EntreLeadership - #215: Dr. Tim Elmore — Meet Generation Z

Episode Date: July 31, 2017

One of our most popular guests, Dr. Tim Elmore, returns to discuss the next generation entering the workforce—Generation Z. This group is definitely different, and leadership styles will need to change. Also on tap, host Ken Coleman interviews one of our youngest EntreLeaders yet—15-year-old Drew Formsma. entreleadership.com/podcast Dr. Elmore's Book Giveaway Marketing to Millennials Guide Summit 18 Registration   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

helping business leaders grow themselves, their team, and their profits. This is the Entree Leadership Podcast. Now, here is your host, Ken Coleman. Broadcasting from the Music City, this is the podcast of leaders, by leaders, for leaders. Thank you so much for joining the conversation. Our guest this episode are Dr. Tim Elmore and Andrew Formsma. Now, Dr. Tim Elmore is no stranger to you if you've been with us for any amount of time. He is an expert on next generation leaders.

What he's doing at Growing Leaders, I think, is absolutely groundbreaking work, and I think it's a must for anybody leading today. Period. That's how important I think his work is. He's got a new book called Marching Off the Map, Inspire Students to Navigate a Brand New World. So we're going to talk about that specifically, Generation Y and Z. And then we're going to introduce you to somebody who I think was one of the most impressive members of that generation, Andrew Formsma.

So this is a 15-year-old kid who recently spoke to our entire team and surprised all of us when he told us he was a big fan of the Entry Leadership podcast. This is not an interview to have him talk about how great we are. We're going to get in the mind and heart of a 15-year-old. And I think it's going to inspire you parents. And, boy, everything is on target this episode. Coming out of that, InfusionSoft, I'll tell you about it briefly. They've got a millennial tool.

to help you market your goods, your services to millennials. So let's get to this. Dr. Tim Elmore is one of the most insightful people I know, period. But when it comes to leading the next generation, I think he's at the top of the list. If you want to go back, if you missed him on episode 149, we interviewed him about leading the next generation. So I asked him to come back on to go deeper into his new book, marching off the map. It's a really great concept and it has terrific context to where we're at. And so I want you to listen in, take a lot of notes, and here's some really fun news. When we're done with the conversation, I'm going to come back and tell you how you can win one of 50 of these books. 50 books, Tim Elmore's team is going to give away to you

people. And I'm going to tell you how you can win one. But first, here is my conversation with Dr. Tim Mellon. Well, Tim, this is so exciting to have you back on. You're not new to our audience. But you've got a new book. And I must tell you, you know me well. I have ADHD. And so when I saw that you had a new book and I saw the title marching off the map, I didn't even read the rest of the subtitle, which is inspire students to navigate a brand new world.

I thought to myself, what is Tim up to? And, of course, you're on target again. But this is different. And you're being very intentional with that title. Why? What is this title tell us that you're going to deliver in this book? Well, I love the title, too, and I love it. I can say that, I think, because I didn't make it up. It actually was inspired by a man centuries ago named Alexander the Great. We all studied him in history class.

But if you remember Alexander's story, Ken, he's marching across the known world with his armies, conquering every bit of the known world. But then he kept on marching. He marched into places they had no maps for. and he actually transformed some of his soldiers into mapmakers. And they continue to map as they marched. And I love this because I feel like it's a picture of where we are today. We are moving rapidly into the future.

We love the new technology. Every one of us does, but yet we're thinking, are we even ready for what we're inventing to make good decisions around it? So, yes, it's about those who lead the young, but it's not just for educators. This book is directed at business people that are hiring the young that are moving rapidly into an unknown world, a smart future, where there's smart phones, smart cars, smart homes, smart clothes, smart glasses.

And I really try to just challenge how do we make great decisions and lead the way, even though we know not what is coming. And I also challenge the idea, Ken, in the book, I think you'll agree with this, that the majority of us as humans tend to be settlers more than pioneers. Absolutely. You know, we want to climb in only after we know it's safe and the pioneers already pay the way and I'm thinking we actually have to be a little more entrepreneurial in our thinking. Even if we're not entrepreneurs, literally we need to be entrepreneur in our thinking because the future is

coming at us so fast. That's right. I love the analogy of the settlers versus the pioneers because the settlers, the early settlers always had a bit of courage, but they weren't the first ones out there. And then they stayed there. And you're right about this idea of settling because it doesn't matter what industry we're talking about or what age of humanity. There's always going to be pioneers who keep pushing, and that means there's always going to be people following them. And that's why this book is huge. You know, you open up the book in the first chapter and you really lay out three significant cultural changes. And you're right about the future. We don't know what it's going to look like, but you are seeing some things. And I think these cultural changes

are huge to start our conversation. So folks, I want you listening in here. If you're on the treadmill, you're in the gym, you're on the lawnmower, or I guess you can't be on the lawnmower. I guess you would have to be on the tractor. But the point is, I want you to go back and get this because this is really huge to set in our conversation, but lay those cultural changes that you see. Yeah, well, I was inspired by rereading some of Margaret Meade's writings from, you know, 35 or 40 years ago. Margaret Mead, when she died, was arguably the most famous anthropologist in the world. And she talked about three shifts in society that she saw.

And she felt like even in 1978, we were on the brink of a new one. And Ken, I think we're in it now. So the first era was what she called a post-fifference. figurative society. And what she meant by that is that if you were a young person growing up millenniums ago, everything was figured out ahead of time and you were the, you figured it out post. The adults pretty much mapped out your life for you. You remember reading about these days. Your spouse was chosen for you. Your job was chosen for you. If you were a son, you did what your dad did. If your daughter, you did what your mom did. And everything was pretty much predetermined

ahead of time by the grownups. But then, with the dawn of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution, we moved into what Margaret Meade called a co-figurative society. And what she meant by that is, because Reason became king in that day, we were rationalizing what worked and what didn't work. The emerging adult and the established adult figured out life together. Our country was born during this day. We said in the very beginning, we hold these truths to be self-evident.

Yeah, so this is rationalable. So you might get to help choose your spouse and you might get to choose your job. But Margaret Mead said, I see the day coming soon, we'll be moving into a pre-figurative world. And what she meant by that is, with the rapid introduction of technology and just invention itself, the young will figure it out faster than the old do. And Ken, I think we're moving into this world now with artificial. artificial intelligence, virtual reality. I think very rapidly, I mean, I looked at my two kids are both in their 20s, but they certainly figure stuff out before I. They got an intuition about how

Apple put their stuff together, you know, or whatever. I say this jokingly, but, you know, when something goes wrong with my iPhone, I give it to my son, he fixes it in five minutes. And I say, how did you know to do that? And he says, how did you not know? You know, I mean, that's the conversations we have at our house. It's true. So very quickly, we see this in business. You know, I mean, back in the 1990s, Kodak, the film company, the camera camera, was on top of the world. And within a matter of a few years, digital cameras and the whole introduction of what we now know, put them out of business. Blockbuster.

Remember when Blockbuster was the leader in entertainment? You know, we'd go down to rent a video. Well, Reed Hastings from Netflix actually approached them and said, you know, I think the future is going to be mailing stuff and then streamed video. And they thought that was stupid. Well, now Netflix is king and blockbuster's gone. So it's just another picture. We've all know this, but I think we're going to have to both share with the young our insight, but glean from the young their intuition.

And that's what I'm lobbying for in this book. Yeah. Boy, that's a really good challenge. It always comes back to leadership, doesn't it? Yeah, it's like the leaders are going to have to be comfortable sitting down with the 20-somethings in their company going, hey, what would you do different? Yeah. Why not be healthy enough to do that? that. Well, and see, that's just it. And you know, John Maxwell taught both of us, you've got to be emotionally

secure. That's your number one possession. So one illustration I give in the book is Angela Arrence. Remember her from Burberry? She's now at Apple. But Angela, first thing she did when she took over Burberry coats, this seemingly antiquated brand at the time, these trench coats, she sat down with her youngest team members and said, what do you think we should do? And if you remember her interns and 20-something employees, they all said, I think we should let our customers post pictures on our site. And we'll call it the art of the trench. And they started doing that. In fact, she flip-flopped everything.

Instead of the old folks, the established executives, telling the interns what to do, you know, because they were the peons. It was just the opposite. All the young employees were saying, well, you guys, this is what I think we should do. And, of course, Angela said, well, we've got the budget and we've got the network. We can make what you think should happen, happen. And Burberry just rose to the top of their industry thanks to listening to that young intuition that she had there at Burberry. Yeah. See, I think that's so great, folks. I think we really need to dial in on this.

I mean, you have the experience to make sure that you can maturely handle what would be the new business ideas or things that need to change. But they don't have any experience, and that's a good thing, which means they're going to think about things different than we do. That's what's beautiful. It's like the experience coin. You flip it both ways, and that's really good truth there. All right, so so much here. I want to ask you about Generation Z. Now, we've talked about this before, but this is important because the word that everybody's talking about is millennials.

Yeah, yeah. But the reality is millennials are getting older every year. What is Generation Z? Who are they? Give us a description. And then how are they different than millennials or what could be some of the challenges there? Yeah, great question. Well, I'm going to try to help the listeners wrap their arms around Gen Z in just a few minutes here.

First of all, Generation Z is the population of young people that follow the millennials. So some of them are babies of the millennial parents. So the oldest millennials are now mid-30s. So Gen Z would be the population that really has grown up since the turn of the century. Ken, some social scientists would have that generation starting as early as 1995. We think they started right about the turn of the century. because if you think about it, so much changed after the year 2000. The dot-com era bubble burst.

There was corporate scandal, you know, Enron, Tyco WorldCom. 911 happened. Crazy terrorist attacks on our soil. And then since that time, 26,000 terrorist attacks have happened. The economic recession, unemployment. Would you not agree, Ken, the last 15 years have been a little bit darker than the previous 15 years before that? No question. So Gen Z, let me just describe them very rapidly.

We're seeing a generation of kids that I think are just as full of potential, but confidence is morphing into caution thanks to this world where the jobs aren't as easy as they were for the millennials in the 90s. Attacking an education is morphing into hacking one. And what I mean by that is instead of, well, let me just give you a scenario. So a Gen Z kid that might be 15, 16 years old, maybe has an older brother or sister that's a millennial, and they bought into what mom and dad said when they said, just go to college and you'll get a great job.

Well, their older brother did go to college. The job didn't open up afterwards. In fact, they're a barista at Starbucks, which they could have done before college, but they have a $28,000 debt. So they're saying, I'm going to make this up. I'm going to take a couple of MOOCs here, do an apprenticeship here, an internship there, another online class there, and my resume will be a litany of hodgepodge items that I'm hoping some employer hires me for, and I'll do a gig. You know, this is the gig economy. I'll do a

gig for a year and a half, and then two years here, and then a year and a half there, and they may have five jobs in their 20s. So I think education's changing. Here's another one. Consuming media is morphing into creating media. So while the millennials might spend three hours watching YouTube videos, Jen Z says, I want to make those videos. I want to create or curate that content. Idealism is morphing into pragmatism. Ken, we're finding, as we do primary research with focus groups and others, we're just finding kids today are much more pragmatic than the early millennials were that thought they were going to change the world by noon on Friday, you know, that sort of thing. But I think that's good.

That can be a really good thing. In fact, we need to make sure they don't become cynical, you know, about what's happening. Spending money is morphing into saving money. So some of these kids are going, 57% of Gen Z would say, when I get money, I think about saving it before I just think about spending it. Well, that's very different than millennials were. Now, let me stop you there for a minute. I want to make sure I'm learning and I want an audience to make sure they're learning. Is that because they are more pragmatic, the point you just made, and they are more cautious, a point you made a few minutes ago?

I think so. There certainly must be more than that. I think sometimes it's the adults that are speaking to their life that are more cautious themselves. I mean, mom lost her job, so we don't get the iPhone the same day it comes out, that sort of thing. So I think all of that. But, you know, Ken, I don't know, call me old-fashioned. I actually think that can be good for kids. It is.

Maybe when it's a little harder, it's okay. I don't, you know, I have to work at it a little bit more. And I just think that's healthy. And work ethic is something I believe in. And I know you do too. So here's another one that moms and dads may benefit from. Viral messages are morphing into vanishing messages. What I mean by that is, you know, for the millennials, it was how many views, likes,

and shares you got on social media. Well, now, you know, again, let's go back to that Gen Z kid. that watch their older sister post a picture of the party she had on Friday night where they got crunk, crazy drunk, you know? And now that girl goes into a job interview on Monday and her future employer saw that photo and now doesn't want to hire her. So Gen Zee's going, I'll just do Snapchat. It goes away in 11 seconds and I can't be tracked.

So they're smart, you know. Two more real quick. I think feeling special is morphing into feeling savvy. Ken, you and I've joked about how the millennials all felt like. they were little snowflake special kids. Oh, yeah. And in one sense, that's good. We want our children to feel special.

But I think savvy is the word I used to describe Gen Z. They are hoping and coping with a very different world than millennials did. And they're having to be savvy about how they do things. But again, that can be channeled in the right way. If you're hiring Gen Z out there, this can be a good thing where you want a savvy young team member that knows how to save money here or maybe lower the cost opportunities on that project or whatever. And then one more, text messages are morphing into iconic messages. Ken, more and more, we just see that young people are using words less and images more, you know, icons, emojis, bit mojis.

So again, for business owners, how do we leverage the picture? How do we leverage an image or even a metaphor? That's their native tongue. Yeah. I want to take you off the topic of the book for just a moment because this audience has heard me interview Adam Braun, who's doing some really innovative things where, you know, they're hiring kids right out of high school. Yeah.

They work for a year. I think that movement is underfoot. I've said it on this podcast. Yeah. It's not culturally accepted yet, but with the massive skyrocketing debt, and we know for a fact that college education pricing is going up, it's not coming down. Do you see for our business leaders a, I see it, but I just want, I think this is leading to Gen Z going like LeBron did, Kobe did, and Kevin Garnett.

They're going straight from high school to the pros. Yeah. Yes, we are, Ken. The data shows us that Gen Z plans to start working earlier and may forego that four-year liberal arts college for maybe a more, again, more practical preparation. And part of that will be the job, you know? I think that's good news. I actually think that the teenage job, which was normal back in my day, has

kind of gone away with the millennials, and I think we need to say, sweetheart, this is great. In fact, it's not beneath you to work fast food or whatever. This is great work. No, you're not going to make a crew out of, you know, dairy queen maybe, but, you know, learn this stuff. And I actually think Gen C might be open to that. So that's kind of cool. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you here, you know, obviously our brand is called Entree Leadership.

Dave smashed the word entrepreneur and leader together. That's right. And we've had kids on this podcast. We're seeing an explosion in the entrepreneur. Newerial, you know, ventures of teenagers. Yeah. They're just going, hey, wait a second. We had a kid on Tim that was from Florida, and he started a pooper-scooper business in his

neighborhood and, you know, bought a $3,000 boat and got written up in the newspaper. You know what I mean? This kid's making real money at 15, real money. And again, for parents for a moment, and we're going to get back into the specifics of the book, but for parents, I'm hearing this and I'm going, hey, certainly go work fast food. but there's an opportunity to push our kids into some entrepreneurial ventures that even if they don't make a ton of money, Tim, and it doesn't last, there's more than just some business lessons they're going to learn, yes?

Absolutely. In fact, Chris Harris, our marketing director and I were just talking yesterday about how the typical lawnmower job that maybe you had when you were 14, now we're finding teenagers are fixing iPhones and making 20 grand, you know, just fixing that I couldn't fix. I mean, I'm not going to know how to fix that thing, but they just intuitively know. So once again, it's that prefigrative society that we're at the brink of a whole new world

that we've got to not just get mad at these kids today, ah kids today, you know? And we need to say, what are they showing us and how can we leverage their entrepreneurial spirit? The majority of them see themselves as entrepreneur. So even if that's not true, they see themselves that way. And I think we need to capitalize on that for sure. All right, back to some great content in the book. And you've touched on this, but I want you to take us a little deeper because the business leader is going, all right, I've got a real good snapshot. Adapting versus adopting.

When we're talking about cultural trends, what does the leader need to understand about adapting versus adopting? Yeah, these are huge words that I talk about in the book. It's very easy for people to just get in survival mode. When so much innovation and technology is being introduced, it seems like almost every day. and we just adopt every new thing that comes along. And I'm not sure that's wise. In fact, we are now finding data that would say social media, while it's wonderful in some ways,

is causing angst and depression among us and our kids in horrible ways. So inventions are coming along faster than we can civilize them. So I recommend not adopting but adapting. We do need to adapt to the new world. We do need to tweak or adjust the sales, if you will, but we still need to be on track with missions that we believe are timeless. In fact, Ken in the book, I talk about being timely and timeless. Those are two key words to us at growing leaders.

How can I be timely where I leverage every new thing that's available, every new tool or resource or invention? But then, Ken, we've got to say what's timeless that perhaps our grandparents enjoyed, and we don't want to lose that. For instance, you know, when I get in front of college students and I talk about this subject, I say, hey, guys, I'm always going to hire an honest employee over a dishonest one every day. I'm always going to hire a disciplined employee.

Those are timeless virtue. I don't care who you are. I don't care how quick you are on the iPhone or whatever. And so I think what we've got to do is say we're going to be on the cutting edge, progressive in our innovation, but we are going to hold on to those timeless values and virtues. And in the book, Ken, I even talk about swing sets and plum lines. We've got to swing backward and see what do we not want to lose before we swing forward into the future and then hold those plum lines that show us, you know, when that wall is crooked. So it's just, it's just essential.

Yeah, so good. I want to go a bit backwards, something you said earlier. You were talking about the idea of, you know, allowing these young people to kind of speak into us and what can we learn from you. Use the Angela Aaron's example. I want to get back to the title in the book and for leaders right here. I want you to speak to leaders. How can they strategically, Tim, as in like they hear this conversation, they go back, sit at their desk and soak on it a bit, and then begin to take action. How do they allow the young people on their team to lead them off the map a little bit?

Yeah. We talked about it, but we kind of moved on, and I want to come back to that because I think there's a certain amount of fear that leaders might face here, and I think that's okay and it's natural. But I want you to help them step into that. Yeah. Well, let me give you another metaphor. You know, I'm the king of metaphors here. Yes, you are. So I remember riding on a falucca in Cairo, Egypt some years ago, that sailing boat that they got out there on that Nile River.

We were out on a very windy day, and I noticed that our sailor was constantly moving. He was barefooted, and he ran around constantly adjusting the sails, pulling on ropes, pushing sails around to make sure that we didn't crash into the banks of the river. I noticed as I watched him, and I even smiled on the boat, he did not yell at the wind, that it was not cooperating with him. He didn't surrender to the wind. It just sat and say, you know, the wind's just blowing the wrong way. I'm so sorry today, you know. Instead, he worked hard to adjust the sales.

So how we do this with our youngest employees and maybe even our kids, if we're parents, is we need to stop yelling at the wind. You know, ah, culture today, it just sucks. You know, it's just horrible, you know. We need to not surrender and say, oh, whatever, you know, just let Katie Perry lead us, you know, into the future. I think we need to say, yeah, we need to say, how do I adjust the same? sales. And I think one good step we can take that I actually think you and I have talked about before, Ken, is reverse mentoring. I actually think I need to sit down with that 22-year-old,

young employee, and say, what do you think in these days? What are the latest apps you just purchased? Can we leverage them in some way with this company? And then I need to share too. So reverse mentoring, you remember, is about both sides, that baby boomer and that millennial or Jazeer, both adding value to the other. But that means I adapt, not a lot of. adopt everything along the way. And that's a fine line that I think we've got to balance. All right. One of my favorite chapters in the book, Modern Day Mapmakers, and this is, I mean, this is a great challenge. The title of book is marching off the map and you use the Alexander of the Great analogy. And he literally, because he had to, he had to come up with some guys who

say, hey, let's make some new maps on where we are. I think this is inspiring for our leaders. How are you not inspired with the idea? Let's go to some new territory that nobody else has ever. seen. And so you actually highlight some folks. Share with us from that chapter. I think this is a wonderful challenge. Well, we just wanted to make sure and include in the book, people in our current setting, you know, so let's say they're a school teacher and they go, well, the school system is bad, you know. Well, maybe it is. But I think even right now with your current realities, you can be a modern-name matmaker. So I love high-tech high school in San Diego. They're a high school with regular high school kids. They're not necessarily brilliant. They're regular high school kids,

but they've gone to a completely project-based learning model where instead of curriculum driving the classroom, instead of lesson plans driving the classroom, we're building something. And that's going to prompt questions that you're going to have. They're going to lead to you getting all the answers you're going to need. Now, the teacher guides, but they're more of a consultant than a commander. And by the way, that's sometimes what I think an employer may need to play the role. And I'm not just a command and control man at the top or woman at the top. I'm a consultant. I'm giving projects, managing by objective, and then consulting because people learn on a need-to-know basis.

And they're not going to remember a lecture until they've got to know it, and then they're going to learn. So I really love experiential learning. Can you know we believe in Epic? I use Epic all the time. EPIC. We need to be experiential in our training. We need to be participatory in our training. That means we need to let them weigh in on how it goes.

We need to be image rich. So we're teaching with images. And of course, you know, Habitutes is how we've led out an entire way to talk with pictures. And then C is connected. We need to let our young connect with each other, connect with us, and think out loud and be part of owning the answers. So it's got to be moving away from commanded control to more, let me consult and encourage. And I know that sounds so cheesy to people. I'm sure you don't want to be a therapist and so forth.

But in many ways, we've got to have those soft skills as leaders in order to bring out the best version of those young employees that we've got. I want to get outside of the book for a moment because you're such an expert on this young generation. And we've got people out here who are listening who are hiring all the time and looking for great talent. And I think this book is a anthem for, hey, there is some just great young eagles out there and you need to find them. I want you to speak on the issue of if you're interviewing, if you are recruiting this young generation, Tim, what should our leaders be looking for? And then how should they be assessing as to whether or not they are a good fit on the team? That's a great question. Well, let me start with some perhaps obvious words, but just to get our brains moving in the right direction.

When we hire young people, interns, young employees, I always, number one, look for initiative. Are you sitting around waiting for the right mentor or job to come your way? Or have you gotten up off your butt and you're going after it? So I always look for initiative. I also look for teachability. There is still a bit of an entitlement and arrogance about the young that not all have, but Ken, you and I were just talking about this off the mic just a minute ago about how it's so prevalent because our kids are growing up thinking, I know the deal.

And sometimes you want to say, no, you don't. You know, you don't know everything. So I look for teachability. I can work with almost anybody with whatever quirks they might have if I know they're coachable and teachable. So initiative, coachability. Another one that I really am looking for now is, and I'm going to put two words together, Ken, but I want to look for both a sense of responsibility that they seem to own things when given to them and there is a moral compass inside.

Now, if you don't mind, let me elaborate on that because I know we probably... Well, it's huge. So Michael Bloomberg, I was reading some of his stuff and he inspired me to have a thought that I want to share right now, and this might be a great handle for listeners. In your mind, I want you to picture two columns, okay? So on the left-hand column, I want to walk you through different periods of history, And then the right-hand column, I'm going to share with you what I think are critical elements that we need to have to thrive, not just survive each time period. So, millenniums ago, we lived in an agricultural world.

We've all read about that where most of us worked outside as human beings. And we were in an agricultural world. We were farming all the time. And the critical component to thrive back then was your muscles. You know, the stronger your muscle, the better you're going to do on your job. Then we moved into the industrial age. and at that point the critical component to thrive was your machines. You know, the better your machines, the more you can take advantage of that assembly line and that factory and you can produce more.

We've now moved into the information age. We've been talking about that for decades now where most of us make our living with our minds. So it's muscles, machines, minds. You and I both make our living with our minds, Ken. And so do our kids. But I actually believe we're about to enter a new age. So we've gone from agricultural. to industrial to information,

I think we're moving into the intelligence age, where as I mentioned earlier, all of our devices are smart. It's crazy. But it's so crazy with artificial intelligence available, so available in the next two to three years, I think the critical component to thrive is our morals. And I think instilling a compass on the inside

where there is a sense of ethic and value on what's important. And I can discern between all, all the voices out there that are not valuable. And by the way, everybody gets to wiki way in right now, you know? That's right. And I can say, no, no, no, no. This is what's right.

And there is a sense of absolute right and wrong. Not in every area, but in some areas. When we dig up the data, I love the young generation can. That's why I do what I do. But two and every three millennials don't believe there's an absolute right or wrong anymore. And while I believe there are a lot of gray areas, I'm thinking, boy, we've got to let them know. There are a handful. Like I mentioned, honesty.

You know, that's just 75% of university students today admit to cheating to get through college. That's three out of every four, not one out of ten, three out of four. So again, if we're going to prepare them to lead the way in the future, and one day we will have to pass on the reins to them, I'm just thinking we've got to do some preparation that's more than just hard skills. That's soft skills. That's so good. All right. Final word, and it's actually a most important final word, if you're looking at the last chapter of this book, Mark, off the map. The single most important leadership practice as you march off the map,

challenges with that. Yeah. Ken, I find far too often that I am prone as an older season veteran to just get frustrated at what's happening with the young and to lead out of what I call relief instead of belief. By relief, I simply mean I just want to vent. Maybe I want to yell. You know, I want to scream at that young athlete if I'm a coach. You live. lazy bum, you know, or I want to scream at that young employee that you didn't have any work ethic. We vent and relieve ourselves. Or sometimes relief looks like this. I feel so badly for that young kid that didn't have a dad, maybe, that I just reduce the

standard that we've set in this company or this school. And relief looks that way. I don't think we lead well when we lead out of relief, relieving myself or relieving them of excellent standards that we've set. I think we've got to lead out of belief. And again, this may sound corny, but sometimes. stay with me. I lead out of belief when I say, we have standards of excellence. We have a moral compass in this organization. And we're going to lead out of the belief that you can do this.

You can do this. And I tell you what, that means we're calling out of people the very best in them. We don't let them just slack off on Tuesday because it was hard. But that's very, very difficult. So I share in the book one of my favorite stories. It's just been passed down through the decades. one of the greatest inventors, if not the greatest inventor in American history, is Thomas Edison. But one of the early stories from his life, it's very difficult to document, but it's been passed on. It's such a great picture of this belief thing that I'm talking about. Young Tom Edison came home to his mom with a note in his hand. His mom said, what's that note?

He goes, well, it's from my teacher, and she said, just to give it to you. So his mother takes the note, and she reads it, and she breaks out in tears. and now he's worried. You know, this kid who's, I don't know, nine, ten years old says, what's it say, Mom? And she says, Tom, the note says, your son is a genius. We do not have the teachers to instruct him. You're going to have to instruct him yourself at home. So for that point on, his mom let him kind of roam and explore and invent things.

And I'm so glad she did. The greatest inventor of the world. Years later, after his mom passed away, Thomas Edison was rummaging through his mother's belongings, and he found this note tucked away in a book. And when he read it, he broke out in tears. The note did not say that at all. The note actually read,

Your son is addled, meaning mentally ill. We do not have the teachers to instruct him. You're going to instruct them yourself. But here was a mom that said, I see something different than that teacher does. And Tom Edison gave his mother the credit for the inventor he became because she somehow believed and saw something different than the other

adults did. So this book is a challenge to any adult that wants to read the book, whether you're an employer, teacher, coach, whatever, to make sure that we're leading out of belief, not relief, as we lead. Oh, that is so good. Folks, that is a final word. That is something to think about. Dr. Tim Elmore, such a great friend of mine.

He has influenced me so much, more than he even knows. The new book is Marching Off the Map. inspire students to navigate a brand new world. Tim is the founder of growing leaders. And Tim, I would be remiss if I let you go without give it us 30 seconds. So these leaders listening in, all shapes, sizes, different industries. How does growing leaders help them? How could growing leaders help them? Well, Ken, thanks for asking. We love getting to partner with organizations, companies, sports teams, etc. We help them by offering tools to start these conversations that I've just talked about. So marching off the map obviously would be a resource that might be helpful.

But Ken, you know these habitus we developed. We've actually got a habitutes book for new professionals that just teach with a picture. So it's an image that starts a conversation around what we believe are 13 fundamental skill sets that a young professional is going to need. So we offer content. We offer epic training. We do events for organizations that are onboarding young employees and how to lead them well. Generation I, why Ken? We've talked about that on this very podcast. podcast before. Growingleaders.com is our website. There's a lot of free stuff there as well, but we'd welcome anybody that might be just wanting to explore this topic to come see us. Well, my friend, you are a wealth of knowledge. We could go for six hours, but you don't have that

kind of time, and our audience can't. They wouldn't even be able to process at all, but this was so good for us to hear. Great stuff, as always. We'll have you back again very soon. We appreciate you being with us. Thanks, Ken. My pleasure. Okay, I think that's an interview that you need to go back. can listen to maybe 10 times because of the implications. There's a lot there. I'm not kidding you, because when I listen to it live, I'm scribbling notes, and Will and Eric see me do that. But it's one of those that I remember wrapping up, and of course, we always do a postpartum and talk about all kinds of stuff we've got to do, what's coming up. But I walked across the

parking lot back to my desk, and I really was running that through my head. What does that mean to me as a father? What does that mean to me as a professional communicator trying to help people in that space? Very interesting stuff. I just think there's a lot there that it's worth several listens. The book is marching off the map, inspire students to navigate a brand new world. This is fun. I told you that Dr. Tim Elmore and his team, and we're grateful for this, are going to give away 50 free copies of the book. Now, here's how it's going to work.

We've never done this before. It's the first 50. Not 50 random. the first 50 people that go to growingleaders.com slash entree leadership. Growingleaders.com slash entree leadership. The first 50, get the book. So you're going to be very fortunate. And for those of you who aren't fortunate enough to get there, just go buy the book.

Invest in yourself. Invest in your team. Invest in your leaders. Invest in this next generation. Speaking of the next generation, Infusionistoff is going to help you with marketing to millennials. Now, listen, folks, many people speak of millennials. Like, it's a term of derision. But here's the reality. You ready for this? This demographic spend $200 billion annually. I've told you on this podcast that millennials are now the largest demographic in the workforce.

So I think we've got to stop saying millennial like it's a swear word. Okay? Because they're here to stay. And I'm looking through the glass at two fantastic millennials, Will the engineer and Eric the producer. You got to stop talking about them like they're just zoo animals that nobody wants to look at. And you've got to figure out how to market to them. 85% of millennials have a smartphone and they consume most of their content through that device. Here's the sad part. Are you ready for this? This is unbelievable. Only 15% of smart. businesses actually market directly to millennials. Wake up!

And FusionSoft is here to help. Check out the guide free. In the show notes of this episode, Entreeleadership.com, click on podcast. Drew Forbesma is 15 years old. His dad came to speak to our entire company recently, and in the middle of his talk, brings up 15-year-old Drew, has him talked to the parents in our audience.

The kid says some great stuff. He goes on to brag about the Entree Leadership podcast. So, of course, Will the Engineer, Eric the producer and I did a head snap. And the reality is, we said, this is an example of what Tim Elmore is talking about. A kid who is getting it. A kid who is on purpose. So you're going to love this, parents. Dial into this.

Here is one of the brightest 15-year-olds I have ever. talk to. Well, Drew, this is a treat to have you on, and it's always fun to talk to our listeners, certainly fun when we have a listener on the podcast. Tim Elmore is our guest this episode and talking a lot about Generation Z and just the future, and you certainly embody that. And you're a sharp young man, so I want to start with the fact that you listen to this podcast regularly.

And the reason I want to start here is not for you to tell us how great we are and and everybody listen to that because quite frankly, everybody listening here is a regular listener probably and they already like it. But I'm curious. At what point did you start listening to the podcast? And I understand that your dad said, hey, you need to start listening this. So, Bravo, Dad. But you start to listen to it and I want to know how old you are and what was your early impression. So a year ago, my dad, he always has said to me, hey, Drew, listen to this. come with me for this and he's always giving me new things to learn. And I'm a learner.

I took a personality test and I'm a learner. So I love to learn things. And so a year ago, I started listening to this. And what we would do is my dad and I would start the podcast at the same time and we would go for a run or a walk. And there would always be a little delay and we would always have the humor like a second apart. But it was fun to learn and kind of hear other people's stories about the struggles of being an

entrepreneur and what can be great of being an entrepreneur. And so a year ago, we started listening to it together. And I think it's really helped me as a kid to hear and kind of be part of the real world. Schools don't usually teach this kind of thinking. And I think that's important for kids to understand this. And I think this is for all ages as podcasts. It's very easy to understand what different people are saying. So I really do love this podcast.

Well, that's cool, man. I appreciate that. But I'm more excited to the fact that we are retaining the attention of a 15-year-old. So what have you done that we could say as entrepreneur? I want to know a little bit of your story. So in 2011, I decided to create a business. And my business was at the time we lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And I decided to create a business called Clean Cans in a Pier Harp.

Wait a second. Are you like a nine-year-old? Is that what you're nine at this time? Yeah. Around that time. Yeah. Okay. I got it.

All right. And so at the time, my brother would shovel walkway. And so there was some competition in the neighborhood. And so to keep up the competition, I had to create my own business. I'm an entrepreneur and I really wanted to start something. So I came up with clean cans and up your heart. And what happened at clean cans and up your heart is I would bring in the neighbor's trash can every week. And once a month, I would clean their trash can.

So I told my dad about this and he's like, that's great, Drew. What are you going to do next? So I went and bought all the material, the sanitizer, the soap, the power washer, the scrubber, everything. And with all my money I had, and I got home, and I had all the stuff, and I kind of thought to myself, I don't have any customers yet. And I'm like, I got to do something about this. So I go out to the neighborhood, and I go to my first neighbor. And I said, hey, I have this great company. Can I please do the service to you? And they said, sorry, bud, I'm not going to do that. We already have a son that can bring the trash can in. I'm like, okay, that's one person.

So I went to the next neighbor. No. And I kept getting the same. same answer, two-letter answer, no. And I'm like, geez, this is a lot harder than I thought. And as I'm watching my brother succeed, he's got the whole neighborhood he's shoveling walkways for in the winters. And that was my first really tough time of being an entrepreneur. Yeah, so you're nine and you're going through a tough time. I can just hear the listeners just completely devastated for you. Now, this is fun. So this is great. Because you really are, I mean, this is you're nine years old and you're just thinking about buying stuff, right? Yeah, I thought that's what you had to do.

What did you learn? Give me one practical takeaway that you can look back on and say, all right, this is what I did wrong in this particular venture as a nine-year-old. Well, as a nine-year-old, I first learned that you probably should not buy all the supplies before you even test the customers and kind of get a feel for the industry, as you would say. Yeah. And that'd be the wise thing to do is probably test it. And I also learned that it's not easy to be an entrepreneur.

There are ups and downs and downs and ups. And I shut down the business. And luckily, we moved to California, so it wasn't the worst thing. Yeah, there you go. All right. So let's talk about the environment that you're in. You've already touched on this a little bit. And I think this is so important for the parents that are listening in here.

Your dad's been extremely intentional to be observant. He sees, okay, you're a learner. You like learning. And so he goes, all right, here's a podcast that I listen to. I want you to listen to it and walk with me and let's talk about it. So he's been intentional there. What else is going on in your world from a learning? You said you were a learner.

So how do you learn beyond listening to this podcast? Well, Ken, I really have to credit my parents both. they took a strength finders test and it gave me I'm a learner organizer and relator and so whenever I'm doing things they always pointed out and so that's been very helpful to me and I'm an audio person I that's how I learn I don't when I hear things it's way better than I read things so my dad has has got me to the Dave Ramsey show and I've listened to the entree leadership and there's just a lot of talks I've listened to and he hasn't forced me to do it, that's very important. My dad's not forcing me. I have the option to listen to it. When it's

forced, I think that's a horrible thing. And I really feel like my parents both have helped me in my strengths of listening and hearing and learning. And this podcast has really helped me develop because I want to be an entrepreneur. And I've gotten some key things from this podcast, which have helped me as a kid. And obviously, the work that your dad's doing, you have acclimated too you're interested in. And so I can glean from what you just said. I'm assuming that the entrepreneurial big dream for you is your own platform speaking and writing on generosity.

Is that correct? Well, right now, I believe that's what God's calling me to do. I feel like I'm supposed to speak to teens and kind of tell them there is a way out. You can have a great life. If you start this generosity, I call it when you move from awareness to action, miracles happen. Awareness is getting that antenna working and then creating the habit of generosity. Every day with your family, bringing it to the dinner table. People don't talk about generosity.

And I think when we reset our thinking on generosity, it's not just giving to the church. It's not just little giving here. It's really making it a lifestyle. Good stuff, folks. Now you know why we had Drew on the podcast. This is a young man who is on purpose. I love it. I love that you listen to the podcast.

If you were going to sit in for me one day and you were going to interview a guest on this podcast, you know this podcast, you know the audience. It's just for fun, Drew. So don't start angling. All right, I enjoy what I do. Who would it be? What guest would you interview? Well, I think I would interview Patrick Leccioni.

I think he, yeah, he really does show that you can be an entrepreneur, and there are many different ways that you can be an entrepreneur. It doesn't have to be retail. It could be however I think I'm an entrepreneur right now. I call myself the manager and I like giving. I'm trying to book the next speaking engagement. I'm trying to sell this many amount of books. That's the fun for me.

I love that entrepreneur spirit and he really does show it. Well, folks, this has been so much fun. And Drew, I got to tell you, I am so fired up to watch your story unfurl before the world. And it is going to be exciting. I love how intentional you are. are. I love how intentional your dad is. Thank you for listening. Folks, again, the reason we put Drew on here is we want to challenge you as parents to not just allow the status quo to take place in your child's life. Be intentional to push them, to guide them, because you just never know

which way they're going to go. And as Drew shared in his story, his dad just asked him a question, and he was waiting for it and ready. And here's something else that I want to mention. before we let Drew go. Drew, you're coming, I'm told you're coming to the Entree Leadership Summit event in 2018 in San Antonio, Texas. Is that true? I am. That should be a lot of fun. Very thankful for that. That's unbelievable. All right, well, I'm looking forward to meeting you there, and we may have to have, Eric, we may have to have Drew on part of our daily podcast offering that we do from Summit to see what the young man is taking notes on and see what a 15 now, what would you, be 16 at that point, I'm guessing. I will be 16.

16, yes. All right, very exciting. I want to see your driver's license. I'm not letting you in the door until I see some ID. But hey, man, appreciate you, Drew. Thanks for being with us, buddy. Yes, thank you so much. Big thanks to Drew Ford and Smith for hanging out with this.

Isn't that kid great? I love that kid. Parents, you can do this. Everybody doesn't have to be as well-spoken. I know some of you're listening to that kid going, man, is he like a robot? Did they program into that kid how to be that well-spoken? No.

He's just got a super talent. He's just got a natural talent to communicate. I can just tell you that. So I just want to make that point. Just because your kid doesn't talk like Drew doesn't mean that your kid's not on purpose or can't be on purpose. Just a little parental note, parent to parent there.

And also, if you want to come to the Entree Leadership Summit, I'm telling you this right now, it is about the sellout. This event has gone bananas. I've told you about it ad nauseum. If you haven't heard about it, go check out all the information in this episode, show notes at Entreeleadership.com. Well, Dr. Tim Millmore is so great. We're going to have him on regularly.

So good. Growing Leaders.com, please do check out what he's doing. I think he can really help you. Big thanks to he and Young Drew. What a fun episode this was. So, as I always say, but I truly mean, on behalf of Will the Engineer, Eric the producer, and the entire Entree leadership team.

Thanks for listening. We'll talk with you again really soon.