The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Business coach Matthew Sanjari discusses leadership and building a strong culture

Starting point is 00:00:00 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. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. 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. It's Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com. Who invited that lady into the room? Where did she come from? Who's that?

Starting point is 00:00:46 Who's that? That was my line. It used to be my line for 14 years. Welcome to the big show, my family and friends. We certainly appreciate you guys being here. As always, we're bringing you the smartest minds, the most brilliant people, and none of them are me. That's why we have guests on the show. And the beautiful part is they bring you the stories, the things we call the owner's manual to life.

Starting point is 00:01:04 Because no one ever got an owner's manual, at least near as I things we call the owner's manual to life because no one ever got an owner's manual at least near eyes i can check unless everyone's lying to me and they got theirs they just don't want to share it which i'm highly suspectful of but the stories and lessons of life and that's mostly what our guests bring when they bring all their journeys to them today we have matthew sanjari a business coach and strategy consultant with Prime Consulting on the show with us today. We're going to be talking about his website, his things that he does to consult with people, to advise them on business owners and discovering their true potential.

Starting point is 00:01:37 He is a gentleman who, after a life-altering accident, derailed his career in life. He spent much of his time over the next decade overcoming chronic pain, depression, and disability to become a serial entrepreneur and transformative figure in the business world. As the founder of Prime Consulting, he leverages over 15 years of business ownership and public speaking experience to empower entrepreneurs and business leaders through coaching and consulting and focusing on pragmatic strategies for scaling business and achieving personal growth. He's got a track record of helping brands surpass their limits and a successful exit

Starting point is 00:02:14 to his name. His holistic approach blends operational strategy with personal development. He aims to elevate clients from day-to-day operations to executive roles, and he stays true to his motto, build people, build business. Welcome to the show. How are you, sir? After that intro, Chris, I'm doing real well. There you go. Every guest says, can I pay you to walk around? You're just me every time. Give you a megaphone? Yeah. Here you go. Give us, Matthewthew your dot coms wherever you want people

Starting point is 00:02:47 to find you on the interwebs yeah so my website for my business is consulting by prime.com so consulting by prime.com and if anybody wants to connect with me after the show matthew sanjari s-a-n-j-a-r-i on linkedin and instagram you go. So give us a complete overview of what you do there at Prime Consulting. Yeah, I hopped into the business coach and strategic consultancy kind of phase of my life that era over the last year and a half. And basically what I do is I work with business owners, entrepreneurs, and truthfully, anybody that considers themselves a high level leader or high level performer. And my goal is to help them reach their full potential. And that sounds, it sounds vague. There's much more pragmatic ways of working that out. But really, at the end of the day,

Starting point is 00:03:36 a lot of my learned experiences have been, I just don't want to leave anything on the table. And I don't want anybody else to either. There you go. So give us a little bit of your history. How did you grow up? What was some of your influences and got you down the road of owning companies and then now consulting? Yeah, you know what? I grew up in a great family. I was actually a first generation. My father from the Middle East, my mother from the Caribbean, and I grew up with a great family, great support system, the whole bit. And honestly, I felt like the world was my oyster in terms of where I could go. Had a lot of dreams, was too short to achieve any of them, we'll say. But at the end of the day, once I started to get into the really what I wanted to do,

Starting point is 00:04:17 a recurring theme kept coming up. And it's at the end of the day, I just wanted to help people. That's really what I wanted to do. And so ended up actually starting off a few friends and i started a church so actually yeah hopped into the pastoring for a little bit i love the tax deduction tax-free arena there let me tell you i don't know if in canada it was the same deal but oh really it's different up there yeah we had a great time and it was a lot of fun at the same time i was working a pretty sweet job coming out of college, where I basically got to travel around North America doing public speaking, trying to sell really boring scanners. But I had a bar tab, and I told jokes, and I figured that's all I needed.

Starting point is 00:04:59 That's all you need in life is a good bar tab and some jokes. Bar tab and some jokes. It's a secret to happiness, ladies and gentlemen. You're on the Chris Voss show. Trying to make some scanners interesting. It was during that job about 12 years ago that I was driving home one night, about 10 minutes to midnight in the countryside. House was pretty spread apart, and I ended up hitting two horses with my vehicle.

Starting point is 00:05:24 Oh, no. Yeah. And to give people context, I with my vehicle. Oh no. Yeah. And to give people context, I was driving an SUV. So pretty big Honda CRB. I didn't know anything about horses. Don't know if you do, Chris,

Starting point is 00:05:32 but I had a friend who hit a horse, put him in the hospital. They were Clydesdales. So he was in an old steel Ford too. Oh man. He hit one, but you, you,

Starting point is 00:05:43 you went full, you went double. Hit, hit hit them both one of them flipped over the sub smashed under the windshield killed them both and so when when the accident when everything kind of you know the dust settled uh pun intended i was basically three inches from from death is what they told me three inches and and And, you know, I did what every guy, I think, in his 20s does who thinks he's smarter than the world. I basically said, hey, you know what? I survived death. I'm invincible.

Starting point is 00:06:11 Life moves on. Let's just keep doing it. And days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months. And next thing you know, you start to realize that everything was not okay. You know, some disabilities, depression, chronic pain, things started to get pretty bad. I tried to hide the symptoms. But at the end of the day, there was no hiding it. I found myself lying on bathroom floors at work for hours at a time.

Starting point is 00:06:35 And yeah. And so that kind of set me off on this journey where I ended up having to leave my job. I actually had to, you know, stop being involved with the church for a little bit. And honestly, life just hit a pause. It felt like here I was in my mid-20s, and all this potential, everything that I had going for me was just done. And I spent the next year really, really angry, bitter, upset, growing a beard, which I feel like all those things are kind of synonymous. Wow. Wow.

Starting point is 00:07:04 We're going to get letters from the beard. Yeah. And so that was really the catalyst that kind of got me on this entrepreneurial journey. And really, I think kind of took my desire to work with people to the next level. Ah, there you go. How did you get, how did you get through it? How did you cross over and, and, and did you start living a healthier life? Maybe working out? How did you get through a journey? Yeah. So before it got great, it got

Starting point is 00:07:29 worse. And you know, for the next year, like I said, things were rough. And you know, one day a friend called me up, he was, he was just working at a local pool shop and he said, and I think he was just trying to throw me a bone, but he said, Hey, you know what? We've got, we're having some computer issues. I know you know some stuff about computers. Can you come in and look it up? And I said, Hey, sure. You know, anything to, to get some cash in my pocket, you know, to, to get out of the house and do something. And so did that. And to, you know, make a long story short, ended up chatting with the business owner. And by the end of that, I had my first marketing client which i didn't go to school for marketing i'd never worked in marketing but we had a great conversation i said you know

Starting point is 00:08:11 what i can i think i can figure that out and i think just him him interacting with me him working with me he said hey you know what it can't get worse than it is so why not give it a shot serendipity oh for sure like it has the most strangest of moments that sometimes can be so life-altering yeah and i mean you know whenever i look back on my story in moments like that i'm like you you couldn't have couldn't have written that better like there's no no one's planning that yeah and so i used that money and i basically started to teach myself and next thing you know i had a business. It was a good thing you didn't buy hookers then.

Starting point is 00:08:51 Didn't blow the money. I was too desperate for that. That's what you do with the rest of the money, Aaron. Anyway, I don't know what that means. Don't do that, people. It's just jokes here. But no, serendipity has these, there's moments. I remember one about my book, several of the moments that changed my life. And sometimes they're kind of haunting when I think back on them. Because if someone hadn't been gracious enough to share that serendipity with me and create those moments, you know, if people were smarter than me, better than me, who said, hey, instead of kicking you down the road, we're going to give you a hand up. I'm semi-horrified to figure out what my life would have turned out to be. Those moments, like that call that you got from your friend and you go down there and

Starting point is 00:09:34 meet that serendipitous, what if you turn that down or what if you'd missed the call? You just look at it and you just go, wow, what would happen then? So now you've got your own consulting business you you you're helping people with business and strategy and everything else is that right yeah and so you know as i built that business out chris you know the first three years honestly were complete failure i didn't know what i was doing i again continuing on with the theme of dumb young and, and brash. We've been doing the Chris Voss show for almost 60 years.

Starting point is 00:10:08 We still don't have a fucking clue what we're doing here. So it works. And so, you know, I basically had to force myself, right? Here's the thing. You know, to this day, I'm still battling a lot of those injuries. I still have the chronic pain, still have the headaches. And so it felt like I always had this theory that, you know, if I could just get in the room, I'd be good. You know, if I could get in the room with someone, I could land the client.

Starting point is 00:10:31 I could get the work done. I could deliver the results. But in the beginning, even though I was getting in rooms as quick as I was landing clients, I was losing them. And so I basically had to teach myself and I'm not wired this way. You know, like what are systems? What are structures? You know, like what does it look like to have a follow up, to have a system? Because at the

Starting point is 00:10:48 end of the day, you know, I could be knocked out unconscious, you know, just kind of, or just not there. Sorry. That's Fridays around here. Is that what you're blowing the budget on? Friday nights, yeah. It's hookers and blow, yeah. No, we're not doing that, folks.

Starting point is 00:11:07 It's a callback joke we always use on the show. That's Fridays around here. I feel like you need a bigger disclaimer at the bottom. Don't do drugs, kids. It's bad for you. But no, we are based in Vegas, so that's half the problem right there. So you figure out a way to work through it then. You just problem solved and figure out a way to make things work i had to and honestly i reached

Starting point is 00:11:30 this point i remember it was like 2016 i you know my health had spiraled as well so at that point i was probably like i think i was like 315 pounds yeah i i you're a skinny guy too by the way if you're listening to this on audio which which 99% of the people will. He's really fucking skinny. I'm probably closer to what you used to look like. And I just ballooned, right? There was just so many, like, it was easier, unhealthy. I was depressed the whole bit.

Starting point is 00:11:56 I remember looking at myself. I was walking up the stairs a couple times out of breath, and I just looked. I was like, look, something's got to change. And I remember, again, it's so basic. It's almost trivial, but I was like, you know what? We're just going to, I can't control a lot of things, but maybe I can control this, right? I can't control what happened to me. Can't control the headaches. Nothing's working, but can I control my weight? And, you know, I just started day by day. I, you know, there's this business adage, you know, you can't manage what you don't measure.

Starting point is 00:12:28 And so I said, okay, we're going to measure, we're going to measure the crap out of this. We're going to measure morning, day and night. We're going to measure what we eat, what we do steps. And next thing you know, you know, I'd lost a half a person or a whole other person. And it dawned on me. I was like, wait, if this worked in my health, why can't I do this everywhere? Why can't I apply that principle to my business? What am I, what does success look like? What am I actually measuring? Next thing you know, I started to apply it in my life. I started to, you know, get other people on that bandwagon and it just kind of snowballed. And so those systems and all those things that I had to build in order to be, to achieve some level of success, they just kind of stuck from there.

Starting point is 00:13:05 Wow. I mean, sometimes we kind of have to find rock bottom. We have to find ourselves in the darkest of moments. They kind of push us to the wall and make us face what's been going on with us. It sounds like you were kind of at that point where you've just been kind of trying to ride through the pain and the issues you're having health-wise and that doesn't really ever give you good stability for for anything else it doesn't if you're in pain if you don't have balance in your life as you were it's hard to balance your business life you know if you can't balance your personal life yeah 100 and i think i

Starting point is 00:13:42 just had to come to this place where i was like you're right it was rock bottom but i think it was also this acceptance for me where i was like if if you know if i don't take ownership if i don't choose to change something here we're just going to be like i could just piss my whole life away that's that's really what it is and so if i don't decide to try something even if the first you know four or five attempts are failures, if I don't try something, we are going to be not in good shape. So what did you try? So, you know, once I started to build a lot of those systems and those structures, I just started to, you know, especially on the health side, I was like, okay, I'm going to try to track everything

Starting point is 00:14:19 I eat. I'm going to track all my steps. I started to ask myself this question that honestly, I ask all my clients now. And I asked myself on a regular basis, I said, you know, not just what's the goal, but what does success look like here? Success doesn't look like $10 million, right? I mean, it might, but that's probably not a good measure of success. And it also doesn't look like, you know, being 150 pounds, like success for me in that moment was, man, I want to live past 40. You know, I want to go back to playing sports. I want to feel good. I want to do the things that, you know, that I want to do. I want to have a business that I'm not worried about every single minute if, you know, I'm not going to be able to take care of it. And so I basically applied that to the business.

Starting point is 00:15:05 I built out a team, you know, and I basically started to build my life in ways that sound strange, but my life didn't depend on me. So one of the things I always ask clients and I love asking, you know, people when I work on work with them in coaching sessions, I say, look, if something were to happen to you god forbid in the next 30 days you know and you got knocked out you couldn't come back when you came back at the end of the 30 days to your business what would you have left and everybody everybody gives me the same reaction everybody kind of laughs nervously then it kind of looks like a ghost comes over them and they have this realization where they say i probably wouldn't't have much left. And I go, then you don't have a business. You have a job. Because when you stop doing your job, you don't get paid.

Starting point is 00:15:50 That's true. But we can build you a business. And so that's kind of where we start from. That's why we have like almost 2,000 episodes in the Chris Voss show. So if I disappear for 30 days, they got a lot of shit they got to catch up to. They'll just overdub with current you now on the old stuff and it'll be fine i already yell at them enough that they need to go back and listen to old shows to make sure they get them you know they'll be they'll be that but no that's an

Starting point is 00:16:16 important aspect that people have to realize with businesses if you are the business it's really hard to sell it it's really hard if you want to leave or vacation or, you know, you're the business. And so if you go down, you know, the income likely is going to dry up. Totally, right? And I think for me, I just like, I'm the kind of guy obsessed over stuff. So I was like, man, if this works in business, it's got to be true everywhere else. Because I mean, you know, if someone knocked me out and i had a headache you know bills don't get paid yeah your credit go to shit you know all this stuff and so i'm like man how do

Starting point is 00:16:52 i build these insulation layers in my life even though i'm not wired i wasn't wired that way how do i how do i build these things that i can still have a good life a successful life in spite of me yeah that's i'm trying to figure out how to have a successful life in spite of me. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out how to have a successful life in spite of me because I'm such a loser. See what I did there? That's what Friday's are for, though. Yeah, I'm talking with my therapist about that.

Starting point is 00:17:18 We're working on it. I have the worst jokes today. So what do you find most of your business clients are struggling with? What do you find? What's a popular thing out there that you find that most people are really having a hard time with as business leaders? Yeah, honestly, it's a lot of the same stuff. You know, it takes, it takes different forms for people, but it's a lot of the same stuff. It's the people, people are like, man, I'm drowning in my business. It doesn't matter if they have three employees or 50.

Starting point is 00:17:45 They're still doing so much stuff. I'm just kidding. They're still drowning in the day-to-day. I've got people who come to me who say, Matt, I'm stuck, and I don't know where to go next. It's a lot of analysis paralysis. I'm laughing because I know exactly. I've lived this. I live it every

Starting point is 00:18:05 day actually and and and i i think honestly for a lot of people one of the most common ones i also get is they just need someone to hold them accountable to give them a hand i'm i tell people i'm the worst salesman because i tell people, I tell my clients to say, you know, everything I'm going to work with you on, you can probably find on Google. You could probably listen to a podcast. You could probably read a book. There are much smarter people than me that are putting out crap that you can go glean from. But the reason why you want to work with me is because you need that outside perspective and you need accountability you need somebody who's going to be with you in the trenches and say hey you didn't meet this deadline how are we going to get there yeah don't make me hurt you the have an accountability

Starting point is 00:18:54 partner really helps i mean it really makes a difference because someone like you say is there to call you up and bug you and harass you and maybe invoke some violence or threats of violence to get you to do what you're supposed to do and we we all kind of need that i mean you look at nba coaches football players nba players you know when i was a kid i can't remember his name i think it was jerry something i'm old and the dementia is kicking in but it was the utah jazz and i think it was coach jerry something i think anyway i was like 10 or 12 years old and we delivered newspapers those little savers newspapers and we we went to a big meeting rah-rah to meet the head coach of the utah jazz and he said you know you would think that you know carl malone was the big player back then he made all this money and stuff and he he said you know you would think that you know carl malone was the big player back then

Starting point is 00:19:45 he made all this money and stuff and he said you know you think that with all these multi-million dollar players like carl malone and and all the guys there he's like think that that since they got paid so well more than me as a coach they would be motivated i wouldn't have to motivate him he goes the funny thing is is you actually have to motivate them. He goes, the funny thing is, is you actually have to motivate them. You have to have somebody to cheer them on and correct them and teach them and guide them. You know, it just all doesn't take care of itself when you pay them a bunch of money. And he goes, that's, what's really interesting about coaching is you think that, you know, all that money would take care of it, but it doesn't, you need a coach. Yeah. I love that. And you're right. At the end of

Starting point is 00:20:26 the day, athletes, you know, some of the best people in the world, politicians, CEOs, these people have coaches. So if the best of the best have coaches, then, you know, what are we waiting for? Exactly. Exactly. I need somebody who's there for you. I don't know if you're a golf guy or not. You, you a golf guy? I used to be, and and i mostly it was mostly lots of swearing drinking and throwing golf clubs into water a lot of broken clubs yeah and then i quit that because it wasn't healthy oh man i heard this phil mickelson thing the other day yeah people ask like phil why do you have a coach and he said you know what the goal of having a coach is that if i can just improve a quarter of a stroke every round then that's a win and i started to do the math i'm like buddy you've you know you're you're shooting

Starting point is 00:21:10 maybe you know 70 i'm like 280 strokes in in a in a four four-day tournament i'm like quarter of a stroke that's one stroke and then you know i started these together i'm like oh but one stroke in four days that's the that's the difference in winning and losing yeah yeah it could be the difference of being on the board or not. And I was like, oh, that's a real good way to look at it. It's those margins. Yeah. It's the little teeny margins that seem small, but they're so huge. Totally. Yeah. That's really interesting. Yeah. For me, I would need a golfing coach so that they could go retrieve the golf clubs from the water. That's what I'd have them for. I think you probably need a few caddies.

Starting point is 00:21:50 That's what I'm thinking. Something like that. The whole thing. There are things I've tried in life that I really enjoy the adventure of trying. I think my pocketbook enjoyed the adventure of spending all my money. Most people get married for fun and then go lose it all i just go on adventures and buy different hobbies that's my marriage you know i try golf and there's a few other things i've tried like photography and different things that i finally after concluding

Starting point is 00:22:17 you know 20 or 30 thousand dollars of whatever it was that i had no talent or skill in that era and it just i'm just like you know what i'm just gonna leave this to the tiger woods of the of whatever it was that I had no talent or skill in that area. I'm just like, you know what? I'm just going to leave this to the Tiger Woods of the world. These guys got this. They don't need my help. I'm glad you came to that realization. Yeah, I did it for them. It wasn't for me.

Starting point is 00:22:38 When you're frustrated, when you're angry, and you're not having fun, it's like, you know what? I need to go find something I have fun doing. Totally. And it's not a hobby. Some people have that in marriage, too. I'm not having fun. You help guide people on their business, help develop it.

Starting point is 00:22:56 Let's talk a little bit about leadership because that's something you delve into. Building strong leadership and culture. That's, of course, one of my favorite topics as well. With leaders, tell us how you coach leaders and develop culture. Yeah. You know, one of the things you've said in that bio that I stick by is that for me, you know, when we build people, that's how we build business. So that's how we build organizations. And so to me, I think that having leadership at the forefront, I don't care if you're a solopreneur, I don't care if you've got a big business, it's always got to be at the forefront.

Starting point is 00:23:29 And it's not just from a, you know, I want people to do more work, or, you know, I want people with fancy titles. I really think that one of the biggest things we can do is to create healthier cultures in our lives and in our businesses. One of the biggest realizations I've had to come to, you know, bringing people on, hiring people. I think a great barometer that I try and educate people on and get people on board is, you know, whoever is newest in your company, you know, how do they speak about your company, right? If someone were to ask them to describe your company and your leadership, how would they describe it? And if, because that's probably going to be a really honest picture of your leadership. And so, you know, one of the biggest things, you know, I gave the example of,

Starting point is 00:24:13 you know, if you missed for 30 days, you know, what would happen to your business, what would happen to your life? I think that's a great testament to leadership, right? It's perfectly normal for things to drop off when you go away a little bit, you know, your margin of error, people are humans. But this idea that, you know, if we can empower people and resource them and teach them to actually take on more opportunity, more responsibility, I think that that leadership culture is just so important. And raising up, you know, the next generation, if you will, or honestly, just upskilling and empowering people to take on new opportunities. That's definitely something I try and focus on with people in, you know, workshops, clients, things like that. What do you think most

Starting point is 00:24:56 business people get wrong in leadership or in being a leader, I suppose, or just even thinking about the fact that they're a leader, I guess. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a great question. And you know what, maybe this is a controversial take, but to me, leadership has always been about, you know, how do I, whatever my ceiling is, if I'm going to take somebody on and pour into them, I want my ceiling to be their floor. I want people, I want to leave people better than when they first came into my company, into my ecosystem. And I think that's often what we get wrong. We, you know, oftentimes, and I'm guilty of this too, you know, leadership can look

Starting point is 00:25:38 like, hey, you know what, I gave people a title or I gave them a bunch of, you know, things to do. And what you did was you delegated tasks, right? Maybe you delegated a few responsibilities, but you didn't empower them with leadership, right? I gave them a pizza party. Doesn't that count? Hey, they organized a killer staff party. So they must be a leader. That's like a LinkedIn joke. They're always like, hey, we didn't get pay raises, but we did get a pizza party. But yeah, I honestly believe that that's one of the biggest things we get wrong in leadership is that leadership is actually service-based. I recently, just quickly, I was doing an onsite with a client a couple weeks ago.

Starting point is 00:26:20 And on the last day, I had them invite the management teams and had them kind of bring in the up and comers in the business, you know, anybody that they thought had potential, because I wanted people to see behind the curtain and kind of get exposed to that. And I had the owners ask the up and comers, hey, how can I serve you better? How can I resource you better? Is there anything I can do to help you do your job better? And people were stunned. Nobody knew what to say. Let it sit for a little bit. And I said, Hey, how does that make you guys feel that the owner was asking you how they can serve you? And they said, man, I like that. It makes me one guy was really funny. He was like,

Starting point is 00:27:02 it makes me want to run through a wall. He's like, like i'm like i'm ready to go to bat for these people but and i was like then it's a bit of an overreaction man it's fine yeah you'll be good i mean unless you're that jello or the kool-aid guy that works that works for you yeah i don't know i don't know if he still does that they may the world crowd may have got angry that he was hurting walls. Oh, gosh. Now you're aging all of us. But it was just such a fun experiment because now everybody in the company started to witness, oh, man, the owner's actually invested in serving and seeing me reach my potential.

Starting point is 00:27:42 There you go. They're invested in my success. And so I think that that's really the paradigm that hopefully leadership should be, and if not, is moving to. Yeah, servant leadership is a real big thing now. It's the new thing, kids. I think it's been around for a while, so I don't think you can call it a new thing,

Starting point is 00:28:00 but it seems more and more people are becoming aware of it. You know, it's very different than the authoritarian style of leadership the the barking orders the cheering around servant leadership is more where you you learn to lead by serving your people and helping them achieve their best selves inspire their best nature inspire their dreams and visions so that they feel fulfilled in what they're doing and thereby, you know, I make a bunch of money. And they do too. Servant leadership. Yeah. That's something that's just, it's really catching on. And we talk about it more and more

Starting point is 00:28:37 on the show. And it's just a real important way because if your people shine, it shows in the company, it shows how they show up it shows how they deal with customers you know in fact i'll tell you a story if you want to hear a story yeah this is a perfect example of it too i'm gonna have to remember this one so i was out to i was out to dinner at a little mexican place here but it wasn't like a mexican place like normally you see mexican places it it was like a really nice restaurant and a really nice building with beautiful windows and stuff it didn't look like a mexican place basically looked like a high-end fine dining joint but it was had beautiful

Starting point is 00:29:14 wonderful mexican food and it's fine dining like we're we're we're spending some serious money here folks and it's a beautiful place is what i'm trying to give you the embellishment of. And the whole time I'm there, just like every waiter is disaffected. I don't know if that's the right word, but basically every waiter is just won't look at us, won't talk directly to me. They're, they're kind of giving us this vibe like, Hey, you're halfway bothering us here. Do we really have to take your order? They weren't like overly rude, but they just acted like they were just trying to get through their day.

Starting point is 00:29:53 And then there were people walking around that wouldn't pay attention to you. You were like, hey, can I get another Coke or something? Right away, I identified that something is wrong at this place because everybody is like this they're just marching around like zombies and at one point i was just trying to get a sprite refill and everyone kept walking by me and i you know usually i'm pretty good about rounding something hey can you go get me you know And then I see my waiter coming with a Sprite refill and my dinner. And this gal comes up, and you can tell she's management. And she's like, has someone refilled your Sprite? Is that a Sprite?

Starting point is 00:30:38 And I'm like, oh, no. And then I see my waiter coming as she grabs the Sprite and goes, we'll fix it. And I'm just like, I didn't know it was a problem. It's a fucking Sprite. Just a simple request. Yeah, just a simple request. But she tells me she's really wound up. I see her walk, and then I see my waiter coming with the Sprite, and she goes up to her.

Starting point is 00:31:02 And I don't know what they said, but you could tell she was barking at her for not making sure my sprite was refilled and the gal's like holding the sprite and she's like waving it like i have his refill right here and you could tell there was some braiding going on from this manager and i went uh-huh i think i see what's going on and the waitstaff it showed up in the waitstaff. All the waitstaff were unhappy, miserable, probably hated their jobs. There's probably some management hell going on in the back where they're being just abused. And it came through. It made it so I don't want to go there again.

Starting point is 00:31:42 The service was awful. And it wasn't the people. You could just tell that, man, these people had been run through the ringer and so it's how you come across as a leader how you come across in culture and how you build a company it it translates to the front line it translates to your customers and your customers feel it and just seeing that interaction i was just really uncomfortable because she hears she is like 10 feet from my table and she's getting berated for the thing she's actually following through on that's crazy you're just like you're just like wow and then the whole time they

Starting point is 00:32:16 were just so you know they just didn't they wouldn't look you in the eye they wouldn't they wouldn't connect with you they were just like you could tell they were just trying to get through their day god bless them okay let me ask you how how was the food food was exceptional that was the crazy thing the food was some of the best mexican food i've ever had in my life so imagine you're you're willing to say that that food was amazing some of the best you've ever had in your life but you'll never go back because of the culture of that place because of the Because of the, it was uncomfortable. No one looked at me. There was, I mean, literally there was no eye contact from anybody except for the manager

Starting point is 00:32:52 when she came by, you know? And she, I mean, she just jumped the table. She's like, has someone refilled that? And I'm like, no. And she's like, what is it? A Sprite? Okay. I'll take care of it.

Starting point is 00:33:02 And, you know, she was just looking for somebody to chew on. You know what I mean? Oh, totally. Yeah, it's one of those managers. And you know what, though? I think that that lesson is like that pretty much explains so much about leadership and culture and, you know, some of the stuff that I encounter. Because I love to use the framework of the, you know, if you walked outside, Chris, on your front step, found a box, and I told you there was an iPhone in it, would you open the box?

Starting point is 00:33:30 Oh, yeah, baby. Now, if you walked outside and that box was covered in crap, I'm talking dog crap, horse crap, all of it, would you open that box? I'm an Android person at heart, so I'd probably just not leave it. I mean, I'm going to find the turn on the outside or the inside at that point. Oh, we just lost the iPhone crowd. The jokes are getting better, though. They are getting better.

Starting point is 00:33:57 Wow. It's a tough crowd, tough room. But yeah, I just think so often people have great products, great services, even great people to offer. But you know what? The culture of your organization matters. And that comes out. And it's not what you say it is. It's actually just the whole, right? The combination of the whole.

Starting point is 00:34:19 I had a client recently, and I won't out them in case they're watching the feed, but they came in, we were in a meeting and then they were like, I was like, Hey, what are, what are some of your values? And they're like, you know what? Our values are leadership and generosity. And I said, okay. And you know, within a week I, we'd done some audits, gone through their calendars, gone through their bank accounts. And then they realized quickly that they spend zero time on leadership and they are not giving to anybody. And those two values were quickly put under scrutiny, much to the shock of management. But you know what?

Starting point is 00:34:51 I think we all need that reality check sometimes. Yeah, we all need that aha moment. You know, the funny thing is so many companies do that. They try and lead culture and they try and do leadership through pr emails like you know hey we're a vibrant exciting company it's fun to work for and our ceo's huge vision is going to touch everyone and move the needle and going you know and then they'll use all the jargon and stuff the business insert 2024 buzzword yeah whatever whatever they are and and then they'll use all the jargon and stuff. Insert 2024 buzzword here. Yeah, whatever they are.

Starting point is 00:35:27 And then they try to see that somehow that PR email that goes out is somehow leadership or culture building by fiat, basically. Yeah. And then the rest of the time, the CEOs run around, I don't know, breaking all the rules and criminal actions and, I don't know, defunding the company or spending money. You know, he's living, he's living life the complete opposite way of what these spouses in his PR thing. And, you know, all the employees are like, hey, you know what? You're full of shit.

Starting point is 00:35:58 Kind of like George Carlin used to put it back in the day and his full of shit. Yeah. And, you know, and people see that and you know and people see that you know people see that on parents kids see that on parents you know when your parents lie to you and sell you a bunch of and then they go do it and you're like wait a second that's the opposite of what you told me yeah mom you said i i can't lie but man you sure told a lot of lies what the hell's going on so the Chris Bosco told me drugs were bad and they were was that right or wrong yeah I know somebody called the attorney and asked him what can I what can I admit to don't do drugs

Starting point is 00:36:36 people it's bad I don't even drink anymore the only drugs they do are coffee and that's good for you at least i don't know i'm not sure in the amounts that i drink but hey it keeps the show rolling what are some things that you're you're seeing in business you can kind of tease out to people or you usually help people with that you find you're really you've really got the game down on you've really got a system that can really help optimize people yeah you know what like everything flows from that first question I asked you where I, you know, where I asked or that I told you about where I asked people,

Starting point is 00:37:09 you know, what would happen to your business? And that, I think the second question that I then asked, cause I, and I alluded to this earlier, it's, you know,

Starting point is 00:37:15 what does success look like for you? Because we can come together, you know, we can make a business strategy, we can make a plan, whatever. But at the end of the day, if that's actually not aligned with what success looks like for

Starting point is 00:37:26 you, we might just be having this conversation six months down the line, except you're three times richer. Your problems didn't go away, right? Sure, you've got more money, but you've got the same problems, maybe worse problems. And so for me, when I lead with those two questions, it's that success question that opens up a world. Because when you tell me, look, a common thing I hear is I want to have more freedom of time. I want to be able to actually go out and enjoy life. I want to spend time with my family

Starting point is 00:37:54 or my friends. Then you know what? Let's set up frameworks. Frameworks like boundaries in your business, having operations managers so that there's a level of responsibility and you're actually functioning like an executive and not like an employee and frameworks. I like that word. I think it's the first time I've really heard it. And, and in the use of the same use of boundaries, cause I love boundaries. I put all my girlfriends on boundaries, but frameworks. So it's the same sort of thing. Yeah. Like to me, everything, everything should have a framework. And, and, you know, again, that, that sounds like a fancy word that I'm sure people are going to, going to take in if they haven't already and, you know, use it

Starting point is 00:38:37 for whatever. But when I, when I say framework, I really just mean, hey, you know, how do we get from point A to point Z in the most holistic, healthy way possible? We're not going to nail it. We're not going to get it 100% of the time. I mean, you gave the example of, you know, CEOs putting out PRs. It's because we don't want to commit to a framework that we take shortcuts. If you had a workout regimen that you know that was, hey, if I go to the gym a few times and I eat well, I'm probably going to have these results. That's a framework. And, you know, we have frameworks for our cars for maintenance.

Starting point is 00:39:12 We have frameworks for our health, going to the doctors. But oftentimes we don't actually have frameworks in our business. And so we kind of become slaves to those organizations. There you go. Frameworks. That's a new word. I just learned something. This is why we do the show, so I can learn something all the time. There you go. Frameworks. That's a new word. I just learned something. This is why we do the show,

Starting point is 00:39:27 so I can learn something all the time. New paradigm shifts. Frameworks. I love it. I'm a big believer in boundaries and relationships, especially people that I want to keep away from me, like some of those folks on Facebook. But frameworks,

Starting point is 00:39:39 I never have thought about setting boundaries in my own company. And I know I talk a lot about setting frame in relationships with a masculine or alpha frame, but I've never really thought about that in my business. So I'm going to give us some deep thoughts that frame works. There you go. Learn something new every day. As we go out, pitch people the final thoughts on how they can onboard with you, how they can reach out to you and handshake with you, see if you're a good fit to work together, they can get to know you better.

Starting point is 00:40:09 Yeah. Look, if you're a business owner, an entrepreneur, or you function as a high-level leader or an executive, I'd love to work with you. Consultingbyprime.com is the website, consultingbyprime.com, or you can look me up on LinkedIn, Matthew Sanjari. And really, what it comes down to is I'm looking for people who actually want to commit to a process. So if you say I'm coachable, you know, if Tiger Woods as a coach, Phil Mickelson as a coach, some of the best people in the world have a coach, then you can have a coach too. And it's really this idea that not only do I want to get better, but I don't want to go on this journey alone. I could read all the books.

Starting point is 00:40:48 You know, I've John Maxwell'd myself out on leadership, but I want to do it in community. I want to do it with people. And I think that's the most holistic way. Then give me a shout and then I'll help guide you down that road. There you go. Give us the.com as we go out. Consultingbyprime.com.

Starting point is 00:41:03 There you go. Thank you very much, Matthew, for coming to the show. It's been a fun show to have you on and kick the ball around. Yeah, Chris,

Starting point is 00:41:10 thanks for having me, man. It's an honor to be on. Thank you. Thanks to our audience for tuning in. We certainly appreciate it as well. Go to goodreads.com, 4chesschristmas,

Starting point is 00:41:17 linkedin.com, 4chesschristmas, chrisfast1, the TikTokity, and all those crazy places on the internet. Be good to each other. Stay safe.

Starting point is 00:41:24 We'll see you guys next time. And that should...

The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Business coach Matthew Sanjari discusses leadership and building a strong culture

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.