From Invisible to Icon with John Fareed

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(00:21):
Hello all, my entrepreneurs and business leaders, and welcome to
the Michael Esposito Show, where I interview titans of industry
in order to inform, educate and inspire you to be great.
My guest today is a personal branding and performance coach,
a highly sought after keynote speaker, and author of the new,

(00:42):
revised and expanded edition of From Invisible to Icon, How
to Become a Known Expert in Your Industry. It's also published,
and this is so important to hear this part, because
not everybody you have self published, and you have these
big published and this one's a really well known one,
and so I'm very proud to present this. It's published

(01:04):
by Posthill Press and distributed by Simon and Schuster. I've
read a lot of great books from them. He's been
a featured speaker at events in Australia, Brazil, Croatia, Egypt, France, Germany, Hungary.
He's been around the world Ireland, United Arab Emirities and
across the US, Canada and Caribbean. Prior to his distinguished

(01:28):
consulting career, he spent fifteen years as a professional magician,
performing on cruise ships and casinos and at private clubs
such as the famed Magic Castle in Hollywood, California.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
He's also served six years.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
In the US Marine Corps. In his mid thirties, he
began a successful hotel, tourism and leisure consulting career as
a solo practitioner, having never worked in the industry and
without the benefit of a college vcation. He spent the
next thirty years advancing from invisible to icon in the industry.

(02:08):
We're going to learn so much about some of his tips.
Please welcome the global chairman of Horwit HTL, the leader,
the leading brand and overseas the firms American offices. Please
welcome John Fred. Welcome to the show.

Speaker 3 (02:26):
Thank you, Michael. It's a pleasure to be here. I've
been looking forward to this all week.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
This has been this has been this is really cool.
This has been quite an intro here. We have so
many different backgrounds to kind of break down in terms
of you've excelled in all of them. It's like, you know,
as I'm reading through it, and it's you go and
also served as in the US Marine, It's like it's

(02:51):
like when you put and also as US Marines and
you're not leading with US Marines, It's like, Okay, this
guy's got a lot on his plate.

Speaker 3 (03:00):
Well, I love you for saying that. It's been It's
been a long journey. I'll say that for sure, but
I'm enjoying it. This has been a good week for me.
The book released. Simon Schuster dropped the book on the
thirtieth on Tuesday, and we've got a bunch of book
signings coming up at Barnes and Nobbles in or Orlando,

(03:22):
to Honolulu, to the Fifth Avenue store in New York,
and it looks like it's going to We're headed to Dublin, Ireland.
Even so, I'm pretty excited about it, but I'm equally
excited to be on your show.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
I appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
Yeah, I wanted to make sure in all the list
of countries that you had, I was going to I
was going to pause and not continue to read all
of them. I was like, well, I got to put
Ireland in there because I know you're going to Ireland
very soon, so I was like, I got to make
sure everybody knows he's also spoken in Ireland, you know,
so from a keynoting career being an author. Those things
we're going to actually, everybody listening right now, we're going

(03:56):
to hold off on those a little bit because those
are really present moment for what he's doing and certainly
going to be talking about the book launch. So cool
to have an author on that is going to be
featured in all these different great bookstores. And also I
want to speak about the publishing aspect of everything, because
I'm soon to be a self published author working on

(04:19):
my book right now with an editor, and we're going
to be publishing that together, and so I'm learning that process.
But of course, what do we all aspire for. We
all aspire to get someone like Simon and Schuster to
back us, to get one of the big brands to
back us, and so I'm very interested in that as well,
and I'm sure we're going to get to there. But
before that, you have a bit of a unique background,

(04:40):
and you were sharing a little bit about it with
me pre show here about how your mom and your
dad met and a little bit about your family history,
and I love if you could jump into that for
us right now, so we get to know you a
little bit.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
Sure, Sure, so, Michael, I'm a first generation American on
my mother's side of the family. Gypt Egyptian grandfather was
a fighter pilot in the RAF and he kind of
worked his way up the ranks to become a bigger
deer general and later became ambassador from the Arab League

(05:14):
to Japan and then to the un But he finished
his professional life in hotels and travel. He opened the
NOWL Hilton in nineteen fifty eight with Conrad Hilton and
later became head of Hilton's small but important Middle East
division and finished his travel career as head of pr

(05:36):
for Egypt Airlines. So back in those days he was
kind of a cool capitalist to say, for sure. But
back in those days, well healed Egyptians sent their sons
and daughters to university in Europe and the US, and
he was a lifelong rotarian, and he secured a rotary
scholarship for my mom to come here to university. I

(05:58):
guess the story takes a turn because shortly after riding
she was unchaperone for the first time in her life,
and she met the schools. What I would say is
equally naive six foot four, blond headed, blue eyed basketball
star from Alabama and boom, I was like conceived. So

(06:21):
I will say this, my grandfather, more or less, who's
a devout Muslim anymore or less to sown my mom
both emotionally and financially, don't come home. Then've called it
right sort of thing. But I was fortunate because he'd
had two daughters with my grandname Lulu, and I was
the firstborn male who carried his name for reed. So

(06:44):
I spent many summers growing up in Egypt being treated
like a prince, while my mom would remain sequestered in
the back bedroom when we the women, could visit her.
I could rarely sell my mom over the summers until
we were headed to the airport to fly back home,
where we lived in or, Georgia, primarily by the way,
on foodstamps from welfare, more or less a single mom

(07:06):
for some years. But just before my eighteenth birthday the summer,
over a quiet lunch, my grandfather asked me where I
was planning on attending university, and I said, yeah, I
really don't think I'm going to university. I want to
be a professional magician. Yeah, yeah, I could tell about

(07:26):
your facial expression. You kind of get the gist of
the response I got from the General Ambassador. He's like, what, no,
If you're not going to go to university, then you
will serve in the military like me and my father
and my grandfather before me, which was a shock to me.

Speaker 4 (07:43):
He's like, there will be no magic.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
And I knew what that meant to him. I knew
that was one of those things where I could end
up in the back bedroom disowned. But essentially I thought
about it because Mike as I guess, this would be
important for people to know. But he carried me during

(08:05):
those summers everywhere business meetings, lunches, dinners, shopping of course,
and he taught me a lot. He taught me about
manners and table manners, which is always helpful these days,
how to buy a gentleman's suit, shoes or time piece.
But he also taught me about business, such as the
importance of long term relationships or I would say, skills

(08:31):
like negotiation or the concept of face and honor. So
I looked at him, I said, Grandpa, you're asking something
huge of me, because in the US right now, a
military is not required like it is in Egypt at
the time, so I don't have to go in the
military too.

Speaker 4 (08:49):
I need to ask.

Speaker 3 (08:50):
Something equally big of you, or you're not going to
respect me as a man. And he looked at me,
and I'm telling you, if he was with us today, Michael,
he would tell you thought I was going to ask
for a car, and he was ready to write that check.
But essentially I looked at him and I said, I
will happily go in the military if you agree to
take mom back fully and completely. And there was silence

(09:14):
at first, and then he slammed his hand on the table.
He walked out onto the LINAI I watched him light
a cigarette and poor whiskey, which was a rare thing
for sure, especially in the middle of the day. But
he came back in and he sat and he looked
at me for twenty minutes in silence, and I'm sure
everybody knows the art of negotiation. After you make your ask,

(09:36):
you do not speak. But eventually he finally looked up
at me. He said, Okay, I'll do this, but it
has to be the Marines, and what did I know.
I was like, all right, fine, So he shook on it.
And the very next day, Michael, he took my mom back.
He walked down the hallway, knocked on her bedroom door
and said, Merva, her name was Merva, come join us

(09:58):
for breakfast, and she did sheepishly, and my grandfather explained
to her that my grandy Lulu was going to take
her to the salon and to buy a new dress,
and that we were going to go to the country
club to have lunch with the entire family, which was
kind of funny because she looked up at me and
from her breakfast and she said, what did you do?

Speaker 4 (10:18):
And I said, I'm going to the Marines.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
Mom needs to say she was not happy about it,
but I have to tell you that day at the
Gaze country Club at Cairo was awesome and it opened
a door. And just to try to shorten this up
a little bit, my grandparents, Salad Lulu ended up moving

(10:40):
to North Georgia shortly thereafter, and my mom and my
grandfather were completely close tight for the rest of their years.
So it was totally worth it. But I did keep
my promise. That's why I went to the Marines. I
spent six years in the Marines, but when I came out, yeah,
I pursued my dream of magic and for fifteen years

(11:01):
I was a professional entertainer like you. You shared with
everybody in casinos, on cruise ships and at clubs like
the Magic Castle. But I think there's this time where
you come.

Speaker 2 (11:19):
The audio is cutting out.

Speaker 4 (11:21):
So I think there's a time where you come to.

Speaker 2 (11:23):
This audio is cutting out.

Speaker 4 (11:25):
Yeah, I think there's a time where.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
Okay, just hang on for a second here. It looks
like it's trying to get back together. Make a note
at a okay, but eleven minutes. Eleven minutes will kind
of we'll edit that out, but you're back.

Speaker 3 (11:44):
So what I was going to say is, I think
a lot of people have come to conclusion or mid thirties,
they're either pleased with their life or not please. And
I came to the realization that I had no home,
no car, no dog, well, no long term relationships we're
talking about, no kids, and I decided to make the

(12:06):
natural pivot to hotel consultant. And I started out as
a consultant in my mid thirties.

Speaker 1 (12:15):
I want to just kind of go back for a
second here, because there was a huge contrast in your life.
You mentioned, you know, you were in Egypt, you were
treated like a prince, but you'd come back home and
you were on welfare and food stamps. And this had
to do with the major separation between your grandfather and

(12:36):
his daughter, of course, and the situation that she was in.

Speaker 2 (12:39):
I'm interested in your mindset, in how.

Speaker 1 (12:42):
You were able to adapt to these two worlds you
essentially had to straddle.

Speaker 4 (12:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (12:48):
So I grew up in a little town called La j, Georgia,
which is very small.

Speaker 4 (12:53):
It's still very small.

Speaker 3 (12:55):
But it was frustrating because I would come home from
summer vacation and obviously the team, you know, you can
imagine a fifth or sixth grade, Hey, what did you
do this summer?

Speaker 4 (13:03):
Tommy? Let's start with you.

Speaker 3 (13:05):
And Tommy shares about his uh, you know, summer camping
and fishing or whatnot, and everybody shares. And I always
got up and talked about you know, yeah, I was
climbing pyramids and riding camels in Egypt. So I was
a little bit of a freak. Well, I hate to
use the word freak.

Speaker 4 (13:21):
I was. I was different. Yeah, so it was it
was unique.

Speaker 3 (13:26):
I was this stud in high school, when you play
the tuba in band and you're the captain of the
chess team and you're in drama club, you know you're winning.

Speaker 4 (13:37):
But I found that I could. I was more accepted in.

Speaker 3 (13:40):
Those types of groups from a I guess from a
background standpoint.

Speaker 4 (13:46):
But it was good for me. I learned a.

Speaker 3 (13:48):
Lot and I found my own I guess rhythm, and
that's what I did. One of the cool things, and
you'll find this interesting, is that in eighth grade, I
wanted to help, you know, earn some money for the family.
And at the time eighth grade was about right. I
went to my drama teacher and said, I want a job,
but please, I don't want to pump gas or bad

(14:10):
groceries or I need something that's going to stimulate me
and lift me a little bit. And two weeks later
she called me and she said, hey, come to my office.
So I went to her office and she said the
local radio station, and I told her that I didn't
want to do I needed a job to help with
the family, but I didn't want to pay for I

(14:32):
didn't want sorry.

Speaker 4 (14:34):
Too long, write No, I didn't want to pump gas.

Speaker 3 (14:37):
I don't want to pump gas or bad groceries, and
I want to do something that would be more challenging
and uplifting. And a couple of weeks later she called
me into her office and she said, so, the local
radio station this is in LJ, Georgia called w l
e J very original, the Big Apple because it's the
Apple capitalist South by the name of Bob Schwab, who

(15:01):
owned the station, was looking for an afternoon DJ, and
he reached out to the drama teacher at the high
school and she said, sure, I got the guy. So
I went and auditioned, and for four years I was
the drive time DJ and Little Bitty LAJ Georgia, which
is kind of a hip and cool thing by the
way at the time. So so that was fun. But

(15:24):
outside of outside of those kinds of things, you know,
finding groups of people that I felt comfortable with and
accepted me and whatnot. By the time I got to
my senior year, I was cooking with gas and I
didn't have any more problems.

Speaker 2 (15:39):
That's awesome.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
Yeah, I think too, Like it sounds like you took
on a lot of leadership roles in order to, I guess,
showcase your abilities in that, you know, while while you
may not have had everything that everybody else had in
your community, you were able to show that you actually
have the mindset of a leader, which we see in
all the other things that you've done in your life

(16:01):
and your experiences. I'm also a little bit interested in
the cruise ships now and the magician life. We just
talked about how you're a performer. I'm interested in you.
For me, my performance background has helped me in my
keynotes and in my speaking and in what we're doing
today right now in a podcast. And so I think

(16:22):
the theater for me has really catapulted me above and
beyond my peers in the sense of being able to
just pick something up from scratch and read it to
an audience, or be able to present a product, like
on my insurance side of the business, be able to
present the product in a more fun, tangible way where

(16:44):
I could paint a picture. And this comes very natural
to me. And I think the last thing I'll say,
and that I want to throw it back to you
is is in theater And you know this. As a magician,
we're constantly making decisions and having to trust our instincts
and trust our abilities to say this is how I
think this line is going to be read, and this
is my instinct in it, and this is my thoughts

(17:05):
on it, and this is how I'm going to put
it out there. And we have to live with the
decision of how the audience is going to receive it,
how the manager is going to receive it. And so
what I'm interested in terms of your magician background is
as a performer, how have you seen that translate over
to your life as you know, the chairman of this
huge hotel hotel organization.

Speaker 4 (17:26):
So I would say this, Michael, I think that.

Speaker 3 (17:31):
When you work in the casino world, or you work
on increase ships, or you work in nightclubs whatnot, you're
constantly called upon. Yes, you have your set shows and
your schedules and whatnot, but there were always surprises. Hey,
we've got a VIP on board. They're having a birthday
party and we want you to do something special for
them in their group. Or we've got a corporate group upstairs.

(17:55):
It's got a hospitality suite, a couple hundred people.

Speaker 4 (17:58):
We want you to go entertain them a while. And
it's a.

Speaker 3 (18:01):
Constant and as you know, things happen on stage that
you're not expecting either. For sure, I think that made
I know I put it. It helped me build my
hutspa muscle on stage of just kind of go with
it and smile and try to think of funny anecdotes

(18:21):
along the way of some things different, but I think
it kind of prepared me for almost any situation.

Speaker 4 (18:27):
For sure.

Speaker 3 (18:29):
It helped me early on in even the Marines. I
mean I used to tell people, Marines are half theater.
If you think the ceremony and the nomen I was
going to say, if you think about the uniform and

(18:50):
the ceremonial aspects of it and the nomenclature of vocabulary
in the Marine Corps, everything's kind of predetermined. But we
put on great show in the Marines. I mean the
dress blaze. I always felt super sexy in my dress blaze.
But it's also something where you're leading a group of people.

(19:12):
I was a platoon leader for a while, and I
guess all of those talents over the years, not just
the performing but also in the rains of dealing with people,
have helped me through the years.

Speaker 1 (19:26):
Yeah, like you said, in the service, there is like
you said, the nomenclature and that there's that theater element
to it. Of course, there's the real element to it all,
and so I'm interested in that as well. In terms
of your Marines, your service experience, the challenges that you
had to overcome there, how those have also helped you

(19:48):
in what you do today.

Speaker 3 (19:50):
Yeah, I will say this, it took away any fear
of jumping into anything, the risk, the risk muscle was
gone for sure.

Speaker 4 (19:59):
I didn't. I no longer worried about risk coming from.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
Like I said, I wasn't exactly studeley in high school
sports guy. And to be thrown into boot camp at
Paris Island was a big deal and it took a
lot of fight on my part to get up to
speed in terms of running and the athleticism that was necessary,

(20:24):
but also the discipline of controlling myself, my mind, my
emotions throughout that process. Was a huge learning experience, and
I found I would send my inner strength I was.
I was fearless after that. I was ready to take
on anything. A few things, a few things scared me.

(20:46):
I'll give you a great example. When I left the Marines,
I had been in between full time in reserves total
six years.

Speaker 4 (20:53):
All right.

Speaker 3 (20:56):
Everybody was like, why are you leaving the Marines to
do magic. What are you thinking, Because another fourteen years,
you could retire from the Marines, you know, and you'd
still be young and you could do other things. And
I was like, yeah, but I've done my time, I'm served,
and I'm ready to do this magic. And when I
literally picked up and went to La and I described

(21:16):
this in the book, and eventually audition at the Magic Castle,
got a gig, got an agent. One thing leads to another.
But I wasn't fearful because in the back of my mind,
I knew I was still young enough and in shape
enough to come back to the Marines if I needed to.
Within a year or two, I could probably re up.
Then when I did the magic for fifteen years and

(21:38):
decided to make the pivot to hotel consulting again, I
wasn't all that fearful, Michael, because I realized, if I
have to, I'll go grab my costumes and props and
you know, the promotional materials that I was fearful of
throwing away. I just held onto everything just in case.
But luckily for me, I never had to go back
and open any of those boxes or great and pick

(22:00):
that up again. But I certainly wasn't fearful of failure.
I will say I was more excited by the challenge
and the opportunity in front of me, and that was
that was huge. And I give you know, I give
myself a lot of credit through all of that to
stop thinking about risk. In fact, I have a saying

(22:21):
that I share with people, and it's be open and
all things, be lucky in all things. So many people
you give them suggestions or you give them advice, and
they immediately they are like, nah, I'm not going to
do that, or are they discounted without absorbing it?

Speaker 4 (22:36):
And I think that's a mistake.

Speaker 3 (22:40):
I have done so many things where somebody just kind
of toss an idea out, including becoming a hotel consultant.
It wasn't a natural leap for me to get into
hotel consulting.

Speaker 4 (22:52):
But I had a magic friend. It was a group.

Speaker 3 (22:55):
He used to come see me perform a lot, and
he was well to do, and he invited me to
his home. A ship docked in Baltimore, essentially he lived
at Baltimore. And he invited me to his office and
his home, and we got this new beautiful jag and
we drove to his house in the hills outside of Baltimore,

(23:16):
and I met his lovely wife and his kids and
his dog, and we had a gorgeous dinner and at
the end of it, we're sitting around drinking whiskeys. Everybody's
gone to bed, and he said, so where are you headed.
I'm like, well, big surprise, and had it back down
to the Caribbean tomorrow.

Speaker 4 (23:32):
And he's like, I.

Speaker 3 (23:33):
Would give anything to have your life. And I'm like,
are you serious, Like I would give anything to trade
places with you right now, and you go and I'll
stay with your family. And he said, you know you
could do what I do. This is you have a
great deal of talent and that's what drives you in
the magic. But what I do, you could do. And

(23:54):
honestly I believed him. In two months later is when
I had given up the magic and help an office.
If I flash forward to another example of that risk
reward be open, and all things be lucky in all things,
I would say. A year or two into my consulting career,
I was at a conference in New York, an industry conference,

(24:15):
and I met this lovely Irish chat named Alex Gibson,
who was a professor at university at the Hotel School
in Dublin, and we kept finding ourselves at the same
breakouts at conference and standing in line to meet the
same speakers, and finally I looked at him, I'm like,
who the heck are you? And we became friends and
he invited me shortly thereafter to come to Ireland to

(24:36):
lecture to one of his classes and then subsequently an
association lecture. So I had a nice weekend in Dublin.
But he was taking me on a tour around the
city center and we passed his campus building behind the
Gresham Hotel and he said, there's a school and I said, well,
I would have really loved to have gone to college.

(24:57):
I think it would help me with my consulting career.
I feel like I missed an opportunity. And he said, well,
you know, you could probably with your accolade and experience
and the clients that you've worked on, you might apply
for just a postcrap and they might take you. And
I thought, really, He's like yeah, he said, it doesn't
happen a lot, but you never know. It's worth the shot.

(25:20):
So I came home and I made three boxes handmade
boxes and put work product in their articles, letters of
reference from various associations, some letters from different schools where
I had lectured with my high school transcript and the
application in the check. I got into three different schools

(25:42):
at master's level, and obviously I chose Ireland in difference
to well, they like Americans and they have Guinness speak English.
But I applied to three different country schools. I would
say to get out of the US, and I picked
up in minto Ireland and got my first post grad

(26:04):
and ended up getting a second, a master's of Science
and Hospitality Management. Had it not been for that, like
passing comment from Alex, I don't know that I would
have that today. And I think that's a really good
example of why you need to be open to things
that come your way and not just not just knock
them down and say, yeah, that's that's not for me.

Speaker 4 (26:25):
Think about it.

Speaker 1 (26:26):
I love staying on a topic of mindset because that's
really what you're talking about here, is having this open mindset.
And so I'm curious was it for you. Was it
a natural thing for you to always have this open
mindset to things coming your way, or was it something
that you had to learn and become.

Speaker 3 (26:45):
I think it developed over my childhood, and I think
the difference between growing up in littletown No Georgia, where
you know, it was rafting and fishing and a lot
of I would say at low people doing local activities
that it still is and it's gorgeous.

Speaker 4 (27:04):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (27:05):
I get very I fried apple pie and apple cider
is like manna from heaven when I go back to
North Georgia. But when you you know, when I go
back and look at what the difference was living in Egypt,
where we're going to a restaurant on the now, we're
eating pigeon, you know, grilled pigeon, which most Americans are

(27:25):
like what, and I'm like, well, these aren't your normal pigeons,
but they they grill them and they dup them on
newspaper in front of you, like crabs and they're amazing.
Or you know, fishing in the Mediterranean for sea urchins
and eating them fresh, or going with my grandfather to
some you know, as a child, they used to buy

(27:48):
me these horrible I would say today, horrible, but I
think Christian you are, you know, jacket vest and knee
high shorts with knee socks and dress sheets to go
with my grandfather to his business meetings. It was quite
different than what I would wear back in Georgia, you know,

(28:09):
Ted Nagent concert right.

Speaker 4 (28:12):
And strip jeans.

Speaker 3 (28:14):
But I think it was just I think it was
something that I learned as a child all the way
up because of the two worlds that I lived in, right,
and it was interesting the contrast.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
The contrast gave you the opportunity to have this open mind.
You almost you almost had to have this open mind,
otherwise you'd end up projecting one or the other. But
in order to absorb both, which were so different, you
had to have this open mindset.

Speaker 3 (28:42):
Sure, And honestly, it's not something that I thought about
a lot. I think it's just something that I acquired
and I didn't realize that it was different from what
I would say most people's mindset is until later on
in my adult life, for sure. But I was always
quick to I mean, my first day on the radio
in w at W l e J, I was so

(29:04):
excited and nervous in four hours on the radio for
the first time and not allowed to help. Quite honestly,
it's one other guy in the in the station that
was a sales guy when I was there. Typically so
I was kind of on my own to spin records
and take phone calls, and you just figure out the board.

Speaker 4 (29:23):
I mean, that's what you're doing right now, Michael.

Speaker 1 (29:27):
Yeah, I've been taught the board back here, and and
it's it's it's got a lot of buttons, and it's
very it's very overwhelming. But once you learned, once you
learn the ones that you're supposed to press, you're like,
all right, I got this, and then when you have
to trouble s something, you go, all right, I don't
got this.

Speaker 4 (29:47):
Absolutely. I know that feeling and that.

Speaker 1 (29:50):
Feeling, but you know, again, just back to this whole mindset.
And I love this because you know, I've been speaking
a lot in my in my talks about the open
mindset and the fixed mindset, and so I really love
how you really shared how the contrast of your upbringing
really helped push you towards an open mindset without even
knowing it. And I think in the same is true

(30:13):
for a lot of people who are in a closed
or in a fixed mindset, and that their upbringing kind
of brings them there. But the great part that I
think we learn and that you know as a leader,
is that you can change you could become a fixed mindset.
You can look at your failures and the things that
have stopped you from achieving your goals and say, you
know what, I'm not going to try anymore, and you

(30:34):
can go to a fixed And the same is true
if you're in a fixed mindset of effort of everything,
and say, I can become more, and I can try more,
and I can be open to more. So I love
that statement that you make. And so because you were
open to so many suggestions, you got into the hotel industry,
and in the hotel industry, you've been there for so

(30:55):
long before we jumped on.

Speaker 2 (30:56):
I was telling you.

Speaker 1 (30:57):
About articles I read about you that are over a
decade old, where you were interviewed by these different magazines
and these different publications and bloggers and all the rest.
And so you've made quite a career there by having
this mindset, which has also gotten you to the point
of writing this book that you're putting out there, this
newly revised edition, to becoming a keynote and sought out speaker.

(31:21):
So I want to go into your hotel experience with
that in mind. Of having this open mindset. The stories
that have you know, brought you to where you were
in the hotel industry, and you're still in the hotel
consulting industry. So share a little bit about what you
do there and how you're leading your teams in this
in this hotel consulting agency that you're in or a

(31:43):
part of.

Speaker 3 (31:44):
Sure you get and with your permission, into a couple
of steps back, of course. But essentially, you know, it's
been a long journey, Michael, and it's one that I
couldn't have made without what I call the power of
personal branding in utilizing that bully. But when I decided
to become a consultant, it was like, for the third

(32:04):
time in my life, I had to think, you know,
I would say, rethink my personal brand. From Marine where
we talked about you know, sameness, think sameness, uniform haircut
vocabulary to magician, think mysterious lots of black hair highlights,
I make up in rhinestone tuxedos, to this conservative consultant

(32:29):
you know, business suits, ties and dress shoes. But more importantly,
I had to rethink things behaviorally, meaning from a personal
brand standpoint. The Marines was get up before you know,
it's zero dark thirty in the morning, run ten miles
or more before the day was done to magic Boy.

Speaker 4 (32:50):
That's what I call it.

Speaker 3 (32:51):
Where you slept all day and you did two shows
a night, six days a week, and then you went
out after work very late with the rockous crowd to
this road warrior of traveling nine to five. Let's call
it a hotel consultant. But each of those steps I
also had to rethink my personal value system. From Marine
to let's say, magician wasn't probably the most healthy period

(33:14):
of my life from a going out decision making standpoint.
But two conservative you know, reputation is everything. Consultant, but
I did. But once I made that pivot, I basically
approached the personal branding the same way that I had
in previous lives. For example, I got heavily and became

(33:37):
a member, got heavily involved in professional associations. I think
that's key, only this time, instead of the Society of
American Magicians and the International Brotherhood of Magicians, it was
the Hospitality, Sales and Marketing Association International, which I joined
in the mid nineties. I became a very involved member,

(33:58):
got on committees, eventually board, and I spent four years
as global chairman of Hsummarized International Foundation at the time
had about eighty six hundred members. I got invited to
join the prestigious International Society of Hospitality Consultants, which is
invitation only vetted organization, and once again I became an

(34:21):
active member, got on the board, eventually became global chairman
of the International Society. Diligently to acquire industry recognized I
also worked diligently to acquire industry recognized designations, certifications, and awards,

(34:46):
and like you saw, I started writing for the trade
pubs in a big way, and even you know what
I would call mainstream interviews with USA Today or ABC
or CBS, Wall Street Journal, which was interesting. But this
time I'm writing articles Instead of Magic Magazine, which I
wrote for for years and was contributing editor, or The Illusionist.

(35:08):
I was writing for hotels and Hotel News Now, and
finally I ended up getting the post grads and all
of that I think has led to where I am today.
I've worked, proud to share work my way up the
industry to become global chairmen today of one of the
world's largest hotel Tourism and Leasure advisory firms or at HTO.

(35:32):
I'm pretty proud of that fact, but again, I could
have never done it, and I still, if I'm really
honest with you and your viewers or listeners, Michael, I
would tay, I still don't have all the answers, and
I still feel like I have miles to go before
I achieved my long term brand goals, my personal brand goals.

(35:52):
But I think I've learned a lot along the way
in the book, I have much to share on the
topic as it relates to the person.

Speaker 4 (36:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
I like how you broke the personal branding down into
three different kind of buckets of rethinking not just our
thoughts but also our behaviors and our values.

Speaker 2 (36:10):
And I think that's.

Speaker 1 (36:13):
So important because our behaviors can sometimes dictate our thoughts,
but we also know that our values really dictate everything
in terms of our thoughts and our behaviors. If you really,
you know, if you get down to it, your values
are really would drive you to do anything?

Speaker 2 (36:33):
Or what will motivate you to do anything?

Speaker 1 (36:34):
When we think about, you know, how do you get
motivated to go to the gym, or how do you
get motivated to go on a diet or lose weight,
or how do you get motivated to work. The motivation
can come in all sorts of forms of goal setting
and all this other stuff, but at the base of
it all, it's your values. What are you valuing? Are
you valuing your health? Are you valuing your finances? Are
you valuing the people you work with? And once you

(36:56):
get down to that and your values, now the way
that you think, the way that you behave is completely changed.
So I really love how you break it down into
those three buckets. I also want to mention that as
the global chair, something that you're I want to mention
to everybody listening here. This is a over one hundred
year firm and we have over two hundred and fifty

(37:18):
con senior consultants that are working in over sixty offices
and more than fifty countries. So this isn't like small time,
small time stuff here. You know, for me, when I
read a little bit about you and I saw that,
I was just like, all right, who am I having
on here? I mean, is he flying in on a

(37:38):
corporate jet and rolling in on his rolls?

Speaker 2 (37:40):
Royce? Tell us a little bit about the lifestyle.

Speaker 1 (37:43):
And what you've experienced from the people that you've met
and the people that you've worked with and being able
to really I think, straddle between the customer and your
end user, of the client experience of the person coming
in using a hotel, and also consulting with these these

(38:04):
hotels where you have that upper echelant, how are you
able to make it to where everybody feels that they're
being taken care of.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
So that's a great question, Michael, But I would tell
you for me, the great joy of being with Horror
of HTL are my fellow members and associates and colleagues
within Horror of HTL.

Speaker 4 (38:28):
They're amazing.

Speaker 3 (38:29):
I mean every time I meet a new group of
people within Horror HTL, which hopefully has come to a
conclusion after a few years being Global chair, I am
so impressed with their backgrounds and the way they treat
and respect one another, and the kinds of clients that
they're working on. I feel very proud and honored to

(38:52):
work with them wherever they are.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
I mean a lot of these people have been working
in the industry.

Speaker 3 (38:56):
As advisors for thirty forty years, and they have emotional
maturity and education, and I would say we've seen that
solve that kind of thinking, which I'm learning from. I
had a Global committee or board that represents Asia, Europe,

(39:20):
Latin and North America, and they're amazing. They provide a
great level of senior level advice, expertise and maturity from
a leadership standpoint, and they tend to put up safety
rails for me and help guide where we're going. But
we make decisions collectively, so that makes it easy from

(39:41):
a client perspective. I'm very happy to tell you that
we work with independent, small boutique hotels from the concept
to repositioning to transactional advice too very large hotels and
hotel brand bands management companies, so we can provide strategic

(40:03):
direction and advice, feasibility or market study kind of activities.
But I mean more recently, just to give you an idea,
we just finished and very few companies can do this.
And I think it's two things. One is we're focused
exclusively on the hotel, tourism and leisure space as it
relates to real estate investment, because really hotels and resorts

(40:27):
casinos are more or less real estate investments place more
than anything. And because we focus on it only in
comparison to like other good companies like CBRE or JLL,
some of those larger companies who are they do every
industry type, retail office, you know, the whole mix. We're

(40:54):
focused exclusively in that area. But because we're global and
we do have a very senior level of expert teas,
and we don't do brokerage. So while we do provide
some real estate expertise, we don't do brokerage. Like you know,
we're not buying and selling your hotels, so to speak.
I think that keeps us independent. But for instance, a

(41:17):
very large brand came to me and said, hey, John,
can you guys develop a global strategy for all of
our brands for the next five years that would be
broken down by geography and other players and investors and whatnot.
It was almost a two year assignment essentially, but it

(41:37):
really paid great people at conferences from that company and like.

Speaker 2 (41:49):
So whatever, ye ahead.

Speaker 3 (41:53):
Yeah, So what I was going to say is that
it's funny because I meet people from that company at
industry conferences and they're like, we are following your plan
to the letter and enjoying it. And that makes me
feel good and proud. But we could only do that
because of our people on the ground, with full knowledge

(42:15):
and relationships in all of those other countries. But essentially
it ended up being a two part seven figure consulting assignment,
and that allowed us to compete with the Mackenzies of
the world and others who are another great firm. McKenzie's
a great firm, but it's fun to compete with those

(42:35):
big boys, particularly in our.

Speaker 4 (42:38):
HTL space specifically, but I enjoyed.

Speaker 3 (42:41):
My game plan within fourth is just try to get
everybody together immdiate of our offices and backgrounds of our people.
I was going to if you think about the diversity

(43:01):
in the backgrounds of our people and where they come from, culturally, politically, economically,
every country has their own situation, and particularly as it
relates to real estate regulations from governments, it's it's pretty interesting.
So my job is really to mediate between all the

(43:22):
parties and provide the best long term strategy and implementation
for us as a group. That's that's my three goal.

Speaker 1 (43:31):
And all of this has really taken you to the
to the finish line, or at least the start, maybe
the starting line, of of being an author, to be
able to put out this book of going from invisible
to icon, how to become known, how to become a
known expert in your industry. So I'm curious on how

(43:51):
everything that we've just discussed has led to you writing
and essentially rewriting your your your up the edition now
this book that you put out there, because I'm hearing
a lot of similarities. I didn't read the book, obviously,
but I'm hearing a lot of similarities just in the
title itself. That's why I wanted to re mention the

(44:11):
title here in what you do in your day to
day and what you're writing about.

Speaker 3 (44:19):
Sure, I mean, what prompted me to write the book
before was I was a solo practitioner, Michael, and I
was used to being kind of solo as a magician,
So it made sense for me to be a solo practitioner.
And I'm not sure anybody Merit or we're talking about
would have hired me when I first started, having no

(44:39):
experience or education in the industry, so it was kind
of my only conduit into the industry. But the first
edition of this book kind of talked about how I
built that practice in the learnings from the Marines to
managing boy to solo practitioner. This new revising, expanded edition

(45:04):
I wanted to write for two reasons.

Speaker 4 (45:05):
One was eleven.

Speaker 3 (45:07):
More, almost twelve years had passed in between the first
writing and this one, and much has changed in the industry,
but also would me professionally, and I learned a lot
more about personal branding through that time period as well.
But think about how COVID affected the world and even

(45:27):
what's going on geopolitically. I mean, when the book I
was sent to the publisher, I would say, our conflict
in the milities had already started, and I write I
mentioned it in a book. Obviously the war in Europe
between Russia and Ukraine was in full swing, but it

(45:50):
also discusses, most importantly, I guess, proof of concept. One
of the things that really made me write the first
book was the events of nine to eleven and how
I watched all these senior level consultants in our industry
who had very strong, well known brands make a fortune
while I was like surviving, you know, on the buying,

(46:12):
on the bund shriveling up. And my goal was to
become this known expert so that in the future I
would be on the list of people that people are
calling their in trouble or they need real help. And
that was the that was the reason I wrote the
first book. This book, I honestly think was proof of
concept for me because I survived COVID. I didn't survive,

(46:36):
I thrived during COVID, I was I was on the list,
I made the list. I got a lot of work
through that. But I talk about that, and I also
talk about my decision to leave as a solo practitioner
and start, you know, with Horward HTL, and that was
driven again.

Speaker 4 (46:54):
You know, everybody wants to know why what? Okay, I get,
I get your thinking. But why? I think that the
essence of any good stories. Why. So I was watching I.

Speaker 3 (47:05):
Mentioned the International Society of Hospitality Consultants and that I
was global chair with That was really just an organization
that still today is chock full of experts and mentors
that I was tapping into early on and over the years,
I was watching a lot of these guys that were
solo practitioners retire and they were kind of licking their

(47:27):
wounds privately with me about the fact that, for instance,
when my good friend and college David Bretney of Bredney
and Associates retired, he basically got nothing except what he'd
put away in his retirement account. Because when David Bredney
leaves David Brennany in associates. The practice isn't worth much.

(47:48):
There's no there's no cash out, you know, there's none
of that. There's no there's no special moment where you
get a check at the end. And I watched that
happen to a few my dear friends and colleagues, and
I thought to myself, maybe I need to rethink as
an entrepreneur and a professional that instead of building a

(48:09):
lifestyle company, which mine was, I had a great lifestyle,
I was making good money and I didn't have a
lot of headaches except with a few clients at a time,
to more.

Speaker 4 (48:18):
Of an asset driven enterprise. So I bought all three
books on.

Speaker 3 (48:24):
How to you know, maneuver from a lifestyle driven company
to an asset driven one and reposition. That was the
only three that I could find on Amazon and Barnes
and Noble or anywhere else. But I read them in
every single book that I picked up. The classic mistakes
that they tell you do not do. I was making

(48:45):
daily every single one. And I was really frustrated because
I was very proud of my business, you know, john
Frey Consulting. I was very proud of it and my.

Speaker 4 (48:58):
Brand.

Speaker 3 (49:00):
The more I read, the more I realized I had
been wondering down the wrong path for a part too
long if I was going to enjoy some kind of
event where I got a buyout. So I made the
decision to pivot. And and that's in the book and
it's explained and how I did it. And I'm very
happy that I did, because it's been seventy eight years

(49:21):
ago that I made that pivot.

Speaker 1 (49:23):
Two questions here, two, and I think you could answer
both of them in your flow, which is one, what
are the three books?

Speaker 2 (49:30):
And two? What were the three mistakes that you made?

Speaker 4 (49:34):
Yeah, you'd have to posit. Let me go grab the.

Speaker 2 (49:36):
Books, worries. We'll get back to that in the show notes.

Speaker 4 (49:41):
Okay, I'll give it to you in the show notes
for sure.

Speaker 2 (49:44):
And what was the other What were the mistakes that
you were making daily? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (49:49):
The mistakes I was making daily was all of my
investment from my company. Was not focused on reinvestment in
the company because it was just me and an executive
assistant at the time. It was really focused on my
s class Mercedes and my beautiful home and all of
the lifestyle, you know, my my Armani seats and the

(50:10):
packaging what I would call my brand packaging as a
solo practitioner, so I had to make some tough decisions.
I had a beautiful watch collection which I ended up selling,
you know, all all the fine launches.

Speaker 5 (50:23):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (50:24):
I got rid of my Mercedes and bought a Honda Accord.
I took a much I put myself on a small salary,
and I really, I really had to make a hard pivot.
And as I see it here today, I can tell
you that I've rebuilt the company. And yeah, okay, I
drive a nice Mercedes today and I do have a

(50:46):
nice watch. But if you read the book, it's a
client gift I got my I got a Rolex as
a client gift from a client. You know, it's like
my wedding band. I won't take it off because, uh,
it's such a great gift.

Speaker 1 (50:59):
It means to you, well, you you did something which
is something that we don't realize is such a step forward,
which is you took this huge step back.

Speaker 2 (51:09):
You took this.

Speaker 1 (51:10):
Huge sum several but you but even like this, this
tangible step back in the sense of trading in a
Mercedes for a Honda and getting rid of your watches
and taking a decrease in your salary in order to
to further progress, to be able to leap forward. And

(51:31):
that's I mean, that speaks to character, but that also
speaks to what you were talking about earlier. Willing to
take a risk. I mean, you didn't know if this
was going to work. You just read three.

Speaker 2 (51:41):
Books on it.

Speaker 1 (51:41):
You didn't know if selling it your s class was
going to guarantee you financial freedom for the future. It's
still it's it's an interesting thing to call it a gamble,
to trade it in a Mercedes for a Honda, but
it really is a gamble because now we go into
what you just said.

Speaker 2 (51:54):
You are packaging your brand, packaging.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
Of who you are as you roll up to a
meeting and it's like, hey, John, is everything okay?

Speaker 4 (52:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah no, And that's true. That was true.

Speaker 3 (52:05):
I encountered that, and I would have to explain that
I'm making a pivot and here's what I'm trying to do.
The biggest part of that, Michael, though, was the emotional
toll because I had worked so hard to build the
John Perik brand and logo, and I would say stories
around that brand, and to leave that brand and take

(52:28):
my name off the business and join another business that
was a legacy business with their own logo and branding
and stories.

Speaker 4 (52:39):
Was huge.

Speaker 3 (52:40):
I mean it was a massive toll. My business cards.
You'll appreciate this. My business cards were letter press on
crane paper, you know, European cut. Just you hand it
to people and going, oh my god, is this a
coaster or a business you know?

Speaker 4 (52:54):
Are you sure?

Speaker 3 (52:54):
It's just you know, it was impressive. And to pick
up somebody else's business card, you know, it's nice. I'm
not I'm not complaining with somebody else's logo and business
thing was a shock to the system.

Speaker 4 (53:10):
But I had to Yeah, there you go. I love man, man,
that's it, right there, I get it. So I knew
you would get this.

Speaker 1 (53:19):
Woult it for our audio listeners. I just I just
shared with him my business card I liked. I got
the thick one too. And my reasoning was very similar
to yours in terms of the personal branding, in that
I wanted it so that when someone receives it, they
they don't just toss it. They receive it and they go,
this is something of value. And so I always joke
with people and I say, if you throw out my
business card, you're throwing out a tree, so you know,

(53:41):
save a tree, keep my business cards.

Speaker 3 (53:43):
So I have to tell you I revived all of
those items. I just had to reprint it as my
author Kenote Business, so it's not FAA, it's separate from Hara.
But I was on a I was on a meeting
call yesterday and the guy said, hey, you send me
your book, and he said, and I'm going to read

(54:04):
it on the flight that I'm doing, you know, this
weekend I'm taking this weekend. I was like, great, he says,
but the letter that you sent me with your business card.
I felt the paper and I opened it up and
I saw that it was letter press and that business
card you had.

Speaker 4 (54:19):
He said that.

Speaker 3 (54:20):
I was like, now I have to get to know
this guy and I have to read his book. And
I do think that's a big part of it. But
I would say, you know, well, I appreciate what you
said about taking some steps back. I think I'm in
a much better position. I think three steps back twenty
steps forward, quite honestly is the game.

Speaker 4 (54:41):
But it was also the.

Speaker 3 (54:41):
Emotional toll of I've talked to several people said I
could never leave my company name and my logo for
somebody else's.

Speaker 4 (54:49):
I don't know how you did.

Speaker 3 (54:50):
That, And I'm like, it's all a matter of where
do you want to go and how do you want
to get there?

Speaker 4 (54:57):
For sure?

Speaker 1 (54:58):
And I think, like you said, you address in the book,
So so everybody, you're gonna have to get your hands
on a copy here. I'm looking forward to getting my
hands on a copy. But it's it's also knowing why
you're doing it, you know, you know, it's leaving everything
that you're doing, you know, from financial to emotional standpoint,
there has to be a bigger purpose and a big
reason why.

Speaker 2 (55:18):
If if you're happy with.

Speaker 1 (55:20):
Where things are at, if you're happy with your name
on it, and you're happy with things the way things
are going, then that's great, then there's no reason to
make that change. But for you, there was a bigger,
deeper reason and and I think for you it was
that event seeing that that gentleman, you know, leave the
organization and the only thing he had to count on
was his four oh one k And for you, that
wasn't that wasn't good enough.

Speaker 4 (55:42):
No, And I knew, I knew, my my ticker was,
you know, my my.

Speaker 3 (55:47):
The time was running out of my career as well,
and only had so many years to really make this change.

Speaker 4 (55:52):
If I was going to do it, I would tell
you too, Michael.

Speaker 3 (55:55):
Much of the decisions those three steps back that we
talked about were also emotional. Know, a Honda Corp. I
got a new one that was loaded in. It was beautiful.

Speaker 4 (56:04):
I was very happy with that car.

Speaker 3 (56:07):
And Okay, instead of my watch collection at the time,
I was wearing an eye watch, you know, which was fine.
I was actually kind of I thought it was kind
of cool. I'm like, well, this does so much more
than my old you know, Cartier or Rollo. It seems
more practical. But I will tell you it was. It
made for interesting conversations. So I'm sitting on a private

(56:31):
jet with a client who's a billionaire, long term client,
and he was a big fan of Cardier and he
used to always ask me which Cardier I was wearing.
And we were on this planet. He goes, where's your Cardier?
And I'm like, well, I sold all my watches and
he's like, what do you mean. I said, I sold

(56:52):
them all and he's like for what, And I'm like, well,
you know, not all of us are billionaires, and I
needed the money and I can't believe.

Speaker 4 (57:02):
How much I got for these used watches.

Speaker 3 (57:05):
And I put the money in the bank and I
bought this guy and he's like, that's not a watch,
that's a toy.

Speaker 4 (57:11):
I'm like, well it works.

Speaker 3 (57:13):
It works for me, and he goes, no, but John,
in your place in life, you should have a gentleman's
time piece. And I was like, well, I appreciate that,
but maybe one day I'll get another one.

Speaker 4 (57:24):
But you know, I'm out.

Speaker 3 (57:26):
And I told him, I said, I even sold my
Mercedes and I'm driving a Hondek Cord now and he's like,
should I feel your head?

Speaker 4 (57:33):
Are you sure you're okay? It was that sort of thing.

Speaker 2 (57:35):
Interesting.

Speaker 3 (57:37):
Interestingly enough, we finished a meeting and we go to dinner.
It was wrap up of an assignment and I go
to my hotel room and it's late and I'm exhausted,
and I noticed that there is this hospitality presentation of
you know, a tray and a bottle of wine and
all of that with a card in a box. And

(58:00):
I go to open the car and it's from this
client and on it he said, here's a classic traveler
for a classic Traveler, thanks for everything he did for
us this year. And I look at the box and
it's a green roll xbox and I open it up
and it was this watch. And I was literally dumbfounded,
like he decided that I needed it so badly he

(58:23):
was going to buy it for me because it bothered
him that much. But that was years ago, and I'm
I'm still learning this. I can't take it off, but
somehow or another, and I have to tell you. On
the flight back on his jet, I was he asked
me what time it was, like three times. Yeah, it's
But the funniest thing was because we were there.

Speaker 4 (58:43):
We were there with some of his people.

Speaker 3 (58:46):
And I said, I just want to remind you that
I also sold my Mercedes for a Honda court and
he looked at me and says.

Speaker 4 (58:53):
I'm not mind you a damn Mercedes.

Speaker 1 (58:57):
I thought he to try, Michael, Well, the good news
is the watch will lasts longer than the Mercedes, so
this is true, and so he got to the right investment.

Speaker 3 (59:10):
I think, yeah, yeah, I'm pleased. And he's still a
client today, so I'm super pleased.

Speaker 1 (59:16):
That's such a cool story of of you know, sticking
to your your vision for yourself and and also having
you know, the confidence in that sticking to it. In
terms of sharing a story with this person, you could
have you could have played it so many different ways,
and you could have, you know, hid behind some sort

(59:37):
of uh, you know whatever, you wanted to make, some
sort of story that you could have made up about
your business, but you told them exactly why and what
you were doing. I think that honesty showed him, you know,
that you are somebody of value, and for him, he
wanted to express it in the way of a gift,
which I think is wonderful and very generous on his end.
But but I think, really what in terms of the

(59:58):
story that I heard you share there, it's for everybody
listening that the learning to me is is when you're
true to yourself and you share that with others, people
who really understand it and who it resonates with will
appreciate that about you. It's it's not about the Mercedes.
For him, it wasn't about the watch collection. For him,
it was about you as the person. And so even

(01:00:20):
stripped away from all of that, he still saw value
in you. And I think that that's my big takeaway
from your story, is he still saw value in you
and he wanted to shower you with a gift. And
there's nothing wrong with that either.

Speaker 4 (01:00:33):
No, no, no, it was a treasure. And I still
treasure the relationship.

Speaker 3 (01:00:37):
And take us back to my grandpa's whole theory about
the importance of long standing relationships, you know, building and
maintaining relationships. And that's that's been a great, a great thing,
a great lesson for me because today it seems like
so many of us just throw away relationships without thinking
about it. And it could happen for any number of reasons.

(01:00:59):
But I think relationships the most valuable thing we own
in this world.

Speaker 1 (01:01:05):
Yeah, and I want to also say too about in
terms of value in terms of relationships, is that building
relationships on value. Again, that story also epitomizes the fact
that you built that relationship on value, not on perception.
And so I know that you know, in terms of
your book, in terms of everything that you do, we

(01:01:25):
talk a lot about personal branding and you speak about
it in all the different ways. And of course personal branding,
like you said, you know, you were a consultant. You
had a conservative consultant, and you have to wear a
suit and choose and time piece and all this other
stuff and have to have this brand. And I think
brand image is very important and I'm sure you'll attest
to that, but at the core of it all, it
has to have value. And I think again this story

(01:01:47):
that you just shared proves that in this relationship, it
wasn't about all of those things. It was about the
value that you brought to the relationship. And understanding that
relationships work two ways. The client brings you value and
you bring the client value.

Speaker 2 (01:02:03):
It works two ways.

Speaker 3 (01:02:06):
It does it does? I mean you can we talk
a little bit about personal branding.

Speaker 2 (01:02:12):
Yeah, let's get into it.

Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
So a lot of people here personal branding, but I've
come to understand that they don't really know what it is.
They think you know, but they don't. But I've defined it.
If we go back to corporate branding or product and
services branding, personal branding has a process just like just
like every every type of positioning, and it's one that

(01:02:36):
I outline in the book. But essentially, I have to
find personal branding as the crafting and management of your
identity so that it stimulates meaningful, precise ideas or perceptions
about who you are, Michael, what you do, and more
importantly what you stand for.

Speaker 4 (01:02:59):
I always tell people that if you.

Speaker 3 (01:03:00):
Have any goals or dreams for your life, then you
have a personal brand today. You just may not be
managing it to its best value, or even developing and
managing it to its highest value. And if you don't
believe me, go ask your partner or spouse, or family
or even colleagues at work to describe your personal brand

(01:03:21):
and they will tell you. That should make some people nervous,
But I think about it from this standpoint. If you're
in business at all today, it's more important than ever
because we live in this knowledge based economy where we're
making decisions about one another in an instant based on

(01:03:43):
our own observations and experiences with people in society in general.

Speaker 4 (01:03:48):
I mean, think about it, when.

Speaker 3 (01:03:50):
You're staying in line at Starbucks, how quickly judge somebody,
or walking through the airport or going to a meeting
or conference.

Speaker 4 (01:03:56):
It's just human nature.

Speaker 3 (01:03:57):
We all do it, so there's no reason to feel
guilty aboutout it.

Speaker 4 (01:04:00):
But I think.

Speaker 3 (01:04:01):
It's very, very important to your perceived value in the
world that you establish and manage your brand based upon
what we talked about, your personal values, your key attributes,
your leading traits and the messaging that you want to

(01:04:22):
communicate about yourself to the rest of the world. So
I would I would tell people if they wanted to
start this process, we could. We could narrow down to
four key steps. And again this is classic branding, and
first is four key attributes. And this is where you
think about your own and this is difficult. What are

(01:04:44):
what are Michael's, mister Esposito's key attributes? What is it
that did you bring to the table from a personal
standpoint and a professional standpoint.

Speaker 4 (01:04:54):
Make a list of them and lead it.

Speaker 1 (01:04:56):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
I would say, bring it down to four words. And
that's a difficult It's no easy task, but it's worthwhile
that it helps you define what your personal brand is.
I'll give you an example. If I were to say
I'm thinking of a female icon that we all know,
and I said, she's organized, she's creative, she's anal, and

(01:05:21):
she's intimidating. Almost to everyone goes, oh, you're talking about
Martha Stewart and I'm like, yeah, exactly. Imagine how powerful
it would be, Michael if someone could mention forwards and
everybody know, oh, you're talking about Michael Lisposito it would
be huge powerful, But like I said, it's the first
kind of baseline that you have to kind of do

(01:05:42):
as self inventory and figure out what forwards would I
hope one day people would use to describe me, Right,
that's one. The next step is to think about your
brand packaging, which we were talking about with clothes and
launches and all of that, but it's it's that people
take an inventory again, an honest inventory of how people

(01:06:06):
might perceive them in their clothing, accessories, jewelry, hair makeup,
you know, glasses or contacts, fragrance, even tattoos and piercings,
what are they, where are they and what the heck
do they mean?

Speaker 4 (01:06:22):
But even the.

Speaker 3 (01:06:23):
Car you drive, or your workspace or office and the
home you live in all shape perceptions about you. And
that's always my first question. Are you happy with your
brand packaging today? Do you have like a signature?

Speaker 4 (01:06:35):
Look?

Speaker 3 (01:06:36):
Are there things that you would like to change? And
we can all think of people that have well known,
well defined brand presence, you know, because I can name
things and images come to mind, like Adele or Bono
or Cara top Comedian or.

Speaker 4 (01:06:56):
Guy Fieri, the Rock Route Paul.

Speaker 3 (01:07:00):
They all have very very well defined personal brand presence
that has helped them achieve great success. Even Dog the
bounty Hunter as a well defined brand that has served
him well. So that's the second step is to sit
down and think to yourself quietly because this is personal,

(01:07:20):
not how you package yourself and how others might perceed
that if you want to make any changes. And then
the next step that I would share the third step
before we get to the end, is essentially a brand description,
just like any brand. If you're a soda, a beer,
a car company, whatever it might be, you would have

(01:07:42):
a one or two paragra brand description. And I encourage
people to write a paragraph or two that describes who
they are. And that means your sex, your age, your
nationality or ethnicity, your education, your religion, sexual preference, are
you married or single?

Speaker 4 (01:08:01):
Do you have kids? You know? Are your parent? Because
that all defines who you are and only who you are.

Speaker 1 (01:08:08):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:08:08):
And next is what you do? Yeah, it's your profession,
but can you can you dig a little deeper and
talk about exactly what you do because not all there's
a lot of accountants, but there's a lot of different
kinds of accountants. The clients that you serve and then
what you do from a professional association's social and civic organizations.
Your talents and hobbies. Yeah, are you a singer, a musician,

(01:08:31):
a speaker, whatever it may be. Or from a hobby standpoint,
maybe you put pile or golf or whatever. But that's
who you are and I would include that because that's
very defining. And then finally is the hard part, and
that's where you sit down and talk about what I
would call your leading traits. This is your values. What

(01:08:51):
are your top three or four values that you value most.
What are your strengths, What are you honestly really really
good at? What is your manner and style? Like are
you timely or you always late? Is that your reputation
and should you change that? Or maybe you're always early?
My wife and I are always fifteen minutes early and
annoys the hell out of everybody because they're like, yes,

(01:09:14):
you're invited to our dinner party, but it starts at
six thirty, not six fifteen. So it's our habit. But
it's essentially your presence. And you just write a paragraph
or two and then finally you come to the end,
which is where I talk about your personal brand mission statement.
Michael and this is very simple. That this is kind

(01:09:36):
of the culmination of that exercise, and as I describe
it in the book, where you take those four words,
those key attributes, you combine it with you your thoughts
about your brand, packaging or presence, and with how you
want to present yourself.

Speaker 4 (01:09:51):
I'm kind of bougie. It's a joke in the industry, and.

Speaker 3 (01:09:57):
That I guess paragraph are two about yourself that your
brand description, and you pull in your long term goals
about how you want to position yourself. And it's not
just about business. It's how do you wish to position
yourself in the minds of your spouse or partner, your kids,
your the rest of your family, your colleagues at work,

(01:10:22):
your clients and customers, your community in general, and maybe
even your industry. And that becomes your touchstone for all
your decision making, like if I buy this, you know,
if I get this tattoo, if I buy this house,
or I drive this car, or I decide to wear
this kind of suit, you know, or whatever, all the decision.

Speaker 4 (01:10:44):
Making becomes very very easy. But more importantly.

Speaker 3 (01:10:53):
What I was going to say is, more importantly, Michael,
it helps you with your value system from a decision
making and behavior standpoint, does this go with my personal brand?
Because if you think about any brand, there's there's three
elements that people need to remember.

Speaker 4 (01:11:12):
When is commitment. You have to commit.

Speaker 3 (01:11:15):
Fully to your brand, whatever brand it is, and make
sure that everything you do supports and confirms that brand.

Speaker 4 (01:11:22):
So it is a strong commitment.

Speaker 3 (01:11:24):
You know, if I if I suddenly showed up at
a conference and I had my nose pierced in a
tattoo on my forehead and I was wearing a wife
beater with a beard and mustache, I wouldn't look as
good as you, Michael, but people would, Yeah, people would
add a lot of questions about what's going on with
John for sure.

Speaker 4 (01:11:44):
So commitment matters.

Speaker 3 (01:11:46):
The other thing is investment, and I talk about this
in the book a bit, but you have to invest
in everything that you can do to lift up.

Speaker 4 (01:11:55):
And push forward your brand.

Speaker 3 (01:11:57):
So joining professional and so social and civic organizations, becoming involved,
taking on leadership roles, speaking and writing, earning designations, continuing
their education, anything that you can do that lifts up
and push forward your brand. And then finally, it is
that consistency thing that we were talking about just now,

(01:12:17):
where you have to make sure that everything remains consistent
throughout your life, with your family, your spouse, your kids, everybody,
because when you do things that are inconsistent, or you
have behavior that's inconsistent, it harms your brand. You lose

(01:12:37):
trust in your personal brand. Because we can think of
icons that have kind of tarnished their brand with what
I would call off brand behavior. Harvey Weinstein, Cosby, you know,
well known public figures having problems more recently even Lance Armstrong,
but more recently, you know, it's Kanye asked and Will

(01:13:00):
Smith with that Oscar slap where people are raising questions
about personal brand. But that's the idea anybody's curious as
to what personal branding is.

Speaker 4 (01:13:10):
I hope I winted their appetite.

Speaker 3 (01:13:12):
To the idea of, hey, maybe this would be fun
exercise for me to get involved in. But it certainly
makes moving up in your industry and even in your
social circles a lot easier. In my opinion, it's like
a guiding light to help you achieve your next step.

Speaker 1 (01:13:31):
I think you really gave us a nice deep dive,
and I want to talk on a couple of things.
But just like you said, in terms of the personal
branding piece of the actions that you make. And you
brought up the Will Smith's lap, and I think you know,
you see, Mike Tyson is a revived career and a
lot of it has to do it his personal brand

(01:13:52):
of who he was and who he is today. And
so Mike Tyson can actually slap somebody and it doesn't
affect his personal brand because of the brand that he's
created around himself, whereas Will Smith is in contrast to
him creating a wholesome brand and then slap someone out
of anger or frustration or whatever. It was not just

(01:14:16):
someone Chris Rock, and it affects his brand negatively. And
it's really because of this how did you build your brand?
And one more example to kind of highlight all of
this for everyone is you think of Snoop Dogg, the
rapper who can go on national television with a blunt,
smoking weed on camera on TV. Everybody accepts it for

(01:14:37):
what it is and accepts him for who he is,
and he gets commercial advertisement and all the rest. And
then you could think of, you know, just put in
the pop celebrity really who it's going to be.

Speaker 2 (01:14:47):
If God forbid, they were caught.

Speaker 1 (01:14:48):
With some sort of marijuana joint or a bowl or
something like that. All of their brands, all of excuse me,
all of their sponsors would drop them in a heartbeat
because of the brand that they've built and created.

Speaker 4 (01:15:02):
You're spun on. I mean, it's just like and you
can say recovery. I mean, Tiger Wood's recovered from Martha
Stewart damage.

Speaker 3 (01:15:11):
Martha Stewart after she got out of and look at
and and like she's doing commercials with Steve Dog.

Speaker 1 (01:15:17):
It just made me think of it of like the
play on how you can revive a brand. But I think,
and I think you'll attest to this and you can
just jump on this bandwagon. Here is it's it's it's
also like you said, that commitment to the brand. So
Martha Stewart could have tried to go back to her
her her like you said, you use the word anal,
which I don't know if she'd appreciate or not appreciate.

(01:15:39):
But she could have gone back back to this conservative
approach and dismissed what the truth and what happened. But
instead she she acknowledged it. She took ownership of it,
and she took ownership of it so much that she
committed to it in a way that we as a
society we accept that when we I think, it's not

(01:15:59):
that we accept what people do in terms of a
negative behavior of maybe using drugs or going to white
collar prison or having street fights like Mike Tyson. It's
not that we accept those behaviors. It's that we accept
the person for acknowledging those behaviors and saying, hey.

Speaker 2 (01:16:16):
You know what, that's part of who I am.

Speaker 1 (01:16:18):
It might be part of my past or my history,
and here is what I'm doing today.

Speaker 4 (01:16:24):
It's true, and it.

Speaker 3 (01:16:25):
Goes back to those are genuine, authentic personal brands, and
that's why we accept and that we know that's really
who they are.

Speaker 4 (01:16:33):
This is not a facade, right, That's just who they are. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:16:39):
I mean I'm known Carrot Top for thirty two thirty
three years.

Speaker 2 (01:16:43):
I was going to ask about that one.

Speaker 4 (01:16:46):
There's Scotty, I should say. So. Scotty and I met
years ago when I was magic Boy.

Speaker 1 (01:16:51):
Like I said, I had a feeling because he's a
prop comment. I had a feeling you were going.

Speaker 4 (01:16:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:16:56):
So we met through this association again, getting involved in
associations called the National Association for Campus Activities and This
was an association where the kids at college that we're
on the committee to book all the entertainment for the
year for the school would go to these conferences and

(01:17:17):
we would showcase. We would do our shows and they
would book us. And me and Carrot Top are kind
of young guns, and we would both showcase and we
became friends.

Speaker 4 (01:17:26):
But I have to tell you Scott his name is Scotty.

Speaker 3 (01:17:28):
Scotty or Carrot Top has been in Vegas now, I
mean always in the top five acts for just the
lux are eighteen years and before that, I think it
was at the MGM for t and Untill and Red Hair.
And he's funny as I'll get up. No, I'm just

(01:17:51):
saying he's funny as i'll get out. But I'm telling you,
Scotty or Carrot Top has a home down the street
from me here in North and I see him. Scotty
is the same person whether he is on stage or
off stage, or in Vegas or in Orlando.

Speaker 4 (01:18:10):
And I can't tell you how many times I've hung
out with.

Speaker 3 (01:18:13):
Him backstage, not a lot, but a few. He wears
the same clothes off the street onto stage and then
wears him off stage to go out because it's just
that's just who he is. That's Carrot Top and he's
genuine and authentic and he's stuck to it and it's
really helped him achieve some incredible success. Honestly, I love him.

(01:18:36):
He's a great guy. I'm going to see him in August,
so looking forward.

Speaker 1 (01:18:39):
To it and speak to this because this comes up
so often in terms of people talk about work life balance,
we talk about we call it more harmony now. And
you know, by having these consistencies of just what you
just said, like using carrat Top or Scotty as the
example of he's the same person on stage and off stage,
speak to how mentally this alleviates so much stress and

(01:19:03):
imposter syndrome and all the rest by having this consistency.

Speaker 4 (01:19:08):
Yeah, no, I agree.

Speaker 3 (01:19:09):
I think when you try to be all things to
all people, you run into this situation where you end
up being no one to anyone. It's not genuine, it's
not authentic, and you can't dig in and get deep
with people if you're not genuine, authentic. And I think
when you present one face to your family and friends

(01:19:31):
and maybe colleagues at work or whatnot, and another one
to prospects and clients, and let's call it the media
or whomever. I think you're quickly found out. And I
think it erodes trust at home, meaning you know, imagine
your kids or your spouse sees us. I don't understand,

(01:19:55):
but it does the same with your colleague.

Speaker 5 (01:20:00):
Imagine said yeah, imagine your your colleagues and clients if
they see two versions of you and how they don't
trust either one one.

Speaker 3 (01:20:15):
I think that can be really really iffy. I think
you need to be yourself. You need to be authentic,
you need to be genuine and it doesn't matter, you know,
you go back and look at people a group Paul
who really puts it all out there, or like I said,
Dog the bounty hunter. We can come up with a
thousand success stories where that truthiness, that genuineness, that authentic

(01:20:39):
person has succeeded because they've found their niche and they've
found their audience and they've they've been true all the
way through and consistent.

Speaker 4 (01:20:49):
And I think that's key.

Speaker 3 (01:20:50):
I think when you can't do that, or don't do that,
it's going to be very difficult for you to succeed
long term, and particularly because I think people will find
you out with this media or someone else.

Speaker 1 (01:21:05):
You can't do that, and you'll find yourself out. I
think that that's where a lot of the nerves come from.
You know, I do a lot of trainings for for
leaders in terms of communications in public speaking and being
able to speak on stages and everything. And that's where
that harmony question comes in, is that so many of
them they're They're going, well, I'm nervous presenting, and I'm going, well,
are you nervous talking to a friend?

Speaker 2 (01:21:24):
No, I'm not nervous talking to a friend. Are you
nervous presenting to you know, a colleague? No?

Speaker 1 (01:21:29):
But why what changes when you're on stage? And it's
because now they're putting on this new persona. Now, the
other thing that they're doing that that we that you
and I can can see with someone is that they
might be saying something to the colleague. They'll say a
part of the presentation. They'll say, yeah, but this part,
you know, I think is BS. But on stage they're
fully bought in. And it's like, well, of course, on stage,

(01:21:50):
you're fully bought in. And of course during that slide,
your your your a, your your nerves are through the
roof because you don't you know, you don't believe it.
You don't believe what you're saying. Yeah, have to trust
what you're saying. And a quick little story on this
that just happened to me recently. Part of what I
speak on today in terms of leadership is trusting the

(01:22:12):
people that you're leading, right, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:22:14):
Having them supporting them.

Speaker 1 (01:22:16):
Part of my whole talk culminates in support of your team,
and it's it's supporting them in their decisions, meaning that
you are trusting them to make a decision. You're allowing
them to make that decision, and you're supporting them throughout
the outcome, whether it's good or bad or indifferent. That's
what true support looks like. It's not just you know,
here's here's the decision, it went great, awesome, I'm supporting

(01:22:39):
you because everything's good. It's also supporting them because they
made the decision and it kind of went south.

Speaker 2 (01:22:44):
So that's true support. And so.

Speaker 1 (01:22:47):
Yesterday my parents came to town and and my kids
get out of school at three o'clock, but the bus
drops them off close to four. My daughter has soccer
practice that she had to lead at five, and my
parents made a two hour trip. So I'm going Denise,
you know, I want to pick you up early so
you could at least maximize the time with them, with my,

(01:23:09):
with my, with your parents, your grandparents of course. Right now, Denise,
I have two daughters, Denise and Tenley. Denise is on
a I will not miss school for anything streak. She
has not missed a day of school. She wants she
wants to get into the Guiness Book of World Records.
She says, okay, so she will not miss school. Tenley
is much like me. She'll look for any reason to
leave school. So Tenley was easy. She was just like

(01:23:29):
she was like, pick me up early. What are we
leaving at lunch? I said, no, no, no, Tenley, We're gonna
leave at three. So Denise is fighting me on this,
and I'm trying to use all of my leadership techniques
right I'm asking her open ended questions, Well, how do
you see the time that you would spend with them,
you know, being valuable if it's only an hour, Or
how do you see this playing out? Or why is
it so important to you to get in the Guinness

(01:23:51):
Book of Role Records. I'm doing all of this, but
at the end of it, at the end of it.
I'm making them mistake of I know what I'm going
to have her do.

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
Stak right.

Speaker 1 (01:24:01):
And so we get to that emotional point where I say, Denise,
I'm going.

Speaker 2 (01:24:05):
To pick you up at three with your sister. Be ready.

Speaker 1 (01:24:08):
I'm sending the email right now. And I see her
look and the tears coming down her eyes. She goes, okay, Dad,
And I'm about to send the email. And my daughter
Tenley comes up to me. She's the emotional one who
comes up to me and starts rubbing my back because
you can see I'm getting a little angst in me.
And I get that moment, that light bulb moment, and
the light bulb moment wasn't parenting. The light bulb moment
was stage for me. And I'm thinking of my talk

(01:24:30):
and I'm going, how could I speak to leaders about
supporting their teams, giving them choices and allowing them to
make the choices if I'm not doing that at home?
And so I turned to Denise and I said, all right, Denise,
you have two choices. You can take the bus or
I'll pick you up, but with no consequence, with no

(01:24:52):
making you feel bad. In other words, like we're gonna
get ice cream and pizza when I pick you up,
which is wh which is what I knew my parents
were going to do with them a little conversation, right,
But I didn't say that. I didn't say that. I said,
I said, with no consequence, which decision. And to make
a longer story short, she chose to take the bus
and I told her, and she was upset. She was

(01:25:14):
worried that I was gonna be upset with her. And
I said, Denise, I'm so proud of you for making
the decision and for standing in your power. I say
all of that, of course to commend Denise. I'm standing
in her power and I'm very proud of her for that,
and we made a big deal about that because I
really was proud of her for that. But also to
say that I knew that when I get on stage

(01:25:35):
and talk about leadership and talk about supporting her team,
that if I would have gone the other way in
my personal brand and told her what to do and
just been to dad and been like I'm sending the
email out, that I would have been b asing my
audience and I would have had some sort of nervous
energy hit me on stage.

Speaker 4 (01:25:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:25:53):
No, I'm so proud of you that you get a
big goal star as a speaker, and two for being
a great parent.

Speaker 1 (01:25:59):
So I appreciate that it was the selfish reason that
I'm teaching everybody here not of living in harmony in
order to not have these nerves and have these this
imposter syndrome. And I'm also using this to tee up
your speaking and your speaking career. You've spoken across the
globe on stages and you're really leveling up in your

(01:26:24):
speaking career, and so I'm interested into what are you
speaking on and where what do you see next in
your speaking career.

Speaker 3 (01:26:33):
So primarily what I speak on is really lately, I
have to speak on industry issues at industry conferences, and
I do a lot of that.

Speaker 4 (01:26:43):
At nauseum. But I enjoy it.

Speaker 3 (01:26:45):
I enjoy it very much, and it keeps me fresh
and it keeps me on top of what's going on
in the industry because people don't want to hear from
you if you're not up to speak and can't answer
the hard questions. So it's a self education process. It
becomes self fulfilling once you book a speech or they
bring you in and we sponsor a lot of conferences

(01:27:07):
so I get some slots, and I do try to
give other members or with HTL members those opportunities. But
in my speaking career, in terms of keynotes, it really
is typically on two things. One is strategic planning and repositioning,
whether it's a business or you know, one of the

(01:27:28):
things that I learned early on is how to take
a failing asset, whether it's a hotel or a restaurant
or a resort, and turn it around and make it
successful and the strategy that's involved in that. So I
talk about strategic market planning, which is not necessarily marketing,
but it is about repositioning. And then of course I

(01:27:50):
talk about any issues involving career success, personal branding, and
lifting yourself up and out into a high realm in
the industry. Those are kind of my two non industry
topics and ones that I enjoy immensely. Funny enough, because

(01:28:10):
you mentioned it, I'm also beginning a new speaking topic,
which as you know, requires a lot of research and
thought on imposter syndrome and how to overcome this. And
I've been running into people CEOs of major companies that
have been in this position of five, six, seven years

(01:28:31):
where they still feel like they're dealing with imposter syndrome
a bit.

Speaker 4 (01:28:35):
Down to school teachers and others.

Speaker 3 (01:28:39):
It's a real issue today and I don't necessarily understand
it completely, but it's one that's worth talking about because
so many people suffer from it. Even the old metal
athletes suffer from imposter syndrome, which I find I'm talking
Olympic athletes suffer from it and talk about the stress

(01:29:00):
that hit them from an imposter syndrome on the standpoint,
But I'm not ready to unveil that yet, unwrap it
and start doing it. But I would love to be
on a program with you sometimes, Michael. I think we
would be an amazing duo on stage.

Speaker 1 (01:29:16):
Yeah, Judy, we'd have a lot of fun. And I
think based off of my knowledge of some of the
imposter syndrome of being found out is also is also
in terms of like like you said with the Olympic athletes,
is that what drives so many leaders, CEOs Olympic athletes
is is this adversity of I'm not good enough. That's
their driving Michael Jordan got on stage for us to

(01:29:38):
receive his Hall of Fame award and just discussed all
of the people who thought he wasn't good enough and
that that was his driving force to becoming who he
was and who he is today. And so that plays
into the imposter syndrome because now that.

Speaker 2 (01:29:54):
You've achieved it, it's who am I? It's I've gotten
the gold, I am the CEO. Who am I?

Speaker 1 (01:30:01):
And it's it's really it's it's and you're in the
right space with this because it's it's rediscovering your new identity.
There's a new identity that needs to be formed in
this moment. So you're you're right on in the right
place to be speaking about it. I want to get
to we've talked, really, I feel like we've talked about
the book the entire time, but I want to make
sure everybody knows one or two key takeaways. We already

(01:30:25):
know what they are, but one or two key takeaways
because I want you to also share where people can
get their books.

Speaker 2 (01:30:32):
As we start concluding this, Sure.

Speaker 3 (01:30:36):
Sure, sure, So I mean just to just to put
it in a nutshell and elevator speech. The book really
shares my personal and professional journey through Marines to professional
magician for fifteen years to becoming a global global chairman
of a very large hotel, tourism and leisure consultancy, and

(01:30:57):
the steps and decisions that I maybe all the learnings
over those thirty plus years as it relates to personal branding.
That's essentially the book. There's a lot in there. It's
very personal, but it gives people a lot of There's
a lot of exercises in the book to work through,
some thought processes to get their juices flowing, and some

(01:31:21):
challenges to see, you know, if people are up to
the challenge of the next step in their professional life.
I would say too. There's some funny stories in there
that we've not discussed.

Speaker 4 (01:31:34):
For sure.

Speaker 3 (01:31:34):
The last chapter is a story about a kid with
the cowboy boots, and I don't want to give it away,
but it's a funny story that happen to be on
the Cruciable.

Speaker 4 (01:31:42):
And the book is.

Speaker 3 (01:31:43):
Available anywhere thanks to distribution by Simon and Schuster anywhere
they sell books. So it just dropped on Tuesday again.
We've got these author signings all over. If somebody's in
New York, Orlando or Honolulu or one of the markets,
I would love to see them in person. They can
look at their local Barnes and Noble and see if

(01:32:04):
there's an author signing, but it's available from Amazon dot Com,
Barnes and Noble Books, a Million Target, Lomart, anywhere you
buy books.

Speaker 1 (01:32:13):
It's so cool to be able to meet the author.
I think it's just really, really neat. And my last
question for you in terms of the book is Simon Schuster.
So we talked about being self published and then getting
a publisher. Have you ever been self published? Do you
see a difference and how did you land such a
great publisher?

Speaker 4 (01:32:33):
So let's be let's be very clear.

Speaker 3 (01:32:36):
My first book, the first version of From Invisible to Icon,
was self published and I used a publishing house and
I did not get the results that I wanted in
that process.

Speaker 4 (01:32:48):
To be honest, but I knew nothing about it.

Speaker 3 (01:32:50):
I was a novice completely and I didn't achieve the
results that I wanted. I also did feel super great
about the book end of the day because it was
I didn't feel like I edited enough with some smart people.

Speaker 4 (01:33:05):
So this time around, I wanted.

Speaker 3 (01:33:08):
To jump through every hoop, across every t do every
I and make sure it was the best possible product
that I could put together. So I had a lot
of people pre read the book for me, that I
mean everything from David Kong, who was CEO and global
chairman for Best Western International globally really smart, a lot

(01:33:28):
of smart people, some best selling authors, one of which
I will send you some email on because he's one
of the ones who wrote one of those three books
that was really good.

Speaker 4 (01:33:39):
But just people that I trusted to read the book.

Speaker 3 (01:33:43):
And then I finished it and put it into the
word doc and I started shopping publishers, and I knew
I wanted a real publisher, and by that I mean
a real partner that would step up and guide me
in how to make this book better from a quality

(01:34:03):
product standpoint, from a distribution standpoint, and make the most
of it. And I found a gentleman by the name
of David Bernstein, someone I would highly recommend you reach
out to Michael at Post Hill Press, and they're an
independent publisher with distribution from Simon and Schuster, and David

(01:34:24):
has been in the publishing industry for four decades. It's very,
very knowledgeable and someone that I've learned to trust. In fact,
I was exchanging email with him right before you and
I got together about some things related to this opera
signing event in Dublin. Ireland, but they've been terrific and

(01:34:46):
with the support of Simon and Schuster. From a distribution standpoint,
it's great to be on Simon and Schuster's page as
an author, a Simon and Schuster author, but I'm equally
proud of running through the post to press house as well.
But I really wanted the real deal this time are

(01:35:07):
in and I feel like I've got him super proud
of the book. And that's also what's allowed me to
get into these book signings. Believe it or not, authors
kind of had to promote their own books these days.
It's not like anybody's opening up a bank account and marketing,
and it doesn't matter if it's Simon and Schuster or
Penguin or anybody else.

Speaker 4 (01:35:28):
They're going to count on you to promote the book.
So all the book signings I have I booked with.

Speaker 3 (01:35:35):
The Barnes and Nobles stores or other outlets directly. But
part of it is here's the book. You know, read
the book, look at the book, look at the product.
Here's the distribution that I have, and here's my network
of people. I think I can get one hundred and
fifty people at an author signing, and it's a lot
of work.

Speaker 4 (01:35:53):
It's a lot, a lot of work.

Speaker 3 (01:35:55):
But that would be my recommendation for you and Michael,
is that you consider more of a high didn't just
self publish it. But I don't know how far down
the road you are, but that was a great, great uh,
It's been best far, a great experience, and I would
I would follow the same path again and again again.

Speaker 1 (01:36:13):
That I'm so happy that I asked you that question
because I was just like, man, you know, I meant
to ask this, and and I'm so happy I did,
because you really just not just educated our audience, but
you educated me on this whole process and.

Speaker 2 (01:36:24):
And I really really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:36:25):
I have a past guest that I'll introduce you to
Mark Albert of media Experts. I'm sure it will be
a really great connection for you in terms of this.
I mean, like you said, as an author, you're you're
like a You're like a low You're like you're like
a rock star and a whole different genre, right, Like
I mean rock stars like like Taylor Swift goes on
tour to sell her album and you have, you know,

(01:36:48):
you have to go to Barnes and Nobles to sell
your book. And I mean it's the way it is.
But I will say this, from what I saw in
your social media, Jay Sheddy's lucky to have his book
next to yours. From what I understand, I'm glad you
liked that one.

Speaker 4 (01:37:02):
That's that's funny. What's so funny? Jay must be? I
mean he is.

Speaker 3 (01:37:07):
He is laughing all the way to the bank because
everybody who saw that post with my book next to
his is like, oh, you're next to Jay Shetty. And
then and then that's the end of the conversation. I'm like, yeah,
but I have a book on the ship, you know.
And they're like, yeah, but you're next to Jay Shetty.
So kudos to him. I mean, wow, that is a

(01:37:27):
I'm gonna I'm gonna start thinking, Michael Monk myself.

Speaker 2 (01:37:30):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (01:37:31):
Yeah, I have to read that.

Speaker 3 (01:37:32):
But I have to tell you it's been a joy
and a pleasure, Michael, this is this has got to
be my favorite interview so far. I really really enjoyed it.
And honestly, I've done interviews every day this week. That's
part of the hustle too, but this has been very
genuine and authentic, and you come across so warm and welcoming. Michael,
thank you so much for this opportunity.

Speaker 1 (01:37:54):
I appreciate that, and thank you too for coming on.
I look forward to hopefully one day meeting with you,
like you said, getting on a ticket together and standing
on stage together.

Speaker 2 (01:38:04):
For all of our audio listeners.

Speaker 1 (01:38:06):
Could you just share your links as to how to
get in touch with you.

Speaker 3 (01:38:11):
Sure, it's so easy. Just just do a Google search
John J. Chen for Red F A R E E
D and it'll it'll populate my LinkedIn, my Facebook and
probably more than I want to admit. But eventually, at
some point, when you keep scrolling, for Reid, Zachariah comes up,

(01:38:31):
and I'm always very proud of that that that he's next,
And eventually for Reid, q tip the rapper comes up.
But in terms of for Reds, in terms of for Reed's,
I'm the leading guy, the leading guy at least under John,
because q tip is John far Reid as well.

Speaker 2 (01:38:48):
Is that that's funny?

Speaker 3 (01:38:49):
But yeah, if you go through and UH and do
a search of just my name, it'll pop up. And
I'm happy to connect with anybody on LinkedIn. I'm happy
to connect with people on Facebook. I don't I don't
have a whole bunch of Facebook people, but I'm happy
to do that. And and generally this is going to

(01:39:10):
be very difficult, Michael, but my email address? Should I
share my email address? Is that too much?

Speaker 2 (01:39:15):
If you if you'd like?

Speaker 1 (01:39:16):
But I'm sure that just finding you on LinkedIn, anybody
who's looking for advice, looking to work with you is
a great one. What I would say is your website
it's John.

Speaker 3 (01:39:25):
So yeah, Johnfreid dot com. Again, it's super, super.

Speaker 1 (01:39:30):
Super easy, and all the links, all the links for
everything that you need are there. The book is there,
the social media is there, and and like you said,
you could just google that.

Speaker 2 (01:39:39):
So it really has.

Speaker 1 (01:39:41):
Been a pleasure having you on. I want to end
with your mantra you mentioned it mid show, and that
is be opened in all things, be lucky in all things.

Speaker 4 (01:39:51):
Sure.

Speaker 3 (01:39:52):
Sure, that's it right there. And I'm going to close
with one other thing if you don't mind. Yeah, that
is a great great friend of mine shared with me
a quote that I've held onto and that is, five
years from now, you will be the same person you
are today, but for the people you meet and the

(01:40:13):
books you read, and I just I hang on to
that because that to me is so so true. So
that's the other one that I kind of I look
forward to. So I want to read more and I
want to meet more people's and.

Speaker 1 (01:40:24):
I'll add to that quote and the podcast you listen to,
that's good.

Speaker 4 (01:40:31):
That's good. I like that. I'm good you forever. I'm
changing it forever. That's what I'm going to.

Speaker 1 (01:40:36):
Say, And Mike, Mike dropped there. Thanks so much for
coming on the show. All right, thanks mine, Thank you
for listening to The Michael Esposito Show. For show notes,
video clips and more episodes, go to Michael Esposito Inc.
Dot com backslash podcast. Thank you again to our sponsor
ten ten Insurance Services helping businesses get the right insurance

(01:40:57):
for all their insurance needs. Visit dent dot io to
get a quote that's d E N t N dot
io and remember when you buy an insurance policy from denten,
you're giving back on a global scale. This episode was
produced by Uncle Mike at the iHeart Studios in Poughkeepsie.
Special thanks to Lara Rodrian for the opportunity and my

(01:41:20):
team at Mike Lespositol Inc.

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