What do business and jazz have in common? More than you think! In this episode, I talk to CEO, author and bass player, Gerald Leonard about performance in business, what he learned from a personal health crisis, and how music (jazz in particular) can inform our leadership.
Have you ever noticed that sometimes the lessons we learn don’t come from where we think they’re going to? Or that it is often the things we’d least like to repeat that shape and mold us the most?
In this episode, I talk to CEO, author and bass player, Gerald Leonard about performance in business, what he learned from a personal health crisis, and how music (jazz in particular) can inform our leadership.
We get into:
- The effects of physical constraints on work/life
- Managing stress and what HeartMath is
- 3 basics from learning to play music that apply to life/business
- How small/agile teams are like a jazz quartet
This is a fascinating conversation that meanders all over the place and will leave you with more than a few takeaways. Listen in.
—
Gerald J. Leonard PMP, PfMP, and C-IQ Coach is the Publishing Editor, CEO, and Founder of the Leonard Productivity Intelligence Institute (which offers a unique approach to accomplishing more every day), as well as the CEO of Turnberry Premiere, a strategic project portfolio management and IT governance firm based in Washington, DC.
Gerald is also an Author, TEDx Speaker, management guru, and, importantly, a Bass player. He brings all these traits and skills into his work, presentations, and interviews.
To learn more about Gerald and his work, and to grab some freebies, head to https://geraldjleonard.com/crisis/
Or connect with him on LinkedIn or Facebook (@geraldjleonard).
I am Celine Williams, and welcome to the "Leading Through Crisis" podcast, a conversation series, exploring resiliency and leadership in challenging times. My guest today is Gerald Leonard, who is the publishing editor, CEO, and founder of the Leonard Productivity Intelligence Institute, as well as the CEO of Turnberry Premiere, a strategic project portfolio management and IT governance firm. Gerald is also an author, TEDx speaker, management guru, and importantly, as you might notice from his background, a bass player. Welcome, Gerald.
Thank you so much. I'm really happy to be here.
I'm very excited to talk to you, not only because you are clearly a person who has a multitude of interests, which is always fascinating to me, but also as we were talking about right before the show started, jazz has a special place in my heart, because of my dad, so I'm very excited about this.
Yes.
I'd love to start with a question I ask everyone, which is the name of the podcast is "Leading Through Crisis".
Yeah.
When you hear that statement, that phrase, what comes up for you, or what does that mean to you?
Leading through crisis for me is like being able to manage when chaos happens or when things happen,
Mm.
and being able to lead your life, and not just lead in business, but lead in your life, lead your family, lead in a situation, and it... I'll tell you a quick story. It reminded me of something that happened to me while I was on a project, a very large project. We were integrating a system that had over 14,000 products in a $16 billion budget for a transportation agency, Virginia. And in August, on the 18th of 2018, I had a major bout with vertigo while I was at a weekend retreat. I was rushed to the hospital. They had to give me some meds to make it stop. I really didn't know what was happening. I would spend a day in the hospital, but the only way they let me come home was You're gonna have to take this walker and we need to know that you can be somewhat mobile, but you're gonna have to go see your doctor and see a specialist, because we don't know exactly what happened and what's going on. And it was later I realized what it was was a major bout with vertigo. Obviously the room was spinning and everything else. Well, that happened with everything that was going on in my life. And so, that was a crisis. And I had to, I spent a week in bed and it happened six weeks before my TEDx talk.
Oh my goodness.
So, you introduced me as a TEDx speaker. Well, that happened six weeks before the TEDx talk. So, I'm laying in bed and I'm rehearsing the talk, because I can't watch television. I feel like somebody hit me upside the head with a baseball bat. Then, I was on the middle of a big ship in the middle of the ocean, and it was just like, okay, is this my life or what in the world happened? Long story short, I'm rehearsing the talk in my head and thinking it through and saying, you know what? I still gotta figure out how to do this thing.
Mm.
So, I came up with a goal. I gotta figure out how to do this. And as I'm talking about being a musician, playing activates the brain in such a way that if there's damage, it will rewire itself. And that's from research that I read and a number of the books that I've gotten my content from for my speech. And so, I thought, okay, well, as soon as I can set up, I'm gonna start grabbing one of those basses and play, and thank God I could. And so, I was able to use the walker, hold onto the walls, make it to my room, play. And I did that every day. And I slowly started moving around the room, continually every day, moving downstairs, moving out to the mailbox, and you get the idea. So, every day, I'm playing some, and I'm walking a little bit and pushing myself. Three weeks later, I walk into the ear, nose, and throat doctor's appointment unassisted, very gated, very deliberate, very focused. But I walked in and without assistance and he looked at me, he goes, I could tell you then really impacted what happened. I shared the story and he told me I had lost 86% capability in my right inner ear. And after...
Oh my gosh.
And so, with all that I was going through, he said, he asked me, he says, "Well, what have you been doing?" I said, well, I've been playing my bass, preparing for my TEDx talk. He goes, "Oh, you've already started your therapy." And three weeks later, I walked on stage and delivered the talk that you mentioned at the beginning of the show.
Yeah.
And I was also still leading that project and working with my client. And so, I had to, in leading through a crisis in that situation, leading myself personally, leading my team, leading the family, leading life, I had to dig deep and realize, okay, I am capable of doing this. I have resources. And it wasn't just financial resources, it was mental resources, it was physical resources, it was motivational resources to say, okay, I'm gonna set a goal and I'm gonna use the gifts that I've been given, playing music, to rewire my brain, so that I could get back to life and start living. And, it left me with what's called a vestibular imbalance disability, but I don't call it a disability. I call it a constraint. And actually, with learning about yoga and mindfulness and HeartMath and all these things, I've been able to recover to where now, I'm living a normal life, getting out doing normal things, and I'm actually a lot more productive and a lot more effective and have written two books since that time happened. And so much more has happened, because of that crisis. And I have actually become a new person because of that crisis. So, when I think of leading through a crisis, that's what comes to mind. And it's not just that, well, I got through the crisis is that by getting through that crisis and facing those dark hard times, it's actually forming inside of me a new person that was much stronger, much more relaxed, much more at at peace, much more confident and understanding, and really having a better understanding of life, because of having gone through that. So, but I wanna go through it again? No, but what I wanna go through it again? Yes, because going through that has helped me to become who I've become.
Yeah.
If that makes sense.
It absolutely makes sense. And I, excuse me, I love that perspective, because I think a lot of times, what you're saying is very relevant when people are going through crisis, which is, or when they reflect back on it, which is, I don't wanna do that again. That was hard.
Yeah. That sucked in a lot of ways. I'm good to not experience that again. And I am who I am because of it. There was a gift inside of it that changed who I am, how I operate, whatever the specifics are, in such a way that I also don't wanna lose that.
Exactly.
If I could have got that an easier way, I'm into that, but I don't wanna lose that gift. And I think that that both things can be true.
Yes.
I very much appreciate you sharing that story. I think it's a... And I also love that you started with when you think of crisis, you think of chaos, 'cause I think in that case and the story you shared, that is a lot at one time. That is chaos. And it can feel any crisis can feel overwhelming for someone. But when there's that
Yeah.
many things at once and it is chaos, a lot of people stop. They don't know what to do.
Right.
They don't know
Right.
know where to start leading themselves or what to do at all. And I love that you turned to music and to the bass, which is so clearly an important part of your life to start the healing process.
Yes, yeah. It made a big difference. Obviously, prayer and just the spiritual mindedness was there as well. And also, as I started the journey, finding mentors and coaches and finding support to help me get through this. And the support didn't always come where I thought it was gonna come from, but it came
Yeah.
and it was there. And so, there were things that I've learned going through that journey that I know I would not have discovered or even thought through or participated. And if I hadn't been in that situation where I needed to figure out how to rebuild my life, my neurology, my physiology, understanding kinesiology, all those different ologies, I had to figure them out,
All the ologies.
to be like, okay, how do I make this all work again?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's so much that you have to deal with when there's any kind of physical aspect to a crisis, to a situation that you're dealing with, like you were dealing with. There's an added layer where you can't separate yourself. And I think so often, people are looking to distance themself in some way, right? Like how can I distance myself from this crisis? I'm gonna put on my rational head and think rationally and not emotionally, which is as you know,
Yeah.
that's bullshit. That's not real. But when it's physical and it involves you in that way, there's no separating the rational from the emotional. You recognize how tied together it all is.
Exactly. When you're going through something like that, it hits you in the gut, right? Because it hits you in the gut and in the heart. And you have to... It made me think and really respect athletes.
Mm.
Athletes who really struggle and they've gotten to the top of their game and then they get hurt.
Yeah.
Achilles, a knee, or a broken leg or something that happens that's traumatic to them. And they have to go, okay, how much do I love this game? And do I still wanna play? And after X number of years that I've been doing this, do I still want to rebuild my life and repair myself to get to this level to do this?
Mm. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. So, I wanna pivot slightly, I hate the term pivot, but I want to pivot slightly, because
Sure.
we've talked about you playing the bass.
Yep.
For anyone who's watching the video, there is a beautiful collection of instruments behind you. So, it is very clear that music is important to you. I would love for you to talk a little bit about what, and I know you've written books that have to do with music as well. So, this is gonna be a big broad question that it... Truly big and broad, because I would like you to go wherever you would like with this.
Okay.
What is the connection for you, or what have you learned, or what is the tie in between music and the instruments you play and jazz and all the things that you're interested in and the work that you're doing? What's there? Because it feels like there are so many things that we could talk about inside of it.
Right.
And I don't want to make you pick one that you don't wanna... Where can we go with this? 'Cause it's so fascinating to me.
Yeah, when I think about just the connection, I would have to say that there are some things that I learned as a kid,
Mm.
literally as a 10-year-old who stole his sister's guitar, the little red guitar behind me on the wall there. I would sneak in her room and grab it and play it. And she didn't really wanna play it, but I would. And so, she found me one day and she's like, "Oh, you can have it. I'm gonna let you have the guitar, but you can have it too. I'm gonna beat you up for taking my guitar." But I fell in love with playing. And what I first realized is to get to grow in it, I had to practice, I had to put in the time, I had to study it, I had to learn the fingering, I had to exercise my fingers to get the nerves to work properly, and so on. And I wasn't reading music or anything. I was just listening to the radio, finding the note on the guitar, and then figuring out how to play that song. And it's like, oh, wow, I could play this song and I could play that song. And so, in that process, I'm learning about practicing
Mm-hmm.
the importance of study and practice and finding the minutiae in the things that you're working on. I'm also learning the value and importance of listening. Because when you're first starting out, you go like, okay, I wanna play music. Well, I need to listen. Well, okay, well, what are they doing? Now, I need... It's kinda like what you were telling me earlier when your dad would sit down in the blue chair and put on the Modern Jazz Quartet and listen to music.
Oh, yep.
And so, he's been listening doing that. And so, he's picking out parts of it and going, oh, he's doing this. Oh, he's up to this part of the register, he's doing... So, you start listening different. Well, you then get to a point where you're like, okay, I... This is what I've done by myself, but I wanna go further. But how do I do that?
Mm.
Oh, I need a coach. Well, I was the youngest of six, growing up in Central Florida, East Coast of the United States, child of the '60s. And I'm like, okay, I wanna get better at this. Mom and dad are paying the bills and making a living. But there's not a lot of money to go around to say, hey, we're gonna pay for you to go buy a bass and take all these lessons, because it's eight of us that we gotta feed here and clothe and send to school. So, I realized if I really wanted to do this, I had to go out and mow lawns. I had to do some maintenance stuff or do some chores and make some money. So, I could then go find a teacher, pay them to tell me what I was doing wrong, and how I could get better.
Yeah.
That lesson never lost me. So, I'll stop with those three things, practicing, listening, and having a mentor.
So, I-
So, now...
Yeah.
Go ahead.
I know, I just wanna say I love that, because, and I wanna share this for a slightly different perspective. I played piano as a child. I started playing when I was very young, 'cause my dad played piano. But there was no joy in it for me, because I didn't have the opportunity to listen to the radio, and then play. I was put directly into classical piano lessons, which I hated, and playing all the mu... And I had a very strict teacher who made me play music that I hated. And as soon as I was able to, I did well, I was great at it. And as soon as I was able to stop, I'm like, I'm done. Because I didn't have that,
Right.
like the practicing and the listening and the mentoring, I had such a different experience. And I share that, because those three things are so important in the right context.
Yes.
And in the wrong context, if it's something that there's no joy, there's no choice in it, it can also go very awry.
Yes.
And I love those three things and the way you positioned it.
Yeah. And there's a bass player named Victor Wooten, who he's been playing since he was five years old, playing with his brothers. And he's probably one of the most iconic bass players of our time. Besides him and Marcus Miller and Stanley Clarke and a few other folks that are out there, Gerald Veasley. And Victor was five years old when he first started playing. So, basically, think about it, it's like this five-year-old hole in the space. So, how do you do that? And do you teach him how to read music and teach him theory? No. You like, hey, play this note and play this thing like this, and we're gonna play around you. So, for him, playing music was learning to have a conversation as a child would have a conversation with a parent.
Yep.
You're learning to communicate, so that by the time we go to school, we can speak in full sentences, we can carry on conversations with experts. Well, think about if you did that from a music standpoint or other areas and standpoint where you develop those skills and you enjoy the process, and then you learn a theory. And so, I followed that process as well.
Yes.
Even though I didn't have brothers and sisters above me playing music. By learning how to play by ear and just listen
Mm-hmm.
and being self-taught, and then having a teacher and then learning some of the theory and the practice and things around. And it became like the natural process for learning.
Yep.
Because that's how we learned to speak a language. You don't teach
That's exactly
a two year old-
what I was gonna say.
You don't teach a two-year-old theory in punctuation. You just let 'em talk. And they learn over time from imitation. And it's because of what we call mirror neurons. Sorry.
Yeah.
It's what we call mirror neurons. And the mirror neurons are our way of saying, okay, this is what you're doing, so I can see it, and so I can imitate. And so, if I can do that and I can imitate, then I can grow. And so, it becomes really, really valuable. So, I'll go back to those three things.
Yep.
Practicing, listening and having a mentor. So, now, let's switch to later on in life. I go from getting a degree in music to now doing some ministry work, and then coming out and finding myself in the world of IT and project manager as I was also being a musician in New York. Okay. So, now, I'm getting into IT and project management. Say, what do you do? Well, you have to practice. So, I read books, I studied, I went to, I looked at webinars, or I looked at little, different little audio programs about this area. I listened to others who, and went to workshops and listened to other people talk about what they were doing, 'cause I was really interested in it. And then, I found mentors who were more senior people who became experts in that area. I read their books. I went to their workshops. I got to know them personally. Fast-forward to me writing my books. I started practicing writing. I would read a lot of books. I would listen to books. I listened to books about writing. And then, I found a really good writing coach. So, you can take that model of what children go through to learn how to play an instrument. And then, if you just scale it up and apply it to the various areas, whether it's to IT, whether it's being the CEO. As a CEO, I'm now being coached by Tony Robbins' team. I'm working with Jack Canfield. I've been interviewed by him. I've been coached by Les Brown. I'm writing a book with him. So, I'm taking, even now in my 60s, I'm taking that same model that I learned as a kid and applying it to real world larger things in my life. And guess what? It still works.
Mm-hmm.
Figure out the basics and practice. Listen to those who are experts around you, and then find a good mentor. I'll say in a lot of my talks, I'll say mentoring and coaching is like being in the HOV lane. 'Cause you think about, if you're in a big city like Chicago, New York, and sometimes it can be Tampa, Florida, trying to get from Tampa to Orlando, you wanna be on the HOV lane. But the only way you can get in the HOV lane, especially around DC, is you gotta have somebody else with you. The cops will pull you over if you put a clown or you know, yeah. They've had people do that, put some kinda like animate object in the car with them. No, that doesn't work.
Yeah.
You actually need a real person. And so, what happens in that HOV lane experience? Well, you and another person are in the car. You now move to the express lane, you can now go 60 to 70 miles an hour. You can put the radio on, you can lay back, have a great conversation, you're relaxing, and you get home. Or you get to wherever you're going. Where everybody else, if they're stuck in two-hour traffic, they're going five miles an hour, they're running outta gas, they're frustrated, their cars' running hot, they're getting cut off, they're feeling frustrated, they're angry, they're trying to make phone calls. Isn't it like life that when you're trying to do it by yourself and you're trying to move into another area of your life by yourself, you're trying to figure it out and just do it all over again. But if you have the right mentoring coach who's been there, done that, and has a track record, then when you put them in the car with you, now in that area of your life, you're on the express lane. It may take somebody else two or three years to get there, you're getting there in three months, because now you have the right processes, strategies, knowledge, insights, and skills that you're learning. And you just apply that same principle to other areas of your life. You apply it to your personal life and I apply it to my personal life and to my business.
Yep. I think it's... I love the metaphor of the HOV lane. I think that's a great metaphor. And I agree with you. I've been saying for years that nobody on this planet needs a coach or a mentor. You don't need one. You can do it on your own.
Right.
It'll take longer and it will be harder. And it will, you may give up way earlier than you would otherwise, but you can absolutely
Right.
do it on your own. It just may be not
Exactly.
the most effective or efficient way.
Right. Well, here's the other caveat. Think about it this way. The highest paid people in the world all have coaches.
Mm-hmm. The best athletes in the world all have coaches.
Exactly, exactly. And those are some of the highest paid people in the world. Yep.
And they all have... They all have coaches, and it's like, wait a minute. So, you've won Super Bowls and you've won awards, or you've won millions of dollars playing golf, or you've won billions of dollars boxing or whatever. Why do you need a coach? Because everyone else that you're competing against is gonna have a coach. And if you're not getting a fraction better every day, a 1% better, then you're gonna miss out. And so, they realize the only way I can keep growing and developing these skills and doing what I'm doing is to have a coach. I would watch Patrick Mahomes, who at the Kansas City Chiefs, obviously a Super Bowl time, everybody's in the playoffs right now. And he would just pull these plays out where he torques his body one way and he is looking another way. And he throws the ball in another place and it goes 30, 40 yards, and the guy catches it. And you're like, what in the world? Is this natural? That's not natural. And I watched a show about him that was called, I'm not sure if it was on Netflix or Apple or whatever, it's called, "Quarterbacks". And he hired a coach that they literally work on his body stretching and physical exercises, so that he could actually do that naturally.
Mm-hmm.
So, all those things we're seeing that we're thinking, oh man, he's just a natural gift. No, that's just not a naturally gift. Yeah, okay, he's talented. He has a talent. But he's actually put in the work. And more than putting in the work, he's actually found the right mentoring coach that knows all the exercises, all the foods, all the stretching, all the things he needs to do, so that in the middle of the game, while he's under pressure, he can look down the field, torque his body, and throw a ball all the way across field 50 yards for someone to catch a foot touchdown. But think about it in business, if you are preparing your body and preparing your business and preparing your leadership team in that way, then when a crisis really happens, you have the skills and the things that you need inside of you to be able to say, okay, you know what? We can do this and we can develop this strategy, or we can brainstorm, or we can bring in another coach, help us. But you have those skills and you grow through it. So, that's how I look at it from that perspective, is you have to practice. And that fact, that's why I call my TEDx, practice is the performance.
Yeah.
Because how you practice and how you run your life every day is how you will perform on stage. 'Cause most professional musicians are only on stage 5% of the time.
Wild.
5% of the time.
That's wild. Yeah.
The rest of the time that they're doing things, they're practicing.
Yeah.
So, if you don't fall in love with what you're doing and falling in love with practicing, then you might as well just go, figure something else out. But everything that you're doing, if you wanna be good at it, is gonna require you to practice.
I think it's a, again, another great metaphor, because we do so often look at the performance aspect of whatever it is, business, sports, musicians, actors, whatever. We see the performance,
Right.
what's in front of us. And we're like, oh, that's what they do. They perform in this way, they present in this way. And we forget that the foundation comes when we're not in those high pressure moments, when we're not in the performance. And without that practice and that foundation, we can't perform in the other moments. And
Exactly.
it's a great reminder of that.
Yeah. And the other part that I learned from that experience of being in crises was also the importance of mindfulness and meditation
Mm.
and mental rehearsal. Because what I discovered later on, talking to doctors and mentors and some coaches and a neurologist was like, "You were under a lot of stress in your life at that time with some family things that were happening, some marital things that were happening, and so on, that your body just said, I can't do it anymore."
Yeah.
So, that thing that you went through was your body being out of balance, your life was out of balance. So, your body just went and said, okay, this is what's happening to you in these other areas of your life, so I'm gonna physically show you. And so, learning that lesson, I made a decision that, okay, I'm gonna learn how to do yoga and I'm gonna learn how to meditate. I'm gonna learn this thing that I was introduced to called HeartMath, where you spend five minutes a day breathing with this device on your ear, and it monitors your heart rate variability, because your heart was the first thing that was created when you were born. So, it has intelligence. Your heart is just as intelligent as your brain and your heart talks to your brain all the time. And it's like, they're in constant communication. So, when you take five minutes to breathe, or even two minutes to breathe from your heart, you create what's called a coherence between your heart, your brain, and the rest of your organs.
Mm.
And it puts your body, you're basically teaching your body to be at rest, to be at peace.
Yeah.
So, that when stressful things happen, you don't just fly off the handle, because you're so stressed out. A lot of leaders fly off the handle, because they're so stressed out. But if you practice mindfulness and meditation and yoga and de-stressing your body, then when those things happen, you respond in a more kind way. And even if it takes you to a stressful place, there are breathing techniques, the military does it. They have this four by four by four by four
Yeah.
breathing exercise that Marines use. And they use that to de-stress themselves in those moments.
Mm-hmm
And so, there's so many ways that we can prepare ourselves, be ready to handle these challenging times, and make things happen, so.
Yeah. We're gonna have so many interesting takeaways for people to look at and research and look into at the end of this. I'm always excited when conversations go like this, where there's so many just great nuggets of information.
Yeah.
So, thank you for sharing all of that.
You're welcome.
I wanna ask a question. I know we kind of touched on this slightly earlier and before we started recording, but one of the things that you talk about is how, or maybe that's, what... I'm gonna say business leaders can learn from jazz musicians when it comes to engaging, aligning teams, the work that they're doing. And I think that is so fascinating, 'cause it's just not a typical link that one might think of.
Okay.
And I'd love if you can talk to me a little bit about that, 'cause I think it'd be really valuable for people listening.
Sure, sure. When you think about small teams, you think about today, we have a lot of agile teams or small work teams. And when I think about a small work team, because I've been playing music and doing business at the same time, I think about a jazz quartet or trio. In a jazz quartet or trio, obviously everybody's practicing, they're listening, and they have their mentors and things like that. So, they have those three basic principles, but they also learn to surrender their skills to the group. They also understand the big picture of what the group's about. They also understand the value of attitude and the... Because if a positive attitude, our bodies are producing oxytocin and dopamine and all these positive neurochemicals. A negative attitude, we're producing the cortisol and adrenaline. And it definitely impacts the music. But if we want to create that, we have to surround ourselves with a high-performing team. And one of the most important things is that leaning in and listening and working together. So that, and one of the reasons I love jazz was that, you can play the song, the same song every night, but it can be radically different when it comes to how the song is interpreted by all the other musicians based on what happened that day, based on what the piano player, the guitarist player's doing, the horn player's doing. And you're listening going, oh wow, he's taking this song here tonight. Oh. So, we started off playing straight ahead jazz. Now, we changed it into a salsa rhythm and we're doing something else with it. That just opened up a whole new world for me. So, you're constantly in an experimenter or co-creator mindset. So, you're leaning forward. And when I think about business teams, it's like, how can I do that? And I think one of the challenges that business leaders have, and a part of it is the lack of understanding of the neuroscience of conversations is that if a team's not performing well, coming in and just being directive or management by walking around and trying to control them to do better, normally most times, don't work.
Mm.
Because if people are in that state, they're brought, their brains are producing tons of cortisol and adrenaline, and guess what? They can't move forward. They literally, physically, emotionally, and mentally can't move. So, by breaking away from that and doing some exercises or doing a team activity or taking the team to lunch or doing something where you get them to change their state,
Mm-hmm.
and start seeing things differently, then you start addressing and having conversations around those things. That happened to me with a team at the Department of Transportation. I had a new team come together with some of the people from, that were part of the old team and the new team. There was a little bit of disconnect of what people were roles were and the focus of the projects that we're working on. And so. I started seeing that disconnect. So, I had everybody leave their laptops, give 'em sticky notes and say, hey, I want everybody to meet up in this room. And we did this one exercise called rules of engagement. And so, I asked 'em a simple question. On your previous projects, what were some of the attributes or actions that made you fall in love with the team that you were working with? So, I want you to think of a project that you were working on where you fell in love with the team, and then write down what were the things that you admired about that team. So, everybody had a few minutes to be quiet, write down on sticky notes. And then, I started getting people to come up and put them on the board. This was before COVID obviously at that time. And as they start putting on the board, if they had something that was the same as somebody else, they would put it together.
Yeah.
So, it creates an infinity diagram. And guess what, 80% of what everybody admired about being on a great team was the same. But here's what that exercise actually did. People were on a little bit of dysfunction. So, by having them reflect on what they love, what does the brain start doing? Producing positive neurochemicals. So, as they're writing down these positive words and positive values, their brains are secreting these positive neural chemicals. As they put them up and say, here's what I value, that makes them feel good. They're being listened to now. And then, when they see that other people value the same thing, the whole room now is just vibrating with oxytocin, dopamine. And so, now, I'm done, my job is done. Because now, that team took off.
Yep.
Because I didn't have to go in and yell at them. I didn't have to go and say, listen, we gotta be directive and we gotta perform better. No. I need to get them all moving in the same direction, even neurologically.
Yeah.
And once I did that, they then were able to, they had the capacity to be able to say, oh, I've put down my different, that little outlier that I have, that little thing that I don't like. We have so much more in common, we gotta figure out how to make this work. And that's what they did. And the team has done amazing work.
Well, it goes back to when you were talking about like a jazz quartet and that co-creation in the moment.
Yes.
They become the co-creators, even by reflecting on prior... But they are now co-creating this together, 'cause look at what they all have in common. Look at where they're aligned. Now, they have a starting-
Right.
So, they're empowered to co-create in that way.
Right. And they feel like co-create and they want to. And that's the thing is that you have to get people to the point where they want to be engaged and want to be involved. And they see that this is not your project, but it's our project. And once you have that and they see the vision, then they're gonna do whatever it takes to do their part. Because now, the team is holding each other accountable and everyone's bought in. And many times, the challenge is, how do I get people to buy in?
Yeah. Yeah. I feel like I could talk to you for the next four hours and unfortunately that's there... As much as I would love to listen to a podcast that was four hours of talking to you, I feel like there's a limit to every podcast length.
I agree.
Sadly. But before we wrap up, I do wanna ask, is there anything that we didn't get to that you wanna mention or something that you wanna reinforce that we spoke about?
I'll say this, I didn't talk about this as part of the first three foundational things that I learned through the crisis.
Yeah.
But one of the things that I did learn, this is gonna be a fourth thing that I did learn, and this happened in 2020. I went and met with a buddy of mine who was leading a webinar, not a webinar, but a workshop out in Las Vegas. And he had mentioned that he had worked with Brian Tracy. And Brian Tracy said, "Hey, if you really wanna see your goals come to reality faster, write them down by hand every day. And then, spend two minutes visualizing yourself living that goal."
Hmm.
So, as I'm heading back home, I stop at the airport bookstore, I pick up a little notebook and I had three or four goals at a time, and I wrote them out by hand. And every day, I would just get a new sheet of paper and I'd write them out by hand. I'd visualize myself and I'd go about my day. And pretty soon, these goals started happening.
Hmm.
And here's why. Because just like when you write something down, you're actually moving the neurons in your brain closer together, so the electricity has less distance to jump. So, you remember things. That's why we say, oh, I need to remember this. Write it down. That's why we do that. We naturally know that that's what... We don't actually know why, but that's why it works. The other reason when you write things down is in the back of our brain, we have the reticular activating system. Think about it this way. Have you ever bought a blue car or a new car or a car that has this unique color? And you thought, man, no one has this car. You drive off the parking lot and everybody in their grandmother has that car.
The only thing you see.
Is that's the only thing you see. Well, why is that? It's because you've told your brain that this is important to me now. So, it starts noticing it. Well, think about it. If you write down your goals and say, these are important to me, then your brain starts noticing everything in life that's related to that goal.
Mm.
People come up to you and say, oh, did you hear about this book? And that's a book that you need for your goal. Oh, did you hear about this program? Or you get an email and it's the exact program or the exact thing that you need to help you move forward in your goal. And so, by writing down your goals every day, you start materializing those goals, because you are actually putting yourself in a state and your programming yourself to see nothing but those goals. So, I think that's another big value that people can get from just practicing that skill. Write your goals out by hand every day. Make it a daily habit and you'll watch your life will change dramatically and really fast.
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. That's a-
You're welcome.
That's a great add-on right at the end. That's amazing.
Excellent.
I want to... So, first and foremost, thank you for taking the time to chat with me today. This has been fascinating. I mean it when like I could easily talk to you for the next four hours. So, thank you, 'cause I love conversations like this that are fascinating and engaging. And also thank you for putting together, there's a page for our listeners, it's gonna be in the show notes, but it's geraldjleonard.com/crisis. That's for the listeners of the podcast. So, I hope everyone goes and checks it out. And thank you for doing that as well. I love it when people have something special to bring to the show. So, I appreciate you very much, Gerald.
Thank you very much. I'm really happy to be here. And yeah, this has been a blessing.
That is very kind of you. Thank you. Thanks for joining me today on the "Leading Through Crisis" podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, please take a minute to rate and review us on your podcast app. If you're interested in learning more about any of our guests, you can find us online at www.leadingthroughcrisis.ca.