643: Anthony Scaramucci - Getting Fired by President Trump, Working With a Life Coach, Playing Quarterback, Building Confidence + Charisma, Telling The Truth, & Finding Your Superpower

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0:57Welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Go to learningleader.com for show notes of this and all podcast episodes. Go to learningleader.com. Now, on to tonight's featured leader, the Mooch, Anthony Scaramucci, served as the White House Director of Communications for President Trump from July 21st to July 31st, 2017. Yes, 10 days. He was at Harvard Law School with President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. He's the founder and managing partner of Skybridge Capital, and he's the founder and chairman of the SALT Conference. He's done a lot.

1:41During our conversation, we discussed what he learned from getting fired by President Trump after working for him for just 10 days. Then, why his wife filed for divorce and how he was able to do the work to reconcile and turn a bad situation into a good marriage. Then we talked about the importance of finding your superpower. And he shared what he feels mine is as well as his and how they're the same thing. And then I think you'll just enjoy his willingness to say exactly what's on his mind at all times. I don't necessarily think this will be for everyone, but I think some will absolutely love it.

2:29Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy my conversation with the Mooch, Anthony Scaramucci.

2:39Anthony, man, it is awesome to have you here on the Learning Leader Show. Welcome. Hawk, how's my lighting, by the way? You got to be impressed, right? I was going to say, you lined it up perfectly with the window. You're in London? Are you in London? Is that where you are? No, I'm in the British countryside. I'm going to the Chalk History Festival. but you know i'm a i'm a vain son of a bitch and i'm just wanted you to acknowledge my lighting before we started are you wearing makeup no no no makeup i swear no i got good skin okay those are those are stem cell moisturizers hawk you're a young man when you know you're going to teach me about leadership i'm going to teach you about vanity okay i i'm going to i'm going to teach you my tricks okay afterwards you're gonna send me where you go okay i need i want to look like you all right okay you can use a little sod replacement on the top there as i'm noticing and i got i got that trick down too all right but this is your podcast i just wanted you to acknowledge can you just send me an email after with all of your advice on things i need to do to look like i just wanted you to acknowledge my lighting before the show started okay well the show's already started but you look great okay hey an uncommon comment on that i was doing all my prep.

3:50I talked to Paulina Pompliano, who did a big, deep dive on you, and she's amazing. She's been on the show. So is her husband, Anthony. You played quarterback. I'm a former quarterback, high school, college, a little bit after college, and I've drawn so much from that time. I'm curious about you, though. What have you drawn in your life as a leader doing a variety of things from your time as a quarterback leading a team? I got hurt, by the way. I hurt my left knee. I tore my ACL and that knocked me out of my senior year but I was captain of the team I'm a little short guy but I had a good throwing arm and this is going to sound a little bit braggy but I'll just say it I was I was someone that could read the defense and so I there was a kid on the team that a much better arm than me but he wasn't as anticipatory so I could get to the line of scrimmage and you could see the eyes and the people you know you know what were their blitzing or what their formation was.

4:43We did a lot of audibles at the line of scrimmage. So I think I learned a couple of things. Flexibility, fluidity, and decision making. You can't just say, okay, here's the game plan, right? Because that's what Mike Tyson says, right? You have the plan until you get punched in the face or all battle plans go by the wayside with contact with the enemy. So fluidity was one of them. I didn't really understand this until later in life. and Derek Jeter said it better than anybody. So I'm going to paraphrase from him and quote it back to you. But one of the key things that makes a good leader is service.

5:20And so if you're on the team, it's not about me, right? It's about you. How am I going to make you better? How am I going to make you feel good about your role? How am I going to get you to think that I'm here to help you? And so Jeter understood that better than anybody. I think he was the real glue that got them to all those championships, never cared about his percentages, never cared about his hit totals, averages, didn't care. He was like, how am I going to get there? How am I going to get the team there? And so you learn that in sports. But then the number one thing, Ryan Hawk, is bone crushing defeat.

5:56You know, you've got your little cheerleader girlfriend out there and she's waving the pom poms and you're going to take her out on Saturday night and you are getting your ass kicked on the field, smashed left and right. And there was a guy named Vinny Testaverde, that son of a bitch. Okay. He played for Sawanica High School. He went on to University of Miami, ended up playing for the Jets, Cleveland Browns. He was a monster in high school. He was a year older than me. And his team, Sawanica High School, ran over us. I mean, literally, I have tire tracks on my back from politics and business. But my first tire tracks came from Testaverde, that son of a bitch.

6:35And I had to get my ass kicked. Here I was, this little 5 '9", squirty, Doug Flutie-like quarterback. And this 6 '4", good-looking giant with a howitzer was, you know, destroying us. And I just remember feeling so puny in front of my high school girlfriend. So, hey, you got to get over that, right? That's called resilience, right? Such a good question. But that's how I would unpack that for you. Well, I love it. I think there's so much to learn, especially from the adversity and preparation it takes and you understanding a defense, like some of that so much plays as you're out in your life, building a business or getting tapped.

7:15I am curious about your story. Let me tell you something, because you know this, okay, because you have an aura about you of confidence and charisma. You know, people listening, confidence, the first fight is with yourself. That's the first fight in life. Am I good enough? Am I worthy? Can I get to the game? Can I believe in myself enough so that I'm standing next to someone else who believes in themselves that I can compete? Because if you go into the game mentally thinking that you're not there, you're not going to be there. Henry Ford had one of the best lines in civilization. You want to hear the line?

7:52He was a son of a bitch, but he had a great line. You want to hear the line? If you think you can or you can't, you are right. Right. Yeah. You've heard it before and you know exactly until you got to get in the mindset. OK, you're going to fire me from the White House. No problem. I'm a crash dummy. I'm mayhem from the Allstate commercial. I'll fly through the window and I'm going to get up and dust myself off. I'm going to keep going because that's my mindset. You're not going to take that away from me. Whatever you think of me actually is none of my business. I'm going to do me. And I think that's a big thing in sports.

8:29It's a big thing in business. It's a big thing in life. You mentioned the White House. So I'm curious about, no offense, but I had not heard of you prior to your job there, right? So I believe it started. No offense taken. July 21st, 2017. What's going through your mind on that day? Well, you know, look, I had worked with Trump during the, you know, 14 months with Donald Trump on the campaign. I work with him on the executive transition team. I had a good relationship with him. Jared Kushner once said that Trump likes talking to you because you remind him of his dad. You made your money on your own.

9:09You don't give a shit. You're not trying to kiss his ass like these other people. And you tell him right to his face what you think. Unfortunately, I brought that with me into the White House. That was not the right attitude in the White House. He was a little bit more brittle in the White House. And so you needed to be a lot more obsequious. And I didn't have that gene. Why would that be any different? I think the job, the personality, look, you get in that job. Barack Obama once said about that job, it magnifies your personality. And so I think in his personality was, I'm right. My instincts are better than everybody else's.

9:47You better kowtow to me. And we're going with my instincts come hell or high water and don't talk back to me or don't contradict me. in the campaign it was way more loosey-goosey he was more entrepreneurial he was like okay i'm taking a flyer on the presidency nobody thinks i can win he didn't think he could win and so it was a little bit more loosey-goosey it was a little more interactive but when he got to the white house it was like okay i got to the white house you didn't get to the white house don't tell me what you think i know what's best you see what i mean see people think i got fired for the newspaper article trump didn't give a shit about that trump trump laughs about stuff like that.

10:24I got fired because I was in a little bit of a tangle with him on a couple of different issues. And then he finally said to me, I knew I was Cook when he called me a deep stater on Friday. He said, you know, I didn't realize you were a deep stater. And I'm like, well, first of all, I'm not a deep stater. I've only been to Washington once prior to this. I think it was on like a school field trip. Okay. I'm a, I'm a kid from Long Island. I'm just looking out for your interest. And don't, don't, don't tell me that. Don't tell me that. And then Monday I get fired. That's fine. Listen, I mean, you're asking me about the 21st of July.

10:55I really thought I was going to go in there and help him. There was some friction going on in terms of the cultural merger of the MAGA team with the RNC. And so the RNC was more establishment. The MAGA team was more aligned with Trump. And I had good relationships with both sides. I was hoping to see if I could fuse those. But what Trump figured out, again, rightly or wrongly, I just want to be objective and observant is they weren't going to fuse, so he blew up the RNC. Trump has done something politically masterful. Again, you can like Donald Trump or dislike him. I'll just tell you what he did.

11:32He decapitated the Republican National Committee. He decapitated what was formerly known as the Republicans of George Bush and John McCain, and he did an M &A transaction, hostile takeover. He inserted his team into that team. And it's now full MAGA. You can't be on the team unless you're full MAGA. And of course, to quote Donald Trump himself, well, what is full MAGA? Whatever I say it is. So it's a party of personality now, less about any levels of guiding principles. But the best thing they've got going for them are the Democrats, because they're in complete disagree. They're lurching further and further to the left.

12:12The country's not that far of the left. And so the Republicans under the Democratic mismanagement, they have an opportunity here to control the card table for probably a decade, maybe a decade and a half. If Democrats are going to go hard left in a national election, like they just got this kid who won the Democratic primary in New York City. He's a hard left, progressive, devout socialist. I'm just going by what he says, not me. The country doesn't want that. And that's been a failed situation in Oakland, a failed situation in San Francisco, failed situation in Chicago, and it will fail here in New York.

12:51And so, you know, it is what it is, you know. Well, it feels to me, it seems like we're somewhat aligned. Elon Musk, in fact, when he was kind of going through that little breakup stage with President Trump, he put out a poll and was like, do we need a third party that's somewhere in the middle? And I know that's kind of where I live, that's somewhere in the middle. And it was like 82 % of the respondents to that. And there's millions and millions of respondents to this is Elon Musk, right? And they said, yes, absolutely. We feel like we don't have a home. We're somewhere in between. What do you think about that?

13:26You know, I'll give you bad news. And Elon Musk is right. And we do need a third party. And if anybody can pull off a third party, it's him, actually. He'd have to make a decision to go in that direction. It would cost$50 billion. He'd have to put up 10, find five other guys to put up 10. And then you'd have to build a coalitional party that is radical moderates, radical centrists that want to reform the government and not do what's happening now. This is a little bit longer of a conversation, so forgive me. But what happened in 1992 is a gentleman by the name of Ross Perot ran as a Reform Party candidate, won 19.9 percent of the vote.

14:08So 33 years ago, the Republicans and the Democrats got the shit scared out of them. And so they collapsed on third parties. They tightened their duopoly. They put up a lot of procedures to block third parties from entering races. They've squashed them. Now, that was a good thing for them to keep their power bases. But it was a very, very bad thing for the country because they allowed each other to gerrymander districts. They allowed each other to stay in this permanent perpetuation of power. So, you know, Chuck Grassley's like, I think he's like six or 700 years old. You know, he's still in Congress.

14:48I mean, I don't know. I mean, I don't know. He'll be running from Iowa from a Ouija board long after he's in the crypt. You know, I mean, they don't leave and they don't have to leave because of what these guys did in terms of the way they set up the system. And so this causes candidate and public servant apathy for the people. So I'm like, I don't have to serve the people. I can do whatever the hell I want. And I'm going to curry favor with the lobbyists. I'm going to feather my bed. And I don't have to worry about the people. And so in the undercurrent of that, you've had this specter of populism.

15:23The people have said, hey, man, this sucks. You guys are taking care of the fat cash. You're taking care of the rich. What about me in the lower or middle class? What about my rising living standard? I was once in an economically aspirational family as a blue-collar person, and now these families are economically desperational. Fuck you guys. And so that's what's happened. And so, you know, Musk is right. Can he break that duopoly? That's the question. Can you break the duopoly? And the answer is you probably could, but you need$50 billion, and you need some very cunning people. You need candidates that understand reality television and understand that this is an entertainment festival, understand that this is a popularity contest as much as it is a hiring decision, right?

16:14The kid, the 33-year-old kid that won in New York, he's a charismatic kid. The policies are misguided, but the social media was A+. You know, the little clips and this and that, and he energized a group of people. and Andrew, my friend Andrew Cuomo was running a campaign that was more politically consultant driven, was more advertising and mailer driven. And we're in a digital world now, you know, and this is why, uh, that's why Bitcoin is going to do well. Now the old folks don't see it, but Bitcoin is going to do well because the younger people like you, Ryan, are living in a digital world. And so they will accept things like digital currencies and digital stores of value yeah well we could go really that's a that's a mouth that's a mouthful i appreciate it i appreciate my lighting hawk forget about it look great how's the lighting you look amazing okay uh can we get can we get personal for a second anything you want me we can talk so so i love i love your show and it's a i'm flattered to be on thank you there so there is a time where based on like your devotion to your work it at least from what i read you can correct it if it's wrong.

17:23Your wife was going to divorce you and was like, Anthony, peace out, dude. I'm not doing this anymore. But then at her insistence, again, correct me if this is wrong. She's like, you need to work with somebody, get a life coach or somebody like that to help you. Is that true? Can you take me inside that story and how you worked through that problem? Because you guys are still, from what I've read, happily married to this day. So that was close to not continuing. What did you do to fix that? So not only is everything you said true, but it's worse than that. And so, yeah. So I would say to you that I owe my wife, Deirdre, a debt of gratitude for actually really loving me because I was off the rails on a few things.

18:06It wasn't just the political ambition. You know, I had made some mistakes in our marriage. And so she's like, hey, I'm not having this. loves me filed for divorce you know we're a little bit of a hot-headed italian group of people it was sort of like a shot across the bow and she's like hey i'm not having this so if you love me get your shit together otherwise we're going to be divorced and we're going to live apart and so she was right i was wrong and i think the lesson to that is you have to take accountability in your life when you're wrong now i do love her very much and thank god she loves me right because if you love each other, you can stay married.

18:46You know, there's a, there's a great cliche. Are you married Hawk? Yes. Okay. So there's a great cliche. Tell your wife this, you can be right, or you can be married. You have to make a decision. Okay. Meaning, you know, you can, you know, meaning you can be right. You can be right. Like in righteous, you know, your husband's wrong and you're right. And then you have divorced or you can be right, or you can be married. Meaning you have to, I'm sorry, go ahead. the one the one thing that the one phrase i don't like anthony let me see what you think is happy wife happy life i'm okay with happy spouse happy house because like we're equals in this thing and so like i don't think you just vote it's good insight you know i'm saying like that's the one thing i don't get that when people say so so i think at times i'm right and my wife is wrong and at times she's right and i'm wrong so i don't know if that's exactly yeah my point is you might be right let it go you know what i mean in other words like you love her you know your people there's going to be some friction it's not not going to have perfect harmony there's no such thing except in a fairy tale yeah you know we were both on our second marriage um love each other uh i was over my skis i mean she hated trump she probably hates trump as much almost as much as melania hates him which is like a very high standard of like hatred right i mean that's like eastern european hate you know what i'm talking about i mean that's like you know joe stalin type of shit right i mean they are they are still married i think yeah but she fucking hates him and she doesn't live with him and you know he said he more part of the reason why he's so miserable is that he's in the white you know you want to hear you want to want to laugh you know trump once called me and he told me that you know you can't get any internet porn in the white house because they got all the sites blocked down you know no way that call happened living alone by himself yeah well you know anyway we can move on to another topic but i mean that's the funny part of trump which i do you know you have to understand like i don't like the policies i don't like the bellicosity of the personality but there are some fun things about him and it's the reason why 80 million people voted for him right he is the most famous comedian in the world i mean you have to just accept that he is right he has a he has a dryness and a delivery that goes over in a way that people find humorous.

21:00But back on the target, Deirdre and I heading for a divorce, did a perp walk in the Nassau County Family Court together. At the end of that session, I drove back to the home that we were living in, which I was now living a part of. And I said, hey, you know, I still love you. I think you still love me. Should we try to work this out she then said to me yeah but you're fucked up and you need to go see somebody and tony robbins is a good friend of mine and tony recommended a life coach who worked with him for 30 years and tony said something to me said listen you come down and see me uh you and your wife should come down and see me and uh let's see if we can help you and so we did that we went to like day with destiny we had some private sessions with tony i then went to the life coach and one of the things about it is accountability ryan right you talk about leadership your books your podcasts are you or are you not accountable like sometimes we go into the denialism about our own weaknesses we go into denialism about who we really are the we want to pretend to the world that we're all good when there's some dark features to our personalities you know this is why Robert Greene's books have done so well, you know, the 48 Laws of Power.

22:21And I've interviewed Robert on my podcast, and I love Robert. But I had to go through a reckoning with myself. I had to become less conflict avoidant. I had to become more honest. I had to become more direct in terms of what my feelings were. And we turned our marriage around. Now, was it perfect in the beginning after the fight started, the first six, eight, 12 months? No. But is it a way better marriage, a stronger marriage today, eight years later? Do we love each other? Yes. And I think we have a tendency in our society to be very disposable with each other. You know, she could have divorced me and been totally justified in divorcing me in 2017 and called it quits.

23:05But that would have been bad for her, in my opinion. It was certainly going to be bad for me. It would have been bad for our two beautiful children. And I think the message, again, this ties back to leadership. stay in things. You know, don't make everything in your life disposable, particularly the things that matter. And if you're working on yourself, one thing I have found with my adult children, because I've obviously had a failed marriage. My first marriage was a failure, but I've got three beautiful adult children. I think they give you the benefit of the doubt if you're working on yourself.

23:39I think your employees give you the benefit of the doubt. You know, talking about athletics, if you're the guy in the gym working out, training your body to improve your performance. Are your fellow players going to like you more or like you less if you're doing that, right? So work on yourself. You know, this is what makes your podcast so good because you're bringing on people that talk about real things and put things in perspective with a level of authenticity. And genuine curiosity. What are you currently doing to still work on yourself? Well, you mentioned my life coach. I have a life coach.

24:16Oh, you're still? Yeah. Yeah. I speak to him once a week. Sometimes I ask him to speak to my kids or maybe even an employee or, you know. Is that like therapy? I'm fascinated by like how a coach works with a person. Like what do you, does he or she give you prompts? How does it go? Such a great question. So again, I've had therapy. I feel that therapy is a regression. life coaching is a progression okay so if Tony Robbins were here or Alonzo Cajun who's my life coach and I'm happy to mention his name in case people want to use him easy to find first name Alonzo last name Cajun C-A-H-O-O-N I just say that Scaramucci sent you okay he'll let out a laugh because I've referred to him a lot of clients but a life coach is forget about the past what the hell are you going to do?

25:07What are you going to do? We're going to relitigate the past all day and discuss what went right and wrong. Who gives a shit? What are we doing today to make yourself a better person, a better dad, a better athlete, a better leader, a better friend? What are we doing today? And how are we setting up tomorrow so that tomorrow is a better day than today? And how are we going to live with a cup overflowing with optimism about the world? there's a lot of reasons to be pessimistic that's life you know you're the human condition the ancient greek said it better than anybody if you walked into one of those outdoor theaters there was a placard of a face that was smiling and then right next to it there was a face of great sadness comedy and tragedy and what would the ancient greek say that's your life you're going to get a package of tribulations in your life some of them are joyous and some of them are tragic.

26:02And by the way, it's going to be tragic. Okay. You're going to end, you're going to meet your own demise. You're going to have to say goodbye to people you love. And so you have to accept that. And by the way, you could be a billionaire, a multi-billionaire. It doesn't matter. You know, one of the most heart rendering things, and I always tell people this, about 30 years ago, Bill Gates, his mom died of breast cancer. And I think he was on Charlie Rose or one of those interviewers and he said look at that time in my life was the richest person in the world you don't think i would have given my money away to save my mom's life to extend the years of her life but it was an impossibility right god has batted a thousand on planet earth i mean we had one guy came back he rose from the dead three days later and he was here for 40 days and he and he's gone you know my point my point being you're gonna die okay so what are you gonna to do.

26:55Face the music in your life. Enjoy your life. Embrace your life. You know, the pessimists look at it and say, oh, well, it's worthless anyway. Why would I even bother? The optimists are like, hey, I'm here. I'm breathing. I'm going to have a good meal, a good cup of coffee. There's some fun people around that I can love and hang out with. And there's some businesses I can build while I'm here. Why not enjoy myself while I'm here to the best of my capability? and whatever tragedy besets me, let me handle it with some level of dignity. Let me handle it with some level of kindness towards others.

27:29I think that's the messaging of life coaching versus my dad hit me when I was eight and so now I'm fucked up. I don't know. I don't think, I'm not a huge fan of the therapy. I'm not saying you shouldn't do it if you need it, but I'm a better fan of the life coaching because I think it's more progressive. I read that your dad abused you guys growing up and it messed your brother up big time, but it turned you into a workaholic. What impact, how has that played out now that you look back on those years? I know you look, you're looking forward, but that is a part of your life and a part of your history.

28:05How did that impact? I'm impressed that you did your homework. You know, I did a podcast with my brother in 2016, which I always refer to people to about addiction. And so my brother became a cocaine addict, 40 years cycling in at a cocaine, maybe seven or eight rehabs. He's 63 today, doing well, very smart guy, lovely guy, sensitive guy, but a real guy, someone I love very much. He became a cocaine addict. I became a different type of a holic. I became a work holic. And so, yeah, my dad was rough on us. So what do you do? You can either hold that anger for the rest of your life or you can forgive and you can choose to forgive him.

28:49Who the hell knows what happened to my dad when he was a kid? You know, who the hell knows? I can't tell you. But for me, and this is the same thing for you or anybody listening, okay? The best among us, okay? This is something my grandmother would have said. She would have said it in Italian, but I'll say it to you in English. the best among us choose not to judge human frailty so harshly. Okay, so whatever was going on with my dad, maybe depression, a lot of anger in human life is represented. There's underlying depression that gets represented in anger. When I see somebody blowing off or super angry and charged all the time, they're probably manifesting some level of not feeling well about themselves.