Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - From Underachiever to Entrepreneurial Success: Robert Glazer's Journey and Wisdom

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey, it's John Gafford from the Escaping the Drift podcast. And big news, my new book, Escaping the Drift is coming out. November the 11th, you can pre-order it right now at thejongaford.com. There are tons of bonuses, tons of giveaways. Get the book. If you are somebody that feels like you might be drifting along, this is for you. If you know somebody that feels like they might be drifting along, this is for you. Available everywhere, all bookstores, everywhere, Amazon, Barnes & Noble's, the whole nine yards.

Starting point is 00:00:29 But pick your copy up. right now at the john gaffer.com and get a bunch of the awesome bonuses i've thrown out because i promise you i put my heart and soul into this thing i want it to help you change your life pick it up everywhere what is the one question you get asked on podcast that you wish people would stop asking you uh well that's a good question i wish they would ask stop asking me uh escaping the drift, the show designed to get you from where you are to where you want to be. I'm John Gafford and I have a knack for getting extraordinary achievers to drop their secrets to help you on a path to greatness. So stop drifting along. Escape the drift. And it's time to start

Starting point is 00:01:14 right now. Back again for another episode of like it says in the opening man, the show that gets you from where you are to where you want to be. And today, I got a guy that's literally got the compass to get you where you want to go. If you will, he is an extraordinary. extremely successful entrepreneur. He's the founder and chairman of acceleration partners, which is a leading global partnership marketing agency. He has written a bunch of incredible books, including a brand new one that we're going to talk about today. He's been a number one Wall Street Journal USA Today and an international bestselling author. The new book that just came out, just hit the bestsellers list. I can't wait to get into it. Without further ado,

Starting point is 00:01:56 ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the program. This is Robert Glazer. Robert. How are How are you, man? I'm good. How are you today? Thank you so much for joining us. I appreciate it so much, as always. Thanks for having me. Yeah, so let's jump right into it, man.

Starting point is 00:02:11 Let's give me a little, you know, not obviously back to high school, but how did you get into what you're doing now? I don't need the, I was born a child of Boston. I just need the skip to the good stuff. I guess the answer is probably underachievement, a decade of underachievement led. to some guilt and some overachievement if you want the if you want the short story so that that's probably how I would put it all together and I I realized you know I was good at building businesses and a marketing in general and those are things that you know the school system doesn't

Starting point is 00:02:46 super reward so it took me a while to figure out you know the things that I was good at were the things that I wasn't spending a lot of time doing and the things I was not good at was the things that a lot of the traditional school systems and institutions around me supported. So once I fell into creating things and entrepreneurship, I knew I had my home and I started building some businesses and learned to kind of write along the way, first in the marketing industry, and then I had started a note to my team that got, people started sharing it all around the world, and then it turned into a newsletter that I called Friday Ford because it was forwarded and then led to some books.

Starting point is 00:03:25 and then suddenly we're here on this podcast today. So let's let's go back because you skipped over so quickly your decade of underachievement. What was your decade of under achievement? Talk about that. Because so many people are doing that, man. You're not unique to that. You're looking at one of them.

Starting point is 00:03:41 Yeah. You know, sometimes when I speak, I start with my report cards from first. And really everyone from first second, they're like, yeah, he seems kind of smart, but we can't get him to like engage or do work or, you know, he doesn't. he seems basically below his ability was whatever report card said for for years. And that probably was true. I just wasn't super interested in what they were teaching in school and sort of checking all these boxes. I was running a little now and later candy business on the side until my grandmother shut it down. And then I was running a moving business in college. And, you know,

Starting point is 00:04:17 no one ever said, hey, maybe you're you're good at this. So I think it took me a while to figure out sort of how to meet my own potential. And a lot of my writing and books are focused on this concept of capacity building. Like how do we build our capacity in service of what matters to us, right? To become better both, both leaders and and just in life at the things that matter to us. Well, I think you said something interesting, which was on your journey of discovering capacity and figuring out what you were really good at or what was inspiring to you. I mean, obviously you said you had a moving business in college. So entrepreneurship started pretty early for you. What was it like, I'd send a light go out, but that's okay. What was it like for you starting that first business

Starting point is 00:05:05 or when did you realize that most entrepreneurs like me are chronically unemployable? When did you realize that might be your issue? So I always said, again, whether it was the 10 year old candy business or, hey, if I'm going to drive to school, I might as well rent a truck and take a bunch of other people's stuff and take it home and I'll pay for my truck and I'll make some money. So, I, you know, I didn't grow up around any entrepreneurs. So I realized it when I was 26 or 7, right before my last job. And someone was offering me a job to move to California. I was working with a company as a consultant.

Starting point is 00:05:38 He said, if you don't take this job, this is probably the last job you ever have either way. He's like, you're probably pretty close to becoming unemployable. And he kind of meant that as a compliment, but he was right. I basically did not take that job. I started two businesses and I've never had a job since. In fact, people reach out all the time and I'm sure you get this like, hey, my so-and-so's daughter is looking for a job and you want to give her some advice. I'm like, I'm like the worst person to give career advice.

Starting point is 00:06:05 Like I don't, I haven't looked for a job in 20 years and I don't have a resume and like, I don't know how I can help you with that. I was, as I said, I'm unemployable, you know, according to people. That's always so funny. like when we have to get bank stuff sometimes and you're getting loans for things and doing what you were doing. And they're like, can you submit a resume? I'm like, I don't have one. Like you said, I, yeah, I'm going to have that W2 employment job in many, many moons. You know, let's talk about something that when I saw this on the sheet, I thought it was really interesting.

Starting point is 00:06:38 And I want to talk about the power of this because I thought it was amazing. I want to talk about your newsletter. Yeah. Because you said you started it just as a note, which grew into this. And I want you to talk about how you grew that newsletter to 200,000 people that were getting it, what you were able to do to monetize it and what that meant for the rest of your career. Because I think people skip over that step, and I think it's so important. Yeah, look, timing, timing in being early on platforms is really important. You could work 10 times as hard and have the wrong timing on a platform and have less of an outcome. So I started this note after it was sort of improving my morning routine.

Starting point is 00:07:16 and I said, I'm going to write kind of a note to my team on Friday mornings, and I started sending it, and I didn't know if anyone was reading it, but after like four to six weeks, I started to get notes where people was clear they were sharing it outside of the company, and I never thought it might have valued other people. It was about, I didn't have the term capacity building at the time, but it was about kind of getting better and doing these things on like just little things around. It wasn't about our company per se. It was like, again, story about how you could get better at something or, and they all have anecdotes. And so basically, after people told me they were sharing it, I was at a CEO conference, I told people, hey, you know, I have a remote team of 40 people. I started this note every Friday. It helps me keep in touch. I really like it. And they said, great, well, send us a copy. And one of them started his own and has done it until this day. And the other three were like, this is great. We'll just send this to our teams every Friday. So I was like, huh, like, I wonder if other people would like this. People were asking me about them. I don't really have a, so I created that. I signed up for like a

Starting point is 00:08:20 WordPress site and I created an archive of them and I created a very simple newsletter thing and I took 300 friends and family and I put it on it. Man, that first week I sent send, I was like, I'm going to get hate mail. Like take me off this. What the hell is this or otherwise? But I didn't and people could sign up and a couple weeks later there was an article in ink. Someone wrote, this is the only newsletter I ever read and 2,000 people signed up. And I, I, I, they were syndicating it to LinkedIn and LinkedIn was sharing it to millions of people and and they signed up. And then I was probably a late early adopter and moving to Substack because I was paying a lot of money for this newsletter list. I never thought about paid and they, you know, obviously their

Starting point is 00:09:03 model is tied to paid and they kind of pushed me. I'm like, all right, I'll try paid. I'll do a second newsletter and I'll share the tactical things. I'll give the archive and I have over 1,200 people, you know, who are on the paid version of that now. And Substack's been a great platform. Again, I was early, right? And Substack has put a lot of things. They don't let you port newsletters anymore like they did two years ago. So I don't know if you started today, you know, if you could get kind of to where I was.

Starting point is 00:09:31 So look, some of its luck, some of its timing, but really like every week I just try to write something super impactful for people. And every week I hear from someone around the world that says, this is the best one you've ever written and it has nothing to do with what I wrote that week. It's that that message hit them at the, I'm playing the odds out of hundreds of thousands of people like perfect message, perfect time and they made a difference for them. And so that kind of motivates me to come up something with the next week. And I just hit 5006 weeks and I haven't run out of ideas yet. What's your process for coming up with ideas? AdD. It's really good. It's good at that.

Starting point is 00:10:08 I have a hundred deep of idealist. In fact, I wrote in my 500. hundredth I sort of was reflective and I was like now like it has made me a better be more aware of like oh like I'm going to pay attention to this interaction this could be a good prompt for my story this week or I think I'm like I'm kind of I'm like a reporter I'm like out in the world looking for a story because it's usually an anecdote that then leads to some sort of lesson or moral or story and so and sometimes I'll find the anecdote and I have then let the thing I wanted to talk about the something effect right on my list for a while and then there was a story where that happened and then it brings it together but that's the real world story is as the prompt has been the the sort of

Starting point is 00:10:52 best format i think for it do you use any of your other social platforms to maybe test ideas before you go all in on the newsletter with them uh no in fact like that's the that's the testing ground i think that that is the testing yeah and lincoln uh are are you know i just i just put the stuff out there I think so much of people's, the problem was with writing that sounds strange or just not writing, right? Are thinking, overthinking, saving the draft forever. You know, it's a five minute note every week. It's digestible. You know, I met someone they were young and they asked me to look at something they had wrote.

Starting point is 00:11:30 And it was really good. And she said, I took six months to write in whenever. And my feedback was like, I think if you keep waiting to write pieces like this, first of all, I read the whole thing because you asked me to. but it's really long and it's really good. I think you're not meeting society where I think if you were to write more often and shorter and just get it out there, you would have a little more escape velocity. You would do better. That's interesting that you would say that from a guy that writes books, you know, that gets

Starting point is 00:12:00 I write books, honestly, now my format, my best selling book, you can read them in an hour to an hour and a half. That's it. I think the format of books of a 300-page book, non-fiction books are super repetitive so they can be $30. My hardcover that I just is $17. It's half the size and it gets to the point. And people are always like, I finish your book.

Starting point is 00:12:24 And it feels like a huge accomplishment to that because they usually pick up a book and, you know, they read a third of it. And they're like, yeah, I get this. Like I get the formula. So, yeah, I elevate was like an hour. This book's like an hour and 20 minutes at most. I don't I'm not writing long books do you um the audio book do your own audio books I do because this was a parable I did the introduction uh I think if you if you have a voice that you

Starting point is 00:12:52 use and you you know some writers are writers I have a podcast like I'm you know and so like I think it's weird when you don't you have a brand I think it's I think it's very strange I I you know I'm probably getting trouble for saying this but because and I won't say who but there were Some authors a couple years ago, I think you got pressured into having like more diverse voices, you know, do their thing. And one of them is a super well-known guy. And he has a podcast and an audio and I'm listening and it's a woman reading his book. Like what are you doing? Yeah.

Starting point is 00:13:21 And I'm like, you have a, this is like James Earl Jones and you're getting a woman. I like, it's just, I was like, you have a brand and a voice and I'm used to hearing it. And this is very strange. It feels not, not authentic and that you're trying to do something that that people want. want to hear. Similarly, again, there's a lot of women that I follow, and I wouldn't want to hear a man that doesn't sound like them narrating their book. I got to tell you, because my book's coming out actually in two weeks. And I went to L.A. and did the audio book. And it was the hardest thing. It's hard. It's exotic. I've ever done. Well, you don't realize how quickly you

Starting point is 00:13:57 speak until you get in one of those booths with an audio engineer who's like, nope, slow down. Too fast. Too fast. Well, yeah. So this one I did the intro. It's a parable. So I did the intro and the conclusion, but the actual book has multiple characters and I wasn't going to be a voice actor, like, you know, because it's not my voice. So we let someone else do that. But I'm sure you found this too. You get in your head, like there's times when you get two pages without a blurp. And then there's times you can't get out of a sentence for five minutes. And you're like, I just can't get out of the sentence. And it keeps getting worse and worse. Yeah. When I got there, they were like, yeah, we booked you for four days to do this. I'm like, four days? Like, that's insane.

Starting point is 00:14:36 saying there's no way that long did it no no it took me about it took me two and a half days but it was uh yeah i i told everybody when i got back listen if you ever listened to an audio book have an immense appreciation for the effort that goes into hitting every single syllable that comes how many words was it i'm i'm 270 pages so 40 000 words is about where i'm yeah that's exhausting i did i usually got mine done in one day but it was usually like a six or seven hour setting It was hard. Yeah. So let's talk about the first book.

Starting point is 00:15:11 So have you always been self-published? Have you always done that? No, I've done a combination of a couple were self-published, but then I work with source books, which is part of Penguin Random House for my last book and for my kind of biggest books. I like hard covers. And so this is the thing like, you know, paperback can all be on demand, on edge all around the world. moving hard covers globally with a global audience, it is like old school distribution houses

Starting point is 00:15:41 and boats and shipping. And I don't have time to manage all that. Yeah, no, no. It's definitely, I also want the publisher for this first one. And it's interesting what you learn through this process. And I don't know if you found this or not, but for me, it apparently with first time authors, this happens a lot that a lot of the people that you run into in the book industry for whatever reason they're associated with one side of it, PR, whatever it is. A lot of them are just full of shit

Starting point is 00:16:12 because they can be. Because you don't know. Yeah. And it's very difficult. And we made some missteps. The publisher is not going to, publisher's a little like a venture capitalist. Like, they make some bets and if they start to pay off, they double down. So, you know, if your name

Starting point is 00:16:28 is Malcolm Gladwell, they're going to put a lot of money behind your book, but they'll give you an advance and they're not going to do anything. other than publisher book. I think that's the reality that most people have come to. So self-publishing was really big and it was a great alternative. But then these guys all doubled and tripled in price to the point where like, look, you can keep a large part of your margins and whatever, but you're paying them for your 50 grand. And then that has a different equation too. So it's kind of all gone in circles. But it does seem like a lot of people were hybriding publishing. I think you basically

Starting point is 00:16:57 have to go out there and assume that you have to do everything. Well, I think the challenge, and you can probably appreciate this as a marketer, but the challenge becomes when you start looking for the return on the spend for what you can do online, right? If you're not self-publishing, the margins are so terrible on what you're in from the publishers. A dollar a book or something like you're so far upside down that you can't run. Like we had a huge digital marketing campaign. We were going to run back to a funnel. And it just became impossible to do because I'm used to clearing seven to one at least on every dollar I spend online. And here it was like, okay you're going to go negative like four to one i'm like i would rather buy the books and

Starting point is 00:17:35 him sit in my garage if i's going to do that it's cheaper at least i'll get something out of it yeah you should really buy them and mail them this i mean that that's what i've learned over them is i would rather figure out how to get books and and put money and speaking dollars and stuff to get books in people's hand uh then do a bunch of marketing stuff that doesn't work and look i just did a huge mass market launch it took me six months and every time we do it and we did a hundred things that were different and and 10 out of the hundred worked right and move any meaningful so you got to always focus in on what that 80 20 is yeah and you see what hermosi just did and just completely changed the whole script for how that works that was uh except he didn't make

Starting point is 00:18:14 the list i think because i think they knew was all gamified uh in terms of yeah um but you know there was a lot of people pushing that through affiliate stuff i actually got a note from someone i was like, dude, this is like super inauthent. Like, I know that you're going to affiliate for this. This has nothing to do with what you normally do or promote. And you sent this newsletter to your kind of donor list. It's, it's strange. So this is, this is the problem.

Starting point is 00:18:39 I think you got to find where the authentic message hits. And I think he wanted to prove Alex is a machine. And he had a platform. He wanted to prove how he could kind of break it. But, but it was, you know, again, all those books were pre-sold, basically, yeah. oh yeah what just just wild well let's talk a little bit about the new book man i want to get into it i mean obviously you've written some great stuff but you seemed very excited about what you're doing now so

Starting point is 00:19:05 let's talk about the now yeah this is what this is the thing i got asked the most about since i wrote my book elevate where i talked about needing to understand your personal core values that's sort of the foundation for getting better and people are like great how do i do that and i would be like well it's not that simple i worked on it for six months and i built a training program and a process And eventually I built a course, which I could send people. But I wanted to kind of bring that work to more people. And so I ended up doing it through a parable where there's a character who's going through these core value life crises.

Starting point is 00:19:35 And he kind of meets a mentor that helps him figure out his values. And then each of those decisions, what I call the big three, your work or vocation, your community and your partner, what he needs to do next and those make sense. So it shows it to you. And then it tells it to you at the end. And I have a formula to figure out your personal core values that I think is very different. I think core values, everyone knows. is important, but they become a little bit ruined by the companies with all their BS stuff and all the

Starting point is 00:19:59 one word values, like family and integrity. This process is like differentiated things where you can say, look, this is what I value and I should make decisions based on it. And of all the people getting the books and reading it, it's interesting. This character, Jamie, they're like, like, Jamie's just a mirror. There's, there's, you have had, if you, when you read, like, there's a scene that you've had with a boss or with a partner or somewhere that like that that will like light it up for you and remember oh yeah that's why that felt really bad i was talking to someone this morning and he was like i just like i got angst in the scene one of the scenes with jamina's boss because it just was so similar to one of the conversations that i had in my in my job so i i think we all have fairly deep core values i think they

Starting point is 00:20:43 go back to our formative childhood years in which we are decidedly trying to double down on things that were important or run away from things that were painful and these things show up for us in all aspects of our life and our leadership and either we realize it and that's a strength that we work with or it's kind of running us rather than we're running it. Yeah, I'm a firm believer in finding your biggest weakness and turning it into your biggest superpower. You know, I told a story on a podcast yesterday where I was talking about, I was talking about as a kid I got picked on a lot, right? For my eighth grade year, was just miserable. And it's probably, I mouthed myself into a physical altercation that I wasn't quite physically up to day, up to engaging in. So I deserved

Starting point is 00:21:29 it. Don't get me wrong. But then my entire friend said, everybody, a kid I've grown up with kind of turned on me and called me chicken and just ostracized me for my whole eighth grade year. And it developed in me this kind of need to be a people pleaser. And so that's where it showed up of me kind of saying anything to get to make people happy and, you know, doing things that, you know, might not be in earnest or honest to make people like me. And what I've realized later in life is when I recognize that that was the problem, I also realized that what that benefited me was an incredibly high EQ with people. So I know when I'm losing people.

Starting point is 00:22:03 And that's kind of become my superpower. And when I sit with clients or potential people work with, it's like, look, you're never going to meet a better dealmaker than me because I just had this innate understanding of when I'm going to lose someone. Like I know when I've got them. I know when I'm going to lose them. I know when to push, I know when to pull because of that getting picked on an eighth grade. So in retrospect in the long term, what was something that scarred me deeply as a child has

Starting point is 00:22:26 become my biggest superpower. You are reading the whole thing I have in there. Purpose and pain live very close to each other. And I think for a lot of us, this is why I'm not a therapist. I spent a lot of time talking about childhood stuff with people because I can always connect the present to it. I'm not trying to fix it, blame it, whatever. Like just understand it happened and it's driving you now.

Starting point is 00:22:47 and I have a different version of what you say. I think that every weakness is a strength overused in most cases, right? Like, if you have, like, this is a really good thing for you, except where you overuse it. So a lot of people's thing that they're really good at comes from an experience like you talk about. In fact, I was having a conversation. I spoke last week at a conference, a gentleman came up to me after, and he was like, I really like this framework. It's super different.

Starting point is 00:23:11 And we're talking about as sort of values. And here's a perfect example. And he was like, I just like, he was talking about I, I, I, I, I, it's very important to me and he was a lawyer and a site, like all these things. He's very important to me to help people unlock their creativity and to be creative and it help them grow. And that's what I do really well. And he was kind of really passionate around. I was like, look, that's, that's very specific. Again, in my experience, for or again.

Starting point is 00:23:35 So let's let's, let, if you indulge me for a second, like, were you a really creative kid or were you not a creative kid. Right? Like, no, no, no. about you. This guy I was talking to, right? And I was so surprised for what came next. He goes, actually, like, I wasn't because when I was 14 years old, someone had me take this Stanford assessment, and it basically told me I wasn't creative and so to not focus on that and I wouldn't be good at that. And then he was like, holy shit, I kind of never really thought about that, like, to this day. And I was like, I'm pretty sure that being told you would

Starting point is 00:24:12 never be something at 14 years old probably and this guy basically helps other people be creative because he's always been longing to do something creative and still sits with this thing where he was told it wasn't him and he was having all kinds of epiphanies after that but I just find if you're willing to ask that question that story is always there you know it's it's funny how I actually came up with that story is I don't remember who said it but I saw somebody in line say if you really want to like go deep in the rabbit hole, ask chat, GBT the question, ask me 10 questions about myself to reveal something that I don't even know about myself. And that's where I even kind of got to,

Starting point is 00:24:52 like, oh my God, I didn't even realize this was such a thing. And it just kept going deeper and deeper, which was wild. And I think that's one of the beauties of AI. No, AI should not be your licensed therapist if you really need one. But for those of us that are borderline okay, but you just might want to some, you know, take a little look under the hood with yourself. I think that's a good way to do it. Yeah, it can help ask you those questions. And look, we have these things. They show up in our operating system. They show up in our relationships, our leaderships, and our community. So imagine two people who get married. We'll go with Susie. So Susie, these are two real stories, but these people didn't get married. But this is what, this is what looks like.

Starting point is 00:25:34 And Susie, Susie's mom was 10 when she was told that she had cancer in a year to live. And she ended up living until 17. And so for Susie's entire teenage years, there was no tomorrow. If you were going to take a trip, it was today, and you do it today. And so her orientation in life became, you do it today. Now, Susie marries Mike. And Mike grew up with a gambling dad who blew away all their money, and there was never a tomorrow. And so he started becoming a saver and a planner because nothing in his house, like no one could look for it. Now, Susie and Mike married. this is a problem right this is what i call a danger zone they are going to have to navigate around this because her operating system is present present and his is his future and so maybe if they

Starting point is 00:26:19 both understand it and they talk about it they can be like look as long as we save enough a month you can spend the restaurant what you want we do one impulsive vacation we do one plan vacation but now imagine i come up with you don't when the people in your life you don't have to have your core values don't have to be identical, but they need to be in harmony or not the opposite. Imagine I come up with three more situations like this that Susie and Mike have. Opposite core values. They wake up every day with these four danger zones when they have to navigate around. That's just going to be really hard.

Starting point is 00:26:51 And that's the same if it's our job environment, if it's our leadership thing. If you work in a company and your core values include all perspectives and you are told every day to unilaterally make a decision without talking to people, it's just going to burn you out. Yeah. When you talk about your personal core values, would you mind sharing what they are? Sure. That's usually a common question. So again, you'll notice there are no one word core values in these and they're not things you're going to kind of hear like anyone would say. So my dominant core value is find a better way and share it. Health and vitality, self-reliance, which has been since I was like very young, respectful authenticity and long-term orientation. So each of those passes sort of a

Starting point is 00:27:37 four-point test that I have called the core validator, which is where most of these things fall apart, which is, can you use it to make a decision past or present? When you imagine the opposite of it, does it strike a nerve? Like if I ask you, we'll test this out in a second. So I'll test that with you. I won't show you. But the true test of a value is when it's violated, it doesn't feel really good. So a lot of times when people are circling around something, I invent the opposite avatar. And if they're like, oh, yeah, like, get me away from this person, then I know we're on the right path. And then it's, is it a phrase rather than a word? I've never seen one word core values that can kind of help really be actionable because they just don't have enough meaning.

Starting point is 00:28:16 And then can I objectively rate myself on it? Like, I'm doing a good job or not a good job. But as I mentioned, this anti thing is so telling. So if I asked you, John, like what, tell me a behavior i don't know any person but what's something that just boils your blood when people do it like a behavior i behave late when people are late drives me absolutely bad shit crazy so what about being late drives you crazy is that is that is that actually being late or is that now now i realize that was a minute late for the podcast no no no you're no no you know no you had a good reason though we've all we've all had the same reason you had for being late No, the reason it drives me crazy and people are late

Starting point is 00:28:57 is because I am a firm believer in how you do anything is how you do everything. And if you are completely, so that shows me that you don't value your potential at all. And then B, it shows me that you value your time far more than you value mine. And I think that is one of the, because time is so finite to us.

Starting point is 00:29:16 I think when you get a little older, you start to realize that. I think when people don't value my time, like you can steal, I'd rather have you steal my wallet than waste my time. I place the wallet easily, but the time I can't. So, right. So you probably have a core value of don't waste anyone's time, right?

Starting point is 00:29:33 I like, like whatever the end. That was so strong that if we thought about the inverse is either something about respectful or don't waste everyone's them. That's not an integrity. That's like, that's a very specific thing that, you know, you would, you know, say to other people. And then I'm, you know, it'd be interesting sometimes I dig into where that came from. Like, were people wasting your time?

Starting point is 00:29:52 Were they not respecting your time? you know when you were younger or was it you know there probably was a for or against story there well again i think it's kind of the purpose of this podcast and message in my book it goes back to i i was drifting through life for so long and wasted so much time yeah i wasted so much time that now i'm like i think to myself all the time you know granted it's never too late colonel sanders started kfc when he was long in the tooth and gray but but my point is i personally feel like if I just would have gone on it at 22, 23, where would I be now? You know, what would I, you know, if I would have that extra eight or nine years back?

Starting point is 00:30:28 Yeah. If I had, where would I be? Where would I be? So that's my deal with time. Right. So if you're at a party and you talk to someone and they just seem like they're wasting their time and your time and not doing anything. Yeah, you're just like.

Starting point is 00:30:42 Politely excuse myself. Exactly. Yeah. So again, it's these, it is these formative moments, right? You turned that pain into something that's super positive and probably a value for you. And the best thing you can do is tell everyone that, you know, tell everyone in friends and family and whatever. Like, look, if you're going to waste my time and yours, like, this isn't the right, this isn't

Starting point is 00:31:06 the right relationship. Yeah. I actually have a chapter in my book. Well, not a whole chapter, but a part of one of the chapter is about mentors and mentees. And it talks about being an askal, which I just, you get one shot at it. If you come in and ask me, you come in and ask me what to do, and I've already done it. And I tell you exactly what to do. And then you do the polar opposite.

Starting point is 00:31:24 That's it for me. I'm out. Like, I'm out. Yeah, I have a similar thing. And I just saw it on networking. Like, hey, can you catch up? And I want to pick your brain. And someone's like, look, anyone who says that is not being good with your time.

Starting point is 00:31:37 They would be like, because they'd be like, you know what? They don't really want to have coffee to me. They want to be on John's podcast. So tell me you want to be on John's podcast. And I'll reach out and ask him if I think it's a fit. Like, don't waste my time for the thing that you want to ask, ask me for, right? Because especially, yeah, I don't need a 30-minute meeting for something in the email could accomplish. Right, I don't need a lunch and how you're doing.

Starting point is 00:31:58 Because you're going to get the same response. Look, I want to catch up with my friends and the people that I haven't seen. I don't want to catch up with people who haven't talked to me in 15 years because the truth is they need something, if that's the only reason they're going to catch up, right? How many people catch up without an – some people do, but 95% of people catch up with an agenda, which is – Nope, but here's the worst part about that. The people that don't have an agenda that want to catch up are completely in a state of arrested development. And they just want to talk about, hey, remember 15 years ago when we did this? And it's like, no, dude, I really don't remember that.

Starting point is 00:32:34 And I really don't care. And, yeah, I can't do that either. Yeah, look, here's an example. I went to speak with, we had some great friends that were lived with us and they moved away years ago. And like it happens, we kind of like fall out of touch, but they were really great friends. And we were in town at something there and we went out to dinner with them. We had an amazing four-hour dinner. Now, we both understand we live in different cities now and different lives, but I did want to catch up with them.

Starting point is 00:33:03 There was no agenda. They were people that were very meaningful at a part of our life. And now we both live in totally different places. is and I would do that. That's a, that to me is a good, good catch up. Well, let me, let me ask you this, because how do you reconcile this? Because I think we're very similar on, don't waste my time. I love, like, like, my greatest joy is seeing people, like, I like the accomplishments of my team. I like the accomplishments of the agents that worked with us. I like their accomplished more than I like my own if they come from me. I get more pride in their success than I do in my

Starting point is 00:33:34 own because I felt like I directly impacted somebody there. So how do you balance? Because I'm sure you're the same way. You're obviously doing all this to help people. So how do you balance that wanting to help people, but also needing to draw a line with them? So this goes to my core values, right, which is my number one core values, find a better way and share it. So I enjoy helping people make better. But I don't enjoy the act of giving without people doing something with it, which sounds similar to you. So I can tell when people are, if you ask something of me and you're asking me to do more work than you're willing to do yourself, then I don't really want to help you with it, right? But if you're, if you're a mentee, if you're taking it,

Starting point is 00:34:13 if you're running, if you're executing on it, if you're working harder than you're asking me to work, you know, I help the people are like back to, and this is what I would do. I really want to be on John's, hey, I saw you were on John's podcast. I really want to be on his podcast. I'm a fit. Here's why. I'm going to draft you an email that you can copy and paste a John that makes you look really good with all the info you need to the invite so you don't need to do anything. Awesome. Let me help you like you're you're helping yourself. So, For me, it's just, again, my, am I, is the, you know, we all want to impact, but, but I want people, I want to pick the right horses, right, who are, who are, the best coaches tell me that

Starting point is 00:34:51 they piss the people who win all the best coaching awards every year, talk to them, they're like, I pick the best clients. I do not pick unwilling people who don't want to be coached. I pick really good clients who want coaching, and that's why I win these coaching awards. I have here, because we're in the real estate space, that's what we do. here and I have people that hit me up all the time and I want to come work for you want to come work for you I have like an eight page thing that I go okay here's the deal I'm going to send you this thing and it's essentially what it looks like to work for me for the first 90 days

Starting point is 00:35:21 expectations outlined benchmarks if you don't hit this you're done I said you read this you agree with everything on it then we'll talk about it about one out of 20 people that gets that sheet calls me back yeah well that's interesting yeah they don't want to do where I say all the time people reach out about the job thing. We joke before. And I have a whole standard. I have standard templates. Hey, Sally, I haven't looked for a job in 20 years. Like, I don't know who's hiring. I don't know who's a great place to work. I'm not focused on CFO jobs. Like, again, these are all things I would never ask someone else who's not doing that, right? Where's good to work? Do you know who's hiring for a CFO? All stuff. Like, I have a ton of

Starting point is 00:36:02 connections on LinkedIn. If you come to me with a job, you do the work. And you find, out that, you know, Mark at whatever CFOs is hiring and you're connected to on LinkedIn. And here's my resume and here's the job. And I really want it. I applied. And can you send Mark a note? And here's the note. And here's my info. Sure, I'm happy to send that. Like, I'm happy to help. But like, you're asking me to do more work on your job than you're willing to do. And I'm not super excited about that. Let me ask you this. Because I have a philosophy. I'm curious what you think about it, which is it seems like ever since COVID, ever since the COVID lockdowns, there's this level of apathy that's just running through

Starting point is 00:36:42 everything. Everybody and everything, just, I mean, it just everything, everybody you deal with in, you know, the service industry or retail or whatever else. There's just this, the level of an interest in doing an elite level job seems to be gone. Yeah. And I think that's something that people are going to have to dress pretty quick because I think a lot of these jobs are probably about to go goodbye. I mean, do you agree that COVID had something to do with this or is this just where we are? I think there's like this burnout after COVID and everyone's like, when are we going back? When are we going back to how it was in the good old days of huge budgets and lots of hiring and all this stuff? I'm like, because it was easier. And like, I'm like, good luck waiting around for

Starting point is 00:37:26 that. Like, you know, someone who's willing to work harder than you or look, I'm big believer in I don't believe in work-life balance. I believe in work-life integration, but I think in having that. But listening to a 23-year-olds with no kids and aren't married talking about work-life. Like, you should be learning. You should be, you should kill yourself in your 20s because, A, you have the energy and the stamina and your body can handle it. And you should be learning like a sponge, right, and getting better and developing some

Starting point is 00:37:55 world-class expertise that you will then be able to unfairly monetize in your 30s and beyond. on. So I don't think, like, again, just work for work sake or work weekends, but, you know, people are putting all these restrictions on their career and before they're good at anything. And I think that's horrible advice. And I'm sorry that it's, look, this is stoicism. This is the reality. Everything right now is more work and less result. So there's some people who are going to be willing to do that if you're not. And if you're just waiting for it to go back to how it was and then there's AI. and there's other stuff, you may be waiting for a long time. So the only choice is to look at where we are now and what is it that you can do from where we are now? I don't, as we talked before, I am not worried. The good old days are in the past. I don't focus on the good old days.

Starting point is 00:38:47 You know, I think these kids in their 20s, I have found that Gen Z is, in most cases, going to eat the millennials for lunch. They're just, some of these kids are just savages as they come out. But I also think that there's a pressure that social media has placed on some of these kids for an expectation of quick results that is just not sustainable.

Starting point is 00:39:09 Yeah. You see a crypto kid with a Lambo and you're like, well, why don't I have a Lambo? I'm 21, you know, when I'm trying to apply for a job at XYZ company. It just, how do they manage that? How is the next generation going to manage all of this? It's very hard because it's all this external expectations.

Starting point is 00:39:27 Again, this book has really appealed to people in their 20s and their late 40s. the most. I think they're either like, all right, let me figure out the stuff I should be doing because I really value it. Look, some of the crypto kids, and they value ego and fame and being seen. And they might be miserable, but they're showing all of these things, right? I think no one wants to hear this, but there's an amount of success and money after which it doesn't make you happier. And I know no one believes that, but the data all proves it. I remember the study that asked people from a hundred million a net worth to a hundred million in net worth, how much was enough?

Starting point is 00:40:02 What do you think the answer was? A million was enough. 40% more than whatever they had. Oh, 40. Oh, they just wanted more. Because more was the answer. More was the answer. More was the answer.

Starting point is 00:40:14 And you and I have met a lot of successful people who have everything that ostensibly would seem to make them happy and they're not. And so I know people, it's hard for people on the other side of that to see that. But it just lets you make sure you're fighting the right fight and in the right race. because sometimes you win and you're like, I don't like this. I don't like this view. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:40:40 I'll have a chapter in my book about are you playing the game by the right rules? Because so often people are trying to win. I'll give an example. People are trying to win the wrong contest. And I'm going to give you this example because it happened again. I was in Napa over the weekend. We're up there with a bunch of friends. And one of my friends, this is this thing.

Starting point is 00:40:58 We were with eight people at a table at a restaurant. And the waiter came over. and he said, what would you like, blah, blah. And everybody started ordering. And Eric noticed he was not using a pen, right? He was not using a pen. I have so many stories. I got a second.

Starting point is 00:41:13 But this is what he does. This way he does every single time. This is he does. He goes, hey, there's eight people at the table. Listen, if you want, we're happy to wait for a second so you can go grab the pen so you don't make any mistakes. And the guy's like, oh, no, I got it. He's like, okay, I tell you what, if you're taking that route, if anything comes out

Starting point is 00:41:29 wrong, I don't have to tip you. Yeah. Deal? And this dude went with no pen. And the reason is, and here's the point of that, at no point in any Yelp review I've ever read about a restaurant, does it say, holy crap, the waiter had an amazing memory. It's not part of the equation that you're trying to win of make money. I love that example because I say it, I remember specifically when my family, everyone

Starting point is 00:41:54 orders martinis and we ordered eight and they were all different. And she screwed up every one of them. And I was like, again, I don't know what you're winning on. this you're only you're only losing yeah there's no upside in that equation other than wow what a great memory for five seconds but you're risking your livelihood what you pay your bills over over the opinion of eight strangers to think you were smart that are never going to think about you again and it happens all the time and people i think in life do that so much yeah they they take risks like that that don't matter they're trying to win the wrong game exactly i i think that is

Starting point is 00:42:32 That is very illustrative of that and they, or yeah, and, and, and, oh, it's an expectation thing, right? My expectation is not that the waiter can memorize everything. It's that he, he or she does not get my order wrong, right? I think what it is, and I'm guilty this back when I used to wait tables a million times ago, I was a no pen guy, which is why I can say this. So waiters of the world before you rise up and like want to boycott my show. and cancel be over saying this. You're recovering. I'm recovering. I was you at one point. And I was a guy that never used a pen. And for me personally, in retrospect, looking back,

Starting point is 00:43:11 it was that I thought that what I was doing was beneath me and beneath my station. And this was my way to prove to these people that I would never see again, that I was better than what they perceived to me as doing. Yeah. So I was willing to literally risk my livelihood on a parlor trick it was stupid i i well look you at least realize that right so yeah yeah it is so when does so the book just came out it's already on the it's already on the wall street uh wall street house street actually doesn't exist anymore uh that's right they got rid of it i'm sorry i should about new york times so i could just i could just you know say that i want it you know we'll buy it out we'll make it up yeah exactly we'll make it up and that's it no books out there's a

Starting point is 00:44:00 course that goes with it. Like I said, it's a parable. It's a story about a young 20-year-old named Jamie who's running into some challenges with his fiance, his job, and the community that they're trying to settle into. And, you know, he really needs to understand his core values to make those decisions. So you watch his journey as he's coached by a mentor. And then at the end, I tell you exactly kind of what you saw and how to apply the same frameworks. Okay. What's the long, so obviously, man, you're still doing these companies. writing, you're doing this. What's your long-term personal goal? Where are you trying to get to? Interestingly, so again, I've set a values-based goal without awareness now, where I'm trying to help

Starting point is 00:44:39 a million people figure out their core values over the next five years. This is the first non-financial, not sort of revenue business growth goal that I've said, but it's really an impact goal. And in that way, it's not, it's not necessarily about the destination, right? Doing 500 of those is going to feel good and feel fun. So I'm really trying to think about things differently through that mindset. All right. Now I'm going to ask you one last question. You can feel free to answer it, even if I've asked you this.

Starting point is 00:45:12 You ready? What is the one question you get asked on podcast that you wish people would stop asking you? It's a good question. I wish they would stop asking me. I don't know. Something is in my bio that they could have just read, I guess. this is just probably the answer. I think my favorite answer to that question ever was Erwin McManus,

Starting point is 00:45:36 so when I asked him that question, he goes, I wish people would stop asking about my childhood, who cares, just ask me about what I'm good at. Yeah. It's funny. And I had asked him about his child. I actually always, I always start by asking, like, so what were you into a kid or otherwise? And I find it's super interesting that it connects to what they're doing today.

Starting point is 00:45:55 So I think it's a good question. I don't think that's a super common question. But where did you come from? It's kind of relevant to where you are today, I found. Yeah, I've always found that most of the people that come through here, it's always divorced parents, usually. It's a first hustle at some point in your, as a kid, moving through that. And it's just always, you were always hustling for some reason.

Starting point is 00:46:17 It's always wrestling. Yeah. And almost nobody got good grades. No, I was the C student that the A students ended up working towards. But here's the, but here's the question, though. Let me ask you this. Yeah. Was it you couldn't was it you were not doing well in all of it or was there just because like for me I could get an A on just about any test that was put in front of me but I never did homework. So I got F and all the homework so I got straight C's I just I just couldn't be into stuff that I wasn't into right. I think that was really the at the end of the day that was the that was the difference for me. So it's if if it wasn't I can't like once I.

Starting point is 00:46:59 actually got through my sort of real flip was when I got through college and I got through all the required courses and I started my major and then I got all A's no matter how hard it was because I was super into it and I was engaged in it and then I had no no problem learning so that's the I think that that for me was the sort of impetus there that was it yeah I managed to uh I made it about two years in college before I felt the institution had nothing furthered off from me and and that was the end of that so what anyway man dude it was super interesting conversation i'm going to go out and get your book obviously available everywhere books are available yeah and dude and next time you cut a new one because from the looks of this you'll have a new one out in the next couple of years and

Starting point is 00:47:40 i'd love to read whatever comes out next and i'm going to subscribe to the newsletter still do the newsletter yeah friday forward yeah would love to have you on it love it love it and so if they want to find you how do they find you yeah so the book is at compass dash within uh combe got great endorsements who rode to North, Pat Lincioni, all of my stuff, including Friday Ford, is at Robert Glazer.com. Robert. Well, thank you so much, man. We will see you.

Starting point is 00:48:06 Listen, if you didn't get anything of that today, you're crazy. But I think it all starts with having, like you talked about it, go by Robert's book, because you've got to have a North Star that you're navigating your life by. And if you don't, you never know when you're off track and you're going to start to drift. We'll see you next time. Hey, it's John Gafford from the Escaping the Drift podcast. And big news, my new book, Escaping the Drift is coming out. November the 11th, you can pre-order it right now at thejongafer.com.

Starting point is 00:48:36 There are tons of bonuses, tons of giveaways. Get the book. If you are somebody that feels like you might be drifting along, this is for you. If you know somebody that feels like they might be drifting along, this is for you. Available everywhere, all bookstores, everywhere, Amazon, Barnes & Noble's, the whole nine yards, but pick your copy up right now at the john gaffer.com and get a bunch of the awesome bonuses I've thrown out because I promise you, I put my heart and soul into this thing. I want it to help you change your life.

Starting point is 00:49:05 Pick it up everywhere. What's up, everybody? Thanks for joining us for another episode of Escaping the Drift. Hope you got a bunch out of it, or at least as much as I did out of it. Anyway, if you want to learn more about the show, you can always go over to escapingthrift.com. You can join our mailing list. But do me a favor. If you wouldn't mind, throw up that five-star review. Give us a share. Do something, man. We're here for you. Hopefully you'll be here for us. But anyway, in the meantime, we will see you at the next episode.

Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - From Underachiever to Entrepreneurial Success: Robert Glazer's Journey and Wisdom

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