The DPD Framework: How to Decide Faster and Lead Smarter | Dr. Geoffrey Mount Varner | 676

And welcome, welcome, welcome. This is Peter Winick. I'm the founder and CEO at Thought Leadership Leverage, and you're joining us on the podcast today, which is Leveraging Thought Leadership. Today's gonna be fun, or I, I think it's gonna be fun. We have with us today Dr. Geoffrey Mount Vernier. He is a medical doctor, an author, a speaker, a thought leader., a whole bunch of things. So by day when he's in, in his scrubs, he's an ER doctor, but he's created this whole framework model methodology that's backed up by a couple of books and other things that he's done on making decisions, split-second instant decisions. And what I love is, uh, one of the things I love about what I do from a thought leadership perspective is when someone takes their domain expertise from one field, right? And moves it into another field. So in this case, we're going from me— medicine to business because The answer to too many things in the corporate world is, oh, we have to make a decision. Let's form a committee and we'll come back in 18 months and figure it out. Yes. Uh, I probably don't want that to be happening if I was unfortunate enough to be lying on a gurney and you're looking over me talking about, you know, I don't know, do we, is he having a heart attack? Is he not? Do I give him this medicine? Do I not? So tell me, how did the— I assume it wasn't because you had an abundance of time on your hand practicing medicine that you said, I think I should start writing books and doing all that, but How'd the spark go off? Where'd the light bulb come from here?

Well, well, thank you, and thank you very much for having me on your show. I love the work that you do. The light bulb happened actually when the mayor of Washington, DC appointed me to be in charge of the emergency Ebola response, um, many, many, many years ago. I was also in charge of all mass casualty in Washington, DC. And the reason why that stands out is that I was working with the chief of police the chief, uh, the, the, the health minister, as well as the— this, all the top chiefs. And what I've learned is that their decision process, some of them was op— some of them had an optimal one, others hesitated. And in some environments you can't hesitate. And so when you mix those, what I found was there's a, there's a pathway that needed to be created to merge for when a decision is a time structured or time involved decision and one when it's not. And least importantly, people just need to spend time on the most important decisions.

So I love that. So when you move into business, right? So, so one is, let, let me take that up a notch. There's a lot of work done on fast brain, slow brain, and then the sort of the, the, an expert, you know, like there are times where you could wheel your car into the shop and that mechanic just knows by that little weird noise that it made exactly what it is. Not because he's impulsive or not doing the work, because he's seen that same problem 1,000 times before and worked on that same situation. So how do you advise people in the business environment when to go quickly and when not to? 'Cause quick isn't— your work isn't binary that says everybody should just do everything quickly. That would be Dan.

Right. So I, I would view decisions in, in, in 3 broad categories. One are the low consequence. Those are what to wear, where to eat. They don't matter. You should spend no time in those. I'm gonna get back to that one. Then you have the, the, the medium ones where there are slight consequences. They are, they are reversible. If you choose a job, buy a, buy a car. Okay. But then the ones with major consequences such as who to marry. Yeah. And where to live. Those have major consequences. And so it's, it's okay to spend time on those. But what ends up happening, Peter, is that people spend an equal amount decision energy out of all 3 categories. And then finally, once you wrap pressure of time on there, it becomes even more interesting. And from the emergency medicine point of view and from the leadership point of view, I would encourage leaders, don't spend any time on those decisions that are low consequence, the ones that don't matter.

So how much of this is based on an individual's personality? Style and history. And I'll, and I'll tell you where I'm going with that. I have friends who I'll, you know, haven't seen in 2, 3 days. They say, hey, what's going on? Oh, I, I went out Saturday morning, decided to buy a car, bought a car. It's getting delivered today. Awesome. Great. Then I have other friends where they've been thinking about buying a car for 3 years, right? And they research every article and every this and every that. They'll never buy the car. I mean, at some point they will, but like it's ready, fire, aim versus ready, aim, fire. How much of that is trainable, teachable versus someone's just conditioned or leans in a certain way?

Well, it's both. Most people, it is binary. People not this or that. You've gotta put 'em in the right environment. And so most of those skills are teachable and they're like a trainable. The question is, are they transferable? But most importantly that you hit on is, do they want to be trained? Do they want to be taught? 'Cause some people are just, you know, they're, they're like where they are. They don't, they're very confident and they have no, they have no interest in learning a new, a new skill.

And what would be something that gives someone that interest, right? Like, so if I've always been, which, which I'm not, someone that overthinks, overanalyzes, whatever, and doesn't get to a decision quickly, is there something where maybe there's a, a consequence from not deciding quickly enough that said, geez, You know what, this isn't really serving me well anymore.

I think it goes down to their purpose. If they, they know what their purpose is, it makes their, it makes their decisions easier. But let me go back to your question. People should understand, and, and this is, I find this with leaders a lot, no decision is a decision. A delayed decision is a decision. Many times leaders will put stuff off And say, I will decide later. Well, wait a minute. The environment may change, the circumstance may change, and your delay may, may require someone who's less skilled.

But stay there in a minute. In, in your domain in medicine, you're about to walk into a 12-hour shift in the ER. You can't, I mean, just the environment there doesn't allow for no decision or delayed decision. There's an expectation because literally lives are at stake. That you will make a decision, or if you're delaying a decision, it might be to get a lab result. You know, it's, it's, it's, it's based on something, but it's not like, yeah, kind, kind of not sure to do what to do with that Peter dude. Let me, let me ponder that for a couple weeks. Like, you have to make decisions, right? So you may need more clinical data, et cetera. But I think culturally in a lot of organizations, no decision and delaying a decision is actually a career strategy for a lot of people. 'Cause they don't want their name tied with it, right? What if it's, It doesn't, this project doesn't, you know, bode well for my career, or what if it doesn't work right, or this product launch or whatever. So I think there is a culture of sort of intentional delay or not, because a decision means you're accountable to who decided that the buck stops here. I made that decision. So tell me how you see that in the corporate world, 'cause that's where you've decided to spend a lot of time these days.

Yeah. And, and that's where I have, um, spare time where, where I see that. I, I view that as a leadership issue. Meaning that what I've noticed is the high-performing leaders, the executive levels, they usually don't have that delayed delay decision instrument. It's those that are directly under them. And if those, if they allow those that are directly under them to like do that, that's a reflection of their leadership. But here's the deal, they can be trained. But you're right, there's a, there's a swath of people who their, who their goal is maintain. Don't decide because I'm not accountable. But what I will argue, and I don't have the, like, data, is that those on the higher end, they're not of that because they made decisions to get them to where they are.

So let's sort of double-click a little bit on some of your work, right? Because it's one thing for you to stand there and say, hey, I'm an ER doc. I make quick decisions all the time 'cause it's life and death. And I'm like, all right, well, I'm an actuary, like, or I'm a whatever. I'm a lawyer. I'm a whatever. You know, I've looked at some of your work and there are, there are models and methods and frameworks and systems. That you rely on to help you do that. Talk about how you develop those and what you've seen as benefits to those that choose to embrace them in the corporate world.

Well, absolutely. Thank, thank you for that question. For those who choose to, um, develop, develop them in the corporate world, first they've gotta recognize to increase your, your decision-making skills, it's not an overnight process. There's a framework, there's time. But for instance, if you wanna improve it right now, I have something called the DPD framework, and that simply is take a deep breath. The reason why that is so— that's so important is because most of our decisions, 94% of our decisions, are emotive. They're based upon our emotions. Taking a deep breath gives you access to two parts of your brain: your locus coeruleus, which slows your heart rate down, and your amygdala, which is the emotional part. It allows you to slow down. You pause.

Pause.

Now you decide. But let me tell you why the pause is so important for everybody. Our subconscious keeps a permanent record of everything. If you pause, it allows your subconscious to weigh in there. We often call it gut, insight, yep, intuition. That's real. So, so just taking that deep breath, pausing, and then deciding is something you can do now and I've seen leaders of the highest ends of, uh, of government actually do that because sometimes I see that even they get flustered if they have not been trained in high level, especially high level decisions where time is a fact.

So I would assume that not only does that lower your heart rate, get your brain to be in thinking mode, but it also potentially neutralizes the external factors of the environment you're in., right? If, if, you know, noise, loud trauma, uh, you know, pressure, the board's calling on you to whatever that is that's inflicting pressure. But it's, it's kind of knocking out that heat of the moment stuff to say, I know in my brain the right capabilities or the best that I have is in there. I've gotta optimize that brain. It's kind of like stretching before a workout, right? Like it sounds like it's similar to that. If you teach yourself to do that, it becomes part of a routine. Is that a fair You're right.

So for everything in life, repetition means everything. What you do regularly, you get good at it regularly. And so you practicing that. And, and then as it relates to leadership, the people you put around you plays a unique role. So I always talk to leaders to say, your leaders who are below you, that's a reflection of you. 'Cause sometimes you may need someone to step in and, and give you advice or give you insight. And so if you have formed a weak leadership team, guess what's gonna happen? Your decision is probably gonna be weaker than what it needed to be, or it may be slower. Okay.

If you're enjoying this episode of Leveraging Thought Leadership, please make sure to subscribe. If you'd like to help spread the word about our podcast, please leave a 5-star review at ratethispodcast.com/LTL. TL, and share it with your friends. We're available on Apple Podcasts and on all major listening apps, as well as at thoughtleadershipleverage.com/podcast. So I wanna segue now into some of your decisions, right? We'll get a little meta here. So life is good. You could be a practicing MD for as long as you'd like to be. You're really good at it. You've got these accolades in, in, in DC and such. But now you're spending part of your time and maybe more of your time in the future or whatever, not practicing medicine, but being a practitioner of thought leadership. How did you make those decisions and what are the things that have been surprising and rewarding and what's that look like? 'Cause that's an unknown place for you to some degree.

It is. Uh, and I, I commented earlier, once you define your purpose, and I think that you've, that you're seasoned enough to know that when you have a purpose, it shapes all of your decisions. And so my purpose is to make sure that people have the skills that they need to make good decisions. 'Cause at the end of the day, and most people don't like to admit this, we are products of our decisions, but only the successful people like to admit that. And so, and so if you train yourself on making decisions is key. And then, and then this is key. Most people, they make a decision and Uh, right or wrong, don't view it that way, you know, cuz nobody's God. You don't choose to make a wrong decision. It's, am I right or have I learned here? Like, I never lose. I never lose. Either, either I win or I've learned a lesson. And part of that is mindset. So, so, so my mission is to make sure that we have the, uh, the most prolific leaders who can think and make decisions and also the students. Okay.

But, but, so stay there a minute. So I could chop the doctor part off of your name and totally that makes sense to me. But how do you wake up one day? I mean, you spend years and years and years studying and practicing what you do and being top of your game. It seems to me, and, and oftentimes, and the reason I'm asking the question is it seems obvious to you, but it doesn't seem obvious to me how practicing medicine And this isn't that far of a leap.

Great question. Thanks. So I have a first book. I mean, and, and, and, and this is, and this is key. It's called Training Your Mind for Split Second Decisions. That framework came from being in the ER, being in charge of Ebola, being in charge of like mass casualties. But then you are such a wise man. Fast decisions happen. And that came from, um, my life, you know, having, uh, uh, having prostate cancer, having come back 3 times. Have 114 doctor's appointments within 18 months. It force you to make decisions. And these are fast decisions because at the end of the day you can say, I'll think about it, Doctor. And guess what that means? It means you may not get another appointment for another couple of months. And when it comes to advanced stages of many diseases, there are no absolutes. So you have to have a framework for thinking about it. And so as a result of going through that, I recognize, hey, decisions, you have to have a framework because at times it won't be a perfect environment. You won't be in the right mental mindset. You may— and when I say that, you may be stressed, you may be worried.

When you're dealing with your own medical issues, you may even be in a place where you resent having to be in the position to even make the decision. I didn't ask for this.

That's it. I saw him in there, brother.

That's true.

That's true. But if you've got a framework, it makes it easier. But you are, you nailed it. You're getting over the fact, like, how'd I get here? You know?

Right.

And, and then you've gotta be careful when you have a decision, which is why I talked about leaders and the people around, cuz then you've gotta, you gotta, you have to be careful about who you discuss your decision or your upcoming decision with, cuz not everybody is equipped to advise you.

Yeah. So let's, let's talk about the business model here, right? Because the business model of being an ER doc is pretty simple, as I would assume as a non-ER doc. Find an ER, right? Get them to hire you and say, hey doc, you're it, right? Like, and obviously there's people that manage the business side of that, but you know, it's, it's pretty clear what that looks like. Moving into the world of thought leadership, there's about 100 decisions that you could make, might make, could, you should make, shouldn't make, et cetera. In order to be successful. And I think a lot of folks from the thought leadership side, because they're coming at it from a place of passion, sort of aren't as savvy or focused or intentional on the business side that's important to them. And if the business doesn't support you, then you can't support it. 'Cause you, you, yes. So what are the things you're finding easy and what are the things you're finding challenging? As you move into the business side of thought leadership? Yeah.

Again, your wisdom stand, stands out. People talk about writing books as being difficult. No, that's the easy part. Yeah. That's the easy part. It's, uh, even, even the marketing gets easy. It's making that leap from, uh, okay, this is not about book sales. 'Cause as you know, books don't make money, but they, they, they give you credibility. But next is the whole speaking circuit and that does well, but those are one-shots. So now it's creating a, a whole ecosystem around your work. So that means courses, that means events, that means intensive sessions set up. Yeah. So creating that and understanding how to do it, I think that that has been the, the like challenging part, but it's been fulfilling just learning. Um, I've got a business coach learning about it. It's interesting. I think what I would highly, what I wanted to comment on is that to do it while you're working is a little more difficult too.

Yeah. Well, I think, I think that's totally true. And you also don't want to be doing so much of the business that you only get to spend a small portion of the time that you have allocated towards this, not doing the stuff that you love, which is getting on stage, talking about it, researching it, right? Because that's what drove you to do this. You didn't drive, you, you didn't tell me, you know what, I wanted to learn how to market courses. That's why I'm doing this. Right. Right. Or I wanted to learn how to, um, successfully price myself as a keynote speaker and how to get that all done. But if you don't figure that out, right, you know, all of that, 'cause that's not fun. That's not why you're doing it. So how do you balance that tension?

That's, that's a great question. I balance it. Um, I try, I try to do things in parallel, but what I've found is, is that if one part of the, of the step slows down, The whole system slows down. What I, I try to do is I set goals. So right now the goal is to get the book, the speaking, the course. Yeah. Have set up. And then most importantly, the team. Having a team makes a humongous difference. And so, um, I, I've always been big on, I don't wanna be the smartest person on my team right now. Unfortunately, I have to be because smart people cost a lot more money., but having reliable teammates, um, has been very helpful. And when I say that, I really mean my admin team, follow up, boom, boom. But the goal is, as soon as I, uh, is to add the, the next hire will allow me to be the talent cuz they'll help manage the business.

Love it. Love it. So this has been fascinating. I appreciate your time. Any, um, I kind of wanna take advantage of the opportunity. There are people like you., right, top of their game professionals, whether it's in medicine or law, whatever other field is that they're, you know, top of their career, top of their game, top of their whatever, but something is calling them like this purpose thing that you had said, I want to do more of that. What would you say to, to that person? Or maybe another way to ask is, what would you say to you 5 or 10 years ago when you started this journey?

I would say move towards your purpose and, and let me, Answer another question that many people say, well, what is my purpose? Well, I would encourage people to get up 3, at 3 or 4 o'clock in the morning when the house is quiet and ask yourself, what do you enjoy doing and how do you want to lead the world? And somewhere in there is your purpose. Now this is the, now this is the key part. While you have gainful employment, start working on your purpose. Yeah. You know, I, I've seen people say, I'm, I'm gonna quit my job and then I'm gonna start this. No. Keep your job, start it. And you know, you know when it's time to leave your job is when business is blowing up so much on this private side that you, that your job is interfering. Then that's a, then like that's a sign.

So no, that's, and that's the opportunity cost math. 'Cause I've worked with medical doctors, other professionals, et cetera, that they say, listen, I really love this thing, but it's costing me a lot because every time I'm not doing what I get paid to do, and I get paid a lot and I'm a, You know, I'm a partner at a law firm, I make 2 grand, whatever. But you gotta be able to neutralize those things to say, wow, this thing is paying me equal to or greater than what my production is. Then it becomes kind of a no-brainer until you see, yes, do that. Or, or, you know, or you, you want a trust fund or something. Well, this has been awesome. I appreciate your time and your transparency. Love the energy and thank you for, for sharing your journey with us. Uh, Geoffrey, thank you very much for having me as well. To learn more about Thought Leadership Leverage, please visit our website at thoughtleadershipleverage.com. To reach me directly, feel free to email me at peter@thoughtleadershipleverage.com. And please subscribe to Leveraging Thought Leadership on iTunes or your favorite podcast app to get your weekly episode automatically.