Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Microsoft EVP Judson Althoff on Striving for Excellence and Finding Balance

Episode Date: September 13, 2017

Judson Althoff is executive vice president of Microsoft’s Worldwide Commercial Business organization.He leads the company’s commercial business strategy and over 40k people across the globe in a whole range of functions that need to work closely together in one coherent team for a company in the midst of digitally transforming itself with it’s customers.Leading that many people who have to work that closely is in itself intriguing. Doing that while being part of a leadership team engaged in one of the most significant shifts in how technology is sold and consumed is another.This conversation is about continuously striving for self-improvement and Judson’s insatiable inner drive to help others reach their potential.It’s about continuously striving for excellence, but not at the cost of hurting relationships with loved ones.We discuss how difficult but important finding balance is and the ways in which mindfulness and an investing in recovery practices can be of help.We talk about what it means to be a leader and what Judson looks for in others when trying to help others unlock their potential.We get into what the word “excellence” really means and the factors that motivate him.If you're hungry to understand the intersection between you chipping all in in particular craft yet at the same time – are searching for deep meaningful relationships with family and friends – this conversation is for you.My hope is that Judson’s willingness to be open, to share from his heart and his head will inspire you to do the same for others._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Judson is the executive vice president of Microsoft's worldwide commercial business organization, where he leads the company's commercial strategy and over 40,000 people across the globe and a whole range of functions. And these folks that he's leading, they obviously need to work closely together. And they're in the midst of a digital transforming of themselves along right with all of us, their customers. So leading that many people to work closely together in and of itself is intriguing for sure. But doing that while being part of a leadership team that's engaged in one of the most significant shifts in how technology is sold and consumed is a whole

nother level of interest. So Judson's ability to quickly synthesize thoughts and to do so eloquently jumps out in this conversation. He has an insatiable inner drive to help others reach their potential. And we talk about what it means for him to be a leader and what Judson looks for in others when trying to help them unlock their potential while at the same time striving for excellence in what he does. And that balance between the two is really important for him. We also get into what the word excellence means to him and the factors that motivate him. We discuss how difficult yet important it is to search for a better sense of balance in life and the ways in which mindfulness and investing in recovery practices can help.

And if you're hungry, I know I am right to better understand the intersection between chipping all into a particular craft. Yet at the same time, searching for deep meaning and relationships with family and friends. This conversation is going to be for you. Judson's striving for it. He's a world leader. He is leading people across an organization in the midst of this transformational change for one of the most significant technology companies that we're part of. And so my hope is that Judson's willingness to be open, to share from his heart and his head will inspire you to do the same for people in your lives. And with that, let's jump right into this conversation with Judson. Judson. Hi, Mike. All right. This is going to be fun. I've loved knowing you and

working with you, and I've been looking forward to having this conversation for a while. Hey, thanks, man. It's really an honor to be able to do this. I know all of the people that you've interviewed historically. And frankly, I'm pretty humbled to be on this side of the microphone. It's phenomenal to me how many people say that. And it just screams at the top of conversations like, I'm not sure I know what I'm going to say. And I'm not sure I am supposed to be included. But almost every person that I've talked to has. And I'm not sure like I am supposed to be included, but almost every person

that I've talked to has said that. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. No, for me, it's like, why, why would anybody want to hear from me? Really? That's a really good question because I've got a lot of answers on why that is. Okay. So let's do this before. Well, let's start in kind of reverse order. So I liked to usually go back and give some context of early life. But what it really means is I run Microsoft's commercial business, which is basically everything that's non-consumer. So you might be familiar with Microsoft products that you can buy in a retail store like Best Buy or in a Microsoft store. Basically, everything other than that is my responsibility. So I'm responsible for our relationship with enterprise customers, public sector entities, governments, state, local, federal, international governments,

to small, medium businesses. And I'm really responsible for how we take our products to market for all of those customers and for our partners around the world. Right. And I guess it's not clear why I would be interested to have this conversation. That is a massive, massive job and responsibility and the ability for you to lead and to be able to set vision and help the organization thrive. That is significant. And so that's at the center of what I'm interested in. And, you know, Microsoft historically has been one of the premier high-tech companies in the world. And you guys are obviously right now on a beautiful uptick. Thank you. Yeah. And it's been fun to see and see what is happening

at Microsoft. So, you know, all of that's really intriguing and interesting. At the center of what I want to learn though, is how did you become in the position of influence that you're in? And how do you think about leading? How do you think about inspiring others? How do you think about change? Interesting. Yeah. So it probably all starts with deciding to be honest with you. And that may sound basic, but you kind of have to decide that you want to lead, especially when you're working at a company of this scale, because honestly, it's humbling to come to work here every day. You're surrounded by really brilliant people that have accomplished so much in their careers and they've built really great products or they've done, you know, really great new technologies and development.

Some have patents and PhDs and, you know, they've won awards that you just sort of make you look in the mirror and go, gosh, am I going to lead or am I going to follow? And for me at Microsoft, anyway, it has always been about this passion for really believing that our best days are ahead of us and feeling like I can do my best to try to help contribute to that. I think in many ways you could look at a company like Microsoft and say, wow, fantastic storied past, 40-year history in the technology industry, which is kind of almost unheard of. How could you possibly do better? And what I see are so many bright people, so many brilliant minds, so many great ideas, so many great pieces of intellectual property that if we compose them well for our customers and our partners, man, we're just kind of getting started, to be honest with you. And so I think it starts with deciding that you're going to lead from that platform. Um, and you're going to inspire others to do so. Inspiration has been,

I guess, a big part of, of, of my recipe book for, um, how to help others find in them what their potential really is. Okay. The ability to make a decision that I want to lead, was that something that was instilled from your parents, from your family structure? Was that something that you tripped into middle part of your career and trajectory? Because I don't know if you have always been a leader, like you were a kid that was a leader or like, how did that work? So honestly, it's really interesting to me because leadership has always been sort of this unassuming sort of position I've found myself in. And I'll maybe sort of explain maybe the big moment in my life where that sort of all came into being. Like I grew up in a really small town in Ohio, a little town called Worcester, Ohio. And so if you go home tonight and you look at your garbage can, it probably says Worcester, Ohio on it because the only thing that happens in Worcester is Rubbermaid

is headquartered there and there's a small college. So your parents either make little plastic containers or they teach school. My mom was of the sort of school teaching type. She taught high school calculus and coached the local speech and debate team. And so I was like reasonably good in school and, you know, and sort of did like every high school student did that, like when I was growing up anyway. And he said, well, where do you want to go to college? Well, what am I good at? I'm, I'm kind of good at math and science. And so maybe I'll go get an engineering degree. And, and I went off to the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, which for me was like, man, like leaving and going to a different planet. You know, 25,000 people would fit in like one corner of Soldier Field or Comiskey Park.

And the thought that I was going to kind of go from this little itty bitty town and go to Chicago to this big school. I mean, I felt pretty overwhelmed. It felt like, gosh, this is going to be a huge learning for me to expect to be at the top of my class at a big place compared to this little town I came from, probably not real. So I did my best. I worked really hard, but I kind of sat back, I think, my first year of college and watched things happen. Okay. So family, mom was understood debate and articulating points of view and multifaceted discussion points to be able to get to some truth or share truth or even win. I don't know what her tone of, of debate would be. Right. Right. She liked to win. It was, it was hard to, to get out of the house on a Friday night. you had to be able to debate the affirmative and the negative. And she normally won both sides.

So it was rough. So it was an intellectually competitive environment at home? Yeah, for sure. First of all, mom would always push me on my mathematics. And I was a pretty good math student. But mom always found a way to humble me at the end of the day. And I think it was actually good. I sort of started from this premise of always understanding that no matter how good I might

be at something, there was always more to learn. And that, that I think was a fundamental, I guess, developmental construct in me. If I even think about my philosophy today, like I am, I am wired to continuously strive for self-improvement and learn as much as I can from my successes and failures. In fact, learn equally, balancing successes and failures, mostly so that I can try to inspire excellence in others so that they can reach their potential. And I think that that probably came most from my mom. Does that sound like the philosophy that you just shared that you're running your life through? Does that sound like mom? Yeah, I think in many ways. She was hard on herself. My dad was also hard on himself. And I think maybe when you grow up in a home where you feel like your parents are accomplished and you're – I think naturally as a kid, you're always proud of your parents and you see the way in which they carry themselves. It inspires you. And so I was really fortunate, I think, to have two very good role models in that regard.

Okay. All right. And then where did the idea that you could travel outside of a small town and go into a larger town and do well. Where did that idea come from? Well, it's interesting. I think it probably also came from my parents. I hate to sound like a broken record, but I sort of feel like I think from a very early age, they made me believe that I could do more always, sometimes more than I felt like I could do. How did they do this?

This is the gold dust right here. How did they do that? Or how do you remember that they did it? I would most often reflect upon my achievements as a kid. did something really well in school or either athletically or I was actually into theater and music. And, you know, so I, whether it was coming home from a concert that I felt was a good one or a theater production that I thought was a good one, or, you know, even an exam that I did well on, there was always this moment of, well, that's what we expect of you, right? And that's what you're made of. You're supposed to perform at that level. And

what more do you think you can do? What's next? Because you're destined for big things. You're destined for being able to produce more. And so I don't want to make it sound like they beat the crap out of me all of the time, but I think for every hurdle in life, I metaphorically jumped. They made me believe that I could jump higher. Okay. And did that come with critique or support or was there a balance of the two? It's interesting. sometimes it definitely came from from critique and sometimes that was harsh and you know all healthy and constructive but you know i think when you're a kid sometimes you feel like constructive because it's pretty hard you know

like yeah like i did something good can't we just celebrate that for a night but uh so there's definitely that but then there was always there was also this belief, I think is better way to say it of like, hey, look, you're going to find more someday. And we're and by the way, we're not always going to have the answer. I mean, they made it very clear that like, hey, we expect you to do more than we did as kids. Honestly, I felt like I lived in the shadow of my father and my mother in that regard. My dad is a very accomplished surgeon. And I always, like growing up, I felt like, well, all right, dad saves lives. That's pretty tall order. Mom is super bright, very articulate. Gosh, if I could be anywhere near as accomplished as them, that would be great. But they, I think, always instilled in me that no, no, no.

Someday you'll do something more. And I'm not sure I'm there yet. Those are still pretty high expectations. I feel like, you know, maybe that North Star of always feeling like I'm chasing a shadow of, you know, my, my parents who I felt like were brilliant people. My dad still is. My mom unfortunately passed, but even still to this day, they're, they're both equally inspirational to me. Okay. How long ago did mom pass? Just over 10 years ago. Yeah. And if you don't want to talk about it no no how did she die yeah um super sudden um and and somewhat tragically um she uh got a really rare brain disease called uh kreutzfeldt-jakob's

disease and um it's a prion-based disease which you know not to get too technical but basically it's a your brain latches onto a bad protein strand and replicates it from left to right. And you kind of, you kind of get brain rot and, and pass away. And it's not unlike from a symptomatic standpoint, it's not unlike mad cow, but has absolutely nothing to do with what you ingest. Um, and so she was teaching school leading into the Thanksgiving holiday, the year that it happened. And I remember calling home, hey, mom, how you doing? Well, been having these dizzy spells.

The doctors don't really know why. They think I might have vertigo or something like that. I'm like, okay, mom. You don't really think about that. I mean, you know, I was, you know, early 30s. You know, you think your parents are still pretty indestructible at that age. You don't expect to lose a parent. I mean, in fact, most of my grandparents were still alive at the time. Both of her parents were still alive and, you

know, never really figured out what the vertigo was coming from. And sort of a couple of weeks passed and, you know, sort of fast forward into sort of the Christmas break. And she's like, you know, I think I got to go get this, maybe checked out a little bit deeper and checked herself into the Cleveland clinic. And I'll remember it very clearly for the rest of my life. Obviously I was traveling in Denver of all places and stuck in a blizzard snowstorm. And I was just finally getting out of the airport when they were opening it back up again. And I get this emergency phone call from my aunt and she says, you better find a way to get to Cleveland. And the doctor's thinking, unless you get here in the next 48 hours, your mom's not going to remember who you are. I'm like, whoa, how did, how did vertigo go to like, you know, mom's going to

die. And sure enough enough two weeks later she passed so it was hard it was um it was also another life moment when you talk about this right now what happens for you i get sad so so so when you revisit past uh pain yeah you are able to feel it in the conversation oh Oh, for sure. Yeah. And then how much of it does it take over you? Because you're still thinking clearly and like, but how much does it live inside? Well, it's interesting because I feel like, you know, talking through it is actually a

super healthy thing and doing so with some relative frequency. I don't mean to say I talk about it every day, but I talk about my mom a lot when people ask me about how I do my job and my profession. And I give her credit for it, I think, largely because it gives me the opportunity to talk about her and remember her the way I want to. And, um, also frankly, um, help me stay centered the way I want to stay centered. And let me explain a little bit more about that. I, I think one of the hardest things to, uh, remember both as a leader and just frankly, as a human being, uh, is to stay present and, and, uh, live life in the moment. Um, because the moment that's happening now, you'll never get back. Time's our most valuable currency. Uh, once you spend it, it's gone. And, um, with my mom, I love my mom. Everybody loves

their mom. Um, I always thought there'd be another day. And the harder I worked in my job and my career, I always thought someday when mom retires and no longer teaching school, someday she'll come home for a summer or she'll come visit me for a summer and I'll get that quality time instead of maybe you know, maybe taking that extra day off or taking that vacation moment. And, um, I missed it. I didn't get that day. Um, I feel bad about it, you know? Um, but I think rather than, uh, is this the, is this the Denver? Is this the, like you didn't go back? No, no. I went back in Denver and I appreciated that.

But sorry to round out the story. I mean there were plenty of times in my career where my mom came to visit and she visited my kids and my wife and stayed for a week and I maybe took one day off out of seven. Because I thought work was more important at the time and it was a mistake, you know? And so, um, I guess all the way back to philosophy, you know, continuously strive for self-improvement. Well, that was a big, powerful lesson of, uh, Carpe Diem and, um, you know, it changed the way I, I, uh, I operate my life now. I mean, balance, um, is also a big word in my philosophy and as hard as I work, I, um, you know, I work very hard to balance it with, uh, my wife and kids, uh, and my father. Um, you know, cause I said, well, I lost, I lost the opportunity with one parent. Let's not,

let's not lose it with the other. So it, well, I don't know how we got to this topic, but it's, it's sort of, it lives with me. Yeah. Okay. Well, first thank you for sure like allowing me to understand where it comes from for you yeah and with that there's something else that's also happening for me during the conversation is i'm going oh my god what am i doing with my mom right which is um i'm ripping and running going as fast as i can possibly imagine yeah and the quality of the relationship with my mom is not what I would hope it would be. And it's this, what you said is haunting, like, yeah, you know, they'll always be there. So it's an easy trap. And so this conversation is also reminding me like, okay, Mike, you know, so you're, you're given two gifts, you know, so one is a gift to know where it comes from,

how you're so wildly successful, what you do, but then why relationships matter so much to you. And then I guess it's a third gift, which is might get your shit together with your mom. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was a get your shit together with your dad thing for me because, you know, my parents divorced when I was in middle school and I lived with my dad for a little while. I was, I was close to him then. And then I, uh, in my high school years, I lived with my mom and, you know, naturally became closer to her. And when my mom passed away, I was like, Oh my God, you know, yeah, bad day, but I still have one living parent and I need to go, I need to go cement that relationship.

And so I'm proud to say now that, you know, my dad lives in the house next door to me. And, you know, when it came time for him to retire, I convinced him to do so. And so that he could be close to my kids. And, you know, I, every random Tuesday when there's an extra time to share a meal with my dad, it's just precious, man. It's cool. Yeah. That is really cool. Yeah. Wow.

All right. So this is. You want to go back to this? Like, how did I become a leader moment? Because I feel like I kind of took you down like this. Yes, you did. You took us to the place of what was real and what's the primary driver. And it's born out of the relationship that you had some pain and some love with.

And then that has shaped your philosophy moving forward about how to be connected and to strive for excellence. But not the cost of alienating or losing loved ones along the way. Right. And this is why relationships matter so much too. You bet. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. This is, I can't tell you, like, this is why I'm doing what this, this is exactly why I'm doing it because you're sparking so much for me right now. Yeah. it because you're sparking so much for me right now as a reminder to be on point with relationships.

And I have a practice and this practice, um, I'll share it with you. I don't think I've talked about this much at all is when I say goodbye to people, it would be anybody, you know, loved ones, friends, you know, and I, and I take a moment and I remind myself, this could be the last goodbye. And so we'll, you and I, after this and I remind myself, this could be the last goodbye. And so you and I after this will say goodbye. And so inside of me I'm like, this could be the last one. Let's hope not, man.

I know, let's hope. At the same time, it is a reminder of how fragile life is. Yeah, you bet. And if we don't get to see each other again, I've appreciated you. Right, right on. That's what that is, yeah. Totally cool.

It's hard to work that way though. Yeah. Because it takes a lot of intensity and focus to do it. You bet. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentous. When it comes to high performance, whether you're leading a team, raising a family,

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digital fatigue creeping in. Plus, they look great. Clean, clear, no funky color distortion. Just good design, great science. And if you're ready to feel the difference for yourself, Felix Gray is offering all Finding Mastery listeners 20% off. Just head to FelixGray.com and use the code FindingMastery20 at checkout. Again, that's Felix Gray. You spell it F-E-L-I-X-G-R-A-Y.com and use the code FindingMastery20 at FelixGray.com for 20% off. Okay. So this is where it comes from. Brothers and sisters? One sister. Yeah. Okay. And then what is that relationship like with you and your sister? It's pretty wild. Uh, because, um, you know, siblings, I guess by the science of it all are supposed to be your closest DNA replica. You know, we couldn't be, we couldn't be different. I, I, she has every skill. I, I do not. Uh,

she's a performance violinist. I'm not. And, uh, she can pretty well pick up just about any musical instrument and learn it at what I feel is a pretty impressive level. And, you know, no time at all. In fact, I remember very clearly we're a little bit apart in age. I was a senior in high school when she was a freshman. And I'll never forget this moment where even though we lived in a small town, the marching band in our town, this is going to sound really crazy, but the marching band in our town was like, it was like a spiritual thing for the whole community.

And on Friday nights, it was kind of like you read about, you know, the town was shut down. The high school was about a mile away from the football field and the football field was kind of sunken into this bowl in the ground. And again, for a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere, very cool, like, you know, Friday night lights moment. Cause they'd shut down the streets and the marching band would march from the high school down into the stadium and into the field and the town would come out and you felt like it was the weekly town parade.

And so it was like, it was a thing where I grew up. And so, but the most, like the most prestigious thing that a female leader in the band could do would be to play the xylophones. It was, it was, you know, you led off with all of the cadences. You started the marching band down the street, the way the cadences worked, we're all built around the xylophone medley. And so my sister gets ready to join high school and she's like, I think I want to, I think I want to play the xylophone.ley and and so my sister gets ready to join high school and she's like i think i want to i'm gonna play the xylophone i'm like aaron there's two we march 200 kids and there's one small detail you you don't play the xylophone you you never have yeah and tryouts are like

in two weeks she's like, but I play the piano and I play drums a little bit. I'm sure I can figure it out. I'm like, yeah, but Aaron, I love you and everything and I think you're great, but there's probably 50 other girls who are going to try out for that spot.

48 of them played the xylophone for like a long time. Long, long story short, of course she proves us all wrong and you know plays the xylophone as a freshman in our little town band and you know i guess it was a prophecy went on to uh be a performance violinist so she plays in a little symphony out in uh south carolina called the long bay symphony And yeah, I don't. The only thing I'm just learning from you is that you are great at storytelling. Oh, well, thank you.

And is that natural? Like did you tell a lot of stories growing up or were you trained in how to tell a story? Do you just have lots of practice because people told you storytelling is important? You know, it's funny. I think I was probably trained. And so essentially I told you about my mom. But also she's just brilliant teachers that I'm just so thankful to have met. So I told you how my mom was a speech and debate coach. And she was also a mathematics teacher.

And we had a lot of fun with that in our home. But because of the – It must have been a lot of fun. Oh yeah. Yeah. Right. Because of the school system, I went to, you know, there were rules, like you couldn't have your mom as a teacher and you couldn't have your mom as a coach, but you know, my mom was hell bent that I was going to be on the speech and debate team. So I did the, even though I debated with my mother at home all the time, I did the speech part of speech and debate and, debate and all kinds of theater roles, not because I was any good, but because I had one talent. And that talent was at the age of 15, I could grow a full beard.

And I think I was the only one in the whole town that could. And I played all the dads. I was the dad in Cheaper by the Dozen. I was the dad in – I played Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. And I often joke. I mean my college degree is in mechanical and aerospace engineering. And I'll – sadly, I haven't done an advanced thermodynamics problem in a long time nor have I solved the differential equation. But I sure do use speech and debate every day of

my life so yeah super powerful skill is that part of how you inspire others as that's part of your philosophy is that the storytelling is it how you share ideas that you want to move in a particular direction is like how do you use storytelling on a regular basis? Yeah. Satya, CEO of Microsoft. Yeah. Sorry. I shouldn't think of him just as sort of first name Satya, but yeah, first name Satya, last name Nadella, CEO of Microsoft. You know, I think one of the things that he says very crisply is what he expects of leaders is clarity, energy, and results. And, you know, certainly how you present and how you inspire fall right into buckets one and two. And I do believe firmly that if you do one and two well, number three kind of takes care of itself.

Certainly at a place this big, it doesn't matter how good I am at driving results. At the end of the day, if I don't inspire excellence within others, we're not going to get to where we need to be. How do you think about excellence? It's a word that we use and I'd love if we could almost calibrate what that word means for each other. How do you think about excellence? Yeah. So yeah, if we had more time, I'd tell you about these like five principles of leadership that I have. And one of them is this notion of a commitment to excellence. And I'm going to tell you about these like five principles of leadership that I have. And one of them is this notion of a commitment to excellence. And I'm embarrassed to say it was sort of a ripoff of the Oakland Raiders because at one point in time they had this commitment to excellence.

It was back before I think they had 10 or 12 losing seasons in a row. But, you know, hey, Derek Carr might come back. Anyhow, sorry for the tangent. But, yeah, people use excellence probably overly so for me though it has pretty deep meaning it it's not about um this quarter's targets uh this year's targets um the score in any one game it's about the endless, endless pursuit of reaching your potential and becoming a student of the same. And, you know, okay, how does that manifest itself into some examples that people get their heads around? Well, you know, whatever goal you're trying to achieve, I would challenge that you can probably do at least 20% better than whatever the biggest goal you can imagine in your life is.

You can do better than that goal. Where does that thought come from? I mean it's an innate belief for me that the human spirit is the most powerful thing on the planet. I mean, you look at athletes, the human body was simply not, I mean, it's just not genetically conceived or mechanically conceived to do some of the things that athletes make human bodies do. That comes from the human spirit and it comes from within and believing that you can always achieve more if you put the

time, effort and energy and focus into it. And I like, I remember this movie I watched when I was a kid. I think it's actually, if it's not historical fiction, it's sort of on the historic base of fact, but it was about the first Olympics. And if you read the history of the first Olympics in the U S Olympic team, they basically to make a super, like a movie, you know, a 30 second synopsis, they basically read all of the rules wrong when they went into training, you know, everything was written, not originally in English. So when they sized the practice shot put that they would throw and the sample discus that they would throw, they were bigger and heavier than what the real sport would require. The hurdles were higher and they practiced that way. So they practice with heavier and higher, heavier, heavier,

heavier shot puts and larger discus, higher hurdles. They practice to that standard higher standards. Yeah. And they came back and won just about every event as a result of the same. And so whether historical fiction or not, I should probably go check my facts and all of that. It was a great movie. And for me, it's like,

wow. Okay. If I want to run an eight minute mile in a race and guarantee that I probably actually do it on that day, even though I'm stressed out, I probably should practice a seven-and-a-half-minute mile. Super bad analogy, but, you know, because nobody really wants to run that slow. But it might be sort of revealing my triathlon skill. But anyhow, the net of it is, is that if you put something extra into the mix, and I've done this throughout my career, and I'm sort of doing it right now. So I'll give you two examples, one from the past, one right now.

But there was a moment in my career where I was sort of bucking to become a senior vice president at Oracle. And I had achieved that. And it was sort of my first year of being under the gun and under a lot of pressure in a new big role. And I decided that that year I would do the Alcatraz triathlon. And everybody that worked around me thought I was crazy. I was 50 pounds heavier than I am now. I couldn't run a mile, let alone swim from Alcatraz to shore, bike 25 miles up and down the hills of San Francisco and run eight miles up and down the same hills and two of them in the sand and all the other crazy stuff that's associated with the triathlon. But I found that if I was training for that, and I'm not an athlete,

but if I was training for something that I thought at one point in time in my life was impossible, if I was training for that and at the same time training my body at work, it not only was sort of this objective evidence that I could do more, but also provided this perfect diversion, this space where I could leave everything behind and just have some balance and some moments of clarity. And trust me, no matter how big the problem seemed at work, the fear of the thought of somebody pitching me off the end of a ferry boat at Alcatraz Island and finding my way to shore was a big motivator and like now it's like we're going through one of the most material and evolutionary periods of growth at microsoft and i've been

trying to learn how to fly an airplane i've always wanted to be a pilot and so in my infinite spare time i've been trying to get my pilot's license and uh knock on wood i'm pretty close to it actually i'm getting ready to take my test so uh yeah but you know you throw it's like you throw that extra thing out there and if you have the extra thing out there suddenly the thing you're trying to achieve so to me is why that's like excellence in a nutshell is pushing yourself not to hit a goal, but continuously striving, continuously striving. And like, if you do it well, it's a job that's never done continuously striving to reach your potential. Okay. How do you find the potential in yourself and then how do you see it in others? And this is probably going to map back onto how your mom and dad saw it in you. You know,

can you, I think that this is a mystery and I feel like I have the ability to see it and tease it and pull it out of people or share ideas that could be for them. But I don't know any science around it. I don't, this is like, I'd love if you shared the way that you work to have a sense of what your potential is or what somebody else's could be. Yeah. Well, it's probably easier than others. So maybe I'll answer that one first. I look for the sparks because everybody has them. Everybody has these moments of brilliance, but you rarely do people see them.

You're not always looking in the mirror when a moment of brilliance occurs. And if you just stop that person and just, whether you do it in the moment in front of their peers or you take the time to pull them aside or send them a letter or an email or personal outreach and say, hey, I just want want to tell you like, that was a brilliant moment. And in that moment, I don't just see a moment where you got lucky. I see, I see more in you and you know, let's talk. And I try to, uh, as my assistant would tell you, and she probably throw a book at me. Uh, she heard me saying this on something that gets recorded. I rarely say no to somebody asking for my time, especially if it's somebody who said, Hey, you know, I'm going to kind of just tell you my story and tell you what I'm interested in and get your advice on like, where can I go from here? And, um, those are the sessions like those are such precious and, and like almost fragile moments too because somebody is actually saying, hey, I'm willing to hear. I'm willing to take that leap, that journey to go start finding out what my potential really is.

And so you look for the sparks. You listen. And I mean, man, you try to help as much as you can, because really, if you can help somebody else reach their potential or even start them on the journey, that's like one of the most rewarding things in life. Okay. What is the reward for you? Like, what do you get from that? It's an emotional rush. I mean, it really is. I mean, when you see somebody hit stride, you know, and you know that they're having that moment where like, I'm doing something I never thought I could do. You know, it's great. It is.

It really is great. I mean, it's just like, I can't really think of much better. external drive, right? Like motivated for things. And there's nothing wrong with either. Okay. And, and I think that modern times there's this critique against being actually motivated. That's not okay. But I, so I just want to have a, as opaque, transparent, you know, conversation about like, what are you driven by? Is it big house, big watch, you know, big job, because you probably have all those, or is it that thing, that watch, big job? Because you probably have all those. Or is it that thing, that feeling that you were just talking about? You hitting your stride, seeing others hit their stride. I think, you know, sure.

Growing up, there was a time when you wanted things. It's interesting. Now that I can finally afford most of those things, I find that I don't want them anymore, which is almost sad. You go to the store, like you find like, I'm ready. I could buy that thing that I thought I wanted, you know, like, you know, and I don't want a thing. I'll tell you a story. You know, simple answer, Mike, is what, what I really want. I want impact. I want to be able to create impact in material ways that matter to people. And I'll be honest with you. There were times in this career, in being in the tech industry, where you're like, okay, well, gosh, if we sell more stuff this quarter, does that really matter?

Yeah, I mean, to our shareholders and to my boss, yeah, sure, it matters. But what real impact are you having? And I have to say, and this is not meant to be a big Microsoft commercial, but it's one of the things that keeps me coming to work here every day because I feel like the mission that Satya has put forward for this company, I mean they're big words. Our mission literally is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. That's a big job. And so it's when I feel like my job can be about, you know, helping a customer develop a new way to drive down water consumption or to increase crop yields or to help cure cancer in adolescence. That's when you go, wow. Okay. So there's that kind of impact,

but then there's the personal personal impact i mean back to the discussion we were having earlier like if you can find in that person that spark and help them you impact them to reach their potential but i think if i had i could have anything on the planet right now um it's funny in the back of the room here is this uh clock that my daughter made for me and uh best christmas present i've ever gotten because you know for years my kids have said well you what do you want for christmas dad i'm like yeah i just want more time and so my daughter very cleverly a couple years ago, gave me a clock with no numbers on it. I said, here you go, dad. Here's, here's all the time that all the time you want. So it was like, yeah. Cause like,

what do I want? I just, man, I like, I want more time. I want more time with my kids, more time with my family. There's always more to do. And, uh, it just seems like there's never enough time to do it the way you really want to do it. To me, it's like potential is, it's like the number infinity. I mean, it's like, there's always one more number. That's at the center of the question is like, how do you suss out what potential is? And I love what you said is that I find, look for the sparks. And to look for the sparks, you've got to get out a lot of noise. You got to get out a lot of distractions and your own internal tension has to be minimized to be able to see something beautiful outside of you.

And then the way that you describe that you call on the spark is really cool. So I'll never forget the way that you do that. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why I've built intentional routines into the way that I close my day. And Cozy Earth has become a new part of that. Their bedding, it's incredibly soft, like next level soft.

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use the code FINDINGMASTERY for 40% off at CozyEarth.com. That's a great discount for our community. Again, the code is FINDINGMASTERY for 40% off at CozyEarth.com. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Caldera Lab. I believe that the way we do small things in life is how we do all things. And for me, that includes how I take care of my body. I've been using Caldera Lab for years now. And what keeps me coming back, it's really simple. Their products are simple and they reflect the kind of intentional living that I want to build into every part of my day. And they make my morning routine really easy. They've got some great new products I think you'll be interested in. A shampoo,

conditioner, and a hair serum. With Caldera Lab, it's not about adding more. It's about choosing better. And when your day demands clarity and energy and presence, the way you prepare for it matters. If you're looking for high quality personal care products that elevate your routine without complicating it, I'd love for you to check them out. Head to calderalab.com slash finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. Okay. What are you searching for? What's the thing that you work really hard? You want impact. Yeah. Okay. What are you searching for? Yeah, it's hard, really hard. Cause I think, I think I've probably given you the answer in different words and pieces, but composing it together goes a little something like this. I want to make a difference in the world to the maximum extent of my potential.

And I don't know what that is yet entirely. I am working on it every day. I work really hard every day to make this day better than yesterday and tomorrow better than today. And each day I find something else I can, I can do a little better. And I feel like I work pretty hard to try to make a difference around for those around me, for my family, for the great customers I get to work with, for the partners I get, I get to work around, you know, what, what does that, what does that translate to someday? I don't know, but I'm going to just keep working at it. And there's an old saying that, and I don't know who said it, I should probably look it up, but it goes something along the lines of never rest until

you make your good better and your better best. And I don't think those are pretty good words to live by because I feel like if my quest is to make as big of a difference as I have the potential to make in the world. And, you know, that's kind of a tireless gig. That is a tireless gig, yeah. And then, okay, super inspiring. What in your past has given you the platform to say to yourself, I think I can do that? Yeah. So I'll come back to that story that I started to tell about going to college from this little tiny town. And I worked hard academically in my first year of school and I got really good grades, but I didn't get involved in the campus.

I joined a fraternity and found some of the best friends in my life there. But I really, I kind of watched and, um, mostly cause I felt like, Hey, coming into this whole thing, like I said, I'm going to come to Chicago or go to this fancy engineering school. Um, I'm from this small town. I'm here to learn from others that obviously do it way better than I do. And you learn and observe. And there was a moment where it kind of all clicked and said, you know what, I can actually have some pretty good ideas on how to make a lot of things around here better. And my school at the time was going through pretty rough things on campus, you know, with racial bias and, uh, you know, South side of Chicago was a tough place in the late eighties, early nineties.

And so I thought, well, you know, I'm going to run for student government president because I think somebody needs to do something about it and nobody's trying. And I may not be the best at it, but geez, I can do better than nobody trying. And so I got elected to student government, eight votes to six. So there were only 14 voting members is how run down things were at the time. And three terms later, when I stepped down, there were 4,000 voting members as student government.

Yeah. Look at that. I just started doing everything I could. I ran student government for three terms. I was valedictorian in my class. I ran the radio station on campus. I started a student organization that brought talent, entertainment, because we were sort of a heads down engineering architecture school and so i thought you know what this place needs to liven up a

little bit let's bring some big bands in and so i think one challenge after another it was sort of like hey i can i can do that and um you know know, what sort of from always this, from this unassuming position of, Hey, look, I'm going to join something first and assume that the thing I'm joining is full of people that know exactly how this thing should run. And I, I just am here to learn. And then, and you do have to have that, like, to be clear, I don't want to sound like this crazy, know it all. We're like, Hey, I showed up and i knew more than everybody and that's not at all the case you have to be a sponge and and you have to be a student of the thing you're pursuing but i find that if you in in pursuit of being a student you know in in mastering your craft you can very quickly get

to a point where you can provide more impact, whether you're the actual like boss appointed leader of a thing you can lead across and you can have impact through the simple and pure goal of trying to make others better. And so that sort of one thing after another was, was my pursuit. How do you do so much? Like, that's a lot of things you just described. And this sounds like it's a theme, right? Like whether it's in college or now, you're getting your license to fly in the middle of radical growth and change and leadership that you're part of.

So how do you do so much? Do you compromise sleep? Do you compromise relationships? Do you compromise sanity? Like, compromise relationships? Do you compromise sanity? Or do you say, no, no, no, listen, I just am A, B, and C is what I do. And there's no cost. Yeah. There's times in my life, Mike, where there was a cost, where I got so damn focused on

doing so many different things that I screwed up my first marriage. It was bad. And I'll live with that for the rest of my life. Thankfully, my ex-wife and I are, are good friends. Uh, how'd you, how'd you screw it up? I got very focused on work, very focused on my career. And, um, you know, someone's told me once is that I asked, I asked that same question, like, how does it go wrong? I'm like, how did it go wrong? Cause I don't want to make that mistake and I don't want to make, you know, try to learn

from other people's mistakes as well. And, and so he said, I was just really selfish. I said, oh shit, that's me. What do you mean? And I just was so head down and focused on what I was trying to do that. I missed the most important person in my life, like helping them. Yeah. So you keep coming back to this idea that it's about others, it's about others, it's about others. Is that something that you've picked up from the loss?

Somewhat. I think that for me, it was a very personal thing. And, and I, I had kids at a really young age and I knew from my own experience being the sort of the child of, of two divorced parents that I needed to, no matter how hard I worked, I needed to spend time with my kids. And I did a good job of that. And I feel like the mother of my, of my two kids that, that, that she did a good job of that. But somehow in the time and energy and space that I put into my job and that she put into volunteering at the kids' school and the time that each of us spent on the kids that we forgot to spend time with each other. So what's a practice that I could learn from you about how to invest in the relationship? Like what is a practice there that is a pearl of wisdom that makes some sense? And I think it's the same. It's actually the same answer to the question that you asked earlier, which is, you know,

how do you do all of these things? You do have to time slice and you do have to be things, you do have to time slice. And you do have to be – when you're in the time slice, you have to be in that time slice and not any other because that – like this notion of multitasking is really BS. I mean there's just no such thing really. The human brain, I mean scientifically proven, you can fast switch. But you can't – the human brain actually can't do two things at once. Novel things. New things.

That's right. Yeah. You can think about one thing and then switch gears really fast and then switch gears really fast back to the next. But you do have to be in the moment. And so it's actually interesting. I feel like I became a better friend to my ex-wife through divorce and what forced me to time slice even more than I was to her when I was married to her. And, um, you know, because, you know, we were, we were really committed on co-parenting and, you know, spending equal time with the kids and making sure that we each, that not only did we spend equal time with the kids, but that we had a common philosophy for managing the kids.

And so it forced you to say, well, if we're going to do all of that and we're both going to do the crazy things we've always done, then how are we going to, like, how do you carve off the time? And so, you know, not to sound overly tactical, but you sort of start even thinking about how you break up your weekend. You sort of have these like seven segments of a weekend. You have like – Oh, my goodness. You have Friday evening, Saturday morning, sort of Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening, Sunday morning, Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening. And so – Never thought about this.

Yeah. But if you try to put more than seven things into a weekend box, you're screwed. Uh-huh. Okay. And when you find yourself saying, I'm going to do all of these things, you're going to go, everybody out of the pool. Which one of these things is going to get either done really poorly or which of these things am I really just not going to do? And if seven are just about the kids. Yeah. Your host.

Got it. Yeah. If there was, if there was, you know, Johnny's got to go to a soccer game and, you know, Susie's got to go to this and, you know, Janie's got to go to that or bloody, bloody. Those aren't the names of my kids, by the way, but you have nothing left for one another. Where'd you come up with that concept that's a good question i don't know i uh i spent a lot of time in um counseling after my divorce through through the divorce and after my divorce and i'm pretty sure it came from that. If you were to add up the hours of counseling that you've done,

like the introspective work. Yeah. If you did one a week, one hour a week for a month, or I'm sorry, for a year, 50 hours, somewhere in that range. Meaning I'm taking counseling from others. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah.

One a week, one hour a week. Wow. I guess it sort of depends on what, what qualifies. Like I kind of feel like, I feel like I kind of take counseling from what everybody talked to, right? Like,

cause you know, I mean, if you try hard enough, you can learn something from anybody you talk to. And, um, in fact, I think that's actually in and of itself a really good learning because I think people always, when they seek a mentor, they're like, ha, in fact, I think that's actually in and of itself a really good learning because I think people always, when they seek a mentor, they're like, ah, let me, let me pick somebody

who's like really good or really famous or really great, man. You can get mentorship from the coffee shop if you look for it. I mean, there's, there's lessons to be learned from everyone, but I sit down, focus. Okay. I'm really sitting here to learn about me and how to be better, a better version of myself. I'd say there's a couple hours a week of that. Yeah. She was. Yeah.

Yeah. That's over how many years? Probably my, most of my adult life, 20 odd years. And that's not necessarily with a psychologist that some of that's with a counselor, therapist, psychologist, and some of it is with other people, mentors. Right on. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I would, cause in that I would throw, I don't know, maybe a 10 year period where I was doing amateur triathlons and,

you know, I've been working to fly over the last couple and that would include time with a tactical teaching stuff yeah tactical but not like i wouldn't i wouldn't count all of the hours that i've focused on flight training as mentorship hours right but the guy who's my flight instructor i consider a mentor not because he's teaching me how to fly, because he's a human being whom I really respect. And I'll give you an example. I've been working at this flying thing for two years. And you can get a pilot's license with about 40 hours worth of training. That's the FAA minimum requirement.

I have 150 hours of flying and 300 and some odd landings. I have at least three times as much of all of the minimum qualifications one needs. And it's because I like i better be able to land the damn plane and land it well but no through all of that there were plenty of times when i had to tell harvey my my flight instructor that hey listen nate's got that is my son's name actually i didn't just make that one up nate's got a hockey game this weekend in minnesota a tournament i gotta go uh so i can't fly this weekend i don't want you to be disappointed in me because I'm not, you know, spending every weekend hour I have learning how to fly. And he stopped me. He said, listen, I'm going to tell you a story. I was, you know, another tearjerker, but effectively, uh, Harvey lost his son and he too, you know, had a moment like I had with my mom where work was always a little bit more important. And I think he realized it too late.

He didn't realize it so late that he didn't reclaim some of it. He told me some great stories about scuba diving with his son and rekindling, but he missed a lot of hours. And he said, don't miss those hours. And so getting back to being present, it's like, Hey, it's time to be a dad. Be a dad. Don't, don't be Microsoft guy. Don't be, don't be learning how to fly guy. Don't be doing a triathlon guy.

Be a dad. Be a dad right now. Be a son right now. Be a friend right now. Be a husband right now. That's what you need to be right now. And everything else needs to go away. Okay. How do you have enough available energy? Well, I start every day with six shots of espresso. It's not a great habit. Wait, hold on. I'm not sure if that's real or not.

No, that's real, man. Six shots. And that's when I'm at home. When I'm on the road, it's eight. I have this big mocha that I get every morning, this giant mocha. And I nurse the sucker all morning. But yeah, that's not how I get my energy. It helps. But look, honestly, it's constant work, man, because it's all about balance. I mean, it's like kind of like one word. It's like, what's the ultimate goal in life is balance. You know, like how do you, how do you do all these things? Like reach your potential? How do you strive to reach your potential? You can't, unless you have balance. And when I say balance, I mean, you've got to, you've got to get enough sleep. You've got to eat well. You've got to take care of your

body. You've got to exercise. You've got to do all of these things. And if you let that thing get out of whack, uh, cause it's not like balance isn't a, Hey, I put all my stuff in the right spot. And so I'm good. Balance is constant work. There's always an extra thing being thrown at you, and you have to decide. Like, hey, I got this. And look, there's times when I choose sleep over an extra hour of work because I know if I get that sleep and I wake up in the morning, I'll be able to do the work in half the time. I learned this skill in college. It was pretty wild.

I had this thermodynamics professor who I actually got to meet again very recently after 25 years. And I told him this story and he almost cried. It was a moment. But anyhow, Paco Ruiz, brilliant guy. And he would give you these really hard problems to solve. And mostly because I think he was doing the same thing I'm trying to do, which is help others reach their potential. And he, after all of the difficulty of solving the problem, he would actually then turn around and grade you on neatness. He'd be like, dude, I just worked my butt off all night to turn in this thing for you, and you're going to take off points for neatness?

I would do every piece of homework I gave to him twice. I would solve the problem, which would take hours. I mean, some complex advanced sermon and X problems can take you all night to work on, especially back in the day when you did all of the math by hand. Think about like one problem being pages and pages and pages of single space, single line, manual calculations, and you get one number wrong and the whole thing's wrong. It's a lot of work. So then I would set that aside and then rewrite everything

until I felt like it looked worthy to give to Paco. And, um, you know, as a result, you do anything twice, you become really good at it. There were times when the problems were so complicated and I was so tired that I would, instead of just grinding through it, I would say, I got nothing left. I could stay up all night and be worthless tomorrow. Or I'm going to do one last thing. I'm going to take a good 10 or 15 minutes. I'm just going to study the problem. I'm not going to work on the answer. I'm just going to study all of the variables in the problem. And then i'm going to go to sleep and i would wake up in the morning and literally write down the answer because you your mind i think a couple things happen one your body's more rusted

two your mind gets to this free space where it well while you're sleeping where you solve problems that you can't solve in an awake state. Because when you're in a wake state, you rule out the potentially stupid idea. Well, I don't want to do that. That might be really dumb. I might expose myself to speaking out and giving the wrong answer. Well, your brain doesn't care about any of that when you're asleep. It's just kind of gone. And so, yeah, it is this balancing act of, hey, no, no, no, wait. What I really need to do right now is I need to go get something to eat because I'm irritable. I'm angry.

I'm not at my best. I just need to take a few minutes to go get something to eat. I need to walk outside. I need to ride my bike to work today, which I do sometimes even though it rains every freaking day here in Seattle. Because it's just that moment. You're like, Hey, I'm out in the rain right now. And you can say, well, that sucks. Where you can say, you know what? That was great. There's like, there's rain on my face. So it's like, you talk about it a lot.

You talk about gratitude and you get it. You can find, you can find gratitude in any moment. And that helps too. It really helps kind of keep everything in check. Is it like an equalizer? That's the image that I get from you. It's like you've got some dials and you're just trying to get that thing to match up to where it sounds really good to you. Right on. I don't know what those dials are in the equalizer for you, but it sounds like it's work and it's family and it's health and it's fitness and it's recovery and it's vibrance and right. There's yeah. Okay. All right, cool.

All right. How do you finish this thought? It all comes down to, Hmm. Wow. One word, huh? You phrase whatever unpack as much as you want one word perseverance i kind of had to have like three yeah it would be inspire excellence persevere cool okay you know and inspire excellence and persevere yeah all right and because there's days when it doesn't all work out, believe it or not. There's days that I'm like, you work really hard on running a play, but the play doesn't just didn't run well. And you know, perseverance is key. Yeah, for sure. Okay. How about, how about this thought? Is there a word or phrase that cuts to the center of what you understand most? I come back to, um, always be learning because I think what I understand most is that

no, how, no matter how much I understand, there's always more. Okay. Where does pressure come from? Time. What do you mean? No matter how much I understand, there's always more. Okay. Where does pressure come from? Time. What do you mean? Or lack thereof. Yeah, what does that mean?

So pressure is an external function? I hate saying no to just about everything. It sounds like it. Maybe like eating Brussels sprouts, I can say no to that uh there's you know you know but uh given it given infinite time and it just my kids are at a point in time where like they they all like we became empty nesters this year and you know i told you i'm divorced i'm remarried though and and uh happily so and between my wife and i we have four kids she has two and i have two and they the youngest one finally left the house this year and you know with infinite time i'd love to just follow each of them around you know i want to see what each of them is doing and every day and moment of their lives and you know you go through that point in time in your life where you can see everything your kids do pretty well.

And then when they're not here, gosh, if I could have a life that I could just dedicate to that, that would be great. I love what I do at work. I love the people with whom I get to work each day. If I could spend more time with them, somehow contributing to their success. And, you know, if there's any way that an idea of mine could help an idea of theirs, I mean, you never, you never want to say no. It's like, and so, but you have to, right? Because you are given only one life and there are only 24 hours in the day. And I've worked really hard to find a way to create a MERS day or a MAPROL or a 25th hour in the day, but it just ain't happening, man. We all get 1440.

You bet. and being present and caring about others. What next? Where is the next phase? And if you could take this in one of two ways, one would be like personally, like what does next look like there? And then professionally, like where is high tech going? Yeah.

Yeah, wow. What are we going to see in five years? Wow. From Judson and high tech. Wow. Let's start with high tech. It's probably a little bit easier, believe it or not, than trying to figure out what the heck I'm going to be doing in five years.

First of all, I love what I'm doing now. So a greater version of that is a pretty cool proposition. Cool. And that's how you see it? Yeah. On the tech side, I mean, we're at the dawn of a new age. And I know that that sounds somewhat ridiculous because I think the tech industry has been saying that forever. First it was the original compute. Then it was the client-server realm, the dot-com realm, and the internet revolution, right? But this digital, this digital era that we're about to embark upon

that leverages everything from augmented reality to artificial intelligence and, you know, deep neural nets and harnessing of data. Wow. I mean, things are going to be, things are going to be revolutionary in our, in our near future here. and just about every industry, banking the unbankable in financial services, curing disease through data and algorithms, autonomous or semi-autonomous cars. I mean, the tech industry is going to fuel this new digital era. And that's part of why things are so exciting right now at Microsoft, because we're just like, we're on fire. We're at the center of helping customers sort through all of that. So that's super exciting. And for me, you know,

it's a blessing to just be a part of all of that. And I feel really humbled to be a part of all of that. I do sort of think though, okay, well, there'll be a day where maybe I feel like, okay, we kind of got through that revolution and then maybe I should go do something more humanitarian, um, give back a little more. And that whilst I do feel good about the fact that in, in many ways, the work I do at Microsoft enables me to give back and, you know, in very direct ways that, you know, there'll come a point in time where I want that to be more of my life. And then the next generation will come anyway as well. My kids will start having kids and, you know, I'll want to give some time to that too. How do you think about mastery?

How do you articulate it, define it, think about it, talk about it? Yeah. I feel like we've been talking about it throughout this whole session. I feel like words like pursuit and journey and potential and excellence. And, you know, you asked earlier, like who, like how many hours do I spend on, on coaching and, um, counseling? And I have a really great career coach, uh, who's, who's coauthor on a, on a book called the unfinished leader. And I don't forget the first day that he gave it to me, I was actually sort of almost offended. I'm like, what do you mean unfinished man? Like, I'm, I feel pretty good about myself when you do like I'm unfinished. Like, that doesn't feel good.

And then I started to think a little bit more about it. I'm like, wait a minute, who the hell wants to be finished? Like, I want to be finished the day they throw my carcass into the ground. You know what I mean? That's, that's when you can say I'm finished. Unfinished is like where it's at. That's what I want to be. And I think when you have that awakening and you realize like, man, the only, the only real thing that makes us human is the ability to learn and, and strive and try to become something more than just yourself. Accepting that and knowing that you're, you're on that journey. Like that's mastery for me. It's like, I know it. I'll never get there is mastery for me.

Brilliant. This conversation is super cool, man. Yeah. I don't know. Do you, are you this deep? Like in all of your relationships? I don't know, man. I guess you probably have to ask everybody that knows me, but I try to be. Would people say that – would this be unfamiliar to have this much soul and care and compassion that is driving you? Is that unfamiliar to people? I think I've probably told some stories that nobody has ever heard before. But I do genuinely hope, Mike, that one thing people would say about me is that I'm authentic. I really don't know any other way to be. I mean, be authentic, be who you are. And

that's not to say that I'm always proud of who I am, but I think you have to be genuine. That's what it's all about. I think it's really hard because of the pressures and the stresses and all the things we have to do and think that we're not enough without those things. Right on. I think it's really tough. Yeah. And I think it's really rare. So that's why I've really appreciated this. No, thanks.

And you're really awesome at this, dude. I mean, like you bring out, when I sat down in this chair, I had no idea I was going to say the things that I've just said. So it was super cool. Me either. All right. One takeaway, give us some sort of pearl, applied pearl. Like what is one thing if somebody that was listening and I'm listening, so it's like something that I could do to get better. One habit, one practice, one thing that you say, you know, it's been really good for me. And if someone is wanting to really get after it in life, here's something I found to be super valuable. Take measured and calculated risks. Don't be afraid to do things that, you know, others are perhaps afraid to do or don't want to do or think you can't do.

That's always really served me well. Do you see yourself as a risk taker? Because you added the measured and calculated, which gives me this thought like you hedge. Balance. I mean, there's balance to it. I mean, I wouldn't say, you know, go try skydiving tomorrow if you've never done it before or never taken a lesson. But there's always that edge, I think, of discomfort. fine line between something you are really not comfortable doing and then just bat shit crazy. Uh, you know, don't, don't go, don't go hurt yourself, but I really do believe that everybody can do a little bit more than they're comfortable doing. And you find that edge and you push yourself right to that. And even a little bit beyond, I think you'll find yourself being exposed to opportunities in life, whether that be

parenting or running a business that will serve you well. That's great. And that's what adaptation is yeah and that's how we force it is by getting into that space where i call it the razor's edge yeah that can be love it could be you know joy it could be something that's physically difficult right you know it could be lots of different things that razor's edge and we stay just a little bit longer yeah then we thought we possibly could that's where we end up building that capacity right now yeah so cool i love this thank you where can we find you where can we follow you what like what's the best way to stay connected to what you're doing yeah right you've got some social yeah easy to follow on twitter uh huge

linkedin user of course um so easy to find on all those places and i'll put that in like the show notes yeah sure where people right on yeah yeah totally cool thank you right on thanks a lot all right thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show, the easiest no-cost way to support is to hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're listening. Also, if you haven't already, please consider dropping us a review on apple or spotify we are incredibly grateful for the support and feedback if you're looking for even more insights

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