David Novak 0:04 

Welcome to How leaders lead where every week you get to listen. And while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world, I break down the key learnings so that by the end of the episode, you'll have something simple you can apply as you develop into a better leader. That's what this podcast is all about. Today's guest is Jim Levine, who is the founder and principal at his literary agency LGR. He represents authors like Tom Brady, Ray Dalio, Patrick Lencioni, and even some guy named David Novak. As the literary agent, Jim's mentality is all about helping others when he wants to land good deals for his authors, help publishers find the right books, and Coach everyone on his team to succeed. Let me tell you, there's a level of satisfaction you just can't get until you learn to help others win. It's a mentality every leader needs to develop. And Jim is the perfect person to show you how it's done. Plus, if you've ever thought about writing a book, you're about to get a rare inside look into the world of publishing. So let's get into it. Here's my conversation with my good friend had soon to be yours, Jim Lavie?

Jim, a lot of people are unfamiliar with how literary agencies really work. Give us an overview of the business you're in and how the business model itself works. Publishing

Jim Levine 1:30 

and being a literary agent is like playing in a casino. There is no logic to it. The longer I am in this business, the more I realized, there is no rhyme or reason, we'll send out projects to publishers say we send out the same proposal, we can have an auction, and bids come in 25,000 50,000 75,300 50,000. How could people in a business who are supposed to know what they're doing be valuing the same property at such a broad range, and this is my life every day, it's not not even that sometimes it's, you'll get no better except one who's willing to pay a million dollars. My job is to find the best match between my clients goals. And the publisher will help them meet that goal. Sometimes it's not just money. There's lots of other factors that go into it. What

David Novak 2:28 

book in your career, Jim surprised you the most and how well it did. Probably

Jim Levine 2:33 

Last Child in the Woods by Richard Luth. That's a book about the importance of nature for all of us. Great writer, really terrific book, we couldn't get anybody to buy that we got one publisher, who made a pretty decent offer, that book has gone over to sell over a million copies has become a classic in his field, and it just keeps selling and selling.

David Novak 2:58 

I'll put it on the list. Now, when that happened, and when you have these surprises. How did it change the way you process ideas from then on. It's

Jim Levine 3:09 

changed me as a leader in helping my young colleagues understand that we're in it for the long game, when I'm training, you know, when I've got young people, I say, feel the skin on my ride often feel that it's as tough as a rhinoceros hide, how do I got that is from all the rejections. I know you want to sell books, you're gonna sell books. But the main thing you got to deal with learn to deal with rejection, you got to just deal with it, develop a tough skin, don't take it personally. If you believe in this project, then stick with it. And we'll help you do everything we can to sell it. If in the end, it doesn't sell okay. But if it's something you believe, and you think it's important, you're passionate about it, you think you've got a great author. Stick with it. Well,

David Novak 3:59 

Jim, you've had 30 New York Times bestsellers in the last two years alone, which is incredible. You know, as the leader in your industry in your category, is there any one thing that you could say is the it factor for the books that really make it? I

Jim Levine 4:15 

specialize in Big Idea books by business leaders, change agents, thought leaders like yourself, there are three elements. One is a contrarian idea, big idea that's fresh. Two is stories, got to have stories. That's what engages readers. And the third is takeaways. People got to know what do I do Monday morning? How is this book going to change my outlook on the world the way I think about the world or the way I act in the world? So I'm always looking for those three elements. You

David Novak 4:45 

know, all leaders have people who bring them a germ of an idea. share a story of when that happened to you with the book and how you helped develop it into a winner wasn't all the way there yet but you you added that special cherry On top that made it go.

Jim Levine 5:01 

So a guy comes to me 2530 years ago. He's a psychologist referred by another psychologist, he's got an idea for a book about relationships, really smart guy, but none of his ideas about psychology work. So what I try to do is find out, you know, tell me about other stuff you're interested in, what do you what do you do for hobbies? And he says, you know, I'm really into craft beers. I have this list. I keep it Yeah, I kind of got a rating system for craft beers. I say really got a rating system because I love craft beer myself. He said, Yeah, I gotta write in my pocket. He takes a little slip of paper out of his wallet, his current lit wrestling of craft beers. I look at him, I say that's a book. He says, What do you mean, that's a book, I say that's a book. We do the beer lovers Bible. I know just the publisher to take a to took it to Peter workman at Workman Publishing, he got it immediately. That book has been selling steadily for 25 years, this guy comes in to my office to tell me one story. And I'm trying to be open minded enough to look at, well, this, this guy's an interesting person, he's got to have other stories. That's really I think what it takes to be successful in this business is not to take what's on the surface, but to try to pay attention to what other people aren't paying attention to them,

David Novak 6:26 

a lot of people struggle to have their ideas challenged and criticized, you know, especially creative people, and you're dealing with really creative idea leaders. And a lot of powerful people who have a lot of people telling them how great they are all the time. Give us an example of how you offer feedback. After you know that people have put their heart and soul into a project.

Jim Levine 6:47 

My whole approach to being an agent and to life, I guess is to catch them doing something right? You know, somebody sends me something that's a 40 page proposal, they put their heart and soul into it. And I'm thinking, this is terrible. There's not a lot of good stuff. But in fact, there is a good paragraph on page 13. And there's another one on page 17. So let's go in and look at that and figure out how we can do more of that. So I'm trying to capture people doing something right. And then coaching them. I'm a coach to my authors. I'm a coach, the people on my team, whatever their strength is, I want to capture that and then help them to develop it to be even stronger than it was when they came to me. You know, sometimes

David Novak 7:34 

we learn things the hard way, Jim, and I'm sure you would recognize that, can you share a time when maybe you offered feedback poorly and what you learn from it? I

Jim Levine 7:44 

got a great example of that, actually, this guy comes to me, he's been self publishing a book. He's making a ton of money selling books out of the back of his car. It's a book called The question behind the question. And I mean, he's selling books, by in numbers, he's selling a million copies a year, this book, he's making a really good living, he's speaking, he's got sales that any publisher would kill for. So he comes to me. And, you know, he wants to be published by regular publisher. And I've always thought to myself, you know, my goal, I want to serve the client, I'm going to get you the best deal possible. And I say to him, Look, I think you should just keep doing what you're doing. Because any publisher, you're just not going to make as much money. You know, man, you got a successful business. Just keep keep doing it. And I didn't listen carefully enough. For him. It really wasn't about the money. He wanted the prestige. He wanted to be published by Simon and Schuster, urandom house to somebody like that. And I took that to heart because another agent took it found a big publisher, the books been a big success for like 20 years. All I had to do is really listen to what does this guy really want. I'm thinking, Oh, I can give him what he should want, which is to keep doing what he's doing. I was missing what he really wanted.

David Novak 9:19 

So Jim, after you vet these ideas that you know, come into your office every day, you then have to go out and sell it to the publisher. If you think it's a good one, what's your template for how you do this to get the most value for your clients?

Jim Levine 9:32 

I'm a matchmaker. I need to understand my clients what their goals are, what their needs are, what their work is. But I also need to understand who would be the right person on the publishing side who's going to really love something that go crazy. And part of that is getting to know editors individually. You know what their tastes are? Here's a great example. guy comes up to my wife at a party. He's a professor Rational golfer. He says, Oh, I got a book I want to write. Right. Okay, so Oh, that's great. My husband's a golfer, he's an agent, I meet this guy's name's Roberto Borgatti. I say, Look, this is great. Roberto, what's your method? Have you written anything on paper? Just I don't really know what my method is. I said, Look, I got an idea. Take me out for a teaching lesson. Take me out on the course. And I'll see if you got a method. And maybe we can put it into words, the guy takes me out. He's an amazing teacher. After nine holes, I'm just playing the best golfer I've ever played in my life. And I come up with this notion that you know what you made me? Do, you made me trust my swing? So I think we can call your method of swing you can trust? And how am I going to sell this? Nobody's heard of this guy. This isn't Tiger Woods. I said, look, the only way we're going to sell this book is I gotta find an editor, or a publisher, who is as much of a golf fanatic as I am. And I got to get them out on the golf course, with you and me. Now, because I know, the editors and publishers who are into golf the way I am, that's how I make the match. So I called Judith Carr, who is the president of atria, Judith, look, I got a great author for you, I got a great book for you. But the only way you're going to believe it is you come out on the golf course with me and him. So the worst that can happen is you get a great golf lesson. The best that can happen for you and me, is you're gonna buy the book, I take her out with Roberto, we play 18, hauls, he gets off the course and says I want to buy the book, I sent her a one page pitch for the book, we didn't even have a full description of the book. She got it, there was magic there. And she knew that she and I could work together to figure out the book.

David Novak 12:02 

Love it, a lot of your deals are much more complicated. There's a lot more negotiation that goes along with it than that, you know, although that's a really unique way to skin the cat. Talk about how you get to yes, when you negotiate with your, with your publishers,

Jim Levine 12:18 

you got to kind of understand this an auction process and publishing. So we'll send out a proposal. And we got to sort of find out is there a market for this book, you know that that golf story was a rare case, that's one publisher, I'll send out a proposal, let's say I send it out to 20 publishers, turns out three are interested, we'll set up what's called a best bids auction, publishers submit their bids. And lots of people think that the best way to get the best deal for that for your client is to have an auction, which people think of is like in a painting at Sotheby's you know, you raise your hand $5 $10. You know, that doesn't work for my clients. Unless I know that I got a big spread, because let's say I've got three potential bidders. If I hold a round robin, and the highest anybody's going to be at is 50,000. I'm not going to get to 100,000 by having a round robin auction. So what I do is I have what's called a one time best bids auction. Publishers hate to do that, because they're they don't know where everybody else stands, they got to put their cards down on the table, that sort of forces them to put the most money down that they're willing to pay. So that lets me optimize for the amount of money. But I want maximum control and flexibility for my clients, I want to give them the ability to choose a partner based not just on the total amount of money offered, but on all elements of the deal. The publishers plan who the editor is marketing, etc.

David Novak 13:57 

As you mentioned earlier, not every book gets sold, and sometimes an author or your people or you yourself you face rejection. How do you coach yourself and others on how to accept rejection and failure?

Jim Levine 14:12 

In our team meetings that we have every two weeks, one of the things we do is focus on what we call situations which are kind of problems or challenges. So we've got everybody coming to the table, including me, saying, I just can't sell this book, or I don't know why. But I've been doing this for a long time. So younger people are hearing all the time they're seeing that they're not alone. In meeting with disappointment. I think that's the most important thing. We built a culture where people feel comfortable sharing their vulnerability, their disappointment and understanding that they're not alone. So I think if you can show people that it's just part of the job and it's part Life and you got a support team behind you. That's what keeps people going is no one they got a team with them. You know, it's like basketball or any sport, you know, one day you win the next day you lose next day you win. But if you know your team's they're fighting hard for you that makes it possible to, you know, we got people working for us a long, long time. And I think it's part of the team culture that keeps them there. Jim,

David Novak 15:25 

is there ever been a book that you absolutely knew was great, but you couldn't sell it the first go around? And you know, you're a busy guy, you got all these books hitting your desk every day that people want you to sell? Do you just give up on that book then and try to get a higher return? On another book that crossed your desk?

Jim Levine 15:46 

Oh, if it's something I believe in, I think it's a good book that's got to get published on absolutely doggone. I'm like a dog with a bone and won't let go that I'm just determined. To sell it. I'll tell you two stories. One is a book by my client, Jeff Hawkins, the guy that developed the Palm Pilot, he's actually a brilliant neuroscientist. We did a book on intelligence and couldn't sell it. And I just went back to the one of the publishers, so I thought it would be the best and I said, you just missing this. I want to sit down with you and figure out because I want to help you see what I'm seeing. And we were able to convince the publisher that he was missing things, and we were saying things the right way. Here's another story, a recent story. This is one of the most fun projects I've worked on to clients come to me. They've had another agent, they're trying to sell a book about Costco DISA to Costco fanatics. They spent years visiting Costco sold around the world, they're on this kind of like a hobby does it cost us okay? They had an agent who was trying to sell a book on kind of how Costco does business. And nobody would take it, you know, they came into met with my colleague, Courtney Pagon. Le young agent than me, we both happen to be big Costco fans. And we're talking about that with them. And pointy says, Well, that's the wrong idea. You need to create a book that gives people the experience of being at Costco, you know, walk in there, you never know what you're going to find, need to create a treasure hunt of a book. So we create this book with them called The Joy of Costco, a treasure hunt from A to Z. I can't get any publisher to publish it because everybody's saying, this is just for the Costco fan base, unless Costco agrees to carry this book. How are we going to do this? So we finally get one publisher who's agrees to at a profit sharing base is going to do it, the author say, You know what, we've decided we put so much skin in the game. We're going to become publishers, we're going to self publish this. Now, at that point, I put a lot of work in this thing. Do I drop out is Courtney drop out. So we said guess what, we'll continue being partners with you. We'll take a piece of the back end. And we became sort of producers we help them find a designer we help them find PR firm and Costco just took an initial order of 50,000 copies. We just believe this was great. We're gonna stick with you. It's unconventional, but we're gonna just, we're gonna do everything to make this work. And it was it was great fun.

Koula Callahan 18:36 

Have you ever wondered what David is thinking as he interviews our guests each week? Or have you been interested in hearing David's take on some of the questions that he asks his guest? Well, I do and I know a lot of you do, too. My name is Kula Callahan. And together with David, I host the three more questions podcasts that airs every Monday. These episodes are just about 15 minutes. And in them, I asked David three questions that dive deeper into the themes of his episode with his guests. David shares incredible insights and stories from his career leading yum brands. And all of His answers are super practical and inspiring. Like this great insight David shared and one of our most recent, three more questions episodes.

David Novak 19:18 

If you take over for a founder, or you take over for a director or you take over for another Vice President, you know, really understand what made the prior person successful. What made other people want to work with them, how did they get the results? You know, a lot of times what I see is people take over jobs, and they can't wait to just eliminate the person that they took over for. They can't wait to wipe out the thought of anybody thinking about that prior person or the founder because their egos so big that they want to be seen as the new person. And so they don't really tap into the knowledge and the know how that the people that they're taking In over four, obviously have get the

Koula Callahan 20:03 

three more questions podcasts in your feed each Monday and dive even deeper into the episodes you know and love. Just subscribe to how leaders lead wherever you get your podcasts

David Novak 20:21 

you know, Jim, you've worked with such famous people, leaders. And I know you've got some stories on this. What was it like to work with Eric Schmidt of Google? What was the one thing you learned from him? Eric

Jim Levine 20:31 

is really brilliant. And he's really tough and demanding, as many of the world leaders I work with are, I think that you just gotta have really high standards, you know, just don't settle for anything but the best. How about the famous investor Ray Dalio. Same thing, Ray is on the marketing side. We're selling his book all over the world. And we're getting offers from our CO agents, from different publishers in China and Brazil, and wherever. And Ray just wanted to know with great detail about each of these publishers, because if he was going to partner with somebody, it wasn't just about the amount of money they offered. He wanted to know where they are going to be really good partners. He's got a name, that's a brand, and he has to protect that. And he forced us to do much greater due diligence in depth in knowing about our foreign publishing partners.

David Novak 21:24 

How about the legendary quarterback Tom Brady.

Jim Levine 21:29 

Tom had a team of people around him, you know, to help us put the book together. So that that that was a case of a book where I mean, just having a book by Tom Brady, we knew we were going to sell it that was just, you know, he's just one of the most lovely, generous, thoughtful, kind guys you could ever meet 100%

David Novak 21:49 

And how about Gillian Flynn who sold over 20 million copies of her book on girl?

Jim Levine 21:55 

Well, killings represented by my partner, Stephanie, Roston? You know, that's again, one of these cases, Gilliam's first book was a really hard sell. Gone Girl wasn't her first book. But her previous books, they were really dark. And publishers didn't know if there'd be an audience for it. And you know, said that was the case was Stephanie just believed in Killians talent, has stuck with her worked with her and Killian is absolutely brilliant. One of the things that that's so interesting about this business is some of the most successful people like Gillean have the most humble, they don't take success for granted. It doesn't go to their head. They've got a really strong work ethic, they just keep at it. They don't rest on their laurels. They just keep doing it.

David Novak 22:45 

You know, I know you're really proud of the fact you've kept the talent on your team for a long time. And continuity in any business is a huge value. But how do you keep getting fresh ideas with a tenured team?

Jim Levine 22:57 

We have meetings we've set up for our fiction team, I don't do a lot of fiction. They're looking for ideas that come from the news media, wherever. And we just have to keep reading widely. Lots of different media coming up with, you know, ideas from out of the blue. I'll tell you one way to keep fresh ideas. Sometimes we had interns, one of the interns was my grandson, Elijah and Elijah is 15 years old. He calls me out of the blue says Bob, I've got a guy for you to go after. I said Who is it? He says his name is ro Khanna who's ro Khanna. So he's the congressman from Silicon Valley. But he is also co chair of the Bernie Sanders campaign. And I think there's a no one's written a book by a progressive capitalist. I think he's a progressive capitalist. So I said, That's really interesting. You know, I never heard of him. But I think one of my clients used to date him. I called her up. She used to date him, she made the introduction. That was a case where Elijah and my 15 year old grandson did the heavy lifting. He basically wrote the guts of the proposal with me, but the fresh idea came from him.

David Novak 24:10 

That's a great when you have a relatively small team, Around 20 people or so how does someone new get hired? What's your process?

Jim Levine 24:18 

I think there's the most important thing in any hiring is to figure out what you're looking for what are your values, and we've identified three qualities we're looking for which I picked up from my client, Patrick Lencioni, are humble, hungry and smart. A lot of bright people out there. A lot of talented people that's necessary but not sufficient for us. We want people who haven't let their smarts go to their head. That's the only way they're going to fit in with our culture that they're open to learning to being criticized to getting open feedback. We had a situation a few years ago, we had two finalists. One was a brilliant young woman gone to Harvard she was Chinese she spoke Mandarin. She had interned at the Wall Street Journal while she was at Harvard, the other guy had gone to a small college I'd never heard of and Pennsylvania, and he just had hustle. This is a guy who was hungry, hungry. And then this woman from China, and the woman from China was just so convinced of how smart she was, we gave it to the other guy, because he was humble, he was hungry, and he was smart enough for us. And I debriefed the woman, when I told her, you know, she didn't get it, I said, Look, you know, what, you're terrific, you're gonna be a star at some other place, let me explain to you why you didn't fit in here, you are really smart. But you're a little bit too much about yourself. And I would keep that in mind, as you go to interview at other places, in case they might be looking for have values more like ours.

David Novak 25:51 

Well, that was the best interview experience she could ever get, you know, has there ever been a time when one of your people went to one of your direct competitors? And if so, how do you handle it?

Jim Levine 26:02 

You know, we've been fortunate that we haven't had that experience. And one of the things I'm proudest of is our culture that we've built. We don't have people wanting to leave, we got people wanting to join us, we have what I call a growth culture. My client, Mary Murphy has a book coming out called cultures of growth, which I think we fit into, we just want to find the best talent and do everything we can to keep them we tell everybody, we want you to be so good, that everybody wants to steal you away, we want to be so good that you don't want to leave. So we try to live up to that. And it's been pretty successful for over 34 years. I

David Novak 26:42 

want to shift gears for a minute, Jim, and I want to take you way back, what's a story from your childhood that shaped you into the leader that you are today.

Jim Levine 26:49 

When I was in seventh grade, I didn't make it onto the junior high basketball team. But we had a recreation League and I was determined that I was going to compete and play in a league. And to do that you have to come up with a sponsor for your team. And I just said, I'm going to have a team. And I got a bunch of my buddies who hadn't made the team. I said, I'm going to just find a sponsor. And I just took the initiative to walk around our small town went to every retailer, I could find till I found somebody will sporting goods, who was going to sponsor us. And I think that came out of anger. Now that I think about it, I was just pissed off that it didn't get selected for the team. And I was gonna have my own team. And I just went out and did it. And I think you know that that's I think back. You know, now that I think about starting my own business, 34 years of kind of what I did, again, I was vice president of a college, new guy came in wanted his own people. And my wife said to me, Look, you could go be president or vice president of some other college, you're not going to be ever happy. You need to start your own business. And I kind of went out and did the same thing. I guess I was just pissed off. And I went out and found my own built my own team over the last 34 years. And I got a great team.

David Novak 28:14 

You know, you have such an interesting background before you became a literary agent. Yeah. And just here's the Cliff Notes for everybody. After college, you worked at preschool, you were a daycare director at a large public housing project. You work for a foundation, you wrote a book called who will raise the children new options for fathers and imprints and mothers. You were a vice president is college as you just mentioned. So I'm curious, Jim, where did this passion come to you for early childhood education and fatherhood.

Jim Levine 28:45 

I've always loved working with kids. When I was in college, I tutored kids. I think some of it must come from my own family background. I was adopted. And I knew that my mother had died. I didn't realize that the man who raised me was also not my biological father. I met him when I was 30 years old. My wife who's a clinical psychologist psychoanalytically trained, pointed out to me, de maybe you're interested in fatherhood and early childhood because of your own experience. So I think that's where it all stems from, you

David Novak 29:24 

know, based on all the research that you've done, and the experience you've had, you know, exploring fatherhood in the family. What's the lesson for us men?

Jim Levine 29:32 

I think the most important thing you can do to take care of in taking care of your children is take care of your relationship with your partner. That is the single thing I found to be the most important. I remember we were sick. Our son Josh must have been eight years old. She's in graduate school. I'm working vice president of this college. We're setting out a plans for the week who's going to go pick Josh up here and Jessica there and cook what meal etc Josh walks up and says, What do you guys do? And he said, we're planning our week, he said, Well, you guys don't look like you ever have any fun together. Wow, that was a wake up moment. From that moment on, we just built in time to take care of one another, we split at that time, we didn't have that much time, we just scheduled date night, once a week, to watch a TV show Hill Street Blues, that's how long it was, that we just carved out that time to just pay attention to even if we weren't looking at one another just to look at the TV together just to hold hands. I think, you know, it's like on you get on the airplane, they say in case of emergency, if you got a job, put your mask on first, I think as couples, you just got to put the oxygen mask on your relationship first. And that will help you take care of your children. Now

David Novak 30:47 

a lot of our listeners or parents talk more about the idea of looking for what you call moments of engagement, I think you've

Jim Levine 30:55 

got to find just small opportunities to engage with your with your kids just pay attention to what they're interested in doing, and take their lead and follow them. For parents of adolescents. You know, everybody says, oh, it's really my kid won't talk to me drifting apart. One of the best moments of engagement you can have with a teenager is if you're driving them, you know, to practice or driving them to school or whatever. It's really strange. But teenagers often open up the most and will talk when they're not looking directly at you. You got them as a captive audience in the car, you don't think of it. But you know, you're together, you're like in this little bubble. You don't have a lot of time to talk to a kid taking them to school or practice, whatever. But just in a few moments, you can actually have a meaningful conversation where they can say something about what excites them or bothers them, and you get to give some feedback. And then you can pick up on it later in the day. You

David Novak 31:53 

know, becoming this fatherhood expert that you were and you still are. You know, I understand you've been the guest on today's show. Good Morning America and Oprah. How do you get prepared to go on the Oprah show?

Jim Levine 32:06 

I was pretty nervous. Frankly, when they invited me, I said I'll come as long as you let me bring my I think Josh was that 12 years old. They agreed they flew us out to Chicago, the extreme white stretch limo shows up. Josh looks up to me says, Dad, do you always travel like this? No, I don't know. How do you prepare? I don't know. You just I was just really nervous. I think if you're not nervous, you're in trouble. You got to have enough nervous excitement. Without it being paralyzing. I don't know, I've just I've just learned to do this so many times. You know, I've gotten used to doing it.

David Novak 32:55 

We'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Jim Levine in just a moment. As you've heard us talk about Jim represents the one and only Tom Brady. And I think it's safe to say that Tom knows a thing or two about helping others succeed. And that starts with great communication with his teammates. When he joined me on the podcast, Tom shared his three C's of communication with me, which helped him build strong bonds with his teammates and coaches.

Tom Brady 33:22 

CCC, clear current communication, you know, really being clear, not, you know, man, I'm going to say something and see if they can figure it out. Or I'm going to try to dance around a topic and then current, you know, what's happening in the moment, not, hey, this thing happened two months ago, and it's really bothered me, it's no, hey, this is the situation we're currently dealing with. And you got to communicate and so many people don't want to communicate. And I think CCC is really important on a personal level. But it's certainly really important in a professional environment as well. Go

David Novak 33:56 

back and listen to my entire conversation with Tom Brady, Episode 53 here on how leaders Lee

one of the things leaders have to do is break through the clutter. You know, what have you learned about communication and keeping people's attention that all leaders could benefit from?

Jim Levine 34:19 

in written communication with email these days? I try to get to the point really clearly, you know, three bullet points. Here's what we got to do. Here's why we got to do is when we got to do it, and not write long, long memos. And I just tried to think keep things really succinct.

David Novak 34:38 

You know, while we're on the subject of emails, you're the only person in the world that sends me an email, it says please confirm receipt. What's behind that?

Jim Levine 34:46 

What's behind that is that in one case, I can't tell you all the details, but I lost a big client because they thought I wasn't interested in them. I had sent several emails that they had never gotten. And, you know, this was a huge client. When I finally spoken and they said, Well, you were so unresponsive. So what are you talking about? I sent you guys email after email I never heard back from you. So that was kind of a pain point that led me to make sure things are getting through.

David Novak 35:20 

I knew there had to be a good story behind. You know, when was the moment you know, you had this incredible career, basically doing good in the world social work almost a gig, you know, carrying about families. When was the moment that you decided that you wanted to become a capitalistic literary agent? Well, it

Jim Levine 35:39 

was when I left me advice, prednisone at a Bank Street College of Education. My wife said to me, you really should start your own business, you've always wanted to do it. And it turns out, I mean, I love business. It's not like the stuff I was doing wasn't business. But I love being able to, we have created employment for you know, 21 people. Now that's a pretty good feeling to be able to start something from nothing. Growing into something you love doing, share the love and the excitement with other people, and support them, help them support their families. That's a pretty great feeling.

David Novak 36:15 

How is the firsthand experience, you've that you've had been an author? You've written seven books, how's that helped you in the literary world? Well,

Jim Levine 36:24 

it's helped in two ways. One is that every book gets written three times, first, you write it for yourself to figure out what the heck you gotta say, then your writer for your editor, based on your editors, feedback, and then your writer for the public. So that's the writing process, the marketing process, I've realized that writing the book is, at best, half the process to be successful. The other half is marketing. And any author who thinks that they finished the task when they've written a book is just naive about the way the marketplace works. Yeah,

David Novak 36:56 

this has been so much fun, and I knew it would be and I want to have some more fun with my lightning round of questions. Are you ready for this?

Jim Levine 37:02 

Okay,

David Novak 37:03 

okay. What's one word others would use the best describe kind? What would you say is the one word that best describes you? Grateful? If you could be one person for a day besides yourself, who would it be?

Jim Levine 37:17 

I would like to be my grandson Elijah. And to see what the world is like, through his eyes what it's like to be an 18 year old in today's world that because of the Our worlds are so different, it just be fascinating to spend a day, inhabiting his world to see what it's like, what's your biggest pet peeve? The one thing that really gets under my skin if somebody is dishonest.

David Novak 37:46 

What are three books that every leader should read?

Jim Levine 37:50 

Aside from your own book, David about teams, which they should definitely read. The three books that have most influenced me, I think, and being a leader are one is Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. I think a second would be my client Bill URIs. Getting to Yes. And third, for me, this really has helped me is Search Inside Yourself, which is a book about meditation, I found that I started practicing meditation regularly about 15 years ago. I think that's been very helpful to me.

David Novak 38:26 

Now, I know you love jazz. What's one of your go to jazz albums?

Jim Levine 38:31 

Anything by Bill Evans,

David Novak 38:33 

aside from books, is there anything you collect?

Jim Levine 38:36 

I'm a very avid photographer. My children might say, he collects too many pictures of us, which means he takes too many pictures of us. And why doesn't he stop clicking his iPhone?

David Novak 38:51 

If I turned on the radio in your car, what would I hear?

Jim Levine 38:54 

You would probably hear a podcast.

David Novak 38:57 

What's something about you that few people would know that I

Jim Levine 39:01 

was on the high school wrestling team?

David Novak 39:04 

So you are a grinder no question about the toughest sport that I know of? You mentioned Stephen Covey's at the end of the lightning round. So good job. Okay. So, Stephen Covey's you mentioned Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. And a big idea in that book for him is to begin with the end in mind as you've navigated your career. I'm curious what you see as your end that you're heading towards my

Jim Levine 39:30 

end is to keep doing what I try to do daily, which is to protect my family and those I love to develop the talents of people around me and to nurture myself so I can accomplish the first two and that means, you know, exercise which I mentioned and meditation. I don't ever see myself stopping doing this job. What I'm doing now is work. If I were retired, I would be doing the same thing. I'd be trying to talk to smart, interesting people helping them develop their ideas. I just have kind of lucked into a role that I never would have imagined ever doing. That just fits me my personality perfectly. And luckily, my wife is the same. She's a clinical psychologist, psychotherapist, he loves what she's doing, she's not going to stop, we love to travel together, we love to spend time together. So we both exercise daily, as long as we can stay healthy and keep our wits about us. I'll probably just dropped out of the copying machine.

David Novak 40:33 

You mentioned your wife, and I understand that if anyone asks your wife, if she's been married, she says three times, same guy, but he's changed. How would you say looking back, you've changed in the last, let's say, 15 years as a leader. Look, I've

Jim Levine 40:51 

just learned that my job is to help everybody else succeed. That's my job. And

David Novak 40:58 

that sounds like a really nice thing. But when did you realize it was time to flip the script and be focused on other people instead of yourself? Was there a time

Jim Levine 41:06 

I think it might have been when I started my own business. And I'm thinking that the guy was the president of the college that where I was vice president, there were a lot of good things I learned from him. But I think I kind of realized he was too focused on himself. And I don't want to I want to be a leader, but not a leader like that. I don't want to be a leader who's taking glory in himself, I want to help other people find the glory in themselves.

David Novak 41:34 

You know, the best businesses have a noble cause. If you had to step back and think about your business and what you do in your business every single day, what would be the noble cause,

Jim Levine 41:46 

we have a set of guiding principles. And we say, our, our mission, our goal is to ignite talent. That's what it's all about. For us. That's not just for our clients. It's really for everybody who shows up at work. One of the things I just love about our team and our culture, it's like, every day, everybody shows up with a sense that each person is going to become better at it, you know, just by being together, I am so much better in doing what I do. When I have a team of people that I'm working with. That's what I guess one of the biggest things I've discovered really, in the last 1520 years is how important to me is having a team, you know, a lot of the stuff I did as an academic, you know, I was kind of the star in a sense. You know, as an academic, you write books, you give talks, I had teams of research assistants. But you know, the glory went to me, I am just so much better at everything. But having a team who have colleagues who I really rely on who we challenge one another day to day, that's been a big learning for me. Last

David Novak 42:49 

question, what's one piece of advice you'd give to someone who wants to be a better leader?

Jim Levine 42:56 

Listen, but listen, not just to what people are saying, try to listen to the feelings. And maybe the thoughts behind what they're saying, don't take any people at their word. It's not that they're lying. It's that there may be stuff, they're really not coming out, and hope to make them comfortable enough to let you know what's really going on with them. You got to kind of respond to the full person to really support people on your team, you really got to know them. And it's not just what they're saying. It's what they're feeling. It's knowing what matters to them. As a person, if you can tap into that, you know, it makes the biggest difference in the world for people to know that you care about them. You can only do that by really listening.

David Novak 43:42 

You know, Jim, I want to thank you for taking the time to be on this podcast and have this conversation with me. You know, I've had the privilege of working with you firsthand on free books. And, you know, I always watched you and how you did your business. And now I have a much better understanding of you as a person and you are a guy who walks the talk on everything that you've said, you know, I think you're kind. You're honest, you're talented. You're absolutely God good, you know, in terms of your determination. And the one thing that I'm very impressed by is that the philosophy that you espouse, you actually live, and I want to thank you for helping me make my books so successful.

I see it time and time again in the best leaders. It's not about how great you are. It's about how you can help others do great things. This is the philosophy driving everything Jim does in his work both with his clients and his team. And it's a mentality we all need if we want to find true satisfaction and fulfillment in our careers. So help other people develop their ideas, recognize their gifts. Listen, when they talk, both to what they're saying and what they might not be saying. Those are just a few ways you can ignite the talent of those around you. Now, if you're a regular listener of this podcast, you know, this is the point in the show where I pause and offer a simple way you can apply this concept in your own world and become a better leader. And this week, my advice is real simple. Just think about someone in your life who helped ignite your talent, someone who offered you a listening ear, or a bit of coaching, or just an opportunity that helped you get where you are today. You have that person in mind. Now take a moment to express your gratitude to that person is Thanksgiving, the timings perfect. And it'll mean the world to that person. You can shoot him a quick email. But if you ask me, there's nothing better than a handwritten note to thank someone, or a call out of the blue. So do you want to know how leaders lead? What we learned today is the great leaders ignite the talent of those around them. Coming up next on how leaders lead is Mark King, the CEO of Taco Bell.

Mark King 46:15 

I believe that if you have this big aspiration, and your thinking is here, meaning you don't know how to get there, you fill that gap with creative ideas. And so for me, it's unlocking the potential of people to find new creative solutions to be disruptive by driving with a big aspiration and filling that gap with creative ideas.

David Novak 46:38 

So be sure to come back again next week to hear our entire conversation. 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