In this motivational talk, Jacqueline Elliott argues that true leadership is defined by a willingness to tackle big problems, a rigorous self‑assessment of personal virtues, and an integrated approach to team and family life. She challenges leaders to examine whether they act from confidence or fear, and to confront difficult conversations with under‑performers and high‑performers alike. Elliott introduces a five‑point self‑rating system covering integrity, discipline, emotional control, stewardship, and accountability, urging leaders to rate themselves honestly. She stresses work‑life integration, suggesting that involving spouses and families builds deeper loyalty and trust. A core theme is the "delusional leader" mindset: leaders must adopt unwavering belief in their ability to close deals and achieve goals, while also balancing numbers with genuine human connection. Finally, she outlines a detailed structure for effective morning meetings—reiterating mission, recognizing over‑delivery, reviewing revenue, offering help, identifying improvement areas, providing a concrete game‑plan tool, and ending with high energy—to keep teams engaged and productive.
Chapters
But you have to understand that great leaders are great problem solvers. Sometimes we try to avoid problems. You're like, man, it's all these other problems. You're a leader because you were trusted to solve big problems. I always tell my team, my leaders, solve big problems, make big impact. Make big impact, make big money. Sometimes we run away from problems. We're problem diggers. We want to solve big problems all the time. We make a lot of mistakes. We just have to not make the same mistakes over and over. You know, you have a lot of responsibility. God trusted you with being a leader, and he gave you this opportunity because he knew you could handle it and you could solve big problems. So don't run away from problems. That's where true fulfillment comes in. So take a moment to answer the following questions: When making crucial decisions, am I operating from a foundation of confidence and possibility, or am I being driven by insecurity and worst-case scenarios? How are you driven? Worst case scenarios or responsibility? And sometimes we've been leading from fear disguised as strategy. Is this you? I've been there. I've disguised fear with strategy. You have to know if that's the difference. What challenging conversation or decision has— have you been postponing that if you had the courage to address it today, would create a breakthrough for your team? Think about what that looks like. Who do you need to talk to? An entitled top performer like with Daniel? An underperformer that doesn't meet the standard that you say, oh man, he's just so nice. He's a good person. He believes in our core values. He's also lowering the standard for your team. You have to have both. You have to push them. That's why they came to you. You have to learn how to do that. Somebody that doesn't align with the core values at home. Your core values here are great, but what about at home? What does it look like at home? I mean, the thing is, your responsibility is to build great men and women, and they have to do that at home, not just at work. This is work-life integration. That's how you get loyalty, trust, and everything. When the spouses come to the events that you put together, do they look at you as leaders like, man, this is the asshole that keeps them late all the time? Or they're like, man, He made my husband great. You changed your life. Thank you so much for pushing him. And I see another level in him. It's so amazing. You've made a team, built a team that way. That's what we do. We bring the wives in. I mean, we, we build a team with them. We know they're, we know the wives, we know the kids, we know everything about these people. And we know how they treat them at home. We have meetings with the spouses all the time. That's what makes a great leader. Hey, look at how you've been showing up as a leader over the past 3 months. Are you becoming a leader that your future self would admire and respect? Would you want to be led by you? Talk about looking in the mirror and being proud of yourself. Can you look in the mirror and be proud of yourself? And the truth is, when something is left undone, people think it stays the same. It doesn't. Nothing stays the same. It either gets better or they get worse. So if you're leaving some things undone, it's only going to get worse. It always is. Okay, so there's a self-assessment here. I want you to rate yourself from 1 to 10. Your integrity: do I do the right thing when no one is watching? Did I keep my word even when it cost me? I learned that integrity isn't about the big moments. It's about the quiet decisions you made when nobody was watching? Discipline. Did I show up consistently even when I didn't feel like it? Did I finish what I started? Rate yourself. How did you do it when you didn't feel like it? What does it look like for you? Those days cost your team a lot of momentum. Truly. Emotional control. Did I lead with composure or react from emotions? How did I handle conflict? Hmm, we talked about reaction. How did you handle conflict? Discipline could have prevented some of that. Think about it. Stewardship— did I steward my time and my talents and my resources well? Did I invest or waste what I was given? Rate yourself there. Too much energy, maybe lower, lower value tasks. How did it go for you? Maybe other things that could have moved the needle that you didn't focus on, that you were holding on to instead. How did you steward your time? Accountability. Did you reward or have consequences for goals, deadlines, or did you have golden handcuffs? What did that look like for you? But also, as a leader, you have to be very, very— you have to control your time and get very creative with that. You have to know what moves your people. We're going to talk about different ways to move your people, people in leading your team. But we're going to talk about being a delusional leader. Okay, we have to be delusional leaders. No, it sounds a little bit awkward, but we talk in that way. Okay, leaders are not born, they're made. Okay, if you're in sales, we talk about being the delusional closer. Okay, knowing that you're going to close every deal when you walk in, that's how you feel. You talk to every single person, even though somebody's like, oh man, this guy's difficult. Oh, and they tell you maybe too much information when you come and you're like already like, oh man, this guy's gonna be Or if you don't really know that much information, you come in with all the energy and you know you're going to close the deal. Well, you have to be a delusional closer for your people, right? And knowing that you're going to close every deal in that way, I'm going to shift your mindset into being a delusional leader. Okay? So you have to be in that, in everything that you do. Okay? So you have to think, I'm a great leader all the time, and you have to plan for those future expectations. But here's the other side. You don't just talk about numbers, numbers, and numbers. If all you do is talk about numbers, then you start losing some of that connection with your people. It happens a lot in high-driven environments. If all you do is talk about numbers, you'll lose everything else that matters. So you're going to have to think about it. How often do I talk about the other things that aren't just numbers? So sometimes you have to be that leader that's fun, that's smiling, that brings that energy, that's easy to talk to. Do the unexpected sometimes, surprise them. It's a really good thing, you know. You have to be that leader that's inspiring, that people like to follow. How predictable are you? Predictable leaders aren't really— or they become uninspiring. You're predictable when you show up. When you show up with your coffee, your meetings sound the same, and everybody— they don't feel like they're growing. They don't feel like they can have initiative. Start having fun with your people. Do you laugh enough? Do you smile enough? Do you have a good time with your team? Do they want to— do they want to follow you? When your people are struggling at home, do they come to you and talk to you first? Are you the one that gives them good, good advice? Oh man, oh my wife this. Oh yeah, yeah, mine does the same thing. Oh, you don't have to deal with that. Oh, come and do this. Or are you the guys like, man, you know, Angie, she loves you, man. Go apologize, go say— go say sorry, and then come back home. Come back later. That's going to save them a whole week of production if you do that. Do you understand? A whole week of just being in the shit the whole time because you told them, oh yeah, mine does that too, instead of being like, hey, go take off and go buy her a bouquet of flowers and tell her you love her and that you're sorry. And then they come back different people. You saved the whole week. Sometimes a week, sometimes— I mean, it's so crazy how that works. What are you telling your people? Are you advising them in the right way? You have to truly love your people, you know. And when you love your people, there are some things that could go wrong. They could take advantage of you. But loving your people is a great thing. It is. God gave you a heart to give that love. You really have to care about your people, and they know it. They feel it when they bring problems to you, when they tell you things. If you really care about them, then you can be direct with them and you can push them and drive them, but you only can do that if they care. Okay, so we talked about having meetings here, we're going to talk about the importance of morning meetings, and what you need to do to structure them so they don't become those boring meetings that we talked about. You know, they talk about updates, they talk about all of these things, they go through the motions, but they're lifeless, right? So what do you do in your morning, in your morning meetings? Number 1, you have to reiterate the mission. What's your mission? Why it's important to you, talk about your core values all the time in your meetings. Okay, number 2, recognition. Make examples of people who over-delivered. It takes 1 minute. Always, always showcase somebody that did something great. Always give the credit away to somebody else. It's so important. Showcase somebody that over-delivered, always. Number 3, you can talk about revenue numbers. Go over what people are tracking openly. Create healthy competition within your team. Always. Commodity is amazing. Our high-driven people like to be— I mean, they like when people hit big numbers and then they, they're constantly moving in that way. Competition is outside, not within your team. Like, hey, healthy competition is great. 4, offer help in your meetings. Always. What do you need to hit your number? And show that you're paying attention. 5, areas of improvement. You always have to do this in the middle of your meetings. Areas of improvement. This is where the criticism comes in. This is the things that we're maybe doing a little bit wrong. Don't end your meetings on that. Don't end on a bad note. Okay, number 6, game plan. Give them one tool they can use. If you don't give them one tool minimum in your meetings, they're just noise. Something that they can apply. Prepare for your meetings before you go in. Don't just wing it. If you wing in your meetings or winging the day, they're not giving you the production they need. They're not moving the needle. You have to know, okay? Bring innovation, something new all of the time, or else they're just noise. And at the end, there's a chance there's a huddle. I know you guys have a lot of energy. End with your energy. End with your energy. Creed, slogan, hands in. They leave fired up, ready to go, ready to own the day, always. Okay? So if you're not structuring your meetings in that way, they're just that noise and they sound the same over and over. And then you wonder by 12 o'clock, by 2:30, why it feels like it's a country club in your office.
