The Game with Alex Hormozi - The Three Dimensions of Leadership | Ep 659

Episode Date: February 28, 2024

“Respect has to be given before it's received.” Today, Alex (@AlexHormozi) shares his thoughts on the three dimensions of leadership, which he identifies as respect, fear, and love, and how leaders can gain respect by setting an example and embodying the values they want to project. He also discusses the importance of respecting others, how it can be earned in different ways, and how it can benefit relationships and leadership.Welcome to The Game w/Alex Hormozi, hosted by entrepreneur, founder, investor, author, public speaker, and content creator Alex Hormozi. On this podcast you’ll hear how to get more customers, make more profit per customer, how to keep them longer, and the many failures and lessons Alex has learned on his path from $100M to $1B in net worth.Timestamps:(0:39) - The three dimensions of leadership(1:08) - Understanding respect and its role in leadership(2:52) - The triangle of fear, love, and respect(5:51) - The importance of sacrifice in gaining respect(8:20) - The role of gender in leadership and respect(14:03) - The respect playbook: Key strategies for effective leadership(18:31) - The triad of fear, love, and respect in leadership(27:11) - Evaluating your leadership styleFollow Alex Hormozi’s Socials:LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Twitter | Acquisition(This episode is a re-run. Original airdate was on June 6, 2019)

When you own your flaws, it's the thing that you're most afraid to say out loud. It's the things that you suck at because you're ashamed of it. But when you take the things that you're ashamed of and you bring them to the light, all of a sudden, what used to be perceived as shame is perceived as strength. The wealthiest people in the world see business as a game. This podcast, The Game, is my attempt at documenting the lessons I've learned on my way to building acquisition.com into a billion dollar portfolio. My hope is that you use the lessons to grow your business and maybe someday soon, partner with us to get to $100 million. dollars and beyond. I hope you share and enjoy. I'm calling this the three dimensions of leadership.

And so I'm making this because I think so many times I've been asked by people in our company, people who know me from before the gyms, just all different times of my life, people have asked, like, how do you gain respect? Right. And they're like, I feel like, I feel like your employees respect you. I feel like, I feel like people respect you. You know, like, how do you, how do I get that? And it's a really hard question for me. And so I wanted to give you a little bit of backstory, I think, of how this kind of came to be. So first off, just some interesting backlog. I was raised by a single dad and I had no siblings.

And so all like my home life was just men, right? And it was a Middle Eastern father. I went to an all guy's school, which is again, all men. As soon as I went to college, I immediately joined. fraternity and surrounded myself by all men. And I think it's because just like on some level, like I was more comfortable there. And my audience, if I look at Instagram and I look at Facebook and all that stuff, is 80% male. And the 20% of females that I think that come in tend to be entrepreneurs. And there's a lot of sort of traditionally male characteristics that go along with that.

Now, I'm not saying that any way that's bad or good in terms of like male catcher. strict or being bad or female, like whatever. I'm just saying like, that's what is, right? And so I think that I've attracted that mix and that like my life has been that way because my primary driver in life has been respect. And so there's there's an amazing series called love and respect. It's four marriages, but I think it's one of the most profound understandings of how to deal with people. Besides like how to make friends and influence people, I'd say the second thing that I would ever watch is that it's a marriage series, but it's really just about men and women. And the difference and the drivers of how how to get people to do what you want them to do, right?

And how to have better relationships. And that book and that series changed my life as well. And it reinforced, it put words to a lot of the things that I did that I didn't know why. And so respect. I called this the three dimensions of leadership because I was trying to think through what is it, right? And if you look it up, it's just admiration of someone due to qualities, achievements, etc. but I was like, how does that, what, what, what's, where's the teeth to respect, right?

And so I was thinking, I was like, I think maybe it's the, it's the middle point between fear and love. And then I thought more about that. And I was like, I don't know if it's the midpoint because like, you know, I think Layla respects me. I don't know if she fears me. Well, maybe she does fear me. You know what I mean? So I was playing with this. And I think it looks more like a triangle.

And so I think it's more fear, love, and respect that says, sit on a triangle and we aim as leaders to be in the middle of that dot. And if you think about the midpoints between each of those three, let's say if you have respect and love, the midpoint there I would say is like loyalty, right? And if you look at the midpoint between fear and love, you have sacrifice, right? And so if you look at each of those dimensions, you have like different characteristics that kind of come out of them. And so to go back to the initial question, like, how do you gain?

respect, right? And because it's been the only goal I've had in most of my life, I didn't, I never really sought to be loved. That was not, it's not a primary driver. If it did happen, it was not my, goal. It was, it was a secondary thing. And I think that because I've lived in all male dominated organizations, sorry, like my whole life has been predominantly male. And then even when I had my gyms, I really, I think I only hired total three women ever between all the locations. Like, I mean, it's just I was more, it's not like it was a sexist thing. It was just like I was more comfortable with guys. And so it just ended up naturally happening that way.

And so, and I never had, I never had trainers leave and steal clients. Like, I never had any of those things happen because the entire organization ran off respect, right? And the things that I've learned about respect is that it has to be given before it's, before it's received. And, and, and, and you have to set that tone in the initial conversation. And so like if someone's first day or first interaction with you, they come in and it's two minutes late. If you're just like, please don't be late again. I won't be late for you. Like it automatically sets a tone because they're like, wow.

But I respected them by being on time and they didn't respect me by not being on time. And so it's like you set this tone immediately and you make these minor corrections and you don't tolerate times where there's minor points of disrespect and you point it out to the person so that they understand. where you're coming from. And what ends up happening is that you raise the expectations, you raise the bar of the relationship, and then as a result, respect follows. And so this has been something I'm probably going to dive more even deeper on because it's like, it's really messing with my head because I want to be able to impart this to, you know, the leaders of the company and then the managers in our company and everything is like, how do we, how do we gain that? And so a lot of times respect is also earned from sacrifice. And so if you want,

especially like in the world of men, at least in my belief, is that if you want someone's respect, you have to do things for them that they wouldn't expect you to do. Right. And so, for example, I'm just giving you an example from like the world of pledging, right? And the reason I'm using that is because it was a short period of time where you rapidly, you're introduced into a new environment and you want to rapidly gain respect, right? That was kind of the environment. So deconstructing like what the actions were in order to gain that.

right and the way to do that in that environment was do more than anyone else would offer to give more far past what was average or what was the most but just give everything to the cause that benefited the whole group and so if you sacrifice yourself and say no guys like I know you all have some tests tomorrow like I'll work late tonight like don't worry about it like it's fine and consistently putting the group first is what gains you respect right and so I feel like there's so many little micro points and so many like micro experiences that I've had that have like, I like put that in my like respect playbook of like, oh, okay. Like whenever there's a little issue that that comes up that's that's either disrespect from me or them like announce it, right? Or if I ever disrespect someone else, for example, by being two minutes late, the first thing I'll say is like first off, I'm at no disrespect by being two minutes late.

I didn't want to disrespect your time. I totally lost track and I apologize. And I can't tell you how many times I've had like, things happen, right? And I mean, I try to always be on time. But even if you're two minutes late or a minute late, right? If you start a conversation like that with a vendor or a new employee or anything, I can't tell you the amount of times that people are taking it back and they're like,

oh, thanks. Like, no, but I appreciate that, but no. And so there's an immediate level of respect of like this person's respecting my time. I'm going to respect his time back. And so that was like one little note in the respect playbook. you know what I mean like try and see if there's ways that I can sacrifice for the group so if I'm on a sales team right like I'll be like guys I'll work the weekends I'll take the late shifts like don't worry about it I got this and then like I'll wake up earlier and then the thing is is that people see that effort and they're like man

like I respect that guy like I respect his hustle right and so there's probably different elements of things that people respect about you right like maybe you're like that in work but you're a horrible husband and people know that but like you're like I don't respect that about him and so there's even more facets, which is kind of bringing in what Layla says where you have to lead what you live, or live what you live, whatever, lead what you live or live what you lead. But if people see through, like, people want, people want to respect someone and they just are waiting for reasons not to. And I think that if you, if you try and live the same life in secret or in private as you do in public, then there's no, there's no inconsistencies between the two. And people can see that because at the

end of the day, like, everything always comes out. Like, the truth always comes out. And so if you try and live that truth and when you know you mess up, you own that, people respect you for it. Because like, I mean, a million people who said this, but like Eminem, if you can own your flaws and know that and then continue to work on them and people see you work on them, they respect you more for it than trying to posture and say, like, I don't have them because we all have flaws, right? And so like, these are just some of the things that have come up like and in trying to reverse engineer this because I want I want my entire company to be you know run based off of respect and I probably lean too much in that direction because that's what I was raised in you know what

I mean Middle Eastern family like it's all on respect right like I the the test that they took in the love and respect which is really really interesting is they have one question that they ask men and women and they do this as kind of like the onset of the entire seminar which is if you like I'm butching the question, but if you could be loved by everyone, right, but no one respected you for the rest of your life, would you prefer that or everyone respects you, but have no love, which would you prefer? Right. And it's like 80% of men say they would prefer to be respected and not loved. And like 80% of women are like, I would prefer to be loved and not respected. And so it's just an interesting dichotomy between like how men and women,

in general, tend to respond to things. And so I'm like, I consistently obsessed about this because it's probably been the primary driver of like how I want all my relationships and my life to work is based on respect. And respect is mutual. It's two ways, right? And it's just like most things you have to give it before you get it. And the way to consistently get it and keep it is to consistently sacrifice for the good of the whole.

And I think that's probably the biggest piece is sacrificing and putting the hole before yourself. And I think when, and doing that not. just in front of people, but especially behind closed doors. Because I think when I was younger and I wanted to gain respect, I always was trying to do it in places where people would see it. And then I realized much later on that I got so much more respect when people would notice things that they knew I didn't, that they would notice things that I had done that they knew that wasn't visual or wasn't public, and then they would tell other people about it, right? And so it's kind of like coming into the party and saying, like, we've got a business that does X, Y,

and Z and blah, blah, blah, blah, versus you coming into a conversation with someone and having them posture against you and say, like, we've got a seven figure business, right, whatever. And you're like, that's amazing, dude, good for you. Like, you know, what are you doing and just being interested in them and whatnot and letting them just, like, beat their chest. And then what happens is they leave and then someone else comes up. It's like, dude, do you know who that is? And they're like, no. And they're like, oh, that guy does X, Y, and Z. And then all of a sudden, in that dynamic, that first person who was bragging feels like a fool. Right. And so immediately, it's the things that other people say

that are going to gain you four more than anything you can say. And so it's like, if you want other people to say the things that you want them to say, what do we have to do in order to get them to say those things. And so like making that realization for me was a huge kind of breakthrough for me because then it stopped being like about posturing publicly, but about posturing privately. And then what happens is, and this is like kind of the funny part is if you start doing the things almost from an external standpoint because you selfishly want to be respected, but you're doing the things in private in order to do that, then all of a sudden you start to change your identity because what you're doing in private is respectable. And so in a weird.

way you kind of push out the things that are not respectable that you do in your life. And so like, and one of the biggest things when I was like really like dealing with the demons that I had earlier on in life was understanding the concept of shame, right? So if like the respect is is what the goal is the opposite of that is shame and embarrassment. And so a lot of times, I think that people were like, man, Alex is so real. I mean, I just see this in the comments and whatnot on like the podcast and like I appreciate it. But I think it was really hard for me to, like, when you own your flaws, it's the thing that you're most afraid to say out loud. It's the things that you suck at because you're ashamed of it.

But when you take the things that you're ashamed of and you bring them to the light all of a sudden, what used to be perceived as shame is perceived as strength. And it's really interesting, just understanding that, like the things that I was ashamed of that I've done and that I've said and how I've acted. when brought into the light, they only give you shame, they only take up your attention in your headspace when you try and hide it. But when you bring it into the light and you talk about it,

then people respect you for it. And it's just this really interesting thing because I think on some level, we all are like that, but then you respect the person who had the courage to do it. And so, like, in the respect Claybook, it's like, set the tone, always don't disrespect people,

sacrifice for the good of the whole, lead what you live. like do the things in the backgrounds and in the shadows that people would think respectable and would talk about you. And then the one that I just said, and then like own your flaws and bring them out publicly so that the things that you're ashamed of actually become the things that people perceive as your strengths. And so like going through this and like, you don't know what I mean?

And this playbook has like lengthened over time. But there's this like this, I didn't know what direction this was going to go in. But trying to understand that triangle of fear, love, and respect and sitting in the dot in the middle because like there is an element of fear when it comes to leadership, right? Like if you think about and so even if you're not religious or whatever, if you think about the relationship that most people would have with their creator, whatever the omnipotent like being in their life is, there's three elements. It's not just love. It's not just fear. It's not just respect. It's all three.

right and it's just kind of like this melting pot of those three emotions and then the the actions that happen as a result of that are the things that happen in between if you have the respect and the love that's where you're loyal you have the fear and the love that's where you sacrifice and when you have fear and respect you're obedient right and so you see these three triangles and the actions that exist between each of those those binaries of the emotion on that triangle plane and that's how you can get those behaviors is by having all three of those things. And so if you're like, I feel like I have no loyalty in my organization, right, then it means that they don't, that you probably don't have the balance of respect and love,

right? And so I think you get loyalty because people see that you're making the decisions not only out of, out of respect for the company, but also out of love for the individual. Like people, like sometimes I don't attract women, I think, because I can be perceived as abrasive, right? Very direct.

And so sometimes that doesn't sit well with people who kind of like just walk into our environment like it's a wall, right? But I think that that loyalty lives there because we're always trying to think, like if I'm making the decision like, is this loving this person? Is this actually in this person's best interest? And that's why parenting is so different than being someone's friend, right? Like we have to do these things. And like I'm saying this not as a parent, but I feel like when you run an organization,

in some ways the relationship's very similar is like I need to I need to foster this person and balance the stick and the carrot you know what I mean of of love and fear and balance this because I truly want the best for the individual now if you don't have that in mind if people don't think you have their best interest in mind and the secret to having people think you have their best interest in mind is to actually have the best interest in mind right and so if they don't feel like you have that then you may have their respect but not their love and so then you don't have loyalty right and so if you have people constantly leaving your organization that's what it is right and if you if you if you have people who like

don't respect you right and like talk shit behind your back and when you make when you make statements and whatnot they're like they roll their eyes or whatever then it means you might not have fear right and so like it's it's constantly balancing between these three forces in order to get you know the behavior that's desired and obviously we're human and we're flawed and sometimes I lean too much towards fear. I'll be real with you. There's probably a lot of people in my company that on some level fear me. And I know that. You know what I mean? I understand that. And I'm not going to say that I don't sometimes foster that a little bit because it's good to make sure everyone knows you still have teeth that like

expectations are still expected to be met. Because if you don't have the fear, then it means you don't have accountability. There's no consequences. Right. And so there has to be that balance of like, I love you. I need you. Like, I want to foster you. I want to grow you. But there are expectations. And after a certain point, it goes from love to fear, right? There are going to be teeth that come out as a result of this relationship. And if you can't do that, then that's when you lose respect, right, from that team or that employee, et cetera. And so, It's this triad. And there may be even more dimensions to it.

I don't know. This is just like as I'm articulating it because I know that I've had a lot of people ask me about it. And it's just such a complex emotion to be able to get from people. And I don't think it's one trick because if it were, everyone would do it. But I think it's like kind of the embodiment of all of the way that you treat other people and the things that you do in in the dark, how you articulate those things and honestly how you live your life. And so when people want to have like, I think the combination of purpose. leadership and have the loyalty and the obedience and the sacrifice and the love and fear and

respect from their team so that they can ultimately lead and influence an organization. It's because they lack some of those things, right? Like you won't have fear if you never hold people accountable or enforce rules for real, right? If you don't enforce, then you have no fear, which is important because that's what moves people, right? If you don't care for the individuals, right, you'll lose loyalty because they think that you don't actually care about them and it's only about you or it's only about the business,

which means that the first chance, then they're going to go care about themselves and not you or the business because they're just going to mirror back what you're showing them, right? And then the same thing with respect, which I think a lot of times comes from sacrifice, right, is that if they feel like you're not willing to do things for the organization that you're asking them to do, then they're not going to do it for the organization either. And I think that to a certain degree, a lot of people, like, I've always felt like it was easier to ask someone to do something that they know beyond a shadow of a doubt I would do five times more. And then it just gives you a high ground from that conversation. And maybe there's other ways to do it.

Like, I mean, I don't know. But at least for me, from my like up to this point in my life, I know that I can speak confidently in saying that most people in the organization don't think that I slack. They don't think that I hope that I that I would hold myself to a lower standard than I would hold them. And so I think that that's one of the keys. It's like if you want to hold people to a high standard, a really high standard, then you in honest or in earnest have to hold yourself to an even higher standard. And that has to be real. And that means that like that video that I made about tradeoffs of like,

well, if you're going to hold some of this standard and you want to hold yourself to a higher standard, are you being real about that? is that actually the standard you're holding yourself to. And if you're not, then that's where they lose respect. Because the moment you ask more from someone else than you ask from yourself, you lose respect, right? And so if it's like, man, it seems so hard to balance all these things, I think it's true.

It's right. That is hard. And that's why most people can't do it. And that's why most people don't lead. Right. And the degree to which you lead and the size of the organization that you're able to lead to the size of the movement that you're able to lead, I think is directly proportional to how deep each of those three roots of the triangle run, right? How hard do people think you can go from a fear side? Like, how much judgment day

do they think that you can, you can dish out if it came to it? How much sacrifice from the respect side, do they think that you would give to better the entire community, to better the entire organization? What would you give up for not your own self-interest, but for the good of the whole? Right. Like when we talk to our gym large community and I say like we haven't taken a paycheck and we're putting everything into building what we think is going to be the future of the gym industry. Like it's not semantics. Like we're doing that and it's not doing it to gain respect. It's doing it because I think that's what's right. And I think that we've been given a lot and to be stewards of that, I want to who much has been given, much is expected.

And I think we've been given a shitload so that there's a lot of expectation. Right. Real quick, guys, if you can think about how you found this podcast, somebody probably tweeted it, told you about it, shared it on Instagram or something like that. The only way this grows is through word of mouth. And so I don't run ads. I don't do sponsorships. I don't sell anything.

My only ask is that you continue to pay it forward to whoever showed you or however you found out about this podcast that you do the exact same thing. So if it was a review, if it was a post, if you do that, it would mean the world to me and you'll throw some good karma out there for another entrepreneur. And if you feel like someone else above you who is always expecting more from you than anyone else, right? and you think about all the things that we're given, I think it shifts your perspective in terms of what is expected of yourself. And so that allows you to raise the bar beyond what most humans would be able to be capable of because it's not from here, right, if that makes sense. And so the last piece is it's the love piece.

And so how deep does your love run, right, for the individuals that are in your organization? And I think that comes from like truly loving people, but truly loving people isn't being soft. You know what I mean? It's knowing the difference of like, is this the type of person? because everyone here who has kids, and I don't have kids, but I know that I'm probably going to father them this way. It's like there's like I have some, like the sales team responds very differently than, then,

you know, then marketing. Very different. You know, very, I've got a bunch of, you know, more creative people there. And like, like, they're not the type of people that need like fear. You know what I mean? Because they're like salespeople in general tend to be more alpha, more pushing the envelope. always and that's good because that's what they need. They need that characteristic in order to succeed, right? But in order to run that team, it needs a very different leader and leadership

style than running a marketing team, right? Which you have to, like, you can't have a lot of creativity in an environment of fear, right? And so it's balancing the needs of the individual and deeply caring about them in reality because you want what's best for them. And sometimes what's best for them is not working for your company and being honest about that with them. So it's like, I care about you. And in this point in your life, you may or may not believe me, but I know that later on, you may gain the perspective to see what I'm doing right now, and you'll thank me for it. And I can't tell you how many times I've had that conversation with people. And then later had them come back and be like, you were done on. Like, I wasn't ready for that at that point.

And I just want to say thanks. And I think as the leader, you have to be willing to not be liked in the moment to do what's right in the larger sense for the individual. And some of the Sometimes it's doing things that they don't even understand themselves. And sometimes I zoom out. And I think in context of like the things that I suffered through in my life and thought in this moment or in that moment, I was, I struggled a ton with it. But then it made me stronger, right? Was it like it either either like struggles either beat the strength out of you or beat it into you. I kind of like that saying.

And so I think that when you think about those in context, they make us, you know, those experiences make us who we are. And if we're going to be the person who's delivering those experiences. experiences to someone else. You have to do it from a position of love, of truly loving the person and what you, where you hope that they can become, whether it's with you or without you. And so that's, it's like, that's the, that's the triad, right? That's the triad between those three things so that you can have the love, the respect and the fear of all of the people in your organization so that you can have the loyalty and the sacrifice and the you, and I don't like the word obedience because I think it has a very negative connotation, but like in a lot of

ways, like the word is obedience. Like it's, you know, when you have, if you have, you have a directive, like it needs to be followed, right? And so maybe a better word would be like buy-in. You know what I mean? That would probably be like the socially accepted word. But like, I like the word obedience because I think, I think it carries, it's real. You know what I mean? It's real.

And a lot of obedience also comes from like, I respect you enough. I admire you enough. I admire your achievements. I admire what you're willing to give up. That I will take what you see and understand that I don't see the whole playing field. right, which is why I was really drawn to the military and it was a really hard decision. And ultimately, both my parents were, you know, we don't want you to go there. Like they had all their fears and all that stuff.

But I think I really would have loved the military, to be honest with you. But I just ended up not doing that direction of my life. I have a tremendous amount of respect for it. And in those organizations, it's it's so indoctrinated and so clear to everyone that like you don't see the greater good. You don't see the whole battlefield, right? you see your peace and you need to execute. And then when that happens, the whole is better. And that's why military organizations are runoff respect, right?

And loyalty because and sacrifice. And so that like those characteristics are more alive because it's mostly a male organization and they understand it better than anyone is that respect is what runs that then, right? That whole organization is run off respect. And so anyways, to circle this whole thing back. If you were trying to lead and you're struggling to lead and you're struggling to get the respect and ultimately the obedience and the execution and the buy-in from your team when you need to make

the hard calls about the business or about changes that happen, look at those three and think which of these am I lacking? Am I lacking the enforcement from the fear side? Have I set expectations and said, this is where we need to go and then not followed through and not had repercussions when we didn't hit it? Have I been asking, so from a respect standpoint, have I been asking things of other people that I wouldn't do myself or that they don't believe that I would do myself? Am I, like, am I willing to sacrifice or asking them to sacrifice things that I'm not sacrificing for respect, for love? Do the people that are in my organization feel like I genuinely care about them in a deep sense, not on a peripheral coddling sense, but like really truly care about the individual, which sometimes means doing things that aren't fun for them because you care about their greater good.

and not just a moment. And so I think that if you look at those three things, you'll be able to dissect your leadership style and be able to see where the deficiencies are in where you have and then kind of go through that respect playbook to get to where you want to go. So anyways, I hope this was valuable for you. This was just like, I had this melting pot

of all these different concepts in my head that kind of came together to this. You know, if you found this valuable, throw a like, throw a comment. I'd love to have your opinion. If you like some of this stuff or you like more of this kind of direction, I don't talk about leadership a ton.

I talk way more about like, you know, business and money stuff, but I think that it's important and I think that it underlies being able to execute anything is because after it's not you anymore and you have a team, then you have an entire team of people that you have to get to do what is best for the business and the way to do that is through leading.