The Transformative Power of Failure | Paul Glover | 614

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, my guest, uh, is an old friend, Paul Glover. Paul is a fascinating guy. He's an author. He's a coach of the No BS Coaching Method, if you will. He's working on some new IP and speaking around failing forward. And an all-around fascinating human being on lots and lots of levels and an all-around good guy. So welcome aboard, Paul. What's going on?

Peter, thank you so much. You left out what I consider to be the defining element of my personality and my career. I'm an ex-lawyer, a recovering lawyer, and an ex-bellator.

Oh yeah, I was going to bring that up too. Yeah, right, right.

And wanted to make sure you hadn't forgotten.

You know, you try not to have attorneys on. They offend me. The ex-felon piece, I couldn't care less.

There we go. By the way, a recovering attorney, you know, we're just about acceptable.

Tolerable. So let's go, I mean, I know your backstory and I find it just an amazing story, but maybe it's got all the drama, right? Eventually it'll be a movie, Redemption and Forest and all that. So give us a version of the Paul story. Sure.

A successful trial, federal court trial attorney in the city of Chicago. And then, uh, because of my client base, uh, I associated with some, uh, unsavory people, to be kind. Uh, and the problem with associating with unsavory people is they expect you to be unsavory and to belong to that group. And I wanted to, uh, I did not join a lot of groups, but this one attracted me. Uh, and one of the problems with being a trial attorney is you're an adrenaline junkie.

Yeah.

Oh, preparation for trial is onerous. Uh, for every hour you're in the courtroom, you're doing 4 hours of prep. Uh, but once you're done, uh, the adrenaline, uh, high starts to go away and you crave another shot. Uh, well, this group of clients and ex-clients gave me that opportunity. Of course, the problem with joining a club is they expect you to be a member in good standing. And their, uh, their requisite for that was you had to, uh, commit crimes. And I committed 33 white-collar crimes. That was what I was charged with, found guilty in a federal court, and sentenced to 7 years of incarceration in a federal prison. Did 5 and a half years, took my case to the Supreme Court, Got a sentence reduction and then got out and found out that I'd never practice law again, which was my passion, but also was transformed by prison. I tell people prison actually softened me. Most people say, "Oh my God, you go to prison, it must make you hard." Prison did two things for me. First, it saved my life.

Right.

Absolutely no question if I didn't go into prison, I would be dead a long time ago. Of a second, it softened me. It made me realize that I wasn't the smartest guy in the room and that I had many blind spots and triggers, and that if I didn't transform myself, I was not only going to lose my family, but probably get out of prison. And as with most people who are in prison, I would go back to prison. Recidivism rate in the United States is over 70%. And, uh, So I made the decision to transform. You can't transform by yourself, by the way. I had to enlist the support of my wife and friends, and it took me a long time. I spent the first 2 years of prison engaged in revenge fantasy. Yeah. I was trying to get even with everyone who put me in prison. Right. Anyway, at the end of that, I got out and found out that I couldn't get a job because I was over the age of 50 and an ex-COD. So I thought I'd take my skill sets, good storyteller because of the jury experience and also critical thinker, but also a guy who had gained humility and gratitude the hard way. And I put it together in a coaching program and started reaching out and eventually started to coach people in the C-suite.

So just stay there a minute. I love the way you just said, oh, and just decided to coach people in the C-suite. Like people in the C-suite are sitting around waiting to get an email or a call from an ex-con saying, I know more than you do. I'm going to coach you through. Oh, arrogant CEO. There's something.

That's the way it happened. Well, it's not the way it happened. You know, I started reaching out because I had an extensive list of people I knew. That was my law practice. But curiously, a lot of them didn't want to associate with an ex-pilot. But I'm a— I tell people one of my characteristics is I'm tenacious.

Yeah.

And so I just kept at it and at it and at it until finally I had a person. By the way, I decided I had to do things differently. I wasn't going to get a certificate of coaching. Yeah. But I was going to do some things that other coaches didn't do. First, I was going to offer a money-back guarantee. We would agree upon an action plan when we enter into coaching relationship. And if at the end of the year we had not reached those goals, I need to pay it.

Right. Which in the coaching game, you know, that— not that there's a lot of blame, but taking that level of risk and responsibility and skin in the game—

there we go—

is fairly unusual.

It is. And I believe you should. And I understand coaching is— I'm giving you my experience, I'm giving you my time, my energy. But the reality is that the skin in the game to me went to the monetary aspect of it. Yes. I truly believe that if I don't provide value, I shouldn't get paid. And who should decide that is not me. It's the client. Of course, I'm not a complete idiot. We set it up so that the person I was coaching wasn't the only person who made the decision. We would do a 360-degree review at the very beginning., and we did one at the end, right? And that would show improvement. Uh, and by the way, it worked very well. Uh, and also I built myself as the no BS coach. And one of my clients gave me a reference. I'm going to give you, he gave me two. Uh, because I said I'd like some references for other clients, potential clients. He said, absolutely. He said, Paul's like an acquired taste, like cyanide. So I said, I don't think I'm going to use that one. He said, all right. Here's the one that you use. You said Paul's a Sherpa.

Yeah.

Get you to the mountaintop, but he will not carry your pack. And that's how I coach.

So I want to go, because I know a lot of the story too. You now wind up with a successful coaching practice. And again, I think all coaching is an acquired taste and there's a self-selection in that process. Somebody wants the soft cuddly. Probably not gonna go to you. Somebody wants somebody to give them direct. Somebody doesn't really know what they want, but there's a trust and respect and they say, I, you know, this guy could be my Sherpa and call it like it is. But then you decide to write a book, right? And then, then you decide to sort of go a little bit more transparent and go in a little bit of a different direction fairly recently on your speaking side. And I know a lot of this because you and I have known each other for what, probably 10+ years. Point. So yeah, tell me a little bit about— so you wake up one day and decide, I'm going to write a book, and then talk about how you get more transparent after a while.

Well, first, the book— book is, uh, was a terrible ordeal, uh, but, but I got through it. And, uh, it was not the book that I should have written. I was told when I got out of prison, uh, don't, don't tell people who you are because that's going to turn them off. If you want to get work, you're going to have to tell Well, and I, you know, and I bought into that for a while. Then I decided there was this thing called Google, and if you wanted to know about me, all you had to do was Google me. So I was like, well, this can't be a secret. Anybody who's going to do work with me that has a brain. So I said, okay, I need to, I need to expose myself. But I didn't do that with the book. The book is still a decent book. It's actually much more relevant now than it was, but it wasn't enough. And I decided that, that I've got a message and I need to, I need to spread the message. I, there's a part of me that needs to pay back. Yeah. I was given every opportunity to be successful and I was, and I blew it. Yeah. And, and I thought, well, this is a very important message that not only leaders, but everyone should accept as understanding how they are making the mistakes that will destroy or define their life. So I did a TEDx talk, uh, everyone needs a fool in their life. Yeah. Uh, the fool is, no, by the way, as my wife told me, when you have to explain a joke, it's not funny. And so she said, nobody is going to understand what you mean by this.

Right.

And they don't. Took me 105 applications to get a TEDx. Like I said, tenacity. But the concept was that in medieval times, the king was anointed by divine light. Anybody who challenged the king committed heresy. However, the fool, the person that if we see a picture is sitting in that dress garb, getting dressed up to some El Jajou, the jester. Uh, but that wasn't what the fool, that wasn't the role of the fool because the fool was looked at as a crazy person. They were exempt from the rules of heresy. Therefore, they could tell the king the truth and not get their head cut off. They had psychological safety.

Right.

I looked at that and I said, every, every leader needs a flock of fools because leaders live in their own echo chamber. When they say it's lonely at the top, that's because leaders choose to make it that way.

Well, but stay there a minute. So oftentimes, you know, and I see this a lot, people that are in the C-suite and even when they come out after, all of a sudden their jokes are funnier. All of a sudden their ideas are better. All of a sudden everybody's got an agenda that they're not as transparent about why they want to get, you know, they don't, a cup of coffee is not a cup of coffee. It's, I've, can I have 3 minutes to, you know, manipulate you, whatever. Right.

There we go.

And there aren't a lot of people, you know, I like that the, you know, the jester's role, the function was to call BS, if you will.

Yep.

Inside of an organization. I mean, there are a lot of people that have the trust and the rapport and they have that consigliere type person, but there's, there's a calculated risk you're making to tell the CEO like, Hey dude, or dudette, whatever, the thing, that new initiative that you're rolling out, really stupid, it's gonna fail, and here's 5 reasons why. Do with that information what you will. Right?

Absolutely. Uh, you, and you're right. The, the echo chamber of course is exactly as you described it, is comprised of manipulators and sycophants. Yeah. Right. They, they're there, they become there. And by the way, you, as everyone, if it's an echo chamber, at some point you start believing what you hear. And by the way, that's why I'm successful at what I do. I provide that objective perspective that says, that's stupid, don't do that. And again, the psychological safety is there. So every leader needs a flock of fools. You need people who do exactly that. They may be a mentor, they may be a coach, but it doesn't matter what it is.

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 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 go back because when you started to put this Fool's idea out in the keynote, you did a bit of a 180, right? In terms of the transparency, the getting in front of it, et cetera. You're telling your story in a very open, and I remember when you were first doing it a few years ago, very open, very vulnerable. Way in terms of not just coming up with a concept by talking about, well, why you needed a Fool and now you are one.

You're like, yeah.

Yeah.

And that, yes, I thought my contention is if you want to be a coach, it's great to have a certificate. It's great to have knowledge. I believe you got to have experience. And if you're going to talk to a leader about this topic, I think you have had to experience the failure. Yeah. I said, I've done this and, and it was self-destructive. So I took it and I put it together. And yes, you're right. Extraordinarily, uh, uh, extraordinarily vulnerable and authentic. Uh, and I remember, uh, my, my wife, uh, we're going through a practice session, right? And she's in the audience and they, they're filming me. Yeah. And, uh, and I get on stage and I break down because I'm just thinking about my family and, and, you know, I left them financially destitute, but also emotionally devastated. They'd been all crook. Uh, and so we're on the way back to the airport and I'm saying, that was just a complete disaster. I'm not sure we're gonna be able to use the bidding. And she's looking out the window and she looks over and she says, cheaper than therapy. And that's what it's become. The concept that I can get on stage and talk about, there's still emotional, still authentic, still vulnerable about it because it goes so deep. It'll always be there, but that now becomes a part of the process that makes it real for a leader to hear. When I step in front of a leader and say, you cannot fuck up your life any more than I have, and let me tell you why. So let's be honest with each other because by the way, I'll know if you're not. And if you're not honest with me, we're done.

Right. There's no point.

Oh, absolutely. Because I'm completely honest with you. And so it works. Once they realize that I have failed more miserably than they ever could, they're like, okay, I guess I could tell you about the things that cause me to want to fail. And, and that's the problem with success, the paradox of success. Once we're successful, we have to keep being successful as a leader, and at some At some point, the burden will break you unless you learn how to deal with it, which means you have to be willing to not want failure, but not run away from it.

Yeah.

Because that's our learning experience, right? That's where we learn, uh, being successful. Unfortunately, we stay in our comfort zone. You have to step outside. Interesting research has shown that if you are not failing 16% of the time, You're not going to continue to be a successful leader.

What was the percent? Was it 6?

Oh, 16. 1-6.

1-6.

Okay. Leaders hate hearing that, but it's the truth. You can't stay in your comfort zone as a leader. It doesn't work. So anyway, that's, that's what I brought to it, the conversation. That's what my speaking is about now, about failing forward, about how you embrace failure as a part of the leadership journey. It's there. It's gonna get you. If you think you are invulnerable to the black swan, you're not. The black swan's coming.

So there's a lot that we can learn from the success and the successes of others and best practices. And, you know, you should study other people in your field clearly. But I would agree with you that when you actually have an honest conversation with leaders or folks that are perceived as incredibly successful and you get them to be, uh, honest about their failures. They're somewhat proud of them because they say that if it wasn't for that, I wouldn't be this. If I didn't do that, this never would've happened. If we didn't experience that pain or the, you know, whatever, bet the ranch on the wrong thing or whatever it was.

Yeah.

And the learnings. And I, and I love that, you know, a lot of what you, you get in coaching is, well, why the hell would anyone listen to that guy or gal? Okay. So, you know, to your point, like, okay, you, you wanna, you wanna talk about failure? 5 and a half years in the can. Lemme tell you about failure, right? You want to like, okay, so you're worried about, a product launch won't hit 12% market share, it'll hit 11%. Haha. Hold my beer. Right. So yeah, absolutely.

So, so yeah, that's where I'm at now. It's, you know, I'll, I'll see where the speaking, speaking career goes. I enjoy the stage. I'm pretty good at telling the story, but I also have a message that, that should resonate with leaders. Hopefully it does, because I think it's a necessary message and one that's avoided. Now it's, everybody's out there and you have to come to some realization about the concept of yes, there will be failure, how you embrace it, and then how you recover from it. And I, and the concept of resilience to me is everybody's resilient who's a leader. When I talk to a leader, they've already managed to become resilient. Yeah. If you're not, I think that it's one step forward. Then the concept that's put out now by, uh, ah, Talib. Antifragility. That to me is, is where leaders need to look. Not only should you recover, you should be able to take this experience, turn it into something that makes you better so that you bounce forward.

But there's a lot of work also, not to go too far down this rabbit hole, on post-traumatic growth syndrome. Everybody talks about post-traumatic stress, which is a clear thing, but what they don't talk about is post-traumatic growth. Not that you want to go through the trauma only for the objective of getting the growth, but a lot of people do experience some sort of transformational growth post-trauma.

They do. And obviously that's what you're looking for. And by the way, the concept of course is so psychological. Yeah. Right. So anyway, that's where I'm at in this concept of speaking, being in front of CEOs, because I want to be in front of the people who have the opportunity and the positional authority to institute change, which means they now have to turn around and look at their people and go, if this applies to me, I want it to apply to you. Yeah. So, so that, so that people now start to have the psychological safety to go to the leader and go, hey, this is a weird idea. It might work. If it fails, are you gonna kill me? And the answer is absolutely not.

No, I love that. And, and the, the last piece I wanna touch on is you're really a master at this, is that people come into, whether it's coaching, advising, consulting, speaking, whatever, and they wanna be all things to all people. Once you can really embrace the concept of self-selection, like, hey, you're an acquired taste, just forget about the economy. Your style, you're this, you're that. Like some people wanna be coddled, don't call Paul. Some people might be offended by his history. Great. Paul, Paul, right? But like, I think everybody needs to think about the self-selection. Who are the types of people, the avatars, psychographically and demographically that I want to serve and I can make a living at serving. And if it means I'm excluding 80, 90, whatever percentage of the universe, that's awesome too.

And you're spot on here, Peter. 80% of the people are referred to me. We don't do business. Yeah. Because I recognize right away that you're not going to commit to the work. The concept of coaching has now gotten into life coaching, which I absolutely don't do. And it, and it, it, you don't understand what it is when you're a leader and you're being coached. It's hard work.

Yes.

And you have to commit to it. And I find it so interesting. I, because of this, I've got, I've got 58 people in my coaching program. And when, when other coaches, it's just absolutely impossible. Insane. You can't possibly do. Them justice. And my response to them is, that's because you haven't selected appropriately.

Right.

Every coaching call that I have, and there's always an exception, there's an exchange of energy. Yeah. You see, if you're, if you're got a bad client, they're an energy suck. And, and you will end up, they, they will drain you like a vampire. First, they, they want you to tell them everything. They want you to share, they want you to be vulnerable, but they don't want to do anything with that. So, so, so I refuse, I refuse to engage. The nice thing about my clientele is that there's an exchange of energy. By the time I get off a coaching call, I'm usually as hepped up as I hope they are. I mean, it's been—

which enables you to sustain having a practice that's bigger than most because—

absolutely.

How many times I've talked to a lot of coaches, oh my God, I had 5 coaching sessions today. I'm drained. And I'm thinking, Well, that's pretty crappy. Like, that's pretty, you know, and I get it. Like, you might get one client that's had a bad experience or there's empathy or whatever, whatever. But like, if that's a consistent pattern, something's broken. Either you've got the wrong people or, you know, something's not—

approach. But, but, and by the way, I'm not saying it works for everybody. It was, yeah, and it does for me. And you're right. I do self-select and, and therefore it's a comfortable relationship, but it's also an authentic relationship. We're willing to share and they're willing to commit to doing the work.

Yeah.

And therefore it works.

Well, actually commit and do. A lot of people commit to a lot of things, right? But commit and you'll hold them to it.

No, I've got a rigid plan here. Every other week we've got it. We have action steps that are going to be achieved in 3 areas. One, you better be taking care of yourself physically. I don't want you in the program. And that's something that's changed, right? The pandemic convinced me that leadership and physicality are synchronized cannot be avoided. So you better be getting enough sleep. You better have a diet that makes some sense. I'm not trying to tell you I'm the food police, but I know that if you're 50 pounds overweight, you need to lose weight. Yeah. And I want you to get exercise. All of this I can show scientifically. Yeah. It makes you a better leader. So if you don't commit to doing that, why are you in the program? Well, just be mediocre. I'm okay with that because apparently you are. So we've got that, but we also have, what do I want to achieve that creates my legacy? If you need communication coaching, I don't feel you must waste your time with me. Holy crap. I'm gonna do— no, I'm not gonna do it. I want to talk to you about your legacy.

Yeah.

Yeah. I want to know what— I want to know what your 3-year plan is. I want to know what you're going to do so that when you step off the stage, They're going to remember you.

Yeah.

People behind you are going to say, I'm where I'm at because this person helped me, developed me, cared about me.

Right.

That's the kind of coaching that I'm involved in and it works.

I love it. Well, this has been awesome, Paul. Appreciative that you came on today and that you gave your story.

So great, Peter. Thank you so much. As always, it's a pleasure to talk to you.

Thank you. 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.