Aaron Witt 0:00 

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, it's, it's oftentimes miserable. It's, 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.

David Novak 0:32 

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 our leaders. 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 the 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?

Aaron Witt 2:07 

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. And 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, 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 you know, started with a half marathon, then you go to a full marathon, then you go to an ultra marathon, then you start to ask, What's next, and triathlons are what's next. So, so here we are.

David Novak 2:52 

You're an Iron Man. Man, that's, that's, that's impressive. Congratulations. Now you know what is being a an iron man taught you about leadership. It's

Aaron Witt 3:01 

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 100 miles, and at that point you're just completely exhausted, and you still have a whole marathon to go. And if you, if you think about the whole marathon, you have to go, you'll, you'll just crumble. There's, there's just no way that you can, that you can take the entire task at face value. But the nice thing about Iron Man's 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 has really helped me out, and I've applied it all over the place. When it comes to leadership, you've built

David Novak 4:09 

a heck of a business and done in a short period of time. Give me a snapshot of build with and and how you make money, how

Aaron Witt 4:17 

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 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 no experience. You've got to develop those people. And so we've developed a software specifically for training entry level craft people for 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 dirt World Summit. It's a live event dedicated to leadership for for the dirt world. So that's that's the business, three parts, marketing, software, training, development, and then our leadership conference.

David Novak 5:52 

And you're the CEO and founder of buildwit, but you also call yourself, and I love this, the the chief dirt nerd. Sure, what in the heck does a chief dirt nerd do? It's

Aaron Witt 6:04 

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 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, 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

David Novak 6:55 

love it. I'm gonna have to go look at my LinkedIn and come up with something a little bit more, more original myself, sure? What is it about bulldozers and dirt that gets you so fired up?

Aaron Witt 7:07 

All you have to do is stand next to one while it's pushing dirt, and you understand, 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 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 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 two fold. 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. 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 hard working 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 they if it's if it's not working, if the powers off, the waters off, if the roads under construction. And yet they, they do it anyway. And it creates such a such a sense of humility that you find rarely in 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.

David Novak 9:06 

I love it you don't and dirt world, that's a, that's a very all encompassing phrase. You know, what actually is dirt world?

Aaron Witt 9:17 

It's a good question. We it's also something we've made up. I think 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 learned when I was 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 shape, shape new shape, shape the world before, before it happens. And so we, we were serving infrastructure. And so construction people here, construction, they think it's. 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 your vertical, up and down buildings, horizontal, you know, along, along the Earth's surface. And so it's called the horizontal construction. It's called heavy civil construction. 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 this stuff into the dirt world. So it's not just earth moving. It's critical infrastructure. It's what holds our lives together.

David Novak 10:52 

You know, I want to talk more about how you're leading build with but first, I want to take you back a bit. What's a story from your childhood that that really shaped the kind of leader you are today,

Aaron Witt 11:05 

man, I guess from the from from just thinking off the top of my head, and since I was just thinking about language, I remember when I was younger. I don't know if I was necessarily a child, but I was, I was definitely quite, quite young. I remember for whatever reason, you know, my, my my father's career as a lawyer. It's quite abstract. To a child. You don't really understand what they do, why they do it. You've, you've absolutely no, no idea what it what it is. 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 really appreciate the 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 taken that lesson, I've I've tried to apply it everywhere I can. Now, as I

David Novak 12:45 

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

Aaron Witt 12:56 

I started in construction, there was a project that was going on in my neighborhood. I thought it was really cool. 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 I couldn't get enough of this construction project. And so one day, all 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 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 that had construction experience. And so I asked him, What should I go do, 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 is 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 1819, 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, 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 I've 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 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 was not the way I wanted to do things. Future state where it was, it

David Novak 15:59 

the leaders who really didn't appreciate the people on the people on the front line, the people that were doing the really the more menial, menial jobs and how they treat them. Is that what really affected you? I think

Aaron Witt 16:09 

it's a big company thing. It's not just construction, but I think sometimes people can be disposable you. 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, you know, 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 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 that don't abide by that logic whatsoever. So it's more than possible to care, care about people, even at big organizations and and make money while you do it.

David Novak 17:07 

What was the seminal moment you had, Aaron, where you said, you know, it's time for me to start my own business.

Aaron Witt 17:14 

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 build America. We're trying to inspire the next generation of the trades people in the dirt world. And it wasn't called the dirt world that time, but civil construction industry, and it was, it was too good to pass up. So I go to work for a software company, and I, 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 I was done, because I just reached the point, for better, for worse, 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 and I don't want to make myself seem like I'm this, you know, bold risk taker. Wow. You threw it all away. You put it all out on the line. I mean, 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 not go try something else? You

David Novak 19:04 

know, the best entrepreneurs, they you have this ability to see what others don't see yet, and then you fill that gap. What was it for you that really led you to really go after the dirt world with buildwit. When

Aaron Witt 19:21 

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 interviews, so on and so forth. And I'd listened to one by a guy, Andy frisella, 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 the more valuable your brand, the more value. Will, you'll be to to employers. And I thought that's, that's a pretty good idea. And 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 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'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 gonna start pulling, and I'm gonna 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 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 in the best way I could. And we've, we've, over time, built a business to do that.

David Novak 22:15 

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.

Aaron Witt 22:23 

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 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 absolutely amazing, and it takes millions and millions and millions of really hard working 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 outsourced. 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 rate the older generation is leaving at 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 doesn't work. And so it's not a nice to have. It's a need to have.

David Novak 25:17 

So you're really out to glorify the dirt world for millennials and make sure there's that next generation of worker that can come in and get it done in

Aaron Witt 25:28 

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 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, it's, it's oftentimes miserable. It's, it's a harsh lifestyle. It's, it's long hours, like I said, it's hot, it's cold, it's, 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 along others, 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. Road 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, 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, 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 we're the place if you want a challenge, this is it, and I think that's the role that the trades plays in society. Hey,

Koula Callahan 27:50 

everyone, it's Kula. We'll get back to the interview in just a second before we do though, I 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, search 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.

David Novak 28:36 

Tell me a story of what is would represent the biggest challenge you faced as as the CEO, as you tried to build this company.

Aaron Witt 28:45 

It's cost me a lot of, a lot of relationships and and it's, it's, it's only gotten more and more expensive. I and there's different reasons for it, but, and I don't, I don't necessarily try to litigate it on on podcast, but, you know, I've been through women I've dated that 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 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 that I did not foresee, that you don't talk to people about that you don't really hear about any anywhere. I don't. Yeah, I can find a million podcasts on, you know, the cool stuff to do as an entrepreneur, and, you know, 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 to be strong. You're trying to recruit people. You don't you can't tell people you're trying to recruit. Hey, our business might be insolvent next week. It doesn't, it doesn't work. And so you have to almost make it, make it seem like it's it's not, it's not hard, and that's why people don't talk about it. But then that is also very isolating, is because when you're when you're in the thick of it, you're like, am I? 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, this sucks, and so that's why I try to talk about it. I'm still in the 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 I there's, there's stuff, personally, financially, that that I like to talk about while I'm in the moment of it the most, 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.

David Novak 31:35 

It's almost like grief. You know you. Everybody has to handle it in their own way, but you go through it as you as you build your build your business, and you get to the other side. Do you ever see yourself repairing those relationships and and can you recover from that?

Aaron Witt 31:52 

I hope so. I had a conversation this morning that was an attempt to do just that with 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, and that's why we're such big fans of Jocko echelon, front Extreme Ownership dichotomy of leadership. It's a 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, it's, it's all on you. And so instead of standing around saying, Oh, they just, they didn't get it, they don't understand, looking in the mirror and saying, All right, well, what, what, what didn't I do? What? What, what? What role do I have to play here? Because I certainly have a role to play here. And so 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 I really screwed this one up and, and here's, here's how I screwed it up and, I feel terrible about it, but, you know, I'm, at least, if nothing else, grateful. I'm learning these, these, these, these lessons, and I'm sorry it came at the expense of you, but I'm trying to, I'm trying to learn from it. I'm trying to be be better for it into the future. So it's, it's taken me a little bit to get there, though.

David Novak 33:17 

You know, you're 29 years old, and you're in an industry that's, you know, 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?

Aaron Witt 33:37 

I think I'm asked this all the time, and I, I find it kind of funny, because I've, I've never really struggled with it, and I think, I think a lot of people do struggle with it. There's the gap between generations, and you've got the old timers that that are stubborn. You've got the the younger, the younger folks that are stubborn in their own way. I instead of looking at it as a, as a 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 a just a 20 something kid. I'm small too. I'm quite short. I'm not threatening to anybody, and so I can the access I have is crazy because I am, I'm not a threat, and I'm just genuinely curious about their business and what they do so 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, I'm young, I am inexperienced, but I'm genuinely curious about what they do, what they have to offer. And 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 gonna take my ego. No one cares about me. Tell me about you. How'd you build this business? What do you guys do? But you do? You have a family? How many kids? How old are they? Oh, man, it's, it's so much easier to build relationships that way. You know, you

David Novak 35:27 

created a lot of training and professional development content for great companies like John Deere and and several others and and, you know, when I think about those industries, those companies, and I remember, you know, looking at some of their stuff in the past, it always seemed like stock photos looks like is, you know, pretty retro. You know, back in time, pretty stiff, to be honest. You know, 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

Aaron Witt 36:07 

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 that's differentiated my my storytelling is you have to be you have to love it, because it's hard and it takes a long time. I've been people ask me, How have you how have you done this? How have you gotten so good at telling stories? Well, I've told stories every day for for seven years now, consistently on social media every day. And if you do something every day for four years, you you get better at it, but I couldn't. I couldn't sustain that if I wasn't so in love with the story I was telling in the first place. And so one I think you have to be in love with, with the story you're telling, and you like, with a photograph. I'm not just taking a photograph, I am. I'm conveying emotions in a way, which is it's quite odd to quite odd to even talk about, and 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. And so one, you have to love it. And then two, and this is what companies I think, 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, wouldn't do and from a from a storytelling standpoint, from a photo 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, quote, unquote, on paper. But that's not how this industry works. It's not perfect. It shouldn't be perfect. And so I'm just going to capture it as I see it as it is. And so I think companies from 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 piano. I don't have that skill. Storytelling is the exact same thing. If you try to go tell one story, make one LinkedIn post, it's gonna 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 tell stories, you're gonna start to recognize the stories happening around you every day with you. Know, how many people work your company? 100 how many storylines is that? You just have to open your eyes and look around you their stories happening all the time. They're right in front of you, but you have to train yourself on how to, how to, how to spot them, and then how to tell them and keep it authentic. Just Just lay it out how it is. Because people, people buy people. If I'm, if I'm going to be a customer of yours, I I'm going to buy you as an individual along with your product. Yeah, you need a great product. But I'm also buying you as an individual. If you're trying to recruit people, I want to if I'm, if I'm going to go work for company, who am I going to work for? Okay, cool, this company has this brand, but who owns the place, who leads the place are, 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, and 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, and that's the kind of organization I want to be a part

David Novak 39:53 

of. What's the favorite story you've ever told? Aaron?

Aaron Witt 39:56 

I think what I've loved most is the international travel. What I've done, I've had the opportunity. Over the past few years, I started traveling all over the United States. I still travel over the United States. I travel almost every week and but then I had the opportunity to go to totally different places, like 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, and it's it's a lot of fun for me like 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 and, and do some funny hand get gestures and and try to to make people laugh, even, even when we don't share a common language. I love, I love that challenge, because it's you almost, you almost lose sight of the story or whatever, whatever's happening, and you're just focused on the humanity, which, which, I think is really cool to be halfway around the world and realize, wow, this guy, he's just like me. He's, he's, he's just trying to make a good living for himself to support his family. He just wants to live in a in a safe neighborhood, to do good work. He's exactly like me. This is, this is so crazy. And to have to have those opportunities in my 20s is awesome. You know,

David Novak 41:40 

speaking of humanity, I know you really are a big believer in building a powerful culture for your team. And one of the foundations of your culture is that you really believe, and you it's sort of a mantra of yours that everybody matters. How do you walk the talk of everybody matters. As the CEO of the company, the first

Aaron Witt 42:03 

thing that I've tried to do, though, as a leader is, like you said, walk the talk. I I want to really take care of myself, and I want to be a great example for others, and so 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. And so 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, Sunday morning. I'm by myself in the office, and I had a lot of anxiety, and so 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, and 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 and I if you're struggling with any of that, if anybody in your family struggling with that, I hope you take advantage of that and and I could sit there and say, you know, all you guys need to teach to take care of your health, need to need to take care of your anxiety, or whatever it is, but It's so much more effective to say, Hey, man, I I don't have it all figured out. I my mental state, yeah, it goes up and down, and when it does, I go get help. And I'm really grateful that I go get help. So I think there's, there's a lot of other things I do, but first and foremost, I try to just make myself a great example. You know, in

David Novak 43:59 

growing your brand, you're you're really leaning into the this idea of community. And one great example that is that your creation of your dirt World Summit, give me a peek into how that fits into your overall business strategy.

Aaron Witt 44:15 

Well, it was last January, 2023 we had a, I think it was a board meeting, and 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. And when the idea came up, I said, No, that's 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 worse, we still have our. Hill 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 outvoted. 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. And so, October of the same year, we have an event for the first time with 700 industry leaders, and 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? And it just all came together in this, 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, yeah, the same 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? And 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 company? How do I get better as a leader? How do we get better as an industry? And and it's, it was, it was awesome. And so we have our second one this year in November. I can't wait. I firmly believe we're building, I think the one of the most exciting events out there, period. And we're just going to keep running with it. We'll be back

David Novak 46:40 

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 Lencioni 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 your you know the the challenge you've had with your past girlfriends and your father, and you know, does that openness, that vulnerability that you have, Does, does that ever come back and bite you in the ass,

Aaron Witt 48:01 

sure, but, 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 it's one of the most leadership, one of the most important leadership principles I've learned vulnerability, because that gives everybody else permission to be vulnerable for whatever reason. I don't know why i My name's on the company for better, for worse, my, my, my formal title is Chief Executive Officer. I'm put in this bucket as this leader, as the guy at the company, and if the guy at the company saying, Man, I am, I'm struggling. Or, man, yeah, I've been around alcoholism. It's, it's rough, or, man, I've struggled with relationships. It, it gives people permission to, oh, yeah, oh, he's human. We're all human. I can, I can. I can talk about that stuff too. I can. I can be vulnerable too. And I think, I think when people are 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, does it? Or you look at their desks, and there's, there's, 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 that's silly. Everybody has a family. Everybody has a life. But there's such a there's such a rigid barrier between that and what they do professionally. And I maybe that works for it works for a lot of big companies. That's awesome, but, but for, for for what I want to do, it doesn't work. It doesn't make sense. And I have to be vulnerable first. I have to go first. Aaron,

David Novak 49:43 

you know, this has been a lot of fun learning about the dirt world and how you're attacking it and building it up. No pun intended. And now I want to have some more with my lightning round of questions. So are you ready for this?

Unknown Speaker 49:57 

Sure,

David Novak 49:58 

the three words at best to. Describe you,

Aaron Witt 50:02 

curious, small and I'd like to say funny.

David Novak 50:07 

If you could be one person for a day besides yourself, who would it be

Aaron Witt 50:11 

president united states?

David Novak 50:13 

Your biggest pet peeve,

Aaron Witt 50:16 

people that chew with their mouth open,

David Novak 50:18 

who would play you in a movie?

Aaron Witt 50:20 

I'd like to say just I have no idea. Justin Bieber,

David Novak 50:25 

what's the number of continents you've stepped foot on in the past 12 months?

Unknown Speaker 50:30 

5455, yeah.

David Novak 50:33 

What's the hardest leg of a triathlon?

Aaron Witt 50:37 

The Run, for sure.

David Novak 50:38 

What do you love the most about your aquarium,

Aaron Witt 50:42 

I just love watching it. I could watch it all day. I've stared at it for an hour today already.

David Novak 50:47 

Is the dream still alive of one day financing a skid steer?

Aaron Witt 50:52 

Yes, I already had a skid steer, so I've crossed that one off the list, and hopefully many more machines future state,

David Novak 50:59 

if I turned on the radio in your car. What would I hear?

Aaron Witt 51:03 

Probably some news podcast. What's something about you? Few people would know that I am definition introvert, so introverted, it's not funny.

David Novak 51:11 

What's one of your daily rituals? Something that you never miss? Exercising. Fantastic. That's the end of the lightning round. Good job.

Aaron Witt 51:19 

Was I lightning enough?

David Novak 51:20 

You were you were absolutely lightning. Tell me more about what you call your chores and how you're shaping them as a leader.

Aaron Witt 51:29 

I I'm a big believer, a big believer in being consistent and notching small daily gains. And 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. So New Year's comes around, January 1, 2025 what's a resolution? I'm gonna read 12 books. Well, how am I going to accomplish reading 12 books? What books am I going to read? How many you know? Okay, so that's a book of mine. It doesn't, it's not a it's not an actionable plan. It doesn't. That 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 gonna 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 gonna sleep in a little bit. I've got to travel today. There isn't room for that. The decision is eliminated. I don't have to decide if I'm gonna read today, if I'm gonna exercise today. I just Ha, 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 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.

David Novak 54:20 

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

Aaron Witt 54:26 

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 with 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 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,

David Novak 55:29 

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 that I'm and I agree with you. We take 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.

Aaron Witt 55:48 

Sure. Yeah, thanks for having me, David.

David Novak 55:56 

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 importance of 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 how leaders lead is Erica Ayers bedon, CEO of food 52 and the former CEO of Barstool Sports.

Erika Ayers Badan 57:16 

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.

David Novak 57:30 

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. You.