Economic UNCERTAINTY? Here's How to Stay Strong
This recorded conversation between Brendan (coach) and Chris explores resilience during economic uncertainty, reframing it from an assumed rapid trait to a deliberate, categorical choice to "recalibrate toward action and progress." Key claims: resilience is not time-bound but depends on (1) choosing to re-engage, (2) clarifying the target(s) and time horizon, and (3) stacking supports (purpose/ambition, mindfulness, confidence, emotional intelligence, self-care). The discussion emphasizes social and organizational influences—positive relationships, mentors, and team culture accelerate recovery—while avoidance and surrounding oneself with complainers reduce resilience. For leaders, Brendan prescribes explicit "performance conversations" (ambition, attitude, obstacles, and habits), radical candor ("open the mail"), resourcefulness, compassion, humility, and building routines that sustain long-term progress. Practical metaphors (unopened bills, broken kneecap, paddling vs. hip-snap) are used to illustrate how to assert, raise ambition, and lead teams through disruption.
Chapters
A lot of people, when they get knocked down and they're only in a selfish mindset, they're like, I'm gonna stay here. But if you got someone to fight for that resilience time that speeds up, you make the choice to fight for them to recalibrate, to assert yourself again. And that's what I've always found. People who keep avoiding, they're doing it because they're in survival mode and they're only for themselves. When the switch happens to be assertive again, it's because they're usually fighting for somebody else. And I would tie that to the conversation of purpose or ambition.
I asked you to come in and, like, meet us in this. In this conversation of resilience. And how do we remain resilient? And actually even isn't even as I gave it more thought about this remaining resilient, that almost implies that we always were or that you either are or you are in. So I want to actually maybe dispel some myths around the topic, but. But maybe just start, man. You have. You have coached and continue to coach and lead some of the. Some of the best and biggest and brightest performers across all industries. Like, define for me what resilience means to you. Let's just start, man.
That's, you know, I'll start with that little piece you mentioned. There is like, are we. Do we always have it? Did we ever have it? And I think there's a lot of high expectations, especially in this group right here, about resilience with. With yourself and the other people that you might have on your teams. You just expect everybody should just be able to bounce back from chaos and distraction and change and upsets and failures, and everyone should be able to bounce back, you know, immediately. And the problem around the conversation about resilience is that so often people think that that's what it means, that you bounce back, as if it's like, hit the mat and you're up again, like a prize fighter or something. But I like to tell people resilience isn't a timed act, right? Just like if you lose somebody, grief is not a timed act. Nobody has the expectation that your grief after losing somebody is going to be, you know, over next week when you go back to work on Monday. And yet we have this weird culture expectation that resilience has to happen immediately. And what you learn is resilience. This ability to recalibrate is really how I think of resilience, the ability to recalibrate where, okay, things got thrown off. I. I got distracted. Distracted. I Got discouraged, I got. I got confused. The economy went crazy, the market's all over the place. And recalibrating toward action and progress is how I think of resilience. It's a recalibration towards two things, action and progress. And sometimes that recalibration, it takes a few weeks to go, wait a minute, you all see that rug pull over there and you're really confused about where you're at sometimes. That's the thing with everyone watching your job as a leader, but also as a high performer. As soon as something, there's a disruption of any kind, good or bad, your job is to, as quickly as you can, recalibrate. Okay, in this changing environment, what are the next right actions of integrity for me? And how do I get progress again? That to me, is what resilience is outside the academic terms, because I think academics often get it really wrong. By the way, resiliency is often talked about as a trait. I don't believe it is a trait. I understand why academics talk about it that way, why psychologists would believe it to be that way. But even a trait only shows up over the long term after the real thing that happens, which is a choice. There is this choice when you get knocked down, when you get frustrated, when things aren't going well, to recalibrate, to take action and progress again. And not everybody makes that choice. Not everybody makes that choice fast. But the leaders, that's the way we're here together, everyone watching this. Your job is as a leader, as a high performer, to get into this, the action, to choose to go, okay, I didn't like this. I'm going to choose to recalibrate right now. And I think that choice is where all the magic actually happens.
Yeah, I like that a lot. Largely because it forces the definition to bring in the ability to develop resiliency because you have to choose to do it. But almost going back for a second, you mentioned sort of the academic definition or how they like to term resilience. Interestingly enough, it always involves time, which, which you've dispelled. Like you've said, wait a second. Like, please don't put a time frame on resiliency or say because you haven't acted within a time frame, that you are not resilient because they, they use terms like quickly. Right? Withstanding or recovering quickly to, to bounce back into shape is. Is another definition of resilience.
Right.
Which is not. It's. It's. It's good for us to think about loss. Like, that's your, your example like when you, when people suffer loss, you may actually recover or deal with that loss completely differently than me on a, yes. Different timeframe. And it doesn't mean that you're met, you're not managing loss. It just means you're managing loss differently. So I love the, I love the permission to recognize that just because you fell down today and you're not back up tomorrow doesn't mean you're not resilient. If maybe it took you a week or two weeks or maybe, maybe you were off your game for, for, for three or four weeks, it doesn't mean that. Well, shoot, you're just not resilient. You don't have a shot. It means you haven't show, maybe made some specific choices. But everybody's on their, their time frame for resiliency. And then I guess the question would be, and tell me if I'm just being, being, being a jerk, but can I shorten it? Like, can I, can I get quicker? And what are the steps to do that?
Yeah, well, let's explore that a little bit because the question that goes along with time is the target. And this is where a lot of people don't understand resiliency because they've never actually coached other people. So if I have a struggle in my business, what does resilient mean? Does it mean that, okay, I had to struggle my business and one month later I'm back to profitability? Does that mean I was resilient? Like, how do we measure it? Because, see, the other thing that academics often get wrong, or other people just talking about, like armchair psychologists, right? They forget that resilience is also categorical. Let me give another example. Outside of the grief example, one time I broke my kneecap, okay, I broke that kneecap. I was in that cast. How do we measure resiliency? The speed in which I'm back on the running track because I was in track, is that resilience I got back on the track or was resilience the fact that I had a broken leg? It sucked, but I kept a great mindset and I kept showing up for my PT on a consistent basis to try to develop, to try to get it back. So where did resilience happen? The day I got on the track or the moment I chose to start having a good attitude, to accept this is a challenge. That's where it began. Okay, I'm going to accept this is a broken leg, didn't want it, but it's real. I accept it, I see it now. I'm going to make the choice to go through this as the best as I possibly can, each day summoning the best attitude I can. To me, that's the resilience. And I say it's categorical because remember, resilience for two different people. One, that resilience, well, it's physical. You know, she's up hopping around. She's going to PT to fix her leg. Another, it's mental. She's staying in the right mental mindset. She's not getting discouraged and quitting. Another pe. Another category is social. You know what? She's going through it. It's struggling. But you know what? She's resilient because she's reaching out and asking for help. She's connecting with other people. She's not turning into a jerk to other people. Other people. It's spiritual. You know what? Everything has been lost. Everything is terrible. But I maintain my faith. I maintain my connection to God or the universe or the flow or whatever your belief is. So you see, it can be. It can be mental, physical, emotional. It can be, you know, financial. It can be professional. It can be spiritual. So when we start thinking about resilience as coaches, we get a little bit more nuanced because we understand these two things that are happening, the time it's going to take, but also the target. What determines whether or not you were resilient? Because a lot of people right now, especially in this industry that place is playing in, right? There are plenty of people who, if you look at, you know, number of sales this month, it might not look like it looked two years ago. And if the target has to be the same as it was two years ago, well, we say, well, you're not resilient. They lose confidence. They're like, ugh, I'm not where I was. But actually look at their behavior. Like, whoa, they're doing the prospecting, they're having the conversations, they're moving the deal. The deal flows are a little different. They're measured differently now in this new context. So it's important when we talk about resilience, there's new measurements, there's different categories, and there's a time horizon. And those three pieces, when you think about them mentally, you tend to not get so discouraged because how easy it is to go, well, I don't make as much as I used to be. I suck. Well, that's one measure. There's all these other measures. You're still a good mom. You're still doing the prospects, you know. I hope that makes sense.
Yeah, it does. It works brilliantly in Our industry, as I think about that. It also means that one of the greatest sort of destroyers of resiliency is discretionary discouragement.
Yes.
And yet if we don't define resilience or, or, or, or our target properly, it is impossible to be resilient like we are. We are fighting a losing battle if we start off with the wrong definition.
Yeah, it's just like the definition of success, right?
Sure.
If you don't know what that means for you, you're on this ever growing sped up hamster wheel of opportunities. People who don't define success. This is very interesting psychology, by the way. People who don't define success for themselves have like a quadruple chance of experiencing burnout multiple weeks or months in a row.
Yeah, I believe it.
So it's the same thing with resilience. Like what does resilience mean to me now that I broke my leg? What does resilience mean to me now that the market has 60% less inventory? You know, I don't know if that's true, but you know what I'm saying? It's like when these things change, my expectation might shift. But the most important thing I want to come back to is one, accept it. Broken leg, market shift, loss of something. Second, to consciously make the choice to get back to action and progress in whatever category or way you define it. If there is no conscious choice to summon the best of who you are and get back at it, then resilience in any capability won't be there. I think the important thing is right now people are very conscious about the choices they're making and the attitude they're bringing in contexts of change. Because if your attitude sucks, I mean, and you do get some progress, but in that category of mental health or mindset, if your mindset and your mental health category isn't resilient because your attitude sucks, but maybe you did get some progress and you did make the sale. Guess what? It feels empty. And it feels like a slog versus a joyful, purposeful ride.
Yeah. And I think some of those things that you're touching on, we will probably unpackage or I hope to unpackage as we go through. Like do we build it? How do we build resilience? One, one of the questions that I see, I think is, is relevant. It's, it's one of mine too. So I'm going to ask it. Some of us feel that, well, we, we build resilience by going through stuff, right? Like go through challenges and you figure out how to get back up and you go through another challenge and this one's harder and you get back up and, and so you're building this resilience muscle. So is that required? Like, do we have to go through difficult things to gain resilience? What is your take or perspective on that or what have you seen?
Yeah, earlier I kind of decided or defined resilience as a choice to recalibrate back to action and progress. And I bring that back up again as a definition or at least a conversation here because, you know, there's this myth that, well, if you've been resilient a million times before, you'll be resilient this time. And the problem is, no, you will only be resilient this time if you make the choice. I know a lot of people, as you do, who they've been through, they've survived hardship after hardship after hardship after hardship, but this time they don't get off the mat because they didn't make the choice. And so the beauty there is, yeah, if you've been knocked down tons of times and you got up, you, you did, you developed it as a muscle, right. It's easier for you, it's more conditioned for you. It's kind of like if you used to run five miles and today you have to run one, it's easier for you than a person who's never, ever run a mile.
Right.
It's going to be hard for them, but you've got some conditioning in the body and the mechanics. So I do believe prior resilience is a strength today, but it hangs on the choice.
Yes. So. So the reason why it feels that way in the real world, it's because we have now built that muscle or we have the habit of making a choice, which makes making any choice again, easier and again, easier and again. But not guaranteed, not automatic. And it isn't the only way to show up resilient. If this is the first time in our life, a lot of people on the call are new, they're new to our industry. Right. They were never in an industry before where they got beat up by no's or got beat up by a market or it was just a, I do this, I get this, I do this, I get this. And all of a sudden they're like, oh, wait, I'm going to have to deal with this period of time where I might not see the results. And so now I need to build resiliency in order to get through it. You're saying, listen, like, you can make the choice for the first time or Maybe you've made it seven or eight times. Maybe it's a habit, maybe it's not. But a habit starts somewhere. First choose. Choose. Resilience.
Yeah, you have to choose. And listen, I've been blessed to work with Olympic competitors in almost every field, and they make the choice to get back up. If that first match or that first round or for that first competition or. Or that first fight. When they fail, when they get knocked down, there is a mental recalibrate. It's like, okay, I gotta choose to let this go, to understand that happened, and I gotta choose to show up right now, and I have to choose right now to be here. Like, I was talking with my friend Ben Newman yesterday. He's one of the world's mental conditioning coaches for sports teams, especially, like, college football, like, you know, the big teams, you know, Crimson Tide and. And Michigan. And, you know, he's worked with, you know, teams from the last six Super Bowls. So he's a. He's. He's a real talent and a great friend. And he and I both have this language about how you kind of have to see the world where it was, but then you have to, right now, lock in and face this next thing, be where your feet are now and really engage now and make this choice to win. You have to make the choice to get up. You have to make the choice to get healthy. You have to make the choice to make the next call. You have to go, okay, this disruption, whatever you call it, I just use disruption as a broad category. For all the chaos in the world, let's just call it disruption. Disruption happened in your life. There is a moment where you choose to re. Engage, to lock into the tasks and the activities again because you want to win. You want to win at life. You want to win the deal. You want to earn more for your family, you want to succeed in your neighborhood, whatever it is. It is such a conscious choice. In every athlete I've ever worked with and every executive, there's that switch. When it happened, no one, I believe, accidentally falls into resilience. I've never seen it. I mean, maybe there's a luck. I do believe in grace. I believe. I have a faith, so I believe in God, so I believe there's. There's some kind of thing that can happen and. And grace happens. But for the most part, if resilience happens in a time frame in which you're proud of later, if resilience happens, a time frame in which you are proud of later, you made a pretty quick, conscious choice to get back in the game. Even if the struggle is real for several months before, categorically, it looks like you succeeded and you're resilient. You got your head back in the game. And I think that's why I admire place leaders because they're not running away from the reality. They're going, okay, lock in, double down, face it, win. And that attitude is what makes this group different.
Yeah, I think, I think it's interesting as we even get ready for our built how event, which you've been such a big part of prep, content, all of that. Right. Have taken that stage many, many times with us and drive that. Our theme for, for this year is we were built for this. Right? Like we are built for this. And so I think, I think that goes to something I was thinking about when you were just talking that it also means that we can do pre work. It also means that we shouldn't get to that moment and then be forced to figure out are we going to make that choice because something has disrupted our business or behind on our goal or we feel less than we felt last year. All of a sudden the award that we thought we were going to get, we're not getting because we like it just has not shown up. And so I'd love to have this conversation of the pre work because I think that that smooths out that, that opportunity for us to make the right choice around resilience. I think to myself that there are certain keys to, to as I think even internally, like, how do I build resilience? Like, what in me allows me to, I mean, 26 years later in the same industry go through lots of ups and lots and downs and, and wins and face punches and, and all of it. Like there was a, there's a couple of things and I want you to sort of, you know, fact check me or, or, or say, hey, like, yes, that's a, that's a yes or it's a no. I think that purpose builds resilience because it, then there's no choice to make. There's no choice and purpose. If this is my purpose, the choice was made by choosing purpose. And maybe we can talk about, I think that mindfulness, like, if I, if I practice mindfulness and what that truly, truly means, then then choice is easier. It makes my, it makes resilience easier. Yes. Confidence. Like, yes, that is a developed quality. Like I am a, you know, I'm not confident in every area of my life, Brandon. Like, you know me as a, as a human, as a person. Like, I think we all have insecurities, but I am very, very confident in, in certain parts of my life and that drives resilience. I think emotional intelligence is kind of the fourth one that shoot like without that resilience is, is, is just like it's almost a non starter. And and I also think that the last one is self care, like truly taking care of ourselves, whether that be physically. You talk a lot already today about mentally and emotionally being prepared to make that choice. So as I, as I think about those things, any one of those or two of those jump out and say necessary for resilience. What, what speaks to you.
They all jump out. Yeah, I think that's a great menu. You know and then beauty thing, the beautiful thing of what Chris just shared with everybody here and I would love for, in the chat, like what, what is your, with what he just shared, what one jumped out for you? I'd love to see that too because I would bet in, in, in this group, you know. Yeah, you're seeing purpose will jump out quite a bit. And so I think that's a great starting point. And what's beautiful about this list that you shared is every single one of these on its own is sufficient to get you there over time when you stack a few of them now we're speeding up that time. You know, a lot of people, they'll take care of themselves but they'll get disconnected from purpose so they won't move. Right. A lot of people that have the emotional intelligence to know what's going on, they'll have that high self awareness and that sort of sensory acuity of what's happening for them, but they won't have the confidence to get back out there even though they have the awareness. So I think all these stack really, really well. I would say if we could underlie it all with like a, A division line if you will, to create a foundation beneath all of that. All of that rests on a very simple thing in human psychology. So forgive me for the simplicity in this. You are either going to avoid or, or you are going to assert. And the thing that kills resilience every time is the avoidance. And I'll give another example. Long before I met you, when I started my career, in my career, when I started writing books and teaching and coaching, I went broke and which is not uncommon for authors, but I was, I didn't know how to do it or realtors. So we're right, I didn't know. So here's what I did though. And this is interesting and some people I'm curious if anyone will resonate with this. You maybe share it in the chat so I don't feel so awkward, but I was getting credit card bills, you know, coming to come into the apartment. I wasn't opening them, I was stacking them over there. I knew what they were, but I had this stack of unopened bills. I don't know if anyone can relate with what I'm sharing right now, but I had a stack of unopened bills. This comes up to me because you asked about earlier, which I thought was so brilliant. It was about the pre work. The pre work means you look at it, you look at reality, you engage it, right? For example, you can't come out of a market if you're not doing these calls that I know places, so many leaders you guys do here with your teams about what is the market, what are the numbers, what is the inventory, what what is the sales? What is the average per acre or lot or foot or all the other fancy things you guys know about? It's like if you don't look at that stuff and you just avoid it and hope that some deal is going to come along, you're not engaged in the pre work. In other words, you're not asserting yourself in the very industry or the very thing you need to do. I had to at some point look at the bills and ask myself the honest question, what do I need to do to earn that much to make that minimum payment to start moving out? Then I had to assert myself and go, okay, how do I go do that in the world? And then I had to do the next thing, which I think is so uncommonly discussed in resilience. I learned this from the athletes, a word that usually doesn't come back with resilience, but I actually think is a form of purpose. And that is you have to raise your ambition again. Because what happens is you get knocked down, the bills pile up and you get caged into this circumstance, your mind gets caged into this level of sales, cage into this level of bill, and all of a sudden your vision narrows so acutely to the problem that there's no drive to the future, there's no connection to having a dream anymore. Wanting to fight for somebody, wanting to build something. What pulled me through that time was I wanted to build a great life for my wife who, you know, and I just. I wanted to. I wanted to have an amazing life for her. And so I had to connect with that when I was down, when I was discouraged, when I wasn't opening the bills that was me. That was my insecurities. That was my lack of confidence. That was my shame, my embarrassment, that couldn't take a letter opener and open it and look at it. That's because that was me. But sometimes being resilient means you connect to a better future for you and somebody else, for you and the kids, for you and your wife or husband or partner, for you and your team. Because a lot of people, when they get knocked down and they're only in a selfish mindset, they're like, I'm gonna stay here. But if you got someone to fight for that resilience time that speeds up, you make the choice to fight for them, to recalibrate, to assert yourself again. And that's what I've always found. People who keep avoiding, they're doing it because they're in survival mode, and they're only for themselves. When the switch happens to be assertive again, it's because they're usually fighting for somebody else. And I would tie that to the conversation of purpose or ambition.
Brendan, just for a moment, you said there was a phrase and sort of this imagery that you sort of painted in that statement. And as you said it, I thought about more than five or six conversations I've had in literally the last seven to 10 days. And it was that we are. We are now. We have built this cage that we see our current reality in, but the cage can. Can very quickly become our future as well, based on the. The current situation. And, and what I. What I'm hearing right now is I actually, maybe, maybe, maybe I don't want to build this as. As big as I thought I wanted to build it. May I. I kind of. I'm good. I'm good. Like, I don't. I don't need to do this anymore. And what I realized is happening in those statements, that's what it is. I've caged myself, by the way. I've also. I've also looked at all the people that I really care about, and I've actually invited them into that cage as well. And now I'm going to try to sell them on this cage. But, but, but that has happened. And that's that assertion that, that we've sort of lost. Right? Like, think about it. You. You painted this picture. And I see. I see certain people in, in that. By the way, I'm not, I'm not. I'm not saying it couldn't happen to all of us or any of us. All that we're like, listen, I'm good. I'm good right here. Like, I don't need that. And that's just because I'm not making a choice to deal with it or to, to be resilient through it. And I've now caged myself in. And I think it's, it's a, it's a, it's a massive takeaway for each of us to say, hey, where has that shown up for me? Has some of my language indicated that I've just accepted a cage? Or I, I'm, I'm stepping into one. Shoot. Did I already, did I already lock it? Where's the key so I can unlock it? Who do I need my world to help me open up that cage? Like all that is just sort of running through my mind as you explain that sort of aside of what was underlying all the things that led to resilience, underlying that, as you mentioned, the foundation of it is that very thought.
Yeah, yeah, I think it's important and maybe this helps people to write down sometimes for yourself or your team or the reality and why it's so important you're doing what you're doing here with Place. Everybody is. Because human beings, we tend to lower our ambition and assertiveness to the immediate context and circumstances and people that we are interacting with. So when we are broke, we tend to allow ourselves to lower all our ambition. When we are, you know, avoidant, we find other avoidant people. And this is not just my opinion, this is like literally, sociology will show that there are certain cultures and contexts in which high achieving, driven people, you put them around a bunch of five complainers and literally over a period, not listen, not a period of months like we think, or years like we think, they'll do goal attainment surveys. So they'll take a hyper performer, right? They'll ask them to describe their future, they'll give them a psychological survey. Then they'll put them in a room with like five, six complainers. Then they'll come out, they'll do a similar battery of tests and journaling activities. Then they'll put them in another room with more complainers, and then they'll do another battery of tests. And then they'll put them in a room with one positive person. And every single time that person's, the language that they use to describe the future is pulled down. And we have to understand though, that when we get around people like that one person who lifts up, that is so key to your resilience. Your resilience as a human species is so sociological and we don't realize that this is why you need to know other agents in your neighborhoods. This is why you need to go have those conversations around the, you know, the coffee table that are ambitious. This is why you need to get around people who have a good attitude, even if the market sucks sometimes, because that's always going to happen. And the important thing is about high performers. I think this is really important because high performance is literally defined as long term success while maintaining positive relationships and well being. Well, real high performers who are the most resilient, they're playing a long game. They know you still have to build. Now what you're building now is the flywheel for when things get easier. And if you don't recognize that, if it's because you're avoiding the now and you're staying in the circumstances, you're lowing your mentality and your ambition and your assertiveness to meet the complainers or to meet the difficult situations. But you got detached from that future and you forgot, oh no, you're in training camp right now. You're building the flywheel right now. You're doing the conditioning right now. You're running that five miles right now. So that later when all you need is to do that one, it's a lot easier.
Yeah. One of the, one of the things that was in my mind, even in our, for our conversation we chatted about it briefly was what, what can, what gets in the way of resilience? And, and interestingly enough, like, positive relationships are key to resilience. Which, which the alternative to that, you know, is why there's an expression that exists that misery loves company. Because as, oh, wow. Complaining. Right.
Yeah.
And as, and as we, as we sort of have lowered the ambition based on, on the market that we're in or the situation we find ourselves in, we oftentimes collect those people. Like all of a sudden, ambitious people just are not exciting or, or may not be exciting to us. Or like, oh, there's Brendan again. Like, and he's always, well, no, you were as well. But the challenge is right at this moment you have decided that you don't actually want to, to be around those ambitious people. And that is why we, we believe so, so strongly in the power of partnership. Because research shows that that resilience is not purely an individual characteristic, but it's enabled by these strong relationships and these networks that we build. And we build that resilience and we grow and strengthen that resilience by, by being around people that maybe, maybe I'm not today feeling wildly ambitious, but then I Sit and I talk with someone that is at a different place, and they are. They see the world different for that day. That's all I need. That's all I need to, like, open up that door and say, well, what cage was I building today? Like, let's get out. Let's. Let's get. Re. Re. Engage with the ambition that I know is there. Why? Because it's built on purpose. It's, It's. It's built on mindfulness. Right? My. My ability to recognize, like, where I am, why I'm here. Like, that's how I. By the way, that's how I think about mindfulness. It's, it's like, it's a. It's being present, like, good or bad. Like, this is where I am. This is why I'm here. I'm aware of that. And now through all of my senses, I'm going to practice whether or not this is where I want to be or what I need to do to change it. That's. That's being mindful. Like, all of that flows into recognizing that. Okay, yeah, people. People matter. Like the people we spend time with, those partnerships or those, those mentorships or just those relationships. Get out of the office and go for a hike with a friend tomorrow. Right? A good friend. Right. Not a complaining. Not that. Yeah, not the friend that you have on your tech chains. And I know those chains, they exist here too. Like, I've been brought into some of them. Like, get on the right. Get on the right one, because that'll. That'll sort of smooth the path towards, towards being a more resilient human being.
So good. So good. You know, earlier you mentioned how, how you've been here over 20 years doing this. You know, I think that one piece about when the context shifts on people is to get around positive people like we've been talking about, and get around people with perspective. You know, we live in a culture where we kind of throw away older, wiser people. You know, we don't realize that sometimes, especially in this industry, there's market dynamics that people have seen before, you know, and when you get around older, wiser people, they're almost always like, yeah, kid, that's just part of it. Keep working, keep showing up like, it's going to be like this. But they always say the same thing. They're like, yeah, don't sweat it. Just keep showing up. It goes like this sometimes. And so for me, when I'm really struggling, a lot of my mentors are much older than me, and I get around them. And it's just like there's a positivity and perspective too that just says, of course it goes like this sometimes. Don't be so mad, don't be so ashamed. Of course you lose some rounds. Of course you're trying to be an Olympian, but you're going to lose a few of those. That's why it takes a decade to do that. It's like talking to people and helping them understand that the journey is hard. And your job is, is to keep showing up through that journey, recalibrating, taking action again, getting progress in areas that matter to you. Always be doing that because the context is going to shift. The interest rates will shift, the markets will shift. I mean, housing will shift. All these things over a period of time shift so significantly. But the ones who win are the ones who are riding it out. And they're recalibrating and they're still paddling. You know, it's like they. It's not that they didn't get turned over. They fell out of the boat too. Then they got back in. They use that little hip snap. They got back up and they're paddling again. And you're like, dang, they're still paddling. They got hit by the same wave. I'm going in to pack it up for the day. It's like, no, no, no. Some people are still paddling. And guess what? When the tides change, when the currents shift, they're so far out in front of everyone's like, oh my God. And it's like, it's hard to explain that to people. But once you're around ambitious, high achieving people, you see, they think that way and it's why they always appear out front. Not always in times of major market dynamic or disruption. Disruption can flatten everybody, but follow them for five, six, seven years and they are so far out of everybody else who, who quit paddling and quit complaining. And now the people who quit during the hard times, well, things change, but because they didn't keep going, they're starting from the shore again. The other guy, he's already on the wealth island because he kept going. So I think that you have to keep that perspective. To me, perspective is so positive when you play it over the long term. It's one of my secrets to not getting discouraged. You know, I'm a big history buff, so I read all this history and when I see how far we've come, even though everyone hates where we're at right now, I'm like, oh, we're doing great. And it's hard for people to understand that if they haven't studied any history, they just think now sucks. But if you study history now, it's looking pretty good. And so I want to encourage people. Perspective can lift you out. The people around you can lift you out. Asserting yourself can lift you out. All these things help over time.
Yeah, agreed, agreed. You know, Brendan, one of the, one of the things that this, this conversation then leads us to is okay, if other people and other people's perspectives can, can, can do such wonders for our own resilience, then what if we are other people? What if, what if we. As I look, there's a lot of leaders on this call that, that have other people that rely on them to lead them and to show up and to be that. How do we drive resilience in our teams and through other people? What are, what are some of the things that we need to practice or what are the things that we can do such that we'll help? And by the way, all of us are leaders. All of us have people in our life that look to us, whether we recognize it today or not, but look to us and say, gosh, I'm so glad you're here because you really got me through this. Could be spiritual, could be economic, could be personal growth, could be career, but what are the things that I should think about as a leader, leading someone through or bringing someone along in their resiliency?
First, I want to again give a huge shout out to everyone here right now, guys, because it's very uncommon that you are here. And these aren't actual common conversations as much as we think these, we think these conversations happen all the time out there. I'm like, trust me, I'm on the road. Most people don't do any self improvement or personal development or personal growth like you all are. So a shout out. And I reference that because I think everybody watching this with your teams, you need to watch this replay wherever you access it later. You should watch this with your teams and then you should ask them some simple questions. What is our ambition? If we, if we can look at a bigger picture, what's our ambition? What's the attitude we're going to choose? And then being honest as a leader going, what's the obstacles we actually need to overcome right now? What do we got to overcome? Getting clarity about the obstacles we have to overcome is as important as defining what resilience looks like. You know, it's because most people, the obstacles that they're saying they have to overcome are things they absolutely can't control. Right. If you sit around a bunch of unconscious people, especially right now, you go sit around a bunch of them. But what are the obstacles we have to overcome? Oh, well, we got all this division between the Republicans and the Democrats and it's, it's the fault of the politics. That's, that's why we're at where we're at. I'm like, okay, you're not going to change that. So what's the obstacle you need to overcome in your career right now? Instead of being solution minded, which is key to resilience, we become delegators of the problem. Well, the problem is over here. It's their fault. Once they solve that, well, clearly interest rates will get better. It's like, no, no, no. Resilience is what do I have to do? What do I have to overcome? What is the thing that I need to calibrate my actions to, or my team's actions to, to get that action and that progress, however we define that today because guess this Monday to Friday, what is, you know, action and progress might be very different than what it means four months from now. This is why leaders always need to be in what we call the performance conversation. The performance conversation is where are we trying to go, what's our attitude in working together, what are we trying to overcome? And then the last piece of that is what are the habits? They're going to keep us chugging along while we fight these obstacles to get the breakthrough. Because beating an obstacle is the breakthrough, but the breakthrough is not success. The success is the long term habits. And so you're gonna have, we all have different obstacles right now based on the market, based on our job, based on our family. Like identify the obstacles, hit them hard, that'll give you a breakthrough that'll be like up, you solved it, you feel good. But then tomorrow, your habits, you still, the habits are the baseline. And so as a team, knowing what is our rhythm, what are our habits, what are our obstacles, what's the attitude we want, what's the ambition we're after? This has to be an explicit conversation. You can't expect your employees or anyone in your office to do this. And that's why I started with the conversation that this is super uncommon, y'.
All.
I, I, I go to Fortune 50, you know, teams that have literally a billion dollar budget for HR and they're not even doing that because it's easier to avoid and to blame. But leaders go, let's have the conversation.
Yeah, it, it's, it reminds me I read, gosh, maybe a couple months ago as I was thinking about like, you know, what is the, what is the right curriculum for real estate agents in 2023. Right. And heading into 2024, and resilience was one of those topics. I came across an article where Tim Cook was talking about what got them through 2022, which was not a, which was a difficult year for every company, right. Heading into 23 and in quarter four of 2022, Apple sort of beat Wall Street's expectations. And Tim Cook was, was being interviewed and he said, I think instinctively, right. Which means it was a habit. It was learned instinctively. They navigated this year by being resilient, high functioning teams. Right? So resilient. Like as he looked at it, it was these teams that came together and they operate in a team format. But each of those teams, whatever they were working on, whatever their purpose was, whatever their mission was, he said, there were unprecedented challenges in our company. There was these resilient, high functioning teams that got together and figured out like, what are we here to do? And then they dove a little bit deeper and said, well, what did those teams do? Could you dive in and figure out what were characteristics of those teams? And he said, we are, we are really candid. Like there is massive candor on those teams, by the way. It was just like you were saying, like teams need to have these conversations. They need to say, okay, what is our problem? And people start, right. I love it. Delegating. You said the problem. Instead of like, that's not your problem. Like, interest rates are not your problem. Inventory is not your problem. You know what your problem is? You're not picking up the phone. You're not door knocking, you're not at the open house. You're not actually engaging with your past clients. You have zero time on your schedule to build relationships. Like, let's have the candid conversation. It's going to build resilience. Second thing he said they were just wildly resourceful. Like they were resourceful. Like, is the budget different? Sure it is. Is economics different? Sure it is. Are there no challenges? Sure. But they got together and they, they recognize as a team, you're good at that. You're good at this. I'm good at this. We could do that. Like they were just resourceful. Love that they were compassionate and empathetic. Like they cared about each other. Like these small groups and these big groups as a company, it was a time for people to show up and, and maybe they're down and they're like, but you know What? Brendan cares about me. Chris. Chris cared about me. We were. We were empathetic and. And compassionate. And lastly, he said when. When people are humble, when your team has humility, when they don't show up, like, oh, I got this. Because interestingly enough, if we show up and we lack humility, then everybody else is going to posture around us, which means they're going to hide the fact that they actually need help to be resilient. And that's a challenge, too. And yet, when we're a humble leader, guess what? People will recognize that you're not always having the best day, but they also feel that you're. You're able to understand where they are and they will come and ask for help. So it's like candor, resourcefulness, compassion, and empathy and humility sort of are some of the characteristics to sort of build these. Build these resilient teams.
Oh, I love that. You got to send me that or post that in the replay for everybody, too. That's so great. You know, what's interesting is, and I hope people caught is that, you know, that first thing there was candor. And let me bring back a metaphor from earlier in this training session for everybody, for the leaders here, is that you'd better, with your team, be opening the mail. You know, the metaphor I used earlier, I wasn't opening my bills. I was. I was avoiding the bills. Team leaders, right now, when dynamics change, what happens for so many team leaders, especially if that momentum. Now they don't have momentum. They feel, as a leader, embarrassed or shamed that they're not getting the results, and they feel frustrated with the rest of the team that they're not getting the results. And so what they do is this brilliant strategy of not talk about it. And I'm here to tell you, like, you need to open the bills with the team again. You know, I promise you, Tim Cook had his dashboards of metrics that he looked at every Monday, and they talked about it, even though it was uncomfortable, even though the numbers were ugly. People forget during that time, major swaths of. Even the S&P 500 were losing market value of 30 to 70%. I mean, it was a bloodbath in the economy broadly more than real estate. And we forget that, you know, Facebook lost like 70% of its value during this. You're talking about billions of dollars. I mean, billions and billions of dollars per company wiped out in market cap. And so people. People don't realize what a difficult time we've already come through, and that the people who came through it during that time when they're watching it all fall apart. I'm promising you, they engaged it, they were radical in their candor and I love what you said, their resourcefulness that allowed them to recalibrate. Oh, wait, we can't do it the way you used to. So, okay, team obstacle ambition, how do we do it now? That conversation of how do we do it now? Has to happen after the disruption which.
Which builds confidence by the way. Like as a team gets together and, and, and says, gosh, this isn't what it used to be, but look what we're doing. Like, I, I, I, I can think of pieces of our business that, that showed up on, on my doorstep on, on, on, on March 1st or April 1st. And I said this is not what I thought this was going to look like. And, and you know, for a second, I'll be honest, like, I went through, like, I'm speaking from experience from earlier. Like, hey, you said that earlier. Yeah, because I said it to myself, like, I thought I don't need this. Yeah, like I'm good. Like maybe I just let this part go away and I don't have to think about it. But there was perfect. Like I had purpose in that. There was a purpose behind it. And so, so when, when we get there, we, we gotta flip that switch and say, okay, well like do, is there a reason for me to do this? If there's a reason for me to do this? And I, and then I get this small win and I get this small win, by the way, it's not nearly the win as I had a year ago, that same month or even two months prior, but I get these small wins. Then the team begins to look around each other and say, we could do this. Like there's confidence building. So again that the faster, not to put a time frame on it, but the faster we build that habit to get back into movement, forward movement, that confidence rises. And again, I just, I believe it's such a big piece of just fueling our resistance, resilience, rather just just gaining that confidence through that activity.
Yeah. So good, so good. You know, one area we didn't hit, but it cued to me when you talked about humility. I think it's really important to have humility. And yet I always also say that the mark of greatness that I've always seen is there's a level of pride and self respect in moving on and moving through things that you're like, I'm gonna do that, I'm gonna survive this because I'M gonna respect myself after I do that. That's a different type of confidence we're talking about. But there's a pride of knowing that you're on the field and you want to win. And I would say this. I shared this with a friend of mine who is in real estate, and he was bemoaning, but I listened to this for like an hour. We're out for a walk. I'm listening to this and this and going on and on and on. And we walked by one of his properties. And you're going to have to help me with the language here, buddy. But you know the sign that's out front of the property and their name is on it. Is there a name for that?
Just the sign.
Thank you. Whatever. But it's, you know, it's his sign, right? It's his. His name is on the literal post and the sign in front of this house. So we're walking along and I just grabbed him with shoulders. I go, bro, that's your name on that. And he's like, well, yeah. I goes, that. That's your name on that. He goes, yeah. I go, how dare you talk about yourself right now. You're building that. That's your representation. The way you are speaking right now, that is your sign. Is this what the universe is supposed to see? This is the sign of who you are to talk like this for this last hour on the road, Take some pride in yourself. You got that deal, you got that post. Like, take some pride. And I think sometimes people need that. I'll give another example. Maybe that doesn't resonate with everybody here, but I feel like if you put your name on something, fight for that, show up for that, you handed someone your card, follow up with them, that's your card, that's your name. That's your reputation. Your resilience right now is your reputation. Do you not get that? I worked with this guy. I'll leave his name unknown because it doesn't sound nice when I say it. Big NFL coach, and it's in the playoff season. And for those who know, I don't know anything about football, so it's a. It's a miracle that I am there being paid what I'm paid to help this coach get through the playoffs. Unbelievable. Remember, I'm not the physical coach. I'm the mindset coach. I mean, his high performance coach. And clock is ticking down, game's almost over. The. The other team, it has the ball and they do this wild play that nobody anticipates. I Mean, it's completely this bizarre. I think it's called a shovel pass, but they did multiple shovel passes and they get this touchdown. The place goes crazy. And the team that I'm on, the coach that I'm working with, I can immediately see he's kind of behind. He's, like, beside himself. The team all kind of gathers around because now they got to figure out the next play. So I'm just standing there. It's him, quarterback, defensive coordinator, and we're all just standing there. And the quarterback comes in, his eyes like, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? Just freaking out. What are we going to do? What are we going to do? And the coach goes, we're gonna knock the heads off. That's what we're gonna do. Get out there. And it was so funny because it's like, we're still. We did not see that coming. What are we gonna do? We're gonna go win. We're going to go win. We're gonna get back on this field, we're gonna knock some heads off, and we're gonna go down the end of the field and we're gonna get a point. Like, let's go. Like, it was so funny the way how he got so assertive in it. We're going to do what we do because that's who we are. We're gonna take pride in the fact that we're gonna go back out there, knock some heads out, get a touchdown and win this game. It was so inevitable. It was so obvious that of course, it sucks right now. So what are we gonna do? We're gonna go run our play. Yeah. The market disrupted, but my friend, he's stuck in that and he's going run the plays. That got you the post, man. What got you the post? Go run those place. The things you talked about earlier, making the calls, talking to old customers, knowing the market, like, being engaged and running the plays you already know how to run, that's going to knock out the wins. You can't just stay discouraged and upset. You've got to find your chance to recalibrate and go, I'm going to lock it in. I'm going to get back on the field. I'm going to knock some heads. We're going to win. And that mentality gets sucked away from us when we're around complainers or we allow ourselves to wallow in uncontrollables versus what's the obstacle. Let me knock that out and keep going. That mentality is not a trait that Mentality is a choice when you're on the field, when your name's on the post, that is a choice in the moment to keep going and to win and to. And a lot of people need to make that decision right now.
Yeah. You know, Brendan, the last thing I'll say, and I'm gonna. I'm gonna allow you to maybe just, you know, just talk to the group one last time before we wrap up here as we're headed to the top of the hour. I think what gets in the way of doing that is just noise. I saw Sean Achor speak recently. He, he wrote the Happiness Advantage and did all that. This research on what gets in the way of happiness. Happiness. Right. But. But he had, he had shared some research that, that our. Our. Our eyes, right, or. Or in our minds, our brains receive 11 million bits of information. Right, every second. And yet the brain can only effectively process 40 bits of information. And, and from the day I heard that, I remind myself of that in those moments of overwhelm that typically leads to discouragement, which typically leads. Leads to me, right, not feeling the most resilient. Like, listen, I got 11 million bits of information coming to me a second. What are the 40 that matter? Like, what are the 40 that matter? How do what 40am I focusing on, by the way? If I there. There could be 10.9 million bits of positive information, and if I'm focused on 40 own that recognize that, oh, I just have the 40 wrong bits of information. Some of us need to look at our partners and look at our friends and look at our colleagues and, and not on this call, but maybe afterwards, like, did you got. You got the wrong 40 bits? Like, go find to choose from. Like, go find your 40 awesome bits of information because those, those 40 will allow you to, to step out of what we're. Where we feel so sunk in. Into. And I just think that puts things in perspective by the way. It's. It's the, the premise of all happiness as well. Like, you know, I just choose. I choose a different 40 than most people. And that's my. Like the world could be falling. Falling apart. And I feel like, hey, like, listen, let's. Let's go figure this out. Like, let's go figure this out with people we like to figure things out with. For people that we want to figure it out for. Like that when we do that, it goes back to your first conversation around. It's a choice like, like we. I know we, We've talked for, for, for an hour about resilience, but I could have just said, hey, Brendan, like, how do we become more resilient? Like Chris, choose to be. Like, just tell me you don't got to get on a, on a zoom. Like, just choose it. And, and I think there's such value in, in that. So, anyway, any, any last comments? When we think about this topic, why it's important and how. How. How the people on. On. On. On the need to. Need to plug in and why it's important for them.
Yeah. Well, again, I just, I celebrate everybody here. Very few people do this work to keep their mindset in the right place. So I celebrate you. I thank Chris for having me here. And as you talked about, you know, it's focus and choosing the 40 and where to focus on everything. I think that's so important. I'll just end with a story is when I'm standing there with the coach and he says, we're going to knock their heads off. What I noticed was he didn't look around at the stadium of tens of thousands of people cheering and chanting for his and his team's demise. He didn't stare awkwardly at what's happening on the other team over there and what's going on over here and everything. He locked into the people who he had to get him on the field and get him to move. You have to zone out all of this distraction that is social media, that is all these other things that you just don't have control about and aren't making you feel good. Anyway, everyone watching this, you have some players on the field, they need your time and attention to know what the next plays are, to get that action and that progress again. And you already know it for yourself if you're the one on the field. But everyone here, if you're watching this, you're on the field. Don't forget, you're already on the field, have that joy and that pride and that respect of putting in a full game, not opening, you know, not refusing to open the Bills, not refusing to have the conversation, not asking, how do we get resourceful? No, no, ask that, engage that, open that and work with the people on the field to move it down. Because you know what? It's going to be hard and it's going to be inch by inch, but then you break through and you get this momentum and you win. And I'm telling you, like that earlier metaphor, people are still paddling and they're out there and it's like right now, oh, we can all collect in our little boats and complain about it, but we're going to open it up and look out there and that guy, that girl, she's like miles away. You're not going to catch them. So do the groundwork and do the basics and win with the people on the field that you got, and I promise you'll be proud you did.
Yeah, I don't know if everyone caught it earlier. I almost said it, but I just let it go by. But when you were talking about, about the, the paddler, Brendan said like, and then there's the other guy that has the hip snap. So I think we can probably, probably sum up the call and just say like, we just need more hip snap in our. And we're all just paddling ahead so.
Some people know what I'm talking about. I promise.
As as always appreciate you like we are. Our organization is just blessed to have someone like you that, that stepped into the chief growth advisory role for us. And the reason being is because your mission and your purpose is every day is a growth day. By the way, everyone at PLACE already is on that app. But if you're here as a guest, which I think we have 500, 600 guests, if you're here as a guest, download the app. I was just on a call this morning in one of our top agents here in Portland. You know, Shelly said I was asking, hey, how do you get your day started? And she goes, I gotta be honest, I, I listened to the daily fire like, growth day. Oh, that's good day. It's. It's hard to not be resilient if we show up with that. We love having you here as a, as a supporter of PLACE and as a, as. As leading personal growth within our organization. And you do that outside of this organization, do for the world. World, we know that's your mission. We're glad to just bring you to the real estate industry and look forward to doing that even at greater level. So thank you again. We thank everybody for being on with us. In the meantime, if you need anything, you know where we are. Reach out. Thanks for being on. Thanks, Brendan.
Thanks, everybody. Thanks, Chris.
Sa.
