The Entrepreneur DNA - Tackling Toxicity: From Bystander to Upstander | Mauricio Velasquez

Episode Date: July 17, 2026

Get Mauricio's book 'Tackling Toxicity' on Amazon here: https://a.co/d/08uHkZag In this episode I sit down with Mauricio Velasquez, a worldwide conflict resolution and emotional intelligence consultant who has trained in over seventy five countries, from Guantanamo Bay to the White House to professional sports organizations like the MLS. We get into why most people are conflict averse and what happens when you ignore toxic behavior instead of addressing it. Mauricio breaks down the difference between reacting and responding, how to spot your own triggers before they take over, and the exact language he teaches leaders to use when someone is coming in hot. We talk through real stories from his thirty year career, from coaching a CEO who nearly destroyed his company's culture in fifteen seconds to a moment in the stands at his daughter's basketball game where he chose to stand up instead of stay silent. This conversation is about moving from bystander to upstander, in your business, your family, and your life. Main Topics Covered Why most people avoid conflict instead of resolving it The difference between reacting and responding How to identify your own emotional triggers What to say when someone is coming in hot Moving from bystander to upstander Holding leaders and toxic employees accountable Building psychological safety for honest feedback Standing up for others in the moment About Mauricio: Mauricio Velasquez is the founder and president of Diversity Training Group and the author of Tackling Toxicity: A Skill-Based Guide to Addressing Toxicity. Over his thirty year career, he has worked as a management consultant, workplace investigator, executive coach, trainer, and expert witness specializing in bias, prejudice, and hate, training more than one million employees, managers, and executives. He has worked in nearly every U.S. state and traveled to more than seventy five countries, coaching organizations ranging from the White House and Guantanamo Bay to Native American tribes, law enforcement agencies, and professional sports organizations like the MLS. Mauricio holds a BA in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia and an MBA in Human Resource Management from George Washington University. Connect with Mauricio: Website: https://www.diversitydtg.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mauricio-velasquez-mba/ About Justin: Justin Colby is the host of The Entrepreneur DNA and The M.O.R.E Show podcasts and a best-selling author. He is a serial entrepreneur and a seasoned real estate investor with over 20 years of experience. Driven by a passion to help entrepreneurs thrive, Justin created the Entrepreneur DNA community to support business owners in building wealth, systems, and long-term freedom. Through his podcasts, books, education platforms, and hands-on mentorship, he continues to help entrepreneurs scale with clarity and confidence. Connect with Justin: Instagram: @thejustincolby YouTube: Justin Colby TikTok: @justincolbytsof LinkedIn: Justin Colby Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What is up, The Entrepreneur, D-N-A. This is going to be a hell of an episode. As always, every episode is brought you by The Entrepreneur-D-N-A community on school. Go to S-K-O-O-L.com forward-slash the EntrepreneurD-N-A. This is a community driven by the podcast guests. They're going to teach you their expertise intimately. So go to school, S-K-O-O-L dot com, forward slash the entrepreneur-D-N-A. Get in the community and learn directly from people like my next guest.

Now, this next guest is really special. He is quite literally a worldwide consultant. He is a consultant for the largest organizations in the world, government, and even professional sports organizations like the MLS as a name drop. Maricio Velazquez is here. How are you, sir? Oh, so glad to be with you, Justin, fired up to be with you. Fired up.

Now, you just had a good little worldwide trip yourself. So I feel like you're back, you're rejuvenated, and you're ready to go change some lives. last two weeks we're in Europe and I cannot believe what was going on in this country the last two weeks. So a little background and I'll let you kind of explain where you've gone for the last 30 years and this is you are literally a worldwide consultant for the largest organizations, governments, sports organizations, etc. because they hire you for one specific perplex, which is conflict resolution,

how to make the workplace, the marketplace. And I say workplaces like professional sports. is a workplace. They are professional. That is their work. Right. And we just had a great story that you talked about. How to how to deal with conflict to actually perform better. So give everyone a little bit of background of like what you've been focusing on over the last 30 years and potentially what are you really focusing on in today's world? Yeah. So, you know, most people are fair, okay, fair at dealing with people that are different. I'm sorry, well, people like themselves. They fail on dealing with people that are different. And I think it's,

because most people are conflict diverse. And they believe, you know, if I look the other way, if I turn the other cheek, this conflict, it will resolve itself. Most people are a conflict diverse. The problem is that's not how it works. And if you look the other way to turn the other cheek, I call it feeding the monster.

You're giving them more power by giving up power. So you see examples of conflict every day in the media, and you see the conflict, and you see everyone else looking the other way, and he's not going after me, so I'm not going to say,

But the victim watches all that silence and goes, my God, nobody wears my back. So, I've been a trainer, a consultant, a coach. I've worked in every state of North Dakota, working life of taking me to 75 countries. I've trained in Guantanamo Bay. I've trained for Native American tribes, law enforcement, you name it.

The White House previous administration, what we find is most people are not equipped, skilled to address conflict. And instead of store what, they just ignore it. And ignoring it allows it to fester. Yeah, you know, I think I've never had a W2 job so I can only contemplate how that works. But running businesses, I will see it inside my own organizations where people don't necessarily get along and they just kind of tolerate each other. What is some best advice when you have someone that is tolerable but you don't get along?

What would be the best advice you can give the individuals to resolve it themselves so leadership doesn't have to get in the way? They have to be skilled trained up to deal with conflict. They have to define boundaries, barriers. And then I call the stop-start continue technique. What do the behaviors we have to stop doing immediately that allows sort of conflict a bit? What are the things you have to start doing? And what have you done all along? I'm going to stop ignoring.

I'm going to start talking to you and we're going to continue to have regular meetings. I'm going to stop raising my voice. I'm going to start listening. Active listening is such a critical skill. And most people believe they're good listeners. Minds people hear, but they don't listen. So it's like a muscle. You got you got to flex it.

You got to constantly work on it. So I think conflict in and of itself, people think is a bad thing. No, it's not a bad thing. It's how you deal with it. But if I automatically say, oh, conflict, yeah, that means I'm not engaged. And if I'm not engaged, then I don't care. Always it looks like I don't care. So I do a lot of work in emotional intelligence and psychological safety because if it's safe,

you can say to reach out. Are you all right? That's the way I approach people. Are you okay? Are you all right? I mean, so many people are self-aware. like in social media a buddy mind's a CEO and I was like

are you all right and he goes what why are you venting and F bombing and curse oh my life I are having a problem at home but what are you bringing that to social you're sitting off your company and the alcohol and grab by your head

what are you doing he goes oh it's so soft tone deaf so it's called angle management but it's really emotional intelligence um

I think it is um it's difficult right uh we all have lives you all have we don't all have children and whatever but like we all have lives that exist outside of the workplace yeah and it just recently made a post about you know there's all these people you encounter every day and some have road rage or honking at you and others flip you off but whatever the case like all these things happen in a given day and it's up to us to to give a little bit of grace because we also have no idea what the hell they're going that's right like i i'm one of

of those people that traffic in a general sense it is a pet peeve I don't have very many I hate it I can't because I'm totally out of control of being able to deal with and I just want to get to the place I want to go right and it's going to slow me down and I have an agenda to be there blah blah blah so it just is frustrating but I do never I never have road rage I get frustrated but then I use the time by getting on my phone I call marisio hey dude what's going on with this whatever the things are but it does frustrate me so there's this connective tissue that I want you to lean into with this question, which is, we are dealing with people in the workplace, in organizations every day that have outside lives that shit could be boiling over and we have no idea.

Simultaneously, when they bring that heat into my world in my workplace, I need to also have enough emotional intelligence not to flip my lid. It actually has zero to do with me. You just reference us. How do we bridge this gap between... understanding people are going through something without asking because most people don't ask, hey, are you okay just like you did your buddy? And having grace, patience, and understanding probably has nothing to do with me. How do we bridge that gap? Well, part of it in self-honourness. So when I do,

when I'm coaching an executive, it means you call this anger management issues, right? People that just go to zero to 60 half a second and they blow up. You need to understand what are your triggers, right? And then you need to understand when the trigger, comes into your life, an external stimuli, you have to understand how to respond. See, most people react. They don't respond, right? So, this is an example I use all the time people get it. You remember that you know you got to just launch you to, yeah, I'm still angry.

And then you fire off the response. About three seconds later, your mind goes, why'd you send that? There's two parts to your brain. There's the fast emotional reactionary part. and move in small, common-sensical, more rational. So what I teach people to do is,

in that moment, put the flame down. Maybe like the text, but I have Renee on my table. You're not sending that, right? I always say you need three to five seconds, create space. So I'm going to the bathroom.

I'm going to get a cup of coffee. I'm going to check the mail. I'll get anybody about donuts, wherever. By the time I'm walking back, I'm not doing what I was thinking I was going to do. That's crazy. It's the animal on the devil, right? And so what people don't understand will react instead of wait for it, wait for it, pause.

You know, and I teach this. Do I need to react now? Well, there have to be me at this moment, right? So a couple of questions that walks you through, oh my gosh. The other problem is, or the other point is, there are many C-Hails I'm work with who they love to create, you know, emergencies. They love to create, they hide up, create stuff so that they can react all the time. Instead of pausing for men going, wait a minute, this isn't an emergency.

This doesn't need to be dealt with. You know, I start to, I coach people all the time on, are you self-aware, what are you triggers, and then how do you walk yourself out off that ledge, off that cliff before you jump? And the problem means to most people think, I don't have those issues. That's not me. But when I do 60 and I interview people, I'm like, oh my God, this guy loses his mind on a regular basis.

So either's in denial or worse. I don't give you an example. CEO, town hall, I don't know, 40,000 people there. And he says at the end of the call, oh, by the way, I don't give a blank about Black Lives Matter. Don't give me that blank. Heads down to do you drop, grind. All right?

So the VVHR comes into the CEO's office, she's like, what did you tell us it? Right? The fines, the emails, the board's getting complaints for to the media, and he looks at them and says, what do you care? You're like, why you want it? And she goes, what are you somebody hired me to coach this guy? And always, you know, what would I do? So this is the other concept, intent versus impact.

Why did you need your phone? And it doesn't matter what you met. My God, man, you put this off there, right? And then he says, well, I beat the beer over the way. sensitive. How many times have I said this in my Korean, I said, you can't tell other people how to feel. That's an emotionally

illiterate, broken human being who thinks he's good at this stuff. When he's horrific, and they fired him because he would not, you know, apologize, he would not put out a message. And the board's like, man, you wrecked our culture in 15 seconds.

We're done. So, and he called me. I didn't know they were going to fire me. I'm right. If they hired me, he was definitely on the docket. He was shocked. So a lot of pieces here. Stuff awareness. Are you open to feedback? Are you a good listener? Do you know your triggers? They go out there. So when someone comes in hot to you, not you, Marisa, but like, so for the listener. Yeah. And it is this bridging the gap of the person's coming in hot and giving them a little grace, but also being able to remove yourself or say, hey, obviously something's on your plate.

What can someone do when someone's coming in hot? You're like, what the hell just half a year? How do they deflect it where it doesn't come into them, right? Like that energy doesn't soak into their pores so that they can actually let it all resolve. What can they do to let that result? Well, first of all, do you have the time, right? So when they come in hot, first thing is, okay, you're coming in, my life uses that for instance all the time. Coming in hot, you're coming in hot.

I need to know and understand. what's going on here. I either have the time or I don't have the time. Can we schedule so I can sleep down and listen to you? That's the cool off period. Can you come back in an hour? And then realize, oh, wow, they may not even know. That's the interesting piece of your story. They don't love them coming in hot. They don't know it's exhumating or pores. They're just, you know, but again, they're reacting. They're not responding to whatever stimuli. So we're saying something I'm like, all right, something's going on here. I mean, are you okay at this moment?

Can we have this conversation? I've got to call him four. I've got a meeting in an hour. Can we have a, we'll have this conversation, and I won't have any distractions that we can really, you know, we can really drill it out. Cool off time is still, you know, one guy I was coaching. Like this, and his faith turns red when he gets hot.

He's getting red with the coach. Me. I said, hey, go get him here. And he went and got a mirror and you put it up. He goes, oh my God. He had no idea. His face turns red when he gets hot. By the very, he's also a big guy, so he's very intimidating.

And his attention to see the yelling scream to people face to face, and he's always towering over. He had no idea. I said, your wife never told you? She had never told him. Well, I think that's a little, that's a tough go, right? That's a tough go. You know what?

I got hurt and robbed and proved their. marriage, right? He was not exercise. He wasn't taking care of himself. You know, the food, the diet, he was getting big. And I said, dude, you know what my doctor said to me once? Do you want your children? Do you want to see your children grow up to give you children?

I'm like, what are you talking about? I had that conversation. I had the same conversation with them. I'm like, you are not on the light path. And it's affecting how you influence everybody else. You're going to get fired, you know. Something I don't understand what I do up here in the mind. They don't get it in the heart.

But when you say you're going to get fired, oh, all of a sudden, there's a motivation, right? So let's say you're, and I'm using fake examples, so you can just educate people that, you know, again, I've never been a W-2, but I have my organizations, but you hear snickering, gossiping at the watercool. And it's offensive. It's judgmental.

It's all those, you know, things that we don't want to hear, potentially racist or gender-specific or, you know, and you hear it. What's your obligation? You do with that. Like you're a renal manager, someone in a fiduciary world, you have to call it out.

And my favorite technique is, ouch. Wow. All my kids, my kids taught me this one. Really? Really. Right? And then we say something like,

is this work related? Is this mission specific to what we do here? Is this what we're paid to do here? I'm very troubled. And then I teach specific techniques, which we can't go into. right now. But I'm very troubled that this is what we're spending time on. I'm paying the three of you and you're at the watercol, you're out of rage times three around a task, a conversation

that has no relation to what we're doing. I'm very concerned. I'm very troubled, right? Now, the worst thing you can do is pretend like you don't hear it walk away and they go like, he heard us and he's okay with it. You see, it's not, it's most often not what we say, but what we don't say. And when I work, leaders, they don't like that accountability. I'm like, you know, everyone's watching you know for that sexist, that racist comment, and it works,

you giggle, you laugh, why CEO high five the guy, right? The CEO calls me once. I'm a story to talk. Everybody from out and he says, hey, I need to talk to you about something. I said, shoot, what's on your mind? I have to double the size of this company, okay, and I've got two friends of mine on my senior

team, one's a sexist and one's a racist. I'm like, okay, and Marisha, up until now, I would define our commitment to what I do, D.E. and I, to respect in the workplace. I would define it as benign neglect. And this is in my book. I'm like, benign neglect. Interesting concept. But now it's time to get intentional. I said, what does that mean? So I'm going to run this by you. I'm going to fire my two best friends because for six years, I have been in the room laughing, giggling, high-fying. I've been, and that's just facilitating and mainly. And we're going to go from 100, which by the way are all white employees, 100. to 200, we got to hire some non-white people. And why do you keep saying that? Well, 40% of my customers are not white. And if they harmed this banter, they would fire us. And if this talent comes in and they hear this banter, they're going to sue us.

I said, you're right on all counts. So what do you give me? I'm going to fire the both of them today. And I said, why are you calling me? He says, what do you think? I'm like, dude, I'll take a bullet for you. Let's do this. Right?

But he is admitting I've messed up all these years by not calling them out. And it can be a simple worry, ouch, hey now, in front of everybody here, can you come into my office? You're not saying you tear them to pieces, right? And you want to attack the person, by the way. You separate the person from the behavior. If you attack the person, you get defensive, right? They're inside it. It doesn't matter what you meant.

Your comments are ridiculous, right? While I was just kidding. Nobody knows you can. Don't be so, so stop telling other people. how to feel. Consent, this is what I hear every day in my work.

And so he fired those two people and sent a message to the rest of the company. This is not our culture. And I apologize immensely. I'm on a pretty

to the new CEO and he said, we're going public soon. I'm going to be buying. I said, oh, that's great. And the poem was my best friend.

I just found out as having an affair. I'm going to have to find him. I said, everybody found out. We were highly ethical. And I found out, I need to find my bull

friend. He's a VP of marketing. I said, you have to. It's going public or it's going to affect the deal. I mean, that's my life every day. That's my life. What if you're the leader of the organization, I have a real life example in mind of this happening. Leader of organization preaches X, personally doing Y. Right.

and why doesn't necessarily get exposed for a long time, but then he, in this example, is the real life, exposes why? He stops and he comes forward. Yep. And it meets to it. Yep. All right. What's your question?

Part of me just says I think the organization needs to re-look at their... Core values? Yeah, but because if he's saying, saying X and doing Y, does the organization still have belief in that person? Or it starts to just crumble. And even though he did quote unquote the right thing over time, is there a world that that's survivable? Well, I don't know how much time is Paris, but he has no integrity, right?

Say you do, do what you say. So when he close from him, says, you know, if he wants to preacher who was about to get called out, I'd send, you know. So I think he's credible. all these damage, possibly and almost out of the house, severe, egregious the conduct was, but incoming folks, most people

interpret us, oh, he's about to get caught. Right? He's coming forward. They're onto him, right? And what we see is organizations start to do the calculus, start to do the math, is keeping him

okay, or is it damaging our brand, our image? You know, Jim said Garrell Bowling got in trouble, the CEO was having an affair with the head of the federal government division. Married, and I'm very following this, but he sent a message to his parable war saying, hey, well, that conference in Europe, my wife's not coming. This goes, add some days on. We got to have a great time.

Accidentally sent the message to everybody on her team. So on the sudden, everybody got smoking gun, right? Well, what happens? Next day in the Walsuit Journal is a sidebar.com in his affair. Why didn't normally? And this doesn't mean Bollon had lost that hired some senior people

from the Department of Defense, they'll go on after contracts, and they were in pocket. And Bollin said, you want to go. We have an image issue with our integrity. He just blew it out. So I will argue in what will be

what he thinks has to happen. This board will make a deal. decision on his behalf. The CEO of not said to me, for hiring your arm organization, the close you are to the front door. And the day that that story came out in the Wall Street Journal about the CEO

and the next day, Bowling fired him. Everybody would have to fire a couple of those DOD employees because they basically said, hey, come work for us, give us this jet deal and everything will be kosher, right? And I do watch out on ethics. They don't understand

ethics. They don't understand morals, values, scruples, coal values, all those stuff is a part of my word. What would you define you? What would you define the difference to be ethics and walls? Morals are personal.

Ethics can be personal but can also be organizational, can be corporate. And then, of course, societal, right? And you see what's interesting is, let's not talk about ethics. Why? Because if we talk about it, we'll go we've got a rabbit hole. No, we're not.

It's an objective standard, right? So I do think ethics is slings shodging back because of the complete lack of ethics in the last, God knows how many years. And, you know, in the side deals and the corruption and the graft, all this happens because everybody involved is having more ethics. You know, hey, we can make a buck. You know, let's do this. You know why people, my opinion, by the bar. Yeah. You know why I believe people don't want to talk about morals or ethics?

Because they are immoral and unethical. They shy away. Oh, we shouldn't go there because I'm kind of doing some shady shit over here that I think most people would find to be unethical. So I don't, let's avoid the topic. Yeah. Well, one thing we're going to talk about because they're not clear what it means. Two, they're not clear on their own ethics, their own standards, right?

They're not clear. or they're subjective or their situational. So let's lean in your book. I see you behind you tackling toxicity. Yeah. Yeah. What, uh, talk us about that book.

Everyone getting, and that's on Amazon, it's on Barnes & Noble. It's on my website, DiversityDGG.com, ebook, audio book. And it's,

if you've listened to me so far and you like the storytelling approach, I'm a storyteller. I'm a master storyteller. So all of my stories of my 30-year career with some of the most despicable people I've had to coach and how I dealt with them. What did I say? It's score-based tools and techniques. Again, we don't, we're not trained.

You weren't in high school or in college. You're not trained with doing conflict, right? And if our parents are going to judge so often, they're not good at conflict with each other and would hot the long way. So, tackling toxicity. I can't even when I wrote it last year. And then, man, the year develops, and you're like, holy cow, you're ahead of the game. Are you omit shit? I have no idea.

I just want this book, you know, 30 years of my work. And it will help people. And it's not just work. It's life. It's church. It's real estate. I have examples of car dealership. I have all of examples that people are there in the moment and then freeze.

Because they don't know what to say. I show them in the book what to say and how to say it, how to disarm them. them. And in many the effects, the law force when we call this how to de-escalate. So, conflict is hyped up, but we can de-escalate, clear our heads

and then communicate. And you signed me earlier. I'm doing this a lot with you, Justin. You put your hand in your mouth. Look at the technical art. This is, shut up. Don't interrupt, Justin. Keep your mouth shut. It's me. Clean my mind, right? Well, it looks like to you. Gosh, she's a good listener.

It's both. Message for you is, but the message for me is don't interrupt him. Don't interrupt the speaker. This is his show. You know, it's funny. So I do that a lot. I'll actually go like this.

All right. Like, as up, because I'm interviewing you guys, and my job is to not talk necessarily, is to ask you a question about your expertise and allow you to talk. We talked about EQ a little bit

prior to even reporting. Let's dive in here. And maybe relate this to your book. Maybe there's some stories in both. But like, I believe, and I'll take it from my frame first. I have some God-given ability that not necessarily trained,

but I think some of it comes from a very difficult childhood, that I have a lot of understanding, I have a lot of empathy, I'm aware, I'm awake, you know, like I understand this is a tough issue and I have that like ability to sit in that and deal with it. And again, been told I just like emotional IQ is really high. I've never been trained on it. I've read, you know, emotional intelligence 2.0, great book. Nothing I've ever dipped doving, doving into it.

I don't know that. I've never dove into it. But I have it. What can people do to increase their actual emotional intelligence? Yeah, see, I think you're so, yourself short. You have been learning based on feedback from the people, your wife, your family, the people you work with. They give you feedback like, you know, Justin, thanks for being so genuine. Thanks for being a good listener. You actually are constantly learning. And I don't want this natural

boring nonsense completely. There's a lot of nurture, a little bit of nature, but you are a product of every interaction you've ever had with people. And some people have told you to have stuff. the real stuff that you then warned, modified, edited you grew from. So part of it, I would say without diving you in the EI, because it's, you know, it's not, you know, there's a lot there.

But it's, get feedback. One, by the way, it has to be psychologically safe. When you ask for feedback, people have to feel safe to come to you. You know, in the military, I call it permission to speak. With the support, you're saying, all right, I'm going to tell you something. You can't come.

my head off, right? Or in workplace, it's, I can't be devil's advocate. Those are two situations, examples of, it's not safe. It's not psychologically safe. But in a psychologically safe environment, meaning you're approachable, you convey that you care, you're genuine,

you're authentic. And by the way, this is hard to teach people to be genuine or authentic. That might be your natural gearift, but you have to build on it, right? And so I would tell your listeners, your people watching is, ask How about it's like me asking my life.

Am I good husband? Could I be better? It's like you're asking my kids. Could I be a better father? I was raised by a father who, in some of you who are going to put, re-giaters, he would say, Wano Quetto, which in Spanish is, I smell lover. That means you're about to get looked.

And how many of me, listen, you know, the side of the belt as it's coming out of the belt, who's, I was raised by the belt. Now, if I did the same thing to my children, I would be in jail right now and my children will be right to my foster parents, right? So change, right?

You've got to be self-aware. I think I could do this differently and be more effective, better, productive, but you need feedback. So the problem is the people I coach are narcissists and don't seek feedback, don't want feedback, don't care,

right? They're in the little bubble. And that's the harder person to coach, quite frankly. They don't even know. I don't even know. I don't even know. I don't even know. how bad they aren't, right? Well, to the point of when someone's a know-it-all? Yes.

How would you go into, because you did, like you just said, typically your clientele tends to be that guy or gal, right? Like, ah, don't bother me that. That's the I got there. How do you break that wall down? Well, I talk about there's what you know, what you don't, and then there's what you don't know, and then there's what you don't know, you don't know, right?

So I tell people, we'll have boring spots. We don't even know we have them. We got a meaning well, but our actions set a different message, different consequences. And so let me give you some examples. And I will tell them, you know, you said this in the meeting, you said that in the meeting, you ran me this, you chew out this person in front of their peers, and say, look, you're a good person. But this sort of, I call them the prefers and the nevers. These are the behaviors you can never exhibit again.

If you want to keep your job, you can't exhibit. These are the prefers. We prefer. So we call this in psychology shaping behavior. I shape. I don't change people. I said, look, you've got a choice. You can continue to do these horrible things,

and they're going to fire you fast when I can smile. Or you can choose a different pilot. So this one guy, I'm coaching him, and you ran an asphalt plant, and all the Lactinos worked there. Asphalt, dirty, dangers, dark, hot. And Alba Lactiola, speak Spanish. They all wore their bread.

So the first thing I said to this guy, I'm coaching, and say, hey, man, why do you call them beaners, eff and beaners, and murder effing beaners? Their name's original they all look alike to me. He sends up in a punch. And then he says, you know, you can't teach you know about new tricks. My favorite phrase, I go, whoa, we'll get you kind of somewhere else. So let me fire him.

Pour my recommendation, because he is a... The guy said he's luckily ever knifed him. So you got racism and violence. He calls me a bluff later. He had a very distinct accent. I knew of some of me because what's up? Because they fired me. I said, yeah, I know something.

Because I had to recommend it. He says, can you want me? I said, what are you talking about? My wife left me. They took my Harley. They took my Mustang. So they did take, I said, what do you talk about? Meals, Joe, I was making, I was the plant manager.

I was making six three years. I've been there since high school. Now I'm starting over making 23-5. I can't make ends meet. Why are you calling me? Can you help me by car, my old employer and having them hire me back? And I said, you know, let's be your dog play. That is so fun.

What he does and how he makes people feel and how he causes toxicity and how, and you give him a feedback, Luke. and people are going to learn, right? I mean, I think, I'm calling you a guest say this, and I think Tony Robbins says it and everyone that we're aware of, right? Like, people are,

they have two reasons to do anything for the benefit or for the fear of pain, right? I'm going to go chase the carrot or I'm going to go run from a stick. Yeah, I call it giving or are you giving or are you taking? No one wants to work for a taker where they take your energy. They want to work for somebody. that praises that leads by example has high integrity or high emotional intelligence high emotional intelligence

stress goes down high initial intelligence anxiety goes down retention goes up so i'm a big fan of this whole ei movement uh emotional quotient emotional intelligence i think there's a lot of room there for growth yeah and listen what you even did not going back in the ring to help him because what that would have done in my opinion right and i think this is why you did it is it continues to propel his everything's okay. You're not doing anything that bad. Meanwhile, he's being very prejudiced and judgmental. And he's not coachable too. I asked him my clients before. I mean, you can whisper. Is this guy coachable? We don't know me to show me. What's a better story, though? I found out his boss had mentored him. So I named his boss. And I said, tell me something. I'll answer my homework.

You have an autistic son. How do you know that's not important? How do you feel when your son's My wife works with this community. My son works with this community. How does it feel when your son comes home all beat up and been bold? Because I'm furious. And so you take that energy and you come to work and you bully everybody here. How do you reconcile that your son's been bold and you hate it? But you come to work and you bully people here.

He looks at me and starts to read things. I don't know those two things together. I said, they just fired the guy that you mentored. You're next if you don't change. It's his choice. I didn't change him. But his wife tells him, it's his income,

my old doom, right? And by the way, special needs, a lot of extra expenses, right? He's like, oh my God, he starts crying uncontrollably.

We have to own, the problem is we don't own the consequences of our emotions. Our emotions drive our actions. Actions have consequences. And every person I courage goes, I didn't know I was hurting people.

I didn't know I did that. I didn't mean it. It doesn't. It doesn't matter. I'm not attacking you. Let's look at how you treat people. Those actions have consequences. That's the nature of my book.

You have to go from bystander to upstander. And it's always more afflicted when I mean when I got somebody willing to Justin. And I say, hey man, justice is a great guy. Who do you ever? If we stand up for each other. Like if you remember the incident on the airplane where this leader's, you want, denigrating this reporter, all the other people shut up

and he's calling her a fatty whatever I'm saying going okay that's a horrible thing to say but I was more concerned about all the other people not saying a word how did she feel that her colleagues and peers just left her right at the altar just totally so

you have to stand up we have to stand up for each other when you've got to be upstanders and stop being bystand bystanding means I'm going to get away turn the cheek and just something seems it just works and evolves it doesn't it festers you're feeding the monster yeah let's use that one example because it means into where i want to go with the professional

organizations that if you're okay talking about this because i enjoy that um you see these reporters one reporter starts to bully another by calling her names and calling her fatty or ugly and all these terrible things as a bystander who should be upstanding what should that person do Right? Because the first thing I think about when you say that, the emotion gets triggered in me and I go, I do the same to him as he's doing her. And in attempts say, how does that feel? Like, you're belittling her, degrading her. Hey, fat, ugly man who's dumber in a box of rocks. How does it feel like that's where I want to go? Yeah. So one one else has kind of step back. One's going to say, ouch. Another one's going to say, wow. Another person is going to say, wow. But she needs to see a response that conveys. This isn't decent. This isn't the civic, simple. This isn't respectful.

The problem is he says this. By the way, he probably got a chuckle or a laugh, which is only worse. But nobody said, oh my God, what? Hey now, wait a minute. That's not appropriate. Nobody had to courage before as I fear if that's something he would retaliate against the.

Don't fear the retaliation. Fear. I wrote an article called The Silence is deafening. the silence was deafening in those moments and you see them all the time the bully oh he's bullying her

so he's not bullying me so I'm not getting in the middle of this instead of going oh my God you can be my brother just sign that message that this isn't appropriate in my book

I talk about this story about this dad and screaming and yelling and cursing during basketball games my daughter's on the team and I missed two weeks because I was traveling to Japan for the main week

and I get back in town and the dad's all right texting where are you? Why are you coming to the game? Like, what's going on? He's out of the again. And what have you guys been doing? We haven't said anything yet. We'll hope he will say something. I'm like, what? For two weeks, stuff. I'm at the game. All right? And he starts cursing and yelling.

And what shocks me is all the parents just keep watching the game. No one even looks back at him. My woman looks back and gives him a little look and I'm standing here. I'm two seats. I'm at the top of the bleachers. And I stand there. I'm about to say something. And my wife puts your hand on my shoulder. and she's just doing embarrassment. And I look at my bratage a bit.

I was put on the planet for these special moments. And I stand up and I say it all right. These are eighth-grade girls. Are you all right? Have you been drinking beers? And you tried to punch me in the guy between his grabs him. Right? So my wife's embarrassed.

My daughter at halftime comes up. She's like, Dad, I was so embarrassing. But behind me, it's a woman. She's come and speak to you, Mr. Velasquez. She knows my name. So come in. I say, how can I help you? She goes, I'm the commissioner.

with the basketball league. And I saw what you did. I said, I'm sorry? I saw you stand up to that bully. I knew more parents like you. I need more parents like you. Who did you do every game when she lasts? I know you can't do it every game.

I was leaving. And the parent grabbed me and brought me back in. I saw what you did. And she looks over at Ron. And Ron is being escorted out of the basketball by two police officers. I said, what's going on? I've banned him.

I had to see it. I'd ban him from him. Thanks to you, Mr. Velasquez. And she walks away. I said, thank you, commission. She was a Kenish. I love that show. I love that show. So thank you, Kimish. She said, thank you, Mr. President. She rocked away. And I went to my wife. I went to my daughter. I said, if you were embarrassed at me, this is in my book. And my wife said, okay, maybe.

For the love of God, getting the game. See, when I stand up, we're standing. And when I'm talking, you're like, by my own children support. And Elise is like, I get it, dad. I get it. She's eighth grader, right? I get it. I said, Elise, when you go to high school and somebody's being bullied, you got to roll, you got to lean in, because they're in your friend. You have to fear of her not alone. So teach a moment, and it's in my book, because it infuriated me. They're my wife and my daughter who were embarrassed with me. Mines, right?

By the way, I went by the meeting with all the parents. I said, look, you can't pretend like he's, and by the way, the only parents are looking back were the parents in the other two. And by the way, this was a Catholic league. You've got to be kidding me, right? So I taught them out. look, Lexington

look, say something that cuts the brain with input that maybe I'm doing stuff around. But when anybody was just, you know,

watching the game out saying the word, he interpreted those silence as permission. It's a perfect example. And by that is every game in sports right now.

It's in my book, too. Oh my God, if you all these parents fighting? It's like, what is going on? Right?

Well, what's silly to me is when it's just the, the rival between I'm a Niner fan, you're a Cowboys fan. Men, we fight in the stands

over our teams. I'm sorry. Like, what is wrong with people? It's it. Right? They're triggers. And they're drunk. We've had beers.

That's accelerates. That glances as kids. They go zero-60. And the anger overwhelms, and there's actually on the back side of that, endorphins. So now I've jacked up.

But I have to put some of it. What triggered this whole thing? I don't remember. You know, my father, what made you so angry? Yeah. I don't know if this is in my book, but I old 16 when I said to my father,

Dad, I think you're being cheap. He looked at me and he just punched me white in the face, right? And I left, I didn't think I left in my shoes. I'm flying ground. My mom's freaking out, cried, and I'm on the ground, right? I think he broke my mom's right, and I say to my father,

I'll never forget this moment, right? Now, Zoonfold, I have a son. He's 16. And he says the same thing to me. He goes, Poppy, I think you're being cheap. I looked at my son. Ethan, I said, oh, my God. He goes, what?

I'll say the same thing to your grandfather. And Ethan said, what happened? He beat the shit out of me. I want to do that right now, but I'm not going to do that because I choose not to. And I'm walking away, shank you, because I am their father's son. All right?

I'm walking away because I'm evident software. I know I can be different. Break the cycle. And I want to call my day. Hey, Poppy, can you come over? Bring the worsty buckle, the ugly... Come on, no, no, can you finish you not for me? Any little pitch here in here, right?

I didn't call my dad. My son of hug me and start crying. You know, I'm really happening again. But my son remembers that. He remembers that. He remembers that moment. He remembers that moment. He says, you look like you're about to lose your mind, and you walked away.

That's emotional intelligence. Yeah. Yeah. There's so... There's a lot we could go down. What I would encourage everyone. The book is everywhere. Barnes & Noble. The book is on Amazon.

Maricio Velasquez is his name. He's phenomenal. Literally the biggest organizations across the world, professional organizations, governments. This guy is the guy to know. And luckily for all of those who are in the community, he will come in and bless us with some advisement on how to better get some emotional intelligence. So that's another. Good Families do more together.

DiversityDG.com is my website. I've been doing this for 30 years. I love it. And I thank you for the platform. You're an outstanding leader in our space. I appreciate you. This is The Entrepreneur DNA. I'm Justin Colby.

If this was helpful and you think a couple people should have so a little bit more emotional intelligence or just simply need to lean into Mauricio, share this with least of your people. Talk to you guys on the next episodes.