The Jordan Harbinger Show - 459: Steve Madden | How a Cobbler Disrupted an Industry

Episode Date: January 21, 2021

Steve Madden (@stevenmadden) is a fashion designer and businessman, and author of The Cobbler: How I Disrupted an Industry, Fell From Grace, and Came Back Stronger Than Ever. What We Discuss with Steve Madden: How growing up as a half-Jewish, half-Irish outsider gave Steve a unique perspective and mindset that dispensed with establishment formalities. Why it's not failure that defines someone's character, but how someone responds to coming up short. In hindsight, Steve weighs the pros and cons of living by the "better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission" credo. Why knowing what you don't know can be what Steve considers "a very big gift." Why it wasn't designs or talent that made Steve's company successful; it was the cultivation of an unstoppable work ethic. And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/459 Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Coming up on the Jordan Harbinger show. It is so true. I used to just freak out when I saw somebody wearing my shoes, but now everybody wears my shoes. So seeing a great shoe is like hearing a great song when you're alone in your car on the radio. That tingle feeling you get when you're alone in your car and you hear that great song and you're just driving.

That's what it's like for me. I might have said that. I said a lot of things. Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people. If you're new to the show, we have in-depth conversations with people at the top of their

game, astronauts and entrepreneurs, spies and psychologists, even the occasional national security advisor, former cult member, mafia, enforcer. Each episode turns our guest's wisdom into practical advice that you can use to build a deeper understanding of how the world works and become a better critical thinker. Today, Steve Madden, yes, the shoe guy. The story you didn't know was that the company was originally started, of course, as a labor of love, as many companies are, but was funded and went public as part of a literal scam. Despite Steve's tremendous work ethic and talent and smarts, he was addicted to drugs, he was addicted to money, all his brothers were addicts, substance abusers. He later went to prison

for working with Jordan Belfort, aka the Wolf of Wall Street. Of course, we know Steve Madden as the shoes that can be found in every woman's closet all across North America. I'm glad to call the guy a friend. He's a living example that talent is nothing without the hustle and grind, both of which he has in spades. It wasn't designs or talent that made Steve Madden a successful company. It was indeed the work ethic, and there are a lot of lessons and a few great stories in this episode here. If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, these thinkers, these amazing founders every single week, it's because of my network and I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. And by the way, most of the guests on our show

already subscribe to the course and the newsletter. So come join us. You'll be in smart company. Now, here's Steve Madden. Having listened to the book, I had a feeling that you were a little bit more gregarious than slightly above average on the gregariosity scale. I don't know what I am anymore. I'm not sure I'm the same guy post pre during COVID. Well, that's not, that's a really good starting point. Let me tell you, because your book starts with you being half Jewish, and I don't even know if you said the other half, but anyway, it doesn't matter. Yeah, Irish, Catholic. That sounds right. I mean, you look the part.

Yeah. So you never really fit in, according to yourself, right? You never really fit the mold anyway. I don't know if you didn't fit in, but you didn't fit the mold. I didn't fit the mold, and it was a Jewish neighborhood, very Jewish neighborhood. It's called the Five Towns. It's very famous suburb in the 60s and 70s. It was the prototypical Jewish suburb in America.

So the Irish, the few Irish that were in the neighborhood, there was a section of town where the Irish and Italian lived. And they were like firemen and cops, blue collar guys. So the notion that someone that was Irish could be with these Jewish guys and sticky and literate and whatever, you know, was a shock to the Jewish guys. and then of course the Irish few Irish guys that I knew didn't want any part of me. You know, I actually enjoyed it.

I have to say, being a little different. I wonder if that's where you get your, I mean, you write in the book, it's better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission. I know neither you are I made that up, but I'm figuring growing up as an outsider is a great way to develop that mindset, right?

Because you grow up going, well, if I don't fit in here and I don't fit in there, I'm just going to do whatever I want, and if people get mad at me, then I'll just fix it later. Yeah, I'm not sure I had that sort of long-range planning. Of course, you didn't have the planning, but that's how it develops. It develops initially, like sort of intuitively, right? Yes, it does. Yeah, the crap you put in the book you think of afterwards and you go, ah, yeah, that sounds good.

I'm going to write that down. That's what I was doing the whole time. Yeah, that's a good one. I actually learned that later in life. And unfortunately, that is a truism. It is a slick little saying, but it is actually true. Why do you think it's unfortunate? I feel like that's, I mean, do you think it's a big deal that you have to be that way?

You know, so many rules that are so important to us, when pushed, you could break those rules, and then nothing happens. And, you know, your life is better or enriched or whatever happens. And you think to yourself, gee, you know, why don't I do that more? What are the limits of that? Because you yourself, and we'll get to this later on in the, the notes here because I read the whole book cover to cover. I really enjoyed it. I didn't think I'd like a book about a guy who started a shoe store, which is what it initially seemed to me. And now I'm like,

this guy's a good brand. You know, it's a good story. You're a good storyteller. Thank you. So where do we run up against the limits of that? Like 2020 hindsight, what's the limit of better to ask for forgiveness than permission? You're asking me some deep questions. Would I say that I wish I wasn't such a rule breaker and I'm not proud of a lot of things that I did. We were getting into some things, but I mean, look what's going on right now. Lots of millions of people that believe that the election was rigged. Muhammad Ali did that in the first Joe Frazier fight. You know, like he said, I really won the fight. This was before you were born, Jordan, but it was a big deal. Ali Frazier won was a big deal. You know, I think it's unhealthy. I worry about my children. I want to

to say to my children, losing does not mean you're a loser. It means you had a contest and you came up short, but you gave it your all. You left it all on the field. And you look your opponent in the eye and you say, good game. How you come back from something is what makes you a man and makes you a winner. You know, because there is nobody that doesn't go through life with some upsets. You know, no one. So I want to say to my young boy that I have and love, I want to say, no, it's actually, you're not a loser. It's how you act in the face of coming up short. That's what makes you a winner.

I really believe that. You said you think you're ADHD, let me tell you, as one ADHD diagnosis to another maybe an undiagnosed person, probably all entrepreneurs that are successful have it at some level, whether or not they ever had to take medication for it or they self-medicated like you did, there's definitely an advantage to having ADHD in business, I think. And you mentioned you had four screens. You had to pay attention to all the time with various things in your business. But I'm curious, you must have had to hire around your weaknesses or the weakness of being able to focus on one thing for a long time. What advantages do you find in business from being kind of hyperactive and having

your focus go from one thing to another really rapidly. I think it was the secret to my success, frankly, was hiring around my weaknesses, for sure. I just had a very keen awareness that I was a complete idiot at certain things. I just knew it. You know, like, it didn't fool myself. I said, like, I'm good at this and this.

I'm really bad at that. I remember one of my first hires was an accountant. Generally a good idea, yeah. Yeah. selling a lot of shoes, I had a lot of good ideas, you know, running a business. And very shortly, I was introduced to this Indian fellow who was so different. And, you know, he would organize things and pay the bills, mostly pay the bills. I would never pay a bill.

I'm laughing because I married my accountant. She's my wife. Oh. And it's a great move. I got to tell you. It's a great move. Marry your account. I would have married this guy.

I wasn't. I'm not gay, but if I was, I would have married. So, you know, that's another thing with ADD. That's another big thing that I didn't really touch on is the bill paying thing. Like, you just, it's not that you don't want to pay. It's just that you can't handle it. It's like, we'll do that next week. I'll pay that next week.

You know, there was no rhyme or reason to it other than control or whatever it was, you know, not to pay some bill. You're going to pay it. Or you're not going to pay it. But so he came in and all the bills were paid and I was able to have this mononial. sort of force, but all the while paying my bills and building a real business. You're like the Tasmanian devil going through the office and he's like behind you with the little sweeper and the little bucket, just like making sure that things don't fall off the wall. Yeah, that's actually good.

Your dad yanked you out of college and I, you said in the book, it was impossible for me. I just couldn't function like an adult. It's funny to look at that now and I think this is me. It's weird now because I'm super responsible and organized. I somehow outgrew it. I wonder if you feel like you outgrew that or if you just. are just better at hiring around your weaknesses now than you were before? I still do it.

I mean, it's different now. We're in a different place because everything has changed now and the company runs better without me than, even though I'm still working every day. I was going to say, you said you were in your office. What did you just show up and they're like, ah, Steve's here. Give him something to sign. God, that assholes here again.

I come to work and I focus on the shoes and I focus on ideas and I have great people that are kind of running stuff. It's great. But yes, it's a key thing. I always say knowing what you don't know is a very big gift. Now, I know a lot of guys and girls who don't have that gift or they think they're supposed to know something. Yeah, and they try and figure everything out and do it themselves.

Yes, they think they're supposed to. You know, that's an interesting thing. You say, well, I'm the head of this, so I'm supposed to know all this stuff. That gets people in trouble. It can sink your business. I mean, imagine if you're the chairman of Google and you think you know how to write a search algorithm and you're ignoring the other 3,000 business units that you have. I mean, you'll never get that far. You know, I think sometimes it happens to people, you know, when they're very, very successful and they start to think they know everything, you know, because they're at the top of their industry.

And, you know, then they start to opine about other things. Yeah, there's a term for this. I wish I could remember the name, but it's something where the concept where it'll come to me after the show, where when you're an expert in one thing and you're really high up, like if you're a doctor, you're a medical doctor, and then somebody asks you about what you think about politics, you will potentially, not always, but potentially have a very strong opinion about it. And you go, well, I'm a, I'm a medical doctor. You know, I'm a brain surgeon. Of course I'm going to be good at all these other things that I'm sort of only moderately good at or even terrible at.

You might know that you can't fix your car yourself, but you don't necessarily, know that you can't sell shoes or design shoes. That's great. The one I use is, well, can you imagine if you walked into a cockpit and you thought that you were supposed to know how to fly on the first day? You know, like, you walked in and said, why don't I know how to do this? And you start beating yourself up for not knowing. And that's the one that I kind of use as a guy. It's easy to do that. When you think of a radically different skill like flying a plane, you go, of course I don't need to know that. But if you think, well, I design shoes. so I should be able to balance the books of a shoe company,

you're actually choosing two skills that are just as different. Absolutely the same thing. Yeah. It's really, so that's why the plain analogy works for me, you know, very well. Yeah, yeah. They're different things, and a lot of founders get in trouble like that. When you were younger, we talked about self-medication, quailudes, I know you got into cocaine and things like that.

You had paranoia, you're so addictive. I imagine you got a lot of work done at that point in time, just because of the nature of cocaine and working in, New York, I used to work on Wall Street, so you'll let your, you know, you can fill in the blanks. You know, some of those guys. Yeah. And they get a lot of work done, but they're, you know, they're dysfunctional. I've heard you say creativity has to make money, otherwise it's boring.

That sounds pretty controversial. It's not that I disagree, but most creatives don't make money from their creative work, right? Do you think that those people are just wasting their time? Well, first of all, that's not true for everybody. It's just true for me. Okay. Yeah, that's all. I want to say that.

There's plenty of starving artists that are not boring or they don't think they're boring, and they're probably not. And I have a lot of respect for them myself. But for me, part of the creative process was hitting the register. That's part of the thing for me. It's all part of the same thing.

It's not enough just to me make a great shoe. It has to sell to lots of girls. Hitting the register, like, ching, is that the sound you hear in your head when you're thinking about it? Yeah. Yeah. And I know that that's the case with a lot of artists.

I've actually heard Paul McCartney talk about this. You know, everybody thinks they're the Beatles. They were just these artists that didn't care about money or whatever. And nothing could be further from the truth. And they were no less creative, by the way. But Paul would say, and I heard him say this on an interview that he'd say, oh, him and John would write a song and say, oh, we just got a swimming pool. Yeah.

That's another car. They understood that. it's not even materialistics. It's just part of the game, you know. I think a lot of people are motivated by that, not just purely by money, but the financial success is part of the game, right? You got to look the part.

You live in New York, so you know exactly what that's like. There's a lot of people that only care about what money can buy them in terms of status. It's not even necessarily materialistic, or it's the only measuring stick that they have because of the way that they were raised, potentially. I think that's it.

I think it's the metaphor for, love or winning. It's really crazy. And I'll tell you what's boring, listening to a guy with money talking about how money doesn't mean anything. Yeah, I know. I try and...

That's fucking boring. I try and reel that in sometimes because I'm like, watch, there's college kids who are coming into the worst job market in like a century. And they're like, Jordan, tell me more with Steve Madden about why I don't need money while I'm living on my mom's dirty couch in a garage.

However, what is true, what is true is that money cannot buy you happy. That is true. Money can make you very comfortable, even if you're miserable. It can make you comfortable. Now, there's no question that you can buy extra blankets and lots of shit, you know, that will not buy you happiness. That is something that you have to get somewhere else. Well, you tried, and certainly some of the other guys in the book tried that, and we'll get to that in a little bit. I want to back up just a smidge because you did, you worked at a lot of places. You go through a couple jobs you had in the book, but you're drinking, you're partying.

like I said, you get yanked out of college, and you started your own wholesale business. And it sounds like in part you started the business because you were not really functioning well in sort of regimented environments because of ADHD or possibly because of the drugs or possibly both. It actually sounds kind of miserable, right? Like you're not starting a business because you're called to it. You're starting a business because you're being pushed out of a lot of the other jobs that you had. Is that accurate? It's close to the truth. I was sort of unemployable, you know. But I always wanted to be in my own business, you know, ever since I was a kid, and I was fantasized about it. I worked for some amazing people, some of the jobs in the shoe business.

I worked for incredible teachers, and I took, you know, a lot of their knowledge and went into business. I'm grateful to them. There's a story in the book, and I can't remember if this was also in a trailer, but I think this is just so, this sort of puts you in a nutshell, if it's possible to put you in a nutshell. You're walking down the street, or you're driving down the street, or you're being driven down the street in New York, and you stop a woman on the street and you say, hey, where'd you get those shoes? And what did you offer to drive her to another shoe store if you could buy the shoes off of her feet? What's going on there? I've done that so many times. I can't, I don't even know what you're talking about, but I stop people all the time in a supermarket in the street. I see a

girl wearing something and it looks great. I'd even stop people and I said, where'd you get that shoe? And they say, Steve Madden. Oh. How about that one? Yeah. So that's happened to me a few times, but I like to see the street, the way they wear something and it gives me an idea and it's a real turn on for me, you know, creatively to see a certain woman wearing a certain shoe. What do you do with the shoe that you buy? Do you just take it apart or something like that? Because I'm trying to think, Why keep it instead of just taking a picture of it, for example? Well, it's often not copyable. It's just the attitude of the shoe.

It's just something that you just want to capture that spirit and it's going on in the whole outfit, you know. That makes sense. It's almost like a marker or something, but. These women must have thought you were like a complete creep, though, right? Like, at first he's hitting on me, now he's like trying to buy my shoes. I just want the shoes. Then he's like, I'll drive you to another store.

getting in the car. When I meet women, I'm like looking at their feet. I'm not even looking at them. Literally, my first move is always to look at their feet. Just obsessed. And you get like eyes up here, buddy. No, that's your shoes. I'm looking at your shoes. Now, especially I'm older and everything. And I just had one in East Hampton. I was in East Hampton. And I went, please, I'm so sorry. She goes, I know who you are. Relaxed. So that's funny. I saw you coming down the street and I wondered if you were going to ask about my shoes. I've heard about this on the internet.

Yeah. I've heard about it. Whenever you weren't selling shoes, you were hanging out in the shoe department at Macy's. This is from the book, watching women react to shoes. Nordstrom's, Macy's, Bloomingdale's, all the stores. So that's not going to lie, that's still a little bit unusual behavior, right? Nobody else is doing this. It's an old sort of shoe doggy kind of.

I think they probably did it, you know, maybe 100 years ago or something. but 50 years ago. But I'd like to see, I love stores, and I would hang out of my own store. That's one of the reasons why I opened my store. I'd hang out and see what they were gravitating to. I can't speak for other people, but that was always something that I wrote and still do.

I just was in my store in North Miami, Florida, and just hanging out, it's not as busy now because of COVID. Yeah. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger Show with our guest, Steve Madden. We'll be right back. And now, back to Steve Madden on the Jordan Harbinger show. Do you tell the story you're coming in?

Like, do you call a header? Do you just show, you're like driving by, and you're like, I'm going to pop in there and see if I get helped right away or something like that? They know who I am because we got loops in the story. Oh, that makes sense. I don't really like that sort of idea. Undercover boss.

I don't really. Yeah. The employees are under enough stress. You know, they don't need to wonder if you're going to pop in. I think that's so true. And I really, I always found that show kind of offensive, to be honest with you. it's hard enough working in a story. It is really, you're dealing with the public

and you're on your feet, and whether it's my store or Zara, those people are in the trenches of fashion business. And I always have a lot of sort of Rakhmunis for them. You know that word? I don't, but it sounds like Hebrew or something. What is it, Rachmanus? It's a Yiddish word.

Yiddish word. I'm the only Irish guy that you know that speaks Yiddish. Yeah, that's probably true. You might, even in New York, that's probably true. Yeah, Rachmonis is a, it's just like, I have like, not pity, but like I feel for them, Rachmanus. Yeah, that is a good word. You're Jewish friends.

Dude, I'm Jewish. I should know this, you know. You're Jewish? Yeah, yeah. You look like as Irish's Patty's pit. You know why? It's because my dad is Ukrainian, German and my mom's side is Jewish. So I'm only like.

Oh, you're only like me? I'm a half breed like you. That's right. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't even know I was Jewish, quote, unquote, until I was like 13 years old because we never did any of the Jewish stuff when I was growing up. It didn't really matter. I never did any of the Jewish stuff.

The thing is that my grandparents who were Jewish, they lived with us for a couple of years on their way to Florida. On their way to Florida. Very accurate. The subtle, yes, on their way to Florida. For a couple of years. They did for two years. No, it was great. I remember a lot about it. And they spoke a lot of Yiddish. I hung out with them. They were interesting people. Yeah. And they were very smart and, you know, readers. And I really dug them.

The Yiddish is such a great language. It really is. And it's a dying, well, maybe it's not dying. It definitely is. It definitely is. Like, it's not going anywhere anytime soon because of Orthodox Jews. Yeah. But it's definitely, if there are any Yiddish schools and things like that, they're just

like religious schools. It's pretty isolated. It's pretty insular. And it's probably nobody's first language. You know what? You hanging out in your store reminds me of, you ever hear that story? of, is it Sam Walton at Walmart? They called the police on him once in like Brazil or something.

He was on the floor like measuring the aisles and stuff and they thought they had this mentally ill guy in the store and it turns out he's like this billionaire or at the time, you know, $100 million, whatever, 100 years ago. And he was like, oh, I just want to see if they know something that I don't with these narrower aisles. Maybe they can fit more items in the store and so he was just like obsessed with every element of the business and he liked hanging out. in his stores just to see how it worked

and how everything worked and try to optimize everything and be in every level of the job. It's just a funny visual to see you or to think about you like lurking in the corner at Macy's and women looking at you sideline like, does that guy work here? And the salespeople be like, no, no, that's Stevie.

He hangs out here because he loves watching women try on shoes. I identify with Sam Walton. I love Sam Walton's story. And, you know, I identify with that. He just believed in his company and he built it and one store after another. And I love the Sam Walton story, and I admire him so much.

And a lot of great entrepreneurs, they did stuff back in the day. They were on the floor of their store. There's famous stories about Mr. Marshall Field, you know, being on the floor in Chicago, and there is no more Marshall Field. Oh, is that out of business? Well, no, it's owned by Macy's. That makes sense. So the Marshall Field famous Chicago store is now called Macy's.

But I identify with that very much. and always felt like his spirit, Frank. You know, it's funny, but that kind of hands-on silly founder. Yeah, the eccentric founder who shows up and is measuring the aisleways. And it's like, don't mind him. He's the owner. We don't question him trying to buy shoes off customers that walk in the store to buy our shoes. Yeah.

Yes. Tell me about meeting this guy Jordan Belfort, the Wolf of Wall Street. For people who don't know, right, people who don't know who he is, they made the movie The Wolf of Wall Street. He's essentially this like hardcore sales sheister, you know, sells bad stocks. He was actually quite a brilliant guy. Yeah, he was actually quite intelligent. And he just chose this, you know, this boiler room thing.

Yeah, like a dark path. But I'll tell you about him anyway. Yeah. So they raised money for companies. And, you know, I never had a lot of money. So through my childhood friend, they raised money for my company. And they were quite dynamic. And it was really something.

It was very much like the movement. captured a lot of the spirit of what they were. And, you know, I got involved with them on doing some other IPOs. And that's how I got in trouble. But he was a very charismatic, very, very brilliant guy. And of course, our relationship fractured, but I don't have, you know, I don't have a lot of regret. I mean, other than I did stupid things. Sure. I'm certainly not going to, I'm certainly not going to blame him for it. Yeah, no, that makes sense. Do you think 2020 hindsight you should have known at the time, or was he just really magnetic and you weren't even thinking about? I was greedy. I was young and greedy and fearful, and he was charismatic, and I never met anybody like him. And, you know,

he kind of like sort of was outside all the fears, you know, all the sort of middle class fears that I had, you know, like, I could never be a rich man. I thought I was good at what I did, but I never thought I would be great. This guy, Steve Madden, right? Yeah. And he was able to go beyond that and reach for the stars. And he did some bad stuff, but it doesn't take away from the fact that he had some stuff that I really admired as I made mistakes. And so, yes, I do regret some of the things I did.

and I got involved with these guys, and I knew it was shady. It was too good to be true. It was too good to be true. So what they were doing for people who are confused, they buy companies or pieces of companies, and then they convince people through like shady marketing tactics and lies and things like that to invest money so that the stock price gets inflated. Right. And then at the top, which they coordinate, they sell off their share of the company at the all-time

high for that stock. and dump it. So it's called a pump and dump. And they do that. And then everybody else who they convince to buy through the marketing and the phone stuff,

the boiler room stuff, those people lose their investment because the stock is actually worthless. It's been artificially inflated, right? Is that more or less how it works? Yeah, it's sort of the greater fool theory. It's a Ponzi scheme. You know, you keep selling the stock.

Now, here's the thing about it. So most of the companies were shitty little companies, right? Like a bagel company, a karate company. And then here comes Steve Badden, tiny little company, Steve Madden, you know, I was doing nothing. They invested in me and were part of the scheme. In the meantime, I'm designing one hot shoe after another. The girls are going crazy

over my shoes. I'm building a business simultaneous to this boiler room, you know, Strat Nocumad. And lo and behold, I built this amazing company. And I think I was the only stock they took public that ended up being successful. Yeah, it was like an accident that they bought a show of your company and it didn't just bomb after that. Yeah, it was. It was kind of an accident. And, you know, but I learned a lot from those guys. And I learned a lot from Jordan and Danny, you know, I learned a lot from them, you know, the good bits, you know, the good stuff. Like what? Give me an example. You know, just the relentless singleness of purpose, the believing in themselves, believing that they were the best, believing that the impossible was possible. You know,

when they came to me and they said they were going to raise me $600,000, that would be like me calling you up to Jordan. I'm going to send you $60 million. You know, it was like that. Like, what? $600,000. I mean, I never had more than like $30,000 ever together in my life, you know. Yeah. And then they took Republican. It was, you know, they raised $9 million. It was the numbers were that kind of thing, you know, just these dreams. Do you think you got addicted to money like you were previously addicted to other substances? Was it the same thing? It's not quite the same thing, but certainly... I mean, you're not putting it up your nose or whatever or popping it in pill form, but like you get that same rush, right? Or similar? Yeah. Same rush. Yeah. For sure. How did that break?

Or do you still have it, but you keep it on a leash, you know? Well, I was punished. And then, you know, I've been the same time, I've been very fortunate. I have a very successful company. But I was punished very severely. Deservedly, I want to say, deservedly. I paid all the money back, millions and millions of dollars. So I learned, I don't keep it on a leash. No, you know, your addictions do pop up, you know. But fear is healthy. Like the fear of getting in trouble is a very healthy fear. Yeah. Like we all lose our temper, want to kill somebody. But like, you know, the fear of shooting someone, the fear of the trouble is, stops keeps order in the society, right? Otherwise, guys would be rocking around with guns shooting

each other if there was no consequences, right? Absolutely. Yeah, of course. I know that so being punished for something doesn't always keep, you know, an addiction per se. No, no, it doesn't. It doesn't. I'm just trying to say what I've learned in my recovery that there's other things and it's not the end of the world and right now one of the things they call it FOMO. Oh yeah. Talk about it all the time. Yeah. Driving this market right now.

You know, and I have to fight that, you know, fear of missing out for the listeners. What do you have FOMO about as somebody who's like? We all, you know, it's just like a human being, you know, you just, you know, you have FOMO, you see people making money and, but. Yeah, let me get more. As I said in my, like if you're watching us on YouTube, you got a pretty good view. I don't even know what that building is behind you. It's absolutely enormous.

You know, but it's... It's the tallest apartment house in the world. It's behind me. It's on Park Avenue in 57. This spire. Yeah. It's kind of amazing. I don't know who lives there, but I'm very lucky.

But you're looking at it. Yeah, and you're like on... You're probably on Park 56 in Park or something at that point. I don't want to docks you on a podcast. But you're not too far away from wherever that building is. I'm down the block. I'm down the block. Right, right.

But it's unhealthy. And I think that when I'm in a good place, it's because I want what I have. Yeah. You know what I mean? I want what I have. And I want what I have. And we're comfortable and it's an inside job, if you know what I mean? You kind of have to feel good about yourself through.

Yeah, self-actualization and development growth. You get self-esteem from esteemable acts, right? Don't you think? Yeah, ideally. So, you know, I always like to say. say, you remember when there was, do you remember the telephone booths and they used to have the big telephone book? Yeah, like metal chained or whatever to the thing. Yeah. So I would look for a number. I'd be in the booth, right? 20 years ago, let's just say. And I would see the number and I ripped

the page out of the book. And that's not very esteemable. No, but you see it in every movie. Right. You see them ripping the, so at some point, I stopped doing that, right? And I went, wow, that's not nice to the next person using this book. And so I would close the book and put it back. And I would, that was an esteemable act. And I would build my self-esteem from the fact that I didn't rip that page out of the book. And sort of that's how it works for me. Well, I didn't do that today.

And I was very proud of myself. I didn't rip pages out of books anymore. Got to set the bar somewhere, right? You've got to start somewhere, right? and so, you know, it's that kind of thing. Did you want to scale your business huge? Like, did you feel an addiction rush or a big dopamine hit when you grew the business or the bottom line of the business?

We just sort of happened, and it was sort of like a big show, you know, that I was putting on and I probably over hired, you know, had a little bit more people that I needed and a little bit more fanfare, but I knew that I was building something and it just, you know, so I just kept adding and adding, and it just exploded, you know. It was kind of like that. If it didn't work out, we wouldn't be talking. That's true. Yeah, of course.

I just wondered if it was always part of the plan. No, it wasn't really. Okay. It really wasn't. Anyway, so it was kind of like the show. I remember, like, early on, I would think I got all these people, like, you know, I had like three extra people that would make me insane. They weren't busy or something, you know.

You have a business. And I would see them and go, oh, God, what a, you know, looked like a big hubbub, you know. The buzz. So you kind of got swept up in that. And you're growing the, you're growing. the business and then of course eventually get punished. We'll get to that in a second because I want to get some of the details on that.

I do want to go back to the shoes and the designs and the customers because I've heard you say seeing a woman wearing your shoe out in public is like hearing your own song played on the radio. Sure, yeah. Or somebody wrote, whoever wrote the book wrote it in there. I think I said it. I might have said it. But it's true.

It is so true. I used to just freak out when I saw somebody wearing my shoes. But now everybody wears my shoes. So seeing a great shoe is like. like hearing a great song when you're alone in your car on the radio, that tingle feeling you get when you're alone in your car and you hear that great song and you're just driving. That's what it's like for me. I might have said that. I said a lot of things. Yeah, there's a lot in the book. Whoever proof read it, you know, condensed it a little bit. No, no, I did. Those are Steveisms.

It makes sense, though, right? It's a good combination of art and commerce. And I find that to be the same with like this podcast, not that it's the same thing as a shoe, but in many ways it kind of is. You know, I'll do an interview. It'll get edited and I hear it and I go, huh, we did a pretty good job with that. You know, like we cut out the train siren, whatever that was going on behind it. We cut out the dog barking. And then it all ended up pretty well. Like during, in the making, you've got glue stuck to your hands. I mean, you know, not me, but you probably, you know, get glue stuck to your hands. There's some fabric on the bottom of your foot. Yes. It's like they say watching the sausages get made is not pretty.

Exactly. But they taste good at the end. Right. No, that's so true. And you hear it, you're walking, like I'll hear my wife listening to something and I'll be like, oh, what is she listening to? It sounds kind of interesting. And then I'll be like, oh, I could barely hear it, but that's our own show about our own topic.

And I'm like, yes. That's fantastic. You know, as long as it's not my voice, usually I can recognize my own voice. But if it's somebody else, I go, oh, who is that? You know, I've always compared it to the music business, which I was fascinated with, like, with hits because-h songs, yeah. We would make a shoe and it was like a hit, like a song. know, like everybody wore it.

I was always fascinated of why a song, you know, would become a hit. I was so interested. I had big moguls on my board of directors and two monster music guys on my board of directors

that I met through different various things because I was so interested in capturing that. And I had this fellow named Walter Yetnikoff on my, you're too young. He was the fucking moguls, this dude,

in the 80s, you know, Billy Joel, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jackson, he was the prototypical music mogul. I had this other fellow named Charles Coppelman, another big, gigantic music mogul. And I would always be like, how do you do it? Like, what's it like, you know? They were like me, you know, they were just putting one foot in front of the other. But somehow, like, there is something that makes these people different. And, you know, sometimes on shows like this, we try to get to the heart of it. But it is a lot of it. But it is, is hard to decode, right? It's very hard to decode. Some of it's habits. Some of it's just the way that these people think. In fact, I know that you wanted to know everything about your customers,

not just what kind of shoes they liked. And I feel like there's something here about taking tons of little inputs that maybe you can't even quite put your finger on in order to design something for a specific demographic. Yeah. How did you get the information that you wanted? Did you talk to the customers that came in and say like, hey, what music are you listening to? You know, how are you getting the data? Yeah, that's interesting. thing. You go through influences and you sort of soak it up and that happened in the stores a lot. It was cool to soak up that stuff. Through osmosis, basically.

Yeah, yeah. I remember recently getting plugged into this little hip-hop thing with my friend Irv Gotti, a buddy of mine, there was this artist named Bobby Shmurda. Rolls right off the tongue. No, I haven't heard of that. No. Okay, so Bobby Shmurda. I would say it was maybe five years ago or four years ago. This guy, this Jamaican kid, does a hip-hop song and a video for like $600. And it captures the imagination of the entire country in the entire hip-hop community. Like nothing I've ever seen before.

It might have been, I wish I could remember. It was four years ago. And he does this hip-hop song. And at the end, he does this dance. and apparently Beyonce did the dance in her concert and it just goes people just go crazy over

the Schmoney dance Bobby Schmurda and I remember like getting plugged into that and how exciting it was that I knew about this hip hop song which I, you know,

it's not my instinct to like I would never listen to hip hop on my own you know. Right. And so, and I would go to the stores and I would play Bobby Schmerter

and the kids would go crazy. Like, how did you know about this? And, like, it was such an interesting phenomenon. Right, because they're used to hearing, like, smooth jazz 94.7 when they go to a shoe store. Yeah, no, they don't hear that at Steve Matt. We're not smooth jazz people. Or even elevate the music you have to buy

from, like, the Muzac company so that you don't get sued by the... Kids love hip-hop music. You know, kids who buy my shoes, they just... They love it. You just throw on a SoundCloud playlist in a store now, probably, and you're probably better off. It's safer.

Safer than turning on Sirius XM and getting sued by RIAA or whatever, the artist legal. But poor Bobby Schmurter, by the way, the song was about, like, robbing and killing people. And he was so, people, like, connected with that genuineness, right? Well, he was so genuine that the guy actually got indicted for murder. Oh, man.

I think he's in jail now. But he was terrific. It was great a song. You got to listen to the song. I will. I'll just Google it, and Google will say, did you mean this? Because I'm not going to be able to spell Schmerda,

but Google will find out. No, Schmurter. It's exactly like you think. Oh, really? H, M-U-R-D-A. Okay, I probably would have thrown an E in there, but that's a good thing you told me. Where do you get your design ideas?

Do things just pop into your head, or is it like a small kind of iterative process? It's a process. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. It's kind of like a writer looking at an empty page. And you have a big team, and I always say that Steve Madden,

it's like a big stew. This is the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Steve Madden. We'll be right. right back. Thanks for listening and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers, that's what allows us to make all this stuff for you. This hopefully great stuff, to learn more about who advertises on the show and support the sponsors that support us, visit Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. That's everything in one place, all the codes, all the

URLs. Please do consider supporting those who make this show possible. And don't forget, we've got a worksheet for today's episode. That link is in the show notes at Jordan Harbinger.com slash podcast. The worksheet has all the drills and a lot of takeaways from the episode so you don't have to take notes while you're at the gym or driving. Now for the conclusion of our episode here with Steve Madden. I know many of the designs are adapted from small run shoes that you discover overseas or somebody will send you something or show you something or you're maybe a million different things. Yeah. Million things. Dreams, movies. Dreams, really? Dreams. Walking into the Gucci store. I mean, just a million different ideas. They just come from every.

We're trying just to make great, trendy, great shoes. If you think of a shoe in a dream, do you wake up and draw it or what? You describe it to somebody. Usually they're terrible, but my dreams are so awful lately. The shoes from dreams are terrible? Sometimes. Sometimes you think, oh, I jumped about this wedge on the beach. I remember that.

And then it's impossible to wear wedges on a beach? No, people do. People actually do. I don't know much about shoes. It just seems harder to wear that on a beach. But what do I know? I remember seeing like a movie poster. You know, remember the one shoe.

It was a movie with Gwyneth Paltrow called Shallow. Oh, yeah. That's a good movie. And I remember seeing the shoe on the poster. I said, we got to do that shoe. What is that? This is what I've been trying to get to. Like, you know, it was like that kind of thing, you know.

So you recognize it when you see it. Yeah. And then you want to make some changes and make it a Steve Madden thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of that. That makes sense.

There's a lot of things. There's a whole book by my. Buddy Austin Kleean called Steel Like an Artist. And the whole idea is like, artists are always saying, like, oh, I'm original, I'm original. And he's like, literally no one is original. So just do take the bits of the best things from other people. That's what real artists do.

That's what we do. You know, so we do it, sure, yeah, we do it all. Yeah. We do all of that stuff. And yeah, memory. Mark Jacobs talks about memory. He's a real American genius, true genius, Mark Jacobs. And somebody I look up to.

And even though he's younger than me. Oh, really? Yeah. He's more handsome than me, too, which I don't like. Yeah, that's infuriating generally. But Mark always talks about memory. You know, because it's so true what you say, you know, again, listening to like interviews with Lenin or talking about like, oh, yeah, he heard this song and he liked that lick, and he would take that bit,

put it in and change it a little bit, that kind of thing. Yeah, look, even with podcasting, people are like, oh, you know, this is different than everything else. And all I think of is, well, I mean, I listen to like 50 other interviews to prep for this one. So are any of my thoughts even original? I don't even know anymore. Nothing is original. We should have a TV show. Nothing is original. So Jordan Belfort eventually this catches up with him. He gets indicted. There's a lot of stress, I would imagine, in your life at this point, because if you're working with somebody on something shady and they end up getting indicted, the first thought has to be, oh, crap, are they

collaborating with the feds against me. I mean, what are you feeling at this point in time? Were you suspicious that they were working against you, like with the FBI? Yeah, yeah, that was a tough one. They got in trouble, and then they cooperated, and that was it. You know, I kind of knew the way it was going to go. If I'm in your shoes at that point, I'm replaying every conversation I've ever had in my head. All of that.

I remember hearing it, and I was in the back of a car, and I remember the first time I heard, they're telling on you, And I remember like slinking down in the bottom of the car. Oh, shit. I actually knew exactly what it was going to be, too. Like, it was weird how I like had a premonition. I was going to do X amount of time in prison. Like you knew instantly like, oh, crap, I've had incriminating conversations with these guys.

Oh, yes. Yeah. And like, were they wearing a wire around me? Like, yeah. Oh, my God. I had a good friend wear a wire on me on the golf course. Oh, man. How did you find out that it was?

I did. I found out later. Oh, that makes sense. And I remember the day, you know, he was acting kind of strange. You know, that was it. It must be weird. I mean, this is a dumb question, but how did that feel? I mean, it has to sting, right?

Because these are childhood friends, some of these other guys in the book. And I suppose now maybe you understand their perspective, given that they were facing serious jail time. But it's still got to be like, dang, man, we grew up together. And you're talking to the feds. Totally. Yeah, it was all of that. It was terrible. It stung, and it was, you know, it was like a betrayal.

Not great for the addiction recovery, right? Yeah, not great. But you know, you go through what you go through and it makes you stronger. I mean, for me, adversity has been a great teacher. It was a betrayal. I hope you never go through it, Jordan. Yeah, it sounds miserable.

You know, reading in the book, the story, the way that you're feeling, even when you were reading that part of the audiobook, I was like, man, he still feels bad about this. Like you can tell in your voice. Yeah, I felt bad about it. I'm not hung up on like, oh, those guys are assholes, you know, it's over for me, you know, it's past.

Yeah, I suppose. Were you worried about the business falling apart if you went to prison? Were you thinking, oh my God, now it's going to, I'm going to ruin everything now? I was. And I had a lot of great people and they kept it going, really great. They did. I hired a guy at CEO and he knew what I wanted to do. It was impossible for me to run my business from prison. Impossible. And illegal, probably, right? And illegal and impossible. Forget about illegal. It was impossible. This guy did a great job. My buddy Jamie stepped in and Jamie Carson stepped in and handled stuff from me. And so I was able to come back to a not super successful business,

but a business that was doing some things really well. And so I was able to step in and, you know, go to that, go to another level. So I was very lucky there. So you were sentenced to 3.5 years in prison. You did a couple years and a half. And this is like 2020 hindsight, right? It was for money, not much else, right? And two and a half years, that's kind of a lifetime.

in the fashion industry. It is a long time. It's a long time. In any industry, it's a long time. And it's a long time to be in prison. And that's why I hate to see they give such severe sentences to people. And people think, oh, we only got four years? Yeah.

You know, like really? For like selling a pound of marijuana. It's like a huge amount of time for somebody who's 29. No, they used to have a mandatory minimums. Over 100 plants was 10 years. Oh, that's so long. That's so long. I could go on about that, but we don't have enough time.

I've talked about that on the show before, too, because people will, I said the same thing as you. Oh, he only got eight years. He's a nonviolent criminal who's 31. He's going to get out at 40. Like, you know, it's a life-ruining amount of time. Yeah. And I'm wondering, even though it was quote unquote only 2.5 years, right, that's a lot of time away from friends, family, business.

Do you ever in your head do the calculation of the money you gained and try and match it to the time you lost? Like, did you ever try to calculate, okay, was it worth it? It's a good question. All right. No, it's not worth it. And I would have gladly given all of my money up to not go to prison. I actually talked about it with convicts, like in the joint.

I'd say, and they would laugh at me, you know. There's nothing worse than being in prison other than you can imagine what would be worse. Right. But I tried to convey it, the awfulness of it. The awfulness of it is not actually being in the prison because human beings, we make the best of every situation. right? You know, I mean, we get a routine and you survive, you know, but it was just being in prison and being away from the world, you know, knowing that the world was going on and you were stuck in your little cell and, you know, while the world was going on and it was like you were dead

and everything was moving along and people were meeting other people and people were doing business deals and people were having children, people were dying and then you would just, the world is moving and your city. there. I can't explain the heartbreaking feeling that was on a daily basis was it was like my heart broke every fucking day can conjure it up in my mind. It's just this horrible thing. And actually, I do my workouts, I read my books, play little cards, laugh with the guys. It wasn't awful, you know. I mean, it's awful compared to our lives today. But you get used to. You to your routine. You're surviving, but I can't, it's just terrible. The way the guards, the people in the prison

treat you so badly, like you're not even a human being. It must be an interesting perspective, because I've heard you say, and I'm paraphrasing here, the differences between other prisoners and me were negligible. I think I just had better opportunities. Talk to me a little bit about that. Well, yeah. I mean, I was fortunate because a lot of, if you, White-collar guys had a tough time because some of them were lawyers and they got disbarred, stuff like that. And then, you know, dope dealers, guys I was with, particularly in the black community, really had a lot to deal with. First of all, they got so much time, which was one, that's a separate subject, but they really go back to tough neighborhoods and it's just the

tough situation for them. Yeah, they don't come out to like $100 million shoe company. Generally. No, they do not. No, for sure they do not. That's true. And it's not a funny thing, but I just, it's a heartbreaking situation and we don't have enough time on this podcast to really deal with it. But they were really smart dudes I was with that just the opportunity wasn't there or circumstance, you know, wasn't there and some of the very smart, clever guys. And I taught classes and I tried to teach the guys, try to channel that into stuff that was, legal. If you use those same sort of marketing techniques, you know, you could be successful. Yeah, like the hustle that some of these guys have, I've done work in prisons, and I meet guys,

I say this on the show all the time, so I'll keep it short, but I make guys all the time that have really good ideas, some of which already exist in our $400 million, you know, junk hauling companies or different types of vendors. And there are guys that that'll tell you stories about how they worked seven days a week selling hats on a street corner to make, you know, X amount of dollars. And then they switched to drugs just because there was more money in it. And I'm thinking, if you were already working 14 hours a day, seven days a week in the rain, sleep, and snow to make money, you could have been successful at anything, but they weren't. They got caught, not selling hats, right? And they end up in prison for 10 years, and then it's game over.

I'm wondering, what did you learn in prison anything that you apply to business even now that you take with you? Oh, that's a good question. Patience. Patience. You learn that for sure. Yeah, everyone's on, you're on their timeline and there. That's got to be tough for an entrepreneur, huh? I know that you eventually had some kids, one of whom I just met. She's very sweet and funny. Yeah, she's sweet. And you can't be a selfish idiot or a workaholic when you have two little babies. I mean, you can, but it's, most people don't do that, right? So I'm wondering, do you think that if you'd had kids earlier, you would have become more responsible? Or, Or do you think you would have just screwed up your kids instead?

I would say that I had children when I was ready to be a good father, I guess. I was very fortunate. Yeah. I feel like I had them late. We have a wonderful relationship, and I'm so happy. I love them, and they're like, it's pretty cool. And it happens when it happens. Yeah.

I guess we don't know, but it's lucky that you didn't have kids earlier. But I know that I'm smarter than I was five years ago, And I know five years ago, I was smarter than I was five years before that. So. Yeah. So that's helpful. Yeah, exactly. I'm not a perfect father.

I just, I was making a sandwich for my son this morning. And I dropped it on the floor. And I just, and I freaked out. Were you like, he doesn't know. I'll just pick it up and give it to him. No, no. He was watching me and he was talking about the football game tonight. And I was making this sandwich and I just dropped it.

And I'm so upset with myself. I freaked out. I screamed to the universe. and we went ah like this because it just plon fell and then he just sort of left me and then i just went to his room and i made fun of myself like i would what can you say i was such an idiot i just exploded on myself i always act like oh i don't do that anymore and then i drop a plate and i just completely freaked out yeah yeah the irishman comes back out yeah that's so true yeah i guess what I was saying was that I wanted to let him know that having a temper is not a good thing.

Yeah. Tell me about it. My dad had a temper. I've got a little bit of a temper. And my wife's like, don't let our kid see you. I got a 15-month-old kid. And I'm like, I know, because it's the worst quality that I have, right? By far. It is a very bad, it is a terrible quality. And my dad had a terrible temper. You know, the house shook. Yeah. And then I have it. My brother's Cabot. And it's like we're channeling our father. And it's just awful. And sometimes I'm really good.

And then today I was just, you know, with COVID. I'm seven things on my mind. And I'm, you know, late. And I'm making this sandwich. And I drop it. And I just fucking exploded to the universe. Like I just actually let out of an animal sound. It's funny now, but it's not funny in the moment, right?

I was like this. And I screamed. Right. to the universe. Yeah. And he looked, he ran into his room. Did he run in there? Was he just like, ah, fucking, come on, dad.

It's pastrom. I think it was all of that. He slithered into his room. And I went back. And I made fun of myself, like, freaking out. I was just, you know, this COVID thing. Yeah. Well, it's driving everybody up the wall.

Yeah. One thing I noticed about you is that even after you had money, you had a family, you had brand recognition, you know, people, when you approach them on the street, they don't get freaked out. They said, oh, Steve Mann wants to look at my shoes. Okay, you're still grinding, you're still hustling. Did you believe at any point that you were as only, you're only as good as your last hit shoe, kind of like a music artist? Oh, yeah, I still believe that.

Yeah? Maybe it's not true right now. I don't know, but I still in my DNA, it's that I believe that. I'm always looking hunting. It's kind of like a music artist, right? They're only as good as their last hit record and you want to stay, right? Do you feel like you have to fight to stay relevant or that you're fighting to stay relevant? We're fighting to make the best shoes.

Yeah. Absolutely. Yes, we are. In closing here, you know. In closing. In closing. In conclusion. In conclusion.

Finally. That's how I ended all my essays in high school and forever. I used to say finally. That's better because in conclusion's a little on the nose, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's right.

So finally. Finally, sir. Do you ever think to yourself this could all come crashing down at any minute? Is it tenuous for you? I did. And at the moment that I started to not think that, COVID hit. Just in case. To keep you on your toes.

Yeah. And you know what? COVID has been a big blow to all of us. You know, I have stores all over the world. It was shuttered. It's been, you know, quite a blow to my company. Of course, we're going to crawl back, fight back. And it's been a big blow.

And we're fighting through it. We've got a great internet business. But it's been really something. Even on a personal level, do you think like, okay, you know, my life is really good. I never thought I would be here, maybe it's all going to go away. Oh, yes. No, not because of COVID, not because of the economy,

but just because, poof, one day you wake up and it's like this whole thing was a dream and you're, you know, you're sweeping the floor someplace. Yeah, yeah. Well, I don't think I'll be sweeping the floor. Maybe driving an Uber. Yeah. But, yes, I had that thought many times. I don't have it as much now.

I've saved some bit of money. But, yeah, I thought that for a long time. It gives me up at night. or gives me nightmares. Steve, this has really been a good interview. I liked it. I enjoyed talking to you, Jordan. I really did.

Do it again. Yeah, I would love to. We'll do it in person when the world opens back up and I fly out to New York. I love that. We've got a trailer of our interview with Howie Mandel,

one of the most iconic comedians of our day, and a judge on America's Got Talent. Howie spent some time with us being especially candid about his anxiety and about how he turned being impulsive into a superpower and more. Check out episode 210 here on the Jordan Harbinger's show. So what happened was we were doing, not unlike we're doing now, we were doing

an interview, and he says, thank you. And we'll probably go to a commercial and thank you, Howie, and I got up. And I started walking to the door, and I thought he was like wrapping it up and going to commercial. And then I just said to somebody really quietly, can you back? And he's going, what are you afraid of the door? And then he goes, just open the door. And I got, can't open the door. He goes, just open the door. And then what happened is I started getting a panic attack and I started breathing heavy and I just turned to him and thinking that he had already thrown the commercial because he was just talking to me. Howard, please, this is really serious. I go to therapy for this. I have something called obsessive compulsive disorder. I'm about to pass out.

If you don't open the door for me now, you'll be calling 911 and taking me to the hospital. This whole thing was on the national radio. I thought, oh my God, that was probably the darkest space I've ever been and I'm walking through the lobby toward the door out into the steaming streets of Manhattan. I might as well just continue walking and walk right into traffic. And I stopped just outside the door and, you know, millions of people are on the street, but I felt very alone. And some guy came into my periphery and said to me, are you, Howie Mandel? And I, you know, I just nodded affirmatively. And he said, just heard you on stern. And my heart dropped him in my stomach. And right before I could take off in the traffic, he said two words, which means something very different today.

But they changed my life. And he went, me too. with Howie Mendel, including some pretty awkward moments of my own making. Check out episode 210 here on the Jordan Harbinger show. This is a fun show. Steve is all over the place, man. He has a lot of energy. There's a lot of editing. The business, he was running the business from home, of course, as all of us are right now, and the phone is ringing in. There's people coming in and out, and I'm just like, how do you focus when this is going on? And he's just wired so dang ADHD, ADHD, but he's turned it into an advantage. So it got me thinking about how we can use what most people consider to be huge disadvantages to advantages, especially if you're an entrepreneur and

you can schedule everything around you or make everything around you or build your environment around what might be a weakness. You really can transform those weaknesses into strengths. So I would encourage you to look at your own environment and look at what needs tweaking in order to turn what might be a disadvantage for you now into something that could be an advantage for you long term. So big thanks to Steve Madden. His book title is The Cobbler. We'll link to that in the show notes. Links to everything we talked about will be in the show notes, of course. Please do use our website links if you buy books from guests on the show. It helps support the show. Worksheets for this episode are in the show notes. Transcripts are in the show notes. There's a video of this interview

going up on our YouTube at Jordan Harbinger.com slash YouTube. I'm at Jordan Harbinger. On both Twitter and Instagram or hit me on LinkedIn. I'm teaching you how to connect. with great people and manage relationships using the systems and tiny habits that I myself use to cultivate relationships for business or personal reasons. That course is free. It's at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Dig the well before you get thirsty, people. Come on. It will be a game changer for you. This show is created in association with Podcast 1. My amazing team is Jen Harbinger, Jay Sanderson, Robert Fogart, Ian Baird, Millie Ocampo, Josh Ballard, and Gabe Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.

The fee for this show is that you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. You know somebody who's interested in the shoe biz, or just needs to know that ADHD could be an advantage in business. Share this episode with him. Hopefully you find something great in every episode, so please share the show with those you care about. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you listen, and we'll see you next time.

This episode is sponsored in part by Something You Should Know podcast. Finding a new great podcast shouldn't be this hard, so let me save you some time. If you like the Jordan Harbinger show, you'll probably like something you should know with Mike Carruthers. It's one of those shows that makes you smarter in a practical, useful way. Same curiosity vibe we go for here, just in a fast-focused format. Mike brings on top experts and asks the exact questions that you'd want to ask, and the topics are all over the place in the best way. Recently, they've covered things like why we care so much what other people think, the benefits of laughter, why sports fans get so invested, and what makes people like you or not,

the through line is always the same. Smart ideas you can actually use in real life. Something you should know has been featured in Apple's shows we love, and it's got thousands of five-star reviews because it's consistently interesting. So if you want another show that scratches that, I want to understand how people in the world really work, itch, search for something you should know wherever you get your podcasts.

Look for the bright yellow light bulb and start listening. You can thank me later.