Ron Carucci, co-founder of Navalent, recalls a moment in the Dachau chapel when a soldier's comment taught him to listen to others instead of promoting himself. He warns that leaders who don't actively seek feedback "fly blind," and says his mentor taught him that only death is irrevocable, so take risks and give second chances.
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All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Ron Carucci with us. He is the co-founder and managing partner of Navelent and is a seasoned consultant with more than 25 years of experience working with CEOs and senior executives of organizations ranging from Fortune 50s to startups in pursuit of transformational change. His consulting has taken him to more than 20 different countries on 4 continents, and he has consulted some of the world's most influential CEOs and executives on issues ranging from strategy to organization and to leadership. So welcome to the show, man.
Tyler, great to be with you. Thanks for having me.
Great to have you on. So, Ron, the first one we got for you today is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Gosh, there are so many. I think early in my career, I was very fortunate to discover that I had picked the wrong career. I began my career in the arts. But in a moment of doing a workshop— back in the '80s, we didn't have the term diversity and inclusion, but it would have been diversity inclusion— in a room at the chapel at Dachau, of all places, where we had East Germans and West Germans and Americans and civilians and military. And in the middle of our conversation, somebody, a young soldier raised his hand and said, "I'm just so tired of being trained to hate." Which floored me that something we'd done up in the front of the room could have made him think that. But I think it was a turning point for me to realize that, you know, telling great stories is interesting, but engaging other people in their own stories is far more valuable. And I think no matter what job you're in, you have more impact in the world if you spend more time thinking about other people's story than your own.
And then what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
If you're leading anybody, you should be desperate to know how they experience you as a leader. Whatever mechanism you need to find that gets you feedback or access to people's hearts and minds about you as a leader, get it. Because otherwise you're flying blind and your, your determination of how big the impact is between what you intend and your actual impact is flawed. So make sure you know and have a pathway of information that tells you precisely how people are metabolizing how you lead.
And then what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry-specific.
I, my mentor, who's been my mentor for 30-something years told me a long time ago, nothing in life is irrevocable except death. So you get second chances, don't be afraid to try.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Don't spend any time at all, much less a lot of time wondering what people think about you or, or being worried about what they think of you.
And then kind of going a little bit down a different path, in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
I think it's knowing that your impact in the world matters, knowing that you're, you're making a difference for other people.
And then what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
The book I would always recommend, I think is required reading for the planet, is David Whyte's Crossing the Unknown Sea, because I think it helps us embrace the reality that our work is an expression of who we are, but sometimes that can be overindulged. So it's a beautiful book that teaches us that our identity and our work are okay to be integrated, but not to the point where we lose ourselves.
And then what is your favorite quote and why?
Uh, gosh, I don't know that I have a favorite quote. A favorite quote is Dory Clark and her thought that I want to be in a world where the best ideas prevail, not just the loudest ones. Because I think in a world where the world's just way too noisy right now, people are not distinguishing between really truly great ideas from just truly repeated ones. And too often it's the hacky ones that get repeated.
Got it. Well, listen, man, thank you so much for coming on. The last one we got for you is where can our audience best find you online?
We'd love to keep chatting with them at Navalent, N-A-V-A-L-E-N-T.com. Come visit us there for videos and blogs. We have a free magazine and we have a free ebook for you if you're leading any kind of transformational change, Navalent.com/Transformation. Come and download that free ebook and Learn our playbook. Perfect.
Thanks again for coming on, man.
Thanks, I appreciate it.
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