[{"_1":2,"_3":-5,"_4":-5},"loaderData",{"_5":6,"_7":8},"actionData","errors","root",{"_139":-5,"_140":-5,"_141":142,"_143":144,"_145":146},"routes/clips.$id.$slug",{"_9":10,"_11":12},"clip",{"_13":14,"_15":16,"_17":-5,"_18":19,"_20":-5,"_21":22,"_23":24,"_25":26,"_27":28,"_29":30,"_31":32,"_33":34,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":40,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_44":45,"_46":-5,"_47":48,"_49":50,"_51":-5},"canonicalUrl","https://howleaderslead.com/clips/3232/listen-for-the-silence","id",3232,"title","Listen for the silence","subtitle","transcript","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.040\nI listen for the silence. When I go talk to people, there's always people who\n\n2\n00:00:05.040 --> 00:00:05.520\ncome up saying,\n\n3\n00:00:05.520 --> 00:00:12.830\n\"That was great, terrific.\" And so you kind of tune those out. There are people\n\n4\n00:00:12.830 --> 00:00:13.200\nwho, if they\n\n5\n00:00:13.200 --> 00:00:17.070\ndon't give you balance feedback and you hear nothing, you should assume you\n\n6\n00:00:17.070 --> 00:00:17.920\ndidn't do a good job.\n\n7\n00:00:17.920 --> 00:00:22.960\nAs opposed to a couple people told me, \"Great, slap me on the back,\" and I went\n\n8\n00:00:22.960 --> 00:00:23.440\naway and said,\n\n9\n00:00:23.440 --> 00:00:26.360\n\"That was great.\" I'm like, \"No, people didn't really say anything.\" So\n\n10\n00:00:26.360 --> 00:00:28.320\nlistening for the silence,\n\n11\n00:00:28.320 --> 00:00:30.720\nI think is a valuable tool for leaps.\n","pretty_transcript","start_time",1242549,"end_time",1273419,"keywords","Communication, silence, feedback, honesty, self improvement","slug","listen-for-the-silence","origin","cms","mux_playback_id","7w9PfT201tko01NDOnZ11UMSeSBMlfQ02aYn5DjgSYd6wQ","mux_asset_id","xaVLLeA6NHpbOv34A402hDrHIN01wqYhhF6jKo5dBpcJY","leader_id",267,"episode_id",419,"updated_at","2026-03-05T16:04:26.000000Z","meta_title","meta_description","og_image_media_id","web_url","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3232/listen-for-the-silence","og_image_url","leader",{"_13":36,"_103":104,"_105":106,"_107":108,"_25":109,"_110":111,"_61":112,"_58":112,"_113":114,"_68":115,"_39":116,"_117":-5,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_118":119,"_91":120,"_44":121,"_122":123,"_124":125,"_46":-5,"_126":127,"_128":129,"_95":130,"_51":-5},"episode",{"_13":38,"_15":52,"_27":53,"_17":54,"_55":56,"_18":57,"_20":-5,"_58":59,"_60":-5,"_61":59,"_62":-5,"_63":64,"_65":66,"_67":-5,"_68":-5,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":74,"_35":36,"_39":75,"_41":-5,"_42":76,"_43":-5,"_77":78,"_79":80,"_81":82,"_83":84,"_85":-5,"_86":-5,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":-5,"_46":-5,"_92":93,"_94":-5,"_95":-5,"_51":-5},"og_image_media","Be brutal with your time","be-brutal-with-your-time","Time is your scarcest resource, so be ruthless about how you allocate it. Start with a clear sense of purpose, and it will be easier to decide what should get your attention and what shouldn't.","summary","

“You have to be brutal with your time.”

As the Chair, President and CEO of Allstate, Tom Wilson knows that time is the one resource you can’t get more of. And he is the master of every hour on his calendar.

But Tom’s discipline with time isn’t about shutting people out. It’s about being present for what matters – and knowing exactly what that is.

In this episode, Tom shares how to be ruthlessly disciplined with your time while staying deeply connected to your team and purpose, why clarity is the ultimate form of empowerment, and why he’s OK being “relentlessly boring.”

You’ll also learn:

Why silence is one of your most powerful leadership tools
The difference between being “in the business” versus “over the business”
How to decide what problems deserve your attention
What it was like to film an Allstate commercial with the iconic “Mayhem” guy

","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.420\nHello everyone and welcome to another episode of How Leaders Lead with David\n\n2\n00:00:04.420 --> 00:00:05.520\nNovak. Today we've\n\n3\n00:00:05.520 --> 00:00:10.420\ngot Tom Wilson on the show. Tom's the chairman and CEO of Allstate Insurance,\n\n4\n00:00:10.420 --> 00:00:11.360\nwhich is arguably\n\n5\n00:00:11.360 --> 00:00:16.570\none of the most recognizable insurance brands in the world. Now in his role as\n\n6\n00:00:16.570 --> 00:00:17.600\nchairman and CEO of\n\n7\n00:00:17.600 --> 00:00:23.040\ncourse Tom knows that time is the one resource that leaders cannot get more of.\n\n8\n00:00:23.040 --> 00:00:23.680\nAnd you'll hear\n\n9\n00:00:23.680 --> 00:00:27.670\nmany times in the episode why he believes every leader ought to be brutal with\n\n10\n00:00:27.670 --> 00:00:28.560\ntheir time.\n\n11\n00:00:28.560 --> 00:00:32.500\nNow this discipline with time though isn't about shutting people out. It's\n\n12\n00:00:32.500 --> 00:00:33.600\nabout being present for\n\n13\n00:00:33.600 --> 00:00:37.880\nwhat really matters and staying deeply connected to your people and to your\n\n14\n00:00:37.880 --> 00:00:39.040\npurpose. You're gonna\n\n15\n00:00:39.040 --> 00:00:42.670\nlove this conversation between David and Tom and be sure to stay tuned to the\n\n16\n00:00:42.670 --> 00:00:44.080\nvery end of the episode\n\n17\n00:00:44.080 --> 00:00:54.290\nso you don't miss the debrief. Enjoy. I gotta ask you you know was there ever a\n\n18\n00:00:54.290 --> 00:00:55.680\ntime in your life\n\n19\n00:00:55.680 --> 00:01:01.140\nthat you wished you had insurance but you didn't have it? Yes. I was on a trip\n\n20\n00:01:01.140 --> 00:01:02.560\nwith some friends\n\n21\n00:01:02.560 --> 00:01:09.390\nin Wyoming. We were using ATVs. The guy wanted to charge some huge amount of\n\n22\n00:01:09.390 --> 00:01:10.000\nmoney\n\n23\n00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:16.320\nfor us for the two hours. I said to my friends don't do it. It's a ripoff. I\n\n24\n00:01:16.320 --> 00:01:17.520\ncrashed my ATV and\n\n25\n00:01:17.520 --> 00:01:27.870\nit crossed me 500 hours. Well that'll teach you. Like I'm like see. You know\n\n26\n00:01:27.870 --> 00:01:28.640\nall state everybody\n\n27\n00:01:28.640 --> 00:01:33.520\nknows all states in big time into college football and all the teams have masc\n\n28\n00:01:33.520 --> 00:01:36.320\nots. There was a mascot\n\n29\n00:01:36.320 --> 00:01:42.400\nthat represented you as the leader Tom. What would it be and why? Wow that's a\n\n30\n00:01:42.400 --> 00:01:43.280\nreally good\n\n31\n00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:50.800\nbecause it's I suppose it's got to be both funny and memorable. It has does it\n\n32\n00:01:50.800 --> 00:01:51.920\nhave to be a thing\n\n33\n00:01:51.920 --> 00:01:55.590\nor could it be? You name it. I guess it should be a thing. It would be\n\n34\n00:01:55.590 --> 00:01:56.640\nsomething that was\n\n35\n00:01:56.640 --> 00:02:07.390\nboth welcoming and you felt comfortable with but it would also had a part. So\n\n36\n00:02:07.390 --> 00:02:08.080\nsomebody once\n\n37\n00:02:08.080 --> 00:02:15.130\ndescribed me as somebody that wore velvet gloves but had steel hands underneath\n\n38\n00:02:15.130 --> 00:02:16.560\n. So maybe that\n\n39\n00:02:16.560 --> 00:02:21.440\nwould be it. I don't know. I feel like I'm respectful and I embrace people\n\n40\n00:02:21.440 --> 00:02:22.240\nwithin like\n\n41\n00:02:22.240 --> 00:02:26.430\nwhen you've got to be you know hard you just have to do that for them and for\n\n42\n00:02:26.430 --> 00:02:27.360\nthe company.\n\n43\n00:02:27.360 --> 00:02:30.400\nIt sounds like you might be a teddy bear that could turn into a grizzly bear.\n\n44\n00:02:32.080 --> 00:02:38.080\nLike that. That's one of those there's a morphing thing. Well I can't wait to\n\n45\n00:02:38.080 --> 00:02:39.040\ndive into how you're\n\n46\n00:02:39.040 --> 00:02:43.690\nleading all state but first I want to take you back Tom. You know what's the\n\n47\n00:02:43.690 --> 00:02:44.560\nstory from your\n\n48\n00:02:44.560 --> 00:02:48.320\nchildhood that shaped the kind of leader you are today? Well I mean all of\n\n49\n00:02:48.320 --> 00:02:49.840\nthese you always we\n\n50\n00:02:49.840 --> 00:02:55.170\nthink we fall farther from the tree than we do but we are all you know products\n\n51\n00:02:55.170 --> 00:02:56.080\nof our parents.\n\n52\n00:02:56.080 --> 00:03:01.520\nI had two really terrific parents very engaged loving and they had a couple of\n\n53\n00:03:01.520 --> 00:03:01.840\nthings that\n\n54\n00:03:01.840 --> 00:03:06.000\nthey just drilled into us. One was just be the best at whatever you're going to\n\n55\n00:03:06.000 --> 00:03:06.560\ndo. Like they\n\n56\n00:03:06.560 --> 00:03:10.490\nwould literally say you can be a trash collector if you want just be a really\n\n57\n00:03:10.490 --> 00:03:12.160\ngood one. Secondly\n\n58\n00:03:12.160 --> 00:03:18.600\nit was always about respect for other people. So it was you know you're no\n\n59\n00:03:18.600 --> 00:03:19.600\nbetter no worse than\n\n60\n00:03:19.600 --> 00:03:23.640\nanybody else whether you have more money less money you're all the same. And I\n\n61\n00:03:23.640 --> 00:03:24.480\nthink the third\n\n62\n00:03:24.480 --> 00:03:29.920\nI think David would be a community involvement. Like we always had something\n\n63\n00:03:29.920 --> 00:03:31.200\ngoing on there people\n\n64\n00:03:31.200 --> 00:03:35.500\ngiving out meals to elderly people. We had signs on our lawn. I mean it was\n\n65\n00:03:35.500 --> 00:03:36.320\njust my\n\n66\n00:03:36.320 --> 00:03:40.410\nparents were you know active in the community. So those would be the three\n\n67\n00:03:40.410 --> 00:03:41.200\nthings I think they\n\n68\n00:03:41.200 --> 00:03:44.620\nkind of do okay. What did that community involvement teach you about leadership\n\n69\n00:03:44.620 --> 00:03:46.640\n? First you have to\n\n70\n00:03:46.640 --> 00:03:52.880\nstart with respecting that somebody can be an individual. Second you have to\n\n71\n00:03:52.880 --> 00:03:54.160\naccept that it's\n\n72\n00:03:54.160 --> 00:03:57.820\nokay for them. Like even if they don't agree with you like that's okay. It's\n\n73\n00:03:57.820 --> 00:03:58.880\ntheir point of view.\n\n74\n00:03:59.440 --> 00:04:03.360\nAnd so my parents were very good about navigating down the middle\n\n75\n00:04:03.360 --> 00:04:08.500\nas opposed to falling into you don't believe what I believe so therefore you\n\n76\n00:04:08.500 --> 00:04:08.800\ndon't come.\n\n77\n00:04:08.800 --> 00:04:13.980\nNow as you got into business and you're coming up with words who influenced you\n\n78\n00:04:13.980 --> 00:04:14.480\nthe most as a\n\n79\n00:04:14.480 --> 00:04:17.560\nleader. Either somebody you were for or maybe somebody you might have read\n\n80\n00:04:17.560 --> 00:04:18.720\nabout. Well first I\n\n81\n00:04:18.720 --> 00:04:22.660\nwould say David like you I'm sure I've had lots of people who helped me some\n\n82\n00:04:22.660 --> 00:04:24.560\ndirectly some just\n\n83\n00:04:24.560 --> 00:04:29.010\nwatching them. You know I'm a big believer and like you know learn leadership\n\n84\n00:04:29.010 --> 00:04:30.240\nlessons by watching\n\n85\n00:04:30.240 --> 00:04:33.180\nother people. So this podcast is actually quite good for that because people\n\n86\n00:04:33.180 --> 00:04:33.920\ncan learn from that.\n\n87\n00:04:33.920 --> 00:04:41.000\nIf I had to pick an individual it'd probably be Ed Brennan who was the CEO of\n\n88\n00:04:41.000 --> 00:04:42.080\nSears. I worked\n\n89\n00:04:42.080 --> 00:04:48.610\nfor Sears for about two years to help them bust it up and Ed was just great at\n\n90\n00:04:48.610 --> 00:04:50.000\npeople. Okay.\n\n91\n00:04:50.000 --> 00:04:53.760\nSo I asked him to I said hey we I don't know anything about retail. I'm working\n\n92\n00:04:53.760 --> 00:04:54.480\nfor Sears. It's\n\n93\n00:04:54.480 --> 00:04:58.290\nthis giant retailer. But you also own co-op anchor and Dean Whitter and\n\n94\n00:04:58.290 --> 00:04:59.520\nDiscover Card. But you know\n\n95\n00:04:59.520 --> 00:05:04.410\nit'd take me to some retail stores and show me what you know. And so we're in\n\n96\n00:05:04.410 --> 00:05:06.160\nour store in Brooklyn\n\n97\n00:05:06.160 --> 00:05:10.720\nand this old little old man walks up to us and says to Ed you don't remember me\n\n98\n00:05:10.720 --> 00:05:12.240\n. And keep in mind\n\n99\n00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:17.570\nSears got like 600,000 employees at this time. And Ed says give me a clue. And\n\n100\n00:05:17.570 --> 00:05:18.560\nthe guy says well\n\n101\n00:05:18.560 --> 00:05:22.010\nactually I never worked for you but my brother worked for you. And he said your\n\n102\n00:05:22.010 --> 00:05:23.120\nbrother's name was\n\n103\n00:05:23.120 --> 00:05:29.040\nX. It was it when I was in Atlanta 30 years ago and and your name is X. And he\n\n104\n00:05:29.040 --> 00:05:30.160\ngot the guy's name\n\n105\n00:05:30.160 --> 00:05:34.650\nwrong but his brother's name right. And the guy and I and I walk we walk away\n\n106\n00:05:34.650 --> 00:05:35.920\nand I said Ed\n\n107\n00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:40.800\nis like amazing. Like how did you do that? And he said you know people are the\n\n108\n00:05:40.800 --> 00:05:42.400\nkey to all success\n\n109\n00:05:42.400 --> 00:05:46.400\nand you focus on what makes you successful. And so since then I've always\n\n110\n00:05:46.400 --> 00:05:47.360\nthought and it kind of\n\n111\n00:05:47.360 --> 00:05:50.800\nreinforces what I was talking about. My parents like people come people are\n\n112\n00:05:50.800 --> 00:05:52.080\nthey be all and end\n\n113\n00:05:52.080 --> 00:05:57.290\nall of success. And so Ed was you know really helpful in having me think that\n\n114\n00:05:57.290 --> 00:05:58.400\ntrue. Yeah so you\n\n115\n00:05:58.400 --> 00:06:03.800\nwent to Sears to basically bust it up and you you you had to learn a lot just\n\n116\n00:06:03.800 --> 00:06:04.720\nby looking at the\n\n117\n00:06:04.720 --> 00:06:08.650\ndemise of what had to be one of the great American companies at one point in\n\n118\n00:06:08.650 --> 00:06:10.320\ntime. What did you\n\n119\n00:06:10.320 --> 00:06:16.320\nlearn from just you know what can go wrong by by looking at that situation.\n\n120\n00:06:16.320 --> 00:06:16.960\nSears is both a\n\n121\n00:06:16.960 --> 00:06:25.070\nterrific story of risk taking and seeing market and customers and then losing\n\n122\n00:06:25.070 --> 00:06:26.880\nits way. So you know\n\n123\n00:06:26.880 --> 00:06:33.360\nSears was basically home depot Walmart everything all rolled into one. And they\n\n124\n00:06:33.360 --> 00:06:34.160\ndid things. And when\n\n125\n00:06:34.160 --> 00:06:38.190\nI worked for them they had they had expanded successfully in real estate to\n\n126\n00:06:38.190 --> 00:06:39.200\ncall a banker.\n\n127\n00:06:39.200 --> 00:06:43.620\nThey started Discover Card from Spit you know it was nothing. They were doing\n\n128\n00:06:43.620 --> 00:06:44.960\nprodigy and online\n\n129\n00:06:44.960 --> 00:06:50.240\nservice. And so they had this long track record of very being successful by\n\n130\n00:06:50.240 --> 00:06:51.920\nfocusing on customers.\n\n131\n00:06:51.920 --> 00:06:55.530\nWhat happened I think was they quit looking outside. So I'm a big believer in\n\n132\n00:06:55.530 --> 00:06:56.240\nbringing the\n\n133\n00:06:56.240 --> 00:06:59.650\noutside in. I'm always out looking to say what do we have what are we doing\n\n134\n00:06:59.650 --> 00:07:00.320\nright what are we\n\n135\n00:07:00.320 --> 00:07:03.610\ndoing wrong. So you got to bring the outside in and then you have to have the\n\n136\n00:07:03.610 --> 00:07:04.480\ncourage to change.\n\n137\n00:07:05.360 --> 00:07:09.680\nWhat happened was they were successful. They weren't doing as well as they\n\n138\n00:07:09.680 --> 00:07:10.320\nwanted to. They\n\n139\n00:07:10.320 --> 00:07:15.530\ndidn't look outside. They didn't say hey we need to change. And they made small\n\n140\n00:07:15.530 --> 00:07:16.640\nchange not big change.\n\n141\n00:07:16.640 --> 00:07:21.520\nAnd so as a result that you know Sears no longer exists. Yeah absolutely it's a\n\n142\n00:07:21.520 --> 00:07:22.800\nit's a tragic story.\n\n143\n00:07:22.800 --> 00:07:27.120\nAnd you know but your your career has been illustrious. You've done many many\n\n144\n00:07:27.120 --> 00:07:27.680\nbig things in\n\n145\n00:07:27.680 --> 00:07:32.890\nyour career. But when you were coming up what kind of work did you raise your\n\n146\n00:07:32.890 --> 00:07:34.400\nhand for early on.\n\n147\n00:07:34.400 --> 00:07:38.400\nYou know and and and how did that shape the path that you ended up on.\n\n148\n00:07:38.400 --> 00:07:41.760\nWell I sometimes you raise your hand. Sometimes you get drafted you know.\n\n149\n00:07:41.760 --> 00:07:48.960\nSo I would say but I first got drafted for is I was and probably I guess still\n\n150\n00:07:48.960 --> 00:07:49.600\nI'm a pretty good\n\n151\n00:07:49.600 --> 00:07:53.530\nproblem solver. Like I can look at a situation I can think about it from all\n\n152\n00:07:53.530 --> 00:07:54.160\ndifferent angles.\n\n153\n00:07:54.160 --> 00:07:58.130\nI'm so okay here's probably the path out of here. And it's and you know and if\n\n154\n00:07:58.130 --> 00:07:58.800\nthat doesn't work\n\n155\n00:07:58.800 --> 00:08:02.730\nwe can try this. So I think that's what kind of got me started. It got me a\n\n156\n00:08:02.730 --> 00:08:03.200\nlike up.\n\n157\n00:08:04.080 --> 00:08:10.000\nI think what's happened after that is I've started to be more focused on what\n\n158\n00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:11.280\nreally matters.\n\n159\n00:08:11.280 --> 00:08:15.030\nBecause there's a lot of stuff you can do that just work. And you got to do it.\n\n160\n00:08:15.030 --> 00:08:15.840\nIt's kind of like\n\n161\n00:08:15.840 --> 00:08:18.800\nbeing at the river and you know paying it for gold. Not every time you stick\n\n162\n00:08:18.800 --> 00:08:19.440\nthe pan into\n\n163\n00:08:19.440 --> 00:08:23.560\nschool come up. But deciding that you're really only going to focus on the\n\n164\n00:08:23.560 --> 00:08:24.720\nstuff that matters.\n\n165\n00:08:24.720 --> 00:08:30.880\nAnd so that's really what I've morphed into is finding those big problems that\n\n166\n00:08:30.880 --> 00:08:31.680\nwill matter if\n\n167\n00:08:31.680 --> 00:08:34.940\nI fix them and lead them. So when people ask me to do like you know you get\n\n168\n00:08:34.940 --> 00:08:35.920\nasked to be I'm like\n\n169\n00:08:35.920 --> 00:08:39.850\nyeah I'm sure you're on a bunch of like social organizations stuff like that. I\n\n170\n00:08:39.850 --> 00:08:40.560\n'm like if you\n\n171\n00:08:40.560 --> 00:08:44.170\ncan tell me what needs to be fixed and it's a big thing and I can really help\n\n172\n00:08:44.170 --> 00:08:45.520\nyou. I'm interested.\n\n173\n00:08:45.520 --> 00:08:49.050\nOther than that I'm not interested. So it's really about being brutal with your\n\n174\n00:08:49.050 --> 00:08:49.360\ntime.\n\n175\n00:08:49.360 --> 00:08:53.780\nBeing a problem solver is a superpower. This is something that's you know you\n\n176\n00:08:53.780 --> 00:08:54.400\n've been able to\n\n177\n00:08:54.400 --> 00:08:58.960\ndifferentiate yourself as a leader. You know how do you go about solving a\n\n178\n00:08:58.960 --> 00:09:00.720\nproblem. What's your\n\n179\n00:09:00.720 --> 00:09:05.900\nyou have a process for? Yeah I suppose there's a process first is being\n\n180\n00:09:05.900 --> 00:09:07.040\nprepared really looking\n\n181\n00:09:07.040 --> 00:09:13.140\nat all the facts. Trying not to have an opinion right away which is hard. But I\n\n182\n00:09:13.140 --> 00:09:14.320\n'm you know I'll\n\n183\n00:09:14.320 --> 00:09:17.200\nbe accused of a lot of things in my life or it won't be not being prepared. I\n\n184\n00:09:17.200 --> 00:09:18.320\nwill know this stuff\n\n185\n00:09:18.320 --> 00:09:26.250\ndown deep. What I've now morphed into is trying to not use come up with my own\n\n186\n00:09:26.250 --> 00:09:27.120\nsolution but to\n\n187\n00:09:27.120 --> 00:09:30.870\nhelp other people craft solutions. So I've become less of a problem solver I\n\n188\n00:09:30.870 --> 00:09:32.240\nwould say David and more\n\n189\n00:09:32.240 --> 00:09:38.190\nof a facilitator with a little nudge every once in a while because what I found\n\n190\n00:09:38.190 --> 00:09:39.360\nis when I just came\n\n191\n00:09:39.360 --> 00:09:44.960\nup with a problem and other people didn't buy it as theirs or their solution\n\n192\n00:09:44.960 --> 00:09:46.160\nthen I was I was\n\n193\n00:09:46.160 --> 00:09:52.070\npushing a rope uphill. So what I've morphed into is trying to find ways to help\n\n194\n00:09:52.070 --> 00:09:53.920\nother people see what\n\n195\n00:09:53.920 --> 00:10:01.040\nI believe to be true and then help find a way to I become more like a maybe I\n\n196\n00:10:01.040 --> 00:10:02.480\nmove from problem\n\n197\n00:10:02.480 --> 00:10:06.680\nsolver to transportation engineering. You know I'm kind of like I kind of like\n\n198\n00:10:06.680 --> 00:10:07.600\nI say okay here's\n\n199\n00:10:07.600 --> 00:10:12.080\nthe way the road could go I help build the road I make sure there's no ice on\n\n200\n00:10:12.080 --> 00:10:13.200\nit then I stand by\n\n201\n00:10:13.200 --> 00:10:17.650\nnow. The one thing I have learned one of my directors said this about me. Tom\n\n202\n00:10:17.650 --> 00:10:19.440\nhas to know you know\n\n203\n00:10:20.160 --> 00:10:24.580\nif Tom knows you know you're going to be good. If Tom knows you don't know and\n\n204\n00:10:24.580 --> 00:10:25.600\nyou don't know\n\n205\n00:10:25.600 --> 00:10:28.800\nyou don't know Tom's going to be really helpful he'll help because he'll know\n\n206\n00:10:28.800 --> 00:10:29.920\nthe details like you\n\n207\n00:10:29.920 --> 00:10:33.860\nknow he'll he'll help sort it out. If Tom knows you don't know and you don't\n\n208\n00:10:33.860 --> 00:10:35.040\nknow you don't know\n\n209\n00:10:35.040 --> 00:10:38.510\nyou're going to have a problem. So I spend a bunch of time and that's where I\n\n210\n00:10:38.510 --> 00:10:39.840\n've had to change as a\n\n211\n00:10:39.840 --> 00:10:45.210\nleader. I would use my knowledge and problem-solving ability to question people\n\n212\n00:10:45.210 --> 00:10:46.480\nto see if they knew\n\n213\n00:10:46.480 --> 00:10:50.680\nand once they knew I was hands-off like here's they come to me for help I'll do\n\n214\n00:10:50.680 --> 00:10:51.840\nthis. People saw\n\n215\n00:10:51.840 --> 00:10:55.950\nthat though initially as I wanted to do their job and I wasn't trying to do the\n\n216\n00:10:55.950 --> 00:10:56.800\njob so I've had\n\n217\n00:10:56.800 --> 00:11:00.590\nto get better at saying look I'm going to ask a bunch of questions but it's not\n\n218\n00:11:00.590 --> 00:11:02.000\nbecause I really\n\n219\n00:11:02.000 --> 00:11:05.410\nthink I know the answer. I just want to know you know the answers to them\n\n220\n00:11:05.410 --> 00:11:06.320\nbecause if you know\n\n221\n00:11:06.320 --> 00:11:10.780\nthat I'm going to go with you. So you're this transportation engineer you help\n\n222\n00:11:10.780 --> 00:11:11.680\npeople solve the\n\n223\n00:11:11.680 --> 00:11:15.910\nproblem and you give it you ask them the right questions and kind of lead them\n\n224\n00:11:15.910 --> 00:11:16.800\ndown the down the\n\n225\n00:11:16.800 --> 00:11:22.010\nroad. What would be a problem that you and your team have solved that was was\n\n226\n00:11:22.010 --> 00:11:23.360\nthe most complex that\n\n227\n00:11:23.360 --> 00:11:28.820\nyou're most proud of? Well they're probably I'm going to come back to the most\n\n228\n00:11:28.820 --> 00:11:29.680\nproud of because\n\n229\n00:11:29.680 --> 00:11:33.680\nthat's a different answer because it's not really that complex but I think it\n\n230\n00:11:33.680 --> 00:11:35.040\ngets to the essence of\n\n231\n00:11:35.040 --> 00:11:41.790\nkind of how I like to lead. Complex problem we decided we have been about seven\n\n232\n00:11:41.790 --> 00:11:43.760\nyears ago we decided\n\n233\n00:11:43.760 --> 00:11:52.480\nthat our high good value decent price strategy wasn't picking up market share\n\n234\n00:11:52.480 --> 00:11:53.200\nso we had to do\n\n235\n00:11:53.200 --> 00:11:56.710\nsomething differently. We decided you know it's all about the cost stupid so we\n\n236\n00:11:56.710 --> 00:11:57.600\nget a lower price\n\n237\n00:11:57.600 --> 00:12:02.810\nand we set off to do that and we created this thing called transformative\n\n238\n00:12:02.810 --> 00:12:04.160\ngrowth which at some\n\n239\n00:12:04.160 --> 00:12:07.040\npoint if you're into I'll talk about middleware but it was how do you get from\n\n240\n00:12:07.040 --> 00:12:07.680\nyour vision to\n\n241\n00:12:07.680 --> 00:12:11.650\nday-to-day activity and it required us to change our distribution our cost\n\n242\n00:12:11.650 --> 00:12:13.200\nstructure our new products\n\n243\n00:12:13.200 --> 00:12:16.430\nour technology was everything and so we went out to all these consultants and\n\n244\n00:12:16.430 --> 00:12:17.120\nwe said what do you\n\n245\n00:12:17.120 --> 00:12:20.360\nthink they said we think you're taking on too much and I'm like well what would\n\n246\n00:12:20.360 --> 00:12:20.880\nyou not do\n\n247\n00:12:20.880 --> 00:12:24.300\nlike which one would you cut out? They're like well you kind of can't cut this\n\n248\n00:12:24.300 --> 00:12:25.440\nor not so we took\n\n249\n00:12:25.440 --> 00:12:30.560\non transformative growth we're about 60 percent of the way there after six\n\n250\n00:12:30.560 --> 00:12:30.560\nyears.\n\n251\n00:12:31.680 --> 00:12:37.600\nA lot of angst and turmoil in the company but it's working like there are\n\n252\n00:12:37.600 --> 00:12:38.000\ncertain places\n\n253\n00:12:38.000 --> 00:12:41.670\nwe're really picking on market share and we feel good about it so that was the\n\n254\n00:12:41.670 --> 00:12:42.640\nmost comprehensive\n\n255\n00:12:42.640 --> 00:12:46.570\nthing I've ever taken on and our companies have ever taken on to be honest and\n\n256\n00:12:46.570 --> 00:12:47.440\nwe're not done\n\n257\n00:12:47.440 --> 00:12:53.350\nyet so I can't like wave the victory flag yet but had we not done it boy we\n\n258\n00:12:53.350 --> 00:12:54.800\nwould have struggled\n\n259\n00:12:54.800 --> 00:12:58.220\nmuch more in the pandemic and we would not be in a good place now as it relates\n\n260\n00:12:58.220 --> 00:12:58.800\nto artificial\n\n261\n00:12:58.800 --> 00:13:02.270\nintelligence so we didn't do it because we knew those were coming my point\n\n262\n00:13:02.270 --> 00:13:03.600\nwould be do the hard\n\n263\n00:13:03.600 --> 00:13:07.610\nthings do the big things whenever anything happens you'll be ready and you talk\n\n264\n00:13:07.610 --> 00:13:09.120\nabout vision and\n\n265\n00:13:09.120 --> 00:13:14.750\ndriving it down or up the organization you know you know how do you do that I\n\n266\n00:13:14.750 --> 00:13:15.840\nmean that's that's a\n\n267\n00:13:15.840 --> 00:13:21.050\nyou know where you really turn vision into action I call that strategic middle\n\n268\n00:13:21.050 --> 00:13:22.480\nware I wish I had\n\n269\n00:13:22.480 --> 00:13:27.660\nknown it earlier it took me about it could be a decade David to figure it out\n\n270\n00:13:27.660 --> 00:13:28.560\n20 years ago we\n\n271\n00:13:28.560 --> 00:13:32.650\nstarted with our shared purpose which is a document like everybody else has you\n\n272\n00:13:32.650 --> 00:13:33.680\nknow it's one page\n\n273\n00:13:33.680 --> 00:13:37.690\nthat helps us align it and then over the course of time I've tried to figure\n\n274\n00:13:37.690 --> 00:13:38.640\nout how to build\n\n275\n00:13:38.640 --> 00:13:43.780\nmiddleware to get that purpose which is you point out very broad very encomp\n\n276\n00:13:43.780 --> 00:13:44.960\nassing ours is they'll\n\n277\n00:13:44.960 --> 00:13:48.380\nprotect people from life sincerity so it doesn't say auto insurance it doesn't\n\n278\n00:13:48.380 --> 00:13:49.280\nsay home insurance\n\n279\n00:13:49.280 --> 00:13:54.160\nwhich is why we now sell 160 million or in case you know so there's a bunch of\n\n280\n00:13:54.160 --> 00:13:54.720\nthings that were\n\n281\n00:13:54.720 --> 00:13:58.650\nreally helpful but what I didn't really think about was how do you use build\n\n282\n00:13:58.650 --> 00:13:59.520\nmiddleware and by\n\n283\n00:13:59.520 --> 00:14:07.020\nmiddleware I mean think of your your brain as the vision and your keyboard as\n\n284\n00:14:07.020 --> 00:14:09.040\nit takes that vision\n\n285\n00:14:09.040 --> 00:14:12.120\nand then your processor is a bunch of zeros and ones right like that's what\n\n286\n00:14:12.120 --> 00:14:13.360\nyour computer does\n\n287\n00:14:13.360 --> 00:14:18.720\nso think of zeros and ones as the day to day activity how do you build a series\n\n288\n00:14:18.720 --> 00:14:19.440\nof middleware\n\n289\n00:14:19.440 --> 00:14:23.630\nthat takes that vision and takes it down to day activity so we have a series of\n\n290\n00:14:23.630 --> 00:14:24.640\nmiddleware one\n\n291\n00:14:24.640 --> 00:14:28.580\nof our things is we have a two-part strategy it's got two parts to it and we\n\n292\n00:14:28.580 --> 00:14:29.680\nhave under the\n\n293\n00:14:29.680 --> 00:14:33.460\nincreased profitability market share we have transformed that's got five\n\n294\n00:14:33.460 --> 00:14:35.200\ncomponents five faces\n\n295\n00:14:35.200 --> 00:14:39.360\nwe have an employee value proposition which has got five components to it we\n\n296\n00:14:39.360 --> 00:14:41.200\nhave we allate our\n\n297\n00:14:42.080 --> 00:14:45.830\nour all-state sliders language and tell it ecosystems a component so we're\n\n298\n00:14:45.830 --> 00:14:46.960\nconstantly trying to break\n\n299\n00:14:46.960 --> 00:14:50.960\nit down lower and lower and lower so that it gets to the day-to-day activity\n\n300\n00:14:50.960 --> 00:14:52.240\nand we have things\n\n301\n00:14:52.240 --> 00:14:58.180\ncalled design build and deploy plans which take the concepts into what day-to-\n\n302\n00:14:58.180 --> 00:14:59.200\nday activities now\n\n303\n00:14:59.200 --> 00:15:05.440\nyou have to be a little careful because sometimes those can be too directive\n\n304\n00:15:05.440 --> 00:15:06.640\nand there's no room for\n\n305\n00:15:06.640 --> 00:15:11.200\npeople to maneuver but if you can build your culture such that you can do that\n\n306\n00:15:11.200 --> 00:15:11.680\nbuilding the\n\n307\n00:15:11.680 --> 00:15:16.230\nstrategic middleware has helped us take this broad vision which could be\n\n308\n00:15:16.230 --> 00:15:17.760\nanything down to\n\n309\n00:15:17.760 --> 00:15:21.360\ni'm a claim adjuster what am i supposed to do today and why do you want me to\n\n310\n00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:22.720\nuse this technology\n\n311\n00:15:22.720 --> 00:15:27.900\nyou mentioned culture how would a frontline employee describe all-stage\n\n312\n00:15:27.900 --> 00:15:29.520\nleadership culture\n\n313\n00:15:29.520 --> 00:15:35.500\nin one sentence what would they say all state uh believes in being a good\n\n314\n00:15:35.500 --> 00:15:36.880\ncorporate citizen\n\n315\n00:15:36.880 --> 00:15:43.930\nand that includes having uh transparent leaders who respect us and uh always\n\n316\n00:15:43.930 --> 00:15:45.360\ntell us the truth\n\n317\n00:15:45.360 --> 00:15:51.280\nthat would be my guess only we could ask that no one knew you probably will you\n\n318\n00:15:51.280 --> 00:15:52.560\nknow you mentioned\n\n319\n00:15:52.560 --> 00:15:59.710\nspending time where it matters most as the CEO how do you spend your time to\n\n320\n00:15:59.710 --> 00:16:01.360\nsend the signal\n\n321\n00:16:01.360 --> 00:16:05.360\nthat this really matters most in our business i'm going to start at the very\n\n322\n00:16:05.360 --> 00:16:06.800\ntop uh and then i'll\n\n323\n00:16:06.800 --> 00:16:10.980\ncome down to how do i allocate my time first i think you have to be brutal with\n\n324\n00:16:10.980 --> 00:16:11.680\nyour time\n\n325\n00:16:11.680 --> 00:16:16.890\nand i use that word on purpose which means there's not you can't buy another\n\n326\n00:16:16.890 --> 00:16:17.760\nhour a day like if i\n\n327\n00:16:17.760 --> 00:16:22.970\ncould buy a 25th hour of the day if you could i'd buy one i can't so i have to\n\n328\n00:16:22.970 --> 00:16:24.400\nuse it as if it really\n\n329\n00:16:24.400 --> 00:16:29.890\nreally matters so therefore i'm very specific about where i spend my time and i\n\n330\n00:16:29.890 --> 00:16:31.360\ndon't make my\n\n331\n00:16:31.360 --> 00:16:35.870\ntime are free good sometimes leaders get caught in the trap of their time is a\n\n332\n00:16:35.870 --> 00:16:37.200\nfree good that doesn't\n\n333\n00:16:37.200 --> 00:16:40.440\nmean that you're not available to people it actually means you are available to\n\n334\n00:16:40.440 --> 00:16:41.360\npeople but only\n\n335\n00:16:41.360 --> 00:16:45.790\navailable on those things that really matter the way i show that off to our\n\n336\n00:16:45.790 --> 00:16:47.520\nteam or lead by example\n\n337\n00:16:47.520 --> 00:16:53.520\nif that's the right way to say it is um i i allocate my time i i track how many\n\n338\n00:16:53.520 --> 00:16:54.720\ntimes i'm in front of\n\n339\n00:16:54.720 --> 00:16:58.880\nemployees how many times i speak to them how many times i'm out with agents i\n\n340\n00:16:58.880 --> 00:16:59.920\ntry to be out in the\n\n341\n00:16:59.920 --> 00:17:05.130\nbusiness and when they see you and you're out there you can help them see what\n\n342\n00:17:05.130 --> 00:17:06.080\nyou you want the\n\n343\n00:17:06.080 --> 00:17:12.570\ncompany to be so and then i also know my stuff so like i i i'm prepared like\n\n344\n00:17:12.570 --> 00:17:13.920\nwhen i come into stuff i\n\n345\n00:17:13.920 --> 00:17:20.790\nknow what i'm talking about i don't like try to use meetings for education for\n\n346\n00:17:20.790 --> 00:17:22.640\nme because i feel\n\n347\n00:17:22.640 --> 00:17:27.210\nthat's too self-centered i might use meetings for education for us but then\n\n348\n00:17:27.210 --> 00:17:28.800\nwhat you're doing is\n\n349\n00:17:28.800 --> 00:17:32.970\nhighlighting that what a good leader is is curious and like tries to interrog\n\n350\n00:17:32.970 --> 00:17:33.840\nate the truth\n\n351\n00:17:33.840 --> 00:17:39.050\nand so it's but i i do spend this a fair amount of time out talking to\n\n352\n00:17:39.050 --> 00:17:41.840\nemployees and getting them\n\n353\n00:17:41.840 --> 00:17:45.840\ninspired so for example a friend of mine who's a ophthalmologist said hey you\n\n354\n00:17:45.840 --> 00:17:47.360\nknow he's big not\n\n355\n00:17:47.360 --> 00:17:51.240\nphilanthropist he said when i go in these philanthropy meetings with the staff\n\n356\n00:17:51.240 --> 00:17:52.000\ni play music\n\n357\n00:17:52.800 --> 00:17:57.370\nbefore and so i now select the song joshku test i select this song if we're\n\n358\n00:17:57.370 --> 00:17:59.120\ngoing to have 15,000\n\n359\n00:17:59.120 --> 00:18:02.870\nemployees on a zoom call i select the song so that's related to what we're\n\n360\n00:18:02.870 --> 00:18:04.160\ngoing to talk about\n\n361\n00:18:04.160 --> 00:18:08.400\nthat's inspiring it's not like elevated music because i feel like there's ways\n\n362\n00:18:08.400 --> 00:18:09.040\nthat you can\n\n363\n00:18:09.040 --> 00:18:13.090\nshow that you're part of it and there's an emotional connection so i try to\n\n364\n00:18:13.090 --> 00:18:13.840\nhave people have\n\n365\n00:18:13.840 --> 00:18:18.350\nan emotional connection connection to us and to me great you know and and when\n\n366\n00:18:18.350 --> 00:18:19.760\nyou when you think\n\n367\n00:18:19.760 --> 00:18:23.310\nback on on all the things that you've done in your career was there a\n\n368\n00:18:23.310 --> 00:18:24.640\nleadership mistake\n\n369\n00:18:24.640 --> 00:18:28.800\nthat you made early on that that forced you to grow faster than you wanted to\n\n370\n00:18:28.800 --> 00:18:29.520\nbecause sometimes\n\n371\n00:18:29.520 --> 00:18:35.000\nwhen you make those mistakes it accelerates your growth yeah well yeah i played\n\n372\n00:18:35.000 --> 00:18:35.840\nmade plenty\n\n373\n00:18:35.840 --> 00:18:41.760\nof mistakes and plenty of what i would say are just economic mistakes and then\n\n374\n00:18:41.760 --> 00:18:42.800\ni've also made\n\n375\n00:18:42.800 --> 00:18:49.850\nsome leadership mistakes my thought on mistakes is you know you just got to you\n\n376\n00:18:49.850 --> 00:18:51.120\ngot to be honest\n\n377\n00:18:51.120 --> 00:18:56.780\nwith yourself say why did it happen what did you learn from it and not let it\n\n378\n00:18:56.780 --> 00:18:58.080\nrestrict you from\n\n379\n00:18:58.080 --> 00:19:01.230\ndoing doing the same thing again because it maybe it's the right thing and it\n\n380\n00:19:01.230 --> 00:19:02.000\njust didn't turn\n\n381\n00:19:02.000 --> 00:19:08.080\nout right i've made plenty of mistakes i would say financially now there's like\n\n382\n00:19:08.080 --> 00:19:08.560\na bunch of\n\n383\n00:19:08.560 --> 00:19:12.000\nfinancials i'm hundreds of millions of dollars so you just got to win more than\n\n384\n00:19:12.000 --> 00:19:13.440\nyou lose on that\n\n385\n00:19:13.440 --> 00:19:18.960\ni would say from a leadership standpoint i don't think it was a mistake but but\n\n386\n00:19:18.960 --> 00:19:19.600\nit was personal\n\n387\n00:19:19.600 --> 00:19:25.520\ngrowth so i was frustrated with our team they weren't getting something done it\n\n388\n00:19:25.520 --> 00:19:26.480\nwas on earthquake\n\n389\n00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:31.690\ninsurance and so i said in the mean look i asked for this for like nine months\n\n390\n00:19:31.690 --> 00:19:32.400\nand i'm going to\n\n391\n00:19:32.400 --> 00:19:35.300\ntell you if we're back here in three months and it's still here i will be\n\n392\n00:19:35.300 --> 00:19:36.720\ntalking to different people\n\n393\n00:19:36.720 --> 00:19:41.280\ni overused my position power i didn't need to do that i could have done it in a\n\n394\n00:19:41.280 --> 00:19:42.000\nbunch of different\n\n395\n00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:47.910\nways and so i try not to overuse my position power i try to be aware of my\n\n396\n00:19:47.910 --> 00:19:49.280\nposition power\n\n397\n00:19:49.280 --> 00:19:55.620\nas a force for good and when i want it to be a force for accountability i do it\n\n398\n00:19:55.620 --> 00:19:56.400\nin different\n\n399\n00:19:56.400 --> 00:20:00.400\nways where do you get the truth teller that makes you realize that do you is\n\n400\n00:20:00.400 --> 00:20:01.840\nitself reflection that\n\n401\n00:20:01.840 --> 00:20:05.080\nthat forces you into a situation where you say hey you know what i didn't use i\n\n402\n00:20:05.080 --> 00:20:05.920\ndidn't need to use\n\n403\n00:20:05.920 --> 00:20:11.280\nmy power that way you know where do you how do you how do you get that kind of\n\n404\n00:20:11.280 --> 00:20:12.320\nfeedback or come to\n\n405\n00:20:12.320 --> 00:20:17.760\nthat kind of conclusion i would say uh i mean there's lots of two things i do\n\n406\n00:20:17.760 --> 00:20:18.720\nenroll others in\n\n407\n00:20:18.720 --> 00:20:23.900\nyour quest to be a better person uh and listen for the silence so what i mean\n\n408\n00:20:23.900 --> 00:20:25.600\nby that is uh i have\n\n409\n00:20:25.600 --> 00:20:29.220\npeople i'll go to and i'll say hey uh how do you think that went and you know\n\n410\n00:20:29.220 --> 00:20:30.240\nyou don't need the\n\n411\n00:20:30.240 --> 00:20:33.800\npeople who are just trying to be nice to you because they think you're gonna\n\n412\n00:20:33.800 --> 00:20:34.800\nhelp them somehow\n\n413\n00:20:34.800 --> 00:20:38.010\nyou need people to say you know Tom you didn't really do that right and so that\n\n414\n00:20:38.010 --> 00:20:38.480\nneeds to be\n\n415\n00:20:38.480 --> 00:20:42.480\na safe place for them uh and otherwise it won't help you and the other part is\n\n416\n00:20:42.480 --> 00:20:43.280\ni listen for the\n\n417\n00:20:43.280 --> 00:20:47.620\nsilence like in my when i go talk to people there's always people who come up\n\n418\n00:20:47.620 --> 00:20:48.800\nsay that was great you\n\n419\n00:20:48.800 --> 00:20:54.710\nknow it's terrific uh and then uh and so you kind of kind of tune those out\n\n420\n00:20:54.710 --> 00:20:55.600\nthere are people who if\n\n421\n00:20:55.600 --> 00:20:59.410\nthey don't give you balance feedback and you hear nothing you should assume you\n\n422\n00:20:59.410 --> 00:21:00.480\ndidn't do a good job\n\n423\n00:21:01.600 --> 00:21:05.270\nas opposed to you know a couple people told me great slapped me on the back and\n\n424\n00:21:05.270 --> 00:21:05.680\ni went away\n\n425\n00:21:05.680 --> 00:21:08.350\nand said it was great i'm like no you know like people didn't really say\n\n426\n00:21:08.350 --> 00:21:10.000\nanything hmm so listening\n\n427\n00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:14.420\nfor the silence i think is a valuable tool for leadership yeah listening to for\n\n428\n00:21:14.420 --> 00:21:15.120\nthe silence\n\n429\n00:21:15.120 --> 00:21:19.440\nthat's something everybody should remember and you know when you think about uh\n\n430\n00:21:19.440 --> 00:21:21.200\nthe failures or\n\n431\n00:21:21.200 --> 00:21:26.080\nthe mistakes or whatever you however you want to describe that you know and it\n\n432\n00:21:26.080 --> 00:21:27.040\n's public you know\n\n433\n00:21:27.600 --> 00:21:31.530\nhow do you come back from that you know when you make when you when you make\n\n434\n00:21:31.530 --> 00:21:32.320\nthat mistake\n\n435\n00:21:32.320 --> 00:21:35.350\nyou know how do you bounce back what do you do personally to get yourself\n\n436\n00:21:35.350 --> 00:21:36.240\ngeared back to\n\n437\n00:21:36.240 --> 00:21:40.240\nyou know get back up on you i like how you said i've won more than i've lost\n\n438\n00:21:40.240 --> 00:21:41.040\nyou know i've lost\n\n439\n00:21:41.040 --> 00:21:46.380\na few million but i've made more million you know how do you how do you bounce\n\n440\n00:21:46.380 --> 00:21:49.120\nback two ways uh one is\n\n441\n00:21:50.160 --> 00:21:57.280\nretouch with my purpose uh and second is be forgiving of myself like like i'm\n\n442\n00:21:57.280 --> 00:21:57.840\nnot perfect\n\n443\n00:21:57.840 --> 00:22:01.410\ni've made plenty mistakes and i'm not gonna shoot myself in the head every time\n\n444\n00:22:01.410 --> 00:22:02.160\ni do something wrong\n\n445\n00:22:02.160 --> 00:22:06.600\nbut i think uh the other part is knowing what your purpose is in life and so my\n\n446\n00:22:06.600 --> 00:22:08.320\npurpose at this point\n\n447\n00:22:08.320 --> 00:22:12.360\nis to help other people achieve more meaning its success in the lives so when\n\n448\n00:22:12.360 --> 00:22:13.440\nyou reached out i'm\n\n449\n00:22:13.440 --> 00:22:18.680\nlike david's doing what i would love to be doing if i can help uh because that\n\n450\n00:22:18.680 --> 00:22:19.760\nand so when i make\n\n451\n00:22:19.760 --> 00:22:24.640\na mistake i come back and say okay did i help other people achieve more meaning\n\n452\n00:22:24.640 --> 00:22:25.120\nand success\n\n453\n00:22:25.120 --> 00:22:30.010\nin lives by trying this might be yes might be no but at least i'm trying to do\n\n454\n00:22:30.010 --> 00:22:31.040\nwhat i set off to do\n\n455\n00:22:31.040 --> 00:22:36.220\nof my life hello friends i hope you are loving this conversation between david\n\n456\n00:22:36.220 --> 00:22:37.520\nand tom as always\n\n457\n00:22:37.520 --> 00:22:40.940\nplease stay tuned to the very end of the episode david and i are going to deb\n\n458\n00:22:40.940 --> 00:22:41.840\nrief the conversation\n\n459\n00:22:41.840 --> 00:22:45.870\nthat he's having to give you some real tangible tools that you can apply right\n\n460\n00:22:45.870 --> 00:22:47.120\naway to your leadership\n\n461\n00:22:47.120 --> 00:22:51.600\nand to your life stay tuned to the very end of the episode and i will see you\n\n462\n00:22:51.600 --> 00:22:52.240\nat the debrief\n\n463\n00:22:52.240 --> 00:22:58.400\nas i understand at tom you've invested heavily in in helping people in your\n\n464\n00:22:58.400 --> 00:22:59.360\ncompany discover\n\n465\n00:22:59.360 --> 00:23:03.030\nwhat their personal purpose is you know tell us about what you're doing when i\n\n466\n00:23:03.030 --> 00:23:04.080\nbecame ceo\n\n467\n00:23:04.080 --> 00:23:07.670\ni've been president so we're working on what i wanted to work on right and i\n\n468\n00:23:07.670 --> 00:23:08.400\nsaid you know we need\n\n469\n00:23:08.400 --> 00:23:12.600\na little more energy around here and a little more fast and fleet of foot and\n\n470\n00:23:12.600 --> 00:23:13.760\nso we went to a place\n\n471\n00:23:13.760 --> 00:23:18.310\ncalled the human performance institute which um i had been through like a one-\n\n472\n00:23:18.310 --> 00:23:19.200\nday session it's a\n\n473\n00:23:19.200 --> 00:23:22.870\ntwo and a half day session and helps you figure out your personal purpose so we\n\n474\n00:23:22.870 --> 00:23:24.400\nwent down there\n\n475\n00:23:24.400 --> 00:23:28.740\neleven of us went one was excited that was me and uh everybody else came back\n\n476\n00:23:28.740 --> 00:23:29.600\nexcited because it\n\n477\n00:23:29.600 --> 00:23:34.420\nwas about their personal purpose and so we and we said this is so good for us\n\n478\n00:23:34.420 --> 00:23:35.600\nwe should take it to\n\n479\n00:23:35.600 --> 00:23:39.610\nour officers so we had two hundred officer time because it'll help them because\n\n480\n00:23:39.610 --> 00:23:40.400\nit's all about them\n\n481\n00:23:40.400 --> 00:23:43.330\nhow do you get better what do you want to get done with your life being honest\n\n482\n00:23:43.330 --> 00:23:44.480\nwith yourself\n\n483\n00:23:44.480 --> 00:23:48.420\nbuilding a plan to get better um and we said well if we did that for the\n\n484\n00:23:48.420 --> 00:23:49.040\ncompany\n\n485\n00:23:49.040 --> 00:23:52.970\nor for the our leaders we should do it for the company and that's how we came\n\n486\n00:23:52.970 --> 00:23:53.840\nup with our shared\n\n487\n00:23:53.840 --> 00:23:57.770\npurpose once we got that we started taking other employees to it and we\n\n488\n00:23:57.770 --> 00:23:58.800\nrealized if you want to\n\n489\n00:23:58.800 --> 00:24:03.580\nbe a purpose driven company you have to be powered by purpose driven people so\n\n490\n00:24:03.580 --> 00:24:05.600\nwe've now helped 75,000\n\n491\n00:24:05.600 --> 00:24:10.810\npeople figure out what their purpose is and help how to pursue their purpose\n\n492\n00:24:10.810 --> 00:24:11.600\nand people leave here\n\n493\n00:24:11.600 --> 00:24:15.020\nbecause of it like they say you know i always want to be a teacher so you know\n\n494\n00:24:15.020 --> 00:24:15.680\ndavid thank you\n\n495\n00:24:15.680 --> 00:24:19.340\nbut i'm out of here and i'm like god bless you you know like if that's really\n\n496\n00:24:19.340 --> 00:24:20.640\nwhat you want to do\n\n497\n00:24:20.640 --> 00:24:25.090\nso when you asked earlier about what i would say that's the thing i'm most\n\n498\n00:24:25.090 --> 00:24:27.520\nproud of is helping 75,000\n\n499\n00:24:27.520 --> 00:24:31.740\npeople figure out what they want to do with their life we can make money we can\n\n500\n00:24:31.740 --> 00:24:32.960\nhelp our customers\n\n501\n00:24:32.960 --> 00:24:37.370\nwe can do all that stuff but that's really powerful you have a really\n\n502\n00:24:37.370 --> 00:24:38.880\ninteresting story of where you\n\n503\n00:24:38.880 --> 00:24:43.300\nsaw someone truly unlock their potential because they found their purpose yeah\n\n504\n00:24:43.300 --> 00:24:45.440\nmany um there's one\n\n505\n00:24:45.440 --> 00:24:48.980\nperson who was probably the best reinsurance person in the world and went to be\n\n506\n00:24:48.980 --> 00:24:49.520\na teacher\n\n507\n00:24:49.520 --> 00:24:55.010\nand loves it he's a math teacher um i have i have a woman who uh two months ago\n\n508\n00:24:55.010 --> 00:24:56.240\ncame up to me and said\n\n509\n00:24:57.200 --> 00:25:02.600\ni'm alive because i did the energy for lifestyle and she had a whole bunch of\n\n510\n00:25:02.600 --> 00:25:04.080\nother issues she dealt\n\n511\n00:25:04.080 --> 00:25:08.010\nwith through through our programs you know that i think it's good for the\n\n512\n00:25:08.010 --> 00:25:09.680\ncompany but uh the company\n\n513\n00:25:09.680 --> 00:25:13.280\nis not just about making money we believe that businesses have four roles when\n\n514\n00:25:13.280 --> 00:25:14.080\nyou got to serve\n\n515\n00:25:14.080 --> 00:25:17.560\nyour customers too you got to make money for your shareholders three great\n\n516\n00:25:17.560 --> 00:25:18.480\nopportunity for your\n\n517\n00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:22.230\nemployees and fourth improve your communities and that third piece that's part\n\n518\n00:25:22.230 --> 00:25:23.360\nof what we're about\n\n519\n00:25:23.360 --> 00:25:27.520\nand uh and i feel great but i mean that's something i'm very proud of i think\n\n520\n00:25:27.520 --> 00:25:28.000\nyou should be\n\n521\n00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:33.280\nbut i think it takes a lot of courage to to make a move like that because you\n\n522\n00:25:33.280 --> 00:25:34.720\nknow i know a lot of\n\n523\n00:25:34.720 --> 00:25:40.400\nleaders who would be hey they'd take the perspective if i you know if i get\n\n524\n00:25:40.400 --> 00:25:41.520\nteach somebody how to find\n\n525\n00:25:41.520 --> 00:25:44.650\nout what their purpose and it's not all state you know i'm gonna lose a good\n\n526\n00:25:44.650 --> 00:25:45.360\nperson if they\n\n527\n00:25:45.360 --> 00:25:49.450\nthey decide to do something else i mean you know i'm sure you had people\n\n528\n00:25:49.450 --> 00:25:50.640\ninternally that would\n\n529\n00:25:50.640 --> 00:25:55.860\nchallenge you on this you know when you were getting started or not and just no\n\n530\n00:25:55.860 --> 00:25:57.760\ni think we uh\n\n531\n00:25:57.760 --> 00:26:03.670\ni think we did and we probably do so let's you know like be honest about that\n\n532\n00:26:03.670 --> 00:26:04.960\nand we have 54,000\n\n533\n00:26:04.960 --> 00:26:09.170\npeople and they're sure some people who still think that that's don't want to\n\n534\n00:26:09.170 --> 00:26:10.080\nencourage people\n\n535\n00:26:10.080 --> 00:26:13.260\nto do everything but if you look at your career uh and you know you're a\n\n536\n00:26:13.260 --> 00:26:14.480\ncorporate executive then\n\n537\n00:26:14.480 --> 00:26:17.940\nyou're an entrepreneur and start a business like if you didn't have that\n\n538\n00:26:17.940 --> 00:26:19.200\nfreedom and if you didn't\n\n539\n00:26:19.200 --> 00:26:24.640\nhave somebody supporting you emotionally uh to get that done like how much\n\n540\n00:26:24.640 --> 00:26:25.120\ndifferent would\n\n541\n00:26:25.120 --> 00:26:28.910\nyour life be and so i'm like if i can help people do that all state will be\n\n542\n00:26:28.910 --> 00:26:29.920\nfine like we'll find\n\n543\n00:26:29.920 --> 00:26:33.700\nsomeone else to adjust claims like it'll and it'll work for them and it might\n\n544\n00:26:33.700 --> 00:26:34.640\nnot work for somebody\n\n545\n00:26:34.640 --> 00:26:38.570\nelse yeah i i couldn't agree with you more i think purpose gives you joy in\n\n546\n00:26:38.570 --> 00:26:40.160\nlife for me you know my\n\n547\n00:26:40.160 --> 00:26:45.140\npurpose is to make the world a better place by developing better leaders and i\n\n548\n00:26:45.140 --> 00:26:45.600\n'm trying to do\n\n549\n00:26:45.600 --> 00:26:50.810\nthat at every stage in life from you know early childhood education you know\n\n550\n00:26:50.810 --> 00:26:51.600\nall the way up to\n\n551\n00:26:51.600 --> 00:26:57.310\npeople who are in business so but that that has provided a real focus you know\n\n552\n00:26:57.310 --> 00:26:57.840\nwhen you think\n\n553\n00:26:57.840 --> 00:27:04.490\nabout the purpose that you've identified for for all state you know how do you\n\n554\n00:27:04.490 --> 00:27:05.600\nkeep bringing that\n\n555\n00:27:05.600 --> 00:27:10.080\nforward and keep reinforcing that and everything you do because it's obviously\n\n556\n00:27:10.080 --> 00:27:10.800\nsomething that you're\n\n557\n00:27:10.800 --> 00:27:19.360\nvery passionate about i am uh relentlessly boring and i say it all the time\n\n558\n00:27:19.360 --> 00:27:24.960\nthere are times when i'm like oh my god and i and i got i sort of went through\n\n559\n00:27:24.960 --> 00:27:25.760\nphases you know\n\n560\n00:27:25.760 --> 00:27:28.910\nfirst it was you do it you create you're very excited about it then you start\n\n561\n00:27:28.910 --> 00:27:29.600\ntalking about but\n\n562\n00:27:29.600 --> 00:27:32.480\nthen you kind of get bored saying the same thing all the time like okay let me\n\n563\n00:27:32.480 --> 00:27:33.360\ntalk about our four\n\n564\n00:27:33.360 --> 00:27:38.540\nitems then you realize that the benefits it can create for other people you're\n\n565\n00:27:38.540 --> 00:27:39.120\nnot really being\n\n566\n00:27:39.120 --> 00:27:43.190\nboring the words are the same but you're delivering them to a different set of\n\n567\n00:27:43.190 --> 00:27:43.920\npeople\n\n568\n00:27:43.920 --> 00:27:49.440\nand so everything i do then my team knows everything i write i'm always\n\n569\n00:27:49.440 --> 00:27:49.840\ntalented\n\n570\n00:27:49.840 --> 00:27:53.350\nin our shared purpose when i do an employee communication we talk about our\n\n571\n00:27:53.350 --> 00:27:54.640\nshared purpose\n\n572\n00:27:54.640 --> 00:27:59.820\ni'm just always reminding people that this is why we exist they may or may not\n\n573\n00:27:59.820 --> 00:28:00.960\nagree with this\n\n574\n00:28:00.960 --> 00:28:04.710\nbut at least they know what we're trying to do so you know what you're trying\n\n575\n00:28:04.710 --> 00:28:05.680\nto do have you have\n\n576\n00:28:05.680 --> 00:28:12.240\nhow is your your purpose helped maybe change the way how you lead in some some\n\n577\n00:28:12.240 --> 00:28:13.680\nsome way i think\n\n578\n00:28:13.680 --> 00:28:18.560\nit's helped me let go a little bit to be honest so uh if you if my goal is help\n\n579\n00:28:18.560 --> 00:28:19.440\nother people achieve\n\n580\n00:28:19.440 --> 00:28:23.670\nmore meaning and success in the lives and then when it comes to a business\n\n581\n00:28:23.670 --> 00:28:25.200\nproblem let's say i think\n\n582\n00:28:25.200 --> 00:28:31.120\nthe answer is a and somebody else thinks it's b i let them do b it longs it's\n\n583\n00:28:31.120 --> 00:28:32.400\nnot going to be\n\n584\n00:28:32.400 --> 00:28:36.320\nbelow the waterline below the waterline for us is if it's below the waterline\n\n585\n00:28:36.320 --> 00:28:36.960\nyou take a unit of\n\n586\n00:28:36.960 --> 00:28:41.190\nship and that torpedo goes below the waterline you sink if it's above the water\n\n587\n00:28:41.190 --> 00:28:41.920\nline you're okay\n\n588\n00:28:41.920 --> 00:28:45.050\nyou don't like having a hole in your ship but like don't worry about it so i\n\n589\n00:28:45.050 --> 00:28:46.160\nknow is that are\n\n590\n00:28:46.160 --> 00:28:51.450\nabove the waterline i think it's helped me say let go time like you don't it\n\n591\n00:28:51.450 --> 00:28:52.240\ndoesn't have to be\n\n592\n00:28:52.240 --> 00:28:56.650\nperfect and you know what more times than often they're right anyway so it's\n\n593\n00:28:56.650 --> 00:28:57.760\nnot even like i'm\n\n594\n00:28:57.760 --> 00:29:03.670\ngiving anything up but i find that i'm hopefully i'm viewed as a more uh\n\n595\n00:29:03.670 --> 00:29:07.040\nsupportive leader you know\n\n596\n00:29:07.040 --> 00:29:12.320\nin terms of like empowering others i'm curious you know your your background is\n\n597\n00:29:12.320 --> 00:29:12.960\nfinancial you've\n\n598\n00:29:12.960 --> 00:29:18.140\nbeen a cfo you know you obviously are very well prepared you know the the\n\n599\n00:29:18.140 --> 00:29:19.040\ndetails of the business\n\n600\n00:29:19.040 --> 00:29:25.280\nand yet also not yet and all state has very powerful marketing you know you've\n\n601\n00:29:25.280 --> 00:29:26.000\ngot the mam\n\n602\n00:29:26.000 --> 00:29:30.880\ncampaign you're in good hands with all state you know so how involved do you\n\n603\n00:29:30.880 --> 00:29:31.680\nget in that part of\n\n604\n00:29:31.680 --> 00:29:38.800\nthe part of the business i think so uh a lot uh i figured you would because i\n\n605\n00:29:38.800 --> 00:29:39.440\nyou'd look like a\n\n606\n00:29:39.440 --> 00:29:43.580\nguy who's creative as well and you yeah like to have fun yeah i think actually\n\n607\n00:29:43.580 --> 00:29:44.560\ni'm a sales person\n\n608\n00:29:44.560 --> 00:29:51.000\nyou know i'm always selling some idea i actually uh when i went to business\n\n609\n00:29:51.000 --> 00:29:52.080\nschool i was i had a\n\n610\n00:29:52.080 --> 00:29:57.520\nmarketing and strategy major uh i didn't even have uh it was finance major but\n\n611\n00:29:57.520 --> 00:29:58.320\nyou took like three\n\n612\n00:29:58.320 --> 00:30:02.880\nclasses and i gave you a stamp you know uh and so and then i was when i was\n\n613\n00:30:02.880 --> 00:30:04.320\ninvestment banker i\n\n614\n00:30:04.320 --> 00:30:08.250\nwas selling businesses so it was you know i i'm numbers are not that hard for\n\n615\n00:30:08.250 --> 00:30:09.680\nme i'm reasonably\n\n616\n00:30:09.680 --> 00:30:14.890\neasy for me so i always find that sales skills and inspiring and communicating\n\n617\n00:30:14.890 --> 00:30:15.920\npeople are the\n\n618\n00:30:15.920 --> 00:30:20.020\nkey parts and so i find myself always trying to like it's i'm selling something\n\n619\n00:30:20.020 --> 00:30:20.960\nall the time\n\n620\n00:30:20.960 --> 00:30:25.200\nthat i was talking to um a guy the other day about how do we give credentials\n\n621\n00:30:25.200 --> 00:30:26.560\nfor high school and\n\n622\n00:30:26.560 --> 00:30:30.510\ncollege students so they can actually be employed on something and he said you\n\n623\n00:30:30.510 --> 00:30:31.600\nknow the best skill\n\n624\n00:30:31.600 --> 00:30:36.510\nthey need is uh sales skills everybody needs some sort of sales skills so i\n\n625\n00:30:36.510 --> 00:30:37.520\nfind like that i'm\n\n626\n00:30:37.520 --> 00:30:42.700\nmostly just a sales person well i'm selling you purpose and want you to purpose\n\n627\n00:30:42.700 --> 00:30:42.880\nbecause i\n\n628\n00:30:42.880 --> 00:30:46.540\nbelieve it'll be good for you i'm selling insurance because i think you need to\n\n629\n00:30:46.540 --> 00:30:47.440\nbe protected or i'm\n\n630\n00:30:47.440 --> 00:30:50.520\nselling shareholders because i'm like you know you should invest in us because\n\n631\n00:30:50.520 --> 00:30:51.040\nwe'll make you a\n\n632\n00:30:51.040 --> 00:30:56.250\nbunch of money i feel like this idea of being customer focused is really\n\n633\n00:30:56.250 --> 00:30:57.600\nimportant success\n\n634\n00:30:57.600 --> 00:31:01.270\nand you know your current commercials your mayhem commercials are really great\n\n635\n00:31:01.270 --> 00:31:02.080\nyet do you have a\n\n636\n00:31:02.080 --> 00:31:08.880\nfun story behind any one of them yeah so uh mayhem is is quite clever um he and\n\n637\n00:31:08.880 --> 00:31:10.240\ni were doing a\n\n638\n00:31:10.240 --> 00:31:14.440\npublic service announcement at one point and he's kind of he's kind of a wacky\n\n639\n00:31:14.440 --> 00:31:15.760\nguy you know uh\n\n640\n00:31:15.760 --> 00:31:20.940\nand he likes and we were it was a football commercial and he was breaking the\n\n641\n00:31:20.940 --> 00:31:21.360\ntable and\n\n642\n00:31:21.360 --> 00:31:25.640\nall kinds of mayhem and at one point doing one of the breaks he takes a piece\n\n643\n00:31:25.640 --> 00:31:27.120\nof popcorn and he looks\n\n644\n00:31:27.120 --> 00:31:30.540\nat me he says they tom and i look at him and he throws and he hits me right in\n\n645\n00:31:30.540 --> 00:31:31.120\nthe middle of\n\n646\n00:31:31.120 --> 00:31:35.110\nfor it uh and our and it's on tape and our team was like oh we can't show that\n\n647\n00:31:35.110 --> 00:31:36.160\ni'm like hey you're\n\n648\n00:31:36.160 --> 00:31:39.650\nkidding that's hysterical we have to show that so i'm like you know whatever\n\n649\n00:31:39.650 --> 00:31:40.720\nworks whatever gets\n\n650\n00:31:40.720 --> 00:31:45.900\npeople engaged in and if we can have humor help them think that they should be\n\n651\n00:31:45.900 --> 00:31:45.920\nbuying\n\n652\n00:31:45.920 --> 00:31:51.100\ninsurance from us then we're all for it you know and anyone who watches college\n\n653\n00:31:51.100 --> 00:31:51.360\nfootball\n\n654\n00:31:51.360 --> 00:31:55.840\nsees your all-state hands catching them the made field hole field goals and the\n\n655\n00:31:55.840 --> 00:31:56.720\nextra points\n\n656\n00:31:56.720 --> 00:32:01.020\nif you had to borrow one leadership principle from the elite college football\n\n657\n00:32:01.020 --> 00:32:01.760\nprograms that\n\n658\n00:32:01.760 --> 00:32:06.970\nare out there right now and bring it straight to your all-state executive team\n\n659\n00:32:06.970 --> 00:32:08.720\nroom what would\n\n660\n00:32:08.720 --> 00:32:15.770\nit be it would be on leadership it would be on uh collective success versus\n\n661\n00:32:15.770 --> 00:32:17.600\nindividual success\n\n662\n00:32:17.600 --> 00:32:25.010\nso i i find uh sports have this great ability to get people to really put the\n\n663\n00:32:25.010 --> 00:32:26.000\nenterprise\n\n664\n00:32:26.000 --> 00:32:29.930\ncalled the team first even though they're all sports stars and they don't want\n\n665\n00:32:29.930 --> 00:32:30.720\nbig contracts\n\n666\n00:32:30.720 --> 00:32:34.890\nand stuff like that uh they they so i would be like i like people who bleed\n\n667\n00:32:34.890 --> 00:32:36.960\nblue i yeah i know\n\n668\n00:32:36.960 --> 00:32:40.640\nthat's you got now we we've got the new mascot and we know what your color is\n\n669\n00:32:40.640 --> 00:32:46.560\nnow you you mentioned the the importance of customers how do you personally\n\n670\n00:32:46.560 --> 00:32:47.280\nstay on top of\n\n671\n00:32:47.280 --> 00:32:51.240\ncustomers i think it's about being in the business versus over the business i\n\n672\n00:32:51.240 --> 00:32:53.360\nthink too many leaders\n\n673\n00:32:53.360 --> 00:32:58.570\ngo over the business think they're not and i'm like you're in talking to\n\n674\n00:32:58.570 --> 00:32:59.520\nemployees you got like\n\n675\n00:32:59.520 --> 00:33:03.620\nwell we have a catastrophe i go out and walk sites i talk to customers i'm like\n\n676\n00:33:03.620 --> 00:33:04.240\nwhat happened to you\n\n677\n00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:09.420\nhow did this work and so you're looking at all the small things that happen so\n\n678\n00:33:09.420 --> 00:33:09.840\nthat you can\n\n679\n00:33:09.840 --> 00:33:14.290\nadd them up and figure out if you're in the right direction so i think whether\n\n680\n00:33:14.290 --> 00:33:15.680\nthat's riding along\n\n681\n00:33:15.680 --> 00:33:22.620\nin a claim trying to like just put your head in how it's about empathy so for\n\n682\n00:33:22.620 --> 00:33:23.440\nexample we just\n\n683\n00:33:23.440 --> 00:33:27.940\nlaunched something called deductible payment plans where if you have you know\n\n684\n00:33:27.940 --> 00:33:29.200\nyou buy insurance you\n\n685\n00:33:29.200 --> 00:33:32.150\nhave a five hundred dollar deductible and you get in an accident you'll have\n\n686\n00:33:32.150 --> 00:33:33.280\nfive hundred bucks\n\n687\n00:33:33.280 --> 00:33:36.800\ntypically you say well that's your problem you agreed to 500 we've now started\n\n688\n00:33:36.800 --> 00:33:37.360\nsome in a couple\n\n689\n00:33:37.360 --> 00:33:41.540\nstates we're like hey we'll loan you the 500 bucks and so you're putting\n\n690\n00:33:41.540 --> 00:33:43.200\nyourself in their mindset\n\n691\n00:33:43.200 --> 00:33:48.380\nso and i think you have to be in the business and out seeing people and being\n\n692\n00:33:48.380 --> 00:33:49.200\nexternally focused to\n\n693\n00:33:49.200 --> 00:33:54.080\ndo that what's a what's a story that that you go back to because i imagine\n\n694\n00:33:54.080 --> 00:33:55.040\nsince you like to inspire\n\n695\n00:33:55.040 --> 00:33:59.460\npeople you're pretty good at telling stories and what's what's the story you go\n\n696\n00:33:59.460 --> 00:34:00.320\nback to time and\n\n697\n00:34:00.320 --> 00:34:05.950\ntime again that really captures what being in good hands looks like from a from\n\n698\n00:34:05.950 --> 00:34:06.800\na from a customer\n\n699\n00:34:06.800 --> 00:34:11.980\nperspective when when your team does it right i would say that that the\n\n700\n00:34:11.980 --> 00:34:14.160\nportfolio of stories for\n\n701\n00:34:14.160 --> 00:34:19.830\nus because not always the same story is always around a catastrophe so when a\n\n702\n00:34:19.830 --> 00:34:21.280\nhurricane comes and\n\n703\n00:34:21.280 --> 00:34:25.210\npeople their house gets blown away all their stuff's gone they have no place to\n\n704\n00:34:25.210 --> 00:34:27.200\nstay you know we're\n\n705\n00:34:27.200 --> 00:34:31.520\nthere for them we have people who are our motor homes are storm chasers they're\n\n706\n00:34:31.520 --> 00:34:32.160\ngetting out there\n\n707\n00:34:32.160 --> 00:34:35.740\nthey're knocking on people's doors they get them apartments they get them\n\n708\n00:34:35.740 --> 00:34:37.200\nclothes we have therapy\n\n709\n00:34:37.200 --> 00:34:41.420\ndogs that we bring they're in case you know they they're feeling like they lost\n\n710\n00:34:41.420 --> 00:34:42.240\na pet or something\n\n711\n00:34:42.240 --> 00:34:47.120\nlike that so those stories are very powerful the reason we use them is because\n\n712\n00:34:47.120 --> 00:34:48.320\nit's easy to visualize\n\n713\n00:34:48.320 --> 00:34:52.970\nthem i think good stories you have to as a storyteller people have to be able\n\n714\n00:34:52.970 --> 00:34:54.240\nto see it visually in\n\n715\n00:34:54.240 --> 00:34:58.490\ntheir head but the same thing happens every day if you're in a car accident it\n\n716\n00:34:58.490 --> 00:34:59.200\nmight not feel\n\n717\n00:34:59.200 --> 00:35:04.360\nlike a hurricane at your house but it's pretty traumatic so those stories about\n\n718\n00:35:04.360 --> 00:35:04.880\ncatastrophes\n\n719\n00:35:04.880 --> 00:35:10.100\nhelp us be empathetic for our customers when they need us most when a major\n\n720\n00:35:10.100 --> 00:35:11.600\ndisaster hits or or\n\n721\n00:35:11.600 --> 00:35:17.740\neven a car wreck for a customer what leadership muscle matters most when you're\n\n722\n00:35:17.740 --> 00:35:18.640\ndealing with the\n\n723\n00:35:18.640 --> 00:35:24.080\ncustomer you have to empower those claim adjusters do whatever it is they need\n\n724\n00:35:24.080 --> 00:35:24.480\nto do\n\n725\n00:35:24.480 --> 00:35:30.390\nto act in the same with the team so one time there was a big catastrophe and\n\n726\n00:35:30.390 --> 00:35:31.520\nthere was the self\n\n727\n00:35:31.520 --> 00:35:35.860\nhours were down and our team was on with a bunch of other industry people and\n\n728\n00:35:35.860 --> 00:35:37.040\nsomebody said one\n\n729\n00:35:37.040 --> 00:35:40.980\nof the cell companies said hey we got 12 extra trucks that need a satellite\n\n730\n00:35:40.980 --> 00:35:42.000\ndress and our person\n\n731\n00:35:42.000 --> 00:35:45.930\nsaid i'll take all 12 don't know how i'm going to use them and if any of you if\n\n732\n00:35:45.930 --> 00:35:46.880\nwe don't need them\n\n733\n00:35:46.880 --> 00:35:51.760\nall call me i'll take so it's about acting right away you know i need to get\n\n734\n00:35:51.760 --> 00:35:52.560\nyou in that you need\n\n735\n00:35:52.560 --> 00:35:57.680\nto be in a uh in a hospital getting an ambulance off we go like we're not going\n\n736\n00:35:57.680 --> 00:35:58.720\nto debate what the\n\n737\n00:35:58.720 --> 00:36:01.820\npolicy say what the policy not say if there's water in your basement get the\n\n738\n00:36:01.820 --> 00:36:02.480\nwater out of the\n\n739\n00:36:02.480 --> 00:36:05.660\nday and basement and then we'll figure out whether it's covered or not so i\n\n740\n00:36:05.660 --> 00:36:07.760\nthink uh and that's true\n\n741\n00:36:07.760 --> 00:36:12.060\nand many things in business when you're dealing with customers having people\n\n742\n00:36:12.060 --> 00:36:13.840\nwho are empowered\n\n743\n00:36:13.840 --> 00:36:17.770\nand importantly feel empowered so they're not blaming on a company well i would\n\n744\n00:36:17.770 --> 00:36:18.240\ndo this for\n\n745\n00:36:18.240 --> 00:36:21.530\nyou but you know the rules are this no customer wants to hear that is this\n\n746\n00:36:21.530 --> 00:36:22.480\nsomething you think is\n\n747\n00:36:22.480 --> 00:36:26.640\ndeeply seated in all state or is this something you need to evolve i think it's\n\n748\n00:36:26.640 --> 00:36:27.520\ndeeply seated\n\n749\n00:36:27.520 --> 00:36:31.270\nin all state and catastrophes i think it's something we need to involve on\n\n750\n00:36:31.270 --> 00:36:32.560\nnormal customer service\n\n751\n00:36:32.560 --> 00:36:37.770\nand and how do you go about driving that home i mean how do you how do you make\n\n752\n00:36:37.770 --> 00:36:38.480\nthat such a key\n\n753\n00:36:38.480 --> 00:36:43.840\npoint i think there's two ways one is i think uh the we have four leadership\n\n754\n00:36:43.840 --> 00:36:44.640\nbehaviors that i'll\n\n755\n00:36:44.640 --> 00:36:48.570\nsay one of which is clarity and i think being really clear with people around\n\n756\n00:36:48.570 --> 00:36:49.600\nwhat their boundaries\n\n757\n00:36:49.600 --> 00:36:55.120\nare uh and uh so helping them do that the second way is we're going to use uh\n\n758\n00:36:55.120 --> 00:36:56.240\nwe use technology\n\n759\n00:36:56.240 --> 00:37:01.450\nso like for example uh we now write millions of emails using generative ai uh\n\n760\n00:37:01.450 --> 00:37:02.960\nbecause it's just\n\n761\n00:37:02.960 --> 00:37:08.370\nbetter so as i understand it's i'm here a huge advocate as you should be for\n\n762\n00:37:08.370 --> 00:37:09.840\nthe insurance industry\n\n763\n00:37:09.840 --> 00:37:14.260\ni mean you you you're very involved with the industry matters you what do you\n\n764\n00:37:14.260 --> 00:37:14.960\nthink is most\n\n765\n00:37:14.960 --> 00:37:21.910\nmisunderstood about the the insurance uh the category uh by consumers that that\n\n766\n00:37:21.910 --> 00:37:22.560\nthe industry\n\n767\n00:37:22.560 --> 00:37:28.470\nreally needs to deal with consumers think it's a one-on-one relationship when\n\n768\n00:37:28.470 --> 00:37:30.320\nreally our job is to\n\n769\n00:37:30.320 --> 00:37:34.730\nbundle you together with other people who are like you so you spread the losses\n\n770\n00:37:34.730 --> 00:37:35.840\nbetween you\n\n771\n00:37:35.840 --> 00:37:39.260\nso what happens you pay us fifteen hundred dollars a year for car insurance you\n\n772\n00:37:39.260 --> 00:37:40.240\ndon't have a loss\n\n773\n00:37:40.240 --> 00:37:44.540\nfor five years and you think we kept off fifteen hundred uh and we actually\n\n774\n00:37:44.540 --> 00:37:46.320\ntook the fifteen hundred\n\n775\n00:37:46.320 --> 00:37:51.840\nand we gave it to josh uh because josh had an accident you didn't most people\n\n776\n00:37:51.840 --> 00:37:52.640\nthink of their\n\n777\n00:37:52.640 --> 00:37:57.120\nrelationship with their insurers as a one-to-one financial relationship when\n\n778\n00:37:57.120 --> 00:37:58.480\nreally our job is to\n\n779\n00:37:58.480 --> 00:38:03.040\nbundle people together who have similar risk characteristics and spread the\n\n780\n00:38:03.040 --> 00:38:03.920\nlosses between\n\n781\n00:38:03.920 --> 00:38:09.610\nyou so that it's fair very very good you know the the insurance industry is\n\n782\n00:38:09.610 --> 00:38:11.360\nextremely competitive\n\n783\n00:38:11.360 --> 00:38:16.540\nyou know what makes you you different from state farm geico and all the others\n\n784\n00:38:16.540 --> 00:38:17.600\nyou know if you're\n\n785\n00:38:17.600 --> 00:38:20.720\ngonna say you're what's your competitive point of difference what would it be\n\n786\n00:38:20.720 --> 00:38:22.960\nfirst we're better at\n\n787\n00:38:22.960 --> 00:38:30.370\nmath than most of the industry we're also better at operational settlement of\n\n788\n00:38:30.370 --> 00:38:31.440\nclaims but we paid\n\n789\n00:38:31.440 --> 00:38:34.410\nthe right amount because we don't underpay but we pay you know you don't want\n\n790\n00:38:34.410 --> 00:38:35.120\nto pay too much\n\n791\n00:38:35.120 --> 00:38:40.330\nyou want to pay too little uh and so as a result of that my proof would be uh\n\n792\n00:38:40.330 --> 00:38:42.400\nwhen you look at margins\n\n793\n00:38:42.400 --> 00:38:47.610\nin the auto insurance business we tend to make about four points more than the\n\n794\n00:38:47.610 --> 00:38:48.800\nrest of the industry\n\n795\n00:38:49.360 --> 00:38:53.450\nand in homeowners we make uh seventy five percent of the gross profits the\n\n796\n00:38:53.450 --> 00:38:54.720\nwhole industry loses\n\n797\n00:38:54.720 --> 00:38:59.840\nmoney the of those who make money we have seventy five percent of that and we\n\n798\n00:38:59.840 --> 00:39:00.960\nhave about eight percent\n\n799\n00:39:00.960 --> 00:39:04.890\nof market share uh and that's because we're really good at math and we're\n\n800\n00:39:04.890 --> 00:39:06.080\nreally good at making\n\n801\n00:39:06.080 --> 00:39:09.990\nsure that uh we fix stuff for customers but we don't overpay for stuff\n\n802\n00:39:09.990 --> 00:39:11.680\ninsurance is all about\n\n803\n00:39:11.680 --> 00:39:15.950\nmanaging risk and as a leader what what's a risk you've you've taken that's\n\n804\n00:39:15.950 --> 00:39:17.360\npersonally scared you\n\n805\n00:39:18.400 --> 00:39:24.640\ni can't think of uh first uh just for you know surgeon general warning i'm way\n\n806\n00:39:24.640 --> 00:39:25.040\nout there on\n\n807\n00:39:25.040 --> 00:39:30.360\nthe risk spectrum uh and so when you know you do those tests and stuff like\n\n808\n00:39:30.360 --> 00:39:32.240\nthat i'm very good about\n\n809\n00:39:32.240 --> 00:39:36.800\nlike i always understand the facts before i make a decision what the upside and\n\n810\n00:39:36.800 --> 00:39:37.760\noutside are i\n\n811\n00:39:37.760 --> 00:39:42.250\nwould say the biggest risk that i took because i think risk is important to\n\n812\n00:39:42.250 --> 00:39:43.600\ncareer advancement\n\n813\n00:39:43.600 --> 00:39:47.530\nit was a personal risk and i think sometimes people get confused between\n\n814\n00:39:47.530 --> 00:39:48.400\ncompany risk and\n\n815\n00:39:48.400 --> 00:39:52.380\npersonal risk sometimes they don't take company risks even though the company\n\n816\n00:39:52.380 --> 00:39:53.120\ncan handle it\n\n817\n00:39:53.120 --> 00:39:58.000\nbecause they have a personal risk uh and i've always been willing to say like\n\n818\n00:39:58.000 --> 00:39:58.560\nif it's right for\n\n819\n00:39:58.560 --> 00:40:02.870\nthe company i'm going if i blow up then i blow up and so there are a number of\n\n820\n00:40:02.870 --> 00:40:03.920\nthose i've done\n\n821\n00:40:03.920 --> 00:40:09.600\nand uh some some work some don't i would say the biggest career risk i took\n\n822\n00:40:10.400 --> 00:40:15.580\num was when i actually came to Sears so i was i was uh an investment banker\n\n823\n00:40:15.580 --> 00:40:16.240\nworking at Dean\n\n824\n00:40:16.240 --> 00:40:21.420\nWitter uh and Phil Prussell who's a CEO at time wanted me to come work with him\n\n825\n00:40:21.420 --> 00:40:22.000\nand uh do some\n\n826\n00:40:22.000 --> 00:40:25.420\nstrategy stuff and said you know maybe you can run the firm someday i'm like oh\n\n827\n00:40:25.420 --> 00:40:26.160\nyou know maybe\n\n828\n00:40:26.160 --> 00:40:30.620\ni had a chance of going to PE uh and be a partner at a firm with some friends\n\n829\n00:40:30.620 --> 00:40:31.600\nmind and then i could\n\n830\n00:40:31.600 --> 00:40:36.780\ngo to Sears uh which was uh not performing well everybody you know was not a\n\n831\n00:40:36.780 --> 00:40:37.680\ndarling of Wall Street\n\n832\n00:40:37.680 --> 00:40:42.550\nand everything and i went because i saw more upside uh and my friend said i was\n\n833\n00:40:42.550 --> 00:40:43.680\ndead from the head up\n\n834\n00:40:43.680 --> 00:40:47.960\nthey're like you went to Sears and i'm like uh yeah i think i could make a\n\n835\n00:40:47.960 --> 00:40:49.440\ndifference here you\n\n836\n00:40:49.440 --> 00:40:53.760\nknow i'm uh and i got the right tenure and so it'll be all right and so i think\n\n837\n00:40:53.760 --> 00:40:56.160\ntaking risk is just\n\n838\n00:40:56.160 --> 00:41:00.160\nabout being prepared thoughtful uh and then knowing what your purpose was at\n\n839\n00:41:00.160 --> 00:41:01.200\nthat time um\n\n840\n00:41:01.200 --> 00:41:06.090\ni had uh our third child was just being born i'm like okay you know i could go\n\n841\n00:41:06.090 --> 00:41:06.880\nto work for Sears\n\n842\n00:41:06.880 --> 00:41:10.990\nmaybe i'll have a life uh or i can go to work for this PE firm and i'll have no\n\n843\n00:41:10.990 --> 00:41:11.920\nlife but i'll make a\n\n844\n00:41:11.920 --> 00:41:16.010\nbunch of money i so i went to Sears turned out i worked every day for the next\n\n845\n00:41:16.010 --> 00:41:17.120\nyear on the breakup\n\n846\n00:41:17.120 --> 00:41:22.330\na Sears so i was completely wrong but what am i gonna do for me uh but\n\n847\n00:41:22.330 --> 00:41:23.600\nobviously i worked out\n\n848\n00:41:23.600 --> 00:41:27.710\nbecause i'm very happy doing what i'm doing yeah great you know and you talked\n\n849\n00:41:27.710 --> 00:41:29.040\nabout the power of\n\n850\n00:41:29.040 --> 00:41:33.920\nAI in terms of how you're handling emails now and and i've heard you say that\n\n851\n00:41:33.920 --> 00:41:35.440\nyou can't promote\n\n852\n00:41:35.440 --> 00:41:40.090\nyou can't promise that AI won't change jobs but you can promise that people\n\n853\n00:41:40.090 --> 00:41:41.120\nwill be employable\n\n854\n00:41:41.120 --> 00:41:47.440\nsay more about that so um employable for us the definition is you can get\n\n855\n00:41:47.440 --> 00:41:52.990\nanother job relatively quickly at the same for better compensation but that's\n\n856\n00:41:52.990 --> 00:41:54.080\nwhat i mean so\n\n857\n00:41:54.080 --> 00:41:58.630\neven if your job goes away uh and so what we say to people who are working on\n\n858\n00:41:58.630 --> 00:42:00.240\nour AI projects now\n\n859\n00:42:00.240 --> 00:42:04.650\nis look um this is going to happen anyway so uh you might as well be on the\n\n860\n00:42:04.650 --> 00:42:06.240\ncreation of it because\n\n861\n00:42:06.240 --> 00:42:09.250\nwe'll be ahead everybody else and somebody's going to need somebody to help do\n\n862\n00:42:09.250 --> 00:42:10.000\nthis for them\n\n863\n00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:14.160\nso that's what employability means i think there's another part david of uh AI\n\n864\n00:42:14.160 --> 00:42:15.280\nthat i wish we were\n\n865\n00:42:15.280 --> 00:42:20.490\nfarther ahead on but i think it's an issue that is uh for all business and\n\n866\n00:42:20.490 --> 00:42:21.760\ncould be a tragedy of\n\n867\n00:42:21.760 --> 00:42:27.230\nthe commons which is building good jobs so if you ask individuals what do you\n\n868\n00:42:27.230 --> 00:42:28.480\nwant from business\n\n869\n00:42:28.480 --> 00:42:32.480\nthey don't say i want a profit margin they might say i like this the service i\n\n870\n00:42:32.480 --> 00:42:32.800\nget\n\n871\n00:42:32.800 --> 00:42:37.220\nbut really what they want are jobs uh and if you look at what AI can do it can\n\n872\n00:42:37.220 --> 00:42:38.080\nget rid of a lot\n\n873\n00:42:38.080 --> 00:42:42.520\nof jobs particularly in a service business like ours or if you go into some of\n\n874\n00:42:42.520 --> 00:42:43.280\nyour own business\n\n875\n00:42:43.280 --> 00:42:46.700\ni mean i go to into restaurants now there's you know nobody there i was buying\n\n876\n00:42:46.700 --> 00:42:47.520\nsome stuff at a ski\n\n877\n00:42:47.520 --> 00:42:50.760\nplace every day there's not even a person there with their name on the badge\n\n878\n00:42:50.760 --> 00:42:51.920\nfrom you know you know\n\n879\n00:42:51.920 --> 00:42:57.870\nbolder and um and so it will take a lot of jobs away i think the challenge of\n\n880\n00:42:57.870 --> 00:42:58.320\nbusiness\n\n881\n00:42:58.320 --> 00:43:03.200\nhas is how can we use this technology to do things for people that they want us\n\n882\n00:43:03.200 --> 00:43:03.440\nto do\n\n883\n00:43:03.440 --> 00:43:08.620\nthat we couldn't do before because it was too expensive that are a job that's a\n\n884\n00:43:08.620 --> 00:43:09.040\ngood job for\n\n885\n00:43:09.040 --> 00:43:13.310\npeople so how to create how do you create a twenty five or thirty dollar an\n\n886\n00:43:13.310 --> 00:43:14.320\nhour job using\n\n887\n00:43:14.320 --> 00:43:18.590\ntechnology that people will pay for as opposed to i can use technology to get\n\n888\n00:43:18.590 --> 00:43:19.520\nrid of an eighteen\n\n889\n00:43:19.520 --> 00:43:24.890\ndollar an hour job we're not that good at it yet we all of our AI teams are\n\n890\n00:43:24.890 --> 00:43:26.640\nhave a responsibility to\n\n891\n00:43:26.640 --> 00:43:30.990\ndo it if i said to you oh here's this great success we don't have a great\n\n892\n00:43:30.990 --> 00:43:32.480\nsuccess i do think if we're\n\n893\n00:43:32.480 --> 00:43:36.750\nfocused on the customer we will come up with something we can do for them which\n\n894\n00:43:36.750 --> 00:43:37.360\nis better\n\n895\n00:43:37.360 --> 00:43:42.480\nusing AI than just saying you can just talk to our champions personally how are\n\n896\n00:43:42.480 --> 00:43:43.120\nyou using AI\n\n897\n00:43:43.120 --> 00:43:51.120\nto make yourself a better leader um so i have my own uh co-pilot agent uh and\n\n898\n00:43:51.120 --> 00:43:53.040\nuh it reads emails\n\n899\n00:43:53.040 --> 00:43:57.080\nit does stuff i use it uh all the time i was coming to the office the other day\n\n900\n00:43:57.080 --> 00:43:58.080\nand i was\n\n901\n00:43:58.080 --> 00:44:02.260\nworking on what we call a design build and deploy plan and i thought you know\n\n902\n00:44:02.260 --> 00:44:03.840\nwe need some sort of\n\n903\n00:44:03.840 --> 00:44:07.590\ncheckpoints and so i was on the way of the office i didn't have time to do it\n\n904\n00:44:07.590 --> 00:44:09.120\nso i i used chat\n\n905\n00:44:09.120 --> 00:44:13.050\ngpt and i did a paragraph and here's what i'm looking for and it gave me like\n\n906\n00:44:13.050 --> 00:44:14.400\nthis four category\n\n907\n00:44:14.400 --> 00:44:18.330\nthree sub points of here's how our check-ins and i just printed off gave it to\n\n908\n00:44:18.330 --> 00:44:19.120\nour team i said\n\n909\n00:44:19.120 --> 00:44:22.920\nchat gpt did looks pretty good to me what do you think they said looks good off\n\n910\n00:44:22.920 --> 00:44:23.200\nwe go\n\n911\n00:44:23.200 --> 00:44:30.200\nand you know we might as i might have spent two hours on it before uh and and\n\n912\n00:44:30.200 --> 00:44:30.880\nyou know we'll just\n\n913\n00:44:30.880 --> 00:44:36.160\nchange it if it's not right you know uh you're an extremely optimistic leader\n\n914\n00:44:36.160 --> 00:44:37.600\nand and you know i\n\n915\n00:44:37.600 --> 00:44:43.720\nsee that trade in a lot of great CEOs what do you do to keep your energy up so\n\n916\n00:44:43.720 --> 00:44:44.960\nyou can model\n\n917\n00:44:44.960 --> 00:44:50.170\nthat kind of leadership day-to-day i try to be but want to be focused on your\n\n918\n00:44:50.170 --> 00:44:50.800\npurpose\n\n919\n00:44:50.800 --> 00:44:54.410\nso know why i do this like i get up in the morning and i know what i'm trying\n\n920\n00:44:54.410 --> 00:44:54.800\nto get\n\n921\n00:44:54.800 --> 00:45:00.320\naccomplished to be really focused on the time but three really manage my energy\n\n922\n00:45:00.320 --> 00:45:01.680\nso um i've always\n\n923\n00:45:01.680 --> 00:45:07.100\nbeen pretty good on managing my physical energy getting workouts eating right\n\n924\n00:45:07.100 --> 00:45:08.240\nthat kind of stuff\n\n925\n00:45:08.240 --> 00:45:13.450\num i would say in the last seven or eight years i've gotten a lot better on\n\n926\n00:45:13.450 --> 00:45:13.760\nsleep\n\n927\n00:45:14.320 --> 00:45:17.980\nas recovery time and necessary so i used to go i sleep six hours a day i was\n\n928\n00:45:17.980 --> 00:45:18.880\nproud of sleeping\n\n929\n00:45:18.880 --> 00:45:24.160\nsix hours a day uh and then i read this book why we sleep uh and i come to\n\n930\n00:45:24.160 --> 00:45:25.360\nconclusion i'm going to\n\n931\n00:45:25.360 --> 00:45:29.680\nget uh eight hours seven to eight hours sleep and i most days i get eight hours\n\n932\n00:45:29.680 --> 00:45:34.890\nasleep uh and i have more energy i feel better i'm in a better mood uh the only\n\n933\n00:45:34.890 --> 00:45:35.440\nthings my wife\n\n934\n00:45:35.440 --> 00:45:38.720\nsaid to me i have to tell you i've been telling you you need more sleep for\n\n935\n00:45:38.720 --> 00:45:39.680\nlike 30 years\n\n936\n00:45:39.680 --> 00:45:43.680\nwhy is it you have to read 300 pages to know what everybody else knows is true\n\n937\n00:45:43.680 --> 00:45:44.080\ni'm like\n\n938\n00:45:44.080 --> 00:45:51.360\ni don't know but i'm getting more sleep well it sounds like i just heard about\n\n939\n00:45:51.360 --> 00:45:52.000\none of your real\n\n940\n00:45:52.000 --> 00:45:57.120\ntruth tellers your wife you know tom this has been a lot of fun and i want to\n\n941\n00:45:57.120 --> 00:45:57.440\nhave some war\n\n942\n00:45:57.440 --> 00:46:00.860\nwith my lightning round of questions so are you ready for this yep okay the\n\n943\n00:46:00.860 --> 00:46:01.680\nthree words that best\n\n944\n00:46:01.680 --> 00:46:07.590\ndescribe you curious enthusiastic change if you could be one person for a day\n\n945\n00:46:07.590 --> 00:46:08.640\nbeside yourself who\n\n946\n00:46:08.640 --> 00:46:13.890\nwould it be the pope your biggest pet peeve self-indulgence who would play you\n\n947\n00:46:13.890 --> 00:46:14.880\nin a movie no\n\n948\n00:46:14.880 --> 00:46:18.300\nthat's a good question i don't know uh tom cruise what's the best college\n\n949\n00:46:18.300 --> 00:46:19.600\nfootball game you saw this\n\n950\n00:46:19.600 --> 00:46:23.400\nyear that georgia game what's something you've been curious about lately that\n\n951\n00:46:23.400 --> 00:46:24.400\nhas nothing to do\n\n952\n00:46:24.400 --> 00:46:29.580\nat work trust solo pushy that's not has to work but it's it's it's out there\n\n953\n00:46:29.580 --> 00:46:30.560\nwhat's the one thing\n\n954\n00:46:30.560 --> 00:46:34.790\nyou do just for you exercise besides your family and friends what's your most\n\n955\n00:46:34.790 --> 00:46:36.080\nprized possession\n\n956\n00:46:36.080 --> 00:46:39.830\nan heirloom that my mother gave me if i turned on the radio in your car what\n\n957\n00:46:39.830 --> 00:46:40.560\nwould i hear\n\n958\n00:46:40.560 --> 00:46:45.740\neither uh classic rock or npr what's something about you a few people would\n\n959\n00:46:45.740 --> 00:46:46.400\nknow you know i'm\n\n960\n00:46:46.400 --> 00:46:51.550\nsuch an open book i'm really sorry i'm trying to think like what do people\n\n961\n00:46:51.550 --> 00:46:52.560\nabout me what do people\n\n962\n00:46:52.560 --> 00:46:56.910\nnot know about me i write poetry what's one of your daily rituals something\n\n963\n00:46:56.910 --> 00:46:58.480\nthat you never miss\n\n964\n00:46:58.480 --> 00:47:02.840\ntelling my wife i love her you're out of the lightning round great job yeah you\n\n965\n00:47:02.840 --> 00:47:04.160\n've been in this\n\n966\n00:47:04.160 --> 00:47:08.720\nrole now for a couple decades of co and and at some point someone else will\n\n967\n00:47:08.720 --> 00:47:09.760\ntake over the range\n\n968\n00:47:09.760 --> 00:47:15.040\nof co of all state what are you trying to drive so deeply into the organization\n\n969\n00:47:15.040 --> 00:47:16.160\nthat it never ever\n\n970\n00:47:16.160 --> 00:47:22.110\ngoes away a belief in that we're creating an opportunity for our employees in\n\n971\n00:47:22.110 --> 00:47:23.440\nimproving communities\n\n972\n00:47:23.440 --> 00:47:28.720\nso improving communities i talk about it all the time we have a foundation i've\n\n973\n00:47:28.720 --> 00:47:35.430\npre-funded the foundation so that even if a new leader comes in and they hate\n\n974\n00:47:35.430 --> 00:47:36.480\nthe work we're doing\n\n975\n00:47:36.480 --> 00:47:41.920\nthere's enough money in there that it gives us a three to five-year window out\n\n976\n00:47:41.920 --> 00:47:43.920\num so i it's\n\n977\n00:47:43.920 --> 00:47:46.950\nit's those two things because i think we're always have to be driven by\n\n978\n00:47:46.950 --> 00:47:47.520\ncustomers\n\n979\n00:47:47.520 --> 00:47:51.930\nand shareholders aren't going to let go either now you have three kids as i\n\n980\n00:47:51.930 --> 00:47:52.960\nunderstand it how\n\n981\n00:47:52.960 --> 00:48:00.010\nis being how's being apparent shape the way that you lead i think i'm more\n\n982\n00:48:00.010 --> 00:48:02.480\nunderstanding of different\n\n983\n00:48:02.480 --> 00:48:09.190\npoints of view um and uh i'll hoping that they can achieve what they want in\n\n984\n00:48:09.190 --> 00:48:10.720\ntheir life so i when\n\n985\n00:48:10.720 --> 00:48:14.390\ni first did my purpose work i was like look i'm i'm a good father i have a good\n\n986\n00:48:14.390 --> 00:48:15.840\nrelation my kids i\n\n987\n00:48:15.840 --> 00:48:19.500\ndon't want them to make my story their story i don't want people who come to\n\n988\n00:48:19.500 --> 00:48:20.880\nall state they have to make\n\n989\n00:48:21.440 --> 00:48:24.740\nour story their story unless they really want it and how do you go about\n\n990\n00:48:24.740 --> 00:48:26.320\nleading it home i mostly\n\n991\n00:48:26.320 --> 00:48:34.560\nfollow what do you mean by that ask lead recognize your position power um uh\n\n992\n00:48:34.560 --> 00:48:38.560\nthe uh it's um you know\n\n993\n00:48:38.560 --> 00:48:43.770\ntry try to meet them what they want so i'm a problem solver not all of my kids\n\n994\n00:48:43.770 --> 00:48:44.800\nwhen they talk to me\n\n995\n00:48:44.800 --> 00:48:49.710\nwant their problem solved uh and so i've had to learn to say rather than you\n\n996\n00:48:49.710 --> 00:48:50.800\nknow here's the thing\n\n997\n00:48:50.800 --> 00:48:53.770\nthey just want me to listen they just really want me to say you know it's going\n\n998\n00:48:53.770 --> 00:48:54.880\nto be okay\n\n999\n00:48:54.880 --> 00:48:58.810\nthey want some empathy uh and i'm like well we could do these things this thing\n\n1000\n00:48:58.810 --> 00:48:59.200\nhere\n\n1001\n00:48:59.200 --> 00:49:05.280\nand so i've had to learn uh to not be a problem solver at work or at at home\n\n1002\n00:49:05.280 --> 00:49:06.160\nand i think that helps\n\n1003\n00:49:06.160 --> 00:49:09.910\nme not be a problem solver sometimes it works how do you learn how to be a good\n\n1004\n00:49:09.910 --> 00:49:11.280\nlister i mean you\n\n1005\n00:49:11.280 --> 00:49:14.160\nknow that that's an important trait it sounds like that's something that you've\n\n1006\n00:49:14.160 --> 00:49:14.880\nworked on and gotten\n\n1007\n00:49:14.880 --> 00:49:20.270\nbetter at i mean what was your process for doing that well it's gonna first i\n\n1008\n00:49:20.270 --> 00:49:21.840\nthink about it physically\n\n1009\n00:49:21.840 --> 00:49:26.340\ni'm like okay i have two ears of one mouth so i should listen twice as often as\n\n1010\n00:49:26.340 --> 00:49:27.200\ni speak so i\n\n1011\n00:49:27.200 --> 00:49:31.300\nin literally like and then sometimes david in a meeting i'll look at my watch\n\n1012\n00:49:31.300 --> 00:49:32.000\nand i say i'm not\n\n1013\n00:49:32.000 --> 00:49:36.560\ngonna say anything for five minutes it's hard for me i'm a vacuum filler and so\n\n1014\n00:49:36.560 --> 00:49:37.760\ni let the silence do\n\n1015\n00:49:37.760 --> 00:49:41.220\nthe work i say to our teams let the silence do the work so if you're in a board\n\n1016\n00:49:41.220 --> 00:49:42.240\nmeeting i tell people\n\n1017\n00:49:42.240 --> 00:49:46.500\nyou're talking our board if they don't say anything just stand there it's gonna\n\n1018\n00:49:46.500 --> 00:49:47.520\nbe painful you're\n\n1019\n00:49:47.520 --> 00:49:51.190\ngonna be wondering you've been here on board you know you're gonna you're gonna\n\n1020\n00:49:51.190 --> 00:49:51.920\nand you gotta just\n\n1021\n00:49:51.920 --> 00:49:57.130\nstand there let the silence do the work so if you just can convince yourself\n\n1022\n00:49:57.130 --> 00:49:58.800\nthat it's gonna be okay\n\n1023\n00:49:58.800 --> 00:50:03.100\nbeing silent people will say they most interesting thing as you look forward\n\n1024\n00:50:03.100 --> 00:50:04.720\ntime what do you see\n\n1025\n00:50:04.720 --> 00:50:09.600\nas your unfinished business but personally and for all state for all state uh\n\n1026\n00:50:09.600 --> 00:50:10.880\nthe my unfinished\n\n1027\n00:50:10.880 --> 00:50:18.240\nbusiness is getting us down the path on alli so really embedding uh all states\n\n1028\n00:50:18.240 --> 00:50:24.480\nour agentic ai into our business and because i've been here long enough not\n\n1029\n00:50:24.480 --> 00:50:25.360\nnecessarily as far as\n\n1030\n00:50:25.360 --> 00:50:29.800\nkind of pretty fast processor but i can see how it all fits together so i think\n\n1031\n00:50:29.800 --> 00:50:30.960\ni have to get that\n\n1032\n00:50:30.960 --> 00:50:38.020\ndone professionally um i i still am uh we are both my wife i big believers in\n\n1033\n00:50:38.020 --> 00:50:40.000\nyouth empowerment\n\n1034\n00:50:40.560 --> 00:50:45.840\nuh and so uh like you uh pursuing something as a professional career i think i\n\n1035\n00:50:45.840 --> 00:50:46.880\ni will lean in\n\n1036\n00:50:46.880 --> 00:50:51.300\nmore on youth empowerment and uh you know helping because i think kids they're\n\n1037\n00:50:51.300 --> 00:50:52.160\nnot they don't carry\n\n1038\n00:50:52.160 --> 00:50:56.400\nout a baggage we have they're risky and you know what like they're the future\n\n1039\n00:50:56.400 --> 00:50:57.680\nwhy wouldn't we help\n\n1040\n00:50:57.680 --> 00:51:01.900\nthem you know you've mentioned empowerment is a word you know a few times and\n\n1041\n00:51:01.900 --> 00:51:02.880\nit's a concept you\n\n1042\n00:51:02.880 --> 00:51:08.860\nknow in a lot of times empowerment can be misinterpreted you know how do you\n\n1043\n00:51:08.860 --> 00:51:10.400\nwhat's your definition\n\n1044\n00:51:10.400 --> 00:51:14.580\nof empowerment as a leader i mean and how do you know when to empower i think\n\n1045\n00:51:14.580 --> 00:51:16.080\nyou're right i agree\n\n1046\n00:51:16.080 --> 00:51:21.360\nwith you that empowerment is often misinterpreted uh i think the best kind of\n\n1047\n00:51:21.360 --> 00:51:22.880\nempowerment is when\n\n1048\n00:51:22.880 --> 00:51:28.360\ni'm really clear with what i expect you to do what the outcomes are and even\n\n1049\n00:51:28.360 --> 00:51:29.680\nhow i expect you to do\n\n1050\n00:51:29.680 --> 00:51:33.490\nit and say just don't do these other things here's what i don't want to have\n\n1051\n00:51:33.490 --> 00:51:35.440\nhappen and then uh then\n\n1052\n00:51:35.440 --> 00:51:39.440\ntrust me i think that empowers people as opposed to hicos all this problem let\n\n1053\n00:51:39.440 --> 00:51:40.240\nme know how you get\n\n1054\n00:51:40.240 --> 00:51:44.660\nthere like i don't think that's what a leader should do so i'm a and some\n\n1055\n00:51:44.660 --> 00:51:45.440\npeople think that's\n\n1056\n00:51:45.440 --> 00:51:48.610\nnot the right kind of empowerment very some of my team thinks like you know you\n\n1057\n00:51:48.610 --> 00:51:49.440\njust need to like\n\n1058\n00:51:49.440 --> 00:51:52.860\ntell me tell me what you need done and i'll go get done i'm like yeah like i\n\n1059\n00:51:52.860 --> 00:51:54.800\ndon't think so um so\n\n1060\n00:51:54.800 --> 00:51:59.980\ni think clarity is really important to empowerment uh because it tells people\n\n1061\n00:51:59.980 --> 00:52:01.120\nwhat the sides of the road\n\n1062\n00:52:01.120 --> 00:52:05.680\nare don't go over here go here so i think that's really important and then i\n\n1063\n00:52:05.680 --> 00:52:07.200\nthink you have to support\n\n1064\n00:52:07.200 --> 00:52:11.130\npeople when they make a mistake go in and help clean it up as opposed to\n\n1065\n00:52:11.130 --> 00:52:12.240\nplaying you mentioned\n\n1066\n00:52:12.240 --> 00:52:15.660\ntrust is being one of those things that you're really learning more about\n\n1067\n00:52:15.660 --> 00:52:16.480\noutside of business\n\n1068\n00:52:16.480 --> 00:52:21.660\nbut it's tied somewhat to business you know what have you where have you gone\n\n1069\n00:52:21.660 --> 00:52:22.160\ndo you have a\n\n1070\n00:52:22.160 --> 00:52:25.910\nsource or a resource that you've gone to that's helped you build your\n\n1071\n00:52:25.910 --> 00:52:27.520\ncapability and understanding\n\n1072\n00:52:27.520 --> 00:52:31.450\nof trust has there been a book you've read that you would recommend or you know\n\n1073\n00:52:31.450 --> 00:52:32.720\nhow are you how\n\n1074\n00:52:32.720 --> 00:52:38.320\nare you honing that skill like most things i um i'm all over trying to get\n\n1075\n00:52:38.320 --> 00:52:39.200\nbetter and learn and\n\n1076\n00:52:39.200 --> 00:52:42.980\nso i've read a bunch of books i've talked to people Richard Adelman uh has had\n\n1077\n00:52:42.980 --> 00:52:44.480\ntrust grammar for 26\n\n1078\n00:52:44.480 --> 00:52:49.910\nyears Robert Putnam multiple called the upswing i've concluded trust is uh it's\n\n1079\n00:52:49.910 --> 00:52:50.880\na huge problem for\n\n1080\n00:52:50.880 --> 00:52:55.070\nus uh the trust is down and everything only 20% of people believe in government\n\n1081\n00:52:55.070 --> 00:52:56.480\nonly 30% of people\n\n1082\n00:52:56.480 --> 00:53:02.920\nbelieve in their neighbors and so and trust is if we don't have trust there's\n\n1083\n00:53:02.920 --> 00:53:04.080\nno democracy\n\n1084\n00:53:04.080 --> 00:53:08.840\nand i also think trust is important for your own personal freedom like if you\n\n1085\n00:53:08.840 --> 00:53:09.200\ndon't trust\n\n1086\n00:53:09.200 --> 00:53:13.200\nthe uber driver you're not going to go anyplace if you're in a different city\n\n1087\n00:53:13.200 --> 00:53:14.320\nso we really need\n\n1088\n00:53:14.320 --> 00:53:19.500\nto work on trust and the thing that uh as you said i'm very optimistic the\n\n1089\n00:53:19.500 --> 00:53:20.800\nthing that genetically\n\n1090\n00:53:20.800 --> 00:53:26.010\ni'm wired against is negativity uh and the world's gotten way too negative uh\n\n1091\n00:53:26.010 --> 00:53:27.600\nwe looked at how much\n\n1092\n00:53:27.600 --> 00:53:32.780\nnegativity there is in the world uh just united states uh and we took total\n\n1093\n00:53:32.780 --> 00:53:33.920\nnegative minus positive\n\n1094\n00:53:33.920 --> 00:53:38.400\nand said what kind of advertising program to be it's a hundred billion dollar\n\n1095\n00:53:38.400 --> 00:53:39.200\nadvertising\n\n1096\n00:53:39.200 --> 00:53:44.480\nprogram it's more than the top 15 advertisers spend a year selling this stuff\n\n1097\n00:53:44.480 --> 00:53:45.440\nso yum and all\n\n1098\n00:53:45.440 --> 00:53:50.650\nyour all the advertising you did hundred billion dollars of us against us by us\n\n1099\n00:53:50.650 --> 00:53:51.760\nwe're just way too\n\n1100\n00:53:51.760 --> 00:53:55.690\nnegative i'm not saying we have to be polyanish i'm not saying you have to but\n\n1101\n00:53:55.690 --> 00:53:57.040\ni'm like i i think\n\n1102\n00:53:57.040 --> 00:54:02.680\npeople if you just stop for a second and think hey could this person be right\n\n1103\n00:54:02.680 --> 00:54:04.160\ncan i just respect\n\n1104\n00:54:04.160 --> 00:54:07.910\nthem for their having an own point of view and then be balanced by it so i just\n\n1105\n00:54:07.910 --> 00:54:08.880\nwant more balance\n\n1106\n00:54:08.880 --> 00:54:12.810\nin life and then building relationships we need to build more relationships\n\n1107\n00:54:12.810 --> 00:54:14.000\namongst each other\n\n1108\n00:54:14.000 --> 00:54:19.180\nbut we've gotten too too diverse the you know the social relationships\n\n1109\n00:54:19.180 --> 00:54:20.240\nreinforce diverse\n\n1110\n00:54:20.240 --> 00:54:24.810\nyou know the same point of view as opposed to you broaden your perspective if\n\n1111\n00:54:24.810 --> 00:54:25.520\nyou have more\n\n1112\n00:54:25.520 --> 00:54:30.400\nneed more people last question what's one piece of advice you'd give to anyone\n\n1113\n00:54:30.400 --> 00:54:30.960\nwho wants to be a\n\n1114\n00:54:30.960 --> 00:54:36.880\nbetter leader constantly change yourself there's there's a book written about\n\n1115\n00:54:36.880 --> 00:54:39.040\nceos and it says\n\n1116\n00:54:39.040 --> 00:54:43.920\nbasically the best ceos reinvent themselves every four years i bet if you look\n\n1117\n00:54:43.920 --> 00:54:44.720\nat your career you\n\n1118\n00:54:44.720 --> 00:54:48.140\nreinvented yourself you're reinvented yourself now you're just young you\n\n1119\n00:54:48.140 --> 00:54:49.040\nreinvent yourself\n\n1120\n00:54:49.040 --> 00:54:55.360\nepipse so i would say be honest with yourself or who you are don't let go of\n\n1121\n00:54:55.360 --> 00:54:56.960\nwhat made you successful\n\n1122\n00:54:56.960 --> 00:55:00.630\nbut don't hold on to it so tight that you don't do anything so if you if you\n\n1123\n00:55:00.630 --> 00:55:01.680\nwatch people in the\n\n1124\n00:55:01.680 --> 00:55:04.760\nolympics the high bar and the low bar and there's you know people swinging\n\n1125\n00:55:04.760 --> 00:55:06.640\naround it let's say the\n\n1126\n00:55:06.640 --> 00:55:10.960\nlow bar is your current success you're going to have to let go of the low bar\n\n1127\n00:55:10.960 --> 00:55:11.680\nto get to the high bar\n\n1128\n00:55:11.680 --> 00:55:17.200\nand so you're going to go back to the low bar occasionally but you got to let\n\n1129\n00:55:17.200 --> 00:55:18.240\ngo so i'd be like\n\n1130\n00:55:18.240 --> 00:55:22.660\njust keep changing keep changing and life will be beautiful awesome awesome\n\n1131\n00:55:22.660 --> 00:55:23.520\nwell tom i knew\n\n1132\n00:55:23.520 --> 00:55:26.970\ni was going to enjoy this and i did i want to thank you so much for the\n\n1133\n00:55:26.970 --> 00:55:29.360\nconversation and sharing the\n\n1134\n00:55:29.360 --> 00:55:33.020\nmany insights that you offered up well and thank you for helping other people\n\n1135\n00:55:33.020 --> 00:55:34.240\nand giving me a chance\n\n1136\n00:55:34.240 --> 00:55:38.320\nto be a part of your great so thanks\n\n1137\n00:55:38.320 --> 00:55:46.720\ndavid i can't help but just keep thinking about all the hilarious mayhem\n\n1138\n00:55:46.720 --> 00:55:50.310\nall state commercials that i've seen over the past three months i mean college\n\n1139\n00:55:50.310 --> 00:55:50.880\nfootball is over\n\n1140\n00:55:50.880 --> 00:55:56.960\nbut i feel like i still see mayhem all over my commercials yeah well you know\n\n1141\n00:55:56.960 --> 00:55:58.880\nwe all have a life\n\n1142\n00:55:58.880 --> 00:56:03.760\nof mayhem from time to time and i think they're pretty good at capturing that i\n\n1143\n00:56:03.760 --> 00:56:04.400\nlove the story he\n\n1144\n00:56:04.400 --> 00:56:07.570\ntells when the mayhem guy just tossed a piece of popcorn and hit him straight\n\n1145\n00:56:07.570 --> 00:56:08.320\nin the forehead\n\n1146\n00:56:08.320 --> 00:56:12.740\nyeah well you got to you got to treat the ceo like he's just a normal guy and\n\n1147\n00:56:12.740 --> 00:56:14.560\nhe did it\n\n1148\n00:56:14.560 --> 00:56:17.760\nand as much as they're paying that guy to do that i bet they let him get away\n\n1149\n00:56:17.760 --> 00:56:19.040\nwith flicking that popcorn\n\n1150\n00:56:19.040 --> 00:56:23.920\ni bet they did i bet they did david i'm excited to debrief this episode with\n\n1151\n00:56:23.920 --> 00:56:24.880\nyou so that our listeners\n\n1152\n00:56:24.880 --> 00:56:28.810\nwalk away from this conversation with some real practical things that they can\n\n1153\n00:56:28.810 --> 00:56:29.920\napply to their\n\n1154\n00:56:29.920 --> 00:56:33.860\nlife and to their leadership and one of the themes that really stood out to me\n\n1155\n00:56:33.860 --> 00:56:35.040\nin this conversation\n\n1156\n00:56:35.040 --> 00:56:40.960\nis this topic of purpose i love the quote that tom says he says it's he says\n\n1157\n00:56:40.960 --> 00:56:42.320\nyou have to enroll\n\n1158\n00:56:42.320 --> 00:56:47.530\nothers in your quest to be a better person and i just love that he also talks\n\n1159\n00:56:47.530 --> 00:56:47.920\nabout\n\n1160\n00:56:47.920 --> 00:56:53.520\nhaving taken 75 000 employees through a process of discovering their personal\n\n1161\n00:56:53.520 --> 00:56:55.200\npurpose and as a\n\n1162\n00:56:55.200 --> 00:56:58.680\nresult of this some people realize that their personal purpose was not aligned\n\n1163\n00:56:58.680 --> 00:56:59.440\nwith insurance\n\n1164\n00:56:59.440 --> 00:57:03.250\nso they left the company and i'm curious david from your perspective what do\n\n1165\n00:57:03.250 --> 00:57:03.680\nyou do\n\n1166\n00:57:03.680 --> 00:57:09.040\nif there are people that work for you who feel like their job doesn't align\n\n1167\n00:57:09.040 --> 00:57:09.840\nwith their personal\n\n1168\n00:57:09.840 --> 00:57:16.740\nsense of purpose well first call i i would say i really commend tom and all\n\n1169\n00:57:16.740 --> 00:57:17.760\nstate for\n\n1170\n00:57:17.760 --> 00:57:20.950\nfor investing in their people and getting them to understand what their\n\n1171\n00:57:20.950 --> 00:57:22.640\npersonal purpose is and\n\n1172\n00:57:22.640 --> 00:57:27.920\ni think that that goes a long way for them to build loyalty and and credibility\n\n1173\n00:57:27.920 --> 00:57:28.880\nwith their team\n\n1174\n00:57:28.880 --> 00:57:34.360\nbecause as sam walton used to say no one will care about you unless you show\n\n1175\n00:57:34.360 --> 00:57:35.200\nthem that you care\n\n1176\n00:57:35.200 --> 00:57:40.410\nabout them and i think the fact that they invested in the the training that\n\n1177\n00:57:40.410 --> 00:57:41.680\nwould allow people to\n\n1178\n00:57:41.680 --> 00:57:46.090\nreally dig deep inside of their their heart and their soul to figure out who\n\n1179\n00:57:46.090 --> 00:57:47.280\nthey are and what\n\n1180\n00:57:47.280 --> 00:57:50.700\nthey want to stand for and how they want to spend their time i think that's\n\n1181\n00:57:50.700 --> 00:57:52.800\nthat's just an emblematic\n\n1182\n00:57:52.800 --> 00:57:57.040\nof the fact that the all state cares about their people you know i think when\n\n1183\n00:57:57.040 --> 00:57:59.200\npeople realize that\n\n1184\n00:57:59.200 --> 00:58:05.280\ntheir their purpose is not aligned with what they might be working on i really\n\n1185\n00:58:05.280 --> 00:58:07.440\nalways encourage\n\n1186\n00:58:07.440 --> 00:58:13.360\npeople to to find what it is that turns them on and go after it you know you're\n\n1187\n00:58:13.360 --> 00:58:14.880\nyou're only on this\n\n1188\n00:58:14.880 --> 00:58:20.790\nearth once as people always say and i know that's tried but it's very very true\n\n1189\n00:58:20.790 --> 00:58:21.680\nso why spend your\n\n1190\n00:58:21.680 --> 00:58:27.160\nlife working on something that doesn't get you juiced up every day and you know\n\n1191\n00:58:27.160 --> 00:58:28.800\ni i really think\n\n1192\n00:58:28.800 --> 00:58:34.240\nthat that's what makes life goes when you can have passion for what you do and\n\n1193\n00:58:34.240 --> 00:58:36.400\nyou know and love what\n\n1194\n00:58:36.400 --> 00:58:40.940\nyou do and and when you love what you do you're you're always better at it\n\n1195\n00:58:40.940 --> 00:58:42.400\nbecause you know first of\n\n1196\n00:58:42.400 --> 00:58:46.330\nall you're you're usually pretty good at what you love and then you can't wait\n\n1197\n00:58:46.330 --> 00:58:47.280\nto learn how to get\n\n1198\n00:58:47.280 --> 00:58:51.400\neven better at it and you have this constant learning mindset and you just keep\n\n1199\n00:58:51.400 --> 00:58:52.480\nup in your game because\n\n1200\n00:58:52.480 --> 00:58:57.390\nyou love it it's like work is not work it's your hobby and you know the other\n\n1201\n00:58:57.390 --> 00:58:58.880\npoint that i really\n\n1202\n00:58:58.880 --> 00:59:03.530\nlove is that you know a lot of leaders don't want to give people that kind of\n\n1203\n00:59:03.530 --> 00:59:04.160\ntraining because they're\n\n1204\n00:59:04.160 --> 00:59:10.460\nafraid that they might come up with the the idea that they should be doing\n\n1205\n00:59:10.460 --> 00:59:12.640\nsomething else and i just\n\n1206\n00:59:12.640 --> 00:59:20.800\nthink that's such hogwash you know you know we we wrote a book you know on self\n\n1207\n00:59:20.800 --> 00:59:21.440\ncoaching\n\n1208\n00:59:21.440 --> 00:59:25.730\nand in that book you know we have people really look harder themselves and you\n\n1209\n00:59:25.730 --> 00:59:26.960\nknow a lot of times\n\n1210\n00:59:26.960 --> 00:59:31.090\nCEOs will buy the books that i write and share them with their companies but a\n\n1211\n00:59:31.090 --> 00:59:32.160\nlot of CEOs didn't\n\n1212\n00:59:32.160 --> 00:59:35.590\nreally want to give them that book because they didn't want to go through it\n\n1213\n00:59:35.590 --> 00:59:36.560\nexercise for their\n\n1214\n00:59:36.560 --> 00:59:40.490\nlook at it what they wanted to do they were afraid of losing their people but i\n\n1215\n00:59:40.490 --> 00:59:41.440\nthink that's a lack\n\n1216\n00:59:41.440 --> 00:59:46.620\nof confidence and what you have to offer as a company and what what you have to\n\n1217\n00:59:46.620 --> 00:59:47.040\noffer as a\n\n1218\n00:59:47.040 --> 00:59:52.160\nleader in terms of what people can learn by by by working with you so i think\n\n1219\n00:59:52.160 --> 00:59:54.240\nit takes security\n\n1220\n00:59:54.240 --> 01:00:00.400\nand uh to to really do what what tom and all states doing and they're confident\n\n1221\n01:00:00.400 --> 01:00:00.720\nwhat they\n\n1222\n01:00:00.720 --> 01:00:04.390\nhave to offer they're confident in all state and they're confident that uh if\n\n1223\n01:00:04.390 --> 01:00:06.000\nthey can help people\n\n1224\n01:00:06.000 --> 01:00:09.930\nyou know uh find their purpose and align it with what they do they're going to\n\n1225\n01:00:09.930 --> 01:00:10.640\nbe a far better\n\n1226\n01:00:10.640 --> 01:00:13.680\noff company and i think it's working for them and also maybe think of how much\n\n1227\n01:00:13.680 --> 01:00:14.240\ntrust the\n\n1228\n01:00:14.240 --> 01:00:18.290\nemployees must have in tom as a leader to actually go through a process like\n\n1229\n01:00:18.290 --> 01:00:19.360\nthis where they discover\n\n1230\n01:00:19.360 --> 01:00:24.280\ntheir purpose and then they themselves have the willingness to say hey this isn\n\n1231\n01:00:24.280 --> 01:00:25.120\n't for me and i'm\n\n1232\n01:00:25.120 --> 01:00:28.020\ngoing to trust that you mean what you say and that you want what's best for me\n\n1233\n01:00:28.020 --> 01:00:28.720\nand you want something\n\n1234\n01:00:28.720 --> 01:00:32.650\nthat aligns with what i feel like i'm put on the search to do and the fact is\n\n1235\n01:00:32.650 --> 01:00:33.840\nis there are very very\n\n1236\n01:00:33.840 --> 01:00:37.930\nfew people that really say i'm out of here have to do in that training you know\n\n1237\n01:00:37.930 --> 01:00:38.880\nthat that's looking\n\n1238\n01:00:38.880 --> 01:00:44.250\nat the wrong side of the decimal point in my opinion and uh you know but there\n\n1239\n01:00:44.250 --> 01:00:45.600\n's far far far\n\n1240\n01:00:45.600 --> 01:00:49.380\nwhere people say hey man this is a kind of place i want to be because all\n\n1241\n01:00:49.380 --> 01:00:50.640\nstates investing in me\n\n1242\n01:00:50.640 --> 01:00:55.820\ndavid another thing that i heard tom say several times during your conversation\n\n1243\n01:00:55.820 --> 01:00:55.840\nis\n\n1244\n01:00:55.840 --> 01:01:01.920\nthat he is brutal about his time and what he means by that is he's brutal about\n\n1245\n01:01:01.920 --> 01:01:02.800\nhis time management\n\n1246\n01:01:02.800 --> 01:01:07.230\nand he is very disciplined about how he spends his time and who he spends at\n\n1247\n01:01:07.230 --> 01:01:08.400\nbliss and what he says\n\n1248\n01:01:08.400 --> 01:01:13.610\nyes to and i want to know david from your seat i mean you were CEO of young\n\n1249\n01:01:13.610 --> 01:01:14.400\nbrands for almost two\n\n1250\n01:01:14.400 --> 01:01:18.560\ndecades you have a lot going on now how do you set boundaries around your time\n\n1251\n01:01:18.560 --> 01:01:19.120\nwell when i was\n\n1252\n01:01:19.120 --> 01:01:25.640\nat yum it was very easy i i looked at my calendar and i i focused on on three\n\n1253\n01:01:25.640 --> 01:01:27.040\nthings the three things\n\n1254\n01:01:27.040 --> 01:01:30.980\nthat were critical to to our company and the three things that that i knew i\n\n1255\n01:01:30.980 --> 01:01:32.160\nhad to do well if i was\n\n1256\n01:01:32.160 --> 01:01:36.400\ngoing to be able to keep my job and and earn the right to keep my job and so i\n\n1257\n01:01:36.400 --> 01:01:37.920\nfocused\n\n1258\n01:01:37.920 --> 01:01:42.160\nmy calendar around people you know making sure i spent the right amount of time\n\n1259\n01:01:42.160 --> 01:01:43.120\nunderstanding\n\n1260\n01:01:43.120 --> 01:01:48.750\nand helping the people in our company grow two was customers you know i felt\n\n1261\n01:01:48.750 --> 01:01:49.760\nthat i had to be the\n\n1262\n01:01:49.760 --> 01:01:53.720\nchief customer officer i didn't think anybody should know the customer better\n\n1263\n01:01:53.720 --> 01:01:54.480\nthan me and so\n\n1264\n01:01:54.480 --> 01:01:58.260\ni spent a lot of time talking to customers going through all the research\n\n1265\n01:01:58.260 --> 01:01:59.280\nreally understanding\n\n1266\n01:01:59.280 --> 01:02:02.230\ncustomers making sure we were doing the right kind of research to understand\n\n1267\n01:02:02.230 --> 01:02:02.960\ncustomers and then\n\n1268\n01:02:02.960 --> 01:02:06.890\nmaking sure we had compelling marketing programs and operating programs to make\n\n1269\n01:02:06.890 --> 01:02:07.680\nour customers happy\n\n1270\n01:02:07.680 --> 01:02:12.860\nso i really focused very much on on customers and the third thing i focused on\n\n1271\n01:02:12.860 --> 01:02:13.520\nwas wall street\n\n1272\n01:02:13.520 --> 01:02:19.840\nyou know i was the CEO of the company i didn't think anybody should be better\n\n1273\n01:02:19.840 --> 01:02:20.720\nat communicating our\n\n1274\n01:02:20.720 --> 01:02:27.170\nstory to wall street than me i knew that i had to do it well and i i spent a\n\n1275\n01:02:27.170 --> 01:02:28.880\nlot of time and energy\n\n1276\n01:02:28.880 --> 01:02:34.480\nand making sure that wall street knew our story and i communicated proactively\n\n1277\n01:02:34.480 --> 01:02:35.520\nand i communicated\n\n1278\n01:02:35.520 --> 01:02:40.640\nclearly and i communicated in a way that helped would help drive our stock\n\n1279\n01:02:40.640 --> 01:02:41.600\nprice so those were\n\n1280\n01:02:41.600 --> 01:02:45.840\nthe three things i looked at my calendar and and if i saw things getting in the\n\n1281\n01:02:45.840 --> 01:02:46.880\nway of those three\n\n1282\n01:02:46.880 --> 01:02:50.330\nthings and me doing the key things that i thought were critical in each of\n\n1283\n01:02:50.330 --> 01:02:51.040\nthose areas\n\n1284\n01:02:51.040 --> 01:02:55.190\nthen i didn't let it stay on my calendar and you know one of the things you\n\n1285\n01:02:55.190 --> 01:02:56.400\nhave to do no matter\n\n1286\n01:02:56.400 --> 01:03:00.910\nwhether you're CEO or or just coming up you have to learn when to say no to\n\n1287\n01:03:00.910 --> 01:03:03.120\nthings you have to stay\n\n1288\n01:03:03.120 --> 01:03:08.010\nfocused and and you know learning the power of no is important then as i moved\n\n1289\n01:03:08.010 --> 01:03:10.000\non and in my\n\n1290\n01:03:10.000 --> 01:03:14.100\ncareer and into what i'm doing right now i went through a different process i\n\n1291\n01:03:14.100 --> 01:03:14.960\nyou know i look back\n\n1292\n01:03:14.960 --> 01:03:21.440\nat at my days at uh yum and i look back and all the time i'd spend it at work\n\n1293\n01:03:21.440 --> 01:03:23.520\nand i ask myself\n\n1294\n01:03:23.520 --> 01:03:29.600\nwhat gives me joy uh and then i ask myself what takes away my joy and i\n\n1295\n01:03:29.600 --> 01:03:30.640\nunderstood what the joy\n\n1296\n01:03:30.640 --> 01:03:34.880\nblockers were in my life and i said okay i don't want to do any of those okay\n\n1297\n01:03:34.880 --> 01:03:35.200\nand then\n\n1298\n01:03:35.200 --> 01:03:39.360\nthese are the things that give me joy and that's what i was going to spend my\n\n1299\n01:03:39.360 --> 01:03:40.240\ntime on the joy\n\n1300\n01:03:40.240 --> 01:03:45.420\nbuilders and for me it's very clear okay i love leadership development that's\n\n1301\n01:03:45.420 --> 01:03:46.480\nwhy i do this podcast\n\n1302\n01:03:46.480 --> 01:03:50.610\nthat's why i have david novak leadership by you know i love i'm making the\n\n1303\n01:03:50.610 --> 01:03:52.480\nworld a better place by\n\n1304\n01:03:52.480 --> 01:03:59.600\nyou know you know developing better leaders and also you know helping uh you\n\n1305\n01:03:59.600 --> 01:04:00.720\nknow helping\n\n1306\n01:04:00.720 --> 01:04:05.840\npeople in need you know and helping people fulfill their potential so you know\n\n1307\n01:04:05.840 --> 01:04:06.320\nwe have a lot of\n\n1308\n01:04:06.320 --> 01:04:09.280\nthings that we do on that front and and i love it i think those those are\n\n1309\n01:04:09.280 --> 01:04:10.160\nreally great and i\n\n1310\n01:04:10.160 --> 01:04:13.580\nlove golf you know those are the three things those are my three big passion\n\n1311\n01:04:13.580 --> 01:04:15.680\nareas uh and obviously\n\n1312\n01:04:15.680 --> 01:04:23.680\nmy family and so i spend time around those those four things and and that's\n\n1313\n01:04:23.680 --> 01:04:25.200\nthat's what i spend\n\n1314\n01:04:25.200 --> 01:04:29.760\nmy time on my spend time on the joy builders and i am really good cool at\n\n1315\n01:04:29.760 --> 01:04:32.400\nsaying no anything doesn't\n\n1316\n01:04:32.400 --> 01:04:38.000\nfit i say no i think you guys probably attest to that okay can confirm you are\n\n1317\n01:04:38.000 --> 01:04:39.680\ngreat at saying no\n\n1318\n01:04:39.680 --> 01:04:44.330\nbut i but i am saying yes to the things that that matter most to me in my life\n\n1319\n01:04:44.330 --> 01:04:45.120\nand matter the most\n\n1320\n01:04:45.120 --> 01:04:48.560\nto others and that's how i do it i love that exercise because it really\n\n1321\n01:04:48.560 --> 01:04:49.760\nrequires you to look\n\n1322\n01:04:49.760 --> 01:04:53.800\ninward and continue to develop that muscle of self-awareness because if you don\n\n1323\n01:04:53.800 --> 01:04:55.200\n't know what it is\n\n1324\n01:04:55.200 --> 01:05:00.410\nthat brings you the most joy then you're gonna live a pretty directionless life\n\n1325\n01:05:00.410 --> 01:05:00.960\njust entering\n\n1326\n01:05:00.960 --> 01:05:04.380\ninto all of these different things that might not add purpose or meaning of\n\n1327\n01:05:04.380 --> 01:05:05.280\nfulfillment to your\n\n1328\n01:05:05.280 --> 01:05:09.850\nlife so understanding yourself first really is the road map that helps orient\n\n1329\n01:05:09.850 --> 01:05:10.560\nyou around\n\n1330\n01:05:10.560 --> 01:05:15.400\nwhat to say yes to right and i think it also leads to good energy management if\n\n1331\n01:05:15.400 --> 01:05:16.000\nyou're focused on\n\n1332\n01:05:16.000 --> 01:05:22.950\nthe things that really uh you know get you excited you know you're much better\n\n1333\n01:05:22.950 --> 01:05:23.920\nable to manage your\n\n1334\n01:05:23.920 --> 01:05:31.330\nenergy and stay up and and you know make the most out of your day if you're\n\n1335\n01:05:31.330 --> 01:05:32.480\nspending time on\n\n1336\n01:05:32.480 --> 01:05:37.750\nthings that sap you your energy goes down you're not nearly as productive and\n\n1337\n01:05:37.750 --> 01:05:39.600\nyou know it's it's\n\n1338\n01:05:39.600 --> 01:05:45.080\ndebilitating so it's important i've spent a lot of time in my life always\n\n1339\n01:05:45.080 --> 01:05:46.400\nlooking at my purpose\n\n1340\n01:05:46.400 --> 01:05:50.930\nokay always looking at my navel as someone say always looking at it and always\n\n1341\n01:05:50.930 --> 01:05:51.520\ntrying to make\n\n1342\n01:05:51.520 --> 01:05:57.680\nsure that i was you know guided by the light okay that i have in my life and i\n\n1343\n01:05:57.680 --> 01:05:58.160\ni think it's\n\n1344\n01:05:58.160 --> 01:06:02.090\ntime well spent so i think you really have to find personal time you have to\n\n1345\n01:06:02.090 --> 01:06:03.840\ntake the time to reflect\n\n1346\n01:06:03.840 --> 01:06:09.060\nyou have to get quiet time you know he i think one of the things he talked\n\n1347\n01:06:09.060 --> 01:06:11.040\nabout is the power of\n\n1348\n01:06:11.040 --> 01:06:16.220\nsilence well i mean it's not just the silence it's in a meeting that you're\n\n1349\n01:06:16.220 --> 01:06:17.120\nhaving where people don't\n\n1350\n01:06:17.120 --> 01:06:21.370\nsay anything because they don't agree it's also the silence that you can create\n\n1351\n01:06:21.370 --> 01:06:23.120\nfor yourself to listen\n\n1352\n01:06:23.120 --> 01:06:31.130\nto what what you're thinking what others are telling you you know evaluate you\n\n1353\n01:06:31.130 --> 01:06:31.920\nknow where you\n\n1354\n01:06:31.920 --> 01:06:37.060\nare in your life you can't do that when you're hustle busing filling your your\n\n1355\n01:06:37.060 --> 01:06:37.600\ndays up just with\n\n1356\n01:06:37.600 --> 01:06:42.810\nbusy work you know that's why i think meditation is so powerful you know you\n\n1357\n01:06:42.810 --> 01:06:44.320\nknow taking that's\n\n1358\n01:06:44.320 --> 01:06:49.950\nquiet time finding it prayer is powerful you know it's quiet time where you get\n\n1359\n01:06:49.950 --> 01:06:50.720\nto listen\n\n1360\n01:06:50.720 --> 01:06:55.600\nyou listen to your inner voice you listen to god you listen to whomever you go\n\n1361\n01:06:55.600 --> 01:06:56.880\nto you listen to\n\n1362\n01:06:56.880 --> 01:07:03.440\nBuddha you listen to whoever it is that you you you you seek value for it's so\n\n1363\n01:07:03.440 --> 01:07:04.080\ninteresting to say\n\n1364\n01:07:04.080 --> 01:07:10.520\nthat david i think i too am a big practitioner of meditation and i wasn't\n\n1365\n01:07:10.520 --> 01:07:12.320\nreally patient enough\n\n1366\n01:07:12.320 --> 01:07:16.560\nto practice it until someone told me that it's like dental falls for your brain\n\n1367\n01:07:16.560 --> 01:07:18.160\nand i just envisioned\n\n1368\n01:07:18.160 --> 01:07:24.400\nmeditation like flicking gunk out of my brain and all day we're bombarded with\n\n1369\n01:07:24.400 --> 01:07:25.280\nall these messages\n\n1370\n01:07:25.280 --> 01:07:28.480\nand all these tasks and all these things we have to do and it just continues to\n\n1371\n01:07:28.480 --> 01:07:29.200\nbuild up in our\n\n1372\n01:07:29.200 --> 01:07:33.160\nheads so to your point if you don't take that time to listen over time all of\n\n1373\n01:07:33.160 --> 01:07:34.000\nthat stuff just\n\n1374\n01:07:34.000 --> 01:07:38.880\ncontinues to build up like plaque on your teeth if you don't floss so i think\n\n1375\n01:07:38.880 --> 01:07:40.560\ntoo not only getting\n\n1376\n01:07:40.560 --> 01:07:46.070\nquiet getting quiet not only helps you reorient yourself around ruin matters\n\n1377\n01:07:46.070 --> 01:07:47.120\nbut it also helps\n\n1378\n01:07:47.120 --> 01:07:52.330\nyou clear the space and kind of gets you back to this baseline of being able to\n\n1379\n01:07:52.330 --> 01:07:53.280\ndetermine what you\n\n1380\n01:07:53.280 --> 01:07:58.490\nwant to let in and what you want to release absolutely and you know when you go\n\n1381\n01:07:58.490 --> 01:07:58.720\nto the\n\n1382\n01:07:58.720 --> 01:08:02.380\nperformance institute which i believe all state would go to and i actually went\n\n1383\n01:08:02.380 --> 01:08:03.600\nthere with pepsico\n\n1384\n01:08:03.600 --> 01:08:08.960\nwhen i was there and you spend time on reflection and anybody tell you that\n\n1385\n01:08:08.960 --> 01:08:10.480\nreflection is critical\n\n1386\n01:08:10.480 --> 01:08:15.690\ni hope everyone listening is inspired to become brutal with their time and\n\n1387\n01:08:15.690 --> 01:08:17.920\ntakes inspiration from\n\n1388\n01:08:17.920 --> 01:08:24.000\ntom and helps enroll other people and your quest to be a better person yeah so\n\n1389\n01:08:24.000 --> 01:08:25.600\nso so cool i think\n\n1390\n01:08:25.600 --> 01:08:30.970\nreally what we got out of this this uh episode that i think is most powerful is\n\n1391\n01:08:30.970 --> 01:08:32.080\nhey you gotta you\n\n1392\n01:08:32.080 --> 01:08:37.230\ngot a fine time to to to understand what your personal purpose is and then you\n\n1393\n01:08:37.230 --> 01:08:37.920\nhave to manage\n\n1394\n01:08:37.920 --> 01:08:43.850\nyour time so that you focus on what really matters and when you do that uh you\n\n1395\n01:08:43.850 --> 01:08:45.440\n're you're on your way\n\n1396\n01:08:45.440 --> 01:08:48.880\nto to really maximizing not only your career but i think your life\n\n1397\n01:08:48.880 --> 01:08:53.440\ndavid thanks again for another episode of how leaders lead and thank you for\n\n1398\n01:08:53.440 --> 01:08:53.920\nlistening\n\n1399\n01:08:53.920 --> 01:08:56.560\nstay tuned next thursday and we will see you then\n","is_pinned",false,"pinned_at","is_featured","featured_at","mix_url","https://chtbl.com/track/DCB44F/traffic.megaphone.fm/DVL8883346391.mp3","dx_media_id",3469,"video_media_id","thumbnail_image_media_id","published_date","2026-03-05","itunes_episode_id",281,"youtube_id","4g7kywswcx8","2026-08-19T21:34:25.000000Z","Listen to this leadership podcast with Tom Wilson, Chair, President and CEO, and discover the power of managing your time and dialing in your 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