The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 551: Greg Harden - How To Control The Controllables and Stay Sane in an Insane World (Tom Brady's Mentor)

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Learning Leaders Show, presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Text Hawk to 666866 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email for me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right. You'll also receive details about how my book, The Pursuit, of excellence will help you become a more effective leader text hawk to 66866 now

Starting point is 00:00:39 on to tonight's feature leader the great Greg Hardin is best known for working with seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady he also worked with Super Bowl MVP Desmond Howard and 23-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps Brady Howard and other athletes credit with inspiring them to overcome obstacles and achieve success in their professional and personal lives. He's the author of Stay Sane in an Insane World, How to Control the Controllables and Thrive. The book debuted at number one on all of Amazon and is a New York Times instant bestseller. During this conversation we discuss why you should do a SWAT analysis on your

Starting point is 00:01:31 self. Then Greg shares in detail what separates the good from the great. Then he gets into how to handle fear and negative self-talk. We discuss those topics and so much more. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy this enlightening conversation with the great Greg Hardin. Greg Hardin. It is so great to have you here on the Learning Leader Show. Welcome, my man. Well, thank you for. for having me right. There is so much to get to, but I am fascinated by people who sustain excellence over an extended period of time. This is something you have done and so many people you've coached and mentored and led have done as well, some of the most impressive performers in the world. I'm curious, Greg, and maybe this could take an hour to answer, and if so, that's fine. But

Starting point is 00:02:30 what have you found to be some of the commonalities among people who have sustained? sustained excellence over an extended period of time. Excellent. That's a great question. And it speaks immediately to the format, the formula that you're talking about. And that is a commitment to continuous improvement. When we're talking about manufacturing, we understand continuous improvement to be based on Six Sigma and everything else. But what we're talking about is people who are hungry and humble, which makes them coachable. What's the difference between Tom Brady and everybody else?

Starting point is 00:03:06 Hungry and humble, open to learning and continuing to push themselves. Even when they're at the top of their game, they're looking to go to the next level at all times. Can you talk about that first meeting with Tom Brady's parents? I read about in your book, which is so good. And we're going to dig into parts of your book. But that when you first met his parents, and then how your relationship with him evolved.

Starting point is 00:03:35 Well, you're good. No one's asked me that question, Ryan. I'm impressed. As a matter of fact, it was one of the great moments of my life where, you know, we're doing the end of the year banquet and the seasons over and they're talking about the year and the families and of the seniors are there and most of the kids' families are there and Tom's family is there. And it's segueing on to the next.

Starting point is 00:04:02 move. And they stopped me. Brian, they look at me and they say, I just want to thank you for what you did for Tom. And I said, oh, thank you so much. I appreciate you saying so. But let me be honest with you. I didn't do anything for Tom. He allowed me to help him. As a matter of fact, the reason it worked was because of what the impact you had on your son. Your son was open to finding mentors, and listening and being coachable by adults. That comes from how he was raised. So let me flip the script on you and tell you thank you for what you did to set this young man up to be successful. Could you have envisioned him?

Starting point is 00:04:47 Because his career at Michigan was up and down, Drew Henson comes in, and I remember reading all about, this is like the number one guy in both football and baseball, drafted by the Yankees. and he's supposed to be the quarterback, yet Tom Brady's still there. And it seems to me when I watch the ball moves down the field and gets in the end zone more when Brady is in versus the hot shot recruit Drew Henson. That had to be tough because he kept getting benched and then put back in. You're there for all of it, right? His entire career coached him.

Starting point is 00:05:23 He wrote the forward to your book, right? Very tight relationship. When he was done in college, did you think, oh, my God, he's going to go on to become the greatest quarterback of all time. I mean, what were you thinking when he finished and he was hoping to get drafted to play in the NFL? Well, Ryan, anyone that said they knew he was going to be that guy is probably exaggerating to make a point. You could tell by the way he carried himself and how hard he worked that he would be a functional, high-performing individual in the NFL.

Starting point is 00:05:56 It was no way you can envision anything that came to pass. What a great story. And the story comes from a guy who was going to outwork you, out train you, out-think you. He can't out-jump you. He can't out-lift you. But you can't measure his heart or his mind. And that boy's mind is crazy. I mean, and don't let that old pretty boy look confuse you.

Starting point is 00:06:24 He's a beast. and he will cut you throw it out i saw him on stage and i wonder how this because you talk about controlling the controllables and focusing on right what's in front of you it feels to me and i've thought a lot about motivation gregg so you're the perfect guy to talk to about this tom feels like somebody who and i saw him on stage recently talk about this who gets a lot of motivation out of people who doubt him out of haters some would say yes and i think some of that is outside of his control, right? What people decide to say about him is not necessarily controlling the controllables because people can say whatever they want. So I'm curious how you see all that when it comes to

Starting point is 00:07:06 motivation and people who may doubt you and stacking chips on your shoulder. Like how do you view all that? Well, think about this. The controllables that we're talking about now is how you respond, how you interpret, how you are going to internalize the haters, the doubters, the doubters, as a matter of fact, you intentionally and deliberately turn them into a source of motivation. That's controlling the controls. For example, let's go back to your first discussion about the era where Drew Henson showed up and he had to share the starting job. Well, it was frustrating, but what we talked about in my office was pretty straightforward.

Starting point is 00:07:51 Tom, you come in my office, feel free to complain. moan, groan, whine. And then when you're done, go out of this office and no one is to see you sweat. There'll be a smile on your face and a song in your heart. And you're going to give everything you've got every time. You're going to give 100% of the time. No matter what they say, no matter what they think, you don't care. In fact, it motivates you. Were you having similar conversations with Drew Henson at the same time? I didn't have that sort of relationship with Drew. However, he was absolutely invested in trying to figure out some of the things that he needed to look at and work on. He was a very interesting personality. He had a very interesting life.

Starting point is 00:08:39 He had gotten, he was drafted by the Yankees. He had people around him, just constantly embellishing and telling him how great he was. So he had a whole different story, Ryan, a whole different story. And he was a good guy. I don't care what anybody has to say. He was first class all the way. So what was your role at Michigan at that time? My role was Director of Athletic Counseling. And what we did beyond counseling and dealing with the issues of clinical therapy was we also turned it into a formula that we had a continuum of care, whether or not you wanted to talk about, I'm dating a fool, or I want to talk about.

Starting point is 00:09:25 starting. You can talk to somebody about anything unrelated to performance or totally related to performance. As I began to segue into, I became a performance junkie over the years, but it started out straightforward in terms of helping young people prior to it becoming popular to make sure that mental illness was a non-issue or was addressed to be able to intervene, to prevent problems, intervene in problems, and keep the young people at Michigan. This is, son, this is in the early 90s. This is in the late 80s where we're talking about building a community where people could come and have somebody to talk to who were not a coach, who could say, this is what's working.

Starting point is 00:10:15 This is what's not working in your life. Let's examine who you are and who you're trying to become. Are you more than a football player, a swimmer, a diver? Are you more than a track? Are you more than hockey? Yes, you are. Wow, what a service to provide? I was a college athlete, nothing against the places where I played, but there is nothing like this.

Starting point is 00:10:36 I wonder if anybody else had this. I mean, you had to be one of the first, if not the first, to do this. Some have suggested that that was the first time they'd ever heard of anything like that. and we instituted a formula that made it clear that over time, we added counselors so that it'd be counselors who even look different and talk different, who could identify with people differently. And it was a major breakthrough all the way. And now it's pretty standard fare that people are invested in seeing the whole person and not just the athlete. It almost feels like this would be something that companies should have a Greg Harden and a team of Greg Hardens at their company to say, this is a place where you can go.

Starting point is 00:11:28 You can talk about performance or not. You can moan and complain and then once you leave the door right, it's over with. Like in a way, I don't know, Greg, has people approached you about doing something like that like within a company? Well, let me help you even more. contrary to popular belief, my career did not start in athletics. My career started in working with some major organizations and companies. My career in terms of personal development started in the College of Engineering and in the medical school at the university, where I developed formulas that I took to athletics.

Starting point is 00:12:05 Prior to all that, I was working with Dow Chemical, Libby Owens Ford, introducing ultimate manage the troubled employee. I transferred the technology of working with EAP's employee assistance programs. The best companies I ever worked with had an employee assistance program. All we did was take it to another level, took it to athletics, and embellished a formula that I saw had tremendous potential, not only in athletics, but in the workplace. So what were your credentials to get this job. I read about the Schembeckler and all that and like you had some trouble your own troubled past. You had some issues. Can you take us back to how you were able to go from some of your own issues and have that talk start your career? Well, being able to accept a mentor to surrender

Starting point is 00:13:02 the ego and allow someone else to coach me, train me, tell me what I needed to look at and how to look at it. And who believed in me before I believed in myself, Dr. Howard Brapson was that guy. I thought I was going to be in radio, television, and film. And Howard Brapson says, nah, I mean, nah. So you're going to go into social worker. Social worker. And of course, you say, you don't know what a social worker is. And of course, I described a social service worker at the state.

Starting point is 00:13:35 And that's not what he was talking about. He was talking about creating programs and creatively finding ways to get the best out of people. And I was fascinated. He said, you'll be a change. I said, like, 007? No, son. You'll be someone who is committed to getting the best out of people. And that was the core.

Starting point is 00:13:58 And so my credentials, I studied sociology, psychology, and then ended up in social work because it was a model that looked at the whole. person, not just from the neck up. Let's get tactical, Greg, for a second. So there's somebody listening now, super intrigued, wondering, hmm, I haven't really done this work. I haven't focused enough because I'm always fighting fires with my job and at home, a crazy household with spouse and kids, you know how it goes. And hopefully this is a moment in time to say, let me. pause for a second and start implementing something to get better. And hopefully this conversation

Starting point is 00:14:43 can be that for people. And I selfishly want it for myself. What are some of the first action steps we could take immediately following this podcast conversation to say, okay, here's the foundation. Here are the first few things to do. Here's the way I need to like overall think about. I know that's a huge question, but I am just curious about how we take action on this. Let's play with it for a moment. Let's say that you pick up the book, Stay Same, and the In Same World, and you're curious. And all of a sudden, I'm telling you what you've already said. I just want to be the very best version of myself. Isn't that what we're trying to do?

Starting point is 00:15:22 You've said it, we've said it, we've heard it, but how do you do it? Well, the secret, that's not a secret, is to become the world's greatest expert on one subject. You, and you've never done that. You've never chosen you. You've studied everything, including MBAs and engineering and all the things that made you pursue of your career. But have you studied yourself? Have you done self-evaluation? Have you done self-assessment?

Starting point is 00:15:53 Have you increased your self-awareness? Have you understood that training, that breathing is underrated? Learning how to breathe, learning how to calm yourself down, learning how to center yourself down. learning how to center yourself. But let's keep it even simpler. Let's use what I know you're familiar with. SWAT analysis. Most of the people who are listening to you, Ryan, know exactly what a SWAT analysis is. And they've had some corporate organizational development specialists come in and say that we're going to look at your organization. And we're going to ask each and every one of you to take a quadrant. and I want you to put strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in four quadrants.

Starting point is 00:16:43 And I want you to list to the best of your ability. When we're talking about the organization's success, what are the strengths, weaknesses, or opportunities and threats that we need to examine in order to go to the next level? Then I'm going to have you go to a small group. We're going to have a group of five or six, no more than eight, and you're going to go over and process, and you're going to come together, and you're going to collaborate and come up with your own list. And then we're going to come back and we're going to present in front of the whole body what you've learned and what you've discovered about this organization.

Starting point is 00:17:12 And we're going to come out with concrete, measurable goals. I have the audacity, Ryan Hawk, to suggest that Ryan Hawk, Incorporating, needs to decide what's working and was not working in his life. I first got to convince him to define success for himself. Not based on what everybody else says success is. I need to know concretely. I need Ryan Halt to describe what he would see are the ingredients, the characteristics of success if his life was working.

Starting point is 00:17:50 Oddly enough, he would talk about not just money and power and influence. He'd talk about happiness. He'd talk about achieving personal goals. He'd be talking about being able to change the lives of people he loved. At some point, he's going to start talking about, all those things. And it's not going to just be about that fancy car. He's going to be talking about being happy and the skin he's in. So we'll find out what success looks like. And then I'll ask you to do a SWAT analysis on your organization, on your corporation, and you will come back with a

Starting point is 00:18:28 great list. And then I have the nerve to say, look, this is a good job. Let's take it to another level. I'm going to ask you to identify one, two, two, three people who you trust, who you can give the responsibility of doing a swall analysis without your input, who will be brutally honest, who will not abuse this power. You've got a hand-pick two, three people, and give them that assignment. And when you come back, we'll compare and contrast. Hulk. This is a true story. Miles Miller. Guy named Miles Miller. It's in the book, so I'm not revealing anything. I tell Miles Miller you're going to do a swall analysis and you're going to get two or three people.

Starting point is 00:19:19 This boy looks at me and he says, I know two people. I said, okay, tell me who you're going to use. Well, I'm going to use the guy that my ex-boss. Well, how did that? Well, he fired me. You're going to do what? I said, okay, well, that's unique and different. And he says, I say, well, who else will you use? My ex-girlfriend.

Starting point is 00:19:41 I knew you could say that. I said, you're going to do what? He said, those two are the two people I trust. And they will give it to me straight, no chaser. And it was one of the best exercises I have ever seen. This boy came back with some concrete insights as to who he is and how he was perceived by those who had been around him for an extended period of times. We were able to see what in each category where there was congruency and what he saw and what they saw.

Starting point is 00:20:14 But we also saw X factors that he could blind spots that he could not see. And from that he could come up with personalized goals. We all know about organizational goals, but how do we get personal goals? How do we get, I mean, I want to run 100 and lotty-dadi. You know, we want to make at least a quarter of a million in this next quarter beyond what we've done. How do you come up with ideas about what I want to change about myself? Swad analysis is one tool that's in the book that tell you about how to do it. Question about the SWAT.

Starting point is 00:20:54 So done a lot of them, certainly getting my MBA. I remember I got kind of sick of it. But I think doing it doing it on yourself would be a great idea. The strengths and weaknesses seem like, yes, got it. And I think the people you give it to, got it. The opportunities and threats, though. How do you do that for yourself? Like if you do it for yourself, Greg, what goes in, maybe let's just get real,

Starting point is 00:21:14 what goes in your column for the opportunities and threats? Well, you begin to see that they're going to overlap in each one of these categories. But when we're talking about opportunities, there are opportunities for me to continue my education. The opportunities for me to decide whether or not this is the best fit for me, and is this coming to good for me? The opportunities for me to examine whether or not I can improve the quality of my life in terms of how I treat other people.

Starting point is 00:21:48 How am I treating myself? There are opportunities for me to change my body. There are opportunities for me to increase my confidence in how I treat myself or how I treat others. There are threats if I do not change some things and how I'm operating. So you become so sophisticated that you just start processing differently in taking a view of yourself from a higher plane, looking in from a distance almost to see what's working, what's not working? How can I improve? What are the opportunities in my life that I'm not taking advantage of, haven't taken advantage of, that people have told me that they are ready to help me with.

Starting point is 00:22:31 What are some of the threats? Is it my attitude? Is it my behaviors? Is it my drinking style? Is it my lack of sleep? Brother, there's so many things to look at. If you're critically conscious and committed to being that person who becomes the world's greatest expert on one subject. The usefulness of having another person who's a great listener and thoughtful and ask really good questions and even better follow-up questions I've gathered from working with senior leaders is helpful. What's your experience been like when working with senior, level leaders who are very busy, have a lot of stress, a lot of demand on their time.

Starting point is 00:23:24 What's it like for you being there, I don't want to say accountability partner, but almost being a great listener for them. But I love that phrase accountability part. You know, when you start talking about what can I do to make this company better? What can I do personally? What can I do professionally? You know, I'll come over with these ideas, but just saying it out loud is nice and it improves the chance that I'll do it. But what if I have

Starting point is 00:23:52 somebody to talk to about it every nine in, once a week, twice a month where we sit down and say, how are you doing in terms of your vision of what you wanted to change, what you wanted to do? I love the phrase accountability partners. I've used it before. So let's take this to a whole other level. You ready? Let's say that we're past all this SWAT analysis. Let's go and to the whole list of the devil on my left shoulder and the angel on my right. The cartoon characters that you remember visualizing. But what we discover is that I want to identify self-defeating attitudes and behaviors. I need to identify what they are.

Starting point is 00:24:35 I don't have to say I have them all, but I've got to get a list. And in the book, there's a list of things that people do, ways that they think and the ways that they behave that can sabotage their dream, their success. So I get so sophisticated that I'm willing to look at that. And not only am I willing to look at that, I'm going to look at what are the things, the ways that I can think and behave that will support my dream and my success story. So we will give you more than one little idea. Swallow analysis is shooting a great idea and I love it and it's effective.

Starting point is 00:25:12 but let's take you even deeper. Let's go all the way. Let's go all the way to where we're willing to look at, is there something I need to change? So what we're doing is we're taking people to a space where they're willing to understand a simple formula. There are unbelievable creatures on this planet. You've seen creatures that blow your mind.

Starting point is 00:25:37 You've seen things, you've heard people say, if this insect isn't alive, we're all dead. What are you talking about, right? My God, Ryan Hawk, the only creature on this planet that can decide I'm not going to be the same today as I was yesterday as a human being. A dog can't decide to be something else. A dog will be a dog, a cow going to be a cow, a lion's going to be a lion every day. a human being can look in the mirror. They can do an assessment

Starting point is 00:26:16 and they can look at what they like about themselves and embellish it and improve upon it and make it grander. Or they can look at what they don't like. And they can decide. I'm not going to be the same today as I was yesterday. To go to the next level, I've got to make some shifts. What other creature can do that? the ability to evaluate self-assessment.

Starting point is 00:26:41 That's not what we're taught in school. We know how to judge everybody else. We know how to criticize ourselves. We're pretty good at that. But to do a clean cut evaluation of, what am I doing? What should I be doing? How can I improve to be deliberate and intentional

Starting point is 00:27:03 about becoming the best? That's what I teach athletes. That's what I teach in the executive ultra professionals. I love ultra professionals. That means they got big bank and big brains. You understand? And the one thing that I'll do that you'll love is like, I count on them being the most intelligent people in the world.

Starting point is 00:27:23 And I explain to them the hardest people to teach are smart people. Why? Because they know everything. Can we go back to self-talk for a second? because sometimes I hear this and I just kind of move on to the next thing until you realize how much it actually impacts you every day. Something as simple is I'm not creative. I'm not good at math. I can't make that throw. Whatever. I can't you write about public speaking. I, no, no, I'm not a public speaker. Somebody else can do that. That's too scary. I don't want to do that.

Starting point is 00:28:03 Right. Whatever that I can't or I'm not or I don't do that type thing. And this is actually a really big deal, a bigger deal than I think I've made it in the past. And I've had friends and mentors talked to me about this recently that's brought it more to the forefront. And you're one of the best in the world at this. Can you share the importance of self-talk and the story you tell yourself and how we can get better at that, specifically in areas that where we deem that we're, quote, not good at fill in the blank? You got a lot of nerve, Ryan. You do understand. This is the critical piece to the puzzle. This is one of the critical pieces to the puzzle.

Starting point is 00:28:46 Training, listen to me, training myself to listen to how I talk to myself. We all talk to ourselves. We all process. All the time. You're all talking about, oh, I'm so stupid. That sucks. And how we talk to ourselves is a reflection of how we see ourselves. And if I want to change, I may have to change my internal dialogue.

Starting point is 00:29:12 Let me explain something to you. First thing you have to teach people is the greatest competition in your life. It's between your ears. There is no greater game. There is no greater contest. Self mastery is the mission. Mastering the way that I think, the way that I process. Mastering how I talk to myself, ooh, that is not an easy assignment.

Starting point is 00:29:34 So what we teach someone, back in a day, I'd have them take a, you know, how you have those little spiral notepads. Sometimes you can get them. They can be three, three by five, tiny. I say, I want you to take this notepad. I want to catch yourself every time you are beating yourself up. Every time there's negative self-talk, I want you to capture it. I say, it's going to be frustrating and you're going to get really anxious once you find out how often it comes up. I'm not only do I want you to identify it, I want you to capture the phrase, I want you to

Starting point is 00:30:08 I want you to even identify what triggered it, and maybe even talk about how you felt after you said it. I say because we can't immediately eliminate an old habit, because now it's a habit. It's not really always how you just feel about yourself, but it's a habit. Not only do I want you to identify it. often and how severe it might be, I want you to begin to visualize that you can shrink, telescope, how often you do it. Because first order of business is to reduce. We can't eliminate it overnight. But we are going to reduce, how do we reduce our self-awareness? We are going to be

Starting point is 00:30:58 so critically conscious of the fact that I do it, that I catch myself, but here's the secret. Instead of beating yourself up, which was your next step after finding out that you're so negative, then you're going to beat yourself up for being so negative. I need you to be amused and entertained by how often you're always beating yourself up. I need you to be stunned. Then I need you to be amused. and then I need to decide I can do something about this. If you don't turn it into an awareness,

Starting point is 00:31:34 if you don't turn it into something that will trigger a positive, and the positive is to be almost amused. This is sick. I do it more than I ever thought. I thought I was bad, but I'm worse than I thought, right? And then you begin to capture in your own mind. Wow, I could benefit if I can just shift it. If I can just change this, it would be beneficial.

Starting point is 00:31:59 But how do we go to the next level? Smart people. Smart people, you have to train them differently instead of saying, stop beating yourself up. You've got to train them to understand. Beating yourself up doesn't work. It's ineffective. The whole shift, that tiny little shift gives them permission to say, yes, Well, if it's not effective, why would I do anything that's not effective?

Starting point is 00:32:35 It's not efficient. It doesn't work. If your mission is to be negative, miserable, and depressed, for all means, continue. But if that's not your mission, you may have to shift. Beating yourself up doesn't work. Worrying is ineffective. So you might want to revisit that formula. That's what I teach.

Starting point is 00:33:00 If that doesn't work, what does work? What does work? Okay, let's give a concrete example. Oh my God, I just blew that. I can't believe, I mean, how did I miss that deadline? Oh, I'm so stupid. Yeah. I heard myself feeding myself up.

Starting point is 00:33:20 I make the statement, I'm so stupid. Wait a minute, stop. Let's take that thought to the next one. two, three thoughts. I'm so stupid. Well, I'm not stupid. That was stupid what I did. Well, I mean, okay, I mean, so you have to process it all the way through.

Starting point is 00:33:38 You don't just stop it. I'm so stupid. No, stupid as an overstatement. You talk to yourself like you would talk to someone else. You know how kind and thoughtful and patient and compassionate you are with everyone else. All we're trying to do is get you to have the same care, compassion, and concern for yourself. To say I'm stupid is not accurate. It's not.

Starting point is 00:34:10 So I catch myself making inaccurate statements. Yes, that was not the best move I could have made. Yes, how would I do it differently? So I keep going until I begin to process and I become what? Solution focused. If I am solution-focused, Ryan, I've always got to take it to the next step, the next thought, to process at another level. And if I can't do it by myself, I'm going to get help. By a solution-focused, you mean what?

Starting point is 00:34:51 What do you think I mean? Think about it. Well, so let's say I missed the deadline, and I initially say, God, I'm so stupid. why did I do this and procrastinate and not give myself time? This was dumb. I should never do this again. What am I doing? Okay, I'm just trying to play this out in my mind. So instead of saying that, I may say what I did may have been,

Starting point is 00:35:16 I may have not made a wise choice, but I'm not a stupid person. Yes. Right. And so in the future, the next time, I'm going to plan better by blocking time on my calendar multiple days in advance of the deadline. I mean, I'm just making this up, right? No, you're not making it up because you've done it. We're talking about creating a different deadline based on the fact that the formula that you.

Starting point is 00:35:39 So that's the solution, right? You're saying you're coming up with a solution for the next time and forgiving yourself for not being perfect. For not being perfect. And it wasn't you. It was the action, right? It's kind of like coaching and teaching. Like you said, you're how you treat others.

Starting point is 00:35:54 When you coach, you're not saying you're a bad person. I think of this as a parent, you'd say, you made a poor choice, but I love you and you're a great person, but you made a poor choice here. And next time, we got to learn from this. Yes. Okay. Exactly. Okay.

Starting point is 00:36:10 And parenting, that's a critical piece to the puzzle. I have to wait until I got to let my anger tone down before I talk to you. Yeah. Because if the angry me comes after you, you think I'm just crazy. Yeah. I've done that for sure. If I calm myself down and say, Ryan, Let's talk about what just happened.

Starting point is 00:36:30 First off, you know categorically that I love you, I treasure you, you are my child. Your behavior that you participated in with your cronies, your buddies, and your pals, that's unacceptable. I don't like what you did. You, I love. But what you did, no, that's unacceptable. That's not how we rolled. So I'm able to separate. and make sure that you can see the context of your behavior,

Starting point is 00:37:02 but also in the structure of you're knowing that I love you. And so let's process it. And then I'm going to take them. So what's the solution? I'm saying, I'm not saying I got a problem. We have a problem. So what is your plan? Look, you'll love this.

Starting point is 00:37:20 And this is not in the book, but I got to give it to you. You ready? If you have children, feel free to tell them, and even it worked. If you have people that you need to discipline, ask them to come up with three things that might happen if they were to design it. Tell them to think of the least, the middle, and the worst thing that could happen. Right. They will shock you. I used to do this with my son and kids I raised.

Starting point is 00:37:52 where they would come with worse stuff than I had ever thought of. Really? Their middle would be better than my worst. You simply engage and you keep people understanding that we have to come up with a solution as to what's going to happen. And it's not just on me. I'm not the bad guy. I didn't make the mistake.

Starting point is 00:38:14 You made it. Yeah. Leadership 101. Maybe we can combine a few things here, Greg. Facing the challenge of public speaking is chapter 32 of your book. The self-talk that could be involved with this. I'm curious because I think from a leadership perspective, this is a skill, communication, sharing the message with your team, doing the town halls,

Starting point is 00:38:40 the shareholder calls as you get shareholder calls as you rise up. All of these are very important to be good at, to develop these skills. and these are skills to be developed. What are some ways we can overcome maybe negative self-talk and we can face the challenge of public speaking? I have some simple formulas. Remember, individual difference. My formulas may not work for everybody.

Starting point is 00:39:10 However, they've been very effective with a lot of people. The first rule is teaching people to understand not only what they're going to say, but to understand their audience. Who is your audience? Study your audience. Know who's in your audience. Know who you're talking to and the range of folks in the audience.

Starting point is 00:39:33 Okay. Is my message designed and is it going to be delivered in such a way that this audience is more than likely to buy it, understand it? Okay. As Covey would say, seek first to understand and to be understood, right? Now, you're ready? The first two minutes of any speech, you had better know backward forward and sideways,

Starting point is 00:40:00 because in those two minutes, you're crapping your pants and you're losing your mind. Am I right or wrong? Are you? Absolutely right. Still? Oh, bro, half the fun is being... Oh, you're opening up the door. Make a note because this is where we're going to go.

Starting point is 00:40:17 We're going to end up talking about anxiety. and we're going to talk about fear and self-doubt, okay? Okay. What you begin to understand and it may just come automatically, given this conversation about public speaking, those first two minutes, you need to have them totally memorize so that even if you're anxious and nervous, the words are going to come out,

Starting point is 00:40:44 and in the next minute and a half, after those two minutes, you'll turn into yourself. First you were anxious. And then what you were supposed to do came out. And you knew exactly what you're going to say, why you were going to say it, and how important it was. One of the things I really like to do is tell people

Starting point is 00:41:06 how nervous and anxious I am. Oh, you do? Oh, I love it because they don't believe you. Brian, you know. You don't open a speech with that? You know, you know people don't believe that you get nervous and anxious. You know how well you speak.

Starting point is 00:41:21 You're one of the best speakers I've heard in a long time. Your voice is designed for radio and everything else. You can just, you can flow. But if you're human and if you're excited, you're going to be anxious, right? Right. So I love standing in front of a group of people and say, I'm about, oh, I'm about to lose my mind. I'm so excited I'm about to lose my mind. You have no idea how excited I am.

Starting point is 00:41:49 I'm just, ooh, giddy beyond. Oh, okay. And then I launch into it. So the door we've opened up, though, is to talk about fear and self-doubt. Yeah. The greatest enemy you will ever face on this earth is fear and self-doubt. You've missed it. You know there's some enemies.

Starting point is 00:42:12 You know there's some evil. You know all kinds. There's chaos. Always competing for you. your mind, your reality. But if the enemy within can't harm you, you've just changed the game. The mental gain is the game.

Starting point is 00:42:33 Fear and self-doubt. This is what we do, which is what I'll teach, and this is what you'll learn in the book. I've known you now for what, 40 minutes, 30 minutes, some of the greatest moments of your life, some of the most excitement you've had, some of the grandest adventures you've been a part of,

Starting point is 00:42:54 You were about to crap your pants before you. Am I right or wrong? Of course. Right. So there's a thin line between anxious and excitement. If you'll notice, the physiological phenomenon of anxiety and excitement are quite similar. Heavy breathing, nervous, anxious, sweating. But what we learn to do is we turn anxiety into anxiety.

Starting point is 00:43:26 excitement, and we turn fear into fire into passion. That's what I teach anyone that'll listen. How do you do that? You can decide that you're, by beginning to understand that fear is normal, don't tell anybody I told you this. Fear is normal part of being human. So once you surrender to the idea that, see, people think you're supposed to be fearless. That's total nonsense, right? I need you, instead of telling you to stop being afraid, I'm going to tell you, stop being afraid of being afraid.

Starting point is 00:44:06 That's a game changer. Just take a moment. Stop being afraid of being afraid. It makes sense that you're anxious and nervous. Duh. Anyone in their right mind would be anxious and nervous right now. Oh, well, that lessons, oh, my God, it makes sense? Yes.

Starting point is 00:44:27 Oh, I'm about to, I'm going to go on this 10-meter diving board. I'm anxious. That makes sense. Oh, okay. Right? We begin to destigmatize fear. Okay, let's take it to the next level. Just in case I'm missing you.

Starting point is 00:44:49 We think courage is the absence of fear. It is not. Courage, sir, is facing. fear. The word courage has no meaning unless we're talking about facing fear, overcoming fear. Some of the greatest moments of your life, you had to overcome fear and anxiety. And so, but at a certain stage, while I'm a fifth year, a senior, I'm in the CFL, I shouldn't be nervous. And if you didn't care, you wouldn't be nervous. Right.

Starting point is 00:45:26 Your passion and your fire is there. You want it so bad. You want to do the absolute best you can. When I'm going on stage and I'm about to crap my pants, I get so excited. I don't know what to do it myself because the curse is about to go up and it's showtime, baby. And I know that I'm going to shift like I've done a million times before. And I'm going to take that anxiety and get charged up, fired up, and ready to go. So is it a self-talk thing?

Starting point is 00:45:58 Is that what it is? Is that how you make that show? shift? Is that how you use the fear as fuel? What is it? Well, before self-talk, you've got to program and, look, you know how many, the commercial, there are commercials you hate that you can't get out your head because it's been redundant and you've been brainwashed. You brainwash yourself. You don't just wait till the last moment and then try to do self-talk. The self-talk is building off of all the language and all the training you've done prior to. You don't. You've processed, you've analyzed, you've repeated it over and over and over in the mirror somewhere else where you're making it crystal clear.

Starting point is 00:46:37 I'm so excited. I don't know what to do with myself. Oh my God. This is going to be overwhelming. Oh, my God, this is going to be great. Oh, my God. This is going to be something special. I can't believe they ask me. I'm so excited.

Starting point is 00:46:55 It's not just at that moment. Before the moment. You anticipate fear and anxiety. You invite them in because you knew they were going to show up. You said, hey, I knew you were coming. You're about five minutes too late. I only got five minutes. I'll indulge you for a minute and a half.

Starting point is 00:47:12 Then I got to go. Self-talk. Not just at the moment, but you build it and you build it until it's part of who you are. It just becomes like your default setting. This is just how I operate. It almost becomes unconscious. Like, that's just how you behave each day. But it takes time and effort and noticeable preparation to be diligent day after day.

Starting point is 00:47:38 So it's not just the day of the speech. We're using a speech as a proxy for anything, any big moment or any moment in someone's life. But I feel like, Greg, what you're saying is this is work that needs to be done immediately starting now, that it just becomes normal, a regular part of how you operate. Well, I tell you what, if there's anybody that can write the book I just wrote, it's you. Think about what we're saying. We're saying practice, train, and rehearse. Yes.

Starting point is 00:48:06 Practice train and rehearse. Practice train and rehearse given 100% 100% of the time at everything you do. I'm committed. My mindset, my default mode is to give 100%. Is that realistic? Absolutely not. but if my mindset, my default mode is to give 100% back in the day when I was off, I'd be down at 30%, 50% on a good day. But if my default mode is to give 100% of the time at everything I do, my worst day will be better than the average person's best day.

Starting point is 00:48:43 Yeah. When it comes to speaking, Greg, I think of the amazing speeches that I've been in the audience for and how those people have changed. changed my life. And I say to myself, as I'm building the deck, as I'm practicing and rehearsing, as I know you're massive proponent of, which is awesome. And as I'm getting ready, it's there and not like doing the reading the bio before you're getting ready to go on stage, is what an amazing opportunity this is. What an amazing opportunity I have to potentially change somebody's life. And that brings, I mean, I get like emotional thinking about this right now. That brings so much energy as you're about to go on the stage to say,

Starting point is 00:49:24 what an amazing opportunity this is that I have in front of me and thinking of the speakers that have influenced me and changed my life, wow, like, I could do that. And that is a cool way to start because you're going to have some passion behind those words, man. Like whatever story or you're opening, you're going to have some juice if you walk on like thinking about what an amazing opportunity it is. I don't care if it's 6,66016.

Starting point is 00:49:52 Yeah. And look, somebody in that room is going to buy it. Yeah. If I can get one, if I can get one, if I can change one person's life, it's been worth it. Yeah. Somebody's going to get it. I don't know what I'm talking to today, but somebody, this is the perfect timing. So good.

Starting point is 00:50:17 Do you get brought in to help companies when they're making decisions of who to hire for leadership roles? No. As a matter of fact, this is the most fun I've ever had in my life because right now I don't have to get brought in by anybody. I choose. I select. I do what I want when I want with who I like. I like you. You got a shot because I'm retired, but I'm busy.

Starting point is 00:50:46 But about hiring, I mean, let's be real clear. Hiring is the art. Hiring people. Anybody can look good on a resume. Anybody can be a star on paper. So what's important is to begin to get people comfortable, getting them so comfortable that they tell you who they are. Ask them about the job, the worst job they've ever had.

Starting point is 00:51:15 Ask them about the best job they ever had. Ask them about the best boss they've ever had. Ask them about the best, the worst. And pay attention to not what they say, but even how they say it. And focus on whether or not they're going to talk about how screwed up their worst boss was, or will they take any ownership for why the relationship did not work. If they can't take any ownership, even if it's just by just out of it. politeness, out of humility, saying, you know, I probably wasn't the best fit for that personality.

Starting point is 00:51:54 And I struggled mightily to deal with difficult personalities when I was a younger person. But now I understand that people are different and I'm prepared better than I've ever been to work with, easy people to work with and challenging people to work with. So find out about how they felt about the person who fired them. I said that first question to get to the second one, which was if you're helping somebody because you want to, what are some of those must have qualities? Sounds like ownership is one of them, like ownership of their past, a knowledge base of themselves. It feels like that's another one.

Starting point is 00:52:36 What are a few of the others that you think, hey, if they got a big leadership role, whether it's with a team or with a company, they've got to have these few things. And this is how I try to uncover that throughout the course of the interview process. How are they going to do? Everything changes instantly. I might have somebody to come into the room and talk about something that was totally unexpected. You got to say, do you think this guy could talk to this group right now? Are you willing to do that, Ryan? Sure.

Starting point is 00:53:04 So all of a sudden, Ryan is in front of five potential colleagues. and doing a panel discussion. Or he's being grilled by four or five people, and no one told him that was going to happen. Oh, you want to see they can deal with that. Oh, come on, how they flow and how they, and if they'll be honest, you know, because we're looking.

Starting point is 00:53:30 And I really like people who can con me into talking when I'm interviewing them. Yeah. I mean, you write about the end of your book, right? Like when you're being interviewed, turn it around like what i think that's chapter 34 what do you mean by that what i mean by that is like hawk is trying to decide whether or not i'm going to be a good fit for his organization yeah and hawk needs to be real clear i'm trying to see if this organization it's going to be a good fit for me my job is convince hawk to convince me that i want to work there instead of me in there

Starting point is 00:54:01 trying to convince hawk he wants me i want hawks convince me because i got options you know so you do that you do that through asking questions you do that through interviewing them just like they're interviewing you you turn it around you know i studied you before i got on here i'm going to study the organization i'm going to study and find out everything i can about them the pros the cons anything i can i'm going to open the door for them to tell me what their struggles are what they're working on. If they can't tell me their weaknesses, I might not want to work there. Yeah. You understand? If they're, if they are brutally honest about what they're working on, what they need, why they think I'd be a good fit. I mean, I'll consider them, but I don't know

Starting point is 00:54:48 if I'll choose them. I need you to convince me this is the greatest move of my life to work with you. So good. Greg, one more before we run, man. This thing is flown by. Let's say you're meeting with somebody who's recently graduated from college. They've done well and they want to continue to do well. They want to progress, but they're not really quite sure what they want to do with their life yet. Like most of us at that age, definitely me. What are some general pieces of life slash career advice you'd give to that person?

Starting point is 00:55:24 If someone that's about to graduate, I'm going to ask them a simple question. I'm asking the same question I ask Michael Phelps. Same question I'll ask any high roller. I'll ask anybody this question. If you had to work the rest of it every day for the rest of your life and not get paid to die, what would you do? If you work every day for the rest of your life and never get paid for it but your needs are being met, what would you choose to do? And then pursue it. I would also teach them that the pursuit of purpose is half the fun.

Starting point is 00:56:09 Your job is to figure out, can I create a formula by which I'm getting paid to do what I would do for free? That's a gig, bruh. Really hard to do, though. Yes. And if I can't do that, guess what I'm going to do, Ryan? What? I'm going to have my high-end, well-paying job, pay for my passion. Yeah. You found that, though, right? You found it pretty early, huh?

Starting point is 00:56:41 Well, I guess when we're relatively speaking, yes, you know, but early is relative, you know, but when you look back at my whole life, absolutely. If you're rolling like that in your 30s, you're rolling. And I mean, I was very fortunate and very blessed to be able to work with some of the greatest coaches in the world to end up working with. some of the most amazing athletes. I mean, actually, it wasn't until this book came out that I really dawned on me, the types of people I had worked with. To me, it were like 17, 18, 19-year-olds, right?

Starting point is 00:57:17 And then when you really look at that list, you say, oh, I guess I have had a grand adventure. So it's been great to be paid to do what I would do for free. and they'll steal people up, try to convince them. Imagine telling Desmond Howard, Tom Brady, Charles Woodson, Juan Howard, Jalen Rose, you've got to decide with or without football. You've got to decide with or without basketball. Your life is going to be amazing.

Starting point is 00:57:56 And if you can decide that, all of a sudden, your sport becomes what you do. do not who you're more than a athlete. This is awesome, man. More than a what? You're more than a C. Try to tell a CEO. You're more than a CEO.

Starting point is 00:58:16 I spoke to a group of millionaires the other day. It was hilarious because at this ageing at this stage, I'm not impressed. So you got money. Does anybody like you? Because we all know somebody. We've all met somebody. We've seen somebody. paper, it doesn't get any better.

Starting point is 00:58:36 Or a negative, miserable, and depressed. Whose self-loathing is torn them apart. And so we've seen people not want to live anymore because of their inability to connect with people. So teaching people how to manage success is an art. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:59:00 Thank you so much for this today, Greg. It was awesome. The book's called Stay Sane. in an insane world, how to control the controllables and thrive. Forward by seven-time Super Bowl champion, greatest quarterback of all time, Tom Brady. Such a good book, an international instant bestseller for good reason. So I'm just really grateful for you, Greg,

Starting point is 00:59:21 and how much thought and prep and effort and energy you brought to this and made it a lot of fun. And I would love to continue our dialogue as we both progress, man. Ryan, as Picard would say, make it so. Awesome, man. Thank you so much, man. All right, see you soon. It is the end of the podcast club.

Starting point is 00:59:47 Thank you for being a member of the end of the podcast club. If you are, send me a note, Ryan at learningleader.com. Let me know what you learned from this great conversation with Greg. Harden, a few takeaways from my notes, the commonalities of people who sustain excellence, a commitment to continuous improvement. They are humble. They are hungry. They are coachable. And they continue to push. They are incredibly driven and it never stops. And then courage is not about being fearless. Courage is about facing your fears. It's about turning those fears into fire and passion for people to say that they aren't fearless. It's not realistic. It's not true. It's not

Starting point is 01:00:34 true. We all have fears. It's about how we choose to handle them and the courage we show in the face of those fears. Then Greg said, you need to become the world's greatest expert on one subject, yourself. We all need to do the work to better understand who we are, what we're scared of, why we say the things to ourselves that we do, and how to improve. It's really hard, but very necessary work. And the fun part about it is it never ends. Once again, I would say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two. Hey, you should listen to this episode of The Learning Leader Show with Greg Harden. I think it will help you become a more effective leader because you continue to do that.

Starting point is 01:01:21 And you go to Ryanhawk.net, which launches you into Apple Podcast. And once you're there, you write a thoughtful review and rate the show, hopefully five stars. And by doing that, you are continually giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis, and for that I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to soon. Can we?

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 551: Greg Harden - How To Control The Controllables and Stay Sane in an Insane World (Tom Brady's Mentor)

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