David Novak 0:04 

Welcome to How leaders lead where every week you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world, I break down the key learning so that by the end of the episode, you will have something simple you can apply as you develop into a better leader. That's what this podcast is all about. Today's guests is Frank Blake, the former chairman and CEO of the Home Depot. It's funny, he calls himself the accidental CEO. And it was a bit of a surprise when he was appointed back in 2007. I mean, come on. It's not every day that a former lawyer for General Electric finds his way to the top role at a home improvement store. But his success at the Home Depot has been anything but accidental. He really turned the company around. And one of his biggest strategic moves was to stop relying on opening new stores for growth, and instead focusing on generating more sales at existing stores. And guess what it worked. This shows us as leaders that sometimes growth for its own sake isn't the right goal. Instead, we want to strive for excellence. Getting back to basics, being brilliant at what we do, knowing that growth is going to come along with it. In Frank's words. It's a compelling, fascinating, never ending journey when we aim for excellence, not just growth. So here's my conversation with my good friend, and soon to be yours, Frank Blake.

Well, Frank, it's so good to catch up with you. You know, I remember how much Whitney and I enjoyed spending time with you and Liz, when we we attended SEO best practice Metis together. So I hope you're doing well.

Frank Blake 1:51 

I am and this is a highlight. We want to get to

David Novak 1:55 

what you did at Home Depot and your career. But you know, I also understand that you're currently the chairman of Delta Airlines. And I just wanted to ask you a question, what's it been like, in that industry in the midst of of this whole pandemic? So David,

Frank Blake 2:10 

you can, you can imagine, for if you can imagine, in February, we thought we were on our way to the best year in Delta's history, then the pandemic hits and the shutdown hits. And don't just delta, the industry stops, you go down 95 97% In terms of people traveling, and I, I've always been impressed by the CEO of delta at Bastion, never more so than now. How quickly he pivoted to the core mission of preserving cash, preserving the airline, treating people the right way, treating his employees the right way, ensuring their safety and health and ensuring the safety and health of our traveling customers. Really an amazing effort. But it's going to be a long haul get the airline industry back to where it was in February 2020.

David Novak 3:15 

Frank, now we're we're facing this George Floyd tragedy. What do you think leaders should be doing and times like these? First off, I

Frank Blake 3:24 

do think I think that communication within the organization is important. And you see a lot of leaders, I think doing that very effectively listening, which is something you emphasize listening, this is not something that a lot of us naturally come to a deep understanding of. So we need to listen to the folks who really are impacted by these issues. And I think, look every I was talking to a CEO last week, and we're talking about diversity and inclusion. And one of the questions I think every leader should ask is when they make a promotion within their organization, because it's the promotion that sort of sets your example of what you want from your team. When you promote someone, how often do you talk about what she or he did to develop their people and promote diversity and inclusion? And if you're not talking about that, as you promote, folks, don't be surprised if you're not getting a lot of it within your organization. I think there's so I think we've made great improvement. But there's so much you know, you know, there's just so much more we can do. I think this is an area where companies will lead the way will really lead the way and do just a better and better job.

David Novak 4:52 

Yeah, I think it's such a sad time in so many ways, but it looks like change may actually happen in a much more dramatic They can fashion going forward. And this Serena, what do you think, Frank?

Frank Blake 5:03 

I agree, I think we've seen a lot of improvement. But this is going to just get people more committed to it. And understand, you know, it's this is lead by doing, yo, it's all the words, all the great statements, those are all fine. They're important in these this couple of weeks. But in the end, it's lead by doing and set the example within your company.

David Novak 5:28 

You have a fascinating story. And one of the best stories that I remember you telling me was what happened when you were asked to be CEO of Home Depot? Would you would you share that story with

Frank Blake 5:39 

us? Sure. So I know you wrote a book called The Accidental CEO, I really felt like the accidental CEO. So I, I'm a lawyer by training, I worked at GE as a lawyer and then moved over into the m&a world at GE ending up as a direct report to Jack doing these mergers and acquisition work. I went to Home Depot working for Bob Nardelli, who used to work at GE and for whom I worked at GE. And I did basically the same thing at Home Depot, I bought companies we bought, we basically put together a whole series of deals creating this company still exists called Home Depot supply only, it's now called HD supply. Hey, that that's what I did. I did that for five, you know, I joined in 2002. I've done that for about five years, I get a call from the board in literally the last day of December 2006, saying they're parting ways with Bob. And they want me to be the new CEO. And I can tell you, David, absolute honesty, that and it never occurred to me, I was going to be the CEO of Home Depot, not ever not driving along debt at night, windshield wipers, you know, what would I do? In this place never occurred to me, nor frankly, had it ever occurred to anybody else. And so. And I said to the board, I said, First, I think you might want to think about this. I think you need someone with deeper retail experience than I have. Why don't you spend a day to think about it. And I'll spend a day thinking about whether I can do it. It was, as I say it was a it was a big surprise. And obviously, they spent a day and came back still offering me the job. And I took

David Novak 7:43 

frank it's interesting, if you get this job you really weren't looking for and you you really aren't deeply involved or under you don't have a deep understanding yet of retail, from your perspective, you know, how'd you get started?

Frank Blake 7:59 

So the good news is for me, and maybe it was the shock of it, and the unlikeliness of it. I felt like my eight years of CEO as CEO of Home Depot was our crash course in leadership, particularly the first year, I was fortunate to have worked for some amazing leaders, Jack Welch on the business side, I worked for a number of political leaders who I learned a lot from, and I read a lot. I looked at examples of leadership, I became a real student of leadership. And it wasn't anything that I had really focused on before in my life. I think that I think I'm, you know, this is one of the things that interests me about you. And I feel like I'm proof that leadership can be learned. It's i I can't describe I mean, a lawyer's training and a lawyer's background, stepping into a retail business where there are over 350,000 people at the time. Now there are over 400,000 people. It was something I had to learn. I had to learn, I had to learn quickly. And we can go through all the different things I learned. But that experience just gives me absolute confidence that leadership concepts can be learned and when they are put into place, they make a difference.

David Novak 9:33 

As I understand it, you actually went to your son as well who was working at Home Depot to get some get some insight what he offer you.

Frank Blake 9:43 

So my son, at the time was a store manager at Home Depot. He he served in Iraq and Home Depot had a program where returning veterans could come back and work in the stores and he had started assistant store manager and then moved around and it was at that time I'm a store manager. And so I called them and I said, Hey, I'm gonna be the new CEO of Home Depot. And he laughed, and he thought I was joking. I said, CBO. And I said, I need some advice. When I and you know, this, David, you have these communication vehicles set up within retail. And at Home Depot, we have break rooms, and the break rooms have a TV company sends in its message. And I had to go on TV, to deliver a message to 350,000 Associates. And I said to my son, what should I say, first off again, he laughed. He said, Good luck, dad. I said, What should I be talking about? And he said, Well, I can tell you how I start all my weekly store meetings. And I said, Great, what do you do? And he said, I read from Bernie Marcus and Arthur blanks book built from scratch, which is a great, one of the great entrepreneurial stories. Home Depot is just one of the great entrepreneurial stories I read from that book. And that's how I started in media, and I can't, that's brilliant. That's exactly what I'm gonna do. So I flipped through the book to find something that I thought would be relevant to talk about. And Bernie and Arthur talk a lot about the inverted pyramid, where the CEO is on the bottom of the pyramid, and the customer and Frontline associates. I thought, that's perfect. That's the message I want to hit. And that was my first conversation with 350,000 Associates. And for eight years, I tried to figure out what does that actually mean, to lead an organization where you put yourself as the CEO at the bottom?

David Novak 11:47 

I'm sure some of our listeners are out there probably rolling their eyes, you know, CEO at the bottom. Yeah. All right, what makes this concept so powerful in reality?

Frank Blake 11:56 

So I think I have a deep belief that, you know, you start off and you say, okay, just as you say, David, you're rolling your eyes, you say, Yeah, okay, that's a little forced humility, you know, fake humility, you're at the bottom of the pyramid, I actually think it is one of the most profound business concepts that exists. And it's profound, because it's a better reflection of reality. First, as you know, I mean, I wish I had the visual of the pyramid here, upside down. But the first thing impresses on you as a leader is, everything you do is uphill, it's uphill, nothing cascades down. When I hear leaders say that they've got a message cascades down through the organization, I go, Oh, no, it doesn't. Gravity is not your friend in an organization, you have to push your message up. Because in the end, people really don't know why they care what you're talking about. You have to provide that motivating force them to care about what you're saying. And so once you view yourself on the bottom, you understand, first off, everything that's important is happening about you, you have to have phenomenal listening skills. That's its whole separate topic. How do you listen? How do you actually understand what's happening up there above you, you have to focus on communication, because your message has to be simple and compelling. Because you're, you're counting on the people above you in the organization to relay that organ back communication through so they have to internalize that message as their own. And you have to, in my opinion, as you think about moving this ungainly pyramid that's flipped over. You have to win their hearts and minds as you say, you have to you have to get people going with you. My own belief that I learned from you and I, you know, what the one thing I would tell every single leader, pay attention, pay attention to what you recognize and celebrate in your organization, because that's what you're going to get. People are pretty smart. And when they're working in an organization, they're, for the most part, they want to be successful. But their CEO, how clear is their CEO and communicating what she or he actually wants. The clearest way you communicate, is through what you recognize and celebrate. I learned that from you. I did it religiously for eight years. And I feel like as I say that the understanding what it takes to move an organization from the bottom rather than the top was absolutely a key to thinking about leadership in the right way.

David Novak 14:59 

totally agree with you, when I was at Pepsi, we tried to do the same thing. We call it a build vote right side up company. And you know, we didn't have the success that I think that you had it at Home Depot, but it certainly moved us in the right direction by putting the front line at the top, you know, and you know, it's interesting, you know, I read built from scratch myself, and I gave it out to all of our leaders, because I thought it was such a fabulous thing. And we actually started a program called customer mania, which we got from Home Depot was to give, you know, be maniacal about making our customers happy. And I know that you talk about the importance of what you do really mattering. You know, what did you do to celebrate customer service? How do you give it a personal touch?

Frank Blake 15:40 

I will tell you, I spend a lot of time on this topic. And I, I tell leaders, you know, we all know, you get what you measure, I'd say there's a corollary concept, which is you get what you celebrate. So be very careful what you celebrate and recognize because that's what you're going to reinforce within your organization, within Home Depot. So I did a number of things. The first thing I did, and this came from, you know, I was fortunate in my career to work for George Bush dead when he was vice president. And the great thing about that job is, you know, the Vice President's staff is kind of small, you see what this guy does. And he would come in every morning. And remember, this is back in 1981, Dark Ages, he would come in every morning, and he had a typewriter. And he'd write these notes. And you knew it was his personal typing, because you know that if you remember typewriters, you'd be wiped out. And that letters would not be perfectly aligned. And he sent out notes for the first hour, hour and a half of the day. And as a staff person, when you got a note from the Vice President, United States, you just felt, I mean, so energized. So I it was such a powerful, positive feeling. And so I took that letter writing thing, that note writing thing. And every Sunday, we had during the week, we had all of our stores roll up great examples of customer service, they'd send them to the district to send them to the regions, and then I get them all. And I'd write about 200 handwritten notes every Sunday. It just write the notes. Thank you, Joe, or Jane, I heard that you did blank. You're awesome. Right. And I wondered, you know, is this kind of be is, is this going to be powerful? And about the third month in or something I was walking a store, and Associates came up to me and said, I got this note from you. Would you mind re sending it? Would you mind sending me another? I said, Yeah, no problem, why? And he said, Well, we all I get this note, and we all looked at we all figured it had to be robot pin. You couldn't possibly have written it. So we put it under water. And it ran and we ruined it. So when you write it,

David Novak 18:00 

what a great story.

Frank Blake 18:02 

So So I wrote the notes. I listened to you talk about putting photos of associates in your office. And I thought, That's brilliant. I'm gonna do that. But every time I walk the store, I you know, ask the store manager who's doing a great job, we take a photo, I put the photo on my office wall, I'd say anytime you come to Atlanta, come up and look at your photo on the wall. And some of the most emotional meaningful times for viewer associates coming and looking at their photos on the wall that came directly from you. I, we did a lot of other things. You know, we did rings, we did trips, we did all kinds of stuff. But I listened. You mentioned at the start that we participated in some CEO, CEO forum together. Every time you got up and talk. I listen. Because and I took furious notes. Because I you know, I think it's true if you lead an organization of three people, but I know it's true if you're leading an organization of 350,000 people, bringing those folks along, having them believe in the importance of what the company is doing and what the end the validity of what you're asking them to do is now it's at the top of the list of things you need to have.

David Novak 19:29 

Well are you obviously are a big believer of recognition and I have to tell you, you're very You're embarrassing me with the recognition you're giving me I appreciate it very much. You know, well Frank, why is it such a powerful force for for you, the giver to provide recognition? What's the giver get out of it?

Frank Blake 19:47 

I give. First off, it's great. You know this when you're writing positive notes to people you feel better about it. i Your life is just better and doing it. But I'm gonna give have a slightly cynical answer. Because I feel like sometimes people think oh, recognition, you know, that's a nice thing to do. It's warm and fuzzy. Here's, here's my sight, slightly cynical view. And it goes back to I'm old enough to have collected baseball cards as a kid. And when you collected baseball cards, you also sometimes tried to get players to sign when you have a baseball card of the utility infielder in for me, it was the Boston Red Sox, because that's where I grew up. So when I got the utility infielders baseball card, and he signed it, what happened, I started rooting for that utility infielder to get in the game and be great, because I had his card, I had his signature. And that's something I feel it's the same way with the people who are working for him. If I recognize them, and invest into them, they go, you know, I don't know about this guy, Frank. He's a lawyer, he's from GE, there are a lot of things I don't really like about his background, but he can't be a complete moron. Because he sees that what I'm doing has value. So I'm now going to invest in him a bit. I want him to succeed. And you know, the broader, more philosophical phrase is, you know, you invest in others, and they invest in your success. But you want as a leader, you want your team investing in your success? And then you turn the question, you say, Well, why the hell would they invest in my success? If I'm not investing in theirs? So I think that's why it's powerful. You've done the Leadership Studies. What I can't figure out, David, is why everybody doesn't get.

David Novak 22:00 

It's every leader secret weapon. You know, I call it purposeful recognition. And you talk about you celebrate what you're really looking for, you know, if a leader does that, you know, you're gonna see a lot more of those behaviors. But it's amazing, you know, a lot of leaders are afraid that if they recognize somebody, that they won't work as hard or they recognize somebody, somebody else will get their feelings hurt or whatever. And how do you respond to that?

Frank Blake 22:28 

I just for me, I would. Does anybody think that they react that way? I mean, I think you're exactly right. And one of the reasons that this isn't as widely adopted as it should be, but I would just ask people on there, you know, to self reflect. If someone says to you, you're doing a great job. Is your reaction I'm going to do less? Or is your reaction. That's great. I, this is terrific. I can self actualize. This is I'm gonna do more of this. I don't.

David Novak 23:04 

Yeah, I don't either. But that's why we're doing these podcasts is so Bora Bora. People will get it you've got a great example of that, you know, and, and Frank, you really study you study leadership, you really learn from other people, other companies, I'm sure you studied your highest performing stores. What were the keys to your best stores? If you had to pick one thing? What would it be?

Frank Blake 23:26 

Yeah, it's really the same factor. David, it's the you know, the store, certainly in the Home Depot world, the store was very much a reflection of the store manager. And you get store managers who, you know, they cared about their associates. They were true. Trainers, teachers, they empower them. It's they gave them you know, structure and purpose and what they were doing in their lives. It all pivoted around all the great stores, great store managers and much pivoted off of that store manager, you know, sometimes. And this may be particularly to a retail, one of the things I would do is every week when I would travel, I try to have dinner on the road with a group of 14 or so hourly Associates, and I didn't it wasn't 52 weeks a year, but I tried to do 35 to 40 weeks a year of at least one dinner a week. And that was so it was such a great learning experience for me because you talk to associates around the table. And you see how much of an impact when they talk about the job and these weren't the kind of job dinners these were more personal, you know, what's up in your life? How much of an impact the store manager would have on their lives? And I'll never forget one young man who is doing really well as an associate. And I you know, he was talking He said, You know, I owe at all my store manager and I said, Yeah, you know, I hear that a lot. He said, No, no, I really, I owe it all to my store name. So when I started Home Depot, I loved the job. But I just had a really hard time showing up for work on time. It just, I have a hard time. And he said, after a while, my store manager pulled me aside and she said, you know, Joe, I love what you're doing, and you're doing a great job. But you show up one more time for work late, and I'm gonna fire you. And he said, I went out. And I bought a digital clock, an analog alarm clock, while all these different types of alarm clocks. He said, I've never been late since. And he said, You have no idea. Just the one simple thing around waking up on time. What a difference has made my life that's the

David Novak 25:50 

power of the store manager than this, why the store manager is the most important leader, you know, because they build the teams that's closest to the customer. And you know, you can't make your customers happy unless you've got team members that are happy. You know, I think you probably learned that one too. Right?

Frank Blake 26:05 

Exactly. Right. And that, you know, I get really irritated with people who downplay retail jobs. And I think there's so much that is learned. I know, I learned so much working on the floor of the store, I think there's so much that people learn as they come up through the ranks in a retail environment. Starting with that basic, I got structure. This is what I got to do today. This is how I treat my customers. This is how I act professionally. I'm a depot, we were really proud of the fact that 85% of our store managers start as hourly associates and most of upper management on the store side started as hourly associates. I mean, it was a way it's a way to succeed a path for success in life. That is that is just unparalleled. My last year as as CEO, said, I'm gonna go out with Bernie Marcus and Ken Langone people, you know, well, particularly Ken, and we're gonna have lunch and it happened to be Columbus, Ohio, we're going to have lunch at a store in Columbus, Ohio, gathered together a bunch of associates. Yeah, 20 Associates, we sit down. And the way the lunch started, you know, all the associates had to introduce themselves. The way the lunch started, was the first associate saying, Bernie Can I gotta thank you, because but for you, but for Home Depot, my kid wouldn't be going to college, that the next associates, I want to thank you because but for you, I wouldn't have a house. I wouldn't have. I mean, these are lives that are being created and enabled. Because you know, they're doing such a great job of customer service. I think it is the American Dream that plays out. It plays out every single day, in stores, like your former stores and stores like Home Depot.

David Novak 28:18 

There are so many people start out in retail jobs as FBM, chief operating officers, President CEOs of companies and the there's just a long list of them. You know, Frank, you're so humble, and you give so much credit to so many other people. But you made a really big strategic decision or more than one I'm sure but at Home Depot, but what would have been your biggest strategic decision that you've made? Because you were talking about how you weren't acquisitions? You sold a Home Depot supply? You know, what would have been what was your focus when you took over the job? The two

Frank Blake 28:49 

biggest immediate strategic decisions that had long term implications. The first one was my first board meeting. It was a proposal to sell the business that I had been coming in in front of the board for the last five years pitching the acquisitions. i We need to sell home depot supply HD supply. So that was the first big decision. It was a difficult one for me, and obviously difficult for you talk about tough board discussion. That was an interesting board discussion. But I had the full support of Ken Langone another we I had a great board, they were really supportive of it. My rationale, it turned out to be perfect timing because the business you know, really had a tough time even harder than Home Depot in housing prices. But the personal reason for me was focused, I said there's no way I can run both a great retail business and a great commercial distribution business, which is what Home Depot supply was. So I need focus. So we sold that business that was An important decision. And then the probably the most important was we stopped building stores completely, completely stopped building stores. And our economic model had been driven off of we were driving, we were building 200 stores a year. And you know, that is, again, if you well know the retail economic model, you open new stores that generates new sales that's, you know, part of the flywheel. And it was clear that our new stores just weren't having the right economic return, and we close, we stop. And we took a half a billion dollar write off clearing out the entire pipeline and new stores. And it was, it was a statement, that's basically what we're gonna rise or fall on our ability to grow sales from the stores we got, we're gonna double down on online, which I think was, you know, we were fortunate that that was, we were probably ahead of the game on that. And we're going to make some other investments, but we're not building any new stores.

David Novak 31:05 

So you ended up you turned around this, you know, iconic brand by basically saying, I'm gonna grow my existing asset base, grow my existing stores, you went back to the basics on the customers. It sounds like that's what it was a back to basics kind of strategy. Why do you think so many great companies lose their way? Because by doing what you did, you had remarkable success?

Frank Blake 31:29 

Oh, David, totally. So this is an odd thing to say. I think that people, sometimes they reach too high for growth, they get too complicated in how they're going to grow, I think is odd to say, but I think they actually sometimes get a little bored of doing the same thing. And want to kind of keep tricking it up and making it different. I mean, I think being excellent. If you define your goal as not growth, exactly. But you define your goal around excellence, and we are going to be brilliant at what we do your raving fans, we're going to be brilliant at what we do. That is a compelling, fascinating, never ending journey. If you define your goal, as I hit X amount of growth, you start doing some different things is my observation. Excellence is really hard.

David Novak 32:33 

Yeah, absolutely. And there are so many turnaround stories when people bring in the new CEO. And it's always, you know, they usually turn the business by getting back to what really got you there in the first place, which is amazing. But it's amazing. A lot of CEOs derail Frank, well, what do you think is the big reason why leaders derail doesn't matter if you're CEO, just the leader, you know, as you're moving up the ladder, what causes leaders to get off track?

Frank Blake 33:00 

So I think the number one thing is, it's a combination of both listening and encouraging other people to speak. So Bernie, Marcus had a great, had great advice for me early on. The first couple of weeks of being CEO, he said, Look, here's what's going to happen, you're going to be the CEO, you're going to be around the table with your team, you're going to tell a joke, and everyone will laugh. And let me tell you, you're not funny. Look, what happens to every CEO is all the people around her or him, all of the folks who work for them, try to tell them the things they think they want to hear. They don't want to displace the CEO. And so suddenly, over time, you get into a bubble. And your bubble is Jay, how smart you are, how all of your decisions make sense. And it's what I think is the problem for most CEOs is, first off, they don't understand how difficult it is to actually listen and spur communication. They think I joke with people I said, Look, if you're the CEO, and I give the example of walk in store, if you're a CEO, when you walk into a store and say in the store manager, how's everything going? There's only one right answer to that question. If he has a store name, the right answer is, everything's great. You're wonderful. Please leave. That's the only that's the only thing. You don't want to talk to the CEO about what's really going on. So you have to listening is a contact sport. You have to figure out how you listen, and how you really sit down with people and understand what the hell What's going on because no one wants to tell you. And so CEOs, in my opinion, where they start going off the rails is they're not being told the truth as it really is. And they're not seeking out the truth. They're losing track. They got the pyramid starts with me. And I cascade down. They're losing track of the fact that everything important is happening above them. They got to work like hell to keep up with that.

David Novak 35:29 

You mentioned this earlier, you you've studied, and you have some ideas and thoughts on how you listen. How do you listen, Frank? I mean, what advice can you give on how to listen? I'll give

Frank Blake 35:39 

two examples of that. The first example was working with Welch. And Jack was one of the things that that she somehow and is scary, smart guy. I mean, and I emphasize both of those words, both could be tagged when you were reviewing with him, and just unbelievably super smart. I started a GE is a little dinky lawyer. I mean, I think I started GE as a lawyer, lawyers at GE were like, I mean, that was the ultimate. And yet, even as a lawyer, a GE, I had in my mind that the path to success at GE, was to disagree with Welch. And of course, you had to be right. If you're wrong, that was definitely not a path to success, but be thoughtful, and be confident and be right. I feel like my career at GE was made from the fact that there were a couple of times where I disagree. And it turned out to be I was right. And he took notice, a lot of CEOs fall they say that they encourage dialogue, and they want to hear and all the rest of that they actually don't, somebody says something different than they think and they jump down their throat. They don't see it. It's a reflex, right? There's a reflex action, they don't see it, they don't see how they're cutting off debate. So that's one example than the other example. Right? On I learned from a member of our Home Depot board guy named blade, Jackson, and laid with him said, look, the only way you really find out what's going wrong is and he would walk a store. And if we were doing some project or whatever the heck Project X, his question would be, why isn't Project X working? And you know, whoever it was, who was with us would come ask how does the board of directors has he know it's not working? Well, he has no clue whether it's working or not. But when you say why isn't it working? Well, you actually prompt the conversation versus saying, hey, everything, you know, how's everything. It's just one example. But as I say, listening is so easy to get cut off, and everything's great until it's not great. And then it's too damn late.

David Novak 38:05 

You focused on your core business. And so you, you had to drive innovation around your your core business team, did you have any things you did as a leader to really drive home the importance of innovation and and encouraging it and making sure that you got it?

Frank Blake 38:20 

Yeah, and David, I'd say I did my best at it. I think we built a really first rate website, and we were a little ahead of everyone on that. But I would say, if I were rewinding the clock, I was not as good in encouraging mistakes is I wish I had. So I think any really innovative culture has to have a tolerance for mistakes. And a little bit going back to our other conversation, a little bit of some celebration of some interesting mistakes. And we did that a few times. But i i That's a learning I've had more since how hard innovation is how the real innovators, everybody wants to pound them into dust, frankly, I mean, you you must hide from your from your life. If you're really innovating. By definition, no one thinks it's a good idea. It's very easy to poke holes in it. And it's really easy for the organization at Yeah.

David Novak 39:28 

You had so much success at Home Depot. Now you're an iconic leader, whether you would accept that definition or not. You are you have all that kind of success. But when you look back did you have you know an epic fail? Um, is there something that you look back on your career doesn't have to be at Home Depot, but just in your life where you said, hey, you know, I really miss this one.

Frank Blake 39:49 

I have lots of failures. I guess the biggest I in some respects, I feel like my first few years at Home Depot. This isn't maybe in the epic terms of impact to the company, but it was epic in terms of its impact on me. So in addition to doing m&a activity, I was in charge of real estate for Home Depot. And, you know, as I said, we were building 200 stores a year, that is, you know, and these are 100,000 plus square foot stores. So that's a clip. And it was a number, say, I'm just an assembly line building. And as I mentioned, my son was started working at Home Depot been I was there for a few years. And he was out in Colorado, he had been in Fort Carson in Colorado, and he left the army there. And he started working at Home Depot in the store and in around Colorado Springs. And then his first big assignment, as a assistant store manager was in a new store, a brand new store outside of Colorado Springs. So I flew to visit him. And we had dinner the night before. And he had three or four of his army buddies who were having dinner. And the first thing that hit me at dinner was just the how amazing these young men were, and the sacrifices they made for the country, and how it was so not I mean, you know, we sort of acknowledge it. But we don't do a great job as a country doing that, really, when you think about putting yourself in harm's way, hey, that, so very, very meaningful dinner. And then afterwards, I'm going to visit him in the new store just opened a new store that I'd built, I'd found the real estate, I'd built the store, it gives me the address, I drive down the road, I don't see anything, I circle back, I don't see anything, I drive down the road, I do this loop, a couple of mile loop two or three times before I finally find the store, I couldn't find the store because there was an immense berm in front of the store that was blocking the visibility of the store and the roadside. So that's hard number one with a tiny dinky little slot that I walk in store, and my son started showing me around. And, um, you know, again, you'd appreciate this as a as a retailer, but everything about the store structure, you could see there were just all kinds of compromises made themes were in the wrong place. Just it was not well done. And that was on me. This is my son, who was so proud of his store. He's just returned from Iraq. And I built a shitty store. And I just built a chain store. And why did I build such a bad store? I, I built it because it was a number. Because I was looking to process 200 stores in a year, didn't really have time to make sure it was the store that my son, the returning Iraq veteran would be running. And it was my first real aha moment of I didn't I wasn't thinking inverted pyramid then or anything like that. But I was thinking I am I am not looking at my job the right way. I need to look at my job as though the things I am doing I am doing for my son and take that responsibility on. Because what I did was appalling. I mean, you know, he wasn't saying that. How could you have built this horrible store for me. But I was saying,

David Novak 43:51 

and that's such a great insight. That's such a such a great insight. And even though as a failure, you learn so much. And I think we all have to remember that and see if you can learn from these things that we don't necessarily do. Right? What three bits of advice would you give aspiring leaders out there?

Frank Blake 44:08 

The first thing is, I think just as a career advice, my first perspective is looking at your job as solving a series of more difficult problems. Just by looking at your career, what you want in your career is solve the opportunity to solve bigger and bigger problems. Don't get hung up on titles. I see too many people get hung up on titles. It's a curse. Just make sure you're solving bigger problems because the more you solve bigger problems, the more problems you'll get to solve related to that, in terms of advancing through an organization or advancing anywhere, just realize that that's your job. If you're starting a business, you're solving customer problems. If you're within an organization, you want to show your boss that you're capable of solving these problems. That's what you are. That's your job. So that's the first thing, think about your job that way. The second thing is I wrestled with this, I'd be curious to your take your which is more important. Self confidence or courage. And I, I'd lean into the courage side of it, do things that you're not completely confident about work your way into them. Don't expect, don't expect that you'll fully understand stuff. Certainly for me. I, I think some of the best growth comes from doing things that are slightly or massively, maybe outside, outside your comfort zone, test yourself move, move outside your comfort zone. And then you know, the third piece of advice is is what you teach in your books. I'm sure what you teach in your course. It's, it's leadership is about people. So understand and invest into the people around you invest into their success. And, surprisingly enough, as I say, they'll invest in here.

David Novak 46:06 

Yeah, that's, that's, that's great, great advice. You know, you know, you asked me about courage and self confidence, they kind of go hand in hand. You know, it's hard to have the courage unless you have some sort of self confidence, but I don't know. I don't know. But I, I really admire people who will get out of their comfort zone like you say, that's fantastic. Frank, I've had so much fun doing this conversation. I want to have a little bit more fun with you and do a lightning round of q&a. Okay, so are you ready for this?

Frank Blake 46:33 

I guess. Okay.

David Novak 46:35 

What three words best describe you? Oh,

Frank Blake 46:38 

I'd say. I hope humorous, reflective, and kind.

David Novak 46:48 

If you could change places with one person for a day, who would it be? And why?

Frank Blake 46:53 

Ah, I don't know. There are lots of different people. But I change places with a great musician. I'd love to be able to make amazing music.

David Novak 47:03 

And what would be something that few people would know about you?

Frank Blake 47:07 

Ah, what would be something? Gosh, I I like I'm a big my big love is Norwegian literature and Norwegian TV shows.

David Novak 47:20 

That would be unique. Do you have any hidden talents yourself? You mentioned you'd like to be a musician?

Frank Blake 47:26 

No, I wish I wish I had some hidden talents. I wish I wish I had musical talents. i There are all kinds of talents. I wish I had.

David Novak 47:36 

You know, I understand, Frank, you're doing a podcast yourself. Tell us about it.

Frank Blake 47:41 

So yes, I am. And thank you, David, for participating. The podcast is called Crazy good turns. And we celebrate people who've done crazy good things for other people. We this is now in its fourth year. I I love it. I am having such a good time with it. And I loved having you on it. Because when I think of how I learned about frontline Associates, and the importance of giving to frontline Associates, and investing in your people, I learned that from you. I happen to think retail workers are I think it's one of the great segments of the workforce. Because you get people who you don't start necessarily thinking you're gonna make a job in retail, but boy, do you learn a lot and you can grow a lot. And again, I learned it from you. And so it was a great granddaddy on the podcast.

David Novak 48:43 

Thanks, Frank. I appreciate that so much. You're giving way too much credit here. But Frank, I got to ask you this, everybody I've talked to. And I believe this myself say that you are one of the most humble people they've ever bet. Even though you've accomplished so much. Are you really this humble?

Frank Blake 49:00 

No, of course. No. David, I would say it to the contrary. I'm I try to be objective. And we've had a little bit of this discussion. But honestly, if you looked at my background, and put me into the job of Home Depot, if I were anything but humble on taking over that job, you'd say What kind of idiot are you should be humble. You know, there are other things where I actually, you know, probably a lot less humble, but no, absolutely not. And, and plus it's, uh, you know, it would be weird if I were saying you know how humble I am I am. David, look, it's it's, no one would have said this was The guy who can who can run home depot. This is a guy who can run a retailer of over 300. No.

David Novak 50:08 

Well, success has many fathers. Now, Fred, you know, success has many fathers, a lot of people really, you know, they're your biggest fans. And I know, I know the guy who was the leader in making you the CEO. It's Ken Langone at Home Depot founder, because he

Frank Blake 50:25 

can definitely saw something in me. I didn't see in myself. So I owe everything to Ken.

David Novak 50:30 

Well, you know, Ken asked me, he said, you know, you're gonna do this podcast with Frank, he said, You got to get him to talk about his law career. It was distinguished. He's one of the he was a clerk for a Supreme Court justice, he started his own law firm, you know, you've got a lot of humility, and you bet you've had a pretty distinguished career. And whatever you've done, whether it's satisfying Jack Walsh, by taking him on, what do you think is the single biggest trait that you do have as a leader,

Frank Blake 51:01 

I like to think that love learning, I just, I love learning. And I think, and it helps, having done lots of things that I that I probably wasn't fully qualified for that, you know, it sort of gives you a rocket boost to the learning part of the job. But that is why, you know, people like you and what you're doing the teaching, I just, I hope, I hope that the people who take your courses and listen to you, I hope they are likes punches. Because what what I would I believe more in my comments is, it actually works and makes a difference. And I don't know, I you know, lots of people do lots of different leadership things. But I believe, and I say this sincerely, sincerely, not because I'm on this podcast, sincerely, I, people have more to learn about leadership, from David Novak, than anyone else. I you understand how you get, I mean, nothing we do is done on our own. Right. And you get that, and you get, I kind of, I gotta get an army behind me. And the bigger the army, the better it is. And you're brilliant. You got armies behind you.

David Novak 52:40 

You know, I tell you. While there's no question Nope, nothing big can happen by ourselves. And you, you know that. And Frank, you are an unbelievable learner. And let me tell you something, anybody that listens to this conversation is going to pick up so much learning that they can put to use and make themselves a better leader. This is this is how you lead you lead, like Frank Blake. And, Frank, I want to thank you so much for taking the time. I'm gonna bring you back because I cut about half my questions just to try to keep this with it at hour, because you got so much to learn from so thank you so much. All

Frank Blake 53:17 

the facts go the other way did it? Many, many times?

David Novak 53:28 

Well, I know Frank Blake very, very well. And believe me, Frank is the real deal. I mean, can you imagine how cramped his hand must feel after writing 200? thank you notes every week. Who does that? Well, Frank Blake does. And he does it because when he sees excellence, he wants to call it out. So this week is part of your weekly personal development plan. We're going to take a page out of Frank's playbook. I want you to write some thank you notes to a few people on your team. Know You don't have to write 200. But go ahead if you've got the energy, but I want you to take the time to write some real genuine thank you notes, and do it with actual paper and a pen. And as you write, praise people for the way they've demonstrated excellence in their day to day jobs. This simple gesture is going to mean the world to your team members. And it's going to show everyone on your team, the power of aiming for excellence and the value that you put on it. So do you want to know how leaders lead what we learned today is the great leaders aim for excellence, not just growth. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead where every Thursday you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world. I make it a point to give you something simple on each episode that you can apply to your business so that you will become the best leader You can be