Leadership And Thought Leadership In A Changing World

What is thought leadership? So, you know, I think people start throwing this term around and it's, you know, we at my firm have been doing this for 15 years, so we're sort of old in the space and we have a perspective as to what that means. But I think people are jumping on that word and it's getting a little bit beaten up a little bit. It's, it's, it's people don't, you know, when people use the same word in different ways, we don't know what we're talking about anymore. You know, it's maybe on its way to guru-dom, which is a horrible word. But my belief in terms of what thought leadership is, is there's 2 elements to it, right? So there's the thoughtfulness. What are you doing that is thoughtful, that is adding to things? So thoughtful could be based on, you know, from an academic perspective, could be based on research. It could be experiential based on your client work. It could be interesting, meaning putting together 2 things that people haven't thought about in the same way. If you think about sort of the birth of behavioral economics, that's really thoughtful, putting 2 totally different disciplines together, economics and psychiatry and neuropsychology, and saying, wait a minute, rational man, psychology people are kind of messed up. What if we put those together? Does irrational man ever go to the store and buy things? Like, what does that look like? That branched a whole amazing piece. So that's the thoughtful piece. The second piece is the leadership piece, is meaning you're taking— you're standing on and acknowledging the shoulders of the giants that you stand on. Like, nobody I haven't seen yet is totally inventing anything totally brand new. It is building on a discipline that you're entrenched in, and you're leading the conversation to a new direction. You're adding to it, you're leading it. You're not afraid to be a little controversial. Doesn't mean it's a popularity contest and everyone has to agree with you, but it's got to be thoughtful, and you have to be elevating the conversation and taking it, or at least attempting to take it, to a new place. And the last sort of twist of it, as I see it, is it's not one directional anymore. That's not the world that we live in. Is what can you do to engage others to have those conversations, to, to participate with you? And so we had a couple new people joining. If you want to turn your cameras on, I see Sander and Eric. So that's, that's my definition. And I'll throw it back to you for your definition of leadership.

Thank you for that. Because the reason I— that, you know, Peter and I were discussing this last weekend about how— where we were going to go with this. The reason I wanted to do it this way was because for you to see that there is so much crossover. So when people ask me, what is leadership? You know, it's not a new thing to say leadership isn't about your title. I think most of us understand that. And in many ways, thought leadership and leadership crossover enormously because when I'm asked what leadership is, the first thing I say is at the simplest possible level, It is influence and impact. And it is the responsibility and accountability to influence and impact. So what that means is that people say to me, well, I'm not really a leader. I don't have a title. And who cares? It's got nothing to do with it. Are you a leader of your family? Are you a leader in your friend group? Are you a leader in your church community? Are you a leader in some other place? And the answer is yes. You're having influence and impact, therefore you are a leader. And the thing I like about that is not to give everybody the title, but to have everybody become responsible and accountable for their own life and for the fact that they are having impact on others. And it doesn't allow us to be victims. It allows us to step into greater levels of power in how we do that. So leadership for me is at that level. Now then, we can start boiling that down a little bit. in the context of what I see leadership and how the people I work with, leadership is about meaning. So if you, you need to understand that the, the, the, the difference between an average leader, a mediocre leader, and a great leader is one who has a single unified monolithic meaning and shares that meaning with others. That meaning frames the culture of the organization. It is based in the ethics and the, what we call, the maxims of the organization. The culture is built on it, and everything surrounds it. So this is the single monolithic meaning. This is our foundation. This is what we're about. It's not a— so we say, well, is that the passion? No. Passion is a vehicle. Is it the purpose? Well, kind of, but not really. So the analogy I'll often use is I'll say to people, have you read Simon Sinek's book Start with Why? They go, yeah, great book, fantastic. I go, agree. What's the first word of that title? And they go, start. And I go, yes, it's a start. So when we're talking about single unified meaning, which we call Dragonfire, that's the why of the why. So that the leader is responsible for knowing what is it that actually really drives them. Not what are they passionate about, not what is the flavor of the week, not what is the thing that's getting them aggravated on the news this week, but what is that primary driver inside that human being. And then to collectively surround yourself with a board of advisors, with a C-suite, with a group who all have their own that they can tie to your unified meaning. And that is what we drive forward with in the company from a very ethical point of view. So that's my sort of Reader's Digest version of what leadership is.

So let's, let's sort of build on that for a moment, Doug. So now you've got the issue of, okay, so I'm a leader. And/or a thought leader, right? So where does the thought leadership fit in? So I, you know, I look at a Linda that I know and your investments in thought leadership and what you've done to put it out there in media. So let's talk about, about that for a little bit in terms of as a leader, there's almost a, you know, it's a little bit of a chicken and egg. There's almost an obligation to have thought leadership so people know who you are, what you stand for, what your beliefs are, and whether that lives in a book or in other things, right? And as a thought leader, There is an element of leadership involved in there. So thoughts on that, Doug? And if anybody else wants to jump in, add a question.

Well, it's what you were— it's what you were saying, Peter. You know, it's the reason we started off the way we did, because there is so much crossover. We think of leadership in the context of I'm the CEO of XYZ company, but that's only one aspect of it. So yes, absolutely. I am considered by many to be a thought leader. I write multiple books, best-selling books. I write articles for Inc. and Entrepreneur and all kinds of different outlets. And, you know, I create— I've got 700 videos on YouTube. I guess I'm a thought leader. I don't hold that title because it's not relevant to me. But I think there's a responsibility, and this is what I'm always saying about It's a responsibility and accountability to how is the— what is the influence you're having and what are you doing with that influence. And so for me, if you're— there are, of course, introverted, quiet leaders. Wonderful. No problem with that whatsoever. But I think that if your leadership is based in what I call dragon fire, in the why of your why, in that depth, Then there's a responsibility to share something out there into the world, and that of course then becomes thought leadership.

So sharing is the key? Whatever it is you're doing, sharing is the key to becoming a thought leader, Dov?

Well, I wouldn't say just sharing because I think that becomes noise-making, Robert. So I would say it's not about sharing. It's actually The reverse, for me, leadership is the reverse of that first and foremost, which is not sharing but curiosity. So not questioning, curiosity. So I want to make this clear to everybody because this is foundational in the work that I do. Questioning requires answers. Curiosity requires understanding. Those are vastly different things. One is exponential. One is a conclusion. A question gets you to an answer, which is a conclusion. But curiosity is constantly growing, it's deepening. And so in that deepening, so that curiosity is with self first, and then with others, and then looking for the rapport, the common ground between those 2 things. Because I am not for everybody. I get that and I'm good with that. In fact, some people even on here might go, I don't like that guy. Great, that's all right. It just means I'm not your teacher. That's wonderful. I'm okay with that. And there's probably wonderful people out there for you. But other people are like, oh, I get this now. And that's what— so it's a curiosity before a sharing. And then there's a responsibility in the sharing. But in that sharing piece, in the line with thought leadership, this is something that goes hand in hand with the curiosity. So curiosity is foundational, but you gotta have courage. You gotta have the courage to make the statements that you want to make that you are deeply connected to.

Well, so I want to build on that, Dov. So the fact that you've got a lot of stuff out there in multiple formats, right? You've got articles, you've got your column, you've got videos. If someone is in the market for a leadership guy, for whatever the guy or gal, right? And, and you're, you know, they come across your stuff, It's going to be a self-selection process, and I agree, not everybody's for all tastes, right? So by the time they've spent whatever, 15, 20 minutes, maybe a couple hours if they choose to, going through your stuff, by the time you get on the phone, they're not going to be surprised at what may or may not come out of your mouth or where you're coming from, or you know, you're not milquetoast or whatever, and that's cool, right? And I think from a stylistic perspective and more importantly from a thought leadership perspective, So, you know, there used to be this antiquated thinking of, well, geez, if I put it all in my book or I put it all out there on videos or if I put it all out there in articles, well, what's left for them to pay me to do? And it's like, that kind of doesn't make any sense. If you don't put it out, how do they know who you are and what you stand for and what you're about and how you can be helpful to them? So I would argue that there probably isn't much that you actually do with clients when you're speaking to them. that they haven't seen or read elsewhere. And that's great, right? I mean, how would you respond to that?

The difference is that it becomes subjective and personal. So I totally understand where you're coming from, what you just said, Peter, because I was that guy. When I started out 36 years ago, I was like, I'm not going to share that. They have to pay me for that. And in fact, when I started speaking, if you wanted to hear me speak, you got on a plane or bus or train or whatever it was to come and hear me speak, or I've gotten one to go to you, and you paid money for anything I had to say. Now that I've got more material out in the world than I ever had back in those days that I just give away for absolutely free because, and as you said, you know, it's because you want people to see the value. And more importantly, and this aligns with, with, um, thought leadership, you want to see the clear point of differentiation. How many— just let's just take a look at this in my space, leadership. How many leadership people are out there? My God, like every man and his dog, every cat woman and her cat are in the, you know, I'm a leader. Okay, you know, you've been a leader for 10 minutes. Like, what do you know? It's not about that. It's about knowing what yours is, sharing that. And as you just said, Peter, making that so clear for others that they can go, yeah. So they are self-selecting in or out, and that's okay. And that's why I said the courage And where I find most leaders and people who aspire to thought leadership— and I'm going to use that aspire underlined— to thought leadership is they lack gonads. They totally lack the gonads to do it because they're not willing to make a statement. There are things you have got to claim with absolute certainty, not arrogance, but certainty. This is what I know. This is my experience. This is what no one else can do for you that I do, and, and that is the truth of it, and here's why, and I can back it up. That's a claim, and if you don't have that, don't bother. It's okay, just don't bother. That's a management position. That's not a leadership position, and it's certainly not a thought leadership position. If you're teaching on the edge and keeping everything in the gray, you're not doing leadership, you're not doing thought leadership. My, my, my job is to help people get off the fence. I'm not building a wider fence. I'm helping you to get off the fence. My side, great. The other side, great.

I don't—

I'm okay with it, but get off the fence.

Yeah, and I think that's, that's, that's sort of the point of is to be unique. Um, now if a client comes to you and they have some parameters, of course, you know, that's up to you. And they say, hey, listen, in this crowd, you know, there's certain language we don't use because it's a whatever audience, you say, okay, great, I can handle that. But if they say to you, you know, you always talk about you believe in this and this and this, could you not talk about that? That's probably not going to be a fit for you.

No, again, this is back to the courage to own your conviction. And not just the courage to own your conviction, but the willing— you know, I wrote an article on this a long time ago, which is the most powerful thing you'll ever say is no. Right? So you've got to be willing to say no. But we get into these, into this scarcity mindset. We go, I can't say no. Yeah, you can. In fact, you're more valuable if you say no. I get about 10 private meetings a week for people who want to be on my podcast, and I say no to at least 8. No.

Mm-hmm.

And that's the reason I have the number 1 podcast in the world, Fortune 500, because I have amazing guests. There was this Bloke, what was his name? Peter Will— no, Will— Winky. Peter Winky, I think.

Something like that.

Anyway, he was on there a while ago. So, you know, I say no because I want to make sure that I'm going to hold to that. I have to— that's what I'm saying about having the gonads to own it fully. Let people self-select. Absolutely.

Cool. Does anybody have any questions for Dov in terms of— because Because what Dov's really good at, he's out there in every format. He's got the podcast, he's got the videos, he's speaking. Anybody got any thoughts or questions for Dov or me in terms of any of those modalities or formats?

While you're thinking of the question, I'll just tell everybody how to pronounce my name. My name doesn't have an E on it, even though Peter loves to pronounce it that way. My name is not Dov, that's a bird. It's Dov, like a dog. But with a B, Dalv.

Wow.

I've always thought of you as a—

For the last 10 minutes, when I heard you talk about leadership, I got the feeling that you were talking about the leader, the person at the top. Some of the things you— well, some of the things you said clearly came across that way. And but I'm assuming that that was a The choice word at the moment, but it's everybody from a frontline supervisor to the CEO who helps people get results.

Yeah, so you're absolutely, you're absolutely right, Robert, that it, it is the person with the title, of course, right? But everybody is in their own way a leader. You might be a leader inside of your family, might be a leader inside of your church community, or whatever it might be. It's, are you willing to take on the responsibility and the accountability of being a leader? Some people are not. So I'm not one of those guys who says everybody's a leader. I'm saying everybody has the opportunity to lead. That's different.

Right.

And if you have the opportunity to lead, then you need to have the responsibility of that. You need to have the accountability of that. And in order to do that, you need to know your dragonfire. You need to know what your ethics are. You need to know what you hold as maxims and the meaning that you're going to drive forward. So yeah, it's everybody potentially— not everybody in actuality, but potentially. And of course, if you have that, that title in any way, shape, or form.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Cool. Anybody else?

How long did it take you to become a thought leader? When were you recognized as a thought leader and how did you know it?

Me or Peter?

Both.

Go ahead, Peter.

Did somebody start calling you that all of a sudden or did you start calling yourself that all of a sudden? Yeah.

So let me, let me I'll clarify part of my definition now. Anybody that calls themselves a thought leader, I mean, that's, that's just bad news, right? I think part of the definition is that you're acknowledged by others in the community, your peers, etc., etc. So anybody that goes out there saying, look at me, look at me, I'm a, I'm a guru, I'm a thought leader, probably isn't. So, you know, Dov is a little humble in this regard, but it's the acknowledgments that you get and the kudos that you get from those in the community. Right. So the fact that he's writing, you know, he's, he's got his column, the fact that he's got the awards, the fact, you know, all that sort of fun stuff adds up, but it's, it's really, uh, it's an outcome. It's not the objective. Right.

I think the way, if you try and, I'm definitely of the belief that you should own a moniker if you want to hold on a moniker or something. But if you try to own a title like guru or thought leader, like, the first thing I'm going to do is not take your call because it's like, you know, you're a cheeseball. I'm sorry, you're just like, you know, like, I'm not interested in that. Um, you know, what am I— you know, when people say to me, what do you, what do you do? I'm here to serve. That's it. I'm here to serve. It just happens to take the form that it takes. But I'm here to serve. That's what it is. I have a moniker that I own that's entirely mine, sure, but I'm here to serve. That's it. And if that service—

So part of your definition for thought leadership is that you have an inclination to be a servant-based leader among other models and theories that you incorporate, correct? You said serve 3 times.

Yeah, I do. I would definitely say, yeah, I'm— and I'm— because I'm definitely a servant leader. And I think that part of the illusion of that is that people think that's religion or religious. It's not, right? Many servant leaders who are not Christians. There are many servant leaders who are. That's fine. It's got nothing to do with religion. So I think it's, you know, it's definitely about being a servant leader, but the illusion of that oftentimes is that Those people want to be wishy-washy. They want to be a servant leader but not really take a stand. Well, you can't serve without taking a stand. So I'm back to courage and gonads. And so, and so people go, oh, well, you hold on, you have to— so think of it as a servant warrior then. That's okay. You have to step into it. You have to claim it. You have to be willing to stand for something that is valuable. So, you know, my moniker is I'm the Dragonist, and I talk about why that is. And part of the thing is, is that what is a dragon? If you look at all mythology, which I'm fascinated with, you will see that a dragon always sits on gold. It protects that which is valuable. That gold is not money. It's the—

Right.

It's a statement of value. A dragon protects what is valuable. And if you can't breathe fire onto anybody who wants to take away what's valuable, you're not really leading. So I'm willing to take that stand for whoever it is that I serve. That's what I mean. So you've got to— that's why I'm saying yes, curiosity, yes, serve, but yes, you also have to be a dragon. You have to be a warrior. You have to make that stand because you need to— you're looking to move people to a better quality of life in whatever form that takes.

Yep. So I want to take this in a bit of a different direction for a moment, if we could. So you said it earlier, and I want to push on a little bit, right? So the world doesn't need another leadership expert, right? I mean, if we Google leadership now, there's probably, I don't know, billions that show up, right?

Billions.

So the question is, you know, how do you— how did you make the decisions that you did to carve out your lane, right? Because there's there's a way to differentiate from a style perspective. Like, I know from what I observe from, from your work, there's a style piece, there's a certain way that you dress, but that's, that's sort of packaging. It's important. It's not the meat and potatoes, but there's a certain style that you have when you're on stage, you're a little bit out there. There's a certain— there's a colorfulness to you. But talk about sort of your lane and how you sort of— maybe some trial and error and how you know that you're staying in the lane and you're— it's your brand, your flavor of leadership?

Okay, so it's a— that's a great question because it's probably something that others are confronted with constantly. To sort of give a very quick background, which will help you to understand why I'm— where I'm going. My original studies were metaphysical studies. I traveled the world to study with different metaphysical teachers. uh, Vedanta, which is Hindu philosophy, Buddhism, the Tao, Gnostic Christianity, Coptic Christianity, and Kabbalah and Torah. From that, I started studying psychology because I got sick of people who were very spiritual but very flaky. And so I started studying psychology, and I became a family counselor and started learning family dynamics, and then got kind of sick of people moaning, complaining, and not doing much. So I started studying Jungian psychology and then started studying the psychology of excellence, which today is called leadership. Then got interested in neurosciences and quantum physics and ended up writing a thesis on the intersection of those things. So the reason I'm telling you that is not just like, ooh, look at me, how smart I am. It's got nothing to do with that. You know, because I could also go, ooh, look at me, look at how distracted I am. I am deeply curious about these things and I can go in any one of those directions. The problem is that then gives me a laundry list and people don't know what to do. And that was the biggest problem I had. That's why I'm telling you all that was the biggest problem I had, because I could go in a million different directions. So I'm going to give you all a piece that I did on myself that I actually teach leaders to do. And I'm not going to go through the whole thing because it would take too long, but I'm going to give you a start. And so the start is this. I want you to take out a piece of paper or something to write on in some way, shape, or form. And I want to ask you this one question. What is something that has pissed you off for as long as you can remember? Not kind of upset you. Not got on your nerves on CNN or on Fox or, you know, not Donald Trump because that's too contemporary. Not BoJo, because that's too contemporary. Not even coronavirus, too contemporary. Look at things that have bothered you for as long as you can possibly remember, that you looked at and you went, why hasn't somebody fixed that? That's what you've got to go after. You don't get your dreams, you don't get your inspiration, you don't get your desire by accident. Your hopes, your dreams, your desires are your soul crying out for expression, and that's your niche right there. And then you go, how can I frame that in the context of who I want to serve? So I want to serve people in service, uh, in the service industry. Okay, that's the niche you picked. Great. Now hone it around that problem. Because then you'll be talking to something that matters to you. Because the number one thing in finding your niche is finding meaning. And finding meaning is not an intellectual process. It is an emotional process. You have got to get on fire. You've got to find that. And it's not passion. It's pissosity. It's not passion. You've got to be praying to the Greek god Pissed Off-ius. You've got to get connected to that fire that is infuriating you that you want to change. And that you may know I can't do this on my own, so you're going to lead in that direction. And you say, so I can create this tribe of people who are all trying to solve this in the world in our own unique tiny little way that collectively creates this tsunami of change.

Well, I want to build on that because I think that's at the individual level. That's what drives you, right? So you have to come to that conclusion. Now you sort of stand there naked in front of the world and go, uh-oh, is there a market here? So who am I going to serve? And you've limited by definition who you're going to serve based on what, what that issue is, because it's not applicable to the universe. Then sort of what are the modalities and the distribution? It gets a little bit more tactical there. What are the pain points that they have? Because if you're the— like, I was thinking sort of jokingly, well, what's the thing that drives me crazy? It's when you go to a fast food place and they give you a ketchup pack that no one's ever used. One, like, why aren't they 3 times the size? But I can't make a business out of that, right? It's just an irritant, right? Does that qualify to be— I'm gonna be the guy that— okay, let's go.

If you wanted to, you could make a business out of it. It— but I'm not talking about— but you're talking about something that irritates you. That's not what I'm talking about. So I'm talking about something that pisses you off. That's vastly different. That's what I'm saying. So we've all got a million things that irritate us. Right? I'm irritated by slow drivers because I'm a European. I drove in Europe. I learned to drive in Europe. Slow drivers drive me nuts. Yeah, but I'm not going to change that because it's not— it's an irritant. It's more to do with me than it is to do with them. So there's a difference. That's why I said it's about pissosity. It's about looking at something that's like, decide what is the hill I want to die on. Most people don't have the balls for it, and if they don't, they're not going to make the difference they want to make. So when you get to the thing that bothers you so deeply, you can then, you can apply that to the world and you can build enormous business out of it. Enormous business.

Well, but my, my point was, once you've got your thing, it has— there has to be an intersection between what you want to put out in the market and what the market wants. And it, it's not always true in every case. So where I was going to go with you is, okay, so now that you've got your thing, tell us about, you know, Maybe earlier on when you had the clarity for yourself, where you brought it to the market and said, hmm, okay, so maybe, you know, the onboarding of nuns is not a market for me. How did you test different markets to go, yeah, this is where it resonates and this not so much, and that's okay? I mean, it's a big world, there's lots of markets.

Sure. So, and you're absolutely right, because that is one of the key things is you've got to be willing to test it. Don't test it by writing a book. Please don't do that. Test it by writing an article. Test it by spending $30 on that article to promote it. And test it by focusing your ads in 2 different directions as an A/B testing to see if they are interested in it. So if this is a problem that you see that HR must deal with. Maybe HR don't care about it, but to your surprise, the people in sales really do. Right? So there was a piece I wrote a long time ago that I went, oh my God, the only people who are responding to this are people in sales, and I did not write it for sales. But I then wrote an ebook around it that I just sold to salespeople.

It was like, okay, so you, so you got the intelligence from the market and it said your hypothesis is wrong. HR folks don't care about this, but hello, over here, the salespeople. So you could have either ignored that and said, yeah, I just want to serve HR people. You said, oh, that's interesting. You know, if I position it in such and such a way, here's a market I wasn't thinking of, but it will, it will present itself to you. And you have to be able to, A, to hear it, put the systems and processes in place to to get that feedback in and then pivot and respond to it. Have there been— is there an example of a hypothesis or a market that you thought you'd kill it in that did not work out and maybe went the other way?

Only about 100. Yeah, because I mean, it's what you say, right? You've got to be willing to know. So, part of the trap, and I know I fell into the trap So many times. Part of the trap is what's cool and trendy.

Right.

I'm sorry?

What's cool and trendy. So I'll give you an example. I was telling this to Peter last week, that I had my team go through my site and remove a word off my site that has been on my sites for more than 20 years. And I And I removed the word because now it's cool and trendy. And the word is authentic. Because—

Oh, geez.

Oh my God, I want to kill people when they use that word because they don't— because this is an authentic water mug. This is an authentic cup. I mean, everything's authentic. So it's got no meaning anymore. So when something becomes trendy, it loses its meaning. And that's a challenge. So So oftentimes I found myself in a trend that I actually maybe had been ahead of. I'd been in a trend and I actually had to get out of it, actually remove myself from it. So one of the things is that I would say to you is when you're looking at those who you think you can serve and why you can serve them is first and foremost, I said it earlier, get curious. You have to be curious. So I always start with a generic question, an open question. What is the, what is the biggest challenge you see in leadership today? Generic. It's open, right? I listen to all that. I post that on Facebook. I post that in my groups. I post that on LinkedIn, Twitter. I send out my emails. Let me collect all that data. And I'm gonna go, okay, what are the top 5 things that come out of that? And am I addressing those, or am I addressing them but, but I've never really focused it in that way? And that tells me, oh, there's a whole market of people here who want what I have. I just haven't, I haven't shown them that I actually already do that and that it's available.

Sure.

So I've, and I've gone the other way where I haven't been curious. I've just been passionate about something. And then I've, you know, that's cost me a lot of money. And a lot of time.

Sure. But I want to push on the trendy thing because I think there is a fine line between trendy and being fluid so that you stay relevant, right? So for example, you know, we go back to just February, just sort of pre-COVID world, and content, you know, parallels in terms of the market for content, the economic cycles, the business cycles, the things that are going on in the world. So the things that were in vogue, if you will, Or the war for talent. Oops, 40 million people unemployed. I guess that war's over, right? The employee experience, not that we're anti-employee experience here, but to find the resources for that now, given we're living in all this uncertainty and economic chaos, it's not gonna happen. So I think, you know, like Bill and I have a client that was, or is, in the customer experience business in retail and hospitality. Not a fun place to be this, you know, this quarter or next quarter or the quarter after. However, Opportunistically, they realized, wait a minute, how come some companies are winning? Amazon, Lululemon, et cetera. They've created the digital experience, because all too often in retail and hospitality, because it's more of a physical business, that their definition of customer experience is, what is the experience like when I walk into a Westin, and what are the smells, and they give me a cookie? Well, how do I experience that? When you order from like a Lululemon online, it's a very parallel experience to being in the store. We live in a world where you can't go to the store. Now they figured out how to still capture market share. So I think that's the difference between being sort of trendy and trying to catch the wave. Being trendy is, oh, I'm a work-from-home expert 3 weeks ago. Well, okay, great. Nobody really cares about that. But being relevant, I think there's a fine line there.

You're absolutely right, Peter. There is a fine line. I wrote a piece that just came out, I think a couple of weeks ago, on my Dragon's Path outlet on Medium. And it says— and the title of it is Agility is the New Certainty.

Yeah.

That we've got to be agile. You don't— and so one of the things I say is your agility is in how, not why. So it's how you do what you do, but the meaning of what you do has to remain the same. Because that's, that's the claim. That's who— this is what I'm about.

So the agility— Hold on. Did you say how?

Yeah.

Is, is, is the definitive—

No, I said how is the agility. You have to be agile within how you do something, but the why stays the same. The purpose, the meaning stays the same.

But how about As we rock into whatever future we're going to be, if you look at all the rhythms and flows that are going on in organizations that leaders at every level have to renew, or maybe reinforce in some cases, I mean, I don't hear you— I don't hear that in what you're saying. Robert, we're looking at the—

Robert, can you create— so if it's important to you to provide an employee with a certain experience while they're working for you, and that is embedded in your what matters to you, what is the meaning for you, you can't do that in the same way you did it before. So the how has to change. That's what I'm saying.

Okay, right. Okay, that's where the changing the rhythms and the flows. Okay, I got you. Thank you for clarifying.

So let's, let's stay on that how piece for a moment. So for example, one of the things we're, we're seeing in the marketplace is, you know, we're all working remotely now. For some of us, that's new. For some of us, it's not new. But for many more in the corporate world, this is a whole new experience, right? And there wasn't any training for it. There wasn't any prep for it. If there was gonna, you You know, if a company was going to make a decision to say starting in Q3, 80% of our workforce will work from home, there would have been meetings and committees and, you know, we would have sort of beaten it to death until we finally did it. And then we probably would have delayed it and it would have been over budget, whatever. So now I think as a leader, you're going, uh-oh, you know what, I find it harder to stay connected to my colleagues and my peers and those that report for me because we're on Zoom all day, we're doing this. That's a new challenge that I have. I used to solve it by walking down the hall or saying, hey, Bill, let's go grab a cup of coffee, or, hey, who wants to have— let's bring in some pizzas today and hang out. I think that's really an example of that. Like, okay, this is new scenario, same problem, right? I need to show my leadership. I need to be connected to my people. And the cadence and the flow and the rhythm of our days don't make it as organic or natural now. So would you— what would you say to that?

So again, you're absolutely right. I'm doing a presentation on Monday called Trust and Connection in a Zoom Age.

Right.

And that's a 2-hour live training I'm doing. You can find out about it at davebaron.com. But I'm doing that based on exactly what you just said, Peter. We can't walk down the hall and say, hey, how you doing? Do you want to have a cup of coffee? Or what's going on? So yeah, we've got to create that. So human beings are driven by certain basic needs. And one of those needs is the need for connection. So how do you build that connection? That's a how. The why is we need connection. Sure. Okay, got it.

Exactly.

But the how is what it is. So, you know, what are you looking at in how you do that? Meanwhile, while making sure you put the kids to bed and that you, you know, you do the homeschooling and you do all the other things. So that comes down to, again, deep levels of curiosity, the commitment to being curious about others. And as a result, people are saying, well, it's very, very, very consuming. Yes, it is. Absolutely. But here's the thing that most people don't understand. Let me ask you all this question. How many minutes per day do you think The average CEO before COVID how many hours, how long a day, let's say a 9-hour day, how much of that do you think the average CEO had of high production time? Any guesses? Guess is all right.

Probably an hour. How are you defining high production time?

Yeah, are we talking about personal productivity, things that Only that leader can do and nobody else can do?

That's right. That's what I'm saying.

Not much.

Maybe an hour.

Not much.

A couple of people take a guess. Come on, just guess. It's okay. Sorry you get it wrong. I'll go for an hour as well.

20 minutes.

Thank you, Nick.

30 minutes.

That's closer. It's 42 minutes. Average CEO, between 25 and 42 minutes.

Is that in the US or worldwide?

That was, that was from some Gallup research that was actually global. So people are not that productive. Um, I just, um, just did some stuff, uh, some research. I'm trying to remember what the numbers were. It's gone out of my head. But the average worker, um, in a 9-hour day is only producing for a couple hours a day. So one of the things that I've been talking a lot about with this is in the context of You know, as Peter just brought up, every, every man and his dog had to suddenly go remote. And if we, if we, if we'd have said, well, by 2025 we're going to go remote, you know, we'd have made it by 2018— 2028, rather. We wouldn't have made it. But everybody had to pivot in 2 weeks. 2 weeks, you're done or you're out of business. And everybody managed to go remote. So Then the question came from a lot of leaders was like, oh my God, Dov, how can I make sure these people are productive? Well, what do we know? Research shows that the average person working remote is about 21 to 23% more productive, not less, more.

Why?

Because they have autonomy. They can put the kids to bed. They can work at 10 o'clock at night. They can do when they want to do, and their productive time is actually more and better. So you say, well, I got to put in more time. Okay, well, let's just assume that you're going to be, as the leader, productive for, let's say, you're a big-time producer, an hour a day. Then spend the other 6 hours connecting with your people. Spend the other 6 hours reaching out to people and not— certainly, you know, part of that could be— half of it could be direct leadership stuff, but the other 3 hours of it should be How you doing? How's it going? How are you managing to juggle the kids with the homeschooling and doing your work? Talk to me about that. Becoming more human with people, and your people's productivity goes up because the more connected you are to them, the more they trust you. And the more they trust you, the more productive they are. And if you don't have that trust and connection, you will pay the tariff of lack of connection and trust. that will lower production.

Dov, that 1 hour versus 6 hours, is that true at the very front level of leadership, like a supervisor leader, quote unquote, a manager leader? Don't they normally have more stuff to do, and that 1 hour is 2 or 3, and then the other is 3 or 4? Does that make sense? Okay, thank you.

You're absolutely right. Yeah. Because they have more tasks.

Right. Okay.

So managers are task-driven. Leaders are people and vision and purpose-driven. That's the— that's the way to understand it. So if you have a bunch of tasks in your job, that is you as a manager. Now you should be able to, to pass off a lot of that and watch over it. Yes. But that still doesn't mean that you're working 8 hours or 9 hours a day. You need, particularly in the age of Zoom, you need to reach out and you need to make the personal connection. It is vital.

Yeah.

Yep. So I want to pivot again for a moment because there's another area I thought we could jump in on here. Given that you're fairly prolific, you get a lot of stuff out in a lot of formats, right? Give us a sense of the systems and processes are in place, the goals and objectives. Do you have You know, like an editorial calendar? Do you have set objectives? If I need to produce 5 videos and 3 blogs, it's like, what does it look like behind the scenes? And what's— what, if any, help are you getting to make sure you achieve what you're trying to achieve?

Well, as you said, we put out a lot every single week. So Leadership and Loyalty is released every 4 days. There's a 1-hour releases, but I have to record them. I have to be interviewing and then they have to, uh, then I have the, uh, my, my editor, she goes through them and she puts the front end, the back end on them. She puts the graphics in them. So that has to be done. Um, then there are the recordings, uh, that I have to block the time for. Then there are potential guests. As I said, about 10 of those a week as well.

Mm-hmm.

So, um, my, um, I will just, I'll do this if I may. Let's just do this for a second.

Yeah, well, back up for half a second on the potential guests. So you're screening folks that want to be guests?

Yes.

I'm assuming it's not binary, that it's either guest or not. There's another category of maybe they're a guest, maybe they're not, but where it leads to a relationship, where it leads to an opportunity. Is that Yes. Is that so?

Yeah, that's absolutely right. So there are, there are without doubt, there are guests. There are people. So there are people who are coming in from all kinds of ways. So people potentially to work with me one-on-one, people potentially for me to work with them in their company, potential people who are wanting particular kinds of trainings that I offer, including the fact that I do a Podcast Superstar training. I teach people how to be podcast superstars. So yeah, all of those things are happening all the time. So yeah, that, that's, that's pretty much it. I will just— I'll do this because it will make people have a better sense. I had to move to, many years ago, I had to move to, if it isn't scheduled, it won't get done.

Mm-hmm.

That's just where I had to go to. So this is what my calendar looks like. Everything has a color. Whoops. Everything has a color. It's all scheduled. Everything is blocked.

Is that one week?

That's just a week. Yeah.

Wow.

So my week is jammed from early in the morning till later at night. And I schedule everything. Everything has to be scheduled. Including there were writing blocks in there.

Okay.

So I put all that in there. And then I have, like I said, my video editor who does that. And then I have my marketing team who I give the things to, who distribute through my distribution channels. So all that's going on, plus stuff like always upgrading the brand and doing all those kinds of things. And I am on interviews as the guest.

Sure.

On average 3 to 4 times a week. So once those come out, then my marketing teams take those and they push those as well. So there are all the— so that, that's, you know, there's quite a lot to the machinery of it. But if I don't block it, it just doesn't happen and it becomes complete chaos.

So 2 things there. One is I love the idea of sort of blocking because most folks that I know, their days are scheduled in terms of calls and meetings and deliverables and whatever. And then Oh, I'll write it at night or on the weekend or, you know, whatever. And, you know, obviously you can't write in fits and starts of 15 minutes between calls. That just doesn't work. But chunking out, you know, 3, 4 hours at a pop is effective. But if it doesn't wind up on the calendar, it will get filled up with other things.

And I do want to say something to that. I know you've got to go on, but I just want to say something to that just to help everybody. Yeah, you have to check with you. So What I mean by that is Dan Pink has a new book out called When.

Yeah.

And I've been following that for years— not his book, but that process— for years, which is you've got to find out when you're at your most productive, and you've also got to find out when you're at your most creative. So for me, writing works best very early in the morning or very late at night. That's when I write my best because I don't have all the other noise. But if I've got an email pinging or I've got a message coming in or whatever it is, I can't get into that flow. I know that I do my best interviews where I'm interviewing in the morning before noon or even before 1. If I'm interviewing after about between 1 and 3, I don't feel like I'm on my game. So you've got to listen to yourself and just notice when you're distracted, when you get tired, when you need that second cup of coffee, when, you know, and also that means you've got to listen to your own body and you've got to pay attention to what kind of nutrition do I need. And like, so for me, when I speak, I fast before speaking because one of my teachers taught me this almost 40 years ago. You can't have a full brain and a full belly because the blood's got to go somewhere. So I will fast beforehand. I might have a little bit of protein, but that's about it. These are all things for you to, to be able to grasp. So yes, scheduling. I'm sorry, Peter, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but I just want to know that, yeah, you got to schedule it out, but don't just put stuff in because you're trying to put it in. Put it in so that it works with what, where you are.

Yep. So the other piece of that is, so you have a lot of investments made there, resources, time, energy, effort, etc. What are the metrics that you're looking for? And then, you know, so for example, you know, LinkedIn is obviously a critically important platform for people to be present on, probably the platform today. However, depending on who your market is and depending on lots of other things, if you're in a more visual business, it might be Instagram. TikTok's new. I haven't seen anybody of our generation have a need for that as of yet in this space. But what are the metrics that you look at to see, oh wow, that, you know, that blog or that video really resonated with people, let me do more with that, or What was it about what I said or how I said it that, that made the point?

Well, at a simple level of metrics, it's where does it drive? Everything I do has to drive people somewhere. So did they go there? Did they go there? So, uh, my metrics for last week, the number one thing was the, uh, uh, the 10-minute piece I did on the, uh, what was it called? It's about upleveling society or something. I did a piece for that and that drove enormous amounts of traffic to the site and it was not specific. It was just driving them to Dov Baron. But sometimes I'm driving them to a forward slash. Sometimes I'm driving them to a webinar. Sometimes I'm driving them to like my 2-hour training I said I've got on Monday or to the podcast. So everything has to be driving to somewhere. And, and, and, you know, you talked about mistakes, Peter. For probably 10 years, I put out stuff that just was, look at me. It was just like, you know, my name was out there. Some of you are old enough to remember Sally Jesse Raphael.

Oh yeah.

Well, I was on the Sally Jesse Raphael show before the internet.

Oh my God.

And people go, oh, that must have been really great. No, it was terrible because it didn't go anywhere. I didn't have anything to do with it. I had nowhere to go. There was no website. I couldn't send people to it. And so yeah, I think that people might have gone in bookstores and looked for the book that I had out at that time. But really, you know, it was great. I had millions and millions of views, but so what? So I use that as an analogy all the time for people because I'm saying, if you don't know where you're driving people to It's, it's exposure. That's great. If I'm on a TV show, that's great. But I always want to be driving them somewhere. And as Peter just said, you have got to make sure that they know that. You have to have a way to seed that into your content.

Well, I think, I think that's critical because number one, where you put your content matters almost as much, if not more, than what the content is, right? the wrong message in front of the wrong people, that's a total waste of time.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, on the guesting side as a podcast, so, you know, we get pitched a lot too for people to be a guest on our podcast or for me to be a guest or whatever. And, you know, my determinant is, okay, does that podcast have an audience that looks anything like the people that I care about? If not, unless it's curiosity or something, I'm like, yeah, it might be interesting. But 9 times out of 10, if, you know, hey, this is a You know, podcast for teachers. I don't, I don't do anything with teachers. Here's a podcast for, you know, stay-at-home moms. Great. Nothing against them. Then it's not my, it's not my market. So I'm going to, you know, nicely decline that. Uh, so I think that you need a little discipline there to say, okay, where do I want to be?

You do need discipline. And I will tell you, I'll be really honest with everybody that sometimes my discipline goes out of the window in favor of my service. So for instance, there's a young lady who runs a podcast. And I think it's called— I think the podcast is called Gen Z. She is a Gen Z girl. She wanted to have me on her show. I spoke to her for 10 minutes. And, you know, I mean, she had like, at that time, I think she had 10 shows, you know, so she didn't have very many shows. And she certainly didn't have many listeners.

Yeah.

And I was so inspired by her as a future leader. I said, I will do the show for you. Absolutely. Because I want to support you as a future leader. And I believe in the Generation Z, and I think that they're going to make a big difference. So I will do that. So sometimes there is the choice to invest without a payback.

But it's a conscious choice. But it's a conscious choice that you made saying, yeah, if I only use the business metrics, she's not going to make the cut. But I feel like giving and I feel like this would be, uh, you know, aligned with my service mentality or my service model.

So it's aligned with the service mentality and it's a lot— it's also aligned with my, my, my dragon fire, what it is that I'm here to do. So yeah.

Yeah.

And that's where you say, you know, because you and I both do this. I am paid tens of thousands of dollars to speak on stages. And every now and then I do one that I don't judge. People go, well, you know, yeah, because I wanted to serve that audience.

Right.

I wanted to serve that audience. They can't afford me. I wanted to serve them. I believe in what they're doing. I will do that. So yeah, there's a discipline, but they, again, you're coming back to that central piece of single unified monolithic meaning. that drives everything. That's the deciding factor.

Great. Well, I just want to be mindful of time. We got just a couple minutes left. Questions, anybody? Comments, thoughts?

Good to see you again, Peter. Yeah, I have a question, and it's regarding— I've seen the industry has changed a lot these last couple of months. Key factors I've seen is, and I come from the tech industry, it wasn't so hard for us to adapt to new ways of work. Adaptability is key. Other key factors would be an ethical approach to business. And this whole aspect you spoke about of leadership by serving others, which by some companies in the tech industries, especially in Silicon Valley, San Francisco, the Bay Area, you have this very present as a, let's call it, it would seem sometimes as a marketing scheme or strategy.

Very good. Thank you for saying that.

My question regarding this is, I've personally— and I work as a strategic business consultant. I'm also a freelancer and do web design. I am a psychologist also. And what I've noticed is there's a couple of aspects. One is generating value, which is of high importance, and especially in these times, generating community. and systems of support. So my question regarding the whole leadership aspect in this thought leadership aspect would be the ethics behind it and the social impact that in your opinion, both of you, Peter and Dov, and how you manage it being influential people with strong followings and established businesses and so forth. What are the ethics in it? And what do you want to expand in this, not only the current situation, but towards humanity in that sense?

The short answer to that is read Linda's book.

What's the title of Linda's book?

The Seven Lenses of the Universe.

Number 7.

Seven Lenses?

Right.

Seven Lenses.

Oh yeah, I've seen that. Okay.

Yeah. So, uh, no, my short answer is read Linda's book. I think the longer answer is, is it's— I wish I had one to hold up there because it was, that was such a great tee-up for your book. Maybe Linda does. Yeah, there we go. Um, oh, oh, what a— there we go.

Oh yeah, I have seen that.

It's a very good, very good book. But that answers the question. I, I mean, I think the, the, the longer answer on that, which we don't have much time for, is That's subjective. You know, everybody's got to have their own boundaries, their own lines in the sand, their own, you know, true north, whatever you call it. And I think, you know, to Doug's point, authenticity has been overused, but you got to have your own authenticity, even if that word's being used to, you know, overused or abused or whatever today. But anyway, we're at the top of the hour here.

So you got to go deeper on it. In the context, in the context of being ethical. So when people talk about, you know, again, you know, I don't use servant leader anywhere on my site because it's the same thing. It's gotten used to death. So, you know, for me, okay, you know, I don't have to talk about authenticity because I am authentic. I don't have to talk about, about servant leadership because I am in servant leadership. And it's like Peter said right at the top of this, if you have to call yourself a thought leader, you ain't one. If you have to call yourself a servant leader, you ain't one. If you have to call yourself authentic, you're not really. You just found an authenticity mask, but that's not the same. So I think that service and, and really making that difference and being of community means, okay, what are you actually doing? That's the question. What am I actually doing? Not what do I think I should do, not what do the people— but what am I actually getting up in the morning and doing? The test of your values is how do you live? That's it. People say family is the most important thing in the world to me, and they never spend any time with their family. Okay, enough said.

Great. Well, it's been great. We're at the top of the hour here, so I, uh, thank you all. And I, and I will call you a thought leader, Doug, because someone else should. So thanks for joining us today. Thanks, everybody.