The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Brian Biro, The ROI of Kindness Book

Episode Date: March 5, 2021

Brian Biro, The ROI of Kindness Book Brianbiro.com As you dive into this empowering little book, you’ll soon discover that this simple secret, KINDNESS, can transform your brand, your customer loyalty, your success in attracting and retaining fantastic people, and your organization moving your team ... - from fear to freedom - from failure to faith - from ego to we go - from good to GREAT! "Each and every one of us needs to become a Chief Kindness Officer."

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times. Because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks. Chris Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com. The Chris Voss Show.com.

Hey, we're coming to you with another good podcast. Oh, my gosh. Another one. Go back and listen to all 700 podcasts. You really should check all the babies out. There's just a whole bunch over there. You can listen for hours and ages. And when you get done, the coronavirus pandemic will probably be over. So, Hey, do that, do that with your time. Anyway, guys, so be sure to check us out. If you want to watch the amazing video version of this interview with this guest,

it's going to blow your mind. It's going to take you to a whole new level, put you in a special place, that thing you've been searching for all of your life, the missing part of you. You might find it in this author or not, but we're going to get really close. I think, are we, Brian? Absolutely. We're on the way already. We're going to get really close. I'll we brian absolutely we're on the way all right here we're gonna really close i'll leave it up to you guys to decide and who knows maybe maybe we don't have

the missing part but you're gonna get closer so anyway people are gonna be like i'm i love you know anyway i have no joke for that so anyway guys be sure to watch the video version let's go to youtube.com for it says chris voss hit the bell notification button it'll give you this completeness you'll feel deep in your soul why do i keep doing this completeness crap who knows it makes people feel good you can go to facebook there's multiple groups over there so many we can't count there's a linkedin there's instagram multiple accounts on instagram as well you can follow over there and you can see us on clubhouse we're talking on clubhouse all the time you can find me there at at chris voss the chris voss show has its own account over there and you can see us on clubhouse we're talking on clubhouse all the time you can find me there at at chris foss the chris foss show has its own account over there too and we should

have a the chris foss show club soon i'm hearing this week they're gonna let us start launching that we've got some most excellent guests i want to plug coming up dr jennifer ashen from good morning america you probably see her in dr oz other places. She's going to be with us next week for The New Normal. We're going to have Ira Rosen, who has the book Ticking Clock, behind the scenes at 60 Minutes. This is going to be a really interesting show because he's got all the dish on Mike Wallace. And, yeah, it's going to be pretty interesting.

If you read it, it's a pretty gossipy book. Tim Story is going to be on. He's got the uh miracle mentality you've probably seen him with uh that uh oprah lady you probably heard of her she's pretty popular from what i understand i've heard of her yeah yeah yeah yeah but today we have the most excellent guest of the day brian byro that's not no no brian bureau right no no no stick with the biro there you go there you go sorry brian he is america's breakthrough coach he's delivered over 1800 presentations around the world over the last 30 years the author of 15 count books, including his bestseller, Beyond Success, and his brand new

book we'll be talking about today, The ROI of Kindness. Brian was rated number one from over 40 speakers at four consecutive Inc. Magazine international conferences with degrees from Stanford University and UCLA. Brian has appeared also on Good Morning America and CNN. Brian was recently honored as one of the top 10 interactive keynote speakers in North America and one of the top 60 motivational speakers in the world. Welcome to the show, Brian. How are you? Chris, I couldn't be better. Having a blast already and we haven't even started. That was awesome. I got to tell you, I get a are you? Oh, Chris, I couldn't be better. Having a blast already and we haven't even started. That was awesome.

I got to tell you, I get a lot of bios from all of our authors and stuff. This is probably one of the best you've written. This is one, not the best you've written, the best bio that I've gotten that someone's written. And I'm impressed with you because you did Brian Byro's bio flawlessly. That's pretty tough to do. There you go. It was a one read, man.

I didn't even pre-read that. I want a special star in my head. So Brian, welcome to the show. Give us your plugs so people can find you on the interwebs. Yeah, the interweb. Oh, that's a cool deal. My website is my name, brianbyro.com, and it's got all the goodies on it. And I love to hear from people. I always will connect. There you go. Brian, you've launched this new book, The ROI of Kindness. People, if they don't know what that stands for, return on investment, or I don't know, you can make up some other stuff, but probably just return on investment. Is that correct? Yeah, we'll stick with that one. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I don't even know what you'd fill in for the ROI of kindness. So tell us what the book's about or what motivates you want to write the book,

et cetera. A couple of things, Chris. Number one, I feel like we're maybe more than I ever remember in my lifetime. It's time for kindness. We need to start to remember how to disagree without being disagreeable. We have so much separation, so much fear. So one of the underlying reasons for doing this was because I want to inject a whole new level of kindness into our culture, specifically in business, because the fun of the book is that we've been conditioned to think that everybody wants kindness, but we've been conditioned to think that kindness is soft, it's weak, it doesn't work in business. But the truth is the exact opposite. And this book really pulls it out in some fun ways to recognize that when your culture is filled with that concept of kindness, it's an integral part of your culture. I call it a kindness value proposition, a KVP. It not only works, it works big to the bottom line. And the book has some really startling statistics that pan this out. Example, in the quick service food industry, fast food industry,

the average annual turnover is 170%. So the turnover almost two times a year, the total number of employees. Two companies in that industry are famous for their kindness, value proposition. It's built into every meeting. It's built into the way they reward and appreciate people. Chick-fil-A and Starbucks. So in an industry where 170% turnover is the norm, those two, 14% and 24%. Now, when you figure that $6,000 every time you have to replace an employee in that quick

service food, that's $300 million to the bottom line. So kindness rocks. And it's also something that each and every person can participate in. So I want to write the book to help people understand that kindness really does work and also give people a real practical and fun and fresh way to look at how they can actually be a part of bringing that kindness culture into reality. That's one of the biggest challenges I have in life. People think that kindness, not all people, but some people think that kindness equals weakness. And I always seem to find these

bullies that decide to wander by and think kindness, Chris Voss, kindness equals weakness. And I always seem to find these bullies that decide to wander by and think kindness, Chris Voss, kindness equals weakness. And then I end up ripping someone's arm off and they're like, they're like, why did you get so angry? And you're like, yeah, you tried to screw. And so I think the perception is there where, like you say, where, where people, people think kindness is weakness. My, my mentor was, and the man who wrote the four in my first book, Beyond Success was John Wooden. John Wooden was the greatest college basketball coach of all time. Many people consider him the greatest coach, period, of all time. He was also the kindest man I ever met. When you were with John Wooden, here he is, 10 national championships, nobody else has ever won more

than five. When you were with him, he made you feel like you were the most important person on the planet. He was confident, but he was kind. And he had a great ability to really elevate people through the power of kindness. You'll love this story, Chris. Bill Walton, one of the greatest players of all time. Senior year, he comes into practice and he has big sideburns and facial hair and coach wouldn't had a no facial hair world. And we're going to have to shave before you play for coach wooden. And so Walton says, coach, with all due respect, we're adults. Now I think we should be able to wear our facial hair the way we want to. And wooden goes up in

total kindness, puts his arm around him. Bill, I've never been more proud of you. A man's got to stand up for what he believes in. And we really gonna miss you and we're really gonna miss you 15 minutes later clean shaven he didn't get those sideburns till he went up to the pros in portland but he handled disagreements without being disagreeable and that that's when you'd start to instill a sense of respect to start and we've and a sense of loyalty when you get start to instill a sense of respect and a sense of loyalty. When you get treated well, you want to respond. You want to reciprocate. So it's a practical book. It's a fun book.

It's got great stories. And it's trying to shatter our old thinking that kindness is weak, kindness is soft, and kindness doesn't work in business. It's the opposite. That's a great story. I really love that story. People need to approach it from that way a whole lot more. I think John Wooden, wasn't John Wooden famous for the get back to basics thing? Oh yeah. He was a real fundamentals guy and he was just a brilliant guy. He had so many wonderful,

wonderful, simple sayings. It's amazing what's accomplished when nobody cares and gets the credit. He used to say that success is peace of mind it comes from knowing you give the best you're capable my favorite of all be more concerned with your character than your reputation because your character is who you are reputation only what others think you are and if you stick with your character it'll become your reputation and see you've already done that chris you're at the top man i'm getting i'm getting there i i getting there. Spotify hasn't picked me up. They picked up Joe Rogan, but we're working on it. It's just a little process.

But no, his get back to basics, I think somebody would come along and they'd see, watch my jump shot or my layup and stuff. And he'd be like, yeah, let me see you throw from the free throw line. I guess Shaq could have used that probably a little bit more in training. He'd be like, get back to basics and i remember all the years of my business i would use that acumen because i would i would get off track i get too much in the weeds the details and stuff and i'd be like get back to basics okay you're off base just get right back there so you travel around the world you did 15 books that you've written, you did all the speaking, team building, leading, coaching, life balance, thriving on change. When your background prepared you to write this book? Chris, I've had three really, really fun and rocking careers. My

first career, I went to Stanford University a very long time ago, we will mention we will not mention any years. And what I the way I got through school, cause I was at, I was a public school kid was I coached and taught swimming. So when I left, when I left college, when I graduated from Stanford, I started a U S swimming team. So a year round swimming. So that was my first career. And I poured my heart into it, loved it. And I realized in those years, you don't really coach swimming. You coach people, you're coaching people's trying to help them believe in themselves, trying to get people to focus more on what they want than what they don't want. And I'd probably still be a swimming coach, except for I had no life. My world was so, the team became the biggest team in America at that time. I had no life. So I'm the only guy you've ever met

who went to graduate school to get a life instead of a job. And I did. And then my second career was in the corporate world, ended up becoming a VP of a real large transportation company and eventually an international training company. And it was when I was in that transportation company, we were like so many businesses, Chris, a deal. We were silos. Operations couldn't stand sales. Sales couldn't stand operations. They both hated the home office just a little bit more. And that just made no sense to me because salespeople don't want to do operations. Operations people definitely don't want to do sales. That's why they're in operations. So we need each other. And so that's when I started doing team building in my own company. And I had an awesome president who let me do this. And he was outside the box thinker.

And I went to him and said, you know, our challenges right now aren't our market. It's us. We don't support each other. We could be doing so many more things if we get behind each other. So I did these events. In one year, we had this massive turnaround. And I said to my wife at the peak of this, honey, we're doing great. Let's quit.

I got to my wife at the peak of this, honey, we're doing great. Let's quit. I got to go do this. And that's when I started doing my speaking and team building work and never looked back 30 years of pure joy. That's pretty awesome. You made me think how many corporations spend so much of their time worrying about their competition and they don't realize they're failing from the inside. You're making me think of all the companies that I've known that they're just sabotaging themselves so much from the inside that that's really their competition. And the deal is that when you focus on what you control, this is the heart of what I talk about in my events, what I talk about in our live kindness. When we control our controllables,

we feel momentum. We feel like we're making progress. We start to get excited and energized. When we try to control what we don't control, and you do not control your competition, that's when you feel frustrated, worried. You're focusing on what you don't want. And so truly to me, I've created this concept I call breakthrough leadership. And it's all built around this concept of shape your future. That's a controllable. Energize and engage yourself and your team. That's the second control. Build people, teams, and relationships. Focus on the inside. Good stuff will come out on the outside. There you go. There you go. In the book, you talk about we're all

leaders, and most of us have been raised to think there are few leaders and mostly followers. Tell us about your fresh perspective here. What's breakthrough leadership mean to you? That is one of the most important things to me and all of them. I've had a chance to speak to close to a million people in my live events. I want them to know that they are already the CEO of their own life. Because when you get down to it, what is leadership? Leadership is nothing more than making decisions.

So how you show up every day is part of your leadership. You're a teacher, whether you know it or not, by the way you deal with life each day. How do you deal with, as we've all had to deal with in the last year, uncertainty, change, challenge that we've never faced before? How you deal with that is a big part of your leadership. Probably most important of all, what kind of impact do you have on people? Do you lift them up? Do you inspire them by who you are? So I want people to understand that you are already a leader.

But I want them to have a fresh look at leadership, a future-ready leadership. And that's that breakthrough leadership concept, controlling those three foundational controllables. Shape your future, energize, engage your team, build people, teams, and relationships. When you do that, you're going to create breakthrough results. And breakthrough results are doing things you didn't know you could do when you started out. Breakthrough results are Airbnb. Airbnb is the biggest hospitality company in the world. They weren't here 12 years ago. When they started out, they weren't thinking about being the biggest hospitality company in the world. They were thinking about paying the rent.

They had three airbeds and a loft they weren't using. 12 years later, they're bigger than Marriott. That is a breakthrough result. But the secret is to focus on those controllables and let the results come as a result of working on the things you do control. That's what leadership is. And every one of us is a leader. I love that mentality. You can apply that to parenthoods where people need to take and look and I'm a leader. It gives you more self-actualization to what you really are. Like you say, have influence in the world, being a teacher and everything else. My mom was a teacher for 20 plus years. So was my sister. She still has people that come up to her and be like, you made such a difference in my life. You helped shape it. And

she was just an elementary school teacher, which that sounds horrible to say, just an elementary school teacher. But it's interesting that she shaped people's lives at that young of an age. And they still remember her and come up to her and be like, yeah, you made a difference in my life. You know what, my favorite movie of all time, I'm a corn ball. You'll know it right away is it's a wonderful life. And, and the story of the Christmas movie from Jimmy Stewart way back when we all watch it 400 times, I still ball like a baby every time. But the key message in it is what you just talked about. And it's so important for people to know. Your mom was an elementary school teacher. She affected some child who was seven years old or whatever. How many lives did that

seven-year-old, could that seven-year-old as they grow affect? And how many lives that that one would affect that many more? So we are ripple effect starters, but you won't be the same kind of, won't create the same kind of ripples until you stand up and say, I am a leader. What I do matters. I have a job here on earth and it's to help the people around me know they're important. That's obviously what your mom did because for kids to come back and say, you've made my, you've made a difference in my life. She made them feel like they had value. She made them feel that they were important. She made them feel that they had capability and she held them to that higher expectation. Wow. I didn't even think about that. The difference that she made in people's lives than they made in other people's lives. You mentioned the word ripple.

One of my axioms of my life has been fortunately early on in my teens, I saw Bobby Kennedy's speech. I wasn't there, but I saw a rendition of Bobbyby kennedy's speech ripples of hope in south africa and and so i've i've always made like posters for people and and different things and i keep the meme around for a while and he basically talks about how we all live in interesting times and how we all make a difference and when we do stuff that improves the quality of man that improves the improves the quality of life and people. We send forth these ripples of hopes that can build a giant current that can sweep down the highest walls of oppression and horrible things that happen in life. That's a real key thing. We all

make a difference. And I think that's something that's missing from a lot of people's lives. They don't feel they make a difference. And people need to realize they do. Whether you're putting a good or bad effect in the world, it's having an effect and it's rippling and making a bigger wave. So you want to sit down and go, what effect am I having? Am I a leader in this world? And who am I leading? And what difference am I making? Absolutely. One of the great things to me about social media has been I coached more than 40 years ago. And I get Facebooks and reach outs from kids I coached 40 years ago who I coached when they were seven years old. And they told me that same thing that were said to your mom, that you helped me think differently. You really helped me grow. I think about you still. And I'm stunned by that because I wouldn't even think they remember who I was to know that some little action, something that you said, some moment where you were just fully present with somebody could actually change the trajectory of their life. It may not have been a big change in that moment, but over time, that trajectory can

make a huge difference. So that's a great thing to carry with you each day. I think it's whether it's with your own kids, whether it's with your teammates, I call it the woo. It's the window of opportunity, which is every precious moment. You never know if the next person you'll meet today may become a lifelong friend. As you didn't know when you met your lifelong friend, you never know as if the next time you talk to your son or your daughter or on your show, if something you say, maybe just what's right for that person that they couldn't

see with their eyes, but you saw it, you seized the woo when you said it and somebody's life got better. Yeah. I've had, I've had twice now on social media where someone wrote me and it was like a quote we shared. And, and over the last 12 years that I've been on social media, I've had two times where someone wrote me and said, I was going to commit suicide today. And what you, that quote that you just put out there just randomly to, to were by automators. It was totally automated. And they said that, that brought me back from the brink. I decided to stay. I'm getting chills because I had the same thing happen in an event. One, one day, a woman, I, I could see her and there's about 400 people. And she came up to me and told me that at the end that i was going to take my life today and i didn't say something directly to her but she took it directly to her heart and and realized

that she still had a choice and that she would choose love over fear which is what all breakthroughs really are yeah we really don't we don't really don't realize it. It's pretty amazing. I've had a lot of people listen to the show over the years, especially when we had Eddie Glunt Jr. on. I had a lot of white people reach out to me and go, I love how you approach the deal of racism and how you had an open mind. And I actually really learned and changed some of my paradigms because of what I saw. So in your book, you talk about the seven habits of highly effective CKOs.

What is a CKO? And tell us a little bit more about the seven habits. Yeah, that's a lot of fun. That's my favorite part of the ROAB kindness, because as I said, we all want kindness in our lives, but how do you actually deliver kindness in the most profound and important ways? And so a CKO, not everybody's going to be a CEO. Not everybody's going to be the COO, but the instant you decide to, you can be the CKO, which is the chief kindness officer. So in every interaction, you can deliver kindness. And the seven habits are, I'll give you one that I think is one of the most,

the one that's just not thought of enough, but it's a powerful one. And it's humility. Being humble. See, a lot of people think being humble means you can't be confident. You can be really confident and be very humble because being humble doesn't mean you think less of yourself. It means you think of yourself less. But the reason why humility is such a key to being the best person

you can be is that only those people who are humble are lifelong learners. Because only those who are humble always know that they could get better. And so they'd rather make a mistake and learn from it than have to be right to look good. And so when you are humble around people, it's a delivery of kindness because it allows them to feel like, hey, you're not about ego, you're about we go. And so that's one of them. Another is probably the most important one of all, I call it the secret behind the secrets. We'll probably talk about it as we go along, is to be fully present. When you're fully present with somebody, 100% of your mind, body, and spirit is with that person. And you can't fake it when you're with somebody, if they're there or not.

The instant that they're not there, boom, you can feel it. And it says to them, and when you're not present, you just don't matter that much to me. You're not as important as my cell phone. You're not as important as this other stuff. And when you are present, you send the opposite message. You do matter. You are important. I think that was probably the greatest thing about John Wood and here, the greatest coach of all time. And when he were with him, bombs could be going off two feet beside you. All he cared about was you in that moment. And you felt like the greatest of all time because he was fully present. So that's, there is no kindness without first presence.

There is no trust without being present because you can't fake it. So to be a CKO is to start to work on being more fully present. When you're with people that matter, put the phone away for a little while. Listen, you got two of these, two ears, one mouth, good ratio. Listen and then formulate what you'll say hang on bob i was uh reading my text message here on my phone or wait brian brian not bob brian did i set you up i am a best straight man i gotta do that joke the uh no it's it's really fortunate i i feel at least for me and probably you that we were born in this generation where she used to sit and talk to each other at least i don't know what your family experience was but i'm assuming it was where we didn't have

these phones where we're just like going yeah bob whatever you john what who who am i talking to i'm reading texts on the internet and it's it's sad to me i remember i remember watching the evolution of it in 2010 2011 when iPads came out and everyone started having the iPhone and looking at it. And I would go to restaurants and I'd see whole families sitting around and they'd be like. Four different phones out, everybody talking on the phone, looking at their phone, looking at a movie.

You know it. The average American father today spends an average of nine and a half to ten and a half hours a day on a cellular or digital device and less than eight minutes a day in actual interaction with his kids. So we got to turn that around because we're going to, we're going to lose, we're going to lose that muscle. We're going to lose that muscle presence. So the greatest gift I've ever given was given to me by my two daughters who are now grown up when they're eight and three. And we had, I've been teaching this stuff, Chris, but sometimes you know what to do, but you don't do what you know. And I was so caught up in my stuff and my career and my speaking that we had actually moved to a

little town. So I would be present when I was home because I was on the road a lot. One night when I should have been and could have been tucking them in and reading them a story and being present with them, I was reaching for my phone to go through a bunch of voicemails. This was even before email. This was even before cell phone, so I don't have a really good excuse. And they came up to me and they looked at me and they said, Daddy, before we go to sleep, can we ask you something? I go, sure, you can ask me anything. And they said, Daddy, we just want to know, do you love your phone more than you love us? Oh, I felt the blade go. Oh, Emerson said what you do scream so loudly, I can't

hear a word you're saying. And I had been living my life as if my phone was a higher priority than my children. I will tell you, Chris, I tucked them in that night. I never missed another night when I was off the road, when I was home. The next morning, I brought them to school, never missed another morning. And my wife was like the happiest person in the world because she does not dig the morning. And that day I made a decision about presence and I changed my calendar so that from that day forward, I would never do more than seven events a month. So speaking some, no matter what you pay me and that their events came first. And so from that point on, I never missed one of their dance performances, one of their soccer games. I never missed one of their dad and daughter dances. And I thought I was doing it for them. Actually, the power of presence, you get more done in less time because you're focused, you're there, you're 100%.

We've all done it, Chris. It's a Friday. You're going to leave at 2 o'clock. You get more done between 8 and 2 on that Friday than you did all week 8 to 8 because you're present. And it sends that unstoppable message that is the message I believe that our job as leaders, since we're all leaders, our job is to help the people that we lead, serve and care about to know they're important. That was a, that was a tough lesson. I need, I had to learn, I think it was Eckhart Tolle, whose book I read, The Power of Now, taught me about being present. And I was having a real big ADHD anxiety problem where I was getting really lost in everything. And I would just, I would sit my dogs would be before me. And I'd just be like,

I'm not, I know I'm not here. I would just have this screaming in my head. Everything's going by you. My dogs had passed my, my early dog family had passed. And, and I was like, I need to be present somehow. I didn't know what it meant. I didn't know what the definition was, but being present is so important because it's really the only time that you have that you really control. You can't control or change the past. You can't really change the future. I mean, you can have an effect on it. You're going to affect the future is by being present.

Yeah. If you sit and worry about the future, you're not present. Absolutely. Absolutely. I would say the past is history, the future a mystery, the gift is now. That's why we call it the present. Give that to me one more time if you can the past is history the future a mystery the gift is now the gift that's why we call it the present i love that that should be a book too right there there you go those long titles again you cut off part way through there you go do you

want to share that we got two of the seven habits. Do you want to share the other five? Just maybe talk to me. I won't share all five of them because I've got to get people to read the book. But yeah, we don't want to. Another one, a huge one is, and because I've just touched on it, the most destructive, destructive word in the language of teams, families, and relationships is the word B-L-A-M-E, blame. So one of the seven habits is to be what I call

a blame buster. Now, blame kills teams. And it's not to say we don't mess up, because we all do. But blame does, serves no positive or constructive purpose for a very simple reason. Think about blame in the context of time. Is blame the past the present or the future always about the past so whenever you find yourself in blame where are you in the past where we just said you can't do anything about that so a blame buster doesn't and and which is leads to being a cko doesn't say oh we didn't mess up or pretend it didn't happen. They go, they said, okay, that's what happened. What can we learn? What will we do now? They take it from the past to where it can be constructive. And that has a powerful impact on people when you don't blame. When instead you say, okay, what are we going to learn? What are we going to do now? Let's make

this, turn this thing into something that's a positive learning element. The great coach at University of Alabama before Saban, Bear Bryant, he said this wonderful quote. He said, I'm just an old country plow hand, but if you want to get a team's heart to beat as one, he says, when things go great, they did it. Things go pretty good, we did it. Things go bad, I did it. In other words, I'm not going to blame you for it. I'm going to take that responsibility. Responsibility is something you take, all right, and that's how you really start to add credit to something you give. That's how you really start to build loyalty, connection, and really deliver kindness in an unexpected way because we're so conditioned to be defensive when we feel like somebody is blaming us. This is why I always blame people for stuff that's going to happen in the future.

Like I just, you're going to betray me someday, like Jesus or something. Jesus was like, one of you will betray me this day. That's a whole new twist. I think that's going to be the sequel. It's good. It's good. It works too. Kill people into shit they haven't even done.

You're just like, will betray me someday. I'll give you one more of the seven habits. We're going to shift out of this future stuff. And it's related to being present. And it's called, it's put it simple as just listen. In my corporate career, when I became the vice president of this international training company, I inherited my director of operations. She had the greatest name ever. Her name was Raffaella Regina Rossi. We called her R3. And she had great energy and talent, but she did not like me one bit. And the reason was, and that was hard for me because I get along with people,

but I had replaced somebody who she had been really loyal to. And she had construed that it was my doing. It was not my doing, but that's the way she took it. For a while, we tried to pretend we got along all right. And everybody knows what's going on. People are walking on eggshells. We're floundering, get nothing done. For a while, I tried the stuff I thought you were

supposed to do to be a good leader, to be kind. I give her compliments that didn't work. I give her space that didn't work. I give her direction. Nothing worked until I remembered the power of listening. And I asked her to come to my office one day. I was honest with her. I said, Raphael, our team is floundering because I haven't been a good enough leader to figure out a way for you and I to break through and work well together. And I said, and so I've asked you here to do something. I know at first will sound a bit odd, but I've got a reason. I said, if you will allow me for 10 minutes, I will just listen to you. I will not interrupt. I will not defend. I will not argue. I'll not

ask. I will just listen. You have a free pass. You can say whatever you want, however you want to say it. And my promise is I will listen. I said, after 10 minutes, I simply ask that you do the same for me, that you listen to me for 10 minutes. I said, would you try it? And Chris, I'll never forget her answer. I don't think I could talk for 10 minutes. I said, Raphael, we got to get better. Would you try? And she goes, all right, I'll try. An hour later, she stopped talking. And in that hour, I was true to my word. I just listened. I didn't say a word. And in that hour, she totally transformed our culture. She realized she had not been fair to

me. She realized if we put our energies together, we'd be unstoppable. Most of all, she reminded herself of how much she loved what we should be doing, but weren't doing because of our stuff. When we walked out of that room over the next six months, we got more done than we had in the previous three years. Our team just caught fire. We had fun. It was today, more than 30 years later, she's still one of my great friends, even though she still owes me 10 minutes. I never got my 10 minutes. So that's the power of listening. Cause what I, what I was able to say by just listening was what I wasn't communicating by talking. It was that I value you. When anybody asks you what you think automatically, you have a sense that they care about what you think. And that's a

powerful, that's a powerful way to build respect i really love that i'm gonna have to write that example down and use that next time i'm having trouble with something someone on a team or something i really love that i i try and always listen to people right whether i'm a host or one of the things i hate is when i watch other people's shows they talk over each other and you're just like it's not about you it's about the guest dude My aunties knows who the hell I am. They're sick of me. That's why we have guests because they're like, yeah, somebody new is Chris Voss. We know what his crap is all about. And it's a really cool thing. And I just sincerely is that I ask in my events a lot of times, what's the most underused sense? And when people think about it, the answer usually comes out hearing, listening.

And why? It's because most of the time we're in a conversation. What are we actually doing when the other person is talking? We're not listening. We're thinking about what we're going to respond. We're thinking of our retort. And one thing I've noticed about you, and I've been on many podcasts, and it's probably why your podcast is so up there, is that you don't do that. You take it in. And something's going to come, whether it's going to be fun or a reaction

to it, whether it's going to be something that you really want to emphasize. But I've noticed, and I just applaud you for it, is that you take it in first and then let it come. That is a really important trait that we could teach one another and teach our kids. Because just listening, again again is a way of, it forces you to be present. It definitely does. But John, I was on my phone getting, no, I'm just kidding. Your name's not John. I like that thing. So anyway, I was on my phone answering text messages on my Instagram. The, yeah, I, I, and the reason I make that joke too,

is I hope people realize what that is. We do that so many times to each other. Hang on, I got to finish making this text. Hang on, I got to finish all that stuff. And it's really important. Listening is so important. I've been on this new app called Clubhouse. Have you gotten on this app, Brian? I've just been introduced to it. So yeah, I know what it's about. Yeah. Yeah. We should have you on stage and do some stuff and then we'll talk after the show. But it's all about listening because it's mostly an auditorial platform. Auditorial? Is that a word? I got what you meant. It's cool. Yeah. I just do a lot of creative poetic license on the show. That's what we do here. Inventing words is good stuff. I went to public school. You can tell. But I do want to do a

callback too to what you were talking about with blame because I had an important thing on that. With blame, the one thing I've learned the hard way is that usually if you end up blaming somebody there's a little bit of karma that comes back to you so you did that and if you usually point that out like you end up being a hypocrite because later when you do it then that other person sees it and goes yeah you're a hypocrite so i've learned there's kind of almost like a karma in life where what's that old saying, if you point a finger at somebody, you have four fingers pointing back at you. That's the one thing I learned about blame. If I blame someone for something.

Blame always carries with it an I owe you. When a person feels blamed, they just, well, you just, I owe you, baby. It's going to come back. I'll get you later on. And so it's so counterproductive because it's, again, I like to make it simple. It's in the past. You can't undo what you're blaming. What you can do is do better now. And let's do that so that we create a better direction in the future. And so it's a, it's a tough one because we're not, we're not conditioned. A lot of our society is all about blame. Our judicial system is all about

blame. Yeah. Some relationships just become like a whole blame game of it's let me pull out your historical context of everything that you've done wrong in this relationship and we're going to go ahead and read the docket if you will court reporter can you please read what the testimony of the and you're just like oh crap that 1997 thing got me again did not disappear digital form and they are stuck in there and you can't build but seriously i'm gonna write down that 10 minute thing i love that idea and my wife and i have done that over the years when we start getting too busy and we're starting to

grade against each other we're little stuff and we'll sit back and it always resets. It always brings us back to where we can recognize how much we appreciate one another and get hung up on the stuff that doesn't matter. There you go. In your books and seminars and presentations, you talk about how to elevate your energy. Talk about how critical that key is to a richer life. And does that just include coffee or is that? I'm right there with you. One of the things I want people to really, really understand about themselves is that, that their energy is a choice. And the truth is many people don't think of that. They think that their energy is like the weather. It's like, I hope I have enough energy today. I hope I have enough energy to make it through this crazy week. But your energy is a

choice. And when you understand that, you can start to ask yourself, how can I elevate that energy? And here's why it's so crucial, Chris. To everyone you touch, to your children, to your customers, to your teammates, to anyone that you care about. Your energy is your example. People won't remember that much of what you say, no matter how well you say it, but they will never forget your energy. And so when I like to help people think about going on what I call an ETP, an energy transformation program. And the easiest way I've ever found to help people with their energy is to just look at your energy on a 10-point scale. So on a 10-point energy scale, one is comatose.

Ten is a child on Christmas morning. Ten is the way you feel when you just nailed it. You did the best job of your life. It's something you really have a passion for. In my seminars, I've had three-quarters of a million people break boards karate style. Ten is the way they feel when they break that board. And so once you've got that context, I ask what I call the trillion dollar question. This is a life changing, family changing, health changing, career changing, you changing question. When you think about that 10 point energy scale from one to 10,

where have you been living your life? And whoa, that's a great question. You're living at level seven. And once you've got that answer, unless you're 99.9, then as a humble breakthrough leader, your next question is, what can I do about it? How can I elevate that number? Because Chris, what that number is, is just your e-habit. It's just the way you've set up your life to arrive at that particular energy level. If you can arrive there, you can change it and replace it. And so the two keys to elevating your energy, which makes it a choice. Number one

is so simple, we miss it. And here's what it is. Your energy is created by the way that you move, period. Anytime you've been at your best, you've moved your body differently than when you've not been at your best, your body line, your facial expression, your eye position, and your breathing. Now I've said it to some people before and they go, Ryan, if I had more energy, I'd move more. Ah, move more and you'll have more energy. So if you want to move your life, if you want to move your career, a starting place is to move yourself. I bet everybody on your, listening to your show knows somebody who blows them away because at a really advanced age, that person has this incredible energy. And though I bet I don't, obviously I don't know who they're thinking about. I bet I know two things about them. One

is that they keep moving. Number two, that they're one of their heroes because of, because of that energy. So first way to elevate your energy by choice is to add a little bit of movement to your life. Never sit at your computer for super long time without changing your position. Open your eyes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So change the way you move. The second is even more profound and more consistent and the real source of all energy. And it's called purpose. When you are full of purpose, you are full of energy. And it's when we lose sight of our purpose, that energy kind of deflates. I joke about it, but here's the truth. When I'm on stage, Chris, I'm 25 years old. The second I step off, I'm back

to 66. But when I'm on stage, I am 25 because I am full of purpose. I'm doing what I feel I was put on earth to do. So when you come from a place of purpose, energy is no problem. And how do you do that? Inch by inch, anything's a cinch. So here's a simple way to work on purpose. Every morning when you wake up, ask yourself, what am I truly grateful about? What you're grateful about will focus your priorities. Your priorities are the pathway to purpose. I love that what you just said, it just went right by me. The inch by inch.

Anything's a cinch. Anything's a cinch. I love that. I'm always one of those people where anytime I have some giant thing, I'm just like, eat it like an elephant. One, just one bite at a time, just start. But I like that a little bit better because I don't have to think about an elephant or eating one, which is not, it's actually brilliant because what overwhelm is having is the sense of that elephant is all around you. That's you got so much that you want to do that. You don't do anything. And the only way out of overwhelm is incredibly simple. Do one thing, just take one step. And suddenly you moved out of overwhelm into momentum. And that now that you've taken that step, you can get to the next, the next, the next.

And another, another great thing for energy is high caffeine coffee brought to you this episode by death wish cup. No, I'm just kidding. Is that a bucket or a cup? I can't. It's a bucket. This is, this is the first one. There's going to be two. No, I'm just kidding. But you said something at the beginning of what you're talking about, where you talked about how people have a thing where they go, boy, I hope I have enough energy. Is that kind of a cop out? That sounds like a cop out to me where people are like, well, I don't really want to be present like you've talked about. I think it can be. I think it's conditioned. I think it's a way that we've been conditioned to think that our energy is like the weather. I hope the weather is good for the family picnic. And so it makes it,

it is a bit of a cop-out in the same way that when you ask somebody and they say, and you ask them an important question and say, I don't know, that is not the truth. What that is, is a, is a conditioned cop-out. And so if you, everybody asks you, you ask somebody and they come back with, I don't know, just say this, I know you don't know, but if you did know, what would you say? And they will pop out the answer right away because we've broken through that conditioned response. In my book, here's a great one, Chris. In the book, The ROI of Kindness, it opens and I asked this question and I've asked it in 1800 events over the years. Silly question. I said,

what color is a yield sign? And every audience that I've ever spoken to says yellow yield signs are red and white. I did it too. Yep. And why is that? Because we have a conditioned response to think of road signs as yellow with black writing. So we stop, we start using our memory to see. So that's one of the other keys to opening our eyes to what's possible is to stop using your memory to see, especially about people. Because when you change the way you look at people, the people you look at change. When you change the way you look at yourself, yourself, you'll see change. That's why I have people break boards in an event to see, wow, I didn't know I could do that. What else see, wow, I didn't know I could do that.

What else could I do that I didn't know I could do? Maybe I could break through with my teenager. Maybe I could get in better shape. Maybe I could write that book. Maybe I could run that 10K. As soon as you shift that from maybe I can't to maybe I can, you got momentum. There you go. I'm going to use what you just said about

the yellow the red thing next time exhibit a next time I'm in court for running a stop sign I'm going to be like well Brian told me that the yellow thing I thought it was yellow I thought it was yellow I thought it was yield anyway so thought it was yield. Anyway, so you've got this website, inspire kindness, kindness.com and join the movement kindness challenges, free printables. You want to talk a little bit about the site and what you guys are doing with it in? Yeah, that's where you can, there's two places you can buy, buy the book, inspire the book of ROI of kindness. You can get it at my website, brianbayer.com or inspirekindness.com. And this was set up by my coauthor of the book named Mack Anderson. He started a company called Inspire Kindness. He's a very successful entrepreneur who had retired and just wanted

purpose. And his purpose was he felt like we need to make this world kinder. Every book sold, a little bit of that money goes to Kindness for Kids, which is a nonprofit to stop bullying, to transform our young people into people who are more about understanding than bullying. And so it's a really all about, he does this because he's set up for life, but he started this because he really wants to inject a level of kindness into this world. And I'm honored and delighted that he asked me to write the book. And we together are trying to make a little dent in the culture of this country and the world. That's awesome. So you got some different things on here.

You can submit your story, basically build a community. You can join a great newsletter you guys have. You've got an affiliate program and corporate gifting program on here you can shop for different things including the book as well and uh the kindness rose is the coolest deal chris you got to get one of these for your for your special someone because this rose lasts one year it's a real rose it's a real rose it's's really fragrant. And they last, the one I got for my wife actually was 14 months. You just put it like in a little, little bowl or basin. And it's, it's just awesome. It's especially bred from Peru and it's, it's the kindness rose. And again, every single product contributes to kindness for kids. Wow. One year that lasts longer than

most of our relationships. Yeah, but now you know that yield signs are red and white. So, man, you're like, you're ready to rock. Yeah, I've got my red and yellows down now. Thanks. That's why I had you on the show, actually. I know. I'm glad to be a service. No, kindness rose.

Holy crap. I didn't know you could make one that last year. That was one of those things I used to be disappointed when I used to give roses to my girlfriends and stuff. It was how soon it would die. I'd be like, I spent spent like 50 bucks for that darn thing and now it's dead after two days and and then i remember years ago i used to have this girlfriend she loved to she's one of the people who used to dry out the flowers and then make like right right and she's i'm gonna kill these and make them and i'm just like this is really weird man but you've got the inspire kindness wristbands the r.i.f kindness book that you can order the inspire kindness hoodie and uh

lots of different materials and stuff camp inspire kindness curriculum virtual fundraising uh world kindness day resources i like this we need more kindness in the in the world and we need to share more and everything else. So I like what you guys are putting forth here on the site. Thanks very much. One of the foundations of what I've taught for 30 years, actually more through coaching, is what you focus on is what you create. So just by shining that light on kindness and from a variety of directions gets us to have it become something that we move towards. We've got a choice. What you focus on is what you create. Let's focus on some good things

we want to create. There you go. I love that. Kindness is good because I get tired of people that mistake kindness for weakness. We all need to stop doing that stuff. Don't be nice to the nice people. And I think a good wrap up here is this final question that I have for you. You're a big believer in reaching out to others and letting them know how you feel. How can a simple thank you make a difference? And why is that important? I like to call it to see yourself as what I call a world-class buddy thinker. And there's been studies about that there are frequencies to emotions.

And the highest frequency emotion of all, so the most powerful emotion that we have is gratitude. So that when we're truly feeling grateful, there's no room for negative emotion. They are overpowered. And here's a big question, Chris. Who are the people in our lives who we tend to forget to thank the most? I've asked that question a thousand times in events, and the answer is always the same. It's people we're closest to. It's the people that we take for granted. And the question is, does that work? I told you in 99, I love you. What do you want? Mush? What's the deal? And there's only a

few guys out there going, man, I hope it works. No. I think the most important words I've ever written, Chris, say that the love we fail to share is the only pain we live with. And if you don't get this right now, if you don't simply say to people, you know, how much they mean to you, how much you appreciate them, you may never get that chance again. Then the love you fail to share is the only pain you leave with.

So to be a world-class buddy thinker, just remember ESPN. E, thank people with effort and energy. Sometimes we thank people just out of rote memory. It's like, hey, thanks. That doesn't mean anything. But when you say, Chris, thank you just out of rote memory. It doesn't mean anything. But when you say, Chris, thank you for having me on this show. This is the best show that I've been on. And I mean that. It means something. Just raising my effort and energy. More important,

thank people for their effort and energy and not just their results. You're conditioned to only give praise when the job's done. But when we thank people for what their effort, their energy, their attitude along the way, then we're focusing on thanking them for what they control. S, occasionally use the power of surprise. Surprise is the super glue of impact when it comes to appreciation. So a handwritten card, nobody gives them anymore. You get one of those, It's like you're a thousand times more interested in reading that than all those emails that add up. So use the power of

surprise. Stop a meeting and just acknowledge somebody who had no idea that they were doing something special. They were just doing what they thought was right. And it just stays with them. P is what we talked about. Most important of all to be world-class buddy thinker, be present. And most of all, do it now. I believe that the greatest gift we're ever given is today. And on that today, it comes in the form of a road. And many times in each day, we come to the same why on the road. One side says as soon as, the other says now. Now, as soon as looks nice. It's well lit, no ruts, been repaved, piece of cake. Now it's curvy, it's got ruts in it. But if you stay on the road called as soon as, it's a direct road to never. Its only destination is perpetual procrastination.

Choose the now. If there's people that you haven't thanked, appreciated, acknowledged, do it now. You may never get the chance again. If there's people you haven't been present with, do it now. You may never get the chance again. If there's people you haven't been present with, do it now. If you've been living at level five on a 10 point energy scale, you know now to change it now. And that now is what gives life momentum and direction and fun as soon as it's just perpetual, perpetual unfulfillment. There you go. And a great gift to give them is the kindest rose. I love that.

You talked about a callback to, you talked about how with your daughters, you're spending so much time working and trying to do your life, but you're part of what you're trying to do. And sometimes that's that excuse we give ourselves in our head is, well, I'm trying to provide them a better life. And I'm sure they see what I'm doing. I used to do that with my businesses and my life and my personal relationships. Would I be like, clearly they see why I'm working so hard is so they can

have the nice house, the nice cars and all the nice life. I go to the oyster bar, you know, every other night and all that crap. Clearly they see why I'm working so hard. And so I wouldn't communicate it. I would think that my efforts showed that, but no, people are different. They need, they need to sit down and tell them stuff. I remember one of my bosses early on in my life, he got angry because one of his employees said, you never thank us for doing the job or act like you're thankful. And he goes, I give you a check on every other Friday. That is the thank you. And he really didn't get that those moments of what people need are very much different in some of the stuff that we talked about today, being present and all that good stuff. The biggest reason people leave organizations isn't about money, isn't about that check.

It's because they don't feel appreciated. They don't feel that they're getting opportunity to shine, to do their best. And that's why a simple thank you, it means a ton. Again, I think back to John Wooden. He said the two most important words in the English language are thank you. And there's a great quote that says, if the only prayer you ever uttered was thank you, that would be enough. That's an interesting thing to keep around.

I should keep that. And the other time where people don't feel appreciated is, it's always interesting to me the day after valentine's day that's when ashleymedicine.com match.com get a flood of new people clearly some people didn't feel appreciated on christmas a blow this blew me away i better blow you away is in 20 before covid there there's studies done every year on loneliness. 62% of Americans consider themselves lonely. And so when you are more appreciative, when you just say something to somebody,

we need to bring that. That's gone up from 49% four years ago, five years ago now to 62%. So when you look around you, odds are at least one of those people is feeling like they they don't they don't matter that they're not that important that they're lonely and we we can change that yeah and part of it is this is this phone thing where people are we feel lonely because we're tuned into our phones but we're not tuned into each other we're rocking around and and and people feel lonely because you're you're going like this and the person's looking at you going, wow, okay, you're not here.

You may not be saying it like my daughters did, but do you love your phone more than you love us? Yeah, yeah. Whoa. Yeah. And if you're like me, love your BMW more than you love other people. My girlfriends just always say that to me. They go, do you love me more than your BMW?

And I'm like, don't make me make choices, honey. But there you go. Anyway, it's been wonderful to have the show, Brian. Anything you want to say as we go out? I just would, first of all, thank you. Thank you for having me. I had so much fun. I love the fact that you balance laughter with meaning.

And it's been an honor and a privilege. And I just encourage everybody to have choices in your life. And so many people don't think they do. You can choose to do what you love. You can choose to elevate your energy. You can choose to be present. And if you do, you're going to start moving your life in a direction that you want it to go. And thank you for being on the show as well, Brian, you've given me so many epiphanies and learned so many things. And hopefully my audience has done that and they'll go out in the world and share more stuff and be and share, spread the kindness. And of course, pick up your book, give us your plugs one more time.

So people can just go to inspire kindness.com, the ROI of kindness or to my website for either my book through my speaking Brian by row.com. Thank you, Chris. Thank you for spending time with us today. A blast, man. I enjoyed it and watch out for those yield signs. They really are red and white. I'm serious. You might get called as an expert witness to me running stop signs every now and then. But we try and stay away from the BMWs these days. That was just speeding ticket heaven. Thanks to Brian for being with us today and sharing his beautiful knowledge. Go pick up his

book, The ROI of Kindness. You can can check it out he's got a bunch of other books you can take an order from go to his website check it out as well thanks to honest for tuning in to see the video version of this it's the newest technology they have out there it's called youtube.com you want to go there you want to hit the bell notification youtube.com fortress chris voss it's free for an unlimited time you want to to grab it? Well, we have this special running. You can just click the bell notification button. You can get all the wonderful videos, and you can watch this one as well. And you can go to Facebook.com, LinkedIn.com, Instagram.com.

There's so many accounts on all those different platforms. It's not even funny. And Twitter, too, as well, if you want to go there. Also, see his son, Clubhouse. And I'm going to talk to Brian after the show, and maybe we can see if we can get him on a stage after the show at Clubhouse to talk about all the see his son Clubhouse. And I'm going to talk to Brian after the show and maybe we can see if we can get him on a stage after the show at Clubhouse to talk about all the great stuff he's doing.

Thanks for tuning in. Wear your mask. Stay safe. And we'll see you next time. Be kind to each other.