The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 246: Patrick Lencioni - The Five Dysfunctions Of A Team

Episode Date: February 26, 2018

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk Pat is the founder of The Table Group and the author of 11 books (including The Five Dysfunctions of a Team)which have sold over 5 million copies and been translated into more than 30 languages. The Wall Street Journal called him "one of the most in demand speakers in America." He has addressed millions of people at conferences and events around the world over the past 15 years. Pat has written for or been featured in numerous publications including Harvard Business Review, Inc., Fortune, Fast Company, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal and BusinessWeek.  This is the second time Pat has been a guest on The Learning Leader Show.  To listen to the first conversation we had, CLICK HERE. Prior to founding The Table Group, Pat worked at Bain & Company, Oracle Corporation and Sybase. Show Notes: The email he received from Miami Heat coach, Erik Spolestra, after his first appearance on The Learning Leader Show How he helps professional sports teams Why NFL teams focus on the wrong things when deciding who to draft Teddy Bridgewater vs Johnny Manziel The characteristics of a great teammate: Humility Hunger Emotional Intelligence The success of Nick Foles in The Super Bowl The camaraderie built by coach Doug Pederson of The Philadelphia Eagles "I'm meant to work with people..." The origin story - How Pat started his own business... and why? Potential to work with Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt The biggest moment in the growth of his business?  Speaking at Willowcreek Church(50,000 people watched) Doing a "talk" instead of thinking of it as a "keynote speech" -- "I'm just talking with the audience." Why turn leadership issues into fables? "We don't read books, but we read yours."  They are so interesting.  "I keep reading your books because I want to see what happens next." Leaders must: Have difficult conversations -- must do the hard things What are the biggest mistakes a new manager makes? "You cannot avoid the discomfort" "Being a leader is uncomfortable" The best leaders are "pushers" The Steve Jobs and Jony Ive story -- "You're so vain" Keys to a great culture: Leaders must be intentional about behaviors they want Must be brutally intolerant if people don't do it well How Pat helped Southwest Airlines Codify their culture -- It had never been done before Working with Chic-fil-a Their CEO wasn't too big to do dishes and clear the plates "They gave snacks for my trip home" "You don't come up with culture, you look at what's there" The importance of stories Pat's business: There are 45 consultants all over the world.  They are: Humble Hungry Smart "Being a leader is uncomfortable.  You cannot avoid the discomfort." Social Media: Follow Pat on Twitter: @patricklencioni Read: The Five Dysfunctions Of A Team Connect with me on LinkedIn Join our Facebook Group: The Learning Leader Community To Follow Me on Twitter: @RyanHawk12

You cannot afford to avoid discomfort. Being a leader is uncomfortable. Every day you're going to do things that if you had a choice, you would rather not. You're going to have to have a difficult conversation with people. You're going to have to raise an issue at a meeting. You're going to have to admit that your company did something wrong to a customer. When people go into a job and they say, boy, I want to avoid discomfort. I want to go home at night comfortable and relaxed rather than tired for having stepped into the void.

If you're not willing to enter the danger as a leader, your organization's going to unravel. This episode is brought to you by Gusto. Gusto is making payroll benefits in HR easy for small businesses. Modern technology does the heavy lifting, so it's easy to get things right. PCMag and fit small business have called Gusto the best payroll for small businesses. Gusto saves you time. 72% of customers spend less than $1.5.5% of customers spend less than

five minutes to run payroll. Don't believe it, just Google them. People love Gusto. How often do you actually love your payroll provider? Most small businesses don't have an HR expert, but you don't need one to use Gusto with great software and great service. You can focus on your business, not payroll and paperwork. And to help support the Learning Leader Show, Gusto is offering our listeners an exclusive limited time deal. Sign up today and you'll get three months. months free once you run your first payroll. Just go to gusto.com slash leader. That's g-us-t-o.com slash leader. Welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. It is Mindful Monday. Text learners to 4-4-2-2 in order to join thousands of other fellow learning

leaders from all over the world. Text learners to 44-22-2. Now, Now, on a nice featured leader, one of my favorite people. It's Pat Linchoni. He's back for round two. He's a founder of the table group and the author, 11 books, which have sold over 5 million copies worldwide. The Wall Street Journal called him one of the most in demand speakers in America. He's addressed millions of people at conferences and events around the world over the past 15 years.

Few of the topics we've gotten into. The one key quality possessed by the leaders at Southwest Airlines and Chick-Fillay, two places that pass. has worked closely with that differentiate them from all others then what NFL general managers can learn from Pat's method of measuring future success and people that could help them make better draft choices and finally Pat defines the qualities of leaders who have a great culture and it's a little bit different than probably what you're expecting but really helpful really useful I think you'll like it

Ladies and gentlemen, it's Pat Lanchone. All right, Pat, thanks so much for coming back on the Learning Leaders Show. Welcome. It's good to be here. You've grown a lot since the last time we talked. Yeah, it's been, I think, a few years. There's episode number 134, really popular one still. I can see stats for every single episode.

And it's amazing to witness that an episode that was released a couple years ago still gets a lot of listens to this day, every single day. So I assume that comes from all these Pat Linchony fans. So I'm really appreciative of you being here again for a round two, man. I just pay people to go listen to those things to up my stats. Okay. What works? What works?

Another cool part. And I just thought of this. I would have brought it up in the pre-interview because I think Amy was in the picture when we were pre-talking. Was that Amy? Yeah, that was it. Okay. So Amy, one of the best people ever to work with when it comes to coordinating these things, someone who's really smart, helpful.

I know you've spoken very high, however, and I love Amy. I brought her up on the last one, too. She's been great, but she shared an email with me that came after our last talk. I hope it's okay to say this. I don't know why it wouldn't be. So the head coach of the Miami Heat, Eric Spolstra, who a lot of people have said is a top five NBA coach, he coached with Coach LeBron, but he also has coached a lot without LeBron, and they've done well.

And Eric Spolster wrote an email that said, Pat, I listened to you on the Learning Leader Show with Ryan Haw. And I loved it. And I'd love for you to come down and speak to my team and at minimum be a guest at one of my games. And when she forwarded that note, that was one of those moments for me, Pat, where I thought, wow. Like, I've never talked to Eric Spolster or I don't know if I've talked to anybody even in his sphere. And I know he came to it because of you, but it was just a really cool moment to see that in writing that, that the message that you shared on this show helped him and his team. Yeah.

And as a result of that, I got to know him. and I helped him work through an issue, a coaching staff issue at one point, and I've done some stuff for him personally and for the team, and I have gone to a game when he was in town, so he and I have become friends. And it's true, you know, you do a show like that, Ryan, you just never know who's listening to it and what they're using it for. Wow. So I was, that was going to be my next question. So it did, something did come from it. Yeah, I talked to him a number of times. He's a really avid reader and a thoughtful coach. And, and that's a kind of, it's interesting. It's a special. organization. They don't turn people over a lot there. They really invest in people. They stay with them. And so, yeah, and he's he's one of my favorite. I'm a Miami Heat fan now just because of him. Well, so when you go to a professional franchise, a sports team like that, I don't know how many you've done, but I would imagine each one's unique. It's dependent upon their unique problems or issues or maybe they're working on building culture a little bit better and being more intention. about it. What do you do when you go in and you get called by an Eric Spolster are one of the best coaches in the world of all sports? What's some of the what is what is that process to help them? Well and in that was more just like a favor as friends. I mean, you know, but you know what I would say is

professional sports teams are some of the most dysfunctional organizations in the world because they're usually a toy of a very wealthy person that they use for their own entertainment. And there's only 32 of them or 30 of them depending on the sport. So it's an oligopoly or a monopoly, if you will. And so it's a funky business. And it's one of the only businesses where the owner is still called Mr. So-and-so. I know CEOs, and nobody would call them Mr. So-and-so. But in the world of professional sports, it's like the last vestige of royalty. People still refer to the owner as Mr. Johnson, how are you doing? So when you meet a guy like Eric and you realize that they're different, it's I would say it's it's the rare organization the San Antonio Spurs and the Miami Heat do things

differently and it's it's from the top down so so generally I don't do a lot of work with professional sports teams one there this is just between us they're notoriously um what's the right word frugal cheap which yeah wait these billionaire billionaire owners who in a lot of cases are like second generation owners now I've noticed meaning the children were essentially gifted the franchise. So these guys won't hire one of the greatest leadership minds in the world to come build their culture? Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, first of all, I don't know about the world's greatest leadership minds, but I do know this.

What of them? They spend so little money on things other than athletes. Wow. Or maybe marketing, which is crazy. There was a professional, there was an NFL coach. He's still an NFL coach. coach whose team was interested in the five dysfunctions and the owner told him he had to buy books used for his coaches.

Let alone bringing you in just to read the books. Wow. So I only work with teams when I kind of know the coach, like Norv Turner, who was a friend of mine because he lived near our office would come by and I worked with him when he was at the Raiders and the Niners and the Chargers. But most teams just don't do this kind of thing, which is crazy. Yeah, that's surprising, actually. And I would think that that would be a big place that they could differentiate themselves from others.

And I've got some experience in the fact my younger brother played professional sports for 11 years in the NFL with the Green Bay Packers and the Bengals and the Falcons. And I think that's one of the, he was fortunate, AJ and my brother was fortunate in the fact that he happened to play in great cultures. Really all three places where he played. But he has a lot of friends on teams on other teams throughout the league. And the brokenness of the culture from the top down is amazing. As you seem to have already found, seems to be amazing where bad coaches that are carried by maybe a great quarterback or an owner who would make somebody buy used books. It just blows my mind. It really does.

Yeah. You know, I think it's, and this fascinates me, I think it's because there's still such a belief among many of these owners and GMs and coaches that it's really about. about technical skills. And it's just about talent. So I had a friend who actually introduced me into, he was the GM of a team in the NFL. And he took an interest in my books, kind of like, you know, who knows who's reading your stuff or listening to your podcast. And he called and said, hey, I'm the GM of a professional team. And I really love your books on leadership. And I, and I really think it would help our team. And he went to the head coach. And he's a famous head coach. And he said, hey, here's this book. I think you would, and he said, I don't want your effing book.

find me a wide receiver. Oh, man. Wow. So it's still a business. It's not very sophisticated, which is why the San Antonio Spurs continue to do well because they keep their coach, they keep their players, they create a culture,

they create a family. And it's why some guy from France wants to live in San Antonio for the rest of his life because he spent five years playing for the Spurs. Because there's something different there. It is the competitive advantage. Yeah, I love it. I can talk to you about. this all days. There's so much to get to. I know we'll follow up on a little bit of what we talked about

before, but get to some new things. And one of the interesting keys that you just brought up before I hit record was that you've recently been studying and writing a little bit about how to analyze people in the NFL draft, looking at specifically their, well, actually, you know what, let me let me let you describe how you're looking at potential draft picks and how that could help general managers select players for their team. Well, I've always been fascinated with the draft. It's the world's biggest and most public job fair. I love employment and I love picking people and culture.

And I have an 11-year-old son who's a total draft nick now. He loves to talk about the draft. And now the Super Bowl is over, that's the next thing in the NFL. People will talk about it for months. But the funny thing about it is these people will go to the combine or they will, and your brother went through this. and they will measure everything they did. They will look at their hand size.

They will, how fast do they run a 40 and the cone drill and the lifting and jumping and all this stuff, which is fine. I totally get that. Those are important. But what they don't know how to do is really understand what kind of team player these people are going to be. And you see this, and they look back two years later. And I was recently a year and a half ago or so, I was speaking at a big management conference. And I used the example of comparing a guy named Johnny Mansell. with Teddy Bridgewater. Now, forget about the fact that Johnny Mansell is out of the league now,

and that Teddy Bridgewater is injured, but Teddy Bridgewater was considered a really good draft pick, but his hands were a little smaller than Johnny Manzels, and Manzell might have been a little faster. And so the Cleveland Browns, God bless them, picked Manzell in the middle of the first round. The Vikings took Bridgewater at the end of the first round, and you look back and you go, it should have been obvious. When it comes to team players, Manzell was not considered humble at all. Bridgewater was the most humble guy. He told his school to stop promoting him for the Heisman trophy because it would take attention away from his team.

And the second, so there's humble. Then there's hungry. Bridgewater was in the film room constantly studied and make himself better. Mansell was out partying. And the last one is emotional intelligence, smart. I don't know about the big difference there. They were both pretty good that way. But the point is, if you look at that, you know that one guy is not going to be an easy fit on a team.

And the other guy is going to be a great leader and a great team player. They just don't consider that enough. So what I'm writing about is how you could go to the combine and look for the kind of behaviors that predict whether this guy is going to be a great team player and a team member. And start prioritizing that because teams win. And drafting guys that aren't good team players is just a bad idea. So the two quarterbacks in the Super Bowl this year, Nick Foles and Tom Brady are great examples of that. They seem, I mean, Brady is, he plays played with a chip on his shoulder from the day he got drafted in the sixth round by the Patriots and started crying famously because he said, I don't have to go be an insurance salesman now. He's happy about that.

And Nick Foles was cut multiple times considered quitting, you know, has admitted a lot of personal failures, not in a, not anything terrible against the law, but he gave these great speech. after the Super Bowl about this. And they just, they both seem to while while both intense and great competitors are very humble people and certainly are hungry, uh, great video came out with Foles who was, he was, he was calm, but, but so competitive in the moments of calling that big fourth down play that ended up being where he caught the pass. It was great. And then that showed some of this emotional intelligence as well.

And Tom Brady's famous for that. So it's interesting when you look at the two teams that. made it to the championship game is that their quarterbacks embody what you're talking about as far as being a great team player. Absolutely. And I know people are going to be listening to this. I don't think Tom Brady's humble. He's a pretty boy.

Well, he doesn't take for granted anything about his talent. He doesn't think, well, I'm naturally fit here. He's every year he's where. In fact, he's a little paranoid about the fact that he could lose his job. Joe Montana was that way, too. I've got to earn it. And so they're humble. and they're hungry, and they're smart about how they talk to their teammates and things like that.

And so compare that to somebody who doesn't have that humility who thinks they're entitled, and it's a completely different game. I would say that the real interesting thing about the Eagles and the Patriots was the Eagles culture of humility is a little bit more of a camaraderie, and the Patriots is a little bit more of a professional one, like a little colder, you know. and the Eagles coach totally embodies that human being. I love that guy. Me too. Did you see the video?

So Foles goes Filly-Filly? That's their trick play to where he would catch the pass. And the coach, he pauses. I don't know if you saw this. You've got to YouTube it, Beau. So Doug Peterson pauses when Foles comes off. And it's fourth down. This is the biggest play of the game, right?

Probably one of the biggest plays in Philadelphia history. Fourth down on the goal line, he says, we're going for it. And Foles runs over, Philly-Filly. And I remember this. As a quarterback, I've done. done this so many times where you run over to your coordinator or your head coach, whoever's calling the plays, and you give him like what you want. And he sat there. He paused.

And he goes, yeah, let's do it. And then he just called it. He called the play. And they ran it. It was so great. It was this awesome moment of a coach having trust and belief. And this is a backup quarterback, as most people know, the backup trust and belief because now Peterson is a player. I think that helps a little bit because he knows.

Also a backup. Also a backup. When you're in the flow of a game, though, because this would bother me sometimes. I played for coaches who never played, and they bothered me a little bit when I'm in the flow, and I have a feeling of what could work. And you run over and you say, Philly, Philly, and your coach pauses and he goes, yeah, let's do it. On the biggest play in the history of the franchise, and they did it, and it worked. I'm so happy that it did work. I'm not a fan of either team. I don't care.

Me either. But it was amazing. It was really great to see this level of trust, this kind of calm, measured approach when it's, chaos happening around them and it worked. It was it was really cool. Well, you know what? And the thing about it was they decided to go for for that on fourth down before they decided on the play. Right. Exactly. And they asked him about it. And it was just he was just like, you know, our players got all the way down to the one yard line. I was, I had to give him a chance to make it. It was so not ego. Right. You know? And that's the thing about that team was and Carson Wentz. I mean, when I saw an interview of him earlier this year and I decided, okay, I think they're my favorite team now.

just because these are great guys. Yeah, yeah. And they don't think it's bigger than it is. And they're pretty loose. He does a good job of keeping them loose. I think they're disciplined, but then you see these team meetings where they're dancing and they're loose and they're having fun. So it was great to see that on display.

And that's why I love it when those guys are miced up during the games because it just shows their true personality when bullets are flying, so to speak. It's not really war, but football-wise, it is for that particular moment. And these guys are calm. They're thinking he's, willing to listen and trust. And I thought that was a great, great example. People will be looking at that video forever.

I'll say one more thing. I think this is true about Foles and about Wents. If they had lost the game, it wouldn't have crushed them. I mean, in other words, their lives aren't tied up in that. Right. And I think that's, I love to see that. They'd have been just as gracious, like, hey, you know, there's other things in life that are more important. Foles is not even going to ever play for the Eagles again, probably.

That he's going to go someplace else, they say, which is such a bummer. But it's like they're like, hey, this is just part of life. I was going to quit a couple years ago. I came back. And I just love that. Yeah. Yeah. I do too.

It's great stuff. So anyway, this is not gone at all how I plan, which is great. I told you, Pat, this is the cool stuff when I get to speak with a guy like you and we can just riff on different things. So there are a number of different places we go. We talked about Spolstra and some of the NFL things. But last time we talked, we didn't necessarily get exactly to your origin story. Okay, getting, so I know we're completely shifting gears. But you, you know, worked in the corporate world and consultant space.

And at some point, you decided that I'm going to go and do this initially probably on your own, or at least with it's a handful or less than that few people for the table group. And I'm really curious about that specific amount, mainly because this is happening in my career. I made a big career change since the last time we talked from working in the corporate space to now partnering up with some other great leaders in doing this full time. And so, yeah, it's awesome. Trust me. And so I'm curious, if you could, could you take us back to that moment, that time in your

life, if whatever you remember of it to say, what was it like? How did you get started? Were you scared? I would imagine you'd have to be a little bit. Or how did you start making money? Like just, just the basics of getting going on your own. Yeah. You know, I think the thing to know about me is that so I

came from a pretty bluish-collar background, lower middle class, never, no college from my parents and all that. So when I got my first job at a college at a very prestigious management consulting firm, I was like this kid from a relatively rural-ish suburban community, but not, it was kind of a little slice of Oklahoma in the middle of California, a very different perspective. Anyway, so I get thrown into this world of finance and strategy and all this stuff. and I was so distracted by the fact that there was no human element at play here.

And so after a couple years of doing that, I did this thing called the Myers-Briggs, and I looked at this book called What Color Is My Parachute? And I was like, oh, my gosh, I'm meant to work with people and understand the human dynamic within the context of work. And so I started getting into that and taught myself about that on the job. So anyway, fast forward another seven years. and I'm at a company, and I'm an executive there, and I have benefits and a title of vice president, and my dad is so proud of me, God rest his soul, because he never was able to do things like that, and he thought, you've got it made, Pat, this company is paying you and you have benefits,

and I said, Dad, I think I want to start my own company, my own consulting, and he was just like, oh, no, and I'm going to take four people with me. Oh, don't do that yet. You don't know if you can afford them. So I came from a background that said you just save your money and you don't take a risk like this. And it was very scary. And my wife said, no, you're going to be fine. Here's all the money we've ever saved for you to open up an office.

And I know you'll be successful. So if it hadn't been for her faith in me and her confidence, I probably wouldn't have done it. But there's one other element of this story that I think is important. And that is that just before I did this, I actually got a job offer from Steve Jobs at Pixar to run HR there. and then from Eric Schmidt, who's the chairman at Google, to run organizational development for a company he was running. And I was considering those jobs, and it was when I thought about my teammates,

Amy being one of them, who you saw just today, and Tracy and a couple others, and I said, wait a second, I'm not leaving them. I want to work with them. I have to start my own firm. So it was really about when you find the right people that you want to work with, that's a huge part of whether you're going to be successful or not.

And I remember driving through San Francisco. I lived in the city with my wife. And one day, it just dawned on me, I'm not going to take any of these other jobs. I have to work with these colleagues of mine and we're going to start our own business. So it was much about who I was working with, not only what I was about to do. And I think that's one of the things I've learned is like, when you look for jobs, think about who you're going to be working with every day because it's huge. And so that was a big part of my origin story, if you will.

Then the other thing is I had no idea what this was going to become. I thought I was just going to have a consulting firm and I was going to drive around and help clients for the rest of my life. And if I paid my mortgage and was able to work with good people, I would be the happiest man in the world. And so good things, we were blessed every step of the way, books, speaking, doing things like this. I had no idea this would ever happen. So when did the one did the first like what was what was it a book? Was it an engagement a client? What was it that that really got you going to say wow this is this is great because I would imagine now you probably get more inbound inquiries than you than you can handle. So at the beginning I would be surprised if it was that way it usually isn't but was it the book or a book or what was it? I think the biggest moment if I think if if I had to say there was one big moment I had written this. my book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. And this place I'd never heard of called Willow Creek called me to speak at their leadership conference. And it's a big church in Chicago.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, evangelical church. And I spoke there. They had me come speak because of my book. They didn't know I was a believer. I'm a Catholic Christian as well. And things just took off after that. You know, probably 50,000 people saw me speak. And that, you know, I think that's how I got to know Chick-fil-A. That's how I got to know Southwest Airlines. That's how I got to know so many people. To this day, people go, oh, yeah, I saw you speak at Willow Creek in like 2003 or something. And it's like, wow. So that was probably the moment when it really took off. Was 50,000 people? Was it on TV? They had like 8,000 in the arena. And then they had, and today I think they have like 200,000 live on satellite. So what was it? So how many, uh, keynotes had you done?

prior to that one? You know, probably, I'd probably done 30. 30. So like your 31st speech is in front of an audience of 50,000 people. Yeah, and 7,000 in their, in their auditorium there. Wow. And it was nuts. And I had no idea what I was in for. And it was so much fun. What did you say? You know, I just, I talked about the five dysfunctions. But one of the things I did is I just went up there by the grace of God and was myself. And I was a little wacky or a little unpredictable. And I mean, you know, about our talks, it kind of goes where it's going to go. And it was fabulous. And I've spoken seven times since, or six more times there more than anybody else because it just is a great audience for me and they invite me back. What's your process like to give a speech in front of

thousands of people? You know, the most important thing I do is I start all of my talks by letting them know what I'm thinking. Like, in other words, I let them in. Like, here's what I'm thinking. and I'm a little nervous or if I'm nervous or this is what my personality is like. So I take the pressure off. So instead of having them evaluate me, I bring them in onto my side and say, okay, so I don't know where this is going to go. This is kind of what's going on in my mind right now. Let's see where this goes. And so if I forget something or if I deviate or somebody has a question in the audience, that actually works for me rather than me trying to be perfect and feel like, oh, no, I'm straying from my talk.

So I try to be very organic. So you don't have a scripted out like big opener to start the presentation, so to speak? The big opener is, hey, I'm an ENFP in the Myers-Briggs. I never stay on topic. I don't know where this is going to go. Please interrupt me whenever you can. And let's get started. That's how you do it?

Yeah. And I have always done it? Yeah, because I realize if I tried to memorize it and stick to my script, it would be too nerve-wracking. And it's just not my personality. I'm very much of a kind of, I'm a consultative speaker more than a memorized. So there's a lot of engagement interaction throughout, even if you have this huge with thousands and thousands, you'll have audience engagement and they'll talk to you during it. Yeah.

And every time I go there, they're like, we really don't want you to take questions. And I'm like, okay, I'll see. And then somebody raised their hand. And that's when I'm at my best. I'm like, because I love interacting with, like, when I'm on a radio call, I love the calls that come in when people have a question. So, yeah, even with big audiences, I do that. So I learned it might have been from you.

So I apologize if it was, but we can bring it up. Somebody on the show has told me that the way they approach talks. I ask a lot about this because I want to learn from the best when I go and do it and maybe figure out how these guys are so successful. They say, I don't think of like a speech or like a presentation. It's just a talk. It is a talk with it. So it might have been you with whether it's one person out of the 10,000 or 50,

thousand, but it is me having a talk. So I remember changing kind of the titles. I'm getting ready to give a talk tomorrow. I have a pretty big one. Then I have another one where I'm going to Maine next week to give another one. And I always try to change the phraseology no matter what they write to say Ryan is giving a talk or doing a talk as opposed to because they want to make it a presentation or a speech. And I don't know, just the mental part of it, I believe. I pick that up somewhere along the way and I really like that. Yeah, and I really think that the more I get to the point where I'm the same in front of five people as I am in front of 5,000, the better I am. And I try not to be any different.

Now, nerves can get to you, but that's why I like to up front to let them know what's going on. And I can stop and say, oh, my gosh, this is what's going through my brain right now. And suddenly they're laughing with me and they're on my side rather than evaluating me and me feeling judge. So do you practice do you practice or just getting the reps to practice? I mean like are you you and Amy? Okay. So you're not like sitting in your room in your office here where you're pulling up the thing and you're doing your your opener where you say that and then you you you don't so it's really just the live live reps. Yeah. I find this if I if I if I'm I've I've prepped, I've gone through my notes. You know, I have notes about the material. But I don't present them in a very in a very direct way, you know, specific way. But if I know my material, it's best if I go up there and I. I'm not completely prepped. Gotcha. I'm speaking from the heart. And then that comes across.

Now, some other people might not, that's not for everybody. Right. But gosh darn it, I think that when you're in an audience, you like to see people being human. Yeah. They make mistakes every once in a while. It's not perfect. But you can tell it's real. It's genuine.

It's authentic. And when I go, oh, wait a second. I've moved on, but I forgot to say something about the last point. Let's go back to the last point. People are like, yeah, that's how I would be if I were talking to my wife or my buddies. And they're like, they're very forgiving. As long as they know, I don't think I'm perfect. Well, I think you come across with this just no sense of an ego.

Whether we're recording or not, people ask me like, what's the difference between people when you record it when you're not? And I say, I always love it when they're the exact same. And I've used you as an example. I said, Pat Lanchone, who, for all his fame of his books and his speeches, is the exact same dude when you're just riffing and talking or when you're recording. There's no, like when I hit record, nothing changed. And I find that refreshing, enjoyable, because people say sometimes it's dangerous to meet your heroes

or meet the people you look up to or you read five dysfunctions and it changes your life. And you're thinking, well, I hope that guy is actually a good dude. And then you meet him and it goes well. I think that's a good feeling. Oh, that's good to hear it. And I'm fortunate that I only have one kind of me. You know what I mean? My wife would probably say there's probably times when you should develop another type.

But I'm pretty raw and I'm pretty me and it's worked well and I'm blessed that way. So thinking about the five dysfunctions and you using, so turning leadership issues into fables, why do you do it that way or why have you done it that way? You know, I had the best little story yesterday. So I was at a client event with the head of consulting from my firm and we were on our way back and we love Indian food. Wherever we go, we get Indian food. Probably because our wives don't like it as much. And so we try to grab every time we can. So we go into this little Indian restaurant, and it's a hole in the wall, which means it's the best food.

And so there's all these people in there, most of whom are Indian, which is a good sign. But I remember there was one non-Indian guy sitting there and an Asian woman. And I noticed them. And then they left and we're eating and we're getting ready to leave and they come back in the restaurant. And they're like, are you Pat Lanchone? And I'm like, I don't love that like, oh, I want to be recognized. But they were just so excited. They're like, we're using our stuff at our office.

We were just talking about you today. And they were so excited. And both of them said one of my favorite things. The guy said it, and then the woman said it about her husband. They said, we don't read books, but we read yours. Wow. And that's one of my, when I first started writing, I was thinking, Ryan, you know, I've picked up a lot of business books that I've read the first three chapters and then put it down and never finished. Yeah.

And so when I started writing, when I first sat down to start thinking about writing this book because somebody told me you need to write a book. about this theory you have, I thought, I just don't want people to not finish it or to be bored. And so I said, I'm going to write something. And this guy said it to me yesterday at the Indian restaurant. He goes, I keep reading your book because I want to know how it's going to end. And that's how I start learning. And so when I sat down to write this, I said, I want to write a book that a person doesn't want to put down. And I had no idea if it would work. We actually didn't have a publisher. We didn't know if it was ever going to get published. But I used to do screenplays for fun. I took a screenwriting class in college and I wrote scripts. And so I said, I'm going to write a book that it would be like reading the script of a movie. And so many people will read my books that don't read academic books or business books because they enjoy the process. And it's made its way into a lot of colleges too because I think a professor can assign it and have a pretty good idea that the students are going to read it. So I've written one non-fable. It's called The Advantage and it's done very well. And I think it was important that I write

this book because it kind of puts everything together. But I have to say, people are like, we love the fables, keep writing fables. And so I'm writing one right now, and it's fun to come up with the characters. And I really spend a lot of time, like, who is this person? And how would they act? And what's their personality? So people seem to have taken to that, which is a good thing for me, because I had no idea. What's the next one about? It's kind of a prequel to everything I've written. It's about the attitude. What I found is that there's a lot of leaders who carry around with them a preconceived notion of why they want to become a leader. And if they have that notion, it means they're never going to be able to create a healthy organization because they're not going to want to do what leaders must do.

It's the concept of, is this a reward or a responsibility? And there's just a ton of leaves. And I use the example in the world of sports too. In this article I was writing yesterday, if a guy becomes an NFL, like your brother. If he goes, wow, I've finally made it to the NFL, man, that's the end of a long career, a lot of hard work and now I get to live the life. Or do they go, oh my gosh, I've made it to the NFL. I'm going to have to work my butt off because this is a huge responsibility. And the difference between those two mindsets is everything. And there's a lot of CEOs and leaders

out there who think their job is a reward for a lifetime. This is the day new mom. This is the the pinnacle. I've reached it. Yes, I've succeeded. Or what they should be saying is, oh, crap, now I have to work harder and do more difficult things that I've ever had to do. It's a huge difference maker. So that's kind of what the book is going to be done. So leaders must do, when you talk about what leaders must do, that's a note I initially took, you mean view it as if they become the CEO or they become a professional athlete, they become the general manager or head coach of a team that they view it as this immense responsibility? Or when you say what they have to understand what leaders must do?

What what do? What must a great leader do? Well, the question is this, do you think your life is about to get harder or easier? Do you think you're going to have to engage in a lot of activities that are very difficult and unpleasant? Or do you think you get to skip those? And some leaders go, okay, now that I'm the CEO or now that I run this organization, I have to sign up for all the hard things. I have to have a difficult conversation with people. I have to

manage people. I have to go to meetings that I don't want to be at and make them great. I have to do unpleasant things for the good of the organization, whereas half of them or more say, hey, I don't have to do any of that stuff anymore. Wow. I don't want to have to have a difficult. I can skip that now because I'm in charge. Nobody's going to make me. Delegated or something like that. Yeah. You know? And it really is one of those binary things. And I'm going to write a book that's going to help make leaders really assess themselves. Is like, do I want to be a leader for the right reason? Am I willing to do the hard things or am I coasting because I think I'm allowed to? Yeah. What do you think is the biggest mistake somebody? So let's say somebody was a very successful individual contributor. And normally those are the ones who get the opportunities to at least interview for the jobs to be a manager, right? So when somebody may, I've been studying a lot of that moment, right? I made that moment.

I made so many terrible mistakes. And I felt like there was, and I've asked around, in my Facebook community and in my email list, I've asked a lot of people about what it was like when they made that jump. And the overwhelming theme I found is that organizations get really busy. The VP or whoever is in charge of leading the manager is very busy. They got to manage up. They got to do all these things. So they don't necessarily do, which is most important, which is help that new manager be a leader, manage people.

They don't. And I'm not placing any blame on people. I worked with or others. That's just a reality. I mean, I've been in that position, and I've hired someone to be a new manager, and I've completely messed it up. And I can, you know, make excuses by saying, well, I'm just so busy. So when you think of the people who are making that specific jump, because there's a lot of people listening who are, they're getting ready to or they just did or they did two years ago and they're still making mistakes.

What is it? What are the biggest mistakes they make and how could they correct those? I think the umbrella I would put over it is you cannot afford to avoid discomfort. Being a leader is uncomfortable. Every day you're going to do things that if you had a choice, you would rather not. You're going to have to have a difficult conversation with people. You're going to have to raise an issue at a meeting. You're going to have to admit that your company did something wrong to a customer. When people go into a job and they say, boy, I want to avoid discomfort. I want to go home

at night comfortable and relaxed rather than tired for having stepped into the void. If you're not willing to enter the danger as a leader, your organization's going to unravel. And so what does that mean? I think what it has to do with telling people things that they might not want to hear, but it's in their best interest and the best interest to the organization. And they may not not like you when you say that. They may not appreciate it. They might even be frustrated at you. And you have to have enough security and self-confidence to say, I did what was right

for them, even if it makes me feel kind of bad right now. You just wrote an article about this, right? About great leaders push. Is that what you wrote? Is that what it says? Yeah. Yeah. Talk to me about it.

Because I think of the best coaches and leaders and managers I've ever worked for, worked with. There are moments where I definitely dislike them. And I feel like they were overly. hard on me. But I think especially my high school football coach, Ron Allerie, I'm going to his Hall of Fame induction this Friday. So I'm really thinking about this a lot. And Coach Ollery was, is definitely, other than my dad is the best coach I've ever played for. And the reason, though, is because he believed there was so much more potential way more than I thought

I had. But he believed and I started believing him. And he pushed and pushed and pushed. And when I made mistakes, he was super hard on me. He made it very. uncomfortable on a daily basis, even when I would score six touchdowns in the game, set a school record, we'd win by 50, and we would talk about the fact that I did make a couple of mistakes. And he was very hard of me, but it was what I needed. It was what was best for me. And so I think about all the coaches and all the leaders, and I love him the most, even though I might have hated him at times because he got the most out of me. And it's really influenced me as a leader and a manager in the business world. Right. And I played football too. And there's something.

on the football field, you have permissions to do that in a different way. Right. You know, because you kind of go in there and know, well, my coach is going to be tough. But the best coaches, the best teachers were the ones that were kind of tough. Like, I can't believe they assigned this. I can't believe he's making me do this or she's making me do this. And at the end of the semester, you're like, I learned a ton. And I'm going to be better for it.

And they do care for you. And they demonstrate care for you. So it's not like they're like a dick all the time. Well, yeah. Yeah, they care. That's why they do what they do because it's out of, yeah. Yeah. You know, Amy in my office, we always talk about Amy.

So I've worked with Amy for more for 23 years before we started the company. She's a founder. And I've pushed her in her life more than anybody. And she's been met. She's been in tears and said, I think I just want to be, I just want to go get a job working at a gas station. You know what I mean? Like early in my career, I hired her as my assistant. She's a general manager of our firm.

She's fabulous. And during her career, many times I pushed her beyond what she wanted to be pushed on. And I thought, but Amy, you can do more. And she's been in tears a few times. And she will say it was the best thing that ever happened. But in the moment, I had to go home at night and say to my wife, I think Amy's kind of upset with me. And I didn't like it. But I still had to be willing to do that for her benefit.

You said the best manager you had was Sally and she pushed you beyond what you thought you could do. What was so great about Sally? I don't know if that's a real name or not. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Sally DeStefano. She was at a company called Sybase. And she just demanded a lot of me and did push me in a slightly unreasonable way. But she was a very kind person. But in the moment, sometimes it was like, oh, my gosh, what are you doing?

And as a result of that, I became more than I thought I could because she saw that potential in me. But she also put my well-being ahead of her own popularity in the moment. Yeah. If all she wanted was to win a popularity contest in the short term, you see this in teachers and coaches. They're like, I want to be the most liked coach. Yeah. They tell people what they want to hear, but it just doesn't work out. And so she had to put my well-being and my performance ahead of her popularity.

It reminded me of the story Kim Malone Scott told me who wrote Radical Candor, great book. And Kim told me the story about Steve Jobs and Johnny Ive. And it was, they were designing something. And Steve came in and spoke to Johnny and his team. And he berated him. And maybe he was a little bit too hard on him. but in the Steve Jobs style, the creative genius he is, he just killed him. And Johnny, when him walked out of the meeting room and Johnny said, Steve, like, what are you doing?

You can't do that. My team's, my team's going to, you know, they're going to revolt. They're going to be upset. And Steve said, what are you doing? It's your responsibility to give them that feedback. You did a bad job. And Johnny said, part of this is they need to like me. And Steve said, you are so vain.

You just want to be liked. And that's not what's best for them long term. And that reminded me of your article when you're talking about leaders being pushers is the fact that while I don't think I agree with every style or every aspect of Steve Jobs, I think his creative genius kind of allowed him to do some things that we should not emulate because we're not creative geniuses like he was. And that's one of the problems occasionally that happens is people think you can just berate people all the time. That doesn't mean you, that's not caring for people, you know. Yeah, you have to purify your intentions in the moment and be intentional about it. Right. And I think you earn a little bit of respect through being competent.

So if you've ever had a bad boss who would berate people, I can handle that a little bit more, just like I can talk about Coach Oller, my high school coach, because he was the smartest guy in the room by a mile. And he also prepared more than anybody I'd ever seen in my life. So he earned some of that ability to be very direct because he was the smartest person in the room because of his work. not just he prepped and prepped and prepped, put in the time, watch the film. And I think that could happen in business too, because I've also had bad bosses who were lazy, not competent, had not earned the right to treat me that way. And what they were saying made no sense, too.

So I think that's part of the kind of the push and pull, the give and take when it comes to being a pusher as a leader is you have to have a high level of competence of what you're doing and show that you're working yourself, you're preparing to earn the ability to be a leader in that manner. Yes, absolutely. But I love what you said, where I love about what Steve Jobs said, he said, you're so vain.

Yep. Because, you know, I used to be the kind of person who didn't push, that's my biggest weakness as an ENFP. I want people to like me. And I used to think I did that for their benefit. Like, I want them to not be upset.

And then one day I realized I'm being selfish. Yep. Because I'm putting my feelings and my reputation. I want them to like me ahead of their best interest. And so it's great that he said, you're vain. Usually we would say you're wimpy. Yeah. But it's worse than that.

Way worse. It's really selfish. Yes. You want them to think you're better than you are and not have them be upset at you, even if that's in their best interest. And I know this as a parent. Oh, yeah. I love when my kids love me, but I have to say to them sometimes, you're going to do this. And even if you're pissed at me, it's going to be good for you.

Yeah. Pat, so recently I've been talking with a number of great writers who have written about culture and they've studied it for years and years, spent time. I think at Dan Coyle, he is an advisor to the Cleveland Indians, and the Indians are famous for they won 20 straight games last year. Yeah, yeah. They've done really well, and they don't have this crazy payroll like the New York Yankees or other teams like that. And so a lot of it is based upon, I think, the culture that they've built within the entire organization. We've talked about professional sports organizations earlier in this conversation. When we think about the business world and culture and leadership, and you said culture, you've written about culture requires a leader.

How this is, this is very broad. So maybe I'll leave the question more open-ended, but thinking about leadership and culture and building the culture that you want to have a successful long-term organization, company, whatever. maybe, what are some of those keys? You know, I think what it comes down to is, because everybody wants to talk about, how do you design a cultural system and what are the artifacts of it and all this? I think what it comes down to is this. The leaders have to be very intentional about the behaviors they want from people, because the culture lives in the behaviors of people.

And then more than anything else, they have to be brutally intolerant of their own and one another's behaviors at the top that violate that culture. because we got to know Southwest Airlines years ago because they called us in to help them with their culture, which seemed ridiculous to us. But they had not really articulated them well. And they called us in and said, can you help us codify our values?

But long before they even printed them or called them something, they had the world's best culture. And it was purely because they knew who they were and the people at the very top of the organization were completely attentive to that culture. And I would take that, Ryan, over any amount of communication and formal programs and clever, creative, internal marketing. You know, Chick-fil-A has an extraordinary culture.

And let me tell you, when I go there and talk to their executives, here's what happens. If I'm sitting down to eat, I'll be talking to somebody and I'll turn around and the CEO or one of the senior executives is clearing my plate. You know, I was there for a meeting recently, and Bubba Kathy, one of the kids and the family who was one of the owners, I'm going to the airport. He goes and gets a sack full of apples and oranges and bananas and granola bars and says, hey, Pat, I noticed you didn't get a chance to eat very much. You could take this on the plane and this will be a good snack for you. Wow. I mean, and when a guy is that, when he's that down to earth and humble and caring, when they're clearing your plate and asking you about your family and. You're like, okay, they don't need to say anything else.

People watch their behavior and it permeates the whole place versus so many companies that put posters on the wall and do all these things. And then the executives are like, yeah, we don't have to do that. People know it and it becomes empty. So I guess what I would say is if you want a culture, identify what it is the behaviors you want and you live them at the top, and it's impossible not to have that take root. John Wooden was famous for walking around and picking up the tape in the locker room and cleaning it up. And in the book Legacy, the New Zealand All Blacks were famous for the most senior players, the superstars, sweeping the stall is what they call it.

They would clean their own locker room. They wouldn't have somebody else do it. And it reminded me to a recently of a story. I mentioned to you. I made this career shift, Pat, and I'm teaming up with some incredible people who have this great culture at a place called Bricksey and Meyer. And Doug Meyer, the Meyer of Bricksey and Meyer. people will tell me the story. He was stopped recently at a, uh, the grocery store. And the person who stopped him said, hey, you know, how you doing, Doug? And I don't know if he necessarily

recognized them. Um, but there is a cleaning service that we, that, that the company hires to come and clean up the, the, they're not employees, but they come to clean up the office, you know, vacuum, take out the trash. And the person said, why, I, you know, I empty the trash for, for your building. I do. And, and, and we found out later that Doug had spent, you know, 20 minutes in the, and the grocery store thanking her and talking to her and asking questions about her and being genuinely curious about what her life's like. She's not an employee of the company. She just is hired to help clean, basically take out the trash and clean up.

I think that embodies that leadership at the top. The named partner, right? The person who started the company is sitting there having a 20 minute conference. I'm sure he wanted to get home to his wife and he needed to bring dinner home, but he took 20 minutes to speak with the person who takes out the trash. not out of thinking this would be a great story just because he's a good guy. And that's that he's living the culture. And I think that when you hear those things, it means a lot to me.

Like that's who I want to work with. Like that's who I want to spend time around when they, just deep down at their core, that's how great cultures are built because that's just who they are. Right. And I think we talked about a little earlier. It's so much easier to tell the truth because you never have to remember anything, right? I think that's something to live by I try to teach our children.

and write, this is why you tell the truth. There's no story to remember. There's nothing that you have to do. You just are, right? And I think that's what it means to speak for 20 minutes at the grocery store with the janitor and treat them the same just as you would. Anybody else, whether it's the CEO and on down. I think that is how cultures can be built.

And there certainly was no writing it down or putting that on the wall. That was just him. Exactly. And you know, and you said something, Jim Collins used to talk about this. He said, and he still has in his books, that you don't come up with a culture. You look at what is true. Yeah. And so people go, what should our culture be?

Let's make it. And it's like, no, no, no. What are we really? Let's build it around what we believe and how we already act. And then, you know, and Brixie should never hire somebody who finds the way he acts unnecessary. I don't like the word soft skills. I think they're essential skills, right? Exactly.

And there's a book called The Soft Edge. It talks about that. And maybe that's how it partially got that name or it's Carl Gar. but I don't that's not a soft skill like that for me that's a necessary ingredient to long-term sustained excellence is just at your core you're a quality person doesn't mean you haven't made mistakes or you haven't done stupid things from time to time like absolutely but that I think is at your core how cultures get get built is by genuinely caring about other people it almost comes down and you talked about being simple and I lost art of simplicity I know you've written about

that recently too. And that's, that's, to me, I think, at its simplest terms is just having a care in other people. Yeah. And, and, and, you know, you, you reminded me of something, which is very important. Stories are ultimately more powerful than anything. And not even, they're not even, like, put on a, put on a plaque. And it's just like, people just tell them, like, hey, I saw the guy do this the other day. Hey, did you hear about how he did that? And like me telling you the story about Bubba Kathy, who is a very wealthy and influential guy who cared more about me not being hungry on my flight, that's more powerful than any training class they could do. Yeah. And so people to go to work there and they hear stories and they're like, I'm going to be that way too.

Do you, this may be an idiotic question. When you get asked to come help Chick-fil-A or Southwest, I mean, these are the best of the best. Do you at times say, what am I, how am I going to help these guys? Like, what am I going to do? You guys are the best. Like, who am I? I think that every time. Okay, okay.

We always lament the, like, gee, how come the healthiest companies want our help the most? But what it is, one of the reasons why they're healthy is they're also very humble. They're like, hey, we have things we need to improve. Yeah. It's just like we talked about Tom Brady. Yeah. He's like, okay, I'm the greatest of all time, but I want to get better at something still. Yeah.

The best companies are like, we have warts too. They know they're not perfect. And so they're bringing people in to help them get even better. Whereas, let me tell you, Hollywood doesn't call us, Wall Street doesn't call us. Even Silicon Valley sometimes can be, because they kind of think a lot of themselves. I was just talking to one of our consultants today, and he works with a copper mine in Utah. And he goes, Pat, I love working with it because they don't think that they're better than everybody else. They really want to get better.

And I think I'm probably having more of an impact there than I would be at a company that's already thinks they're terrific. So it's Southwest and Chick-Fleigh don't think they're better than their country. competitors. They don't think they're great. They, they're truly wanting to always improve. What's an example of something you do for a place like Chick-fil-A? Well, like, we'll do everything from sit down with the executive team to look at what are your dynamics and how, how can't, how much candor is there in your conversations? Are you having good conflict? Are you committing to decisions and holding each other accountable? Or we'll go through and say, are you clear about, you know, what your strategy is? And we, we have a very holistic approach

that you don't talk about strategy without talking about behavior and you don't talk about culture without talking about goals and finances. It all goes together. There's nothing soft about it. It's the thing of the work. You don't change the culture at the Miami Heat without looking at who their power forward is, but you don't draft a power forward without understanding how the culture works and whether they fit. It all goes together. So we'll go in and do stuff like that. We'll help them. They'll say, hey, we have an issue in our company. We want you to come in and talk to some people and figure out what you think it is and summarize it for us. But it's really, it starts with the leadership team and are they behaviorally cohesive

and are they intellectually aligned? Those are the first two things we do. And we have, you know, 45 consultants around the country and around the world actually now that do that do. And that's what they do. They go in and they say, let's make sure your executive team is behaviorally aligned and intellectually aligned as well. 45.

Wow. So you, so how, what was that process like to build up from just you and your small team to now worldwide with consultants everywhere. I love that question. We have the first consultant in our office today. He lives in Texas now. But we met him at a client years ago, and he said, Pat, I'm traveling all the time, and it's killing my family. And I don't know, I need to find another job. And I said, David, you could do what we do. You would be great at this. He goes, what? And he'd never done it before. And he's been doing it now for 15 years. And now, and we just, so we just gave him a job.

and he's an independent contractor, but he does our stuff exclusively. And then we met another guy. And we were like, hey, you'd be great at this too. And all of the best ones are people that have never done it before. But we're passionate about the material. They'd seen it. And they thought, do you think I could actually do that? And we're like, you would be great at this.

So it wasn't like we need to go out and hire the world's greatest consultants. We said, let's find people that are humble, hungry, and smart, and who have a passion for organizational health. And let's give them an opportunity to work for themselves and be part of something special. And then you guys just work out the financials on the back end. Yeah. And what I would say is we are ridiculously, and I don't mean this like as a virtue, we just decided, you know, if we're generous with them, they're going to be generous with us. So we gave them the best deal in the world.

We said, you're going to get to keep almost everything you do. We'll send you leads. We'll train you how to do this. But you can do your own thing. And you're going to make, and they're like, what? Other people would have taken four times this amount. And we're like, that's okay. Good things will happen.

And good things have happened. And it's and it's just worked out terrific. You're thinking long term investing into people caring about them has led to more and more. It's multiplied, it sounds like. It wasn't about maximizing our short term revenue. We decided, no, this is about changing the world and giving these people an opportunity. And their loyalty and their passion has more than made up for that. Man, that's really cool.

I love that style of doing it. Pat, I could talk to all there. But I do know you have an event coming up, right? Yeah. For the first time ever, we've been in business now for 20 years. And in May, in Santa Clara, we're going to have our first public event that anybody can go to. And it's at Santa Clara University. I have two kids going to school there, actually, and we're working with them.

But it's five minutes away from the San Jose airport. And I'm going to spend a better part of about a half day going through all of my material. It's going to be 500 people in a room. It's going to be really small. And then there's a VIP thing afterward if people want to do it. But it's our first chance to just get people to get in a room and talk about what I do and take questions. And then we haven't even announced this one yet, but next year in January in Dallas, we're going to have it. So I think you're the first to hear this.

We're going to have our first ever two-day experience where people are going to come together and we're just going to dive into all of our materials. It's going to be like a conference, whether it's a consultant, a CEO, a football coach, anybody who wants to come and just like immerse themselves in organizational health and teamwork and meetings. We're going to be doing that in Dallas of next year in January. Wow. But our first event is a half-day event in Santa Clara, and it's on May 10th. It's in, and it's like five minutes from the San Jose airport. I love it. Well, we'll definitely be talking.

It sounds like both are really cool events. And kind of the two-day immersion sounds really attractive, too, but I'm sure both of them are. So not only, I'm guessing not only for what they'll learn from you and your team. from each other. Yeah. I'm guessing from a peer to peer perspective, the learning in the, in the, in the, hallway, so to speak, in the hotel rooms, I would imagine in the lobby. I think I had, David Hornick calls his, his conference every year the lobby because

they try to emulate the lobby of conferences because that's where a lot of learning takes place. But when I think of a Pat Lanchone event, I think of the type of people that would go, whether it's the Eric Spolster types of the world, the consultants, the CEOs, I would imagine that would be a place to be. So that's really cool that you're doing that. Thanks. You know, we decided to call us the organizational health forum because we said we wanted to

be like a, and we looked up the definition. The forum was like where everybody got together like in the lobby and kind of taught one another. Yeah. So it's the same kind of thing. So maybe we'll see you there. Yeah. Time flies when I'm talking to you.

This is a blast. I know what you talked about an hour now. So I appreciate it, Pat. And thanks to Amy, she just kind of reached out of the blue. and said, hey, you know, because I always check in on her, hey, what's Pat up to? How's he doing? Because I could talk to you every week. It would certainly help me personally. But, and she said, hey, why don't you guys do another one? I thought, oh, of course. I'm in. So I imagine we'll keep this going. We'll have around three at some point in the future.

But thanks so much for being here, Pat. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Ryan. You do a great job at this. Thank you, man. Is there anywhere you'd want to send people online? Oh, you know, we have an website, tablegroup.com. Okay. We also have a tablegroup.com forward slash hub, which is like as free resources where you can read articles and stuff. And people, we do a lot of tweeting. I don't always type it in myself, but I type things on my computer and then people tweet it out.

So you can follow me on Twitter. I guess we have a lot of followers, but I'm not too good at doing it myself. I got you. I will make sure all that's linked in the show notes too on learningleader.com for regular listeners. That'll be there, Pat, stuff. So Pat, thanks again for bringing her man. I look forward to the next one. Good luck to you in your move.

And that's very exciting. Thank you, man. Thank you. As if you couldn't tell, I absolutely love talking to Pat Lanchone. We had this one on video so I could see the excitement level that he brings to it. He truly cares and is very passionate about his message of leadership and building culture. And speaking of culture, there's a note that I wanted to reiterate, quote, you don't come up with culture. You simply look at what's true.

Great for all of us. to remember. If you enjoyed this one, I'd love it. If you would write a review, subscribe, and rate the show in iTunes Apple Podcasts. That's subscribe, write a review, and rate it hopefully five stars in iTunes Apple Podcasts. It really helps spread the message. Thank you again for being here. I cannot wait for the next one. See you next week. This episode is brought to you by Gusto. Gusto is making payroll benefits in HR easy for small businesses. Modern technology does the heavy lifting so it's easy to get things right. PC MAG and fit small business have called Gusto the best payroll for small businesses.

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