What Does Leading by Example Mean, and How Do You Do It?

0:03Welcome to Leadership DNA, a podcast for those who aspire to be a better leader. Alongside Arturo Gomez, I'm Rob Cressy. In today's topic, Leading By Example, and we've got another special guest joining us. And Arturo, I'm going to allow you to do the introduction. Perfect. Well, it is with great pleasure that I get to introduce my friend and acquaintance over the last 10 years, Chad Bronstein, who is currently the CEO and co-founder of Fyllo, which is a MarTech company. So Chad, give us a little introduction and tell us what your day-to-day life is like, and a little bit about Fyllo.

0:45Yeah, thanks for having me, Rob and Arturo. Arturo, we obviously go way back to the days of 10 years ago, we had underground. So I got to see both of us grow, which is great from that. But, so yeah, I started Fyllo about a year and a half ago, founded it. When I was at Amobee, Arturo, which you knew me at, I decided I was going to go, wanted to start something new and be an entrepreneur again.

1:10And so I saw the opportunity to do something in cannabis. And there was an opportunity that there really wasn't much technology in the space. And so I went and had the idea and then went around and brought some co-founders on with me. Aristotle, you know him, his local Chicago guy, and Eric Shani, who was with me at Amobee, and really went out and started raising capital on the vision. And we were able to raise $16 million. And I went around and built a really amazing team.

1:40I think we'll talk about it later, but Fyllo wouldn't have been as successful as it is today, which the year and a half later, we're 75 employees. We're in multiple markets, Israel, L.A., New York, Chicago, Denver. And we're growing because of the team that we built and kind of our mentality. So it's been fun. It's exciting. Learning something new every day as an entrepreneur. But yeah, that's in a nutshell. I've been in MarTech for 14 years, guys.

2:10Started at Konian, which is a small company by myself. When I was in Chicago, we grew up pretty quickly with another entrepreneur, Kim. And, you know, had a lot of success there and was ready to do it again. It's amazing. So, you know, I mentioned that you and I have known each other for about 10 years. About, it was probably about three years ago, you and I spent some time together. I actually got a chance to see you interact.

2:34And as much as I knew you and respected your hustle and saw this passion and this hunger to be like a true entrepreneur, I actually had never had a chance to see you interact with your team, really. It was always kind of from the outside looking in. I got a really unique opportunity to actually see you interact with your team. And I think I left after those three days and I knew in my mind, I said, wow, one of the reasons that Chad is so successful is because of his leadership style.

3:04I saw the way that you were interacting with your team, the respect level that they pushed back onto you. And just those are the key ingredients to a formula, in my opinion, for real success. One of the questions that I have for you is who along the way or how many people or what people influenced your leadership style and who can you say may have had the greatest impact on you?

3:32That's a tough question. I think, you know, at the end of the day, I got I had great parents that taught me a lot from that standpoint and always pushed me to be a hustler and persistence and, you know, just but I think, you know, you have all these different. Like you said, it's hard. I had wrestling, great wrestling coaches in high school that taught me a lot. You know, I had great parents. My wife taught me a lot. You learn a lot from a lot of people. And you are good friends. I wouldn't call us friends. I'd say good friends.

4:03And, you know, from my standpoint, it's like you bring people around you and you learn from them and they learn from you. And I think part of coaching and being a leader is just taking tidbits from people that, you know, teach you that bring in different plays you can call in your playbook as you grow. And right. And so, Rob, you're a sports guy. I think a lot of what I do is analogy sports analogies, but it's like building a successful sports franchise. Right. You got to have the proper coaching. You may be able to call play, but someone may see a play that you weren't able.

4:33Well, someone calls an audible that you didn't see. You have to have coaches around you that may see that before you do. And that's kind of my methodology, Arturo, is just bringing bringing talent. And in Amobee, when you were in Vegas with me at CES with the team, that was one of the best teams that I've built. I'm great people. It's energy. You have to energy fuels me. Right. And that's the key. And so I didn't say I brought some of that Amobee talent over to Fyllo. But at the same time, we went out and brought new people as well.

5:01I never worked with Aristotle, but I knew his energy and his and his hunger would really fire me up. And it has. And he never worked in technology before. Nicole Cosby, our chief of data compliance, she was running Publicis. I met her negotiating legal. And so bringing her on here, we just built a relationship. And I knew she had something special to drive this organization. And if you look around our below, you'll see a lot of special talent that allows us to be who we are.

5:28But it's energy. Energy fuels me. That's I think that's the best way to describe it. Awesome. And Chad, so today's topic is leading by example. And I'm curious to dig into your mindset of how you lead yourself, because to be a great leader of others, you need to be self-driven and be someone with a growth mindset who always wants to get better. So how are you pushing yourself to always get better so that you can better lead?

5:57I think, I mean, for me, it's I know what's going on around me. Right. And I'm not the guy. I'm not an ivory tower type of leader. I mean, I'm going to sit in a room and say, do this, do that. I actually will do whatever, you know, I always say, or I talk about this, but I'll do what the janitor would do. I have no problem doing that. Right. So I, you know, I built this ground up with the team, but I did it ground up. Right.

6:18And so every which way I know what needs to get done. And I think being a great leader is being a player and a coach, which is like, you know, when you look at the great, I think a lot of the great coaches, they also played and understand they had a different vision. And for me, I think that I can play the game and coach the game properly. And there's nothing that I won't do that my team that I would ask my team to do.

6:42And I, and I'm heads down kind of guy. There's always competitors guys, but I'm a heads down doing what I think we need to do. And that's, that's how we win, I think. And so we don't worry about outside factors. We just worry about hustling and working hard and you know, getting to the finish line. And so I think I have, I'm, I would say that if you ask people about me is that I'm a loyal, persistent leader and I will do what I ask other people to do.

7:10And that I always, I think ethically, I always stand by the right morals and ethics. And that's why people like to work for me. You know, I would, I would, I would think that's what you would hear from people. That's what you'll hear from me for sure. Yeah. So, I mean, I think everything that you just mentioned to me is really encompasses and describes what I would, what I would say is a cultural impact. Somebody who's driving culture in the space.

7:35What do you guys tell me a little bit about Fyllo, the mission and what that culture feels like right now within the company. It's a new company in a totally new space and not working in offices. Great. You ask great questions, but so we have, we have a motto. It's all in, all out, all together. So we were in a, we were in my lake house in Wisconsin. We just raised a little bit of money and we're all together in the room.

8:03Like what, you know, you see at other organizations, Arturo, you know, Rob, you've probably seen your careers. Like there's things you really liked, there's things you really didn't like. So when we started Fyllo, I've seen a lot of things that I liked and a lot of things I didn't like. So now that it was a company that I founded, I got to really establish the core culture that we wanted. And so it's about, you know, being together and working together. And so we said all in, all out, all together. So we're going to live and breathe that.

8:29And so that's the culture we work on, you know, in terms of coronavirus, I'll be honest with you. I think, you know, Arturo, we were just talking earlier about the restaurant industry. And even when we were, we raised this capital, we hired a really good team. We're on this run and then coronavirus hits and we're like, oh sh*t, what's going to happen here? You know, are we, are we going to, are we going to have that one year, like nine month run? And we're going to have to recall it quits because we just didn't know the future.

8:55And then I've never worked a day in my life at home. I mean, Arturo, you know me well. I traveled all the time. I was always in different offices and I lived off of energy. So this was new to me. And I think we really pivoted really well where the zoom, like doing this, like we have tons of zoom calls and we have a good working methodology. We're more productive actually from home than we were at the offices. Right.

9:22And so, you know, the fact that cannabis was deemed an essential was great. Right. For, for our business. So that kind of gave us the boost we needed for the morale when we were in this situation. But I feel that now you have to do a challenge to communicate more. You can't really fly under the radar when you work from home. You have to, if people don't hear from you, it's pretty easy to tell that they didn't hear from you and there's no productivity when you're working together. So I would say we became more productive.

9:51Our culture is strong because it enforces the fact that you have to engage more via zoom versus when you're in an office. It's, it may be harder when you're working from New York or Chicago. Now it doesn't matter because you have to be on zooms. Right. So I feel like from that perspective, it's worked out really well for us and you know, our culture is strong, but as you get bigger, you have to stay focused on how do you create engagement.

10:17So now that's the next challenge that we're focused on is like, we used to be able to go out for dinners and do offsites and stuff like that. Now it was like the new norm. What do you do? And so these are things that we are doing, we're figuring out and just making sure that we don't lose sight of growing. I don't want to be that CEO that is that big guy, big woman or man that's at a big company that loses sight of how they got there. So I think my methodology is keep it as we grow, keep it consistent, you know?

10:47So Chad, as part of getting a good culture and growing is personal development, whether that's training the people who are working with you or also getting them to level up themselves, including yourself. Sort of how do you put personal development for your team in the ethos of what you guys do? I think, you know, that's a great question. So my C-level team, just to give you guys some context to the listeners, is pretty talented, right?

11:15So Nicole, like I said, chief data compliance, head attorney for Bad Boy Records, then went to AOL, then went to Publicis, came here. Jeff Ragovin, my chief commercial officer, sold Buddy Media for $745 million to Salesforce, right? Aristotle, 30-year-old guy that sold his company to Marcus Simonis. My CFO was a Chicago guy, sold Q Discovery and Bucket Feet, was a part of that. Eric Shani, my co-founder, sold a company called Kontera to Amobee, where we met.

11:45Conrad Liscoe, I think Arturo, you met him before, but he was the CMO, I mean, the head of marketing at Amobee. But what I'm getting at is each one of these people, I have to be my best self because it's not like I'm managing some, you know, junior level leaders. So I have to really just be cognizant of how I approach each person. Everyone has different personalities.

12:07So I think that, you know, knowing, I'll say this and I can't say a name, but I've seen someone just come into a company and bring a book and said, this book, this book makes me successful. We have to follow all this, what this book says. And again, I think great coaches can never just follow someone's other coaches methodology. You have to bring in your own, you have to bring in your own day-to-day play calling and be able to call audibles.

12:33And so, like I said, every time I deal with a situation, I bring a different approach. And if I make a mistake, which I do, everyone does, I have to, I sit in my office and I think about how I can do it differently. And I have a board that is very sophisticated, great board and they challenged me and they always, Arturo knows me like I could get frustrated and I may get frustrated, but I will after, I may challenge them, but then I'll go home and think about it.

13:02And I can apologize and say, you know what? I was frustrated and I took the night to think about it and calm down and you were, you were right. Right. So I think that I may be tough, but I also couldn't come back and say I was wrong. And I think that's a leader needs to be able to do that at all times. Awesome. So you just, by the way, so you're, so I've been on the outside kind of looking in again, as you guys have been forming this team.

13:29I mean, a lot of these guys I've known from, I've just known their careers. Some I've known through you. It is an all-star cast. I mean, it really is like a list of heavy hitters. So, and one of the things that people really don't talk about in leadership is the idea that recruitment is such an important piece of the repertoire of great leaders.

13:52You have to be a great recruiter, in my opinion, to be considered a truly strong leader, because it's the team that's going to ultimately drive you to success. So, so recruitment for me is like, you have to have confidence as an individual. You have to have confidence to bring people on the team that potentially could be bigger, stronger, faster than you. Right. You also have to have a resume that people will look at and say, well, this individual has been successful in his life.

14:20And I think that you have to also be able to paint a vision, a picture of like where we're going and to be able to articulate all those things. Do you, I mean, do you have a particular recruitment strategy to be, I mean, tell us how you got all these people to jump on. I think recruit, you know, I'm going to, both of you guys, Rob, I'm guessing you understand, you're a great recruiter and understand recruiting. And Arturo, I've seen you recruit excellent talent and building an icon of what you've done in your past. So it's the same thing, right?

14:50It's like when you, when I recruit, I'm always thinking about how do we get to the finish line, right? If everyone has a different goal, you're a football team, you want to be a Superbowl, your basketball team, you want to win the NBA finals. So companies want to have an exit or a great opportunity for all their employees. And so how do you get there? And what, how do you know, you want to get there sooner than later, right? When you build a team and you bring on great talents, like the goal is to do it, cut five years off of the time to win. And so everybody I bring is back to the cultural side.

15:20Like if you look at our board, I'll just name some names like Mitch Kahn. I met Mitch at a Canaccord conference. So it was back to our networking. It's like when we can actually network. I got introduced to him by Clive Sirkin, who's on my board. Who's a Chicago guy. Who's a CMO, Kimberly Clark and Kellogg's introduced me to Mitch. Who's for people that don't know, he's a CEO of grassroots. It is sold to Curaleaf for about a billion dollars. And, and just bringing him on, we connected.

15:45I spent four or five months just recruiting him to be on the board, educating about what we're doing and earning his trust. And Katie Ford, our chair, you know, who's on our board. She's phenomenal. She was my client, Rob. She was running a park in Chicago as the president. And we hit it off and she came to work with me at Amobee. And when I started this, she was the first person I told. And she's like, I want to be in. I want to be a part of this. So she joined the board, not knowing this is going to be successful or not.

16:14Just blind belief, I think, in me and our relationship. And so the board is extended. We got Katie, Clive, Mitch, Christy Hafner just joined, who was, you know, a legend in all different areas. And we met through a mutual friend. And I spent a lot of time just getting, you know, getting to know her and her getting to know us and what Fyllo was trying to do in our vision. But across the board, we have a lot of great people.

16:41Lorne Gertner, who they call the godfather of cannabis, who started Tokyo Smokes in Toronto. And they sold it for quite a bit of capital to Kronos. Jason Clarich, who's our lead investor with Jason Wild, who's on our board. Excellent as well. And we just added another person, Craig Robinson, to the board. But the board, again, it's challenging the team to do better. And so I recruit really well, I think.

17:08I recruit based off of how they fit into the company and not just their backgrounds, but their culture. A board is like my good friend from, I don't know if you've met him, but Asaf, who was the founder of Kontera. You know, I said you're as good as your last dinner, right, when you're in board meetings. And I want to have a board. I just, in general, I want to have a board that you enjoyed having dinner with. So whether it's your last dinner or not, every dinner you go, it's enjoyable. And our board's like that.

17:37You feel like you're going into your family. And that's what's cool about it. So, Chad, one thing that I love about talking with you is I can feel your energy. It's transferable. And we recently had Carrie on the podcast. Carrie Luxem talking about positive energy. And I just want to recognize that in you because I can feel this energy from you. But another thing that I'm noticing about you is vision and thinking big.

18:04And for me, this is something that just this week, I changed my word of the year to vision. It used to be give, but right now vision is more important. And I know great leaders are great at selling a vision. And I'm curious on your end what you do to sell a vision both for yourself and for others. Because I think certainly for leaders, we need to believe in ourselves first. And then we can sell it on others.

18:32Well, I can tell you one thing. I'm very confident in myself. And so I believe always that it's not about being better than anybody else. It's being the best I can be. And so I always just challenge myself always as a leader just to be, I'm competitive with myself. I learn when you're younger, you're immature. You're like, I got to be better than this or that. When you're older, it's like you got to be better than yourself and keep pushing yourself. But as a visionary, visions are what raise capital.

19:00Like Arturo with Edie's, like great vision and it's become a reality. And I'm just looking at him. I knew if he starts something because I've known him for a while, he'll work his ass off to do it. I'm the same way. You got to bring substance to a vision, right? I start off with the vision. I raise a lot of capital for the vision. Then once the vision and the excitement around the vision is there, you have to have substance to the vision. And so that's where we're back to like, I was able to raise a lot of capital because I brought a great team. I had a vision. We knew we would execute.

19:29When people give you capital, they want to make sure that if they give you capital, that they're the right team to execute on that vision. Because everything you invest in is a vision. And so vision is very important. You have to have a strong vision and you have to be accepting that the vision may have pivots. But you can still stay within the vision, but you may have to have a pivot in the vision, right? And so I had a vision. It definitely extended to more than I could have expected, which is amazing. I don't think a lot of people can say that.

19:59And we've been lucky. But I think you have to have a vision and believe in, especially in these times, Rob, because it's depressing times in certain areas. So you have to be stronger mentally than ever. If you are going to set out to start an EDs or start a podcast or start something, you have to be vulnerable but unbreakable. So when you have those vulnerable moments, you look at yourself and say, step the f*ck up and let's go keep going, you know? Love it.

20:25So I think we have time for maybe perhaps one more question. But so, you know, in experiences that I've had along the way over the last, you know, call it 20 some years of being in business, is I've felt that I've seen certain leaders that have been that hold back a little bit. They hold back for the fear that they may lose a particular employee.

20:49And they try to, in a very selfish way, try to close down doors because they don't want to see that teammate leave because of the strength or for whatever reason. You have an all-star team. I mean, people that are insanely accomplished in different parts of their past career. How do you keep them engaged? And what would you say to some of those leaders that selfishly sometimes roadblock people's careers?

21:16I personally am not going to roadblock anybody's career. And again, like, Arturo, if you look at, you know, people you met at CES, like all those people I've still talked to and I've helped them get other opportunities. And it may not be with me, but, you know, if you have good people, you got to let them go. And I've seen, I'll go to you, but look at Scott Horst. He's looked at you at Underground, right? He came to Amobee and then he's now started his own company.

21:41But it's like, you want to let people, there's a certain point where you hope they stay with you as long as you can to help you build it. But if they say, you know what, I've done my piece and I can't help you out anymore. And I want to start something, I want to go start something new or do something else. Like, you have to let them be, right? And I think that a great leader hopefully gets to retain. I look at my retention of talent and I haven't had any struggles with retention in my career. And that's because I'm very transparent.

22:09I think if you want people to stay with you got to be transparent. If they don't know why they're staying, they don't know what they're here for and what opportunity, then there's a good shot they'll leave, right? And so when transparency goes out the door, I think you lose retention. So it's just making sure that I'm transparent with people and they're transparent with me. If someone were to, I'm a loyal person, so I'll leave it like this.

22:31But if someone were to catch me off guard and say, and I've been great to them, loyal to them, and they said, you know, I'm leaving you tomorrow to go to your competition, then I wouldn't be so happy, right? It's just, everything has to be done. If I'm transparent with you, I expect transparency back to me. And if you are transparent back to me, I will help you. Like I will make sure whatever you do that I will help you be successful. So it's just about, it comes back down to etiquette and ethics.

22:59Be, do right by me, I'll do right by you. And I think that's the methodology that I've always lived by and it served me to the, you know, good to this point. One of the things that I've really enjoyed about this conversation is Arturo, when I look at the episodes that we've recorded so far on a micro basis, from EQ to energy to grit to all of these different things.

23:25I see so much of it in Chad, in what he's speaking and success leaves so many breadcrumbs along the way. And so often we have narratives that we talk about over and over again on this show. But for me, when I hear it makes me feel good because it reaffirms the tenets of leadership that I know are so important. Do you agree, Arturo? A hundred percent.

23:49And I think that one of the episodes at length, we've discussed that, you know, at least from my perspective, where I think we share this perspective that for me, when it's all said and done, my success won't be measured in monetary. It won't be measured in anything other than the legacy that I left behind in human capital.

24:09The people that I've seen succeed over the years because of the work that we've done either together or the work that they put in or the work that I put in to put them in that spot. And so that's, you know, a hundred percent agree. And that's why I was super excited to have Chad on the show, because like I said, it's there's been a lot of respect for many years there.

24:31But seeing firsthand how he engaged with his team, there was so many different attributes of true leadership that I saw there. But, you know, I think Chad is going to be one of those people, too, that his legacy already speaks for itself. He's already I've already seen people that have worked for Chad, with Chad, that may not be with the current team, that have all gone on to be really successful in whatever they've done. Yeah, I would say lifelong relationships.

24:59Kim Perala, who's my old boss, you met her, Arturo, but she she always said lifelong relationships. I think it's very true. That is true. I love what you just said, too, about human capital. I think, you know, people are like, oh, this person, you're you're you're at the end of the day, you're trying to make everyone liquid and make money for everybody. But then the day, that's not necessarily like it's it's the trophy, but it's not what drives you. What drives you is having fun day to day when you lose when you lose fun.

25:26And it happened to me like Selena, how I started a few is I'll leave it at this. But I sit at my table and I'm like, you know, I'm kind of miserable, you know, doing being a large corporation now. And that's just me. And she's like, as I go do another, you know, run another company or start this cannabis company. She's like, you I want you to be happy. So, you know, it's a huge risk. I was doing very well for myself. She's like, but we can we'll figure it out. Just go do it. I think Arturo, you have that support at home.

25:56Rob, I don't know you personally, but I know Arturo's wife. And so it's just making sure that you have like support. And she pushed me. She's like, just go f*cking do it. And that's really without without her saying that I wouldn't have done it because I have a family. And so you just have to there's just like a back to there's so many factors of how you get somewhere that you just it takes. You can't give it in 40 minute podcast. But I like the human capital thing you said at the end of the day. I think that's the most important thing of what drives me.

26:22So we like to end every episode with an action item or a takeaway. And Arturo, I'll let you lead so that Chad can see how we get down with this. Yeah, I mean, I think my action item is that is is today's a great example of all the little micro pieces that I think that we've left along the way with with our podcast. And, you know, looking at, you know, obviously, people don't know. Some people may know Chad. They may not know Chad.

26:49But understanding that leadership dive into this concept that it's it is not it's not consisting of one thing. It's consisting of a lot of little things that really make leaders stand out. And I think, you know, so so looking at that entire body of work, but also, again, understanding that that we have responsibilities to our investors and to the people that have jumped on board that have said, I'm going to follow you and I'm going to follow your vision. So, you know, just I think bringing that awareness out, not necessarily an action item.

27:25I think it's just more about the action item would just be to to think about it and consider that that there's responsibilities and there are people along the way that we were there to serve. And Chad, do you have an action item or takeaway from this conversation? I love it. I love your guys' style of this podcast. I think you guys should keep it up. I think it challenges people like, you know, free flowing brings out, you know, the actual rawness of a story. So I personally have enjoyed this.

27:54I just see you guys keep going and bringing on good stories because, you know, Rob, I've heard great things about you and through Arturo. And so I know you've hustled your way to be very successful and I've gotten to see, you know, I've always looked up to Arturo as well. So I think, you know, I've been around him for 10 years, seeing his hustle. So just keep, like we said, just keep inspiring people to hustle and, you know, try to follow their vision. Like you said, Rob, earlier, just focus on your vision. If you have a vision, try to make it a reality.

28:23But it's not, there's no shortcuts to that. Oh, I love that. And for me, my takeaway, Chad, is actually something that you said that resonates so much with me that's in my DNA. You have to be better than yourself. That's the only one. Anytime someone says, who's your competition, I'm my own competition because we're the ones who are the architects of our worlds and we can create anything we want. So we've always got to be getting better, better at all times.

28:54And Chad, really enjoyed this conversation with you.

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0:02Welcome to Leadership DNA, a podcast for those who aspire to be a better leader. Alongside Arturo Gomez, I'm Rob Cressy. In today's topic, the benefits of leading by example. And Arturo, every single action that we take as a leader sets the tone. Are your actions echoing louder than your words? Let's dive into leading by example and how this can amplify your leadership impact. Yeah, I mean, I think it's kind of one of those things that I feel like goes without saying, right? It's, you know, it's a saying that's been around really, I think, from the beginning of when I started trying to study, you know, leadership and coaching. And it just, you know, has always just felt like something that just was common sense.

0:55But I think when you really kind of dive into it's the thing for me is that if people are going to be, if you're going to try to convince people or move people to follow you, your message has to be believable. And if your message isn't believable, it starts really with, are you actually doing the things that you're asking us to do?

1:15And I think it's, you know, listen, it becomes really difficult because depending on where you are or who you are in terms of like the people that you're leading, I think it's a critical part of establishing culture and conveying the right message, directing people towards a vision. If you're not walking the walk, it's very difficult to get people to buy in. Yeah, and I think a lot of the things that we've previously talked about all layer into this.

1:44And I think part of leading by example is also selfless leadership or servant leadership where ego can get in the way of people from leading by example. Because oftentimes leadership or management can be seen as a hierarchy of who's at the top and the people at the bottom. And because I'm above you, I'm going to tell you what to do. So no matter what I say is the way that I do things.

2:09But for myself, I lead by example in everything that I do in my entire brand has been built around this. And I think back to the very beginning of my journey and a mentor once said, Rob, if you ever hope to get paid to do what you love, you better be doing it already. And from that moment, I was like, all right, I want to get paid to talk about sports for a living. So I taught myself podcasting, being a host, being on camera, social media marketing, brand building, essentially how to build a media company.

2:38So when I eventually evolved to being a coach and people hired me for strategy, it's very effortless for me because I led by example because I'm the one who is always doing. And I've always took a slight amount of umbrage at marketing agencies who sell services, but then I check out their social media or their YouTube. And I look and they're not doing the same things that they do for their clients.

3:05And to me, as a creator and as a leader, I always want to lead the way. And I think about my personal growth side of things. And I lead myself, one for myself, but also for my family, for people like you, Arturo, the people who are listening or watching right now, that the way that we carry ourselves is an energy and it's a standard and it's a lifestyle.

3:30And all of those things coming from the top of leadership, they just get disseminated in everything that you do within your organization. Yeah. I mean, listen, I think you bring up a valid point. I mean, so there's different forms of it, right? So there's, you know, lead by example in terms of leading yourself. And that's a critical thing. And we talk about that a lot. And, you know, so what's that attached to? It's attached to, you know, who this individual that you want to be and more so the individual that you're telling people that you are.

3:58And so, you know, it's critical that you're able to lead yourself and represent yourself as an example of what you're trying to be or who you're saying you are. Right. I think that that's critical. I think the other thing, too, is, you know, how does a coach who's, you know, communicating from the sidelines, how does that individual lead by example when, you know, they may be out of their prime or never have played the sport, but they have the ability to coach and to mentor people?

4:27I think for me, it's a lot of it is really attached to the culture. You know, there can certainly be a self kind of inclusive culture where, you know, the things that you are doing as an individual in terms of how you're trying to lead your own life, I think is a culture as well. But I think when we talk about leadership and this concept of lead by example, for me, it's very much attached to the culture of an organization or the culture of a specific movement, so to speak. And so, yeah, I think it's I think it's critical. All right, Arturo, let's look at the other side of the spectrum of people who may be in organizations who are not leading by example.

5:14And this doesn't mean that everyone within a company is all aligned. Of course, that's one of the reasons why we create this podcast is to help create this alignment and harmony and all that we're doing. And oftentimes the leader may lead by example, but there's an element of self-awareness and experience or earned confidence that helps you get to this.

5:37So if there's someone on your team who is on the come up or maybe they're at the top of the food chain and they're not leading by example, where there is an incongruency between their actions and their words. And this is the worst when it happens in the top of the food chain because everything falls or rises or falls to the level of leadership. What are your thoughts on what to do when leading by example is not present in an organization at any part of it?

6:06I think you got to reel that in quick. It's a fact. But listen, I think there's two parts of it, right? I think, you know, and it happens all the time. It happens all the time. I mean, I think this entire concept of lead by example, I mean, it's like, you know, you're asking for like sainthood, right? It's like it is, you know, that somebody is going to be flawless, you know, every day, 24-7, you know, that's not realistic.

6:36And so, you know, the math, the numbers, the percentages have to be have to lean towards more. You know, you're more in that leading by example space than certainly not. But, you know, I've seen it in various times where people just kind of lose control and they go down separate path. And they're certainly not, you know, holding themselves up in a way that's representative of that concept.

7:01But I also think there are times and opportunities that if leaders are honest with their team and letting people know, hey, today, you know what? I'm having a bad day. Like, I'm not in top form today. I think that that's also okay. I think it's important to be transparent. I think it's important to actually communicate that, you know?

7:25So, I mean, there's times where I will, you know, share that information with my team. Like, hey, if you see me in the building and I'm wearing X or I'm doing Y, I'm not here as your boss or your leader. I'm here as a patron or I'm here to, I'm here for another reason. So, just understand that.

7:49Understand that, you know, if I'm sitting here and enjoying myself, it's not because I'm not wanting to or focused on doing my job. It's because I'm merely here enjoying myself. And so, kind of categorize me a little bit differently. I still think that there's, you know, there's aspects of you being in the building or you being around your team that you have to uphold. I mean, it doesn't give you free right or reign to be, you know, different, a different, a completely different person.

8:18But I think that there's oftentimes that, you know, people are looking at you in a certain way. And I think that it's hard to be that person every day. Yeah, and I think you said a very interesting thing about people lose control and how we see control as leaders, as we lead ourselves. And I don't see leading by example as me being perfect because perfection is the enemy of greatness.

8:48That, to me, it is actually a flaw in leadership if everything you do is all around perfection. Of course, there are standards of excellence, but perfection oftentimes can lead to inaction or not shipping the work. And we're not going to go down that rabbit hole. But I really like the concept of where control lives in all of this because leading by example, to me, is effortless. Because it is a state of being. It is who I am. And it doesn't mean that I'm perfect, but you feel the energy and you feel the heart. And you understand my core values in who I am.

9:33And this is more of a DNA than it is a control side of things. What are your thoughts? Yeah, I mean, I think, listen, I think for some people they are. I think for young managers and people that are aspiring to try to understand how to lead people, I think that there's always that element in the back of their mind. I mean, there is certainly for me.

9:55You know, yeah, some things I think are very, you know, flawless and just, you know, part of the behavior and part of the actions of like just my mechanics. But it's not, there is not a day where I don't put pressure on myself to make sure that the things that I'm asking or the things that are coming out of my mouth are things that I know that 100% that I can do or that I'm showing.

10:20Because again, to me, it's in order to move the needle from a cultural standpoint, it's either people are going to look at you and they're going to believe you or they're not. And if they're going to believe you, they have to really understand that you have the capacity to do what you're asking them to do. And so, you know, to the points that we've kind of been making, there's different forms of it.

10:42It's are you able to, you know, lead yourself and kind of create those examples and kind of move down a path where you want and honor that? And then, you know, how does it look when you're actually managing large groups of people? And what is that, what does that requirement look and feel like? And so I think for me, there's, there's always an element in the back of my mind is my message coming across properly?

11:08And are they viewing the way that I'm delivering it and the things that I'm doing to kind of help move this thing along in the right way? Yeah. And one quote that comes top of mind for me is, I would never, I would never ask you to do something that I have not done myself. And it doesn't always mean that we've done every single role, but in leadership, our ability and Arturo, we even did podcasts about this on getting our hands dirty, that we are both visionaries living at the top as well as willing to do or have done the air quotes grunt work, that the day-to-day execution side of things that we don't live in an ivory tower and we understand and we can create empathy and it allows us to be a better leader because we've been in those shoes before.

12:00Yeah. I mean, you know, I think there's also the flip side it's too, it's, it's, if you know, in the, in the aspect of asking somebody to do something that you can do or you can't do, you know, I, sometimes I don't, I don't allow that to be a hindrance when I know that the responses or the direction should be in a specific, I'm asking you to do something that maybe I understand, but that I certainly can't do, but I'm going to acknowledge that teammate, hey, I need your help. I need you to do this. I'm not going to even pretend that I can do what you're doing. That's why you're here. You're, you're part of, you're part of this because you're different than I am. But, you know, I think, I think you can still bring elements of lead by example throughout that entire picture. I think it, it comes with intensity. It comes with preparation. It comes with the way that you communicate a specific message. And, and a lot of it too, to me is attached, not necessarily about individual behavior, but I think that that is very important. I think it's also, you know, what's the, what's the vision? Where are we, where are we trying to go? And, and, you know, we all should be leading in that, in that specific direction, but I'm not afraid to certainly ask somebody to do something that I'm incapable of doing or don't understand if it's, if it's going to get us across the finish line.

13:24Of course. And by no means, does this mean that we have the ability to do every single thing in our business? Right. Because that's why there are people that we bring in that specialize in certain things. And, and I think the theme of course, being the, there's a variety of tasks that can happen in an everyday scenario when leading people. And it can be as simple as picking up a paper towel off the ground in a bathroom, because you understand that cleanliness and everything you do is a reflection of your brand. So you as a leader are willing to pick up a paper towel on the ground and not saying that I won't do something like that, as opposed to, yeah, I don't know, Photoshop and graphic design, but me as a leader, I'm just going to fight my way through it is we have those things for specialization for a reason. So Arturo, let's get to our action item and our takeaway.

14:17And for me around leading by example, give what you would love to receive in your life. So what I would love for you to do is to give someone on your team a compliment and encourage them to pass that along to somebody else, because your ability to create a positive culture and a positive environment for others starts with yourself.

14:42So just go today, give someone a compliment and say, Hey, by the way, pass this along. What about you, Arturo? What's your action item or takeaway today? I think if people are getting an opportunity to start practicing this, and again, I think there may be people that are listening to us that don't have the opportunity because they're just not in that place or in that position. I'd contradict that and say that we all have an opportunity to lead by example.

15:12And so I think, you know, determining intention, you know, if somebody really is trying to impact this specific lane, to just think about what they're representing and what their goal is in terms of their representation and use that as an exercise to try to, I think, further define and help show themselves primarily that they can, you know, follow down that path.

15:43Arturo, one of the things that's very important to us is engagement. We'd love to hear from you. We've got this across all social media platforms. We've got a LinkedIn group.

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