Creating Brave Spaced: Culture & Leadership Vision

Speaker A: M.

Speaker B: You're listening to the Scaling Culture podcast where we sit down with thought leaders who share their experiences building incredible workplace cultures. Our guest today, Chris Stever, a ah, culture and leadership visionary with an impressive background that includes influential roles at Disney and Apple. Chris has dedicated his career to understanding and shaping workplace culture, focusing on themes like co creation, people empowerment and leadership transformation. His insights challenge traditional leaders paradigms and encourage leaders to embrace curiosity, empathy and brave spaces in their teams. In this episode of Scaling Culture, Ron and Chris discuss how can curiosity unlock new dimensions in leadership? Can ego be replaced with empowerment? How do we create not just safe spaces, but brave spaces? And what's the secret to balancing honesty and empathy? And is empowerment the future of leadership?

Speaker A: Uh, welcome to another episode of the Scaling Culture podcast. I'm your host Ron Lovett and today we're honored to have Chris Deaver with who's the co founder of Brave Corps and the author of Brave Together, Chris from California. Welcome to the show. My man.

Speaker C: Thank you. Excited to be here, Ron. Thank you.

Speaker A: Yeah, look, I was so intrigued with your background. You really have a, I'm going to call it a full cycle, full circle background. You don't just live in. You're not a researcher. You've lived on all sides of the fence, it seems, if that, is that, is that fair?

Speaker C: I think so, yeah. I don't know how to categorize myself, but I like that description. I think that fits well.

Speaker A: Yeah. Because it should give you, uh, experience on all sides on following, leading, being in an interesting company, uh, speaking, facilitating, you're educating, you're really living in the full sphere of culture. You're drinking from Kool Aid at all sides, I guess.

Speaker C: Yeah. And it's fun. Um, I think there's so much about culture that we haven't explored, uh, that can really make an impact on the world and changing our lives. Yeah.

Speaker A: So can you give us, um, and give the listeners just a high level summary of what got you into this? Why do you even give a shit about culture?

Speaker C: Yeah, well, if you go back far enough, my experience in seeing the world was really from an artist standpoint and uh, I studied animation years ago. Uh, that kind of got me to this creative sense of what should things be, almost an ideal version of how things should feel, uh, some of the pathos of it. And I've always had an interest in business and leadership. And my dad was a scout master, boy scouts for 30 years. And so I got to be part of that starting age 10 and observed a lot of different versions of leadership that sometimes worked well and others, uh, not as well. Uh, but I feel like.

Speaker A: Sorry, Chris, were you able back then to make an assessment of, like, wow, this doesn't feel right, or, wow, that worked? Like, what's an example of that at that age?

Speaker C: Pretty. I mean, it's pretty easy. Like, you're. You're standing. Either you're the leader, uh, you know, patrol leader, or somebody else is, and you got to put a pup tent together, and there's, you know, four guys that are just making a mess of things for, you know, way longer than it should take. Uh, and, you know, things like that where you just. You're observing and you're seeing how certain things work, certain things don't, and how, especially at that age, young, uh, men in particular, uh, you know, they either kind of follow somebody and listen or they don't. And they're pretty good at not really kind of doing their own thing. And you could notice, uh, certain things that people could do that that would, you know, inspire them. Maybe they're sharing a story, usually just the way that they embody the principles. Right. That they're trying to lead by, uh, that had an early impact on me. I deserve it. My father and how he led. He's a great man. Um, but a lot of those things contributed to me just having a curiosity about leadership of the future and in particular, what it could be. Uh, I got kind of grounded in the philosophy of, uh, Stephen Covey. He wrote the Seven Habits book. And I read that book, and I did a service mission in Peru, and one of the leaders there knew him really well. And so I learned the Seven Habits there. It was actually in Spanish. I learned them, but I had such a curiosity about, who is this guy? What is the background, the man behind the curtain? And I got to meet him. He became a mentor. Uh, and that grounded my thinking somewhat there. And then later at Disney, when I was working there, I met, uh, well, I guess really when I was at Apple. After Disney, I got to know Ed Catmull, uh, who started Pixar and that creative sensibility about building a culture. He wrote a book called Creativity, Inc. Where he dives into the culture of Pixar. Uh, and kind of the combination of those things really interested me. Uh, timeless principles like the Seven Habits and then creativity and how cultures and leaders can really shape the future with. With those things. And that's, you know, that's been my interest. Yeah, really interesting.

Speaker A: I want. I want to go back to the. The Scout piece for a sec, because as you were saying that. I was thinking. So we both have, you have three kids, right?

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, right.

Speaker A: Teenagers. 11, 14 and what was the other.

Speaker C: Or 15 and 17.

Speaker A: Yeah, 15 and 17. Sorry. Right.

Speaker C: And the oldest, he's, he's, uh, he's taller than I am now with the hair. He's, you know, I'm like, come on. Saying, I'm like, hey, it took me 40 some years to get here, you know. Come on, man. He's already like six, three or whatever, so.

Speaker A: Well, look, I'm, I'm, uh, I'm curious because, uh, you know, I think when I think about my children, and by the way, if I go to the baseline of leader, it's just having people follow you to whatever that is. Like really, like, like there's so many different types of leadership. I think Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall kind of broke the myth of leaders. Spiky. You could be a chess player that's blind and can't speak and people follow you because you're a great chess player. You're spiky in something. Right. And so, but, uh, I think my leadership has been challenged more than it ever has before because trying to get my children to follow me to certain things has been way more challenging than adults. As complex as adults are with the nuances. And I remember this, when you were talking about this, uh, tent story, it reminded me of this article I read where there was this frustrated mother who could not get her sons to follow her to putting the laundry away. That was her leadership was like, I want you the direction, which is following my lead and getting your room clean, which is putting laundry away. She couldn't get it. Couldn't get it. She was having a nervous break time. And one day she had an idea to put a small little basketball hoop above the laundry basket. And all of a sudden the kids are shooting threes for the old laundry and she nails it out of the park. Great example of how to conform to leadership in a different way. Was it that complex? Did you see anything back then that's like, oh my God, this is so complex. You can't, it's command and control. My son taught me last night. Does work for him, right?

Speaker C: Yeah, no, I think.

Speaker A: Really? Is it, is it?

Speaker C: Yeah, it's simple, right? I, I, and yet hard in the sense of like, we have to, you know, pull away these obstacles that are self imposed or, or ego sometimes. Um, and like something like that, right. That she did was that's co creative, right? That's, that's, that's thinking in the context of, like, what. What are the wants and needs of, you know, the kids and, and then blending and what she wanted. And I think that's, that's where the power really is. I mean, I noticed that like in, you know, my dad as a scout, as a leader, you know, there are things where I think like, ah, he's, you know, I was dealing with him as a dad as well. I was like, well, there's a lot of things where I just like, uh, ah, he's just, it's just dad talk. You know, he's just, he's just telling us what to do and it's a classic. But then other times he'd just share a story, inspire you, and suddenly you're just doing that thing, right, that he wanted us to do or to accomplish. And sometimes it was like active engagement. I think what you're saying about, you know, and whether it's sport, we, uh, do a lot of that, uh, or just certain things where you just connect, where you connect with where people are moving or where they want to move. And, you know, that's kind of the energy what can become perpetual motion, right? The, the. The elusive perpetual motion machine. In science, they say that can't be created. It can actually be created through people power. And that's what happens in the best cultures, right?

Speaker A: And you look, I know when we did our research, you know, in your bio it says culture shaper, right? And so what does that mean to you? What is it? Because culture's so broad, what does bring us through? What is shaping culture? In your version of culture, what does that mean?

Speaker C: Yeah, I think at the core the best version is, uh, co creation, right? So we're here as co creator or as creators first and then, um, co creators, right. There's a sense we talk about flow and how that matters, right? Stepping out of time and that feeling when you're doing something you love, you could be in nature, could be art or sport, and um, or you're writing or just creating something that you love. And that's a special feeling, right, of being in the zone. And, uh, we like. So that's important and that matters because you're expressing your creative propensity. Uh, and that becomes more and more important in the future, right? In this future of. And regardless of industry. Because over time we have focused on, we look back the history of business as we know it, kind of the sense of efficiency, focus on the industrial worker, the assembly line. Frederick Taylor, Dale Carnegie spoke to how to level up in that. Be a salesperson, get to know people. Covey was focused on this time of knowledge worker, right? There was a focus on effectiveness, hacks, hustle, optimization of habits. But all of that stuff is not enough in the future. Uh, um, for many reasons. Partly because first of all knowledge is ubiquitous now. You find it on Google, you can find it on ChatGPT. Have it being the expert model leader doesn't really matter anymore, right? And this is what we saw this like years ago in the car industry. Like there was a point in time when I was, this is years ago, I was in college, I was selling cars and it was like. But I didn't, I didn't enjoy the job at all. But what I did enjoy was spending time with people. I didn't know anything about cars. All these other guys that showed up at the same time I did, they knew in and out about the cars and so they're selling all the technical specs, right? And these customers are coming in and they already had Google. They didn't care about that stuff. What they wanted was just somebody to listen to them, them. And so I just listen. So I started selling the most cars of anybody and I didn't even know, uh, it was just like I'm getting to these people and I'm connecting them with what they want and that's you know, and if we look at it agnostic of anything else, the power of relationships doesn't go away with AI. The power of uh, you know, collectively building the future together. And so if we, if we're thinking of you know, companies like Pixar or Apple where they create these incredible technologies and I've observed this where these teams come together, it's a co creative experience. And so if we unpack what culture is on an individual basis, it's even true, right? Is like well what, how, how do I think about the space that's around me, right and the space I occupy with others? Is it a space that is just. Well it could be dark matter, right? It could be fear based and that's not a good place, right? People don't enjoy those experiences. That's when they talk about toxic bosses or broken cultures. We've seen that. But the future, um, you know, and people may lean into something else and say well it's safe space and that's better than you know, the other alternative. But really the ultimate is being in this brave space which is we're breaking out of just, you know, fear. We're breaking out of braving it alone and we're braving it together. And as we do that, everything changes because we unlock creativity, uh, in each other, and then we can start to create magic. Right. Solutions that we would never thought of before.

Speaker A: But is there a line? So, for instance, when I first, uh, sold my security company and I'd launched Conley Owens, we wanted to create this culture consulting business. And back then, our strategic approach was, if you believe in culture, more servant leadership and empowerment. If you believe that's the way to go and you just don't know how to execute, we're your team. But if that's not for you, we didn't want to try to convince you that was the way forward. Do you have a line that says, look, you're not. You're not looking to create a safe environment, so we're not going to talk, you know, what's the line for you? Or what's. What's in the strike zone for you?

Speaker C: Yeah, it's interesting you ask that because, like, I'd be. So when I was working at Dell years ago, uh, they were in a moment that was really crazy, right? The sky was falling for them. They were having rifts every four, three or four months. The three VPs that hired me left after three months. It was brutal. And we had, um. Well, then I went to Disney and we had Simon Sinek come speak. And, you know, I got to know him a little bit, and we were talking about Dell, and he's like, well, some companies I work with, some I don't. You know, it depends on where they're at as far as their mindset. And I felt the same way. Like, you can only. You can only take them so far, Right. If they're. If the patient is willing. Right. And sometimes if it's like extreme surgery on the patient. The patient as in the culture itself. And if we're talking about cultures that have already been in motion or there's already some inertia there, it can make it harder. Um, I had the opportunity, though, if we take Dell as an example, to end up spending a lot of time with some of the senior leadership, Michael Dell, doing some coaching on culture. And I saw, hey, there's things that made it a fixer upper, but there were other elements that really you could amplify to make it even become more great. Uh, and one of those things was just a, I think, a baseline humility. So if you look at. If you strip everything away and say, if a leader can look themselves in the mirror rather than looking other places to blame, and they can say, what do I need to do differently?

Speaker A: And what's my responsibility here. Right?

Speaker C: That's the ultimate question. So if we have that as a starting point, we can start getting somewhere. Uh, and I found that to be true.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: So if you couldn't get to that starting point, it was kind of like, look, we're just spinning our tails here.

Speaker C: You can tell, right? Like uh, some leaders, it's just like they know everything. Everybody uh, else is stupid or um, they have an agenda. Right. That's so locked in that they don't care what anybody else thinks. And you just can't, you know, it's, it's too much ego. Um, but usually those people find out say the hard way at some point it hits the fan. Yeah.

Speaker A: And so you mentioned Apple and Disney. Uh, were you working there or as a consulting capacity? What was the relationship?

Speaker C: Yeah, I was inside those companies and I kind of took it on myself to uh, similar to, with Dell, to really look at it from a consultant perspective inside the company.

Speaker A: And what role were you playing? Ish. You probably moved around a bunch, but

Speaker C: yeah, mainly like hr business partner.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker C: And you know there's programmatic stuff you do in a role like that. But I was always curious about other things and I don't know if that's just a little bit of the rebel in me or misfit. I didn't, I think there's, there's certain things you think, okay, they're, you know, talent development, leadership, you know. But I was curious about where is this culture going and if the culture is a person. Right. Um, what's the future version of that person look like? First of all, what is it like today? And you know, you get to know these and it's actually quite interesting. And I don't know if, I mean there's certain books that have alluded to these things, but you look at a Disney and they're pretty old. They've been around for 80, 90, some 100 years and they kind of have this grandfatherly quality about their culture. Very nostalgic, but sometimes slow moving and bureaucratic. Um, and so it was opportunistic when they bought Pixar and they infused this new kind of energy into the heartbeat of animation. This also led to uh, Ed and Steve, uh, Jobs. They helped broker these deals with Marvel and Lucasfilm to infuse this different kind of energy. And so it's kind of like a grandfatherly figure but just taking on a uh, infusion of energy and enthusiasm and acting like a 40, 50 year old man or trying to. And you get to Apple, I Got to Apple and I was like, well, this is probably about 40s, 50s, and he's got a couple of kids, and it's kind of figured out who it wants to be. Um, and then you have others, you know, and it's not always correlated with the years. But, um, I think the. But also the companies that have a sense of intention about their future. Um, like I. I think of the movie Interstellar. You know, Chris Nolan, I'm a m. Big fan of his movies. And, uh, Matthew M. McConaughey was in that movie. And, you know, he spoke at the Academy Awards at one point and they asked him, or he said somebody had asked him about who's his mentor. And he said, well, most people would think it's going to be some actor. He said, no, said, my. My mentor is me in 10 years. And I didn't really understand what he's talking about until I watched that movie. And I want to spoil it for everybody if you haven't seen it. But there's a part in there where he's from. He's in the future, and he's basically trying to teach his past self and bring his past self into the future. And I think that's the ultimate question of cultures, if to do that in the best way. And in this case, he's really trying to save himself and his family, right. All the humanity. Um, and I think the question for cultures is, what is that future version of yourself? What are the first principles as to how you could actually create that? Uh, and then what are the sacrifices you have to make to do it? And, uh, more often than not, one of the big sacrifices is going to be some version of ego, right? Laying down that. And that's, that's the hero sacrifice, right? We talk about the hero's journey and we love the part of. At the end with all the rewards, right? We've got. We slay the dragon and all that. The heart. The part that's the hardest is the hero sacrifice. But if we, if we make that the emphasis and we magnify that out, and I'm sure you've seen this in your. In your business experiences as a leader, is. That's, it's. The. It's, you know, we talk about the messy middle, but it's kind of like the messy stuff is constant. It's, it's, you know, and the more we can do to be humble or take an approach that opens up possibilities, it. It changes things. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker A: I like when I hear you say messy stuff. I think you're you're talking about the, the human nuances and behaviors that you have to kind of formulate to create the culture. That's what you're referring to.

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, right.

Speaker A: You know, it's funny, I was thinking about this the other day Chris, when I uh, I'm an EO entrepreneurs organization and I've joined a new group and I was in Boston last week, uh, Goldchester actually I think I'm saying it right. Gloucester I'm going to. Yeah, right, just about Boston. Anyway, um, met with this group and it reminded me then and continues to remind me when I talk to other entrepreneurs that may not have ah, their focus on culture as much as like you know, client development and operations. And I get all that but not an equal, um, like to me, um, the stools wobbling the wrong side because there's a lag of people and culture that they' not focused on as much as, as the other two. And, and I find that when I talk to entrepreneurs that aren't focused on that their biggest challenge. The phone rings all the time for me, Ron. I'm dealing with this thing. It's always people, people, people. I don't have those challenges. Doesn't mean I, sorry, I don't have as frequently and as deep and messy. It's less messy. It's, it's short term pain for long term gain. I'm just not, I don't have those types of challenges. Even through scale. Do you see that? You know, are you seeing the same type of trend?

Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. Well, and I think you're, what you're probably also doing is there's building blocks that have been really pressure tested or that you have put in the work to create a uh, sensibility. And I can tell, I mean you have you know, great countenance, a great approach and you know, I think that dynamic of relationships we know over the course of time in a lifetime, um, you know that Harvard's done these 80 year longitudinal studies about this is like. And it shows that relation, you know, happiness or call it everything, satisfaction, success is relationships. Right. Full stop.

Speaker A: That's a belonging in relationships and trust. Right?

Speaker C: Yeah. And you know, I mean I'll give you an example. Yeah. To your point about the founders, like I was talking to uh, this friend of mine, he's an advisor for a variety of startups and uh, there's this one that they're just, it's a breakthrough idea, it's super innovative. They're probably going to reinvent the entire market around Bitcoin, um, mining and how it works and just like get to a tenth of, you know, the speed and, and it's tenth of the digital footprint. So it's a big opportunity that they have. And yet the founder was like, um, you know, just trying to set up meetings on the weekend. This random like, right, right before. And, and this guy, the survivor's like, ah, it's not like, you know, okay, you know, it was, he's trying to frame up like you gotta, you gotta hone in on what, how you're, how you're taking a methodical approach with intention to your team and to your, to advisors like me. And I think it was just one of those, to your point where it's like, you know, and this, this matters for founders. Like if you take a scattered approach, it's, it's not, um, there's not intention around it, but the more intention they can put in it, especially when it relates to their, to people, um, whether it's an advisor or their staff, you know, or people that work for them, people can feel it. Right. And.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: And it matters, you know, a lot. Yeah.

Speaker A: So, you know, I know you've done work with startups and I want to dig into that. I've got some questions about that. But I want to go back to Disney and um, Apple for a second. You, you started to mention some things around Disney of what I heard you say was very grandfather. I'll call it strong foundational, you know, old roots. Um, but the counterbalance of that was maybe bureaucracy can't change much because they're so rooted in old foundation. So I'm curious anything you would add from a need to keep. Need to move on from, from Disney and then I want to do the same thing with Apple. So what, what else did you see that is like, wow, that, that, that if I'm going to build a company, I'm also going to lean into the attribute or the strategy of X and I'm going to leave behind Y. And then I want to run for Apple too, objectively.

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, I think, I think, um, Disney was great and still is great at essentially, you know, I, uh, said creating happiness or creating an experience that's singular. Right. That just is all about magic. And I think that stays true, generally speaking, um, their challenge, in fact, they paid consultants to come in and analyze the whole culture and they did a one, A one slider. Right. That said you're too nice. But it was in the context of they're not having the challenging conversations. Like they weren't.

Speaker A: Sorry, Chris, was that getting the way of performance. So the consultant said, look, you could be performing much better. You're just too nice, you know.

Speaker C: Well, what it was was they would, they would have meetings where you're. They're supposed to work through some jugular issue or some challenge, but they do, you know, the leaders would kind of intentionally do prep meetings, then they do after meetings. And so you had all these meetings happening where the issues should have just been dealt with in the meeting. Right? And in Pixar, Ed, uh, Catmull talks about this in his book a bit because he was, he was caught. Then he got to be president of Disney Animation and they infused the Pixar way, you could say, um, which was much more candor and, you know, with respect. Right. But you can have both. And I think they were, they weren't always, always willing to make that trade off. And, you know, that makes it hard because then you have a lot of passive aggressive behaviors. And I hope they're getting better at this. Um, I know that with Pixar it helped a lot. And you know, some of those acquisitions, bringing that infusion of culture because. And if I get into Apple, it's like, well, one of the things that makes them great and that Pixar embraced and they're both related to Steve, uh, is they call it. Steve called the rock tumbler, right. Which is debate. These stones polish together and they may have rough edges, but it all works together for the better. And, uh, I think that's true. That's one of the strikes of Apple culture. And that you could have people show up in a room and have.

Speaker A: They need radical candor to have debate, honest debate. And so he was also a fan of that and that was infused in the culture, right? Or it seemed.

Speaker C: That's right. That's right. And I think there's an element to that. When we call it, you know, it's about being brave, right? We call it brave space or being brave together. And uh, because if you're willing to challenge, you know, and also not make, I think being brave enough too, to not make it about you. Right. Or not making it about your perspective. And you know, they say Steve could do this. He'd, he'd be, he'd present a point of view and, uh, you know, halfway through a meeting he'd do a 180 disagree with himself and people would say, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, no, that's like whiplash, right? Most people think, hey, the CEOs got to know it all and they're going to stay with their point of View like, no, he's like, that's a better idea. So he changed his mind. Um, and I think, you know, we talk about this in the book a bit as being. It's not just, um, listening to understand, you know, Covey would say, and that's true. Uh, but listening also, um, you know, with a willingness to change our mind. Right.

Speaker A: Ah.

Speaker C: And to get the, you know, to get the proper context to do that. And I think both of those things are true. Uh, but it, it really that that's a superpower, you know, that Apple has and that's explains some of the success of their products.

Speaker A: And what would you leave behind? What was your experience? You say, I, uh, wouldn't bring that forward. And why?

Speaker C: Well, here. Well, when I got hired in, it was, uh, I mean, they were already the most valuable company on earth. But what we saw was, um, they had grown significantly. And so where you had one person as a team leader over an organization of, let's say, 10, they were now leading a thousand. Just an example or a hundred. Right. A lot more people. And so all these, they had vertical strength of depth, technical expertise, uh, and they could do this across. But the teams were getting so big, it was very, very difficult, very weighty. And, uh, they also have elements of secrecy and what gets shared, what doesn't, so that you have surprise at the end when a product gets launched. But all this was kind of getting in the way. What we did was, um, we really amplified. So it was going from, hey, we're great at thinking different and that's foundational innovating personally great or as a team, let's get better at working different together. So that was their next level, their future culture. And then we had to identify and kind of heat map who are the most innovative leaders and teams here and extract their first principles. And that was what we set as the roadmap. And one of those things, for example, was, uh, this leader we asked, we sat down, he's leads 4,000 engineers and he, you know, they do all the cool stuff, right? The cameras and the, in the phones and you know, face Id like, his name's Lynn Young, said what, you know, how do you think about yourself? Right? What's your leadership philosophy? He said, I'm a coach. And you know, for him to say that just out of the gate is pretty interesting. Right? Um, and then, so what's your, what's your approach? Like, what would you say are your principles? And he said, I think about this, um, way he goes, I. If I'm in a He goes, I get in a room and I'm having a conversation and you know, people's ideas are like their kids. And if I care as much or more about their kids as I care about mine, then magic's gonna happen. And, you know, and then he, he distilled that down further. He said, you know, we think about bias as a bad thing. You know, there's training for that. He goes, but I think about it like this. He said, uh, I, like, I focus on being biased towards others ideas and that's like empathy, right? That's powerful. And I thought that was a really interesting. And then we. Principles, right? So we captured that. We're like, well, this is how this company can move into the future. Um, and so we brought the brain trust concept at Pixar that works, uh, for building movies. Uh, we saw that, we were doing one at Apple in the camera team and it was very successful. And so as an example, the AirPods team was kind of struggling. There was a lot of things happening as far as escalations and challenges. So we created an AirPods brain trust based on the same principles. And quite simply, it's, you establish a cross staff meeting once a week. E goes off the table, building blocks on the table, you have all the functional partners there, and then you do the stuff we're talking about. People are just very clear about, hey, here's where I'm at, here's what I need, here's how I can help you. Like, they're just, and they're looking out for each other. So there's actual team sensibility about cross function. And this doesn't, I mean, it sounds like, oh, yeah, obviously, like everybody should be doing this. Like, of course, like, no, it doesn't always happen. For some reason you have these silos and because of the expert model of expertise, people will double down on, hey, I'm the accounting or I'm software, they're hardware, we all do our thing. Um, but anyway, it, it was transformative. Yeah, it's interesting.

Speaker A: Um, and, and, you know, so I want to go back to the startup world because you've done a lot of work with startups, right? And it's funny, I think most people view startups as, oh, the culture has to be great. Like, you know, I, I've had people leave me in the past that, you know, went to a startup and it maybe wasn't quite what they thought. And I think that's just common. Like, oh, it's, it's energizing and chaotic and crazy and there's certainly some of that stuff. And of course it always depends on the leader or leaders and. But, but I'm curious, from your experience, where does this culture start to break down? What doesn't work with startups? What are you constantly seeing? Is it that they don't create a foundation? Like, where's the pieces that break down in startup world?

Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, it's hard because I think they have to create, um, you know, a product or a service that is meaningful. And so I see that if the speed to do that overtakes this, the, um, intention of building the proper partnerships across their team, whether it's with the founders themselves or others, then, uh, it's going to have some trouble. They're going to run into some challenges that could be devastating. Because if people, I mean, especially, let's say the founders or the key people, the key talent there, like, if they don't feel like, hey, there's a place that I'm able to do my best work and it's, you know, and granted, it's hard, right? Startups are hard. Um, but if they don't feel that way, they're likely to leave. They're likely to not be part of that. And then if you lose that, it's like, what do you have? Um, I think that's probably one of the most underestimated things because, like, usually it's like, well, we just need a good idea, get some funding. Like, yeah, but the team, you know, that's really everything. I mean, you look at a band, it's like you don't have, you know, the guy playing the guitar or the bass to the drum. Like, they leave, you know, they're not part of it. Then you got a guy who's just singing, singing at the microphone and good luck, you know.

Speaker A: But you, you bring up m a great point about the band analogy because, because I think as a startup, you have one, maybe two founders that have to play nine instruments, right? And then let's assume we're bootstrapping and trying to figure out, and then we hire another person and we now there's three of us playing nine instruments. Eventually you need expertise. And you know, my, my experience is that's when the first, like, maybe not the first, but that it's got to be a breakdown piece where the, you know, you don't know what you don't know. And so if I had to rewind the Ron Lovett 1.0, 2.0, speaking at 1.0, I'd say, look, everybody, this is what it is. We Know that we don't have the true expertise here and we're going to do our best. But while we're building this, let's do the best to find a lane here, because otherwise we're all gone. Like, we just. So I'd be that transparent, that kind of radical transparency of, yeah, you know, the office managers, the accountant and the marketing person. And then eventually it's like we need a marketing person and an office manager. And if that person is an expertise of one of those three, they're gone. You know, and then it's this, uh, you know, you treat your people like garbage and you're just chewing them up, spitting them out, I mean, whatever the version of the story is. But I find that's really challenging. Do you, do you see that?

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. I think what you're getting at, I heard the term, uh, recently was founder mode. And you know, right. They linked it to Steve a bit, Brian Chesky at Airbnb, and she was talking about. There's people online talking about it. And I think it has that feeling, right, where you're like, this is. I mean, for those of us that are parents, like, this is my baby, right. And I want it to grow in the right way and just in the same way care and feeding of. Right. It's like, well, you got to give it, you know, and, and, and, and teach, teach the right things at the right time. Right. And then as, as a child grows, it's like, well, let's expand the perspective and what it can do, what the child can do and you know, boy or girl, but like what support it needs. Yeah, yeah, because like, I think those things get forgotten. You know, Brian made a point, uh, some conference he was or, you know, or Chesky, whatever. B. He's like, you know, the difference between that manager mode of um, and is like somebody just parachuting in on a mountain that was already created. And like they don't even have the context of what, what happened. And so they're just like suddenly saying, oh, well, we gotta hike this other mountain. But, you know, it's like, it's not the same. And you know, this, this is an argument for you say for founders, but I think for like, that's why the founder mode moniker I think is sticking. Because you're saying, hey, I think anybody can opt into that. So if, if we've seen it, right, we've seen people show up and lead a company as a startup or as a medium size or large, and they just have that mindset, right. I think it's easier if the person is the founder, but you can have it and, uh, that matters. And, and then on, on this note too, of like, um, does a leader really care in terms of like, who their team is? Um, you know, because on the one hand it's like, well, of course because. But if they just see it as the requirements of a product or service, that's very different, I think, than saying, hey, it's the perpetual motion machine. Right. Or like that Steve quote or Ed or others. Uh, Ed that started Pixar. When they ask like, what's your favorite product? Right. Or whatever. Right. Movie. It's like it's the culture, it's the team. Right. So that answer that it's the team.

Speaker A: Yeah, look, I agree. I would also add too like, I think, like, I've invested in some startups, uh, in the past and one thing that I've noticed, uh, with new startups, and I think this is lacking for leadership broadly. But I don't think I would write another check unless I'm comfortable that the leader. And this is a top ask, by the way, and I think it's very challenging because I think even senior leaders suck at this. Is the, the ability to have difficult conversations with people and be kind and leave them feeling better than when you started. That is like that. That's a pandemic of its own with leadership. I find senior leaders at, I'm sure at Fortune 500, they just are challenged with that. But I know that it is, um, you know, I've invested in some startups, I've been close to some and that's the make or break they can't. There's this like family mentality. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. I'm going to let it all crash before I let someone down. Buy a tough conversation, which I'm avoiding. The whole thing's gonna implode. Would you agree? Disagree. You're seeing something else.

Speaker C: Yeah. And you know, given human nature, I think we always have this. And I think, yeah, you're absolutely right. But like given human nature too, it's like we have this tendency to, like, live in the extremes of, um, how we think about things. Right. Like, okay, and this is like the battle between the heart and mind, let's say. Right? So people, you can either be, you know, the tough, execution, performance person or you're the compassionate, you know, heart, uh, you know, uh, and you know that we see this show up in politics. Oh, yeah. You know, facts don't care about your feelings. And the Other side it's like, well, my, your feelings, you know. Well, feelings don't care about facts. And the other way around, right? This whole battle and uh, it's like, well, wait a minute, um, what if you can have both, right? What if the. And answer the synthesis in between that, that co creative solution based on principles is that you can do both and that the best founders, the best teams, the best companies actually do both. So let's take, you know, Nvidia for example, who's had. Happened to have a pretty good track record, you know, last couple years and fortunately enough my son told me to invest in them uh, like two or three years ago. So that, that turned out well. I actually, I ignored his advice. This is my son about going in on GameStop like a couple years before that and uh, it was totally random but you know, somehow he knew. So I was like, well, it's probably gonna turn out right. Nvidia did. And you uh, buy him something.

Speaker A: I hope. You bet I hope.

Speaker C: Yeah, he's on. Yeah, he's, it's. He's. Yeah, he squared away for sure.

Speaker A: Um, you're not gonna hear the end of that no matter what. That's for money. He's pulling that card out. You're done, Chris.

Speaker C: Yeah, it's true, it's true. Um, but you look at like Jensen Wong, right? He started this company like out of dental Denny's. He uh, was working there and then. Or I think he, well, he met with some friends, but he was doing like, you know, washing toilets. All these hard stuff. All these hard, you know. But he talks about. One of the things that really strikes me was this conversation they asked him about, hey, you know, you said it's uncomfortable to fire people. And he said yes, because I don't like to do that. He goes instead, what I'll do is I'll, I'll um. He's like I said, I'd rather like torture them to be great, to become great, right? And you know, it's a little tongue in cheek, but the reality is like if we keep those expectations so ultra high as we have the compassion, you know, to help get people there. And this is, I think it is. I mean, I don't know that we'd say like, hey, you know, because to your point, like the easy way to write things off and be like, well, it's like family and like. And you know, that assumption is like, hey, it's just, you know, it's all um, unconditional love and there's no expectations of anybody but I don't know that that's bs. It is bs.

Speaker A: That's not true.

Speaker C: It is BS in family too, right?

Speaker A: Yeah, that's right.

Speaker C: Well, do that.

Speaker A: But. But I'll say ish. Because you can't just kick your. Like, I don't know, I'm like, I'm generalizing, but I understand when I think it was Jody and our team, uh, someone who brought that to my attention that said, like, team is a better word than family because family's bs. Because you can't punt your, your daughter and just say, look, your three year old. I joke, uh, I joked before the podcast, I was getting a restraining order on my 3 year old. Like, I can't do that actually. Like, that's a joke. Right? And so.

Speaker C: Right, right.

Speaker A: So there is this. I do agree with that. And then, you know, but to your point, it's interesting because I use a similar sentence in our company which says lift someone to greatness or lift them out of the organization, but one or the other.

Speaker C: Right, right.

Speaker A: Push them to greatness or push them out the door. And that's actually what I say. And, uh, I agree with that. But that's in a team environment. That's, that's what you should do as a team. You push your teammates to greatness or go get, get a new team, you know?

Speaker C: Right. That the onus of, as a leader, like, it should feel excruciating because in the sense of like we go, we talked about the hero sacrifice earlier. It's like, that is the sacrifice. It's like I am doing everything I can to help this person be successful. Right. And to help the team be successful. And I think about, you know, okay, yeah, we were talking about leadership, you know, Michael, Michael Jordan. Right. And then, you know, those that have seen the Last Dance, you know, it's, it's a, it captures all that spirit of like, uh. And by the way, I don't care what they say about LeBron. I mean, Michael, there's just not. Nobody compares with the guy. He had an extra cushion of air at all times. But beyond that, here's a guy who, he realized his limitations at some point, right? He was hitting the playoffs, but he didn't get to, you know, where he wanted to be, uh, in terms of championships, until he learned the very thing we're talking about, which was making the team great. And there's one of my favorite moments in that Last Dance series. I think it's episode seven. They're interviewing him and, and you know, they asked him like, hey, you Were tough on some player. And, like, he and Steve care out of, you know, back and forth. It was heavy, right? And of course. But, you know, look at Steve. It's like, well, he's had a great. I mean, since then, great track record, one with the Warriors. You know, Jordan would set him up for these perfect shots, right? He hit the threes to win the games. And you looked at all those other players, Paxton, Bill Cartwright, Scotty Pippen, who became great, right? He was on Dream Team with. And Michael helped make that happen. But, you know, there's a moment in that. In that. There's a clip there where, like, you people said you were pretty hard on other people. And he was. It's like. And he says, yeah. He goes, well, um, I just wanted to win. And he said, I wanted the team to feel like what it felt like to win. And then he starts to get emoted. He's, like, tearing up because this is his soul, right? And he's like, okay, turn the cameras off. Like, he's done right? That's his moment. And. But it's. It gets into his core of where he is truly brave. And, you know, hey, it could show up differently for different players. Like, Steph Curry does it a little differently, maybe not quite as abrasive. I think the world's changed, too, in terms of what's expected there. But you get similar results. And, um, you know, he's a guy who. Or Steph, in the glory days of warriors, that Steve Kerr would say, well, you know, he's unbelievably humble off the court and incredibly, like, arrogant on the court. But, like, that combo of, like, what you can accomplish as a team, but I think that team centered, too. The other thing is, like, in interviews, Caitlin Clark does this too. It's like they get all asked all these questions, like, okay, you hit all these records, you've been successful, and you get some players who are the rock star, who in that interview, in an interview otherwise would be like, well, we're, uh, going to win because I'm the best player. Like, okay, that's, uh, whatever. But then the ones that actually do win, the ones that have dynasties that are constant greatness. It's a lot of we. They're talking about other people, they're talking about the team.

Speaker A: And I wonder, you, uh, know, if I was to have Mike on the podcast, I would question him on his reflection on the delivery. And what I mean by that is, you know, I keep making the statement in everything, I believe that things should be absolutely 100% focused and stubborn on vision, but flexible on execution, even when it comes to leadership. And with Michael, I don't think there's a moment of winning. It's win at all. Uh, well, I'm going to just take away at all costs for a sec, but win, win, win. But how I, how I execute that message to you, Chris might be different than Sally and Tommy and Terry because I need to like a leader. I need to, I need to speak your language and connect with you in a way, because I think what Michael did. And again, I don't have all the facts, but my observation was I'm gonna. This is how I communicate. And it's going to rub some people really wrong and too bad, so sad. And it's going to rub people. You know, that's my authentic self, but almost similar to my mother, you know, my mother, you say, well, this is me. Like it or leave it. I say, yeah, right. But if multiple people say that you're an. Then you should adjust if you're the problem, you know, like. And so there's a little bit of that, I think.

Speaker C: Yeah, no, you're, you're, you're right. I think. And there was a time, I think dirt, like, let's say that time, that time window. Um, and by the way, I think he was his. For that role, just as. As being kind of the best player that was leading the team through that. That's one thing. But like, Phil Jackson couldn't have taken that approach, right, as the coach, and Steve Kerr couldn't have taken it with the Warriors. And I think if you look at what is a quintessential leader of a

Speaker A: team, but doesn't Bill Balachek take that approach? And I don't know. But isn't he like a hard ass all the time? Isn't that his approach a little bit?

Speaker C: I, I don't know either, but I, Yeah, I, I have heard some things. I mean, I think football is, you know, also tough. But you look at like an Andy Reid, right, with the Chiefs, and he's. He's probably more like a Steve Kerr or Phil Jackson where it's like, he's empowering people, right? They're driving. And so, you know, and hey, maybe either model can work. I mean, you look back far enough in, in college basketball, you know, you had Bobby Knight throwing chairs, you know, and he was somehow successful at that. I don't know how, but, you know, he was, I think his intensity of what he wanted, of winning. But then Coach K, right after who, by the way, Ended up surpassing him. And wins had a very different approach. Right. More empowerment of the team. And I think, yeah, probably more about the future. Like that's more.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: Yeah. Uh, and Chris, when I think about Michael and I, if I break that down, right. And I'm no expert in this, but I'm just thinking critically about this, I guess. And. And if I think back to that, if Michael's pushing Steve Kerr, there is a risk to that type of one size fits all communication to pull someone to greatness. The risk is maybe I deflate him. He becomes in screen misses every shot tonight because I the wrong button and I've got. I've actually gotten his head, his mojo's down versus lift him up to say, no, I'm going to get this. I got. Someone's going to step up to that, but others may not. And so there's some risk. And I'm sure that there would have been some risk and reward to that.

Speaker C: Right? Yeah, yeah. I think the sensitivity and you could look at like a Steve Jobs, right. And he was on his own hero's journey too. He got fired from his own company, was in the wilderness. He had to learn some lessons in rebuilding and starting over with Next and Pixar, frankly, about compassion and empathy. Right. And, uh, right. You know, I mean, there's actually another standing question to all of this, which is as great as Michael is, right. Michael Jordan, um, you know, he never did coach a team and his Hornets didn't really have a championship, didn't have a lot of success. So, you know, I think if you look at him as a person, as a player, the fact of, like, he would practice, he said he would practice in practice, he would treat it like a game.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: So it's like a next level, you know. So as a player, he full. He was fully optimized. But I think if we're getting to the question of like, okay, how does a coach do this? How do they do it over time? What's. What's based on principle? Right. That doesn't go away. Um, yeah, I think some of those things you have to shave off and say, well, you know, we also live in a more sensitive time. I mean, you look at, yeah. Like, like a Steve even versus Tim, uh, Cook. Now, Tim Cook is much more, you know, I'd say so, say socially aware. Steve was social, but, like, he's queued in or dialed into situations and his understanding is far more broad of what's going on. He's much more of a listener. But, you know, Steve prepared Him for that. And it's like there was some intuition about that, but I think it tells us too. Like, well, maybe that's part of the leadership of the future. It's. It could also, I mean, you could also argue that it's situational. Right, I know for sure answer, you

Speaker A: know, and on that note, I better move topics because I don't watch any sports. I know that's the only thing I

Speaker C: watch with the bull.

Speaker A: So half these people you're talking about, I'm like, yes, yes, of course, yes, that person. I can't keep up with you here. I got to move topics.

Speaker C: Yeah, no worries. That's okay.

Speaker A: So I want to move to this. And we didn't mention this, but you've got your own podcast, um, Lead with a Question podcast. Just give us an overview of what that is and then. And then I've got a question around that.

Speaker C: Yeah. Uh, well, the roots of that are simply, uh, we asked Ed Catmull, who started Pixar, um, what his leadership philosophy was. And he said, I used to go around. He's a PhD, he's a smart guy. He's like, I'd answer questions everybody and just. They all ask me whatever. And he said, I was exhausted all the time. He goes, I wasn't empowering anybody. And so he went on. His wife told him to go on a meditation retreat. And so he did this for seven days and all he could do is ask people questions and listen that those are the rules. And after two or three days, he said it drove him crazy, but he stayed, you know, the seven days. And he said it changed his life and it changed him as a leader. And, you know, here we are talking to him and uh, uh, he was just listening. We went. It was like gonna be a 30 minute conversation turned to three hours. He was actually just asking great questions. I thought, that's powerful. So the podcast is based in that. Oh. So we asked him, what's his leadership? He said, I lead with a question. So that principle of lead with a Question is our first meta principle in the book. We believe that ties into the future because we look at these waves of efficiency effectiveness, which is that kind of cubby timeframe. Well, this bigger wave of the future is co creation. And AI tells us that, well, it's doing a lot of things that a lot of people used to do. Right. This is happening so fast. Uh, in the tech world, we've seen massive layoffs and then they're going back and saying, we're just going to hire in AI. People. Um, but what we're really. What the. What the future really needs is people that are attuned to, you know, curiosity and leading with questions. And so we've had a lot of different conversations, a lot of different people, people that run different companies, Adobe, other places, and just try to understand and get a better sense of, like, you know, I mean, these are people that kind of, yeah, they're living in the future. They come off the DeLorean, you know, 30 years from now, and they're like, here's how you do it. And, uh. Right. You know, we just stay curious about what. What it is they, you know, how they go about it, I guess. Yeah.

Speaker A: Love that and love the topic. We. We recently had Bob McDonald on, who's, uh, CEO and then chairman of Proctor Gamble. He was our last guest, actually, and he's also has this program at West Point, which we've had two of our leaders go down and then was able to spend some time with Bob. If you haven't had him, I would suggest having him on. He's fantastic, uh, leader, and so that'd be great. Let's wrap with this. Chris, what is the most powerful, interesting question that's come out of your podcast? What's your favorite question?

Speaker C: Wow. Um. That is a great question. I. I think, um. Well, part statement, part question, I'm thinking of, uh, Scott Belsky, who's. He's a chief product, um, officer of, uh, of Adobe. And I guess for some reason it's on my mind, but, uh, he was basically saying, and he did a startup himself, so before all that, he created a company called Behance, and it's basically creative portfolios online. And everybody was saying, like, you guys are crazy. So he's working with this team, trying to do this something that everybody thought was impossible. And, um, he basically, he said you have to kind of raise the flag with your team and lead this charge with them and inspire them and be inspired together. Uh, but something else that he mentioned was you have to find a place to. Where you're kind of on the edge of reason. And so it's kind of this question of how do you stay on the edge of reason, where you understand the context of the past, but you're challenging things into the future to become different. Um, and I think it's a hard place to be, but it matters. And we also get inspired by doing something that's truly original. Right. As a team, like, together. And I think that's what the. That's what helps create a beautiful future. Any of the products or services that we see in the world. And this could be in any industry. I mean, I was just talking to somebody who they, um, you know, they work at a startup that's in the. They saw school buses and they're like, school buses have not been innovated ever, right. For like 100 years. And they created these EV buses, school buses that are way better. Right. And they're selling like crazy and they're great. Right. It's a. It's a much better experience. You know, it's like almost a luxury experience for these kids who have been sitting on these like, basically rock chairs. You know, you've done it. We've done it. Right? Yeah. And I'm like, wow. Um, you know, and I just think how exciting it is, that possibility of if people are willing to stay in that. And we call it the messiness or that. That hero sacrifice, but the edge of reason to say we're in this together and if we do it collectively, we can lead that brave together future together.

Speaker A: That's great. Well, Chris, look, it's been fantastic having you as a guest today, but really enjoyed the discussion. Love the work that you do and where can our listeners find you?

Speaker C: Thanks so much, Ron. It's been great to be here. Um, yeah, so Bravecore Co is our website. There's a lot of, um, you know, articles and videos and, you know, podcasts, different things and. And the book, of course, uh, Brave Together is, you know, on Amazon. And, um, there's actually a video book that just came out, two lit book videos, ah, released that captures, uh, the essence of the book as well, and we're excited about that too, but love to connect with people and you know, we, uh, we love to work with leaders and teams and organizations too, so. Fantastic.

Speaker A: Well, my friend, good to see you and let's keep in touch and love the work you do.

Speaker C: Thanks so much, Ron.

Speaker B: For more information about Chris Deaver and his work, please visit Bravecore Co. Um, to learn more about our books or the Scaling Culture masterclass on building resilient high performing teams, please visit scalingculture.org lastly, if you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a comment and share this podcast with a friend or colleague. We'll be back soon with another inspiring guest.