Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey everybody, welcome to Ed and Ken's mini podcast. We have a great show for you today. We have a topic that we were discussing and literally we had to stop ourselves because all the good stuff was just flowing. We're like, wait a second, wait a second. Let's hit the record button and let's talk about this topic and, and let's get some, some of this raw, raw thoughts and emotions out for, for our people that are listening. For all 100,000 listeners that we achieved last week, I'm just, nah, maybe not, maybe somewhere around 100 million.
[00:00:33] Speaker B: Dude.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: I think that's what the number was after I looked, but, but no. Hey, what's happening today, man?
[00:00:39] Speaker B: Everything's happening. It's a beautiful day on the Gulf coast of Florida. Things are happening good things are going on great. People are coming together, man. I've never been happier and more energized, man. It's great. It's a great time to be alive. It's a great time to be in this business.
[00:00:56] Speaker A: I couldn't stop thinking about you last week when I was in Clearwater 2 for two reasons. On Friday or Saturday, excuse me, when it was cold, I couldn't stop cursing your name like that's. He told me it's nice here. And then on Sunday it was absolutely gorgeous. And I kept thinking, man, I'm jealous of Ed that he gets to enjoy this way more than I do.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: That might have been the nicest day of my life.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Weather wise, it was perfect. Perfect game for a base for day, for a baseball game. Perfect day to spend time with the family. It was, it was super cool. Let's get into our topic today because we're going to shift gears slightly. Not really, but we are going to talk a little bit about leadership today and why leadership is important as, you know, as, as a, as a real estate agent, as a lender, as a parent, as a, you know, a brother, a sister. A lot of the things that we understand and we learn through, through the art of leadership can help us in so many ways in our life. But, but let's, I want to start with a, with a topic just to get us right into it here. And you know, I want to know what, what makes a leader stale? And, and can you define or can you picture what stale leadership looks like?
[00:02:02] Speaker B: Yeah. So what makes a leaders leader become stale is they either decide to go into management mode or the, maybe the company that pays them pushes them to be more of a manager than a leader.
And there is complete difference between the two. And I was in the real estate world, in the mortgage world. I would say this from my experience, which is, and I see it like when you look at a company that grows 10x, they have a great leader. When you see a company grow at the incremental levels, they have a manager and a manager follows the rules of the company.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: So that's, that's one indication, right. That you're managing. So a manager follows the rules of the company. Right, the policies, the, you know, close mindedness that's required to blindly follow the rules. Right?
[00:03:08] Speaker B: Yep. The, this is the way I looked at it. The, the only asset that a real estate brokerage has are the agents.
So I will always make the decision that they come first.
They come before the stockholders, they come before the owners. And it's risky because I'm telling them that the ones that are signing my check that the agents are always going to come first. The employees will always come first. First. Always. Not even a question.
[00:03:42] Speaker A: So what are some of the other indications? So let's, let's take it from. Because we're all human and we all have, you know, human tendencies. What are some of the ways, you know, you can spot in yourself that you're being a manager and not being a leader?
[00:03:56] Speaker B: Yep. So here's, I'm pulling up a meme and I know I've got a million of these but I can't find them all right now management.
Management is about arranging and telling.
Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing.
So a leader will come into a. Again, this is just my perspective as a leader.
A leader will come into a real estate brokerage or a real estate company or a mortgage company.
Take that instead of saying here's how to do the business, here's the business in the box.
[00:04:38] Speaker A: Right.
[00:04:39] Speaker B: Science of achievement. Right. If you make 8,000 calls, you're going to get five leads. So do this every day and you're going to be successful. Nothing wrong with that. That's management.
A leader is going to say, let's go for a walk in the park.
I'm going to bring your disc assessment or your other assessment with you.
I want to find out about you, where you've been successful before, where you've failed before. I'm going to put you in a, in a world where you're working in your strength zones where you are so fulfilled with what you get to do every day.
[00:05:17] Speaker A: How.
Let's talk about leadership, management and the idea of accountability because it's such a, it's a word you hear all the time. I need to hold myself accountable. I need someone to hold me accountable. I got to hold you accountable. Like. Like, talk to me about the word accountability, especially in the context of leadership versus management.
[00:05:39] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm glad you asked that.
I don't believe in it.
Accountability, number one. If you think about the word. And I remember Tony Robbins talking about this, accountability comes from words like 9, 11.
We're going to find those who did this to us and hold them accountable.
What. What did Rumsfeld mean when he said that? It meant we're going to find them and we're going to kill them.
[00:06:08] Speaker A: Yeah. Certainly something negative.
[00:06:11] Speaker B: Yeah. So I call it. I switch the word accountable to personally responsible.
Do you want to be responsible for doing the activities? Whether it's fitness, mortgage sales, real. Real estate, sales, mortgage. Like, do you want to be held responsible? Do you want to hold yourself responsible? I can't hold you accountable.
I can't hold. But I can build you up enough and put you in the right position to hold you responsible. Perfect example. The Eagles, they held each other responsible, but they put the right people in the right positions to perform at their highest level.
Everyone.
Everyone performed at 10 to 20% higher than their natural ability because they were in the right positions. To hold someone accountable in a position that they're not built for is cruelty. It's like asking a fish to climb a tree. I'm gonna hold you accountable no matter.
[00:07:25] Speaker A: How hard you try. You're not gonna. It's not gonna happen.
[00:07:27] Speaker B: Yeah. The way that I hold people accountable would be this way.
No one loves you enough and cares about you enough to tell you this. You're not a fit for the business.
That would be the only way I would hold someone accountable.
[00:07:46] Speaker A: So the. The. The. The absolute.
[00:07:48] Speaker B: You were born for something else. You have greatness inside you for something else. It's not doing loans and it's not doing real estate.
[00:07:57] Speaker A: I want to share with you my.
I learned this 15 years ago. The definition of responsibility, how I define responsibility. Because you're right. Like, there's words that have meaning that. Like what? Connotations. Certain words have connotations. Accountability is one of those words. But I like that you redefine and you use the word. You prefer to use the word responsibility. But even responsibility has negative connotations in our culture that you have to. As a leader, as a salesperson, as a dad, as a mom, parent, brother, sister. You have to understand, responsibility is not fault. It's not blame. It's not guilt. It's not judgment. It's the willingness to Accept yourself as the cause of your situation, regardless of what it. You are responsible for how you feel. Most people live in their circumstances, say, this person yelled at me today, which makes me feel bad. You're responsible for how you feel. Not, you know, you're not. Not the person that yelled at you and, and you're responsible for your actions, not the person that, that's going to call you later and say, what did you do today? Like, understanding that you, you are the cause of your situation is one of the most empowering concepts that I embraced in my life because it means that if I'm responsible, I'm responsible for all of it. I'm responsible for the good. Right? I can, you know, my. One of my old friends, Mark Gordon, used to say, you know, you're the problem, and that's the good news. You know, like, like when you're, when you understand that you are the cause, you are no longer the effect of your circumstances. You are the cause of your circumstances. It's actually kind of scary if you really believe it. If you truly sit down and think about it and understand it and say, okay, I'm going to buy into this idea. The second emotion you feel is immense fear. At least I did, because, wait, holy crap, if I am really responsible, that's a big load to carry. But for me, it made me feel great. It didn't, but I could see how the weight of responsibility, knowing that it's just you, you're responsible, that can be tough to bear. And it takes people like you to kind of help people build those muscles. But once you understand that responsibility is your willingness to accept yourself as the cause of any situation, it's a, it's, it's an empowering moment, no doubt.
[00:10:22] Speaker B: And no matter what, that's freedom right there. If I dive into a pool today, God forbid, and, and it says that it's eight feet, but they got it wrong. It's only three feet and I break my neck and I'm paralyzed.
I chose to dive into the pool. I chose to dive in head first.
If I don't take responsibility for that, I'm gonna live a life of resentment, anger, right?
[00:10:55] Speaker A: So it's a tough, it's a tough topic to, to really dig into, especially with a lot of people. And I don't, you know, there's some really difficult things out there that people are dealing with and, you know, really kind of weird to be like, you're responsible, but if you remove fault, remove blame, you know, understand that you're the cause of. You're you're the cause of, of everything. And, and even still, like if you're in a. Just experienced a couple of deaths of some close people, like, I mean it's sad, but, and, and I can think it's unfair and I can, I can really wallow and, and you know, I mourned, but it's not about that. Like, I still want to be responsible for how I feel every day regardless of the circumstances of losing two people that were close. And, and I think that, that, that's the, the beauty of it when you really embrace it.
[00:11:46] Speaker B: Definitely now I would get back to. And I said I'm, I'm a self proclaimed. I'm going to vote myself in the top 1% of 1% of leaders.
This is what leaders do in the most horrific situation. They get down on their knees with the person that's suffering. They hug them, they cry with them, they have compassion.
They hear them out and then they say, how can, how can this serve the world? What new meaning can we give this? Because we're going to use this. And this is the only time I'll curse on your, your podcast because it.
[00:12:24] Speaker A: Needs to be our podcast.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: We're gonna. What's that?
[00:12:27] Speaker A: Our podcast.
[00:12:28] Speaker B: Our podcast. We're gonna, we're gonna take this pain and light your soul on fire.
What new meaning can we give to this tragedy, this pain, this whatever it is when a human, when a leader can reach into someone's soul, grab it and go. I, I'm taking this, I'm taking control of your pain with you. And we're going to put a new meaning to this where life will never be the same again.
Dude, there, there's.
I'm doing a, I just did a Facebook live real quick. Side note, something I'm seeing in our, in our industry is as I go through the B5 method with the agents and brokers and mortgage people and going, going, going, going. What I'm realizing is there's a lot of, there's too many people in narcissistic relationships. And I'm like, how do I tie narcissism, something I didn't even believe in, to leadership?
And it's to build your bonds and what that does. And I'm, I'm going, I want to end this suffering. So I'm going to educate. I'm not going to do the education. A therapist and a psychologist is going to do the education.
It's like, that's something for me as a leader. I'm like, not on my watch. I'm done seeing People suffer in these situations within the real estate industry that affects them at work. So again, a leader. Oh, Ken, your numbers are down. And you have a beautiful marriage, a beautiful family. Let's pretend it's another Ken Jordan, right? Your numbers are down. Are you making enough calls? What's your scripts? What's your objection handlers? What's your value proposition? Well, let's just pretend that Ken Jordan has somebody that they come home to at night and that someone goes, you didn't close a loan today.
God, it's so hard being married to you. When are you going to be a real man and produce and provide?
Whoa. Or vice versa, Right? A man telling that to a woman.
How do you expect that human being to produce and. And to be lively and positive? Right? These a little rant. Some of these leadership management people are like, they have a mindset problem.
I'm the one that steps in in a crowd of a thousand people and go, do you know what's going on at home with that person? They don't have a mindset problem.
They're married to a lunatic and a rant.
My opinion, just me. That's the way I've chosen to operate as a leader. Because if you're not going to go 100 levels deep, you're not serving at the highest level, and there's no way you're going to be able to transform that person.
[00:15:27] Speaker A: I'm reading, I mentioned this book earlier, the 15 commitments of conscientious Leaders. Conscious leaders. Phenomenal book. That's my recommendation for the day, that the four types of leaders as me, to me, through me and by me. And I feel like what you just described is a through me leader that, you know, you, you know, through you, you're going to bring them to where they need to be, assuming they're open to it and willing and it's important. And then there's the to me, the victim leader, you know? Right. The victim leader blames, complains, there's a problem, someone's at fault, someone should fix this. I heard a really cool stat. I'm going to just say it's a stat, but I promise you, I don't have any references for this, so take it for what it's worth.
They said that positive people are multipliers. Positive leaders, for instance, are multipliers. Even positive teammates are not necessarily in a leadership role. I put the air quotes up for people that are listening. Positive people can multiply and increase the effectiveness of the people around them by 15%.
Dividers. Negative people, people who are victims. People are always looking for somebody to blame.
They, they actually bring down the effectiveness of the people around them, their teammates, by 30%. The negative person is far more detrimental to the team than the positive person.
Far more. Double, twice as detrimental to the team as the positive person. And I, I, I go back to, as a leader, you have an obligation. And we talk about responsibility and, and, and how you're responsible. You are the creator. Everything happens. You're the cause.
Leaders, especially leaders that can pull together positive energy, exude positive energy. You have an obligation to your team, right? To be as the best self you can be on any given day, regardless of your circumstances. And I always use the analogy deodorant, right? We all know body odor is natural, but nobody wants to smell it, right? So what do we do? We put deodorant on? Do we put it on for us? No. We don't even know we stink. We put it off with people around us, right? And I think the same goes for your energy that you bring as a leader. It's your obligation to work on yourself to be the best self you can be that day. Because that's how you just that alone can bring your teammates up. Just that alone can bring your teammates up. And if you choose to be the victim, if you're choosing to be the, like you said, the manager. What are you doing? What are you doing wrong? Why aren't you doing what I told you to do? If you just listen to me, this would work. Now you're bringing the effectiveness of the team and everybody around you down by 30% if those numbers are correct. Right? But I think you, I think you understand what I mean by it, right?
[00:18:17] Speaker B: I believe they are. And let's get into leader a leader. I believe this a leader to lead the way they want to lead.
That will raise everything in the organization needs a good manager beside them. And what I mean by that is, and we brought this up years ago, worked with a beautiful human being, maybe the best, the best manager that ever operated in the Chester County Penns area. God bless his soul, Brian Brainard. And I'm the leader of the company. He's the manager of the company. We're in a agent leadership council meeting, and this is what we're doing. We're going here. I'm gonna pull the greatness out of you, this and that. And there was one member of that that went, that was very, in my opinion, negative at the meeting. I said, brian, we got to get that dude off the agent leadership Council. He, and he goes, no, you can, Ed, this is why every leadership team needs a black hatter.
And a black hatter is someone that questions things, right? They don't just go along with it.
Now, I wrote down the word intent.
His intent was to make the company better by looking at the things that the deodorant was hiding.
I took it as you're negative. A manager looked and went, no, we need him. Right? So what I looked. Now what I did was instead of resenting him, I said, like I literally said, joe, you are such a valuable part. Thanks for always questioning things. So that would be.
In every situation is different, right?
But in general, so if someone, if you and I are doing a training, right, and there's one of these negative nellies out there, I'm going to say, hey, you know what? We're here, Ken and I are here to pour our heart and soul, our experience out to you. What is your intent of asking that question?
Because if it's to raise the level of consciousness here, that's great. I'm going to curse again.
But if it's not, get the fuck out of here right now. These people want to learn. They want to live better lives. They want to serve their families better. And your intent here is to bring everyone down. Get out.
[00:20:59] Speaker A: Intent is very, very important. It's very important. And you're right. And as people that like that, we, you know, teachers, which, you know, one of my favorite things to do is learn, and my second favorite thing to do is teach. And I want people to question. I want people to question. Because the question a lot of times is what allows you to get to that next level that maybe you didn't think you needed to go to. So you skip over it and like, wow, you left this little nugget on the table that would have really helped a lot of people. But you went over it because you didn't. I didn't as the speaker. You didn't as a speaker, the teacher know that we had to go there and that one person who's got the courage to raise their hand and question, okay, let's go back. Let's go a little deeper there. And all of a sudden there's unleash all kinds of truth and value to the people around them. So you're right, that person is absolutely invaluable.
[00:21:46] Speaker B: So.
[00:21:46] Speaker A: So there's nothing wrong with managers, but there's a right way and a wrong way. Leaders can be good leaders. And then there's. There's people that think they're leaders and their toxicity not, not necessarily and then questioning doesn't make you negative. So those are our three kind of. From my perspective, that's my three takeaways from today.
[00:22:03] Speaker B: Yeah, baby. This is fun.
[00:22:05] Speaker A: Yeah, it is. I love this.
And as a real estate agent, as a lender, remember that you are the leader in the transaction. And your team, as real estate agent and, and loan officer especially, you guys are a leadership team. And you're leading all of the folks in the transaction. You want them to follow you. If you practice these effective leadership techniques and skills and educate yourself and on these topics, you'll have people follow you to the settlement table instead of fight you along the way. And that's why I'm going to recommend for Those out there, 15 commitments of conscious leadership. Ed, what was your book of recommendation for today?
[00:22:41] Speaker B: Oh, crap.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: You just had it.
[00:22:44] Speaker B: I got it. Well, there's two right now.
The one you got me.
[00:22:50] Speaker A: Love it.
[00:22:50] Speaker B: The Trillion Dollar Coach. Which by the way, this guy was a leader.
[00:22:54] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:22:55] Speaker B: He broke the rules. And then when I just started. Yes to Life by Viktor Frankl.
[00:23:00] Speaker A: I have to check that one out. I haven't read that one yet.
[00:23:02] Speaker B: Game changer. And I'll go back again to a third one that I'm reading for the 900th time. Key to freedom.
Don't believe everything you thinking is the beginning and end of all your suffering.
Unbelievable.
[00:23:20] Speaker A: We BW past our 15 minute deadline as always. And I'm not even sorry about it anymore. But I hope everybody has an awesome day. We'll catch up soon. Yeah.
[00:23:29] Speaker B: See ya.
