G2G063 - Faisal Hoque

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Welcome to Garage to Goliath. I'm Dan Quiggle, and I'm honored to have Faisal Haque joining us today. Voted top 100 most influential people in technology and a regular contributor for Fast Company and the Harvard Business Review. Faisal is an accomplished entrepreneur, noted thought leader, technology innovator, advisor to CEOs and the U.

S. federal government, and a best-selling author. His newest Wall Street Journal bestselling book, Lift, Fostering the Leader in You Amid Revolutionary Global Change, explores the intersection of transformational leadership, systemic thinking, and experiential learning, all required to survive and thrive the tsunami of changes and disruptions caused by the fourth industrial revolution, the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and misinformation trends. Faisal, thank you for being here today.

So Faisal, I know right now I've got some listeners out there that maybe have family-owned businesses and their parents ran the business a certain way and the culture's already been set, or maybe they're just, they started their own business, but just over time you get kind of out of sync and this culture is kind of, it's how people are doing things right now. So how do leaders establish an innovation culture in their workplace or on their teams if that's not the direction they had been headed in the past?

Well, I think you have to kind of define what innovation means to you. And there's no one definition of innovation. But the way to look at innovation in general is what is going to give me the capability that acts as an accelerant and creates a differentiation than anybody else is doing out there. So once you establish that mindset, you start thinking about things very differently.

So for example, I'm a technology entrepreneur. I happen to love writing and I do all kind of other things. I'm at a stage of my life when I wanted to take this knowledge and distribute out there, but I don't have the time to become like a typical author, speaker, and be on the road, you know, and do those type of things. So I'm leveraging technology to distribute my knowledge in the form of docu-series and online learning, et cetera, et cetera.

So I'm just giving you as a personal example of what I wanted to accomplish and differently. So it really starts with mindset, and then you kind of have to take it from there and recruit the right people and establish the right process and make it part of your DNA and ask yourself every day, what can you do differently? that will accelerate your goals, but that also will have more time so that you can do other things. It is interesting because, so I talk in my speeches about creative destruction, kind of taking where you are ripping it apart not for the sake of change but you know talking about you know products pricing margins delivery systems leadership teams all these different you know KPIs Like I think that what I taking from this is you know sitting the staff down and saying, hey, what is going to be the accelerant?

What is the new innovation? How can we be better at all of these different factors and use that time to get input from your staff, doing that with the family? I mean, sitting down and saying, where do we want to be? You know, what's going to be the accelerant that gets this family moving again, gets them excited, traveling, learning, being the best in your industry, the best on a team, you know, the best coach, whatever that is that you're doing.

So I love that part of it. And I love that term innovation culture. So thank you for that. You know, to use the phrase expert in business when referring to you, Faisal, it feels almost like an understatement.

I love reading about, you know, what you've done and all the success that you've had. What is one of the current trends in today's world that you think shapes business the most? I think, you know, obviously, you know, the most obvious thing that comes to mind is the convergence of many different technology hitting us all at the same time. That is a major driver, meaning, you know, I mean, if you look at five years ago versus now, we have enterprise technology, we have social media, we have manufacturing technology, we have robotic customer service, AI driven assistant, all that stuff was obviously there.

But I think this is my argument, and this is coming from a person who has been technologist all his life, is that we kind of somehow missed the boat in many ways in developing the human skills that is the glue to make all this into an impactful and more sustainable society. So I think the trend, we're seeing a trend along with the technology, you know, exponential growth is hyper focus on humanity and a lot more conversation about soft skills and leadership capabilities that revolves around resiliency, mindfulness, empathy, you know, that sort of things, because that's how we connect with each other.

And the world is a very complex place, as we all know, all kind of misalignment, misinformation, kind of conflicts, war, you know, simultaneously all this advancement. So it requires any leader to think about all this and use these capabilities for good versus just half-hazard way and consciously or unconsciously create more destruction. So moving forward into the future of technology, how would you advise leaders who want to stay current and not get lost in all of it? Because I know, I mean, I speak to a lot of CEOs.

A lot of them have surrounded themselves with younger people, maybe, who are more technologically proficient. But if you're that CEO, how do you stay current and not kind of get discouraged? We have to practice what you preach. So what I mean by that, you may have all kind of technologists in your farm and your company, but let's say you're afraid to use the technology yourself.

You never gone to social media but you want to preach the customer you know your company to create a social brand You are doing all these digital communication but you afraid to get on a Zoom call or a podcast or Teams You can do a speech and motivate people digitally Those are not going to be a helpful situation as a technology. So use the daily stuff that has become part of our DNA, and that's how you stay first current with technology. not just go and look at your email and calendar.

That's not even a starting point anymore. That may be some of the greatest advice you've given today, only because I do see that a lot. I mean, you have leaders that talk about change and then they don't want to change themselves. You know, very hard to get people to follow your lead when you're supposed to be the person inspiring them and you're not practicing what you preach, as you said.

So for example, now many companies have all kind of a dashboard to see where things are in their company, right? But yet, they will ask their assistant or associate or a junior person to go and create a bunch of PowerPoint slides and print it for them, right? So why do you have the dashboard? You can't log in to the system and look at KPIs yourself.

You have to have somebody create a PowerPoint slide and bring it in front of you. See, that's what I mean by not preaching what you practice. If you want everybody to use the dashboard, then start using it yourself, and then you'll maybe get there. It is tough because, you know, people use time as, as the, as kind of the excuse.

And, and, but the reality is that even that assistant, even those, those managers around you, when they're watching everything you do. And so if they see that that's, that's, you're not using it, then why would they use it? Or why would they be excited about it? So you re you really do have to set the standard on the way that you lead and the way that you affect change.

It's funny. I'll, I'll speak to groups of CEOs and I'll ask a question and nobody will raise their hand. And I stop right there and I go, so you remember this is on leadership. And if your employees were here and they were not raising their hand, you'd be like, have I not led them to raise their hand?

Like, have I not led them to be great leaders? You know, and yet here they are sitting there not raising their hand. So, you know, you do need to be proactive in that regard. You know, it is interesting.

With such a successful career, I'm curious to ask who in your life instilled or inspired your passions of today? You know, I draw inspiration from all kind of people and all kind of profession, not just from, you know, what you may think from a business world or technology world. I do a lot of reading. I read a lot of old stuff, you know, and I read a lot of philosophical stuff.

So I draw inspiration from that. I draw inspiration from movies, you know, and I'm kind of at a closet chef. So I love cooking. I draw inspiration, especially when it comes to creativity from all kind of chefs that are all around the world that are doing unbelievable stuff.

So I draw, you know, and then writing is kind of my creative outlet along with cooking. So I draw inspiration from all kind of stuff. I draw inspiration from, you know, not politicians, but government leaders that we don't know, meaning we don't see their face, that actually keeps our country and the world together. I look at their dedication, and it's a totally different kind of motivation, what drives them, you know, total power public servant.

I draw inspiration from them. So my inspiration comes from many facets not just the obvious few technology entrepreneurs and business leaders So if there was one person you could thank in your life today who would that person be I don think there would be one person I don't think I could just thank one person. But I think it will have to start from my friends, from my family and my friends. Because that's kind of my mother, my son, my wife, my friends is what keeps my uh keeps me grounded uh so i'll have to start there it is you know of course important to have a good support network close to you so that i'm glad to hear that i think you know so often we take those people for granted right you know you they're kind of the last ones to be thanked sometimes not all the time but sometimes and so i i do talk in my speeches kind of this attitude of gratitude like being thankful for who who you are and because of these people and letting them know on a regular basis.

Absolutely. You know, and you have to be vocal about it because it's a declaration to yourself and a declaration to the universe. And I am utterly grateful and fortunate to have a handful of these very, very close-need friends, family members, especially in bad times. That's where I draw the strength from.

What I appreciate is that you're putting this down. So, you know, you have this new book, Lift. What is it that you hope for readers to take from it specifically? So, I mean, you know, what I argue that, look, I mean, if you look at just last five years, you know, it's a tremendous amount of change.

Most of them are not in our control. But yet there is tremendous amount of opportunities, personal, professional, and otherwise. We must be optimistic and lift other people by lifting ourselves. We can lift other people if we can't lift ourselves.

So that's where the name lift comes from. We didn't say change. We said lift. And the point of lift is if you want to lift other people, first you have to lift yourself by optimistic and by practicing certain habits, philosophy, practice, whatever you want to call.

And only then you'll be able to go through that constant reinvention process. So many great takeaways today. I can't thank you enough for spending the time with us. I mean, you know, I love that you talked about innovation being, you know, kind of not a solo act, but a team sport.

And so, you know, so many good things on mindfulness, keeping your finger on the pulse of what's going on around you on a regular basis to be the best leader you can be. Innovation culture. So many good takeaways. Thank you for joining us today and sharing your insight and expertise.

I hope you got some great takeaways for your personal life and career and feel inspired to take on the challenges to create your own future. I'm Dan Quiggle. Hope you enjoyed this episode of Garage to Goliath. Please share this episode with your family, friends, and network.

But Faisal, thank you again for your time. I truly appreciate it. We'll make sure we put in all the notes, show notes, ways to get a hold of you, ways to buy your book. We want to support you and we want to learn from you.

Thank you so much, Dan, for having me. Totally enjoyed this. Also, please rate, review, and subscribe to this leadership podcast in iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Your feedback helps us improve and also gets the message out to more listeners around the world.

To rate, review, and subscribe, please visit quigglegroup.com. That's Q-U-I-G-G-L-E group.com forward slash iTunes.

Thank you for listening to Garage to Goliath. I'm Dan Quiggle, joined here today by Faisal Haque. Lead well.