Courage to Leap & Lead with Dr. Bob Nelson, part 1 - Episode 146

You've got courage to leap, courage to lead.

Be brave and be bold. Whoa, let it roar.

Welcome to the Courage to Leap and Lead podcast, where each of our guests share the stories of courage that helped them become powerful leaders. Before we start today's show, please remember to visit courage-consulting.com. Where you can find all the episodes and other excellent resources, all at courage-consulting.com. Now, here's your host, Leadership Courage Coach CB Bowman.

Hello everybody! How are you today? You know, I miss you. And this is my second recording today. I just did an interview with Sally Higgerson, who is the author of Women Rise and Rising Together. And she is a powerhouse. So if you missed it, it's on your favorite podcast. This is CB. How are you today? Well, we have another— of course, I always bring in amazing people. I don't know how I do it. Well, today we have Dr. Bob. That's what he's known as, Dr. Bob. And Dr. Bob has some really fun stories to tell us about how he turned failure into success. And let me tell you, this guy's successful. I had a time and a half to try to get him on my show. I mean, really? I thought I was trying to book Donald Trump? It was really amazing. But—

He should be available now.

Dr. Bob has a heart of gold, and he stepped in and he said, of course, CB. And you know, that's my favorite kind of people who just want to hang out with us normal people. So Dr. Bob, welcome.

Welcome. Feeling is mutual.

Thank you.

Good to be with you and good to be on your program.

Thank you, Dr. Bob. Um, you are known for helping organizations increase productivity through their employees in a way that really works for the employee and the organization. I know that you did some work for WD-40, who we both know.

Yes.

And you made a huge difference. Now, I want to know about that, and I want to know about you personally. How did you get to be so smart? How did you get to be an expert in these things? And how did you get to be in demand? I want to know it all. So let's start from the beginning. Tell us about you as a kid.

Okay. Well, it goes back a bit. Loving parents, moved around a lot. My father was in the military. We moved every 3 or 4 years, which really felt like a blessing because it got me, you know, to be— I'm an introvert at heart. It got me out of my shell. So, we'd move to a new neighborhood in a new state. And first thing I'd do, I'd go knock on doors in the neighborhood. Do you have any kids my age? It's going to be a long summer if I don't have someone to play with, you know? And so, I got over being shy and made things happen. So, that's kind of served me my whole life to not be afraid to take a risk.

Well, that's not an introverted move at all, Dr.

Bowman. No, no, speaking. I make my living speaking. And speaking, you wouldn't think an introvert is— people can't believe I'm an introvert. But I'm a writer. Writing is a lot of internal thought work, and I'm very reflective. And that's the exact opposite of being out there in front of a group. But it's a learned skill, and you can learn any skill that can help you be, you know, I remember I debated on the debate team in high school, and the first debate I did, I threw up afterwards. You know, I was so nervous. But, you know, you stick with anything, you get better at it.

And that's— I mean, Dr. Bob, we've got a lot in common, as you can see. I'm a military brat.

Is that Army?

That's Army. Yeah. Okay.

Air Force for For us. But yeah, thank you for your service.

Yeah, it was my parents. My dad was a lieutenant colonel.

So was mine. Wow.

He's laid to rest at Arlington National with my mom. We didn't travel around, but after I grew up, I traveled a lot to make up for it.

So did you work at the Pentagon?

Hmm?

Did he work at the Pentagon?

No, no. He's of the career era. Yeah. So, yeah. And I am also an introvert, very high on the score of being introverted. And so, and I have my first book coming out.

Congratulations.

Thank you. May, June. And yeah, it's a heavy lift. A heavy lift.

A lot of work, isn't it? But it's a lot of work.

It's incredible, incredible. I mean, people just— and I've tried to write books before. Fortunately, I was introduced to a publisher that made it happen for me, and, um, because he had a specific methodology that you use. And even with that, I mean, it was much easier than I thought than previous attempts, but it takes concentration. It really does. Yeah.

Writing, rewriting, a lot of choices along the way.

The rewriting was the killer for me.

That's what makes a good book though. That's what is— the tighter you can edit it. The same is true with the movie. You can tell a movie that wasn't edited very well. It kind of didn't quite hang and flow and But a well-edited movie could be a whole notch a better movie as a result, you know.

Well, I made my first mistake by sending it into the publisher for the first edit without reading it. Because I was so done with it, right? And it would have been a disaster. When I got it back and I read it, I said, well, they didn't edit this very well. And I realized, No, you didn't write it very well.

Well, that's— that actually development editors have pretty much gone to the wayside. Like a lot of publishers just take what you give them and print it. Where do you want us to send the books? You know?

Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. Yeah.

Yeah. So when I got back and I saw that, I said, all right, if you're serious, sit and rewrite the book. And that's what I did.

All right, good.

So Now, Dr. Bob, so you grew up in the military eyes and traveled around and made friends. And then what?

Oh, well, on my upbringing, when I was also a senior in high school, I remember taking English class and the English teacher was passing out papers and she stopped at my desk and waved it above and said, best paper I had in 4 classes. I go, oh, you know, kind of surprised. back and reread the paper. What, what'd she see here? And, but I, I got a message that I, I had a, a gift for, for writing, and that, that kind of moved me in a, in that direction to, uh, do that, uh, more, um, to pursue that. And I, I did publish, self-publish my first book when I was 21, and I've now done, uh, 31 books.

Wow.

And, uh, 32nd is one I'm doing, uh, about Lessons from Steve Jobs. That's kind of fun, exciting. And then I've done about probably 1,000 articles and columns and things like that. So writing, you know, has been a good friend of mine.

Well, okay, let's start here. Did you just, from your first book, you just jumped into faith fame and fortune writing?

No, I worked my butt off. What are you talking about? Who's the— I saw a band, who is it? I'm blanking on the name, but I remember in front of the crowd he goes, I want to thank everyone for supporting us over the past 20 years before we became an overnight success. And that's kind of how I feel. Like, so the first book I I self-published, and then I, I did all the marketing. I went around to bookstores, and I learned a lot, learned a whole lot, and experimented a lot with different types of marketing. And, um, then, then have done books with different publishers. And it wasn't the— it was my 12th book that really took off. So my, my 11th book was a professional book done by Scott Forsman in Chicago, great little publisher, business publisher, and total sales was 3,500 copies. And I said, well, hmm, this is a good book. This is helpful. I think it's still relevant now. You can develop people by how you delegate.

Yes.

But it didn't really kind of ring a bell and hit a nerve, as they say. And And so I said, what's wrong with this picture? And I decided, well, what's part of the problem was, is you go to a business publisher, they from the get-go feel they're not going to sell many copies. So they— let's not— let's put a boring cover on it, you know, because no one's going to buy it anyway. And that's not wasting any time trying to tell anyone about it because they're not going to buy it. And then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and no one bought it. So, so the— on my 12th book, which I had an idea for, uh, at a graduate school class where we were talking about, uh, reward systems, control systems class, and, and, uh, positive reinforcement, informal reward systems. And I remember my professor saying— I credit him in the book— he, he said, you know, with as proven as these concepts are, there really hasn't been much application in business. And I said, you know, I'm gonna do something about that.

Mm-hmm.

And I got home, an hour and a half away. I got home late at night and I typed out a letter before the internet, to a publisher in New York City that I felt was a strong marketing publisher, Workman Publishing. Not a business publisher, a market— they were— they did trade books and they're very, very high quality. You can pitch— you can pick a Workman book off the shelf from 20 feet, you know, great design. And And I sent this letter off to the president of this publisher and spent 2 weeks trying to get him on the phone. And finally I heard his assistant say, would you talk to this guy? He keeps calling. And I hear all of a sudden, what do you want? It's Peter Workman, the president. I go, Mr. Workman, my name is Bob Nelson. I sent you a letter about a book. And he cut me off. He goes, you sent us a letter? We're not going to respond to a letter. If there's a book you want to do, you've got to send us a proposal. In the proposal, you've got to say why this has got to be one of the books that comes out this year. That year there were 70,000 books printed, published that year, and why this— your book has got to be one of those, and why we're the only publisher that could possibly get it right. And as he's hanging up, he goes, by the way, we get 10,000 proposals a year. We published 24 books. Click. And so I guess I could have been discouraged by that.

Definitely.

And I wasn't. I said, game on, time to do a proposal. And I went and did a proposal and I got an agent. And next time I talked to Peter Workman, I was sitting across from him in his office in New York City. And my agent, you know, because there's a, you know, process for a proposal, and I've got a great one-page, you know, one-page description if anyone wants it.

Yes.

But my agent said, well, you know, it'd be really good if you laid out a few pages. I go, oh, once I really made it clear what the book's about? You go, well, just help us visualize it. So I laid out a few pages, and then she said, this is great, can you do a few more? I go, Come on, how much— it's obvious. Just, Bob, just imagine, think of it this way, more laid out pages, better advance I can get.

Yeah, exactly.

Okay, so laid out some more pages, and sure enough, here I'm in front of Peter Workman, and he opens it to those pages, the layout of the book, and he says, this could work. This guy's a very visual guy. Every book he's done, he personally has seen and feels. And so this could work. Now, he doesn't— now he knows the project, he believes he sees the project is good. He doesn't know anything about me. So tell me about yourself, Bob. And I didn't have my PhD yet, and I was an administrator for a training company, Kendall Blanchard Companies in Escondido, California. And I said, but that's not what I really want to do. And he goes, oh, what do you really want to do? I said, be a bestselling author. And I could just see a little twinkle in his eye and done deal. And, and they, um, that, that was in 1994. The book is now in its 64th printing, has sold 2 million copies.

Oh.

So, so 3,500 copies, my 11th book, 2 million copies, my 12th book, with just a couple changes in perception. And, and one was, uh, going with the book, the company that knows how to market books. And, and even with that, I gotta tell you that, because I got, you know, dealing with the marketing director, and at one point the book was coming out, I said, can you send me a proposal on what you could do marketing? And she kind of laughed and said, well, we don't really do, you know, marketing plans per each book. But I said, well, I've got a few ideas. You mind if I send them to you? Oh, that'll be cute. Go ahead. And so I sent her a 60-page document, single-spaced. With a one-line cover sheet that said, this is what I'm going to do to promote this book. What are you going to do to meet me halfway?

That's Dr. Bob.

A couple years later, I remember talking to them, and they said they all looked at each other. They said, what have we unleashed? And they sent me to 27 cities at a time when publishers didn't really do that anymore. It's very rare to do because that costs money. You know, and not just, you know, the travel and stuff, but you got to hire a PR person to set that all up. And then in each market you go to, you got to have a media escort that knows where they're going to get you there on time. And so it's a, you know, a time and expense thing. And they sent me to 27 cities. And when I was done, I wanted to keep doing it. And I was, you know, I was getting booked to speak. So each place I was booked, I would line up media while I was in that market, that type of thing. And, you know, and I remember that kind of rubbed them because they have other books, other authors, you know. And my agent called Peter Workman and said, you know, he said, Bob wants us to keep doing this. We got all these other books coming out and other authors, and, you know, they deserve their turn too. And she said, well, do you have any other authors that are willing to do what he's saying to keep hitting it? And he goes, no. Well, why wouldn't you do it then?

Wow.

Wow. And so I said, okay, well, we'll keep doing it. And I struck a deal with him that I would pay for— what was it? I'd split hard costs with him and I'd cover labor costs that I was spending. So we kind of did it together and then the book kept selling. So as a result, And was on Businessweek's bestseller list for 239 weeks, something like that, in 6 years. But—

Have you written a book on how to market your book?

No, no, but I talk to people about it a lot. Okay.

And actually, I got in—

with all due respect, this was You know, before the internet is before social media. So it was— I did thousands of interviews and crisscrossed the country. And so, and just every, you know, trying to look for how to make the connection. So every time I'd come back from a city, say St. Louis, for example, I hired someone in their home to— I did a postcard of the book and I'd say, here's the book. It's currently in its, you know, 7th printing. It sold this many copies. And here's what I'm doing nationally to promote the book. And then here's what I just did in your market, St. Louis. And I'd list 5 or 6 things. And I'd have her send a postcard to every bookstore in town. after I left. And so I did that for a couple years, you know. So, and so if they, if they hadn't ordered the book, they would when they got that, you know. Well, stuff's happening in our market, people are going to know about it, we need to have it, maybe we'll put it on display, that type of thing. And so that was one thing to help move books. And I remember once I was in New York City staying at a seedy hotel across Madison Square Garden and And I can't remember what I was doing there, but I decided, you know, I'm gonna just take an extra day here in New York City. And I, in the hotel there, you know, they used to have phone books in the hotel rooms because— Yellow Pages.

Yeah, Yellow Pages.

I looked up bookstores and I took the section, I ripped it out, and I went out to a cab and I got in and I said, I want you to take me to as many of these bookstores as you can today. And that's what we did. And so I could— we went to like 27. So while I was in signing books or talking to the bookstore manager, he would figure out where the next closest bookstore was. And then I got to catch my flight at 6 PM at Kennedy, you know.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. What did you do at each of the bookstores that you went into?

Well, I introduced myself. I said, I'm the author of this book, and if you have some copies, I'd love to sign them for you. And if they did, I would, and they'd be appreciative. And I actually liked it more when they didn't, you know, because a lot of times they said, well, that would be, you know, embarrassing. Well, ah, it's too bad you don't have them because I would sign them for you, you know. And they would often take out the order form and order them in front of me, you know. It was oversight, sorry. And so you made— that was a bigger sell because now they're gonna you know, if they buy 20 books or 30 or 3, you know, they're gonna have the book now. And so that was, you know, that it was about exactly a year later I returned to Madison Square Garden, but this time I was speaking about my book. At any rate, but like, so everywhere I— the first year I probably went to 400+ bookstores. And so, for example, they're out of business now, but Waldenbooks used to be a chain and I remember, and I'd take notes on each one. I'd go into the Waldenbooks, and it was strange because they'd say, you know, well, our computer says we have 3 copies. Let's go see if we can find them. And I go, okay. And they go, and they wouldn't be on the shelf, and they disappear in the back for 20 minutes thinking, I found one, you know. It's like, great. And I said, well, I don't, you know, I don't know much about how you guys do business, but it seems like you're centrally— you order books centrally from home office. That's right. Well, it seems like if your computer says you got 3 and none are on the shelf, no one's gonna buy any of them and you're never gonna reorder. Yeah, you're probably right.

It took a genius to tell them that.

So I took all that data. Now I've gone to, you know, 87 Waldenbooks across the country and here's what I found. And that was a story at most every one of them. And so a couple things. One, they put out a word to other Waldenbooks to watch out for this guy because if you haven't got the book, get some. And so it went from like 33 copies in 30 or 40 bookstores, it got bumped to, you know, 120 bookstores for 4 or 5 copies. And that's how you got inroads in the bookstores. Now they're not going to do that if the books don't move in the bookstores. So you've got to be doing promotions. So one is you gotta get them into the bookstore, but then you gotta get them out of the bookstore. And that's how you get the movement done.

How do you get them out? By signing them?

You name it. Doing media, doing stuff like this. Or I remember in Minneapolis, the Minneapolis Tribune had done a feature about the book. It's 1,001 Ways to Reward Employees and a nice feature with a picture and I went to Barnes Noble there and there's 40 copies. Do you have this book? Yeah, look here. They had like 40 or 50 people that called to order it and they had books on reserve for them. I go, okay, well, let me sign those for them, which I did. But that's moving the books or do a book talk, you know, the talk in. I found the talks in the bookstores Didn't— I mean, I probably wasn't famous enough, you know. If I was, if I was a politician or something, there'd be people around the block probably. But, but so I found that by itself wasn't very effective. But what was, was the relationship with the bookstore to say, what can I do in your community? And then I had, you know, the book— the bookstore man, I get different bookstore managers and like I remember Brian Baxter at Tattered Cover Books in Denver, delightful bookstore, multiple ones. And he said, Bob, let me make some calls. I think I'd like to have you here and I'll take you around. And he did. He took me to 5 or 6 different talks in one day and just, you know, 200 people here, 300 people there. And it was companies that he called and said, You need this guy, you know. And, and they'd have a meeting, or they were having a meeting then, and, and, uh, they bought all the books from Brian, but, and I was there to do as a draw. At the end of the day, he goes, Bob, I heard— I learned something from each time I heard you speak. And it was one thing he said. The second thing is that I can bring you back every 3 months and we could do this again.

So, so I want to understand this. So you went to him and you said, What can I do to help you in your community?

I went to him and I said, well, my book was moving with— for him. And I did do a signing. I did do an event in their bookstore. And so, we had like, you know, 30 people for that. And I set up with a local— I know it was a lunch and learn. So, we got box lunches, you know, for the local restaurant. And, um, and so they, they, they liked that, and the book was doing well for them. So they— Brian was, was very big on saying every book's— books address a need. If you find the people that have the need, then you've got the book that could help them, then connect them with the author. And so he, he just believed that, uh, you know, um, you know, 85% of employees today, and then as well, feel overworked and underappreciated. So who recognized them is very important. And although it's a very proven concept, most companies, most managers don't make that good use of it. You know, they're too busy, they're whatever. And so he believed in the concept and he heard me speak, he believed in my message and he knew his community. And I mean, they could look at just who the corporate buyers were. So you'd start with there and say, hey, I've got a great author that I think would be perfect for next event you have, or next, or even pulling your people together because he's gonna be in town. So now there's, you know, there's a lot of bookstores that wouldn't do that. And like a lot of bookstores will have someone set up to get authors in the store, and they don't care what authors, they just want bodies. And, you know, and I mean, that's the flip side of it. So I could tell you the fun glory side, but each thing, there's a flip side. I remember flying once at my own expense to Cleveland, Ohio, and driving out to the suburbs to a, you know, a bookstore to speak at, Barnes Noble or something, and sleeping in my car until, you know, 7 PM when I was— my session was. And I go in the store and no one's there. And the entire trip that I spent in Cleveland, the only person I talked to was one little old lady came up to me in the bookstore and said, Oh, I feel so bad for you. There's no one here and you've got stacks of books all around me. But you got to take that in stride, you know. Well, that one didn't work very well. And why? Why was that? Well, because the person just wanted to fill my name in on their sheet until they're done. You know, we got— they didn't do anything to promote it. They didn't put in their own calendar. They didn't tell local businesses. So, you know, that you got to— it's the devil's in the details. So, but that really wasn't an event if it wasn't promoted. You know, it was just a guy showing up in the bookstore.

And you have a great story to tell about it.

Yeah, I haven't told that one in a while. But so there— but I guess there's a, you know, courage to lead is sort of— it's, uh, you keep going, you know. You don't— I never would be stopped by one thing, anything, one person or one publisher or one failed book or one—

What gives you the The strength and the motivation not to be stopped, Bob.

Well, you got to have fun with it. You got to feel that you're making a difference. And I want to make a difference. And I want to, I have a value to, I really like helping people and I want to help people. I had, in fact, you know, I got, it doesn't take much to keep going. You know, basically, I got an email a few weeks ago from some lady in Indiana and she said, When I read your books, Dr. Bob, it makes me feel like you're a personal friend giving me permission to do the right thing.

Oh, yes, yes.

I want that on my tombstone.

Oh my gosh. That's like I received a note on Facebook from a woman who I don't remember, wrote me a note and said— she wrote it to Facebook. She said, I remember CB coming in for a job interview. And this was with AIG. And we've— we're talking at least 15 years ago, right? And she said— and she was so kind. She wrote me a thank you note. She wrote one to my boss, and she did not know at that time I was going through hell. That thank you note I still have. I thought, oh my gosh.

There you go.

You just never know what you do and how it's going to affect somebody.

It's true. You got to keep trying. I've talked to a lot of people that were shut down by, by, you know, one thing. They had a draft of a book and they forgot it in a hotel room and now it's gone. It's like, well, is that, is that it? You know, you could get to rewriting it real quick because it's probably— you could still capture what you had, you know. Or, um, it's, uh, but people play life by different rules. And I, I, I think part of what, what gives me the the power to do it is, is, um, I have fun with it. I really enjoy it. I enjoy talking to you now. I enjoy, I enjoy selling books. I enjoy speaking. I, you know, um, so it's, um, that, that in itself does it for me. I, I enjoy it. It's fun. It's energizing. I know I, I help people. I can get it from their comments. Last presentation I did, the Last week in Nashville, we had, you know, okay, the session's over, you know, we got people. So any questions? Like, you know, like 40 hands go up. It's like, oh, okay, okay, here we go. And we're still, we're past time. No one's leaving. You know, we're having a great conversation. And so it's, that's fun. And it's about I'm dealing with people about real problems that they have, how to get a motivated workforce and how to do that with— that session was on the millennials and Gen Z, you know. Oh yeah, yeah. How do we get them in the game? And well, what are you doing now? How's that working? And I didn't think so. And you might try this, you know, talk to them.

Dr. Bob, we skipped over something. You went from writing books in general to focusing in on employ— you know, you heard a situation, you said, that's a great idea, I'll write a book about it.

Yeah.

Well, that's amazing. Not very many people can do that. And now you have a focus area of helping employees and employers develop a better relationship. How did you get from A to Zed.

Well, I think all my books are out of that cut of the cloth, is how can I improve the relationship? How can I help people be more productive? How can I help companies be more motivating places to work? So all my books have that anchor in there that they're all research-based. But like I did a book on Ubuntu, which is a South African concept of connectedness.

I see you.

Yeah, I see you. And it's just a brilliant concept and it's in the fabric of the culture in South Africa. And I spoke there and I was very impressed. And I said, this concept deserves, you know, broader acknowledgement and business can use it. US business can use it because it's a softer more empathetic side of things. And so, whatever book I've done is anchored in how can we make for a better work environment and more productivity and better for not just the company, but better for the employee as well. If you have a, you set up a partnership where, you know, you get a contract worker and you're gonna do what I say, you know, how's that gonna work for you? You know? It's the days of being told what to do are kind of past. You know, you got to have a conversation. And this is why I was thinking, you know, you'd like to take this on and give them the choice, you know. So, or a new employee and, you know, focus on catching them doing things right. It's easy to find fault. You know, what were you, stupid? You did that. I already told you how to do it. You did it wrong. Well, okay. Yeah, they're stupid. Now, now where do you go with from there. They're gonna leave. Yeah, they're gonna go. They're gonna ghost you. They're just not gonna show up tomorrow and you're not gonna know why. Well, I didn't think they were very good anyway. Okay, well, self-fulfilling prophecy. So it's, it's, uh, you know, as opposed to, um, I was working with a, uh, you know, manager who runs a car parts, you know, store, and he had a new, new hire a 16-year-old, you know, part-time job, and you have him in the back room, you know, straightening up inventory. And after 45 minutes, the kid comes out all excited, animated. Come here, I want to show you. And he takes him back. Look at this. And the kid's been stacking oil cans for 45 minutes. And the manager said, I almost went with my knee-jerk reaction, which would have been, what do you expect, a medal? Get out there to aisle 4 and clean up that spill. These kids today.

Ah.

You know, but he caught himself, and instead he said, Eric, I don't think I've ever seen an oil can so nicely stacked. Oh, I can tell that you're really someone that cares about doing a good job. I want to start to show you how we take inventory this afternoon. There's gonna be no limit to where you can go in our business. It's like, well, what does the kid do? What could he— what did it help but do? He stands up a little straighter. You met him at his energy, and you can mold and amplify that energy. And out of the chute, he may not be perfect, but you can move him in the direction that makes him more valuable to you and to himself. And whether he stays with you or whether he finds a job elsewhere, you can give him skills to have for the rest of his life. Talk in those terms, you know, and all of a sudden it's just not a job anymore.

But again, it's more than skills. It's having the feel-good inside, feel-good. What you've done and, and feel like you could tackle anything.

Yeah. Well, and there's 2 sides to just a simple praise that you can do in a hallway in 10 seconds. You know, it's gotta be timely. It's gotta be— have specifics. So any praising has specific feedback, and we all need specific feedback to be on mark and to stay on mark. And especially younger generation, they can't work in a void. So it has that. And then ideally, you also add an emotional charge. I knew you'd be a good hire. I'm so glad you're on my team. Something, you know, from you personally that gives it a charge. And, you know, Mark Twain, he once said, I can live for 2 weeks on a good compliment. And I think it's even longer today because there's, we get less of it. We get so little of it. You know, we're moving so fast. We're maybe working in different locations or from home. You're Manager's not— doesn't even see what you're doing. You know, it's, it's, it's harder to make the connection, a good connection on an ongoing basis with employees. And you got to do probably more of it than you think, because a lot of managers, you know, they got their own work to do, and then they only deal with the employee when there's a problem. And that's too little too late. You got to be proactive. You got to be proactive and and catch them what they did right and why it was— is right, why it tied into our values or our monthly goals or the teamwork that we're trying to get going and the context for why that's so important. And that makes the simple thank you and praise more meaningful, larger impact, and something that the person then can carry with them and feel a part of them. And that builds their pride. So it actually works.

It ties into my work of being courageous as a leader. You know, I think that many, many leaders today feel that— well, first of all, they don't recognize courage in the workplace. That's number one. Because they don't realize how much it takes for an employee to come out and Take a stand, make a recommendation, give a suggestion, and they just— they ignore it or shoot it down. And then, then you've got the whole ball start rolling where no one has the confidence to, to come out and help the organization grow. But yes, also—

I'd agree with that.

Yeah, I think also there is this thing that managers have that if I compliment somebody too much, If I recognize what they're doing too much in a positive way, then it's going to give them the confidence to leave and go and get a better job. And so therefore, let me just keep them in their place kind of thing, you know?

Oh yeah, there's, there's a lot of that. Or if I, if I, if they, they leave, maybe I won't be able to replace them because the budget's tight, something like that. So we got— or yeah, and that's to their detriment as well as the employee's detriment. It's, it's— that's a, that's a big hurdle if you have managers or are insecure themselves. And, you know, my wife's a great manager. She has 12 guys in her recent job. She had 12 guys reporting to her. And in just one fall a couple of years ago, she had 4 of them get promoted. And that was, she saw that as a victory for her, you know, that she helped develop them, that they could take on other roles. And she encouraged them the whole way. And she constantly talked to them about what they want to do next. And Well, let's go try you in that department. I know the manager. Let me call them and see if they, you know, and then if it works out, you can stay there. You know, it's like, yeah.

That sucks a lot.

It does. A lot of managers wouldn't do that because then I got more work to find someone new and I got to train them and I'm going to have more work in the meantime. And a lot of, like you're talking about, the importance of courage, you know, to speak up when the norms are against it. There's a lot to keep you in your place. And to— and, uh, I remember, um, listening to Robert Reich. He was, uh, uh, what, what role do you have under Clinton? He was, uh, I forget, I forget, the Secretary of, uh, Education maybe, I don't know. But he was, uh, Robert— or Treasury. But he, he now teaches at Berkeley. And I remember him speaking that, that he, he He wanted and needed critique, you know, all the time. And once, you know, and whenever he'd do something, you know, the people around him, they would always compliment him, like, you know, and, okay, but how could I be better? And he was, he remember coming off of a speech or an interview or something and being in the elevator and asking, well, what'd you think? And the person that, you know, was his handler said, oh, great, great job. And a voice in the elevator at the back said, You pause too much. What? What? What? This is a sub-employee, you know, that said, I just felt that you took too many pauses, that lost your momentum. Something like that.

Right.

He said that that woman went on to be one of his closest advisors because she would give him feedback that he needed to get better. And although the person that first complimented, she worked for that person, And she was all mad at her, was going to fire and stuff, you know. No, she ended up being, you know, so there she took a shot there and she gave honest feedback. And—

Well, you know, this, this I find here in the United States, most people don't know how to give feedback. That's true. Let's start from the get-go, right?

Yeah. Or how to do appraising. And you mentioned the word compliment. I never use the word compliment. I talk about recognition, praise, compliment. Oh, that's a nice outfit. I like your glasses, CB. That's really— it's like, no, no, no, that's— that's— recognition is around performance first and foremost. So if you start, if you start doing other stuff, it confuses people because now you think you're, you're being— you're giving a lot of recognition and you're doing, you're doing meaningless, meaningless flattery that's not helping the person. It might even, you know, so it starts with, uh, you got to be directive around performance that matters. It's It's what they did, what you saw, what you heard, what you read in a report, what you got from the client. When you have something positive, you want to grab that. And, and when you see something, say something, do something. It says that, that you saw it, you noticed. Make a note on, on the note you got, or, or pass it on to your boss, or whatever it might be. Bring it up at the staff meeting. In fact, I, when I worked with the Bank of America on this topic, they had 210,000 employees, and I convinced them that this is Recognition was too important to leave to the whims of when the manager felt like doing it. And so they actually instituted a new policy that said, whenever you meet with a group, whether it's 300 or 3 people, we're asking you as a policy of the bank to start with some type of recognition. Here's the latest numbers from the bank. Here's how our department's doing. John just finished a degree. Let's give him a hand, you know, and then go on to your business. Or start with some type of recognition and then pause and say, does anyone else have any recognition they want to call out here in our group? And the first time you do that, maybe no one will. But next time, yeah, I've got something. You know, Sally got a call bounced to her. It was my client and they'd been passed on 3 or 4 times. And Sally took the time to actually help them and covered for me. Sally, thank you so much. You know, and, you know, have it be a couple minutes of a forum on pause because that's going to lift the whole group. It's gonna make the group a tighter working group. It's gonna make everyone's day a little bit lighter, a little bit more positive. And you gotta work that into the daily repertoire, if you will.

You know, now I know why I like Bank of America, right? It's because it's my bank. But I interviewed Sandra, who was in the DEI space there. And their approach to employees is very different than most organizations. And now I know their secret sauce. They bring in people like you.

Well, I'm sure other people help.

Well, one of the things that they do is when an employee reaches a certain level and there is no place for them to go in the organization, They let that person go outside and work for a different company while still being on their payroll. Um, I think they're still on their payroll. Um, but they go in and they bring in their expertise to other organizations that are struggling, like in the nonprofit space.

Yeah.

And that is just a brilliant idea on all parties all around.

Yes, I think there's one national charity that helps set that up and encourages that. So they basically, the money, they keep paying their salary, but that becomes a donation as well.

Yeah. I mean, that takes a lot of courage for an organization to do that. They don't know if they're going to lose their star employee. They just, you know, they don't know how they're going to—

If you love them, set them free, you know. So What, you know, that's the— that gets back to the manager again. The manager is protective, and I'm gonna— you gotta stay here, you gotta keep working for me, and no, you can't interview. And you're gonna— they're gonna stifle— you're gonna stifle them, and then they're gonna have to leave. So it's, it's rather build them up and help them, and then, then, uh, help them on their way, you know, and just, just have the It's going to reflect on you in a positive way. It may be more work in finding the next person, but, you know, maybe, maybe they'll come back and join you again after they've been away for a year or 2, and that happens. So I know, I know one job my wife left, they— it's kind of cool. They did a whole— they did a plaque of all the different business roles, all the business cards she had in that company. It was about 5 or 6, and then they added other ones like, you know, team supporter. And then the last one they left blank for when she returns, and they gave her this when she left. It was like a boomerang award. And then I know a company that uses the boomerang. They give you, when you leave, they put the date you're leaving on one edge, and they save the other one for when you return. And they give that when you leave.

Great idea.

In a nice So it's like, it's— you can't, if you're trying to control people, the days of control are, you know, long gone. It's more of a collaborative workplace now. And you got to involve people in decision-making. 89% want that. You've got to have 2-way communication. 95% want that. If you make a— if they make a mistake, they want you to still support them. Maybe turn it into a learning opportunity. 92% of employees want that. So, it's all, it's all the hot, the best motivators are all things that don't cost any money. They just— Yeah. It's a little bit of behavior, a little bit of thoughtfulness and actually doing it. You know, you can't, you know, one of the things I've run into is that because the concepts I talk about, you know, sound like, feel like common sense, they go, well, I can do that. They go, yeah, I know you could do that. I'm not here to, I'll talk to a group. I know you all can do this. I'm not here to question if you could do it or not. question that, will you do it? And what's your evidence that you're doing it? You know, if your people were here, would they say you're doing it? Because a lot of times you think they will, but they don't. Because you're talking about Fred. Fred never does this stuff. You know, when he started the job 8 years ago, he brought in donuts once. That's about all he's—

But what I want to talk to you about is your next book is about Steve Jobs. Now, I thought the world of Steve Jobs as a businessman. What he did for Apple was beyond reproach. My question now is, he had a reputation for not being the best employer in terms of how he treated his employees. How is it that you're writing about him when he seems to be the Antichrist To what you're preaching.

Well, he's gotten a bad rap and a couple movies about him, his biography. I'm working with people that maybe were closer to him that said, I mean, even Marc Benioff, head of Salesforce, who was an intern for Jobs, and he said no one gets it right. He was very spiritual actually. You know, he spent 7 months in India and he came back with a very different view of life from that and the importance of intuition over intellect, by the way. And so he was very driven and that maybe gave him some of the rough edge that people saw because he had a very clear vision. you know, wanted to make a dent in the world and very clear he wanted to move this direction. And if there was somebody that was on the team and kept bucking the idea, that disagreed with it, eventually he'd say, you out. And he would do that in meetings. That sounds very cold and heartless, but, you know, and then maybe the person had been with him for 9 years or something. But when he saw that you didn't see or agree with the vision that he was driving, There's no room for you on the team anymore, you know. So that, that's real.

Isn't that contrary to what you are doing and talking about? I mean, you allow room for people to be heard.

And yes, I'm, I'm, and I'm not condoning that. Maybe there's a better way you could have handled it, you know. But he has, he had that. And I've talked to Apple employees that I talked to a guy that he said, I had this project and, you know, and it was Steve, I had to give Steve Jobs an update on. I went in and he spent the entire meeting just shredding everything I had done and I left there all kind of beaten down, but I was motivated to come back harder and get it right. And when Steve Jobs died, he left the company. He said it wasn't the same. It wasn't the passion-driven place to be that, that was before, you know, to be in, in the, in the light of greatness, and, and it wasn't, it wasn't inspiring to him anymore. So that, that kind of, that tough edge, yeah, I find, I find that, you know, whether it's some of the, the people that can most— can be most motivational are the people that— I can remember professors that were really hard hard to get an A with and a lot of work and extra work. And man, but if you're able to get it, I remember my daughter, the only B she got at Cornell was in organic chemistry. And she just felt prouder of that than anything because it was such a damn hard class.

Yeah.

So, it's sometimes if you have someone that's really challenging you, that can be more motivating than someone who's just, well, okay, you tried your best. So goes, you know.

That's true. That's true. That sort of tough love.

Yeah, but a power in the light of a powerful visionary. And Steve Jobs, if anything, he was— he had— he is a visionary and executed on that vision as best he could. So, you know, and there's funny stories too, like he had, you know, the first prototype of the iPhone, you know, And he had a team working on it for 18 months. He goes, no, no, no, this is way too big. It wasn't this one. This is way too big. And he was in a room that had an aquarium and he dropped it in the aquarium. Look at all the air coming out. There's a lot. You could squeeze that down a lot more. And he walked out of the room and they were like, that was their only prototype for 18 months. But you know what? They started over and they made it smaller. And, you know, If he had said, well, you tried your best, what can you ask? You know, then we probably wouldn't have the iPhone now. You know, he was driven. He was driven. You know, the MacBook that could fit into an envelope, you know, you take it on stage. It's like, he had a vision, you know, and it's to make the things he made. He revolutionized 7 different industries. 7 different industries. He was adopted, you know, it's sort of, don't please, what was handed to him in his life, you know, come on, you know, the guy that started Domino's, he was an orphan. Nobody handed him anything, you know. So, who are you waiting for someone to hand you something? Make it happen, you know, it's like, what are you waiting for?

Yeah.

And that's what I love about Steve Jobs. I was so inspired by him and his in his 2005 commencement speech at Stanford, one of the things he said here, we're all naked. You come into the world naked, you leave naked. Why are you scared? Go for it. Make something of your life. You know, this is now. It's now or never. And so, I think it's very inspiring. And I've talked to many people that have been personally inspired by him, from him. Even in the MG100 group, I remember one day, I remember I had like 3 different people that said, you know, that's why I'm doing what I do, Steve Jobs. You know, it's like, wow.