The Infinite Game: Chapters 6 & 7 | Book Club with Simon

Hello, Hello. Hello everyone. Welcome to.

What edition is this week three of the book club where we are reading the Infinite Game.

Welcome back, welcome back. We have added Twitter to our live feed now. So we are live on YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. So hello the Internet universe. As always, thank you everyone for joining us. From around the world, we've got Brazil, we've got Dubai, we've got the uae.

How are you?

Nihon, Japan, Germany. Y International Book Club.

Good to see you again.

The Bridge House Book Club in Hamburg and Berlin. Good to see you.

Lovely to see everybody from around the world. It's part of, it's one of my favorite things. I quite frankly, if I'm honest, I'm completely blown away. Hello from India.

Just hello from, from Sydney. Isn't it the middle of the night there?

It's like three o', clock, four o' clock in the morning there.

Isn't it exotic? Davenport, Florida. Liverpool, Scranton, Pennsylvania. Lovely to see everybody. Thank you for emailing all your questions and your photos. It's so great to see them all. Today we're covering two chapters, Chapter six and chapter seven, Will and resources and trusting teams.

And we'll be taking your question now. Usually what I like to do at book club is I like to talk about the chapter and tell you some of the behind the scenes stories. And I'm going to do a little differently. I have something really special. So in the chapter of trusting teams, you may recall.

I drew a chart, a graph of trust versus performance, performance versus trust. And I tell the story of how I learned this from the Navy SEALs. Well, I thought what would be really fun to do is invite the Navy SEAL who actually taught it to me. He'll share some stories of how it, how practical is and take some of your questions. So without further ado, retired Navy SEAL Commander, my friend Rich Devinney. There he is. Good to see you, Rich. How are you?

Hey, my friend. How are you? Good to see you.

I see quarantine is treating you well.

Yes, lazy. My lazy beard.

Your lazy beard? Yeah, yeah, my lazy beard as well. Although I shaved it recently so it's a little shorter than it was. It got a little bit out of control.

Thanks for coming. It's always good to see you. We'll jump right in. You know, I remember when you, when you and I were just, I think we were just at dinner when I first came out to visit the Navy seals and we were talking about what it takes to perform, produce a high performing team and you drew this trust versus performance matrix for me. Which, as you know, has stuck with me. I absolutely adore it. First of all, how did you learn it?

Yeah, so. So I was. So when we. When we. When we first met, I was running training for a pretty specialized SEAL Command. But in that. In the process of that, I was also.

Talking to and conferring with the. The main SEAL Command training, which is buds, Basic Underwater Demolition. So we were talking quite a bit. And. And the guy who was running that at the time showed this to me, this chart. He said, hey, this is kind of how I see this thing. We really. It really resonated with me. And we kind of took that, and I took it back to what I was doing because really what it told us was that, hey, you know, trust and performance are actually two different things. Certainly competence matters. Certainly. However, when it comes to assessment and selection, performance typically looks at skill. And I'll, you know, kind of go into the differences here, but skill there. It's very, really easy to measure and assess. The best, the best shooter in a military example, best shooter, best diver, you know, scuba diver, best skydiver in the business example, it could be the best, you know, delegator or critical thinking. Right. Yeah. In normal life, it'd be riding a bike or throwing a ball. Those are skills. They're very easy to see, assess and measure. Trust comes from something different, something a little bit more innate. It's typically behavior and behaviors come from what I call attributes. And, you know, you and I have been talking for years of my. My book coming out here in January, the difference between skills and attributes. But attributes are things like patience, situational awareness, empathy, humility. When it comes to team ability, it comes to conscientiousness, integrity, those are the things we measure. So that's how it came to me, and that's how it worked.

This is the question I get most often, you know, which is, you know, performance metrics are just very easy to measure. It's one of the reasons we have an unbalanced bias towards them.

It's not.

Not because we necessarily believe they're more important. It's just because it's easier. So, you know, one of the questions, I guess, is how do you measure patients? How do you measure, you know, things that are more of our character?

Yes. The attributes show up. So attributes are more inherent to our nature. Okay. We're pretty much born with them. All of us have all the attributes. It just depends on what level of adaptability we have. They are. They inform our behavior. They show us how we're going to show up to a situation, my patience, my resiliency, my adaptability will show how I'm going to learn how to ride a bike.

It's all qualitative. It's all qualitative.

It's qualitative, but it's also, it's environment, right? Uncertainty, challenge and stress. Where you can't apply unknown skills. Skills direct behavior for a known situation. Uncertainty.

Say that again slowly. That's good.

Skills, direct behavior for known situations.

Skills direct behavior for a known situation.

Right? Here's how to ride a bike. Here's how to drive a car.

Okay, and now the other part.

When you get into an unknown, uncertain situation, skills don't apply, right? We lean on our attributes.

Okay, this is what I love. Because this is finite and infinite games.

That's exactly right.

Because a finite player likes to train and prepare so that there's no such thing as unknown. Because finite minded players fear the unknown. They fear uncertainty. And so they practice, practice, practice, practice. This is athletes, this is military practice, practice, practice. So that you're prepared for any eventuality. And as Dr. Karst explained to me, at the time of something uncertain or unknown, the thinking has already been done the thing. But the problem is, the problem is that works for expected things.

That's exactly right. That's exactly. And how many of us throw the.

Finite player into a tizzy where the infinite minded player embraces uncertainty? And as Dr. Kars explained to me, where finite thinking, the thinking happened in the past, it's now muscle memory, right? I didn't have to think, I just relied on my training. You hear it all the time. Where the infinite minded thinker at the time of uncertainty or the time something goes completely haywire. Now the thinking begins and this is what you're saying, which is skills are good for finite mindedness, but building these attributes is really what it takes to build an infinite mindset and a trusted team.

When we talk about trusted team, we talk about high performing teams. Okay? High performing teams aren't just good when things are going great. The truest high performing teams are great when things go south and sideways. And I've seen it all the time. It was kind of what the idea for the book was. Dream teams, right? I get business people saying, hey, I just built this dream team. Best salespeople, top graduates, all these skills, right? Measurables, but they're toxic. The team's toxic. And when things went to hell, we all fell apart. And I said, because you were looking at the wrong things. You need to look at attributes, you need to look at things like adaptability, patience, situation awareness, those things that we lean on in uncertainty. That's. That's what starts building the trust. Because trust, after all, are behaviors. You know, it's like you and I. Trust is not just a feeling. You know, trust is more than just a feeling. It's a belief. A feeling is just a human emotion, justified or no human emotion. That's all it is. A belief is a human emotion, justified and rationalized. Doesn't matter if it's right or wrong. It just matter that it has been. So it's a belief. You can't make anybody trust you. All you can do is behave in a way that allows them to make a decision to trust you. And that's what you have to do in trusted teams.

You're my philosopher warrior friend. Okay, let's take a couple questions. I have one question from Brittany Worship, and I'm gonna let you field this one.

Okay.

She says, what is your advice for building a trusting team of teachers and administrators who can navigate birth so that they can navigate both the uncertain and complex waters that lie ahead this school year?

Okay, great question. Thank you, Brittany. The first step is to understand that trust comes from behavior. We trust each other because we behave in a way that allows us to make that decision. So things like listening, care, empathy, those will immediately generate trust when we talk about specific teams. So in this case, teachers and administrators, we have to.

How do they build a trusting team? Facing the unknown future.

Yeah. Step one. What are the attributes we're looking for? Okay, so it's not just skill anymore. What are the attributes we're looking for for this team? Because every team, the attributes that we need for a seal team is different, are different from the attribute list that we need for a team of teachers and administrators. What are those attributes? And then begin to assess each other as to whether or not you have those attributes. This time of stress and challenge probably has assessed some of those things we've already seen. I'm sure, Brittany, you've already seen who are the patient ones, who are the adaptable ones, who are the ones with empathy, who are the ones with less empathy, things like that. So understand the attributes you're looking for, and then start to look and assess for those as well.

A trusted team is a mesh of people with skills and attributes that complement each other. And so one thing trust requires is vulnerability. Vulnerability does not just mean showing your weakness. It means also showing your strengths. Because I need to know if Simon and I are working together, I need to know exactly what he's good at and what he's not good at. He needs to know what I'm good at and what I'm not good at. So I know when to lean on him and he knows when to lean on me. That's what I trusted him does. So look at that and start to think about that in terms of your team.

That's great. If anybody has any live questions for Rich. Hello, India. Hello, Pakistan. Hello, New Zealand. Hello, Waterloo, Canada.

Phoenix, Arizona. If anybody has any live questions for Rich, let's take one.

Yes.

Neil Hall.

Hi, Neil.

How can you quickly understand attributes through the interview process? How can you quickly. Oh, good one. Thank you, Neil. How can you quickly understand attributes through the interview process? I guess it's good both ways, interviewee and interviewer.

Absolutely. This is a great question. I could go for hours. Okay. What I want to just say, if you're Interested, go to theattributes.com we're going to post that in the chat room. You'll go to the landing page for the book and you get to take an assessment tool that we're building to measure attributes or we're collecting data right now. So if you do this for us, we'll give you the free full assessment. So you can take it. I know you're doing it.

I'm going to go take that as well.

Yeah. So how do you do it? Here's the simple answer. You throw stress and uncertainty into the process. Okay. If you want to find out so you can tell someone, hey, I want to know how good a presenter you are. Presenting is a skill. Okay? So someone could prepare. They kicked butt on their presentation. That doesn't tell us much. Well, what if during the presentation you throw in change? Right. Hey, I'm sorry. You know, two minutes. We're just starting. Two minutes. You're not presenting on this anymore. You're presenting on this. Right, Right. How they react. This is exactly what we did in the SEAL teams. It was fun. Our environment, admittedly in special operations, it's this to a T. I mean, it's all uncertainty. That's why I always considered us. We were kind of masters of uncertainty because we trained in these environments. You can develop attributes. Difficult, but it could be because you can't sit down and learn an attribute like you can a skill. And it has to be self directed. It has to be a deliberate process on yourself. But throw stress, challenge and uncertainty at anybody, you're going to start to see the attributes emerge.

So good. Anything else you want to say before you head off? I know you have to go. Any stories from the teams to help us understand the value that trust plays even amongst high performers? Like why trust is even more important to you than just sheer grit and strength?

Well, let me throw out a concept which we cover in the class that we. That we're running that Simon Simon's team.

And I developed stories from the teams to help us understand the value that trust plays even amongst high performers. Like why trust is. Is even more important to you than just sheer, sheer grit and strength.

Well, let me throw out a concept which we cover in the class that we. That we're running that Simon Simon's team and I developed here. So. But it's a concept that I realized when I was running training there at in the seals. Okay. It's called dynamic subordination. Okay. Dynamic subordination takes the task organization model that we know, whether it's a pyramid, the flat or the upside down pyramid, and turns it into kind of what I'd say is an amoeba or a blob. And the idea is, where does the leader sit in that blob?

Right, Right.

I would get answers center. Right? Whatever the answer is anywhere the leader needs to be. In a dynamic subordination environment, the team understands challenge and stress, and problems come from any angle. And whomever is.

Capable of and ready and closest to that problem steps up and takes leads. And everybody follows. Right? It's a dynamic swap between leader and follower. Quick example. In the normal world, okay, the captain of an airplane on a commercial airline, he is, you know, by.

Or she.

He or she is in charge of that aircraft, right? There's no debate. That person is in charge of that aircraft. However, if when taxiing out to take off, the maintenance officer calls and says, hey, you got a problem? You got to come back at the gate. No pilot worth him or her wings, his or hers wings would ever say, no, I'm not turning back. They immediately defer to that expert. Okay, that plane turns back. That plane starts to deplane. Well, the pilot doesn't take charge of deplaning either. He leans on the flight attendant. That's the expert, who steps up and takes lead. That's dynamic subordination.

I love it. So even though he's fully in charge, the maintenance guy says, you have to come back, and the pilot now becomes subordinate.

That's exactly right. Because there's trust, right? You don't do that without trust. If the pilot didn't trust that maintenance officer, that wouldn't trust back. If the pilot didn't trust the Flight attendant to get that plane deplaned. Right.

And this is where we get micromanagers.

Right.

So micromanagement is a sign that there's a breakdown in trust because that person feels that they have to do everybody's job for them.

Right? Right.

Not necessarily because they don't like them. They might be nice people. It doesn't necessarily mean that they're overbearing in command and control. But there's. There's issues of trust, which is, here, let me help or I'll just do it better myself. One or two of those. Very interesting.

The job as a leader is to show vulnerability by allowing your people to do what they're good at and lean on them so that they get better at it. So that in those environments, you don't need to step up. You can just lead. Right. That's the challenge as a leader.

Good stuff. Thank you so much, Rich. As Rich mentioned, when we were putting together all of our online courses, when we pivoted in Covid, all those live courses we put up, we looked at our book for inspiration. We looked at my book for inspiration, and we remembered that Rich paid such a big role in teaching me about the relationship between trust and performance. We said, rich, would you like to develop a course with us and teach it? And Rich said, what, are you crazy? Absolutely not. We said, please, please, please, Rich, please, please, please. He said, fine, fine, I'll do it. And so Rich has worked with us to develop a class all about trust, performance. I think the it's on. On Simonsonic.com it is, yeah. Next one. It's called Building trusting teams. And the next one is on Friday, July 31 at 9am Eastern. And if you're in the book club, nobody else is listening to this. We have a 20 discount for you if you want to do it. The code is book club rules. All one word. Book club club rules. So you can check it out@Simon Sinek.com Inspire you.

Rich. Always a pleasure.

Love you, man.

Take care of yourself, take care of your family, and I'll talk to you real soon, I hope.

Sounds good. Sounds good. Thank you, brother, for having me.

Okay. So good to hear from him. I. I've learned so much from him. Let's jump into more questions from everybody else, shall we?

Okay. Will and resources. What am I says, well, chapter six, Will and resources. Okay, here's the reason I wrote Will and Resources. So we heard about trusting teams, will and resources, you know, throughout this whole book. And we learned this the last. In the last chapter about the responsibility of business. You know, I had this responsibility of business by.

Milton Friedman hanging over me throughout the whole book because this is what American and global business is basically based on these days, is this ridiculous responsibility of business that's 40 years, 30 years old, 40 years old, more 50 years old.

And. And it's produced some very uncomfortable situations in, in global business. The, the. The decline of trust, the decline of cooperation, the decline of innovation.

The way.

We use and reuse people, the lack of loyalty, all of these things. But I recognize the importance of money. And I got tired of saying in public forums, you know, people are more important than profit. And everybody thought that I meant profit is unimportant.

And so I had to sort of reconcile those two. And I realized that the two currencies of business are not just money. That mistake we've made is that we think the only currency of business is money. It's not. There are two currencies, will and resources, in that order. The will of the people and the resources available to continue to help advance the cause. You have to have money, you have to be profitable. It's like having the perfect car. You might have the perfect culture, you might have the most amazing car, but if you have no fuel to make that car go.

Then you never achieve anything.

Money is a finite resource. Whether you're getting it from a customer or from an investor, whether you're getting it from a stock market or from other forms of investment, it is finite. It can run out and it can stop coming in. That's why you have to produce good product and good marketing to help keep the resource coming in, like drilling, you have to keep drilling or putting up solar panels. If you want more energy. You got to have a resource producer.

But will of the people is unlimited. And that's where good leadership comes in. And one of the things that's been so interesting, especially during COVID times, which is I think people like money. Money doesn't just sit like this, and it doesn't just go like this. Like it's not just a hockey stick. You know, money goes like this. It can be affected by weather, by politics, by marketing. You maybe have a good product or a bad product, and it goes like this. The goal is to keep the trend up, right? Or at least stable. But the same thing is with will. You know, people have good days, people have bad days, Leaders show up badly, and leaders show up well. It's like this. But overall, you want to keep the trend of the will in a positive direction, which is every leader. And remember, leader has Nothing to do with rank. Anyone can be a leader at any level. That's the important thing here. This is not just the responsibility of senior leadership. Senior leadership has to go first and model the behavior that's ideal. But everyone who's showing up to be the leader they wish they had actually helps keep that will up on high. And this is why it's so important for senior leadership to take care of the people in their charge who are then told to take care of the people in their charge who are then told to take care of people in their charge. It's like mom and dad taking care of the older kids and asking the older kids to take care of the little kids. It's kind of like that. And then what ends up happening is you have a loving, trusting family again. Good days, bad days, it all happens. You have ranges of emotion. We are human, but that is the point of will and resources that we have to invest in will. Just like we take investment or invest in money.

Let's take some questions. Hello Romania. Hello Kosovo. Hello Malaysia. Hello Brazil. Obrigado for coming France. This is just Greece. This is amazing. I should just do the book club world tour.

Okay, let's see what we have here.

Always here, always loyal. The Dakota Potato Peel Pie Literary Society. So good to see you. Kelly and Ritu asked. Today's question is from a statement in chapter 15 of Leaders Eat Last. Okay, it's the infinite game Book club, but we can go retro. That's okay. Which directly correlates to the trusting teamstepping. There's the connection.

There's no such thing as virtual trust. Apparently I wrote.

As we have had to pivot over the last four and a half months. Are your thoughts on virtual trust the same as when you wrote the book or have they shifted? Obviously nothing can replace the human connection of a warm hug, a firm handshake, or a high five. However, have any virtual signals of trust emerged during the prolonged isolation? You basically answered the question. What I mean by this, no such thing as virtual trust is it's not that we cannot form trust over a computer. What it means is that it really is the deepest kind of trust is when we can interact. I mean, think about it. We've had a virtual team for years and we built trust with new team members. And we had, by the way, for people who think that we can just replace the office and just all go virtual. Now, running a virtual team is way more difficult than running an in person team because you don't have hi in the hallway. You don't have the. Just shooting the breeze before the meeting starts. You don't have, hey, want to get lunch? In a virtual company, everything is formalized. Right? You don't have. You don't have serendipity. You don't have accidental meetings in the hallway, and everything is scheduled. What time is the zoom meeting? What time is the conference call? What time's the zoom meeting? And so we all show up and just work. There's very little of the. Of the interpersonal and accidental stuff, which is where trust happens. As Isaac Stern said, the famous virtuoso, the famous violinist. Music is what happens between the notes. Well, trust is what happens between the meetings. Trust is what happens between the decisions. It's the same thing. So one of the things that we learned, we were building relationships with people online. But then when we had our company off site, they came together and they hugged and they reinforced and they solidified that relationship. Think about online relationships. Think about dating. Can you talk to somebody online? Yes. Can you get to know them online? Yes. Can you start to form some sort of relationship online? Yes. But is it ever really solidified until you get to hold each other and hug each other and say, hello, I've been waiting so long to meet you. So I still believe that there's no such thing as virtual trust. I still think that trust is a deeply human thing. It's not something that can exist on the computer. We can't build it over email for sure. And even when we're doing things virtually, there's tone of voice, as you've heard me talk about. I think phone is actually better than video conference very often because I find that people are more present as opposed to just looking at themselves or looking at a hole on the top of the camera or. My favorite one is, like, you're trying very hard to make eye contact with somebody by looking at their eyes on your screen, but what they see is this, because there are little boxes over there. Anyway, you get the idea. Nothing beats in person. So, yes, I still stand by the fact that there's no such thing as virtual trust.

Let's take another one. Greetings.

Wait, was it.

Did somebody say greens from the North Pole? What was that? I missed it. I lost it. Greetings from Qatar, Chile. Holy cow.

Italy. Oman. I've been to Oman. I had a lovely time there. And I ate. Drank camel's milk just a little bit, though, because I was told that it. It upsets your stomach, so I didn't want to risk it. Okay. Nia Samal. Even if we Operate in an infant with an infinite mindset, we might not feel motivated to have the will to keep going all the time. True. How do we keep ourselves engaged with our will intact so we can keep advancing consistently and efficiently? Okay, this goes perfectly to trusting teams. None of us is smart enough, strong enough to do this thing called life, to do this thing called work, to do this thing called business alone. This is where the team comes in. You heard what Rich said, which is the value of trust on the team is not when the team is great. It's not when everything. When the conditions are great, people talk about their dream teams. Dream teams work beautifully when the conditions are great. But when things go sideways, when things get difficult, that's when the trust of the team really comes to bear. And so it's all fine and good for us to operate with an infinite mindset. But remember, one of the core practices of maintaining an infinite mindset is the ability and responsibility to build relationships and take care of others. And so if you find that your will is drained. And by the way, I have felt it. Everyone has felt it. We are all dealing with the trauma of COVID And for those who, you know, sort of had an easier time of it, they did not compartmentalize their. Their feelings. They did not avoid dealing with the trauma. It just meant it was going to come later. For me, I've been actually dealing with it lately. It's taken me four months to start really feeling, feeling it. And the first thing I did is I picked up the phone and I called people and I told them how I felt. So, Niha, what I would recommend is pick up the phone and call people and tell them how you're feeling. Call the people you love and say, I'm having a behind day. We don't believe in good days and bad days with our infinite mindset. They're too absolute. So if we say good day, we have the false belief that that it lasts forever. And if we say bad day, we have the false belief that it lasts forever. We have a head days and behind days. This is a journey and you're having a behind day. You call someone and ask for help and be there and offer your help for those who are suffering the same.

Let's see, let's. Here's a LinkedIn user with no name. Where's the first place to start when trying to change a finite company to be an infinite player? Is trust at leadership levels or lower organizations or is it grassroots? Okay, great question. So it's very common, especially in this day and age. Where leadership, senior leadership of a company is operating with a finite mindset.

They believe the will of the people is subordinate to the money. All they care about is performance. It's all about short termism. There's no just cause. They're trying to advance and they believe growth is a cause. So this is pervasive. And so the question is, how do you change it? Now, the most efficient is if senior leadership takes responsibility and goes through that transition. It happens. You've heard me talk about Bob Chapman. I wrote about him extensively in Leaders Eat Last. And I just recently did a podcast with Bob. And if you've never heard Bob speak, oh my God, you have to go listen. He is the way. Let me tell you how his kids describe Bob Chapman. The way they describe him is if he walks into a room and finds a pile of shit in the middle of the room, Bob will look up and say, where's the pony? He's that kind of optimist.

So it can happen at the top. Bob made this conversion himself. He was a finite minded leader who became an infinite minded leader. But it doesn't have to. The tail can wag the dog. And so we have to be the leaders we wish we had. We have to start embracing the concepts and the practices of the infinite mindset so we can have a cause and we can bring it to work and say, guys, let me tell you why I love this company, why I love this opportunity. And even though we have our challenges, I came to work to, to learn how to be a part of something bigger. And this is the world that I'm trying to build. And even though I may do it in this little arena, this is what I'm trying to advance when I come to work every day. And it could be create a world in which people feel inspired, safe and fulfilled. That could be the cause that we're trying to advance, all of us to build this inspired, safe and fulfilled world that every one of us can feel. And you're gonna do it in your team. So you're gonna offer them the just cause. It can be yours, it can be someone else's. Remember, we have to find one. You're gonna take responsibility for building the trusting team, for expressing vulnerability, saying how you feel, setting the tone. Because if you set the tone, regardless of your rank in the company, other people will feel safe to come to you. So if you express vulnerability, they'll close the door and say, hey, can I talk to you for a second? Or in these day, in this day and age, they'll call you up and say, do you have a moment? But you set that tone.

So we can all be the leaders we wish we had. So if you're working in a company that you're trying to help them make that conversion into an infinite mindset, you lead with the infinite mindset. And what you'll find is the people on your team will learn those practices and they will take them and they will take them to other parts of the company. And at some point we will. The tail wags the dog. How long, I don't know. Remember, this is one of the reasons that finite players don't like the infinite mindset. It's because it's unpredictable in time. Like you've heard me talking about. It's like working out. If you go to the gym every single day for 20 minutes, 100% you will get into shape. 100% it is not in doubt, when, dunno. And it'll be different for everybody, which means it's different for every company, means it's different for every team. 100% it works. I just don't know when. And remember, finite minded players don't like unpredictable. They like to exert extremes amounts of control. They want the right time, the right number, everything to happen on schedule. But that's not how this works. And so we are comfortable with the uncertainty of the time frame. We're committed to the process. That's how you convert to infinite mindset. Okay, let's take another question. Got one here from, from Deborah Bearden in Nashville, Tennessee. By the way, if you've ever had the brunch at the Omni Hotel in Nashville. Oh, the honey, the biscuits. Incredible. I've had the opportunity and privilege to have a great leader for a manager. She made me have even more will than I thought that I had. I love that. How do I help others lead? How do I help other leaders inspire the same for their people? So leadership is not just about subordination, it's not just about subordinates. I mean, leadership is about taking care of people. So we can lead up as much as we can lead down through the hierarchy. So for example, if you see somebody who's in a leadership position who may have a position that outranks you.

And they're having a bad day, they're short tempered, they're a little bit rough in a meeting.

Instead of just deciding that they're an asshole, which still might be the case by the way, but not necessarily the case. Practice what you would want them to practice with you if you were having a bad day. Which is empathy. So it is okay to call somebody senior and say, hey, you were a little rough on us today in the meeting. Are you okay? I know it's been really tough lately. I know you're under a lot of stress. I just want to make sure you're okay. And that is one of the ways to inspire.

Other leaders to help the team. And again, it's a process. Right.

They may not see the impact of that. And then a little bit down the way, they'll start to see that you're completely dedicated and devoted to helping them stay on track and block and tackle and help lead the team, where they may be falling behind because of pressure. And before too long, they'll start opening up to you, and they'll start learning from you. And they'll start, maybe without telling you, you'll start to notice some of their behaviors change. It's like children. If you have kids, you start to change things. You have a kid who, let's say, has terrible tempers, and you always yell at them when they have a temper tantrum and you try something new. You start sitting down and say, hey, what's bothering you? And it doesn't happen immediately, but in time, you start to see things change. It's the exact same thing.

Let's take another question.

Samantha Gonzalez. I'm having issues with my general manager, who is completely new to my company. He constantly has his foot in his mouth syndrome. He constantly has foot and mouth syndrome. He doesn't inspire me at all. And I'm. And I'm the one who's constantly pulling the rope in front of. Well, when someone's new, there's all kinds of love.

You, man.

Take care of yourself, take care of your family, and I'll talk to you real soon, I hope.

Sounds good. Sounds good. Thank you, brother, for having me.

Okay. So good to hear from him. I. I've learned so much from him. Let's jump into more questions from everybody else, shall we?

Okay. Will and Resources. What am I says, well, chapter insecurities that come with that. And very often new people, especially new people with positions of authority, feel the need to prove that they are worthy of being hired. They feel they want to make sure that leadership knows that they deserve the position. And sometimes they want to sort of let everybody know that they're here. It's very often insecurity. Chanel, the company Chanel, just takes will and resources. Okay, here's the reason I wrote Will and Resources. So we heard about trusting teams. Will and resources. You know, throughout this whole Book and we learned this the last, in the, in the last chapter about the responsibility of business. You know, I had this, this responsibility of business by, by Milton Friedman hanging over me throughout the whole book because this is what American. And they do something that I love, which is all senior leaders, when they're newly hired, are not allowed to speak in meetings for 90 days. Think about that for a second. They're basically saying, we know you're smart, we hired you. We trust ourselves, we know you're good. Now shut up and learn. And I just absolutely love that. I love the idea it's easier to do in a big company than a small company. But I love the idea that new people are not a lot. New leaders are not allowed global businesses basically based on these days is this ridiculous responsibility of business that's 40 years, 30 years old, 40 years old, more 50 years old. And, and it's produced some very uncomfortable situations in, in global business. The, the, the decline of trust, the decline of cooperation, the decline of innovation. The, the, the, the, the, the, the way we speak in meetings, there's, they're there to learn. So one of the things you can do is again, have empathy.

The reason it could be that your gm.

You know, hasn't studied leadership and is only doing.

What he thinks, what he thinks works, or what he's seen other people do. Maybe he's never had a good role model, so just go to him and say, hey, welcome to the company. When I remember and talk about yourself, I find that the ease and reuse people, the lack of loyalty, all of these things. But I recognize the importance of money. And I got tired of saying in public forums, you know, people are more important than profit. And everybody thought that I meant profit is unimportant. And so I had to sort of reconcile those two. And I realized that the two currencies of business are not just money. The mistake we've made is that we think the only currency way to have difficult conversations with people is when you can relate things to yourself because they can't argue your experiences and your feelings. So you can say, hey, I remember when I first joined the company, I was like a duck out of water. I was flailing and I didn't know what to do. And I found myself sort of, sort of speaking too much sometimes. And your business is money. It's not. There are two currencies, will and resources, in that order. The will of the people. All I know is I was so grateful when somebody came to me and said, hey, don't worry, I got Your back. So. Hey, boss. And the resources available to continue to help advance the cause. You have to have money. You have to be profitable. It's like having the perfect car. You might have the perfect culture, you might have the most amazing car, but if you have no fuel to make that car go.

Then you never achieve anything. I don't know what you're going through, and maybe this is totally irrelevant, in which case it doesn't matter. But I just want you to know you're new to the company. I'm here to help you navigate. I'm here to help explain anything. And please, if you ever want to lean on me, I'm happy to help teach you about or share with you about our culture and how things get here so that you can be super successful and happy and get the same joy out of this place that I do. Give that a try.

Okay?

Yes. Money is a finite resource. Whether you're getting it from a customer or from an investor, whether you're getting it from a stock market or from other forms of investment, it is finite. It can run out and it can stop coming in. That's why you have to produce good product and good marketing to help keep the resource coming in. It's like drilling. You have to keep drilling or. Or putting up solar panels if you want. I'm gonna have a little bit of smoothie. Jorge Ochoa. Dear Simon, what are the foundation of the infinite mindset? For instance, how shall I start my day knowing that I have only 24 hours? Oh, I love that one. Jorge asks, what are the foundations of an infinite mindset? How do I maintain an infant mindset knowing that today I only have 24 hours in the day? It's a finite day. Want more energy? You got to have a resource producer.

But will of the people is unlimited, and that's where good leadership comes in. And one of the things that's been so interesting, especially during COVID times, which is, I think people like money. Money doesn't just sit like this, and it doesn't just go like this. Like, it's not just a hockey stick, you know, money goes like this. It can be affected by weather, by politics, by. Remember, the infinite game is not the absence of finite games. The infinite game is the context within which those finite games exist. There are always finite games in the infinite game. So, for example, in an airline, a gate agent who has to get a plane to leave on time, there's a beginning, middle, and end. We absolutely want them to maintain a finite mindset because we want that plane to Leave marketing. You maybe have a good product or a bad product, and it goes like this. The goal is to keep the trend up right? Or at least stable. But the same thing is with will. You know, people have good days, people have bad days, leaders show up badly, and leaders show up well. It's like this. But overall, you want to keep the trend of the will in a positive direction, which is every leader. And remember, leave on time. We get really frustrated when it doesn't go that way. And when that finite thing is over, they're going to do it again, and they're going to do it again. It's filled with finite experiences throughout the day. However, we want that gate agent to be aware of the infinite context. In other words, we want them to treat passengers well, we want them to speak nicely to them, to be polite, and sometimes maybe even having a short delay to do. The leader has nothing to do with rank. Anyone can be a leader at any level. That's the important thing here. This is not just the responsibility of senior leadership. Senior leadership has to go first and model the behavior that's ideal. But everyone who's showing up to be the leader they wish they had actually helps keep that will up on high. And this is why it's so important for senior leadership to take care of the right thing. Let someone who's running late on the.

Plane.

Because we want those people to come back and do business with us again. And that's more of the infinite mindedness, which is we have to stay in the game. We have to keep this going beyond this one thing. And this is where bureaucrats are so frustrating. They seem to lack any context of the infinite game. And they want to talk about this right now. And that's why they're so obsessed with what the rules say, because there's no context. And so the people in their charge, who are then told to take care of the people in their charge, who are then told to take care of people in their charge. It's like mom and dad taking care of the older kids and asking the older kids to take care of the little kids. It's kind of like that. And then what ends up happening is you have a loving, trusting family again. Good days, bad days. It all happens. You have ranges of emotion. We are human. But that is the point of will and resources that we have to invest in will for you to maintain an infinite mindset. It's to understand that every day you have is contributing to something even bigger. Now, there was something I read about a bunch of years ago Which I absolutely love the idea of if you want to try this. Jorge.

We know what the average lifespan of a person who lives where you live is. You can just look it up online, right? Find out the average lifespan of a male in wherever you live. It'll be in the mid-70s, right? So that means you can do the math and you can figure just like we take investment or invest in money.

Let's take some questions. Hello, Romania. Hello, Kosovo. Hello, Malaysia. Hello, Brazil. Obrigado for coming France. This is just Greece. This is amazing. I should just do the book club world tour.

Okay. See what we have here. You're out how many years until you hit that age? You can figure out how many weeks you have until you hit that average age.

Right?

And what I want you to do is go buy two fishbowls and I want you to buy a bunch of marbles and you're going to put a specific number of marbles in one fishbowl. It's the number of weeks you have left on the planet Earth. That's what's going to go in fishbowl number one. And every Sunday night you're going to pick up a marble and say, was this a week worth living? Did I contribute to something bigger than myself? Did I in some way shape or form grow myself or help someone grow? And if the answer is yes, you can put that marble in the other bowl. If the answer is no, you throw that marble away. That was a wasted week. I mean, you could do it daily if you. Always here, always loyal. The Dakota Potato Peel Pie Literary Society. So good to see you. Kelly and Ritu asked. Today's question is from a statement in chapter 15 of Leaders Eat Last. Okay, it's the infinite game Book club. But we can go retro. That's okay. Which directly correlates to the trusting team savvy. There's the connection. Really wanted to. That's a lot of marbles. And then you reach that average age and now you're living on borrowed.

There's no such thing as a. As virtual trust, apparently. I wrote.

As we have had to pivot over the last four and a half months. Are your thoughts on virtual trust the same as I'm? And the point is, is we want to try and make sure that every week that we live is contributing to something bigger than ourselves. That it's just more than achieving the finite goals and that we want to live with. When you wrote the book or have they shifted? Obviously nothing can replace the human connection of a warm hug, a firm handshake. Or a high five. How the second bowl of marbles completely full. That mean we lived a life worth living and we lived a life that could contributed. So all of your 24 hours, however, have any virtual signals of trust emerged during the prolonged isolation? You basically answered the question. What I mean by the day is contributed to something even bigger and grander and to the lives of others. Because truly it is service that gives our lives meaning. It is not simply accomplishment or. There's no such thing as virtual trust. Is. It's not that we cannot form trust over a computer.

Our resumes, nobody, nobody wants their resume published in their, in their obituary. What it means is that it really is a, is a, is a the deepest kind of trust. You know, we, we talk about what, how, how people were to others. That's how we want to be talked about is, is when we can interact. I mean think about it. We've had a virtual team for years and we built trust with our, with, with, with new team members. And we had, and by the way, for people who. Okay, let's take a look at. Hello, Sherry and Simon from the Cool Cats Club in Northern California. For a leader to effectively prioritize the will of the people, do they need to thoroughly understand the company's resource depth and limitation? Think that we can just replace the office and just all go virtual now? Running a virtual team is way more difficult than running an in person team because you don't have hi in the hallway. You don't have the. Just shooting the breeze before the meeting starts. You don't have hey, want to get lunch in a virtual companies in order to convince others of this preference?

That is a great question. Everything is formalized, right? You don't have serendipity, you don't have accidental meetings.

It is important. Let me think that we dissect that one for a little bit. For a leader to effectively prioritize the will of the people, do they need to thoroughly understand the company's resource depth and limitations in order to convince others of this preference? Okay, so a good leader. One of the hard things about leadership is, is that there's the constant balancing of the will and the resources and understanding that decisions in the hallway, everything is scheduled. What time is the zoom meeting? What time is the conference call? What time is the zoom meeting? And so we all show up and just work. There's very little of the interpersonal and accidental stuff, which is where trust happens. As Isaac Stern said, the famous virtuoso, the famous violinist. Music is what happens between the notes. Well, Trust is what happens between the meetings. Trust is what happens between the decisions that prioritize. One can sacrifice the other. And the hardest, hardest thing about leadership, and I'm learning this firsthand in Covid, the hardest, hardest thing about leadership is being able to balance those things. Not just in the immediacy of the now, but to be able to balance those things and understand what the repercussions and secondary effects are going to be after a month, after three months, after six months, after a year.

It'S the same thing. So one of the things that we learned, we were building relationships with people online. But then when we had our company off site, they came together and they hugged and they reinforced and they solidified that relationship. Think about online relationships. Think about dating. Can you talk to somebody online? Yes. Can you get to know them online? Yes. Can you start an understanding that.

Sometimes on purpose and sometimes by accident, which we take a hit to the resources.

Because we're trying to do the right thing, and sometimes we have to do the right thing and it takes a hit to the will and it's this constant battle and the effective leaders form some sort of relationship online.

Yes.

But is it ever really solidified until you get to hold each other and hug each other and say, hello, I've been waiting so long to meet you. So I still believe that there's no such thing as virtual trust. I still think that trust is a deeply human thing. It's not something that can exist on the computer. We can't build it over email for sure. And even when we're doing things virtually, there's tone of voice you've heard me talk about. The effective leaders will feel that battle. The ineffective leaders. This is not a discussion. This is not a battle. It's only resources. The ineffective leaders. There's no conflict and there's no battle. It's only will. And by the way, that organization won't survive very long. The resource organization will survive longer, but it won't last forever and it'll have a short, unhappy life. And so if there is, I think phone is actually better than video conference very often because I find that people are more present as opposed to just looking at themselves or looking at a hole in the top of the camera, or my favorite one is like, you're trying very hard to make eye contact with somebody by looking at their eyes on your screen. But what they see is this, because there are little boxes over there. Anyway, you get the idea. Nothing, nothing beats in person. So, yes, I still stand by the fact that the stress and managing those two, then. Then I think that leader is. Is aware of the. Of the importance of will and how to manage it and keep it strong for a long time. But understanding that those things are. It's an ocean. So, yeah, it's hard, I guess, is the answer.

Do you have one over there? Do you have one? No such thing as virtual trust.

Let's take another one. Greetings.

Wait, was it.

Did somebody say Greens from the North Pole? What was that? I missed it. I lost it. Greetings from. We have a.

Here's one from Magnus Florian from Facebook, Qatar, Chile. Holy cow.

Italy Book, Florence. Sorry. Magnus, what do you think is the number one trait? Oman? I've been to Oman. I had a lovely time there. And I ate that need that is needed to meet a sustainable future. If we maintain an infinite mindset. I think the number one trait is courage. I think it takes huge amounts of courage to do the right things for the long term. It is easier to do the right things for the short term and it's easier to do the things that are right that make you look good to Wall street or your boss or something like that. Those are. Those are the easy decisions because you're actually not considering what the right thing to do is. You're considering what will make me look good, what will help me get the promotion, what will help me get the bonus, what will help Wall street reward me. To make the courageous decision sometimes means being unpopular in the short term, and that's hard. So I think courage is king. You know, I've had this discussion with friends of mine as well who rank integrity higher. And I still think it takes courage to be in integrity. I think when confronted with very difficult decisions that to make the decision that is the one that reeks of integrity, I think continues to drank camel's milk just a little bit though, because I was told that it. It upsets your stomach, so I didn't want to risk it. Okay, Nia Samal, Even if we operate in an infant with an infinite mindset, we might not feel motivated to have the will to keep going all the time. True. How do we keep ourselves engaged with our will intact so we can keep advancing consistently and efficiently? Okay, this goes perfectly to trusting teams. None of us is smart enough, strong enough to do this thing called life, to do this thing called work, to do this thing called business alone. This is where the team comes in. You heard what Rich said, which is the value of trust on the team is not when the team is great, is not when everything. When the Conditions require courage. Remember, the pressures on us are overwhelming. Whether it's pressure from our boss, pressure from Wall street, pressure from the market, pressure of keeping a business going, the pressures are overwhelming. And to continue to march down a path of integrity is it's courage. And as we write, you know, people talk about their dream teams. Dream teams work beautifully when the conditions are great. But when things go sideways, when things get difficult, that's when the trust of the team really comes to bear. And so, you know, it's all fine and good for us to operate with an infinite mindset. But remember one of the core practices of maintaining an infinite mindset talked about before.

Courage, I don't believe is some deep internal fortitude. I believe is the is the ability and responsibility to build relationships and take care of others. And so courage comes from trust. And that when we have trusting relationships, we have more courage. When somebody says, I got your back, I believe in you. You got this. No matter what happens, I'll be there with you. It gives us the courage to do the right thing. Maintain your strong relationships, take care of others. That's how you build courage. We'll do one more. If you find that your will is drained. And by the way, I have felt it. Everyone has felt it. We are all dealing with the trauma of COVID And for those who sort of had an easier time of it, they did not compartmentalize their feelings. They did not.

Came in from Lucas.

Hello, Lucas. Why then with all this knowledge present, do most companies still hire avoid dealing with the trauma? It just meant it was going to come later for me. I've been actually dealing with it lately. It's taken me finite mindset.

Lucas asks the $10 million question. Lucas asked, with all of this knowledge present, why do companies still hire four months to start really feeling feeling it. And the first thing I did is I picked up the phone and I called people and I told them how I felt. So Niha, what I would recommend is pick up the phone and call people and tell them how you're feeling. Call the people you love and say I'm having a behind day. We don't believe in good days and bad days with our infinite mindset. They're finite minded players who are just performance driven. Is that basically what he asked?

Because it's easier? Because an infinite mindset is hard work. Why do people get too absolute? So if we say good day, we have the false belief that it lasts forever. And if we say bad, why do people take. Why do healthy people take diet pills instead of exercising? And eating well because it's easier.

You know, we're all, we're all subject. I mean today we have the false belief that it lasts forever. We have a head days and behind days. This is a journey and you're having a behind day. Call someone and ask for help and be there and offer your help for those who are suffering the same. Look at, look at most of the things that we do in life. Look at most of the industries that thrive. Most of the industries thrive.

Let's see, here's a LinkedIn user with no name. Where's the first place to start when trying to change a finite company to be an infinite player? On our laziness. Right. I mean, what's Amazon? It's shopping for lazy people. You don't have to go to the store, pick things up. I mean, you know, I'm speaking historically, we don't go to stores at all anymore.

I mean so many services that we. Is trust at leadership levels or lower organizations or is it grassroots? Okay, great question. Buy or to make our lives easier. And by the way, I believe in that. That's good when something makes our life easier. So it's very common, especially in this day and age where leadership, senior leadership of a company is operating with a finite mindset. They believe the will of the people is subordinate or helps make life better. And we perceive value in whatever that thing is and we're willing to pay money for that service.

That's where value is derived. We continue to hire performance people, I think for a few reasons. One, it's easier and two, because maybe we're working in a culture that rewards us to the money. All they care about is performance. It's all about short termism. There's no personally for somebody else's short term success. You know, if you're working on a team that's all about short term, short term, short just cause they're trying to advance and they believe growth is a cause. So this is pervasive. And so the question is, how do you change it? Now the most efficient is if senior leadership takes responsibility and goes through that transition. It happens. You heard term you're going to hire people who are really good at short term. I really think it's funny when Wall street, for example says we have to pay ridiculous, exorbitant salaries that are completely out of whack with normal compensation disparities because we need to pay the high prices to attract the best talent. You've heard me talk about Bob Chapman. I wrote about him extensively. Leaders eat last and I just recently did a podcast with. No, what you're doing is attracting people who just like to make a ton of money. You could also say we're trying to change the world. We're trying to do something powerful. We're trying to create a world in which is inspired, safe and fulfilled. And if we're successful at that, Bob, and if you've never heard Bob speak, oh my God, you have to go listen. He is the way. Let me tell you how they his everybody will thrive and do well and share in the spoils. But we're looking for people who want to do that. Guess who you'll attract? Kids. Describe Bob Chapman. The way they describe him is if he walked into a room and finds a pile of shit in the middle of the room, Bob will look up and say, where's the pony? The best companies in the world don't necessarily pay the highest salaries. They pay fair salaries. They pay competitive salaries. He's that kind of optimist.

So it can happen at the top. Bob made this conversion himself, but they don't necessarily pay the best salaries because they're offering more than just money. And you derive more than just pay by working at these companies, the companies where it's all about money, then they're only hiring performance people because that's their whole business model. But this isn't. He was a finite minded leader who became an infinite minded leader. But it doesn't have to. The tail can wag the dog. And so we that why we're having this book club, because we consider this a movement. This is not a book for us. This is have to be the leaders we wish we had. We have to start embracing the concepts and the practices of the infinite mindset so we can have a cause and we can bring it to work and say, guys, let me tell you why I love this company, why I love this opportunity. And even though we have our challenges, I came to work to learn how to be a part of something big. It's not just a fun discussion to have on social media to help pass the time in our day. We show up here because for us, this is a movement that every single one of us here who is a part of this wants to see change in the world and wants to be a part of that change, that we want to be the leaders we wish we had. We maintain our infinite mindset. And this is the world that I'm trying to build. And even though I may do it in this little arena, this is what I'm trying to advise because we want to be the tail that wags the dog. At a macro level, we want to be the one that changes our nation. That when I come to work every day, and it could be, you know, create a world in which people feel inspired, safe and fulfilled. That could be the cause that we're trying to advance, all of us, to build this inspired, safe and fulfilled world that every one of us can feel. And you're going to do it in your team. So you're going to offer them the just cause. It can be yours, it can be someone else's. Remember, we have to find changes our economy and. And 20 years from now, 30 years from now, who knows how long it'll take took us 30, 40 years to get to where we are now.