Leadership Lessons from Navy SEALs, Fortune CEOs & Top Executives

26:14What I love about that perspective and lens is how the self is infused in it. I feel that many of our ideas around leadership are all around the other people, the people we are leading, building the culture, and there's not enough self-reflection built in on how you yourself are leading from the inside out. So with this framework now, and as we see the pieces starting to come together, do you see that there are a lot of leaders who have a stronger side in their personal lives, their professional lives? Do they lean on one or the other? And when there are deficiencies, how do we start to improve those deficiencies?

26:56So take that lesson, that framework for you and actually implement in our lives. Because I know some in our audience are already in a leadership role. Many in our audience are looking to get into those leadership positions. And in order to do so, it's going to be really important for them to take this advice and, as you say, put it into action in their own life. I think what Johnny was saying earlier about how there's certain individuals that can fit in certain spots at certain times. And what I've noticed with leaders, and it almost goes in this idea of work-life balance, which I'm not necessarily a fan of.

27:32I get the concept and the idea, and I definitely spend a lot of time working with individuals on how they can do more self-care and how self-care shows up more in their life. and there are time, kind of a time and place. So there's moments in time where somebody may have to spend more time at work and then things will plateau out. And so with leadership, I've seen that same thing. There may be an individual that is more focused at the workplace and as far as leadership, being a leader, showing up and then they go home and they don't carry over those same frameworks or that same value or that same idea.

28:13So if you run meetings at work, how often have you done a family meeting? Like, hey, a check-in. So if I'm taking out my team members once a month, how often are you taking out your kids? If you have, you know, I have two kids, so I try and make it a point to do something individually with the kids. So there's framework that's very easily transferable. And so that is, so really just helping leaders. if there's a mission statement at the organization, what's your mission statement at home? So if there's a value statement at work, what are your values outside of work? And we can get into ethics and ethical practices and all that stuff.

28:55But it's really like, really, how are you deciding to show up to really our human experience? And with that, if there's differences or if there's misalignment and it's not for me to judge. It's really just to help the individual see what that, where it is and where the work that they want to put into. And once again, it's also their decision on where they want to put the work in. So that's kind of how I, how I lay things out as well. And it sounds like leadership is not a switch that you just flip in the moments where you need it. It sounds like it's a practice and a muscle that you need to strengthen in all areas of your life to really be that great leader.

29:36It's not something that you put your leadership hat on when you're in front of your team at work and then you take it off at home and you don't have the self-practices to be a self-directed leader in your family life or in your personal life, but instead looking at it more holistically of how am I showing up with my friends, how am I showing up with my family, and how am I showing up with my team. John Mackey discusses what conscious leadership is, and you can use it to create win-win-win scenarios. A lot of leaders really want to be conscious leaders, and they want to be conscious capitalists, and they just wanted more, how do I do this stuff?

30:13And so in a lot of ways, this book was an answer to those requests. That's kind of the backstory. And what do you think is the difference between what we typically think of leadership and what you call conscious leadership? Conscious leadership is a lot more internal. It's about, the last chapter is called Contingency, Learn, and Grow. In a lot of ways, the whole book is about that. And most leaders, they're doers. They're action people. They have checklists, and they have self-confidence, and they move forward, and they're bold. And we have sort of this idea of a leader in our minds. And certainly that is a leader.

30:51But a conscious leader can still have that, but it's doing the inner work to develop their emotional intelligence, their sense of purpose, their integrity, their love. These are all skills that people have to work on to develop them. They don't happen automatically. You're not born with integrity. You have to develop it because all little children are like pathological liars. And from the moment a child learns to talk, they learn how to lie, I think. And deceive, yeah. And deceive, exactly. A lot of the leadership books that I have read, a lot of them begin with doing a lot of myth busting because there's these ideas of what conscious capitalism is or what conscious leaders or just leaders in general, who they are and how they operate.

31:34And you had just mentioned about leaders always moving forward, stepping forward. And a lot of times boldly with no idea how things are going to go down, but they understand that if they're going to grow, they have to step into these positions. AJ and I certainly have to deal with it in our own company of constantly stepping into uncertainty. How in the book did you want to approach busting some of these myths? Well, we do bust some of the myths. I mean, particularly when we start talking about leading with love, because I can already tell you on this tour, whenever I start talking with sort of conventional media, the whole idea of leading with love, it's like, well, come on.

32:15Everybody knows business is just a cutthroat. It's this, you know, it's a cutthroat thing. So how can you be leading with love? And that's one of the myths that you have to bust, that it's this kind of metaphors that we used to think about business or war, Darwinian, sports, games, all hyper-competitive. And competition is part of business, but it's not the essence of business. And so to bring love is hiding out in the corporate closet until we bust the myths and create a space for people to feel like love actually is a good strategy in business and life. It's not something we have to check at the door because do that at home because we're going to war today.

32:55You have to bust the myths on the win, win, win because we are so locked in to sort of win, lose binary thinking. If people, somebody is getting rich, somebody else is getting poor. If people are either good or they're evil or they're light and darkness. And those kind of binary dichotomies really are myths, that it's always on a continuum. It's always more complex. You can have win-win-win scenarios. It doesn't have to be one person winning and everybody else losing. These are myths. These are the way, and we construct the way we experience the world by the narratives that we tell ourselves, that this is the way the world is.

33:33And so we act and react based on what our hypothesis or our theory of how the world is. And if you have a crummy story, then if your narrative is not a very functional narrative, then you're gonna sub-optimize. So a conscious leader has to do some myth-busting. You're absolutely right. Now, many in our audience have heard of win-win scenarios, but win-win-win scenarios is a little odd to many of us who've never heard it. How do you break down a win-win-win situation or scenario? Well, a win-win is it's good for you and it's good for me. We both win. You can imagine situations that might be harmful for society we have a win-win.

34:14Somebody pays somebody to go drop toxic waste in the river. They get rid of the waste. That's a win for them. They get paid money for it. It's a win for the person doing it, but definitely a loss for the environment and society. So the win-win-win is good for me, good for you, and good for the larger community, however we might define that larger community. As a leader, you have to deal with criticism, but not from who you think. The most piercing criticism often comes from that little voice in your head, your dreaded inner critic. It's so influential that we train our X Factor Accelerator members how to own it, navigate it, and focus on what really matters.

34:53Here is John Mackey discussing how he responds to it. One of the things about human beings that we're always not conscious of is sometimes we can be our own worst critic. We have an internal critic that's always busting our chops for not being perfect, for doing, making mistakes, and having somebody else let us off the hook and just tell us how much they appreciate us and seeing special things about us that we're not even maybe willing to admit to ourselves. And then they tell us about it. And it's like, you know, I guess that's true. I never really thought about myself that way. So we actually, it's a gift to appreciate people because we, in some ways, are giving them permission to love themselves.

35:31100%. Now, you mentioned something before we get to the gratitude practice that I think is also important because many of us are afraid of criticism and afraid of negative feedback. And obviously, along the journey, you have had your fair share of criticism as a leader. How do you handle those outside forces and that negativity and reframe it for yourself to be constructive and grow? First, let me say that's still a growing edge for me. I'm a lot better and more skilled than I used to be. But I would say definitely when I was younger and still to a certain extent, the human reaction is when you feel like you're unjustly accused is to defend yourself, right?

36:10It's like, that's not true. And that's unfair. And they don't. That's just completely inaccurate. And one thing is to see yourself very clearly and to look at that information and say, is it true? And if it's literally not true and you know it's not true, then you have to let it go and not bust your chops about it. But if you also look at it and say, you know what, some of that's true and I got to own up to it. And then you can reframe it to see that criticism is actually a way to help you grow. It's a way for you to, it's a challenge. I'm going to be better. I'm going to make sure that criticism disappears and I don't hear about it anymore in the future.

36:51So we can either react defensively or we can open ourselves to it and use it to help us transform ourselves. So obviously, the second strategy is better, but I'm not going to say that's always easy to do. And it sounds like with the support of your wife and your team, you also have that opportunity to ask them, give me some reference here. Is this really true? Do I have this blind spot that I might not see in myself? That's right. And we talk about that in the book because we talk about the shadow. The shadow is the part of our being that we're just not conscious of. Other people see our shadow.

37:25Make no mistake about it. We may not see our own shadow, but other people see it. And the people that love us the most are the ones that can help us deal with the shadow in constructive ways. I really think the significant others that we're closest to, they see all the bullshit about us. and they still love us despite that. And if we are open to it, they can help us deal with that part of us that needs to be dealt with because it's what we're oftentimes, we're not conscious of it frequently because we don't want to be conscious of it because it's ugly, because it's a part of our being that we don't want to admit is there.

38:05And so we just push it out of the way. We just push it out of the way. We refuse to see it. So part of being a more conscious leader is simply taking more things out of the shadow and shining a light on it and getting them integrated into our fuller self. And the shadow can be our friend if we're willing to not be afraid of it or just deny it, but begin to slowly accept it. And that's part of who we are. Guess what? I'm sometimes that way. I admit it. I'm sorry. I'm going to do better. I'm going to try harder. I'm going to become more conscious of that. That's why I make a joke that I've always been her wife's biggest project because she's always working on the shadow stuff in me every day, seemingly.

38:48But I know she loves me. So I don't feel like her criticism is coming from judgment. It's coming from love. And that makes all the difference, right? I don't feel attacked. I feel like she's just really trying to help me be a better person. Patrick Lencioni talks about how vulnerability plays a role in connecting and establishing trust with your team. We tell people, don't let them see you sweat. You know, like the deodorant commercial. Like you always have to be on. And, and the truth of the matter is they know you're sweating before you do. They know. So the best leaders are the ones that raise their arm up and point at their arm pin and go, check this out.

39:21And people go, so, you know, and they're like, of course I know, you know, I know. And they're like, okay, I trust you. Let's talk about this. I will tell you this, as you're getting ready, you're, you're engaged as a parent. I've learned that acknowledging when I'm wrong in front of my kids actually builds a stronger relationship with them. And my parents, God bless them, different, different generation. I don't remember my parents saying they were wrong very much when I was growing up. You know, it was kind of like, talk to, you know, be quiet. I'm right. I'm the parent. And I gained so much credibility when I go to my kids and go, I was kind of a jerk to you today.

39:53And they're like, yeah, I know. And that doesn't mean I do it like, cause I want to be their, their buddy and win their popularity. I mean, I just have to convince them that I'll actually see it the way it is. We gain much more credibility by being vulnerable when we're leaders. It's crazy. Now, you also write for people who are not necessarily in a leadership position. And you talk about one of the most difficult positions or job killer is really feeling anonymous in an organization. What can we do to not feel anonymous in our organization and not be that cog? A secondary part of our business, we help organizations become more successful through their leadership teams.

40:28We are so bent on helping people not be miserable in their jobs. And every company out there is like, it's a war for talent. How do we get people to be more engaged? And what do we need? Better food than lunch? No, no, no. People at work need three things that are free. And if you give them those three things, they're going to bounce off the walls and love working there as long as you're paying them enough. You don't have to overpay. Overpaying people to work in a miserable job is a terrible idea. Pay them well, but give them the three free things they need. And the first thing they need is to be known.

41:02it's like and that sounds so silly it sounds like this is a kindergarten lesson but i work with leaders and it's like you have to take a personal interest in the employees who work with you for you in their job and then how they're doing and in their personal life and i don't mean if you're the ceo and you have a thousand employees you got to know everything but how about the your direct reports take an interest in them if you're the executive vice president of nike and your boss the CEO isn't interested in you as a person, you're not going to love your job. And I've worked for professional football players whose coaches are totally disinterested in them.

41:38And they're like, it's kind of a drag. I go to work and they don't really care. And I don't care in any job, your manager, and man, if your manager's manager does it, it's even amazing, take an interest in their lives. It's free. We know in our jobs, nobody will deny that it makes a difference to them and their work. Everybody will say, oh, yeah, I love it when my manager's interested me. And I'll say, well, why don't you do it for your people? I'm like, I don't know, I'm busy. And I don't know, it might be awkward. And, you know, we all live in California. So we think, well, if you make eye contact with a person at work, you're going to get sued.

42:10No.

42:16You got to love on the people and you've got to do it by taking interest. So that's the first thing. Anonymity is a total job killer. I've worked in jobs where nobody cared about me. I don't care if it was the sexiest, most high-paying job in the world. I was miserable. The other two things are, then you have to let them know that their job matters to someone. And I don't care what their job is. I don't care if they're a doctor or, you know, doctors and priests and firefighters, they already know. Teachers, you know, that's a vocation. Most people's jobs, they don't know. The job of a manager is to go tell their employee, I don't care if they're the receptionist sitting at the front desk.

42:51Here's why when you do a good job, you make my life better or you make somebody's life better. You matter here. And you're not like telling them something that's not true. You're just being frank. Like your job makes a difference to people. Too many managers don't do that. They think, well, they know. We told them at orientation. No, our job as managers to remind people constantly, hey, I noticed you did this really well today. Do you realize who that impacts? And do you realize how that helps the firm and how much better I feel because you do that. Nobody ever left a job and said, you know, if my manager told me one more time why I made a difference, I'm out of there.

43:24And the last thing is people just need to know if they're doing a good job. They need to have some way of assessing, not just the boss's opinion, but some sort of observable assessment, whether it's not always a metric, but some way of going, am I doing well? I don't know. Let's take a look at your output. Yeah, it looks like you're doing great. So if a person is known, they're reminded constantly why their job matters and their work matters, and they have some way of assessing their success, they're not leaving. If you give those three things to a person in a job, they're going nowhere unless they are so grossly underpaid that they just have to do it for their family.

44:01We know that vulnerability can be tough for you as a leader, but there's one thing that's even harder to learn and communicate, and it's humility. That's right. And Jake Wood tells us that not only how to deal with it, but how he takes learning opportunities on the chin to get better. I know as a leader of this team, how important it is to bring that humility in and showcase for the team that I'm learning too. And I don't know everything, but I'm also willing to bring the self-awareness into the equation and let the team know what I don't know. And I think that's where many leaders go wrong. They try to hide that weakness.

44:37They try to hide that gap in knowledge or in experience. And in the process, they create an environment where other team members are doing the same thing. And those gaps where we don't have communication, where we're not on the same page, we're not clear on the obstacles, those create bigger problems and bigger headaches. I love that message of understanding that every single year I'm auditioning for the same job. Nothing is handed to me and I'm going to show up like I'm auditioning so that everyone who's on board is going to bring that same mentality. It's that vulnerability that I spoke about earlier, right?

45:08It's being able to surround yourself with people that you're willing to be vulnerable in front of, to walk into a room and shut the door behind you and say, guys, I don't know, or I need help. Sometimes it's hard for men to say those three really challenging words, I need help. But I think it's some of the most powerful words that a leader can say. Now, you don't strike me as a guy who hears no very often. You'd be surprised you should meet my wife. But I'm sure at this point, you've experienced plenty of no's and plenty of challenges on the way to growing this team. And of course, when we have an idea we're excited about, we want to be able to convey that and sell that.

45:48And we hope that everyone else can get behind it. But there are going to be people who don't buy into the mission, who don't go for our pitch, who don't believe in us. How do you handle that? The no and the naysayer and the self-doubt that comes along with that? We got a ton of that early. I mean, the number of times over the first couple of years where people would tell us that we had a cute idea that couldn't scale or couldn't sustain. You have to hear that feedback with some healthy reality. You have to sit there and you have to force yourself to ponder the question, are they right? Because otherwise you're just putting your head in the sand, right?

46:17So if you're getting a consistent signal, you know, you should probably be paying attention to it. But I think there's a quality in successful entrepreneurs, which is, you know, F the doubters. You know, we are going to persevere. we are going to overcome. And so, you know, if you can't hear no and continue marching on, you're not going to have what it takes to be an entrepreneur. But you have to be able to hear no and ask yourself, why are they saying that while continuing to march? That's the balance you have to strike. And Brad Lomenick elaborates on the traits that make effective leaders. Obviously, social media doesn't reward humility.

46:56Oh gosh, no. So many of us see this message that a good leader is someone who is in your face and someone who has no humility. But yet it's one of the core legs in H3 leadership. So when we're confronted with this message and we see people we look up to who are not appearing humble or meek online, it doesn't really sit well with who we want to become and how we want to become a leader. What's your advice in that situation where it doesn't seem like the meek are the ones who are inheriting. Right. No. And here's the thing. Humility is not, it's not weakness. Humility is the premise, again, that there's a bigger story.

47:38So I would say that generosity, generosity actually is perhaps, I think, the best currency in social media. I don't know if you guys would agree, but people who are generous, people who are generous through social media or through just their life, that's actually humility. Because what it's saying is that I know there's a bigger story here. Like it's not a zero sum game. And just the premise of me having an abundance mindset, that's sort of taking the best of hustle and the best of humility and now saying, how am I going to make it about others? So I think the difference for me between a leader who appropriately lives out humility and hustle is that the idea that my hustle is for others, that's like appropriate hustle but humility is that it's appropriate humility is when i say i know that i'm really good at what i do but i don't have to like wear the sandwich board in order to in order to tell everyone you know it's the it's the quiet confident but very content leader who walks into the room and everybody knows it.

48:52We would not consider that person a non-humble leader. We would probably say that leader's humble, but we also wouldn't say, well, that leader doesn't get anything done. Nobody knows who they are. Again, the reason I can be humble is because I'm confident. I think the opposite of humility is actually insecurity. I don't think it's arrogance. I think arrogance is a byproduct of insecurity. They're walking around thinking, I hope nobody finds out. And this is where self-awareness comes back in. Humble leaders create congruency between the fact that I don't know what I'm doing, but I'll work hard at it, and the fact that your team knows you don't know what you're doing.

49:37But you're going to keep working hard at it. It's, it's, it's Pat Lencioni, you know, the, the author of five dysfunctions and Pat talks about like the old days were never let them see a sweat. Right. Old spice. And now that today, the, the, the thinking is like, no, show them your pit stains. When you come in the room, like, just, just show everybody, listen, check it out. Can you believe the amount of pit I got working all the way down to my hip? And that's appropriate authenticity. It doesn't mean you're weak. Well, if anything, it shows that you have the courage to stand there at the front of the room with the pit stains, right?

50:14Because the weak ones leave the room, change their shirt, never show up. And that's the difference. And you're walking in now with seven shirts on, and everybody looks at you and goes, what are you doing? We know underneath there you're sweating out. I love that example. And for somebody who's so far from that, there is a Dave Lee Roth, the singer for Van Halen in his book, Crazy for Me, that he writes about how all the different A &R people would pop in on tour to see how they were doing and what was going on. And Dave made a mention that he would always look at their slacks because he didn't trust the guys who had creases in their slacks because he knew they weren't doing any work.

50:55They were just there. Their only thing they were looking at was the bottom line, the bottom number. And that's about as much work as they did. That's why they had nice creases in their slacks. but he would always hang out and talk to the A &R guys who came in who were a bit disheveled because he's like, these guys are working. These guys are the ones behind the scenes who are actually putting in some sweat to know what's going on around here. I'll talk to those guys. I'm not going to talk to the guy who just wants to point at the bottom numbers here at me. I can appreciate that. And who doesn't want to see everyone around them working?

51:29It only invigorates the team to put that much more effort into it. Again, I'll use Pat Lencioni and his book, The Advantage, is a really great book for any leader. We've had him on the show. It's fantastic. Yeah, but he talks about that the foundation of any team is trust. And trust is built by, again, by a posture of humility that I'm for you. I know you. I have empathy for you. We're connected. Now you can have moments of tension. Now you can fight for the best idea. The best idea wins when we know we're for each other compared to a team and a culture built on distrust. You know, politics is a great example of an environment that is built on distrust.

52:16So, you know, there is very little self-awareness, transparency, vulnerability, honesty in that one industry. Well, why? Well, it's because we trade on distrust compared to a great culture and a great team. They trade on trust. The asset is trust. So now we're for each other. We're willing to share things. We're willing to hold you accountable. We're willing to create feedback loops for all of us. And the idea is, well, I just want to see you get better. I'm not trying to take your job. I just want to see you actually be the best version of the leader you can be. And Jake Wood finishes this conflation up by talking about what you need to be a successful leader.

53:00You know, when I think about what have been the keys to my success as a leader, I think early, I was humble enough to admit that I didn't really know what I was doing. And, you know, I didn't allow my insecurity as a young entrepreneur, a first time entrepreneur, get in the way of putting together the right team of talented people who were often more talented than I was and empowering them to, you know, do their job and not get in the way of them. That gave me the time and space to learn from them. You know, I had the humility early, I think, to lead that way. And also, I think I've been a pretty vulnerable leader, right?

53:37I haven't been afraid to walk into a room in front of some complex situations and say, guys, I don't know the answer here. Let's figure it out together. I think if you can have that type of authenticity as a leader, when you are confident that you have the right answer, no matter how unpopular it is, people are going to know that you're for real, right? And they're going to follow you. Yeah, I think that's been really, really helpful for me. I'd like to think that I am a leader that is always led with integrity. I mean, oftentimes, I think a lot of people are able to make excuses for why they should put something, whether it's market share or profitability or whatever, their own skin ahead of integrity.

54:19I think I've done a pretty good job of that. I would hope my team would agree. So I think those are some of the most consequential lessons. I think in 2020, though, there was one other one that I will call out, and that is, you know, in moments of crisis, leaders need to be able to confront the brutal facts of a situation and turn to their team and communicate really clearly about just how bad something might be while still helping them to maintain faith that they'll see it through. And I think that with COVID, I saw a lot of leaders in government and corporations and institutions who really refused to embrace just how bad COVID was going to be.

54:58They put their head in the sand either because they just refused to believe it or because they were afraid that it would cause panic among their people or for any variety of reasons. Yeah, a lot of reasons. And the problem is most people can see right through that. They can see through it. they know that you're bullshitting them. And as a result, they then assume that you don't trust them. You don't trust them with that information, with the brutal facts. If you can dance that dance, if you can both confront it, but also keep them inspired and confident that you're going to find a way, that's pretty powerful.

55:35That builds trust. It builds confidence. I think being honest in the face of a crisis is incredibly important. Understanding the crisis is happening before everyone's eyes. And social media has shown us that you can't control the narrative. There are ample examples of how the narrative is in front of everyone. And I think the point you touched on earlier is also incredibly key, and that's leading with integrity. And I think what we've seen in the lack of leadership is the different set of rules for those in power and the sacrifices they've asked us to make, while they may not be following those same sacrifices because they've been able to gain a level of power.

56:17That lesson in integrity, how did that come to be for you in that experience? And how do you carry that forward for this next generation of leaders that you are obviously training up in Team Rubicon? Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, I think one of my role models was my father. He was, you know, a guy that I think led, you know, interesting story. I mean, he not college educated, started working in a factory, eventually was promoted into management and eventually ran a factory. And, you know, he always believed in doing right by the people that he led the workers in his factory and would go to bat for them and, and, you know, always led with integrity.

56:56And I think that was evident at his funeral when he passed away suddenly five years ago, six years ago. And people that had worked for him on assembly lines dating back 20 years that came a thousand miles to go to his funeral, which was, you know, I think telling for the type of leader that he was. But I think for me in the most consequential environment that I was ever in, when I was in Afghanistan and that sniper team, you know, we were a six man team going out every night, life and death decisions. We had full authority to make them ourselves. And you can probably imagine how dangerous this environment was and what those decisions were.

57:35And, you know, my team leader was a guy of unimpeachable integrity and told us early that the only litmus test for success for that deployment was whether or not we went home with our honor intact. It wasn't how many bad guys we bagged. It wasn't how many airstrikes we called in or any of these other metrics that a sniper team might measure themselves by. He said, I will never ask you to compromise your integrity, even if it means that we're jeopardizing our own safety. Even if it means that we don't make it out of here alive, we're never going to do anything that will compromise our honor or integrity.

58:12And listen, there are plenty of times when it's like, now might be the time to compromise our integrity. You know, it's pretty dicey out here. But, you know, he always held that line. And, you know, never for a moment did he waver from it. So, you know, if we could do it in that environment, we can do it when all we're talking about is revenue or profit or market share. And in these situations, obviously, emotions run high. and whether it's entering a foreign country in the theater of war or as entering a foreign country to help in a disaster situation are there practices that you have personally to help you mitigate those emotions that may not help you make great decisions in those moments of crises shut them down i mean i i probably don't deal with the emotional side of things as healthily as i should if i'm being honest i wish i could tell you that i was like a zen buddhist and did a bunch of meditation.

59:07I don't. One of the things, for better or worse, and I explore this in the book, you know, you've become pretty adept at in combat is shutting down your emotions. Your emotions don't keep you alive. It just, they have, you know, and that's, I think that's what you're saying, right? So, you know, in these dangerous situations, how do you keep them in check? Well, you know, it's a survival mechanism and actually human beings are really good at it. You know, it's in our DNA to not dwell on some of these things. We just kind of have to tap into a little bit more of a primal element of our nature. Unfortunately, I got pretty good at that.

59:36My wife will tell you. So she's still trying to crack my hardened exterior. A little too good. Yeah, I know. Johnny, I've been absolutely loving the feedback on our compilation episodes. In fact, X Factor Accelerator members have been sharing their notes on our weekly calls and how these strategies have been impacting their daily lives. Yes, absolutely, AJ. I mean, it's amazing to me how this show affects people's lives. And after 17 years, it certainly does not get boring. And we certainly love hearing it. So please write in and tell us how these concepts and episodes have helped you.

1:00:21This week's shout out comes from Boris. Boris, take it away. Hi, my name is Boris. I'm a senior software engineer. I was born in Europe and moved to United States 10 years ago. There was a time when I was lacking sense of community and belonging. I chose the Art of Charm program because I wanted to advance my career and build a personal circle of people with similar values. The program made me view people around me as doors to new opportunities. That person at a conference can refer you to your next job. That stranger at the coffee shop is a gateway to your new hobby. That passenger on a train is your significant other if you make the move.

1:01:04I recommend to take a step and sign up for the Art of Charm program. I will see you at the AUC family reunion. If you listened this far, my guess, it's because you are ready to master communication and grow your wolf pack. Stop wasting your time trying to figure this out on your own. Stop putting off your best self and start building your future now. The X Factor Accelerator is the ultimate solution for analytical men ready to take action, build their wolf pack and find the one. Weekly coaching, implementation sessions, and a personalized curriculum designed to skyrocket your confidence, connection, and networking skills.

1:01:38With 17 years of expertise and over 10 ,000 clients satisfied, including executives, military personnel, and men just like you. The Art of Charm has honed the art of transformation. Imagine reading any room, forging meaningful connections, and attracting the partner of your dreams. Scientifically backed lessons to unlock skills and become a super communicator. Break free from the ordinary and step into the extraordinary. Join the Art of Charm's X Factor Accelerated today and unlock the secrets to your success. Visit unlockyourxfactor.com and learn Learn more and take the first step towards a brighter, bolder future.

1:02:15The Art of Charves X Factor Accelerator, where confidence meets connection. Apply today at unlockyourxfactor.com. All right, before we head out, a huge thank you to our producers, Michael Harreld and Eric Montgomery. If you enjoyed this episode, please do us a huge favor, rate and review the show and your favorite podcast player. We hope you go out there and have an epic week.