail university.
And that retail university ishow you learn.
I call it learn while you earnright.
You win your day job.
(15:02):
That's how you earn money.
And then, while you're earning,you have to learn so that you
can progress.
Performance alone doesn't getyou where where you want to be.
Performance and potential does,and so you need to do both.
You're always going to do morework on the day job because
that's how you pay the bills,but you have to take in the
inputs you can grow yourself sothat you have more to offer to
others.
You're listening to retailleadership with Steve worthy,
(15:22):
excellent, excellent.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
This the foundational one character.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Can we talk about that one?
Because I want to talk aboutall three as well.
But I love that you start withcharacter, because what we, what
we tend to see, and you and I'mquite sure you've seen this
throughout your career is thatwhen we start to see leaders who
get into high, intense,intensity situations, one of the
(15:52):
first things that we end upseeing is that the character
starts to go out the window.
We start to see, you, thedecisions that are made not in
the best interest of you know,maybe the person that's in front
of them, but maybe it's it's inthe best interest of themselves
.
How does one this is a bigquestion, right, but how did you
go about?
(16:12):
I'm going to kind ofpersonalize, instead of it being
general.
How did you kind of personalizethat you know, that character
perspective?
What are some of the thingsthat you have done to actually
kind of cultivate that mentality?
Because I'm quite sure I knowyou talk about it, probably in a
book as well, but I just wantedto get your perspective, you
know, on that aspect.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Yeah, I mean I asked myself, you know, whenever I was
stuck in my career, why, like?
What was it?
And it was one of those fivethings I just mentioned.
I wasn't working hard enough, Iwasn't learning, I wasn't open
to it right, I wasn't settingthe right example, I wasn't
being accountable and I wasn'tbeing disappointed.
So I knew that those were thethings that were holding me back
.
(16:53):
And my father said from day onelike you have to out work.
You know you want to putyourself in a position to be
first, second or third at alltimes.
I refer to it as podium moments.
Like you want to be at thepodium all the time and if you
do and work on your characterand you work on the five things
I mentioned, you'll be at thepodium Regularly.
Now you might not be ready fornext, you might never be good to
(17:15):
get to next because you lackthe connection piece, but you'll
be at the podium at your dayjob on a regular basis and I
like to refer to them as kind oflike knock it off moments.
Like you know you should outworkfolks.
Like you know it, like you knowyou should be learning Right.
Like like you may not want to,but you know you should and you
know when you're not, setting anexample is probably not the
(17:36):
best thing for you, and you knowwhen you're being a victim
you're not going to be able totake control of your own destiny
, and when you're notdisciplined, you're not going to
do the things you're supposedto do.
So I had to come to terms withthat and the accountability
which is the fourth pillar inthat.
First, I'm sorry, the fourthpractice in that first pillar to
me is the linchpin.
Yes, you have to work hard, yes, you have to be open to learn,
(17:57):
yes, you have to set examples,but if I can't accept and
embrace my own realities, Ican't figure anything out.
So to me that's the linchpin,and so I have to accept and
embrace when I'm not workinghard enough and start doing it.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Yeah, I love that.
I'm sorry.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Eric, care of your stuff doesn't.
Yeah, I was just going to saylike care of your stuff kind of
doesn't need to be developed, itneeds to be recognized.
And so my hope is in this bookI can clearly spell out like
here's the five things you haveto do, and sure some of it might
require some skill setdevelopment.
For the most part it's kind oflike you just have to do these
things you set yourself up toput in the work for the
(18:33):
electives that are next.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Oh great, I love that and I love you said the word,
two words that really just stuckout was discipline.
That's my word for the year.
Actually, discipline, pick aword for the year and I'm
telling you right now.
It has been taught in a reallygood way, though, but I love the
fact, and it's a really goodsegue into the idea of around
(18:55):
accountability.
Use the word accountability.
And the next, the next pillarthat you discuss is your
connections.
So I would, I would am I safeto assume that when we, when you
start to bring in others, thereis a perspective or a thoughts
around accountability associatedwith bringing in other people
to that journey as well?
Speaker 3 (19:15):
100%.
I mean the first practice ofthe three in the connection
pillar is development.
Like, if you want to, if you,you got to do more for others
and you have to be able todevelop others.
And then, as you shift fromthat into communication, one of
the things that I think peoplehave a hard time with is
accepting the reality that theyneed other people.
Now, my entire book 100%, butmy entire book is like you need
(19:37):
to own it, don't rely on anybodyelse, and if you're lucky
enough to have somebody else,take full advantage of it.
However, you own yourcommunication, you own your
influencing skills, but otherpeople still have to respond a
certain way and you're gonnahave to make decisions.
So, like, the very lastpractice in influence is one
that I think a lot of peoplearen't gonna like, and it's
(19:59):
where I say very clearly youhave to meet your boss and their
boss 51% of the way or more, oryou're stuck.
It is what it is Like.
They are in control, they willmake the decisions.
You have a choice to decide togo work for somebody else where
you can meet them 51% of the way.
That's your choice, and a lotof people don't make that choice
or they don't make the choiceto actually find the
(20:21):
professional contribution inthat leader so that they can
align to that leader and givethem what it is that they need.
So there's a lot ofconversation and connections
that are around how you canstill own your outcome even
though other people are gonna beinvolved because of the
decisions that you make alongthe way.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Yeah, yeah, it's interesting that I love what you
said about ownership andmeeting your boss 50% of the way
.
I think one of the things thatpeople fail to realize and I'm
excited and can't wait to readyour book is that there is
ownership in meeting your bossat 51%.
You are actually owning theconversation.
(20:59):
You're actually owning thatportion of the relationship.
I always talk to my team andtell them I would rather be a
part and actually generate theconversation and the dialogue
than to have the dialoguethrusted upon me or like a new
initiative.
Right, you know how it goes inthe retail world these new
(21:22):
initiatives just get thrustedupon you.
I was one of those.
Leaders is like we'll do thepilot, we'll do the pilot, we'll
try it over here.
And my team hated it initially.
But I'm like do you notunderstand what we're doing?
We actually have a seat at thetable.
We were actually being able tocontrol the conversation instead
of having the conversationthrusted upon us.
(21:42):
So I love what you said aboutownership and meeting your boss
51% of the way.
A lot of people don't get that,so I'm super excited to read
that portion of your book.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Yeah, steve, let me throw one thing out there.
So I'm gonna give my wife aplug.
Who's my co-owner on the WellWish your Company?
She's a.
I live with an executive coach,basically.
So both fitness and leadership,so you can imagine the lessons
that I get.
She's the one who taught meLike I came home one day and I
was miserable and I'm not amiserable person, I'm pretty
happy on a regular basis and mywife said very clearly she said,
(22:15):
look, you have two choices youchoose to find the professional
contribution in your boss or youchoose to leave.
And she said very clearly,because he's not gonna meet you
where you are, yeah, stop, andhe won't until you do so.
I did.
I met him 75% of the way andall of a sudden he started
meeting me 75% of the way and wehad an amazing relationship and
(22:36):
we had a great career together.
So, but again, like you said,like we have to take ownership
in it and not expect others to.
We might get lucky and have oneor two leaders that actually
look to meet us where we are,and those are fantastic leaders,
but they're far and few inbetween.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Very far, very far Before we move into the plan.
One of the things that you Iwanted to drill down is that you
said a lot of people and Icompletely agree with this a lot
of leaders fail to recognize oreven like, kind of, from a
vulnerability standpoint I'mjust gonna use that word to be
(23:11):
vulnerable enough to realizethat.
You know.
Hey, brian, I need connection,I need help, I need your
assistance because I don't haveit all together.
Right, I am missing something,I am stuck.
Right, you know thatvulnerability and leadership are
rarely placed in the samesentence, and I know you've been
(23:34):
a very successful leader, butthere I say, I think a lot of
some of your success has beenbecause you've been able to be
vulnerable.
Would you agree with that andwhat are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
100%.
Yeah, I used to joke, you know,when you trip in the street,
you know you're yellow, likejust kind of fall and keep
moving and act like it didn'thappen.
And that's me like I trip on aregular basis and I just keep on
moving and act like it neverhappened.
You have to be vulnerable,otherwise you can't take any
inputs.
You know, and for me, thelessons when I wrote this book,
(24:06):
because most of the content inthe book it was there, I just
needed to get it on paper.
But I was reminded of somethingand learned something in the
book, and I remember for years,for the last 10 years or so, I
tried to really work on myhumility and really tried to
make sure that it was outwardand that people knew it right.
And what I found was, you know,because I wanted to let other
people speak first and I wantedother people to have a voice.
(24:27):
Maybe my voice wasn't as loudas it was in the beginning part
of my career, and it was because, growing up, I had a very fast
record, I was successful inmoving up the ladder, so to
speak, and I was perceived to bearrogant, right, and what I
realized, though, in writingthis book, is that I wasn't
arrogant.
I was extremely humble becauseI was learning like you wouldn't
(24:49):
believe behind the scenes.
I was reading.
You know I was doing we'redoing a podcast back then but I
was reading books like I waspaying attention, I was taking
feedback criticism, no problembut that was during practice.
Like that was behind the scenes.
When it was game time.
I knew what I was doing becauseI had been putting in the work.
And so I heard a quote.
(25:10):
I think it was Kobe said thisyou know, practice like you've
never won before and play likeyou've never lost before.
I love it Like.
So I was always humble in a way, but I didn't recognize that I
was humble.
But you have to be and youdon't have to necessarily be
humble when you're playing thegame.
You need to go out and play thegame, but hopefully you have
done the work already so thatyou know what you need to get
(25:31):
done.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
Yeah, I think that there is strength in humility
and what I mean is that the actof being vulnerable but also
being able to take ininformation and then internalize
that information and into anoutward expression.
Right, I think about it.
I think about it just to kindof further.
Your example of Kobe I rememberthere was a scene not a scene,
(25:58):
there was a game when Kobe wasprobably new in the league and
he was actually and he wasguarding Mike and they caught
the conversation.
He was literally asking Mikelike what do you do on this play
?
What do you?
How do you post up here?
How do you do this?
And I just I love that.
I'm like you're in the middleof a game, right, you're in the
(26:18):
middle of a game and you'reguarding for me the best player
ever and you are just takingthis opportunity to humble
yourself and actually stilllearning.
I think the model mentalitykind of came from that.
So, anyway, I got excited aboutwhen you talked about Kobe,
because that scene just kind ofresonated with me.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
Well, I think you'll appreciate it and, by the way,
michael is the best player everand, yes, he used to call
Michael at like two in themorning, I think as well.
I hopefully you'll appreciatethis one.
But at the end of the day, youcan't take yourself so seriously
and that's what I had to learn.
I think when you see people andyou know this you've seen VPs
(26:56):
and chief operating officers andchief you've seen regional
direct you've seen people thattake themselves so seriously,
they look down on other peopleand it took me a while to figure
out how do you be humble andconfident at the same time?
Because you have to be.
People follow confident leaders, but you have to be humble to
take in the inputs, to then begood at what it is that you do.
And when you take yourself tooseriously, you're letting your
(27:17):
ego get the better of you, right?
And so I like to joke you.
When you and I first got on thispodcast, you talked about me
wearing black, right, jokingaround Like that's what I wear.
I feel better in black, but Idon't look down on you if you
wear bright colors.
But if I take myself realseriously, I would you know I
ride Harley Davidson's.
If I took myself so seriously,I would look down on people who
chose not to ride a Harley, butwhen I'm on one I feel good,
(27:41):
like when I drive that 150s Ifeel good.
So I think it's about accepting, you know, your ego in a
positive way, the things thatare about you that you enjoy
doing.
But don't take yourself soseriously, because then you look
down on other people andtherefore you're going to not
take in the input.
So I think it's important tonot take yourself so seriously
100% agree.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
100% agree.
All right, let's move into theplan.
Let's move into the plan, right?
We spoke about characterconnection and the last part
about your book is the plan.
(28:22):
Talk about that and some of thethings that when people start
to read the book, what are someof the takeaways that they're
actually going to get from this?
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Yeah, it's funny because that was the one thing
that went back and forth wasbuild your plan going to be the
first pillar or the last pillar?
We made it the last pillarbecause we really wanted to
cover the content of the workfirst.
Five piece of performance isthe beginning of the plan.
You have to win at your day job.
You have to get to the podiumright and if you're not at the
podium on a regular basis, thisbook will help you because it's
(28:52):
a diagnostic tool to figure outhow to get there.
But what you have to be able todo is you have to focus on
people and product, you have toprioritize it, you have to put
processes in place and that'sgoing to drive your productivity
, which delivers performance.
It's a lot of piece, it's a lotof words, but it's all in the
book and it's outlined andspelled out in terms of what you
need to do.
But people are first andproducts a close second.
(29:14):
But if you don't prioritizethose things and you try to get
to it all, at best you'll be a Cplayer.
But if you want to be an Aplayer, you got to get to what's
most important when it comes topeople and product, when it's
most important.
And then you have to createprocesses and routines,
disciplines to get the work done.
And I talk about breaking it upinto quarters at a time so that
(29:34):
way you can be nimble enough toadjust when your plan is or
isn't working.
And I like to say it's likedefense and playing football.
A lot of coaches draw up thefirst few plays because they
want to see what the defensedoes, and then they adjust from
that point.
Your plan's the beginning stageright, but you need to be
flexible enough to adjust.
(29:55):
And so that's the, I would say,half of the builder plan pillar
.
And then now you're winning atyour day job.
Now you're at the podium on aregular basis.
It's time to go to school.
I refer to it as you got toearn to learn.
All right, now I'm earning, nowI've created space to learn
because I'm winning.
And when you win quote unquotewin means you're making it to
(30:15):
the podium and you feel goodabout what you do.
Your supervisors tend to leaveyou alone.
That's not necessarily a goodthing, but they tend to leave
you alone.
They shouldn't and I talk aboutthat in the book as well, but
they do.
And so that means every mistakeyou make you can learn from,
because nobody's yelling at youfor them.
But if you're not making it tothe podium, they assume that
same mistake is the reason whyyou're not any good and they
(30:36):
give you a hard time and youcan't learn from it because
you're playing too tight.
So the second part of the bookis really how you ascend in your
role in three to five years andwhat that looks like.
And part of that practice that,again, people aren't going to
like is every new boss, everynew role, every new company,
every new responsibility.
(30:56):
You got to start over.
You got to start proving yourcharacter all over again.
Now you can prove yourcharacter really quickly if it's
inherent in you, but you got toprove it to the new employee or
leaders that now report intoyou.
So my hope is that the buildnot my expectation is that the
build your plan portion is thetactical work that people can
put pen to pay abroad and startseeing themselves get unstuck in
(31:20):
their careers.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Excellent, excellent.
I was fighting back my one ofmy phrases when I said no one
cares.
Like we're talking about, likeevery next, the new level, like,
like to no one cares.
No one cares.
All of the successes thatyou've had right, all the people
that you've been influenced,it's all about, like, what's in
it for me right now.
You as my leader, right, I cancare less about what you did for
(31:42):
Brian.
I want to know what she's goingto do for me right now.
It's a hard truth, but a lot ofleaders need to accept it.
Well, hold up for a second.
I just promoted like fivedifferent you know people to,
you know to, district manager.
I can care less.
Like, what are you going to dofor me right now in this role
right now?
Go ahead.
You were going to say something.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
No, no, no, no, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
One of the things you said and it caught me.
You said holding things tootight.
You know, my, my oldest brother, stan, and I, we, you know I
remember I was, I was strugglingwith something and he, he and I
were talking.
He said, steve, you, he saidyou're holding the too tight.
And I don't know if you're agolfer or not, but one of the
things that they talk about whenyou hold the club it's almost
(32:28):
like holding a baby bird, right,you're like, you're not.
You want to hold it just enoughto not let it go, but you want
to, but you want to hold ittight enough to not crush it.
And I, when I think about youknow our careers, and I think
about our journey, almost,almost in that similar fashion,
and I think about and I'mthinking about the, you know,
I'm thinking about the roadmapis that you want to hold your
(32:48):
career tight, but, man, you need, you need and that plan tight,
but you need to have some wiggleroom in there in order for
things to still kind of get inthere so that you can make the
best of that journey.
Would you agree with thatthought process?
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Yeah, it's funny you talk about golf.
For me it was always baseballor football.
I agree you hold the footballtoo tight, right, you're going
to throw the ball.
You're not going to throw itwith a spiral, and when you play
your career you do your job.
That way.
It's the same thing.
You're thinking too much andyou should be thinking when
you're learning, you know tothink.
When you're playing Like, atthat point it should be habitual
.
I remember, you know I'm notinto like, I'm not a manifestor
(33:23):
or all this other kind, but I dobelieve, you know, in the fact
that if you've done the work andyou've you've, you've
recognized the work that youneed to do then when it's time
to do the work, it's natural.
It's like I like to refer to itas like when you drive for many
years you don't think about thered light or the yellow light,
you just drive.
But when you first start thatyellow light, you start to get a
(33:44):
little apprehensive.
You don't know what to do andthe red light isn't going to
turn red, but it eventually justbecomes habitual and so you
play less tight when you do thework behind the scene, so that
when it's time to actuallydeliver, it's natural, excellent
.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
All right, we'll move into this last section.
So you've had, you know, you'vehad a big, big retail career,
right, Tons of roles.
Now you are moving into this,this, this, this I dare I say
entrepreneurial space with, withthe, with the, the well-wisher
company.
Could you talk a little bitabout that transition from being
(34:19):
that guy to now being this guy?
It's different worlds, butthere may be some things that
translate.
There may be some things thatdon't translate.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Well, you know, I got to give my wife, mel, a little
broad credit because she's beendoing it for 10 years.
She started the, herwell-wisher, 10 years ago and it
turned into the well-wishercompany, you know, a couple
years ago and watching her gothrough it, you know when she
decided to not go back to workafter having our son.
It's.
You know it's not verydifferent.
What's different is, you know,you don't have a company funding
(34:53):
you, right, you don't have apaycheck that comes in in the
same way, and so, although Isaid you have to outwork folks,
and I did, I still got apaycheck.
Now I have to outwork folks,right, to earn the paycheck.
No one's going to give it to me, and so the the, the
applications that I put in thebook are transferable, and I'm
doing the same thing.
I got my real estate license notthat long ago as yet another
(35:16):
way to write, like fund the workthat we're doing and help other
folks get into real estate,something that I love to do.
But if I did not work folks, Iwouldn't have gotten, I wouldn't
have passed that exam, you know, like I had to put in the work.
So what I'm finding is all thatI'm doing in my entrepreneurial
you know, in an entrepreneurialway, it's really all the same
(35:37):
work.
I just don't have a trampolineunderneath me to catch me right.
If, if I don't do the work, Idon't have to check, I can't get
stuck at this point.
I think that's probably thebiggest difference.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Yeah, that's a great, that's a.
That's such a great point.
Yeah, you can't, you can't, youcan't, you can't afford to get
stuck right, you can't afford toget stuck.
All right, so I want to closeoff.
Yeah, when I paid, I didn'tmean to cut you all, I was going
to go when you earn thatpaycheck.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I remember I remember working for John Hauser at
Urban Outfitters and he used totalk about that Like just
because you were, just becauseyou get a paycheck right, like
you get this steady check comingin every two weeks, you don't,
you don't necessarily own yourbusiness with that same level of
entrepreneurship.
And when I worked for Urban forthe eight years it was all
about entrepreneurship and youran it like you owned it.
(36:23):
So those eight years definitelyhelped me.
But you know it's it's aninteresting, interesting journey
, but looking forward to it.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Yeah, excellent, excellent, all right, as we, as
we close up right, there's a lotof, there are a lot of leaders
I know they're going to andthey're going to read the book,
but can you provide just someclosing, you know, thoughts on
for the, for those leaders whoare, who are currently stuck,
and give them some?
You know, give them, give themsome of that.
Retail leaders, you know, youknow real-matter perspective on,
(36:52):
you know some of no, here'swhat I, here's what I want you
to do, here's what I want you todo.
I want you to give them some ofthat early morning walk, you
know, david Goggins, or retailperspective right now that they
need, they need, they need tohear right now.
Go for it.
Speaker 3 (37:12):
Well, I end every single run talking about get up
and go, and that's what I say tomy son every single morning,
and my first thing I would sayis stop hitting the snooze
button, Just stop.
Like, just stop, get up, puttwo feet on the floor, put one
foot in front of the other andwalk in the direction that you
want to be every single day.
Some people they say, like youknow, one day at a time, I don't
(37:35):
have no, every minute right.
Like every minute at a time.
Like, take advantage of thetime that you have and don't
just assume you have tomorrow.
Like, take advantage.
So for me, that's, you know,that's the biggest thing is you
have to walk in the directionthat you want to be.
If you're not, you're going tostay stuck.
And I think, yes, the book willhelp with all of the you know
specifics and the tactics andeverything else, but you have to
(37:58):
.
You have to wake up with thementality that you're going to
win the day, and the best way todo that is to avoid the snooze
button.
I'm still trying to get my sonto learn that one.
And you know, just get up andgo and walk in the direction
that you want to be, and if youdo that, you're much more likely
to end up where you want versuswandering around aimlessly.
You know, hoping you'll end upwhere you want, Hope is not a
(38:20):
two words.
That I.
It's funny.
We're called the well-wishercompany, but I don't like the
word wish, and the reason is wedecided we were going to call
the company well-wisher becausemy wife's her well-wisher in
support of her and allies of her.
But we want to make wishingaction-oriented.
We want to help people right,Wish well on you but actually do
something for you, Whereas mostpeople wish something was
(38:44):
different.
Well, guess what that means?
You're not happy, so why wishsomething was different?
Just walk in the direction thatyou want to be and you'd be
surprised how often you end upwhere you want to be.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah, I love that and I love what you just said.
Wake up with the mentality thatyou're going to win today.
When is the book?
When does the book come out foreverybody that's going to be
listening to this with us on thevideo, also on the audio
podcast?
Speaker 3 (39:10):
Yeah, thank you, steve.
So March 12th it's going to be11 months 11 months of work, 35
years of blood, sweat and tears,but March 12th it will drop and
be available to everybody.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Excellent, excellent, excellent.
So, brian LeBrock, I want tothank you so much for being on
retail leadership with SteveWorthy and telling you what I'm
excited about.
One, the book.
But here's the other thing I'mexcited about.
I'm excited to be a part ofthis journey with you and, more
importantly, that I'm going toconsider ourselves friends and
then we're going to be attachedto the hip as we continue down
(39:45):
and changing the retail industry.
So thank you so much for beinghere.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Thank you, Steve, for helping me.
I appreciate you, sir.
Welcome to Retail Leadership with Steve Worthy,
where we go well beyond thecorporate playbook to unpack
major opportunities, hiddenchallenges and critical issues
that senior retail leaders faceevery day.
If you're ready to get theinsights you need to elevate the
impact you have on your team,increase the profitability of
(00:28):
your stores and level up yourretail career, then keep
listening, my friend, because Isee a lot more success in your
future.
So let's get started right now.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, brian man, I gotta tell you I'm super excited
to talk to you today, and ourinitial conversation was long
overdue and it was quiteinteresting because you were
talking a little bit about yourdad and where he got started and
you threw up a couple of storesthat just kind of like threw me
(01:04):
back into my teenage years,when we get into the role that
your dad played for everybody.
Just tell everybody about Brian, and we're gonna, of course,
talk about the book, we're gonnatalk about the principles of
your books, we're gonna talkabout all of that.
So save some of that foreverybody.
(01:26):
So tell everybody a littleabout yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
No, yeah, yeah, no, I appreciate that.
Yeah, chess game goes quite aways back.
Huh, sir, you know I'm aretailer.
You know I like to tell peopleI'm a retailer.
You know it wasn't accidental,it was a choice of mine.
My father was a retailer,grandfather was a retailer.
If you look at my last name inGoogle you're gonna find
manufacturers and retailersdating back to the 1800s, so
it's just in my blood.
(01:50):
So I was privileged growing upto see my father corner office,
you know VP, taking the MetroNorth train into the city every
single day.
So I knew what I wanted.
Once I realized my baseballcareer wasn't gonna pan out and,
you know, started, you know,focusing in on retail.
Started focusing in on mycareer at a very early age.
You know, started working on Iwas 12, paying taxes at an early
(02:10):
age, primarily because my dadwouldn't pay for the Jordans
that I wanted.
So in order for me to get thoseJordans, you know had to earn a
little bit extra on top of theKmart prices that he was willing
to fund.
So, yeah, started out that wayand, you know, 35 years later,
you know achieved the corneroffice a couple different times
and now looking to see how I canhelp other people achieve what
(02:31):
their outcomes need to be.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Excellent, Excellent.
So did I hear baseball?
I didn't you know, in ourentire conversation that never
came up, so can we talk aboutthat for a second?
So talk about that part of yourof what happened here's what
I'll tell you.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
I thought I was going to be a professional baseball
player all the way until I was15.
And then, when I turned 15, Igot distracted by all kinds of
stuff and my baseball career wasover at that point and retail
was number one.
But what I will say is Ilearned probably some of the
most valuable lessons in myretail career and my life and my
leadership journey when I waslike 10, 11, 12, playing
(03:09):
baseball just with coaches.
I got lucky to have some reallygood coaches.
You know things like run thefirst base as hard as you can
regardless, like simple littlethings.
You know that just stick withyou and it's fun watching my 10
year old go through it.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
No, my baseball career ended at 15.
Yeah, yeah, running out.
Running out, that's what theyuse, because when I play
baseball, that's my coach'sresult.
Run it out Doesn't matter, it'sa ground ball, run it out.
I love that.
I love that.
All right, so I think this thesecond place I wanted to start.
You sort of alluded to it, yourdad and the thing that we, when
(03:44):
I talked about in the openingwhere you had mentioned chess
king and for those who, here'sthe thing if you are not
initiated and if you don't know,like I don't know how far you
go back in retail, I just got tosay that if you don't, if the
word chess king or oak tree,like, does not ring a bell, I'm
(04:04):
not particularly sure how faryou go back in retail.
I'm just saying talk a littlebit about that and the impact
he's had.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yeah, I'll do you one better on that before.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I do that, so I was with.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Justin, when they got bought by Mary go round too, so
I was a part of that.
Mary go round.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Come on, come on, come on.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Oh, you got a lot of fun.
I love that.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I love that I love that I'm telling you.
If you don't, if you okay, I'mnot even gonna go in here.
That's a whole nother show man.
That's a whole nother show.
Talk about your dad.
Talk about your dad.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
All right.
So I call it living with myidol.
You know, I tell people all thetime I was lucky enough to live
and grow up with my idol, youknow, and I tell people like, be
careful to not have your idolsbe people that you don't get to
engage with an Iraq on a dailybasis, movie stars, athletes,
those kind of things.
I was lucky enough.
I had a role model that set theexample for me at an early age
on how to be a husband, a fatherand a hard worker.
(04:58):
So I really want to pay thatprivilege forward and that's
what this book is about.
That's what my career really hasbeen about is trying to figure
out how to help folks that maynot have been as privileged as I
was in that sense to grow up ina household with a father like
that, with an idol like that.
And you know he taught me froma very early age.
You know you got to grind itout, you got to outwork folks,
(05:18):
which is the absolutely veryfirst practice in my book.
You got outward folks.
So from an early age, I like tosay from the age I was able to
sit at the dining room tablewith the family, I was learning
about leadership and I waslearning about careers and I was
learning about how to progress,because those were the
conversations that we had.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
So, okay, I'm going to go back to young Brian.
Right, and you're sitting atthat table.
I remember part of our initialconversation was around you know
college, and you were like thisthis, this wasn't for me, and
your dad gave you some advice.
Do you remember that piece ofadvice that he gave you?
Speaker 3 (06:00):
You were like this isn't for me.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
This isn't for me, and I want to do something else.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Well, I went to high school for three years.
I graduated in three years, notbecause I was super smart,
because I was creative and Itook two Englishes.
My senior year got enoughcredits and so I was ready to go
to college.
I got my syllabus.
I decided after getting mysyllabus that it wasn't what I
wanted to do, because I realizedit was going to impact my
ability to earn during theholidays ADHD and, you know,
(06:25):
instant gratification, all thatfun stuff that's me.
So I talked to my father aboutit.
Okay, here's the deal.
Like you're an adult, at thatpoint I was 17.
You choose what you want to do,but you better be where you
want to be in three to five.
So you either go to school,graduate, you have your diploma
and you start working where youwant to work, or you, in three
to five years, be where youexpect to be.
(06:47):
And so I wanted to be a DM.
It was plain and simple.
I knew the route because I hadseen my father ascend, so I knew
district, regional, like headof stores, chief operating, like
.
I knew what the roles lookedlike.
And so I had to work backwardsand say, okay, if I want to be
somewhere in three to five years.
What do I have to do?
And put together my owneducation.
And the last actually the lastchapter in the book around build
(07:09):
your plan is retail universityand it talks about how you can,
in retail, achieve success inany level, any role, in three to
five years.
If you pay attention, call it365 days a year for three to
five years.
That's plenty of time to becomewhat I would say is close to an
expert, or at least best inclass at what you do 100%, 100%
(07:30):
of it's, almost it's I, I, Iliken it to love what you just
said.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
I liken it to that idea on a 10,000 hour rule.
Right, we all heard, you know,malcolm Gladwell kind of talk
about that whole idea around.
You know, 10,000 hours it getsyou, you know, gets you to be,
you know, an expert, I Would say, in retail.
You know that's, um, you know,we can probably cut that, cut
that in, cut that in halfbecause of the intensity,
because of the intensity of theindustry and what we have to and
(07:57):
what we have to go through, um,one of the things that you,
that you often talk about isresults stem from, from the
right attitude.
We're gonna get into the bookhere in a second and there's
probably some parts of the book,but, um, you know, one of the
things I enjoy Is that, you know, almost every day, I think I'm
gonna say no, I'm saying almostevery day, but every day I'll
either go to Instagram and I'llsee my man walking, I see this
(08:20):
guy, here's a, here's a.
If you haven't seen Brian, thisis, this is Brian right here,
walk, walk in and talk it andhe's dropping, and he's dropping
some knowledge.
And Can we, can I talk a littlebit about that for a second,
like when did that start?
And I Gotta tell you, I, I, youknow, I think a lot of people
(08:44):
are like myself, we start ourday with, with, with listening
to that.
When did that start and whatwas the inspiration behind that?
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Yeah, it's funny because I don't.
I don't run like unless I wasrunning from somebody I don't
run.
And so during COVID I waslistening to a video and Goggins
got me off the couch like I waswatching one of his
inspirational videos, cursingleft and right, all that good
stuff.
And I just got up and we wereliving at the shore in Jersey at
the time, so I went to theboardwalk and I just ran.
(09:13):
I think I made it a mile and Iwas proud of myself.
From that point forward I juststarted running and I wasn't
posting anything.
And then I decided, when I wasstarting to write the book back
in April of last year, that Iwas gonna start to Share a bit
more of what my journey waslooking like and try to help
some folks in the way thatGoggins got me off the couch,
got me running.
I've always worked out, I liketo say.
(09:34):
I picked things up and put themdown, but I never did any kind
of cardio.
And If he could get me off thecouch and get me running, what
can I do for more folks in ourfield that are trying to achieve
their success and put betterfood on the table for their
families?
And so I started the videos,you know, and just started
getting more comfortable with itand you know I would run for a
mile, walk, a quarter run for amile, and in those quarter mile
walks is when I would kind of domy my thing and Try to share.
(09:58):
Initially it was just veryorganic and it still is organic
in a sense, but now it's a bitmore tied to trying to, you know
, obviously market the book andmake sure people pick the book
up, because I do believe it'sgonna help a ton of folks, but
it it motivates me as much as Ihopefully motivates others, and
the book and In podcasts andthings that I'm gonna do.
Next, I want to be content thathelps.
(10:18):
You know, I kind of like to saylike motivation lights the
flame, but content is what'sgonna sustain it, and so my hope
is that the videos help somepeople get up in the morning to
get moving.
But I want to deliver somecontent that can provide some
some quality results that aresustainable for folks excellent,
excellent, all right, so let'smove into.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Let's move and talk to talk about the book.
One other thing that we, we, wehave in common, based on our
conversation, was was Jack Welchright?
You know we, you know we, wegrew up in the in the age of
leadership, where you knowbottom 10% got to go and and how
that really impacted you know,I think, us as a leader, when
(10:58):
you think about you know yourbook right and the idea around
the book.
When did when did it start?
When did it occur to you to sayyou know what?
Hold for a second.
I need to take all this thingsthat I've learned and actually
put it into a book.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
It's interesting because I would say my very
first year as a district manager.
I was 21 years old and Iinteracted with a general
manager and that general managergot promoted a year later and
that general manager had a realtough time.
She struggled mightily in herfirst couple and it bothered me
and I realized back then that Iwas an example set, or people
(11:35):
just followed my lead and I justdelivered, but I didn't know
how to articulate it, I didn'tknow how to explain it to people
, and so that day I learned Ihad to start to operationalize
things.
I had to start to be able toarticulate things in a way that
I could Pass on the other, sothat they could be successful
when I wasn't around.
So that was the beginning ofthe journey.
And then I would say again,back in April, when I started to
write the book probably about ayear prior to that I started to
(11:57):
think about it and mostlybecause I want to try to find a
way to help the masses and notjust individuals within one
organization.
I've worked for a couple oforganizations to three actually
for extended periods of time andI've enjoyed developing the
talent within thoseorganizations.
But I believe that there arethere are a tremendous amount of
(12:18):
people right now, today thatare stuck in their careers
outside of the organizationsthat I chose to work for and I
want to be able to find ways tohelp them, and so this book is
meant to hit the masses andreally meant to help folks
either start their career theright way with that three to
five kind of plan, or getunstuck and rewrite that outcome
.
But yeah, I would say I knew along time ago this book was
(12:41):
needed, and I just needed about35 years of content building to
put a pen to paper.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Yeah, it's interesting how, when you think
about everything that you'veyou've learned kind of
throughout your, throughout yourcareer and a lot of times it
becomes muscle memory right whenwe are having conversations or
we're interacting or we'reengaging with, you know, with
with leadership teams, and wedon't understand Maybe we do to
some degree, we understand theimpact that we're currently
(13:09):
having and then when you startthat book writing process,
you're like, oh man, I didn'trealize I was actually doing all
of this.
The title of the book is theretail leaders roadmap and you
you break down three strategiesand three, three steps and could
you, could you highlight theeach one of them and then kind
(13:29):
of what I want to talk abouteach one of them as we, as we
move forward?
Speaker 3 (13:33):
Yeah, absolutely so.
The first pillar is build yourcharacter.
Second pillar is build yourconnections and the third pillar
is build your plan.
The first pillar is reallyabout the character.
Right, it's about the hardskills, it's about your
foundation.
I like I liken it to.
It's like the foundation ofyour home.
You know, hurricane comesthrough.
You want that home to stand onits own.
You need a strong foundation.
(13:53):
We talk about out working, wetalk about out learning, we talk
about being the example, beingaccountable, being disciplined,
and those five practices are thecore of your foundation, the
core of your character, and theyset you up for success.
I look at that as kind of yourunderclassmen years, kind of
like that first and secondfreshman sophomore year.
You have to kind of take thoseclasses to be able to take the
next round.
Build your connections isreally where other people start
(14:16):
to become a part of your successequation, right, you start
developing talent.
You have to enhance yourcommunication and you have to
improve your influence skills.
You know those influence skills, you know I put at the very end
, because who cares if you caninfluence folks?
If you can't communicate well,if you can't develop folks,
you're not going to be inposition to get involved.
And then the last pillar isreally build your plan.
Now that you know you have tohave strong character and you
(14:38):
have to have strong connections,now you have to have a plan
right.
And there's two real bigsections in the build your plan
that people are going to be ableto take and put pen to paper on
five piece of performance, andthat's how you win at your day
job.
And then the retail university.
And that retail university ishow you learn.
I call it learn while you earnright.
You win your day job.
(15:02):
That's how you earn money.
And then, while you're earning,you have to learn so that you
can progress.
Performance alone doesn't getyou where where you want to be.
Performance and potential does,and so you need to do both.
You're always going to do morework on the day job because
that's how you pay the bills,but you have to take in the
inputs you can grow yourself sothat you have more to offer to
others.
You're listening to retailleadership with Steve worthy,
(15:22):
excellent, excellent.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
This the foundational one character.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Can we talk about that one?
Because I want to talk aboutall three as well.
But I love that you start withcharacter, because what we, what
we tend to see, and you and I'mquite sure you've seen this
throughout your career is thatwhen we start to see leaders who
get into high, intense,intensity situations, one of the
(15:52):
first things that we end upseeing is that the character
starts to go out the window.
We start to see, you, thedecisions that are made not in
the best interest of you know,maybe the person that's in front
of them, but maybe it's it's inthe best interest of themselves
.
How does one this is a bigquestion, right, but how did you
go about?
(16:12):
I'm going to kind ofpersonalize, instead of it being
general.
How did you kind of personalizethat you know, that character
perspective?
What are some of the thingsthat you have done to actually
kind of cultivate that mentality?
Because I'm quite sure I knowyou talk about it, probably in a
book as well, but I just wantedto get your perspective, you
know, on that aspect.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Yeah, I mean I asked myself, you know, whenever I was
stuck in my career, why, like?
What was it?
And it was one of those fivethings I just mentioned.
I wasn't working hard enough, Iwasn't learning, I wasn't open
to it right, I wasn't settingthe right example, I wasn't
being accountable and I wasn'tbeing disappointed.
So I knew that those were thethings that were holding me back
.
(16:53):
And my father said from day onelike you have to out work.
You know you want to putyourself in a position to be
first, second or third at alltimes.
I refer to it as podium moments.
Like you want to be at thepodium all the time and if you
do and work on your characterand you work on the five things
I mentioned, you'll be at thepodium Regularly.
Now you might not be ready fornext, you might never be good to
(17:15):
get to next because you lackthe connection piece, but you'll
be at the podium at your dayjob on a regular basis and I
like to refer to them as kind oflike knock it off moments.
Like you know you should outworkfolks.
Like you know it, like you knowyou should be learning Right.
Like like you may not want to,but you know you should and you
know when you're not, setting anexample is probably not the
(17:36):
best thing for you, and you knowwhen you're being a victim
you're not going to be able totake control of your own destiny
, and when you're notdisciplined, you're not going to
do the things you're supposedto do.
So I had to come to terms withthat and the accountability
which is the fourth pillar inthat.
First, I'm sorry, the fourthpractice in that first pillar to
me is the linchpin.
Yes, you have to work hard, yes, you have to be open to learn,
(17:57):
yes, you have to set examples,but if I can't accept and
embrace my own realities, Ican't figure anything out.
So to me that's the linchpin,and so I have to accept and
embrace when I'm not workinghard enough and start doing it.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Yeah, I love that.
I'm sorry.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Eric, care of your stuff doesn't.
Yeah, I was just going to saylike care of your stuff kind of
doesn't need to be developed, itneeds to be recognized.
And so my hope is in this bookI can clearly spell out like
here's the five things you haveto do, and sure some of it might
require some skill setdevelopment.
For the most part it's kind oflike you just have to do these
things you set yourself up toput in the work for the
(18:33):
electives that are next.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Oh great, I love that and I love you said the word,
two words that really just stuckout was discipline.
That's my word for the year.
Actually, discipline, pick aword for the year and I'm
telling you right now.
It has been taught in a reallygood way, though, but I love the
fact, and it's a really goodsegue into the idea of around
(18:55):
accountability.
Use the word accountability.
And the next, the next pillarthat you discuss is your
connections.
So I would, I would am I safeto assume that when we, when you
start to bring in others, thereis a perspective or a thoughts
around accountability associatedwith bringing in other people
to that journey as well?
Speaker 3 (19:15):
100%.
I mean the first practice ofthe three in the connection
pillar is development.
Like, if you want to, if you,you got to do more for others
and you have to be able todevelop others.
And then, as you shift fromthat into communication, one of
the things that I think peoplehave a hard time with is
accepting the reality that theyneed other people.
Now, my entire book 100%, butmy entire book is like you need
(19:37):
to own it, don't rely on anybodyelse, and if you're lucky
enough to have somebody else,take full advantage of it.
However, you own yourcommunication, you own your
influencing skills, but otherpeople still have to respond a
certain way and you're gonnahave to make decisions.
So, like, the very lastpractice in influence is one
that I think a lot of peoplearen't gonna like, and it's
(19:59):
where I say very clearly youhave to meet your boss and their
boss 51% of the way or more, oryou're stuck.
It is what it is Like.
They are in control, they willmake the decisions.
You have a choice to decide togo work for somebody else where
you can meet them 51% of the way.
That's your choice, and a lotof people don't make that choice
or they don't make the choiceto actually find the
(20:21):
professional contribution inthat leader so that they can
align to that leader and givethem what it is that they need.
So there's a lot ofconversation and connections
that are around how you canstill own your outcome even
though other people are gonna beinvolved because of the
decisions that you make alongthe way.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Yeah, yeah, it's interesting that I love what you
said about ownership andmeeting your boss 50% of the way
.
I think one of the things thatpeople fail to realize and I'm
excited and can't wait to readyour book is that there is
ownership in meeting your bossat 51%.
You are actually owning theconversation.
(20:59):
You're actually owning thatportion of the relationship.
I always talk to my team andtell them I would rather be a
part and actually generate theconversation and the dialogue
than to have the dialoguethrusted upon me or like a new
initiative.
Right, you know how it goes inthe retail world these new
(21:22):
initiatives just get thrustedupon you.
I was one of those.
Leaders is like we'll do thepilot, we'll do the pilot, we'll
try it over here.
And my team hated it initially.
But I'm like do you notunderstand what we're doing?
We actually have a seat at thetable.
We were actually being able tocontrol the conversation instead
of having the conversationthrusted upon us.
(21:42):
So I love what you said aboutownership and meeting your boss
51% of the way.
A lot of people don't get that,so I'm super excited to read
that portion of your book.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Yeah, steve, let me throw one thing out there.
So I'm gonna give my wife aplug.
Who's my co-owner on the WellWish your Company?
She's a.
I live with an executive coach,basically.
So both fitness and leadership,so you can imagine the lessons
that I get.
She's the one who taught meLike I came home one day and I
was miserable and I'm not amiserable person, I'm pretty
happy on a regular basis and mywife said very clearly she said,
(22:15):
look, you have two choices youchoose to find the professional
contribution in your boss or youchoose to leave.
And she said very clearly,because he's not gonna meet you
where you are, yeah, stop, andhe won't until you do so.
I did.
I met him 75% of the way andall of a sudden he started
meeting me 75% of the way and wehad an amazing relationship and
(22:36):
we had a great career together.
So, but again, like you said,like we have to take ownership
in it and not expect others to.
We might get lucky and have oneor two leaders that actually
look to meet us where we are,and those are fantastic leaders,
but they're far and few inbetween.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Very far, very far Before we move into the plan.
One of the things that you Iwanted to drill down is that you
said a lot of people and Icompletely agree with this a lot
of leaders fail to recognize oreven like, kind of, from a
vulnerability standpoint I'mjust gonna use that word to be
(23:11):
vulnerable enough to realizethat.
You know.
Hey, brian, I need connection,I need help, I need your
assistance because I don't haveit all together.
Right, I am missing something,I am stuck.
Right, you know thatvulnerability and leadership are
rarely placed in the samesentence, and I know you've been
(23:34):
a very successful leader, butthere I say, I think a lot of
some of your success has beenbecause you've been able to be
vulnerable.
Would you agree with that andwhat are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
100%.
Yeah, I used to joke, you know,when you trip in the street,
you know you're yellow, likejust kind of fall and keep
moving and act like it didn'thappen.
And that's me like I trip on aregular basis and I just keep on
moving and act like it neverhappened.
You have to be vulnerable,otherwise you can't take any
inputs.
You know, and for me, thelessons when I wrote this book,
(24:06):
because most of the content inthe book it was there, I just
needed to get it on paper.
But I was reminded of somethingand learned something in the
book, and I remember for years,for the last 10 years or so, I
tried to really work on myhumility and really tried to
make sure that it was outwardand that people knew it right.
And what I found was, you know,because I wanted to let other
people speak first and I wantedother people to have a voice.
(24:27):
Maybe my voice wasn't as loudas it was in the beginning part
of my career, and it was because, growing up, I had a very fast
record, I was successful inmoving up the ladder, so to
speak, and I was perceived to bearrogant, right, and what I
realized, though, in writingthis book, is that I wasn't
arrogant.
I was extremely humble becauseI was learning like you wouldn't
(24:49):
believe behind the scenes.
I was reading.
You know I was doing we'redoing a podcast back then but I
was reading books like I waspaying attention, I was taking
feedback criticism, no problembut that was during practice.
Like that was behind the scenes.
When it was game time.
I knew what I was doing becauseI had been putting in the work.
And so I heard a quote.
(25:10):
I think it was Kobe said thisyou know, practice like you've
never won before and play likeyou've never lost before.
I love it Like.
So I was always humble in a way, but I didn't recognize that I
was humble.
But you have to be and youdon't have to necessarily be
humble when you're playing thegame.
You need to go out and play thegame, but hopefully you have
done the work already so thatyou know what you need to get
(25:31):
done.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
Yeah, I think that there is strength in humility
and what I mean is that the actof being vulnerable but also
being able to take ininformation and then internalize
that information and into anoutward expression.
Right, I think about it.
I think about it just to kindof further.
Your example of Kobe I rememberthere was a scene not a scene,
(25:58):
there was a game when Kobe wasprobably new in the league and
he was actually and he wasguarding Mike and they caught
the conversation.
He was literally asking Mikelike what do you do on this play
?
What do you?
How do you post up here?
How do you do this?
And I just I love that.
I'm like you're in the middleof a game, right, you're in the
(26:18):
middle of a game and you'reguarding for me the best player
ever and you are just takingthis opportunity to humble
yourself and actually stilllearning.
I think the model mentalitykind of came from that.
So, anyway, I got excited aboutwhen you talked about Kobe,
because that scene just kind ofresonated with me.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
Well, I think you'll appreciate it and, by the way,
michael is the best player everand, yes, he used to call
Michael at like two in themorning, I think as well.
I hopefully you'll appreciatethis one.
But at the end of the day, youcan't take yourself so seriously
and that's what I had to learn.
I think when you see people andyou know this you've seen VPs
(26:56):
and chief operating officers andchief you've seen regional
direct you've seen people thattake themselves so seriously,
they look down on other peopleand it took me a while to figure
out how do you be humble andconfident at the same time?
Because you have to be.
People follow confident leaders, but you have to be humble to
take in the inputs, to then begood at what it is that you do.
And when you take yourself tooseriously, you're letting your
(27:17):
ego get the better of you, right?
And so I like to joke you.
When you and I first got on thispodcast, you talked about me
wearing black, right, jokingaround Like that's what I wear.
I feel better in black, but Idon't look down on you if you
wear bright colors.
But if I take myself realseriously, I would you know I
ride Harley Davidson's.
If I took myself so seriously,I would look down on people who
chose not to ride a Harley, butwhen I'm on one I feel good,
(27:41):
like when I drive that 150s Ifeel good.
So I think it's about accepting, you know, your ego in a
positive way, the things thatare about you that you enjoy
doing.
But don't take yourself soseriously, because then you look
down on other people andtherefore you're going to not
take in the input.
So I think it's important tonot take yourself so seriously
100% agree.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
100% agree.
All right, let's move into theplan.
Let's move into the plan, right?
We spoke about characterconnection and the last part
about your book is the plan.
(28:22):
Talk about that and some of thethings that when people start
to read the book, what are someof the takeaways that they're
actually going to get from this?
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Yeah, it's funny because that was the one thing
that went back and forth wasbuild your plan going to be the
first pillar or the last pillar?
We made it the last pillarbecause we really wanted to
cover the content of the workfirst.
Five piece of performance isthe beginning of the plan.
You have to win at your day job.
You have to get to the podiumright and if you're not at the
podium on a regular basis, thisbook will help you because it's
(28:52):
a diagnostic tool to figure outhow to get there.
But what you have to be able todo is you have to focus on
people and product, you have toprioritize it, you have to put
processes in place and that'sgoing to drive your productivity
, which delivers performance.
It's a lot of piece, it's a lotof words, but it's all in the
book and it's outlined andspelled out in terms of what you
need to do.
But people are first andproducts a close second.
(29:14):
But if you don't prioritizethose things and you try to get
to it all, at best you'll be a Cplayer.
But if you want to be an Aplayer, you got to get to what's
most important when it comes topeople and product, when it's
most important.
And then you have to createprocesses and routines,
disciplines to get the work done.
And I talk about breaking it upinto quarters at a time so that
(29:34):
way you can be nimble enough toadjust when your plan is or
isn't working.
And I like to say it's likedefense and playing football.
A lot of coaches draw up thefirst few plays because they
want to see what the defensedoes, and then they adjust from
that point.
Your plan's the beginning stageright, but you need to be
flexible enough to adjust.
(29:55):
And so that's the, I would say,half of the builder plan pillar
.
And then now you're winning atyour day job.
Now you're at the podium on aregular basis.
It's time to go to school.
I refer to it as you got toearn to learn.
All right, now I'm earning, nowI've created space to learn
because I'm winning.
And when you win quote unquotewin means you're making it to
(30:15):
the podium and you feel goodabout what you do.
Your supervisors tend to leaveyou alone.
That's not necessarily a goodthing, but they tend to leave
you alone.
They shouldn't and I talk aboutthat in the book as well, but
they do.
And so that means every mistakeyou make you can learn from,
because nobody's yelling at youfor them.
But if you're not making it tothe podium, they assume that
same mistake is the reason whyyou're not any good and they
(30:36):
give you a hard time and youcan't learn from it because
you're playing too tight.
So the second part of the bookis really how you ascend in your
role in three to five years andwhat that looks like.
And part of that practice that,again, people aren't going to
like is every new boss, everynew role, every new company,
every new responsibility.
(30:56):
You got to start over.
You got to start proving yourcharacter all over again.
Now you can prove yourcharacter really quickly if it's
inherent in you, but you got toprove it to the new employee or
leaders that now report intoyou.
So my hope is that the buildnot my expectation is that the
build your plan portion is thetactical work that people can
put pen to pay abroad and startseeing themselves get unstuck in
(31:20):
their careers.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Excellent, excellent.
I was fighting back my one ofmy phrases when I said no one
cares.
Like we're talking about, likeevery next, the new level, like,
like to no one cares.
No one cares.
All of the successes thatyou've had right, all the people
that you've been influenced,it's all about, like, what's in
it for me right now.
You as my leader, right, I cancare less about what you did for
(31:42):
Brian.
I want to know what she's goingto do for me right now.
It's a hard truth, but a lot ofleaders need to accept it.
Well, hold up for a second.
I just promoted like fivedifferent you know people to,
you know to, district manager.
I can care less.
Like, what are you going to dofor me right now in this role
right now?
Go ahead.
You were going to say something.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
No, no, no, no, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
One of the things you said and it caught me.
You said holding things tootight.
You know, my, my oldest brother, stan, and I, we, you know I
remember I was, I was strugglingwith something and he, he and I
were talking.
He said, steve, you, he saidyou're holding the too tight.
And I don't know if you're agolfer or not, but one of the
things that they talk about whenyou hold the club it's almost
(32:28):
like holding a baby bird, right,you're like, you're not.
You want to hold it just enoughto not let it go, but you want
to, but you want to hold ittight enough to not crush it.
And I, when I think about youknow our careers, and I think
about our journey, almost,almost in that similar fashion,
and I think about and I'mthinking about the, you know,
I'm thinking about the roadmapis that you want to hold your
(32:48):
career tight, but, man, you need, you need and that plan tight,
but you need to have some wiggleroom in there in order for
things to still kind of get inthere so that you can make the
best of that journey.
Would you agree with thatthought process?
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Yeah, it's funny you talk about golf.
For me it was always baseballor football.
I agree you hold the footballtoo tight, right, you're going
to throw the ball.
You're not going to throw itwith a spiral, and when you play
your career you do your job.
That way.
It's the same thing.
You're thinking too much andyou should be thinking when
you're learning, you know tothink.
When you're playing Like, atthat point it should be habitual
.
I remember, you know I'm notinto like, I'm not a manifestor
(33:23):
or all this other kind, but I dobelieve, you know, in the fact
that if you've done the work andyou've you've, you've
recognized the work that youneed to do then when it's time
to do the work, it's natural.
It's like I like to refer to itas like when you drive for many
years you don't think about thered light or the yellow light,
you just drive.
But when you first start thatyellow light, you start to get a
(33:44):
little apprehensive.
You don't know what to do andthe red light isn't going to
turn red, but it eventually justbecomes habitual and so you
play less tight when you do thework behind the scene, so that
when it's time to actuallydeliver, it's natural, excellent
.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
All right, we'll move into this last section.
So you've had, you know, you'vehad a big, big retail career,
right, Tons of roles.
Now you are moving into this,this, this, this I dare I say
entrepreneurial space with, withthe, with the, the well-wisher
company.
Could you talk a little bitabout that transition from being
(34:19):
that guy to now being this guy?
It's different worlds, butthere may be some things that
translate.
There may be some things thatdon't translate.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Well, you know, I got to give my wife, mel, a little
broad credit because she's beendoing it for 10 years.
She started the, herwell-wisher, 10 years ago and it
turned into the well-wishercompany, you know, a couple
years ago and watching her gothrough it, you know when she
decided to not go back to workafter having our son.
It's.
You know it's not verydifferent.
What's different is, you know,you don't have a company funding
(34:53):
you, right, you don't have apaycheck that comes in in the
same way, and so, although Isaid you have to outwork folks,
and I did, I still got apaycheck.
Now I have to outwork folks,right, to earn the paycheck.
No one's going to give it to me, and so the the, the
applications that I put in thebook are transferable, and I'm
doing the same thing.
I got my real estate license notthat long ago as yet another
(35:16):
way to write, like fund the workthat we're doing and help other
folks get into real estate,something that I love to do.
But if I did not work folks, Iwouldn't have gotten, I wouldn't
have passed that exam, you know, like I had to put in the work.
So what I'm finding is all thatI'm doing in my entrepreneurial
you know, in an entrepreneurialway, it's really all the same
(35:37):
work.
I just don't have a trampolineunderneath me to catch me right.
If, if I don't do the work, Idon't have to check, I can't get
stuck at this point.
I think that's probably thebiggest difference.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Yeah, that's a great, that's a.
That's such a great point.
Yeah, you can't, you can't, youcan't, you can't afford to get
stuck right, you can't afford toget stuck.
All right, so I want to closeoff.
Yeah, when I paid, I didn'tmean to cut you all, I was going
to go when you earn thatpaycheck.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I remember I remember working for John Hauser at
Urban Outfitters and he used totalk about that Like just
because you were, just becauseyou get a paycheck right, like
you get this steady check comingin every two weeks, you don't,
you don't necessarily own yourbusiness with that same level of
entrepreneurship.
And when I worked for Urban forthe eight years it was all
about entrepreneurship and youran it like you owned it.
(36:23):
So those eight years definitelyhelped me.
But you know it's it's aninteresting, interesting journey
, but looking forward to it.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Yeah, excellent, excellent, all right, as we, as
we close up right, there's a lotof, there are a lot of leaders
I know they're going to andthey're going to read the book,
but can you provide just someclosing, you know, thoughts on
for the, for those leaders whoare, who are currently stuck,
and give them some?
You know, give them, give themsome of that.
Retail leaders, you know, youknow real-matter perspective on,
(36:52):
you know some of no, here'swhat I, here's what I want you
to do, here's what I want you todo.
I want you to give them some ofthat early morning walk, you
know, david Goggins, or retailperspective right now that they
need, they need, they need tohear right now.
Go for it.
Speaker 3 (37:12):
Well, I end every single run talking about get up
and go, and that's what I say tomy son every single morning,
and my first thing I would sayis stop hitting the snooze
button, Just stop.
Like, just stop, get up, puttwo feet on the floor, put one
foot in front of the other andwalk in the direction that you
want to be every single day.
Some people they say, like youknow, one day at a time, I don't
(37:35):
have no, every minute right.
Like every minute at a time.
Like, take advantage of thetime that you have and don't
just assume you have tomorrow.
Like, take advantage.
So for me, that's, you know,that's the biggest thing is you
have to walk in the directionthat you want to be.
If you're not, you're going tostay stuck.
And I think, yes, the book willhelp with all of the you know
specifics and the tactics andeverything else, but you have to
(37:58):
.
You have to wake up with thementality that you're going to
win the day, and the best way todo that is to avoid the snooze
button.
I'm still trying to get my sonto learn that one.
And you know, just get up andgo and walk in the direction
that you want to be, and if youdo that, you're much more likely
to end up where you want versuswandering around aimlessly.
You know, hoping you'll end upwhere you want, Hope is not a
(38:20):
two words.
That I.
It's funny.
We're called the well-wishercompany, but I don't like the
word wish, and the reason is wedecided we were going to call
the company well-wisher becausemy wife's her well-wisher in
support of her and allies of her.
But we want to make wishingaction-oriented.
We want to help people right,Wish well on you but actually do
something for you, Whereas mostpeople wish something was
(38:44):
different.
Well, guess what that means?
You're not happy, so why wishsomething was different?
Just walk in the direction thatyou want to be and you'd be
surprised how often you end upwhere you want to be.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah, I love that and I love what you just said.
Wake up with the mentality thatyou're going to win today.
When is the book?
When does the book come out foreverybody that's going to be
listening to this with us on thevideo, also on the audio
podcast?
Speaker 3 (39:10):
Yeah, thank you, steve.
So March 12th it's going to be11 months 11 months of work, 35
years of blood, sweat and tears,but March 12th it will drop and
be available to everybody.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Excellent, excellent, excellent.
So, brian LeBrock, I want tothank you so much for being on
retail leadership with SteveWorthy and telling you what I'm
excited about.
One, the book.
But here's the other thing I'mexcited about.
I'm excited to be a part ofthis journey with you and, more
importantly, that I'm going toconsider ourselves friends and
then we're going to be attachedto the hip as we continue down
(39:45):
and changing the retail industry.
So thank you so much for beinghere.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Thank you, Steve, for helping me.
I appreciate you, sir.
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