I don't want to glamorize the trades and the blue collar world. I think a lot of companies are making that mistake right now. They're trying to make it into something it's not. It's hard. It's oftentimes miserable. It's a harsh lifestyle. It's long hours. Like I said, it's hot. It's cold. It's away from home. It's not for everybody, but that's also what makes it great. You might not believe me now, but after today's episode, I bet you'll think twice before you complain about road construction. Welcome to Alleters Lead. I'm David Novak. And every week I have conversations with the very best leaders in the world to help you become the best leader you can be. My guest today is Aaron Witt, the CEO of BuildWit, which is a company that serves the dirt world. Of course, you're asking what the heck is the dirt world? Well, that's the label Aaron came up with for companies that do the infrastructure and construction work most of us take for granted. But Aaron has always loved this dirt world and BuildWit offers marketing, training, and leadership development to make sure those vital companies keep growing. And he leads with the level of vulnerability that you just don't find very often. Because he knows if you want your team to feel comfortable taking risk and being open, it's up to you to set the example of vulnerability first. Plus, he's a master communicator and I guarantee you he's going to have your wheels turning about how you can use storytelling to elevate your own brand, your own company. So here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours, Aaron Witt. Now, I know you don't like to label yourself as one, but I understand you're a triathlete. Now, what got you into that? I started traveling when I started BuildWit in 2018. And when you're traveling, as you know, it's hard to maintain a healthy lifestyle or it's more challenging than being at home. So I would bring a pair of shoes with me because that eliminated my excuse of, oh, I don't have a gym. I can't work out. If you have pair of shoes, you can run anywhere you are. And so I started running consistently and for about five years now, I've worked out every single day of the week, every month, every year. And I started with a half marathon, then you go to a full marathon, then you go to an ultra marathon, then you start to ask, well, what's next? And triathlons are what's next. So here we are. You're an Ironman, man. That's a pressing congratulations. What has been an Ironman taught you about leadership? It's taught me a lot. I think the biggest lesson I've learned when I first, when I did my first Ironman, you know, you swim a few miles, you bike well over a hundred miles. And at that point, you're just completely exhausted. And you still have a whole marathon to go. And if you think about the whole marathon, you have to go, you'll just crumble. There's just no way that you can take the entire task at face value. But the nice thing about Ironman is they have an aid station or a water station every mile. And so you have 26 miles in the marathon and you've got 25 aid stations. And so instead of running 26 miles, all I had to do was just get to the next aid station, get to the next aid station, stop, grab some water, get an orange slice, get to the next aid station. And so I think that's one of the biggest lessons I've learned is learning to break those bigger tasks up into those smaller pieces. And it's obvious advice. We've all heard it, but learning it like that has really helped me out. And I've applied it all over the place when it comes to leadership. You've built a heck of a business and done in a short period of time. And give me a snapshot of build with and how you make money. How we make money. I started my first business model was taking pictures of construction sites and trying to sell the pictures to construction companies. The big problem, the dirt world, as we call it, has is workforce. The dirt world is critical infrastructure. And so if you flip the lights on, if you open the tap, take a shower, drive anywhere, if you live somewhere, that's all critical infrastructure, that's all the dirt world making that a reality. And we've got about half of the workforce retiring. And so the initial business thesis was, well, if we want to attract the next generation, we've got to educate the next generation on what it takes to keep the world moving. And so I started with pictures, then social media, and then websites and all kinds of marketing. But today, the business does a few things. We help attract the next generation with our marketing business, get the word out, tell the story, get people in the door. Then you have people coming in with with no experience. You've got to develop those people. And so we've developed a software specifically for training, entry level, craft people for how to run equipment, how to drive a truck, how to use a measuring tape, how to communicate more effectively. And then once you get those people up, you want to keep them. That's when leadership comes into play, like what we're here talking about. And so that's when we have our area at Dirt World Summit. It's a live event dedicated to leadership for the dirt world. So that's the business three parts marketing, software training development, and then our leadership conference. And you're the CEO and founder of BuildWit, but you also call yourself, and I love this, the chief dirt nerd. Sure. What in the act does a chief dirt nerd do? It's funny. I made that up my first maybe month in business. Someone, a friend of mine, Keaton Turner, he told me about LinkedIn. And he said, you've got to get on LinkedIn because, okay, sure, you've got Instagram or Facebook, you've got all these people, but the decision makers are on LinkedIn. And I realized, man, this is a powerful platform, but everybody on there looks the same, sounds the same. You have to differentiate yourself in some capacity. And so I could have put founder and CEO of BuildWit on my LinkedIn profile, but that meant nothing. It was just me at the time. And it's not different. And so I just, what am I? I don't know. I like dirt and I'm a chief, I guess. And I'm a nerd. I have an engineering degree. I wear glasses. So perfect, chief dirt nerd. And it's, I guess, stuck. I love it. I'm going to have to go look at my LinkedIn and come up with something a little bit more, more original myself. Now, what is it about bulldozers and dirt that gets you so fired up? All you have to do is stand next to one while it's pushing dirt. And you understand that they shake the ground. They roar. They quite literally move mountains. It's so amazing. And so I've, I've loved heavy equipment since I was a little kid. I didn't grow up around the industry. My dad was a tax lawyer. So as far from the trades as I possibly could have been, but he was doing tax work for the local caterpillar dealer at the time. And through the CFO, he arranged a birthday party for me and my friends when I was when I was six years old. And I just from that point on, loved, loved tractors, like most little kids do. It's not, it's not very unique . But fortunately, I had, I had the opportunity to choose whatever career path I wanted to choose. I didn 't have parents saying you need to go do this or that. And I chose to chase after the big machines. I'd, I'd loved since I was a little kid. And now I still love the big equipment. There's nothing cooler than watching a mining truck go past you hauling 400 tons of gold or whatever it is. There's just nothing cooler than that. But I think what I love about the industry now is twofold. One, it is the foundation of our entire society. If the dirt world went away, humanity would go away. There's no food, water and shelter without the dirt world. And so the, the intense, a purpose behind it is, is just so incredible to me. And then to the people, you have all of these hardworking people working 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year to make all of our lives as comfortable as they are. They never get a thank you. They only hear about it if it's not working, if the power's off, the water's off, if the road's under construction. And yet they, they do it anyway. And it creates such a, such a sense of humility that you find rarely, you don't find elsewhere, elsewhere in society. So I just, I love the purpose behind the work. I love the machines. I love the people. I love it. You know, and dirt world, that's a, that's a very all encompassing phrase. You know, what actually is dirt world? It's a good question. We, it's also something we've made up. I think I, I, I love language. I think I picked up the love of language from my father, who is a lawyer, and which is essentially the study of language. That's all they do is manipulate words. And so I, I learned when I was a young that language really matters. And that you can actually craft language, and you can use language to build things and create things and, and, and, and, and shape, shape , shape the world before it happens. And so we, we were serving infrastructure. And so construction, people hear construction, they think it's all one thing. But there's different, there's different parts of construction. You can build homes. That's residential construction. You can build buildings. That's commercial construction. And then you have horizontal construction. So you vertical up and down buildings, horizontal, uh, up, you know, along, along the earth's surface. And so it's called the horizontal construction. It's called heavy civil construction. It's, it, it just had all these names. And I was sitting around thinking, Hey, we need a better term for this that just wraps it all up in this nice little bow that we can use to explain to anybody. And so we wrapped it all up, critical infrastructure, roads, bridges, pipelines, power, water, natural resources, materials, all of the companies supporting the companies doing all of this stuff into the dirt world. So it's not just earth moving. It's critical infrastructure. It's what holds our lives together. And I want to talk more about how you're, you're, you're leading build with, but first I, I want to take you back a bit. What's the story from your childhood that, that really shaped the kind of leader you are today? Man, I guess from the, from, from just thinking off the top of my head, and, and since I was just thinking about language, I, uh, I remember when I was younger, I don't know if I was necessarily, um, a child, but I was, I was definitely quite, quite young. I remember for whatever reason, you know, my, my, um, my father's career, uh, as a, as a lawyer, it's quite abstract to a child. You don't really understand what they do, why they do it. You have, you've absolutely no, no idea what it, what it is. Um, but I remember over a few week period, watching him work on a single paragraph, because he knew this one single paragraph was going to determine the case he was working on years down the road. And so he was so far ahead of the case that he knew they would go and reference this paragraph. He had written the book on the subject, and he was going in to adjust the paragraph, essentially, to update it, to substantiate something. I don't, maybe, maybe that was completely wrong. It was something along those lines. And I remember him working so intentionally on crafting a single paragraph over weeks. And I, I didn't understand it at the time, but now I, I really appreciate the, uh, the intentionality behind communication. And I try to be very intentional with my communication because I know if you're intentional, you can again, shape a company, shape a culture, shape a future beyond, beyond your company or whatever it is. And so I've, I've taken that lesson. I've, I've tried to apply it everywhere. I can. Now, as I understand that you work for five different contractors before you started your, started your business. And what, what would be the big lessons that you pulled out from those experiences? When I started in construction, there was a, a project that was going on in my neighborhood. I thought it was really cool. Uh, it was my fall semester, my senior year of high school. So you're 17 years old asking yourself, what do I do with my life? And, and I couldn't get enough of this construction project. And, uh, so one day all of the trucks on the side said Pearson Construction Corporation, big black letters. And I thought, why don't I Google Pearson Construction Corporation call the office line and ask to meet with Mr. Pearson. And so that 's what I did. I, I, I sat down with Mr. Pearson after, after high school classes one day, I go to his office, big desk, plans, scale construction models. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. And he was the only guy that I'd ever talked to formally, uh, that, that had construction experience. And so I asked him, you know, what should I go do? And, and how should I do this? If I want to be you, I want to be a construction business owner. What do I do? And he said, go to engineering school. So I signed up for engineering school, not knowing a single thing about engineering, not knowing it was all going to be math and going to be miserable and not going to be suited for me as an individual whatsoever. And then he also said, go work for different companies as many companies as you can, because every company's different and different size companies are different. And so I spent the first two years working for smaller companies and I was in the field. And it was, it was awesome because I was, I was the little white boy out there working with these Mexican guys. And they were the hardest working people I'd ever been around in my life by a mile. And these guys, they were substantially older than me. And I was struggling to keep up 18, 19 years old. And so the first lesson I learned was just hard work. It doesn't take you long to figure out hard work when you're working in a ditch, quite literally Phoenix, Arizona, in the middle of the summer with a bunch of guys that can run circles around you. And so that was, to me, a really humbling experience. And then further along, I go to work for some bigger companies, some multinational, international corporations, monster, monster operations. And I saw, I saw what what great leadership was, but what stands out more when I went to some of these bigger operations was the bad leadership that I saw. I saw some really good examples of what not to do that have stuck with me since then. And I think that have shaped me as a leader. Say more about that, Aaron. I think in the construction industry, the whole industry is built upon human beings. It's not built upon heavy equipment. It's not built upon materials. It's built upon human beings. And if you go talk to any leader, they'll say, it's not what they do or the equipment. It's the people that make the difference. But based on my experience, I think oftentimes people are last in the equation when they should be first, they're not necessarily first. That to me just didn't feel right. And that to me was not the way I wanted to do things future state. Where it was at the leaders who really didn't appreciate the people in the front line, the people that were doing the really the more menial jobs and how they treat him. Was that what really affected you? I think it's a big company thing. It's not just construction, but I think sometimes people can be disposable. You know, they say you're not a number, but you're a number. And they'll talk about loyalty until it doesn't suit them anymore. And then there's no loyalty. And so I struggled with that because it just didn't really make sense to me. And I guess I was a little naive at the time, but it still doesn't make sense to me. I think you still really have to care for people. And that's why we've gotten involved with people like Bob Chapman, who you just had on the podcast, for example, is because he's an example. I think you're an example of that's not, you know, a lot of times they say it's just business. Well, there's a lot of great examples of really phenomenal business that don't abide by that logic whatsoever. So it's more than possible to care about people, even big organizations and make money while you do it. What was the seminal moment you had, Aaron, where you said, you know, it 's time for me to start my own business? I went to work at a road construction company in Texas after college. And then a software company called me and they said we have a program called i BuildAmerica. We're trying to inspire the next generation of the tradespeople in the dirt world. And it wasn't called the dirt world at the time, but civil construction industry. And it was too good to pass up. So I go to work for a software company. And I was just a fish out of water. I go from the field and loving building stuff to then in an office every day, working at a software company. And it wasn't, it just wasn't something that I saw myself doing. And I'm really grateful I did it because it showed me the bigger picture, the bigger opportunity that was helping to inspire the next generation. But it just didn't didn't align with me as an individual. So it was like a Monday or Tuesday, I was sitting having lunch by myself. And I just thought, I don't want to be here anymore. I don't want to be here. And so that afternoon , I quit. And I said, I'm done Friday and Friday afternoon. I drove back to Arizona overnight. I was done because I just reached the point for better force that I knew I didn 't want to be there anymore. I knew I wasn't happy and I just needed to make a change. I didn't know what the business was going to be, honestly. And I don't want to make myself seem like I'm this bold risk taker. Wow, you threw it all away. You put it all out online. I had the opportunity to go move in with my parents. So my risk was almost zero. I didn't have a wife and kids to support. I didn't have any debt from college. I had no debt whatsoever. And I had worked construction my entire college career. So I'd saved up a ton of money. And so to me, I was in a position I didn't want to be in. And I didn't really have any real risk. And so why, why not go try something else? You know, the best entrepreneurs, you have this ability to see what others don 't see yet. And and then you fill that gap. What was it for you that really led you to really go after the dirt world with build with? When I was in college, I was listening to these podcasts. I've always tried to read and listen to podcasts and meet people. I had the good fortune of growing up around very successful people. And I didn't necessarily learn how they did business, but I learned their habits. And so one of the big habits is they're always learning. So okay, I need to always be learning. And so I started reading, listening to interviews, so on and so forth . And I'd listened to one by a guy, Andy Fressella. And he talked about personal brand. And I thought, you know, that's pretty cool. He was talking about the value of it, future state, and and the more valuable your brand, the more valuable you'll be to employers. And I thought that's that 's a pretty good idea. What could what could my brand, what could my brand be? And so I evaluated my life for a unique storyline, a unique offering that I could provide. And I arrived at construction. I looked online. There wasn't any really dynamic storytelling in the construction industry. And I was I was learning a lot at the time. I had all these photos on my phone from my my brief stints in the industry. And I thought, why don't I go? Why don't I go share about it? And so then I started sharing it online from a purely a purely selfish intention to just increase my career prospects. But then because there wasn't a lot of it at the time, it started to really take shape. And so then, you know, you've got 20 followers and then 100 followers and then 500 1000, 5000, 10,000, 20,000 , 30,000. And it starts to somewhat snowball. And that's when I started to realize, hey, there's there's a bigger picture here. And when I went to I build America, I realized, wow, there's there's actually a huge problem. This is this is no joke. This industry supports all of society. But all of these people are retiring. And there's no plan on how to go get the next generation. So maybe I can maybe I can do something. And I think people, they they mistakenly think you have to have everything figured out, you have to have the perfect business plan when you begin. But all I did to begin was, Hey, there's an opportunity to use storytelling to inspire the next generation. So that's the thread I'm going to start pulling and I'm going to pull at it a little bit more , a little bit more, a little bit more. And over the past six and a half years, it's revealed itself further and further and so my plan when I started was not to start a marketing business was not to have an event, was not to have a software company. I didn't intend to do any of this, but I all I intended to do was be extremely curious about the industry and try to figure out how I could serve it in the best way I could. And we've we've over time built a business to do that. Say more about what happens if you don't get done what you're trying to do. I mean, you talked about this problem. Tell us more about the problem. The problem is is no joke. I think people we take infrastructure for granted because we've always had infrastructure. But in the grand scheme of things, when it comes to the history of humanity, infrastructure and the comfort that we have in the day to day lives that we do is quite is quite new. Sanitary sewer, that's still a pretty modern invention, consistent food, still pretty modern transportation, still still pretty recent. But in my life, I've flipped the switch on the wall and the lights have always come on. And so I just assume that that is how things work. It is the state of affairs. And if that doesn't work, there's something wrong. There's something seriously wrong, but it'll get fixed. And and maybe in an hour, maybe, maybe tomorrow, whenever it is, it'll come back on. But that that doesn't just happen. It's it's a once you start to dig into it. It's a miracle that 300 and whatever million people in the United States can get from point A to point B whenever they want to get from point A to point B, have consistent power whenever they want it, have clean water whenever they want it, have as many calories as they want whenever they want it. It's it's absolutely amazing. And it takes millions and millions and millions of really hardworking people who are willing to work on the weekends on Christmas overnight, 80 hours a week in the hot, in the cold, away from home away from their families in a hotel room, whatever it is, it requires those people to do it. It won't be automated. It won't be outs ourced. We're not going to technology our way out of it. It's always going to come down to hard working people. And today, the excitement is around software. I'm we're building a software company . We're part of it. AI, whatever it is, all of that's great. But all of that is bits. None of that is real. All of that requires atoms. It requires the real world to make a reality will still be no matter how much technology we have in the future, human beings dependent upon our basic needs being met, food, water, shelter. So that's what the dirt world does. But over the next decade, we have half of the industry retiring, leaving with all of the knowledge of building everything they've built over the decades in their heads, leaving, disappearing. And we have a younger generation coming in, but not nearly at the right. The older generation is leaving it. And so it creates this enormous gap. And the question is, how do we bridge that gap? Because we have to, we can 't tell society, sorry, we just couldn't figure out how to put water lines in the ground anymore . So water, I don't know, maybe, maybe not, or we couldn't figure out how to build roads anymore. So whatever you got, you got, that's not that's not a possibility that that doesn't work. And so it's not a nice to have it's a need to have. So you're really out to glorify the dirt world for for millennials and make sure there's that next generation of worker that can come in and get it done. In a way, I don't want to, I've always tried to be careful. I don't want to glamorize the trades and the blue car world. I think a lot of companies are making that mistake right now. They're trying to make it into something. It's not, it's hard. It's oftentimes miserable. It's a harsh lifestyle. It's long hours. Like I said, it's hot. It's cold. It's, it's away from home. It's, it's not for everybody. But that's also what makes it great. That's why people that do it are so proud, are far more proud than most people out there because they have a real sense of purpose because they work hard because they work hard alongside others. They know what they're doing every day at their, at their work. And I think the issue is not necessarily that the next generation doesn't want to do it. I think the issue is the next generation doesn't even know it exists. I didn't know it existed. It's on the periphery construction. It's just an inconvenience. Broad construction, all it does is slow me down. That's all I think about it. But what it is is no, that's actually helping you to commute more efficiently into the future. There's, there's, there's value being created there. And so I think what we're doing is we're really just trying to educate people what it takes to keep their lives moving, even if they're not going to consider the dirt world as a career, people like my mother. I just want to give her a sense of appreciation. Hey, there's all these people out there making your life a reality day to day. So make sure you 're appreciative of that because without them, you would be nothing. And then two, hey, if you want a sense of purpose, if you want to make a lot of money, if you want to work hard alongside other people, if you don't ever want to have to question why you do what you do, this could be a great industry for you. And it's not for everybody, but for those, those it is for, it's a great place to be. And if you look at the US military, the only branch of military that's saying, hey, we're not for everybody is the only branch of the military that is not missing the recruiting goals. And that's the US Marines. They know exactly who they are. This is only for the toughest. This is not for everybody. But for those, it's for where the place, if you want to challenge, this is it. And I think that's the role that the trades plays in society. Hey, everyone, it's Kula. We'll get back to the interview in just a second before we do, though, have a question for you. Have you downloaded the How Leaders Lead app on your iPhone? If you haven't, take 20 seconds right now, go to the App Store, search for How Leaders Lead, and download the How Leaders Lead app. In the app, every day, you'll get a two- minute video that'll give you a leadership insight from one of our amazing guests from our podcast to inspire you and to really get your mind in the right place before you start your work day. So go to the App Store, start How Leaders Lead, download the How Leaders Lead app, and start your day every day with two minutes of leadership wisdom. It'll take 20 seconds. Go to the App Store, download the app, and you'll be able to watch every day, just like me, the leadership insight from How Leaders Lead. Tell me a story of what would represent the biggest challenge you faced as the CEO as you tried to build this company. It's cost me a lot of relationships , and it's only gotten more and more expensive. And there's different reasons for it, and I don't necessarily try to litigate it on podcasts, but I've been through women I've dated that I'm no longer dating because I've just been so heads down focused on what I'm doing, but the worst one, by far, the most expensive one. My father hasn't talked to me in two and a half years, and we had a great relationship, or at least I thought it was a great relationship, and then I started the company, and it, for whatever reason, started to throw a wrench in everything. And it got to a point where he called me out of the blue and said, "Hey, I no longer want to talk to you." And that's the last time I've talked to him two and a half years ago. Now, I don't want to just blame the company for that, and I want to take ownership for that. A lot of it has been on me. I could have said plenty of things different. I could have done plenty of things different. I want to do things different into the future, but that's the kind of stuff when I started in business that I did not foresee, that you don't talk to people about, that you don't really hear about anywhere. I can find a million podcasts on the cool stuff to do as an entrepreneur, leadership this, leadership that, or whatever it is. But to hear people with their personal struggles, financial struggles, you can't really talk about a lot of that kind of stuff because in business, especially financially, you're trying to sell your services to companies. You're trying to be strong. You're trying to recruit people. You can't tell people you're trying to recruit, "Hey, our business might be insolvent next week. It doesn't work." And so you have to almost make it seem like it's not hard, and that's why people don't talk about it. But then that is also very isolating, because when you're in the thick of it, you're like, "Am I the only one that's here? Am I the only one that's been here? I have no one to talk to, and this sucks." And so that's why I try to talk about it. I'm still in the thick of things. I don't know what I don't know. I'm 29 years old. Our business, we're still trying to figure things out. But there's stuff personally, financially, that I like to talk about while I'm in the moment of it, the best I can, because if nothing else, I try to extend a hand to others that might be there and say, "Hey, I'm in the same fight. I don't have any advice for you. I can't do anything for you. I wish I could help, but I can at least say, "I get it. We're here together. Let's just keep pushing." It's almost like grief. Everybody has to handle it in their own way, but you go through it as you build your business and you get to the other side. Do you ever see yourself repairing those relationships? And can you recover from that? I hope so. I had a conversation this morning that was an attempt to do just that with a relationship that I've badly damaged in the past for being two heads down in a way. I think one of the most important lessons I've learned in leadership is taking ownership. That's why we're such big fans of Jocko, Echelon Front, extreme ownership, dichotomy of leadership. It's a book. It's a lesson that just makes a lot of sense to me as a young man, young business owner. Hey, it's all on you. Instead of standing around saying, "Oh, they just didn't get it. They don't understand." Looking in the mirror and saying, "All right, what didn't I do? What role do I have to play here?" Because I certainly have a role to play here. It's funny you asked that because just this morning it was me. I don't know if it'll be repaired or not, but at least it was me saying, "Hey, I really screwed this one up. Here's how I screwed it up and I feel terrible about it. I'm at least, if nothing else, grateful. I'm learning these lessons and I'm sorry it came at the expense of you, but I'm trying to learn from it. I'm trying to be better for it into the future. It's taking me a little bit to get there though. You're 29 years old and you're in an industry that's run by people a heck of a lot older than you. How do you manage this dynamic of being 29 and working around so many people that have so much more experience and they're older than you? I think I'm asked this all the time and I find it kind of funny because I've never really struggled with it. I think a lot of people do struggle with it. There's the gap between generations and you've got the old timers that are stubborn. You've got the younger folks that are stubborn in their own way. Instead of looking at it as a gap or a disadvantage, I've turned it into probably my greatest advantage over the past few years. I'm not a threat. I'm just a 20-something kid. I'm small too. I'm quite short. I'm not threatening to anybody. The access I have is crazy because I'm not a threat and I'm just genuinely curious about their business and what they do. I can walk into rooms that other people, older, bigger, whatever it is with more experience, would never be able to get into because I am young. I am inexperienced but I'm genuinely curious about what they do, what they have to offer. When you express a genuine sense of curiosity, when you ask somebody to talk about themselves, most of the time they talk about themselves without issue. That's all you have to do. You just have to take your ego, put it over here. Just tell me about you. This is what I love about Dale Carnegie as well, how to win friends and influence people. You'll make a lot more friends being more interested in other people than trying to get people interested in you. So cool, awesome, understood. I'm going to take my ego. No one cares about me. Tell me about you. How did you build this business? What do you guys do? Do you have a family? How many kids? How old are they? Oh man, it's so much easier to build relationships that way. You 've created a lot of training and professional development content for great companies like John Deere and several others. When I think about those industries, those companies, I remember looking at some of their stuff in the past. It always seemed like stock photos. Looks like it's pretty retro, back in time, pretty stiff to be honest. What are the best practices you'd share about creating content that will make you contemporary, make you today, and make it so that people actually want to pay attention to you? I would say one, you have to be excited about the stories you're telling. I think that's been one of the biggest things that's differentiated. My storytelling is you have to love it because it's hard and it takes a long time. People ask me, "How have you done this? How have you gotten so good at telling stories?" Well, I've told stories every day for seven years now, consistently on social media every day. If you do something every day for years, you get better at it. I couldn't sustain that if I wasn't so in love with the story I was telling in the first place. One, I think you have to be in love with the story you're telling. With a photograph, I'm not just taking a photograph. I'm conveying emotions in a way, which is quite odd to even talk about. It's a little touchy-feely for me. But I am conveying not just the emotion of the individual or the operation I'm capturing, but I'm conveying my emotion for that operation in a way. You have to love it. Then two, and this is what companies I think get wrong more than they get right , it has to be genuine. It has to be authentic. Everything we've done since the very beginning, it is what it is. I'm not setting up shots. I'm not scripting stuff. I'm not trying to make people do what they wouldn't do. From a storytelling standpoint, from a photo, a video standpoint, is it a pain all the time? All the time. If I had just put in a little bit more pre-production, I would probably get a better product on paper, but that's not how this industry works. It's not perfect. It shouldn't be perfect. I'm just going to capture it as I see it, as it is. I think companies from a company standpoint, from a leadership standpoint, if you're a leader wanting to just tell better stories, one, you have to be consistent. Storytelling is a skill. If I go over to a piano right now and try to play you a song, it will sound terrible because I haven't practiced piano. I don't know how to play a piano. I don't have that skill. Storytelling is the exact same thing. If you try to go tell one story, make one linked in post, it 's going to be terrible. You don't have that skill, but if you do it every day, there's a quote, "Great stories happen to those who tell stories." You're going to start to recognize the stories happening around you every day with how many people work your company, a hundred. How many storylines is that? You just have to open your eyes and look around you. There are stories happening all the time. They're right in front of you, but you have to train yourself on how to spot them and then how to tell them and keep it authentic. Just lay it out how it is because people buy people. If I'm going to be a customer of yours, I'm going to buy you as an individual along with your product. You need a great product, but I'm also buying you as an individual. If you're trying to recruit people, if I'm going to go work for a company, who am I going to work for? Okay, cool. This company has this brand, but who owns the place? Who leads the place? What do they believe in? Who's going to be my manager? I don't know. People want to know who they're going to work for. I think that's why like our business, we don't have a recruiting problem because we're telling these stories all the time. We're being very open and honest. People see that. People resonate with it. Wow, these guys, they don't have it all figured out, but I don't have it all figured out and they're at least admitting it. That's the kind of organization I want to be a part of. What's the favorite story you've ever told there? I think what I've loved most is the international travel I've done. I've had the opportunity over the past few years. I started traveling all over the United States. I still travel all over the United States . I travel almost every week. But then I had the opportunity to go to totally different places like Saudi Arabia or we went to Jordan a little bit ago or I've been to China or Chile. We've been to some just extraordinary places. It's a lot of fun for me. Say I'm in the Middle East. It 's a lot of fun for me to tell a story without sharing any of the same customs, without sharing any kind of similar upbringing, any kind of similar religious beliefs, any kind of similar language. We don't even use the same alphabet. I have no ability to talk to these people, understand these people. But in a way, I do because all I have to do is just watch and listen and do some funny hand gestures and try to make people laugh even when we don't share a common language. I love that challenge because you almost lose sight of the story or whatever's happening and you're just focused on the humanity, which I think is really cool to be halfway around the world and realize, wow, this guy, he's just like me. He's just trying to make a good living for himself to support his family. He just wants to live in a safe neighborhood to do good work. He's exactly like me. This is so crazy and to have those opportunities in my 20s is awesome. Speaking of humanity, I know you really are a big believer in building a powerful culture for your team. One of the foundations of your culture is that you really believe and it's a mantra of yours that everybody matters. How do you walk the talk of everybody matters as the CEO of the company? The first thing that I've tried to do though as a leader is like you said, walk the talk. I want to really take care of myself and I want to be a great example for others. I can't care for other people if I'm not caring for myself. We started this interview talking about fitness. That's why I'm so dedicated to fitness. I have that higher purpose. I want to be a great example for others around me. I want to help people live better lives. How do I do that? First and foremost, I have to be a great role model. I have been religious about working out. I'm religious about reading. I haven't drank this year, which I really enjoyed. I tried to be open and honest, candid. I sent out a message. I sent out a video message, five minute video message to our team every week. It was Saturday or Sunday morning. I'm by myself in the office and I had a lot of anxiety. I started this week's call saying, " Hey, before I get into what's going on at the company, I'm really anxious right now." I talked about it in therapy this week. I'm glad I did. We've got this great program called U-turn Health. You can call the phone number and they've got counselors for stress, for anxiety, for addiction, for you and your family. If you're struggling with any of that, if anybody in your family is struggling with that, I hope you take advantage of that. I could sit there and say, "All you guys need to take care of your health, need to take care of your anxiety," or whatever it is . It's so much more effective to say, "Hey, man, I don't have it all figured out. I'm a mental state. It goes up and down. When it does, I go get help." I'm really grateful that I go get help. I think there's a lot of other things I do, but first and foremost, I try to just make myself a great example. Growing your brand, you're really leaning into this idea of community. One great example of that is that your creation of your dirt world summit. Give me a peek into how that fits into your overall business strategy. While it was last January, 2023, I think it was a board meeting. I think it was Dan, Randy, Jason, Jonathan. Everybody but me, whoever it was, individual group, they brought this idea of, "Hey, we should have this industry event because there's an opportunity here. There are a lot of industry events, but there's no industry event dedicated to the biggest problem in the industry, workforce development and leadership." When the idea came up, I said, "No, that's silly. We're not in the events business. We don't need to be the events business. We just got our butts kicked all last year, 2022. We still have our tail between our legs right now. We've got to focus this year. We don't have time to be messing around with trying to put an event together." I get out voted. They prove the model, "No, this will work. Cool. Hey, if you guys say it'll work, if you believe in it, I believe in it, let's go." In October of the same year, we have an event for the first time with 700 industry leaders. It was completely different because we got to start with a blank sheet of paper. What does the industry need? Who are the best leaders we've met in the industry? Who are the best leaders we've met out of the industry? Bob Chapman. What if we call Bob Chapman and see if he's around? See if he can come to our conference. "Hey, Bob Chapman said he's around. He'll come to our conference." What? Bob Chapman said, "Jocko, hey, what if we call Jocko? Jocko said he's around. What? Huh?" It just all came together in this extraordinary event that was all focused instead on, "Oh, yeah, you know, kids don't want to work these days. Oh, yeah, this workforce problem. Instead of the same tired conversation, it was all, "What do we have to do to get better? Where are we going? How do we get better as individuals? How do we make our organizations better?" The event itself was extraordinary because it had a different energy to it. Everybody there was by definition asking themselves, "How do we get better as a leader? How do we get better as an industry?" It was awesome. We have our second one this year in November. I can't wait. I firmly believe we're building, I think, one of the most exciting events out there period and we're just going to keep running with it. We'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Aaron Witt in just a moment . You know, Aaron's not the only leader who knows the importance of vulnerability. Patrick Lynchione is a best selling author and the founder of the Table Group. And I just love his insight into what happens when we as leaders show our humanity. When they see you being human and when they see you said, "I made a mistake." They're like, "I can relate to you. I will follow you." And I believe that you are worth listening to because you're not trying to promote yourself. And yet, so many young people and older people go into the world thinking, "To be a leader means I have to be perfect. I have to be on. I have to avoid making mistakes." And it is the very thing that makes people not want to follow them because we don't trust people that aren't humble. And so I think humility and vulnerability are the key to being a great leader. Go back and listen to my entire conversation with Patrick, episode 147 here on How Leaders Lead. You seem to be a pretty open book. I mean, you know, you're very vulnerable. You talk about, you know, the challenge you've had with your past girlfriends and your father and you know, does that openness, that vulnerability that you have, does that ever come back and byching the ass? Sure. But there's so much more value to it. That's why I still do it. I've been doing it long enough. And I wouldn't do it anymore if there wasn't value in it. It's one of the most leadership, one of the most important leadership principles I learned, vulnerability, because that gives everybody else permission to be vulnerable for whatever reason. I don't know why. My name's on the company for better or for worse. My formal title is Chief Executive Officer . I'm putting this bucket as this leader, as the guy at the company. And if the guy at the company is saying, "Man, I'm struggling." Or, "Man, yeah, I've been around alcoholism. It's rough." Or, "Man, I've struggled with relationships." It gives people permission to, "Oh, yeah. Oh, he 's human. We're all human. I can talk about that stuff too. I can be vulnerable too." And I think when people are more vulnerable, it creates a better organization. You can have better conversation. You can solve better problems. It's more human. There's a lot of companies you walk into their office. It's inhuman. It's like, "What's going on around here?" Or, you look at their desk and there's nothing personal in anybody's desk. It's just gray. You're like, "What ?" So, none of these people have families. None of these people? No, silly. Everybody has a family. Everybody has a life, but there's such a rigid barrier between that and what they do professionally. I, maybe that works for a lot of big companies. That's awesome. But for what I want to do, it doesn't work. It doesn't make sense. I have to be vulnerable first. I have to go first. Aaron, this has been a lot of fun learning about the dirt world and now you're attacking it and building it up, no pun intended. Now, I want to have some more with my lightning round of questions. So, are you ready for this? Sure. The three words that best describe you. Curious, small, and I'd like to say funny. If you could be one person for a day beside yourself, who would it be? Present United States. Your biggest pet peeve. People that chew with their mouth open. Who would play you in a movie? I'd like to say just, I have no idea. Justin Bieber. What's the number of continents you step foot on in the past 12 months? Five, four, five, five. Yeah. What's the hardest leg of a triathlon? The run, for sure. What do you love the most about your aquarium? I just love watching it. I could watch it all day. I've stared at it for an hour. Is the dream still alive of one day financing a skid steer? Yes, I already had a skid steer, so I've crossed that one off the list and hopefully many more machines future state. If I turned on the radio in your car, what would I hear? Probably some news podcast. What's something about you few people would know? That I am definition introvert, so introverted. It's not funny. What's one of your daily rituals, something that you never miss? Exercising. Fantastic. That's the end of the lightning round. Good job. Was I lightning enough? You were absolutely lightning. Tell me more about what you call your chores and how you're shaping them as a leader. I'm a big believer, a big believer in being consistent and notching small daily gains. If you add those small gains up over time, they add up into, it's just the compounding. Everybody knows about it, but few people can be so consistent because they don't have a system that allows them to be consistent. They're trying to do too much stuff. New years comes around. January 1st, 2025. What's a resolution? I'm going to read 12 books. Well, how am I going to accomplish reading 12 books? What books am I going to read? How many, okay, so that's a book of mine. It's not an actionable plan. It doesn't make sense. You're probably not going to read 12 books. Well, what is so much simpler? I'm going to read 10 pages every single day. How many books is that? I have no idea, but I'm going to read 10 pages every single day. So that's one of my chores. Every single day, non-negotiable, read 10 pages. The nice thing about making things non-negotiable exercise especially is that I don't need to sit in bed in the morning and negotiate with myself. Ah, it's cold. Ah, it's raining. Ah, it's still early. I'm going to sleep in a little bit. Ah, I've got to travel the day. There isn't room for that. The decision is eliminated. I don't have to decide if I'm going to read today, if I'm going to exercise today. I just have, I have to do it. And when you have to do stuff, you do it. It's so simple. And I think it's easier to do things every day because you eliminate that decision. And so my chores exercising every day, practicing a different language every day, writing one page every day, no script, just write, fill a page, whatever's on my mind, and reading 10 pages a day. What's your unfinished business? My unfinished business. Man, I don't know not to get too wishy washy, but I, a quote that's always stuck out to me is Abraham Maslow, you know, a writer, a writer must write, painter must paint, what a man can be, he must be paraphrasing there. But I am fixated on the concept of becoming all that I can be as a as a man as an individual. And I think that's the fun of life. I think it can be tough if you don't smell the roses. I try to be good with that. I'm not that good. But I think that's, that's the fun of life. There's there's always something unfinished. There's always something you can improve upon. There's always something to reach for. And when you stop reaching is when, is when, is when the music stops. Last question here. What's one piece of advice you'd give to anyone who wants to be a better leader? I go back to vulnerability. I think one vulnerability, but I guess if I was to say something else, communication is so key. And it is a skill. And I see a lot of people in leadership positions with very bad communication skills. They can't write very effectively. They can't speak very effectively. They're not clear and concise. They're nervous speaking in front of others. And you can be in a leadership position without communication skills. But it is such, it's just like walking around with handcuffs on, you can only do so much without those skills. And I think if nothing else, you've got to convey ideas. You've got to, you've got to teach. You've got to, you've got to hold standards and all of that is done via communication. And so I'm grateful as a young leader that I've spent so much time working on my communication skills. I've got a long ways to go, but I am doubled down. I am doing everything I can to be a better communicator because I know that's what's going to make me a better leader. Well, Aaron, I want to thank you so much for coming on this podcast and having this conversation and being so open and teaching us about an industry that I agree with you. We take for granted. You certainly put it in a new light for me. And I'm sure everybody that hears this conversation. So thank you very much. Sure. Yeah. Thanks for having me, David. Now forgive my awful pun here, but I can't help myself. I loved digging into the dirt world with Aaron. It's a vital part of our lives. And he's doing a heck of a job communicating the important sub it. Talking to Aaron is just a great reminder. Just because you're a leader doesn't mean you have to have it all together. Oh, he knows what he's doing, but he realizes that nobody knows everything. And when you're honest about that, people will trust and respect you for it. And your vulnerability is the cue everyone else needs to be more open to. So if you want your team sharing big ideas, taking risks, owning mistakes, you've got to set the example of vulnerability first. So this week, find an opportunity to share something you've struggled with and maybe struggling with right now and what you're learning from it as you do it. Show everyone on your team that you're comfortable not being perfect. And I bet you'll find people tend to open up and trust you more as a result. And they're going to be rooting more for you too. So do you want to know how leaders lead? What we learned today is the great leaders set the example of vulnerability. Coming up next on HowlEAD is lead is Erica Ayers-Badon, CEO of Food52 and the former CEO of Barst ool Sports. If people are saying things in your company and you don't say, I hear you saying these things and the lack of acknowledgement of it, I think is it just creates kind of a break between management and people. So be sure to come back again next week to hear our entire conversation. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of HowlEADers 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. [BLANK_AUDIO]