David Novak 0:03 

Welcome to How leaders lead where every week you get to listen. And while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world, I break down the key learning so that by the end of the episode, you'll have something simple that you can apply as you develop into a better leader. That's what this podcast is all about. Today's guest is Terry McGurk, the chairman of the Atlanta Braves in 2016. Right after the Braves went 6893 has a pretty rough season, Terry told me that it would take five years to turn the franchise around. Well, guess what? He had a turnaround plan that worked. And in 2021, the Braves won the World Series, which is exactly what he predicted. In this episode, you'll hear him talk about how they did this. But the lesson for us here as leaders is that Terry had extreme clarity about where he in the organization needed to go. Now many leaders don't have a clear vision for their teams. Instead, they get caught in a vicious cycle of responding to emails and attending meetings, without doing the necessary work to pause and zoom out and get clear about where the company needs to go. The goal of the leader is to take their team to victory. And we can't do that if we haven't first identified exactly where we need to go. You're about to hear how a great leader like Terry McGuirk had a clear view of success and how he assembled a team around him to execute that vision. So let's get right to it. Here's my conversation with my friend, and soon to be yours, Terry McGuirk?

Terry, I can't tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time and coming on the show.

Terry McGuirk 1:51 

David, it is such a pleasure to be with you. I've been listening to your podcast for a long time. And it is it's a real honor to be to be with you and the fact that you want to spend the time with me. So looking forward to it.

David Novak 2:04 

Oh, great. We're gonna have a lot of fun. You know, the 2022 baseball season is obviously up and running. But I want to start by going back to 2021. Congratulations to you and the Atlanta Braves for being the world champions. I mean, what's that feel like? You know, they know you're actually a world champion.

Terry McGuirk 2:22 

Well, since the last out in November to sort of a week of celebration, which we just concluded and I fear may have taken the minds of our baseball players away from winning games and more into the celebration movement. But we have had a fantastic winter, the offseason is for the players to recover and renew. But the number of times they get called on as a result of this is amazing. But this past week, we had opening day we unfurled the banner, the world championship banner. That was on a Thursday night on Saturday night, we had the ring ceremony where we had all of the players come up on a day as in the infield, in front of 40,000 fans. And it never fails to amaze me that you know these grizzled old baseball guys, 50 years in the game, come up the stairs to the day is weeping like babies, and the ring is the highest form of achievement and rewarded baseball, you have that ring forever. And that's what really means something to them.

David Novak 3:26 

So you spoke to 40,000 fans in the stadium. I mean, I can't imagine that. That is a lot of people I did tell us about that experience for you.

Terry McGuirk 3:35 

So say it wasn't my first rodeo. But it is always exciting. You have to have something special to say our fans are beyond belief. They're just so attentive to this team. And I was there rewarding their heroes with the ring. And so my few minutes of acknowledging that their fandom and their support and enthusiasm, both last year and as we started this year, I think was well received.

David Novak 4:03 

You know, I understand that you actually got to design the World Series rig and that you went for what you called some real bling. What the heck do you mean by Blake and tell us about the ring itself?

Terry McGuirk 4:15 

Well, coming out of the World Series last year, unbeknownst to me, that was the first thing almost every player had to say to us, we want something really special. And you know, frankly, we hadn't thought much about it because we're so much in the heat of battle. But upon reflection, we did what they wanted. We challenged Justin's the ring company that we chose to do something even a little out of their comfort zone and this ring opens up as a little pop top and inside is a model of the stadium and it actually has lights inside of it that look like the stadium lights. And every stone on the ring means something starting with the 755 dot Diamonds on the face for Hank Aaron. There's 44 diamonds on each side for Hank Aaron. And you know, there's a lot of beading in every part of it.

David Novak 5:09 

Yeah, how many diamonds are in the ring itself? Dairy?

Terry McGuirk 5:12 

Well, that's a very good question on just the face there besides the 755. There's an A on top that is very prominent, and that has 155 diamonds on it. And that stands for the number of years that we've been in operation, you know, and that sits on white gold, which and there are rubies, and there are, you know, beyond belief. Everybody should get a look at this. And it's on.

David Novak 5:38 

I loved it when he showed it to me. It was fantastic. You know? And Terry, you're one of the most understated, guys. I know where the players surprised that you could come up with a design that was so bold and audacious is this. What I think

Terry McGuirk 5:51 

they were I think they thought we were going to come up with something had a Brooks Brothers that looked like a college signet ring or something. And to a man they all up, and we're extremely appreciative and they wanted something outrageous. I think we delivered.

David Novak 6:08 

I could say you did you need to go online and take a look at this rig it. It is absolutely amazing. Now, you featured you know, Hank Aaron on the ring is number and its number of homeruns. And I know you were very close to him, and you actually gave his eulogy at his funeral. Tell us a story about your relationship with Hank Aaron that few people would know. Wow,

Terry McGuirk 6:31 

Hank and I were very close. We got to know each other pretty well in the middle 70s. We used to play racquetball together. And we would travel all over the country with the team and around our needs to be in motion. And we would always find a racquetball court and it's something he liked to do. And I sort of took it up. But he could have been a professional racquetball player, and people would stop even in, you know, major cities where people were a lot of pros were playing, they'd stop and come over and watch and the sound when he hit the ball with those giant forearms of his and wrists, and is the reason they call them the hammer was incredible. So you know, Hank, was an amazing superior athlete in his prime. Father Time got him and you know, we watched him sort of go downhill with some different issues, new knees, and various cancer problems and whatever, but just an amazing man, one of the most genuine nice men I have ever met.

David Novak 7:30 

Just the thought of the sound of him hitting a racquetball really could scare the heck out of you when you're on the court itself. I played a little racquetball. I think I know what that would be like. You know, Terry, you may not remember this, but I sure do. Because you and I were on a on a golf range in a few balls. And it was 2016 Right after the Braves went 6893 Not a great record. And you told me that is going to take you five years to turn the franchise around. And you did it. How did you go about building a winning team? And what were the major building blocks that you had to put in place, Terry?

Terry McGuirk 8:09 

Well, that was a pretty bold projection I made to you. And obviously, somehow it came true. But we had a championship team. As we started building our new stadium that won the East in the National League yeast in 2013. We were in first place through the all star break of 2014. And at that point, our team went 26 and 40. In the second half. And you know, basically, we lost the team, you know, a veteran team. And I hate to say it, but they gave it up. And we knew we had to break the team up start over. And so at the time tanking had just become sort of a version of what was going on. I think Chicago had started to do it Euston had done it Kansas City, there were a couple of teams that had sort of completely rebuilt, sold off all their veterans and gotten draft choices and young players. And so we went completely committed into that mode. And, you know, when you do it, you expect maybe you'll lose 100 games for a year or two. We didn't we lost 90 at our worst. But we built a minor league system, which was number one, two or three years in a row. And we then began the project of rebuilding. And I knew that as we moved into this new stadium, the economics would work in our favor, and we would be able to afford better payrolls. We were probably in the 15 to 20 range out of 30 teams and payroll. Today, we're number eight, and on the rise. So each of those two factors, talent and payroll. Were sort of in that idea of that projection. When we talked that day. How did

David Novak 9:55 

you go about developing that strategy? Terry? Is this just something that you came up with and you're sitting in your office yourself or to be with your team and, and figure out which way you want to go, because I'm sure that had to be a really debatable subject.

Terry McGuirk 10:07 

We've have an amazing senior management team here, this really goes back to Turner Field when we decided in 2013, to abandon that stadium, and which was not very old had been the 96 Olympic Stadium, which we took over. But we knew that it was highly limited in its economic return, and that we would never be a top 10 payroll team, with all of the commendations for fans and premium seating and fun in the ballpark and outside of it, and it just didn't fit what our vision was. So we then launched off to build this new stadium in northern side of Atlanta, with a mixed use project called the battery around it, which is now about two and a half million feet of bars and restaurants and experiential things that our fans absolutely come for. They stayed late, they come early. And the whole package is what has made this a very successful economic enterprise.

David Novak 11:13 

So you make this big move to build this new stadium and Battery Park. And I want to talk a little bit more about that later. But you also had to, I'm sure reinforce the culture of winning, you know, how did you go about instilling the belief that it takes to win in the organization, particularly when you're really saying, Hey, we're going to struggle in the next couple years? You know, you took a long term view to this, we did

Terry McGuirk 11:36 

have a long term view, and it certainly isn't something I walked into the clubhouse and said, Boys, we got to win. In fact, as most enterprises that are in the winning and losing business, no, it isn't trying to win or trying to get the most points is the process. It's how you do it. It's the coaches and manager and an organization you build that teaches all of the processes and you know, the 30 teams every year, we're all trying to do exactly the same thing. And if one team is 3%, better than another team over 162 games, there's going to be a material difference in their winning record. So we have focused on how to do it right. We call it the Braves way. But probably every team has their own comment along those lines. But you know, I take a lot of pride in the business side, the development side, the player personnel side, we try and pursue that endless perfection every day in everything we do.

David Novak 12:35 

You know, it's so important as a leader to repeat the vision over and over to your team and your organization. So that there's really great clarity in what you want to get at. You talk about the Braves way was that your recurring message? And what exactly is the Braves way because I'm sure there's some learning there that we can apply to all the businesses that were in.

Terry McGuirk 12:55 

Well, the breezeway is a little bit like what I described, it starts really at every level working up and down, and no acceptance of secondary performance in how you think and how you approach things. You know, we were bringing in a lot of young guys, that had been winners at other levels, at colleges or in high school. And so it wasn't hard to instill the culture of being successful. But they all had to do it together. And they all had to reinforce each other. You know, there is a mix of veterans and young guys, but you know, the leadership of baseball on field is mostly an old school group. And the new world is analytically driven. And, you know, a lot of the drafting today comes out of analytics, you know, sometimes we don't even see a player, we just see video, but we know the spin of the ball, the velocity, the angles, and out of those things, you can make great decisions about players. And we have a general manager, president of baseball ops, Alex Anthopoulos, who has done a fabulous job at building us, I think, one of the best analytic groups. And you know, people look and they say, what is an analytic guy in baseball, they're not baseball guys, necessarily. They can be a physics professor and a college, whatever. They're all very, very smart people who know how to analyze performances, technically. And then the art and the science of that is taking that version of what they discover and bringing that to sort of an old world side of baseball and having that interface is really, really important.

David Novak 14:41 

You talked about the Braves way, you know not accepting second rate anything as you were going this march over five years of World Champion. Can you recall a time where you saw sort of that second rate thing creep in and how did you as a leader really identify it and attack it?

Terry McGuirk 14:59 

You know, we were involved. Alden, so many levels over the last five years in this organization from picking the tile for the bathrooms in the new stadium, to building a new spring training facility, that we wanted to be the best in all of baseball, with probably very little ROI on the actual spending of building this on 100 acres in Florida. But knowing that it had to be a certain way in order to instill in the people that arrived there, that vision and that expectation of how good we expected it to be, you know, I can't expect those players to know how to be and behave up to a standard if we don't provide the facilities and the direction and the commitment. And so it goes two ways. It's like when the player is expected the ring to be a certain way, we try and meet them at every one of their requirements. But we expect really great things out of them. Also,

David Novak 16:00 

you know, I want to dig a little bit into the 2021 season, because in July, you just happen to lose your best player to injury, Ronaldo, hakuna, and everyone basically wrote you off for dead. Tell us how you felt when that happened? And how did you pick yourself off the mat. Because, you know, I imagine everyone that's listening here has lost or will lose a key team member for one reason or another. And I'm sure you'll have some helpful advice on how to move forward

Terry McGuirk 16:27 

with that really is the metaphor of our 21 season just before all star break. Last year, mid year, we lost Ronald Hakuna our right fielder, who arguably could be the best player in baseball, we already were struggling to get to 500, the team just really wasn't gelling. And it was sort of one of those moments that everybody had a gut check. And we start the year, you know, you don't really really start the year saying you're gonna win the World Series, you start the year saying, I've got to win my division, because that enables you to get into the playoffs at the right level. And as this bad news hit us, we were looking around at the National League yeast. And it that's where the gut check came, where we made the decision that in the coming weeks instead of being sellers at the trade deadline, and trying to get rid of a few veterans and maybe get some more youth into our organization that we would double down and try and bring in some veterans. Our outfield had gotten a little bit weaker because of the loss of Hakuna. We brought in Rosario Solair Pettersen and Duvall four very, very accomplished outfielders that other teams were shedding at the All Star break, due to them being out of their divisions, and it made all the difference, you know, we took the road less traveled. And what it did is it absolutely energized our clubhouse. And that's probably what may be the typical baseball person, you know, who's watching from the outside, can't see is the human characterization of that of that clubhouse. These guys were down. They were wondering how in the world they were going to pick themselves up. And it was just the simple commitment of the organization. To them that said, we can win by what we did. And they totally bought into it. And we went on a tear, obviously, that resulted in the World Series.

David Novak 18:32 

Well, the players obviously went on the field, but your front office was credited, I think more so than almost any baseball team in recent years. For the brilliant moves you made before the trading deadline there. You know, it seems so simple looking back, but here again, you you know, this was a big move that you made. And how did you go about deciding whether those four players were right for your team? You mentioned analytics a little bit earlier?

Terry McGuirk 18:57 

Well, you know, we're coming out of the pandemic year, where we were scrapping together every dollar we could for payroll, and we did not have a very good balanced budget at the time as we started the season. And I thought we were in some trouble. But our fans came back we by mid year we were you know, the turnstiles were rolling pretty good. And we committed 15 to $20 million when we brought those new players in in mid year. And that was 15 to 20. We didn't have at the beginning of the season, and had just appeared because of some better economics of attendance during the year. So, you know, we were spending our savings basically on the bet going forward. And so it was it was pretty important to us. There are teams there's a lot of big teams, Yankees, la Chicago that they've got plenty of money. They overspend at times and they have somebody go down like Hakuna. They have a guy that they can bring into is almost as good. We didn't have have that, and our budget doesn't afford that. You know, I think what we would be most proud of out of the 21 season is that we won the World Series with the 14th highest payroll, there were 13 teams with higher payrolls and us some with 100 million or more, and we tracked them down and beat him. And, you know, that's pretty illogical, almost impossible. But it happened.

David Novak 20:23 

You know, I want to go back to last season just a little bit more, you know, you have 10 teams go into the playoffs dairy, and you're the only one with less than 90 wins. What was it about this team that you really believe got them over the finish line?

Terry McGuirk 20:37 

That's correct. We had less than 90 wins. Going back to that, we just had to win the National League East. And so that was our focus, we got ourselves into the playoffs and won the east. I remember at the end of the season was still everything was in the balance. And we had to go on we go, we're going to the west coast in mid September, we played San Diego and LA. And we had to do pretty well. And we got to San Diego, the last stop. And all of a sudden, our young pitcher fried through almost a no hitter. And we all looked at it and said, This guy is really hitting hitting his stride. This is you know, and we do have a lot of young pitchers. But this is really special. And then we were coming home and we had to play Philadelphia and the Mets to finish the season. And in the division, we could have easily lost division if we had been swept by Philadelphia and then lost to the Mets turned out we swept Philadelphia and then beat the Mets in a series and coasted into the final days. But, you know, it really went to the final moments. We never had this thing I used and in our hands. And I think that is part of the magic. You want to go into the playoffs with the most momentum, the highest edge and maybe have played a lot of really tough close games. And you've got your focus exactly where it needs to be.

David Novak 22:04 

You had a heck of a run, no question about it. And you know, my mom and dad 92 years old, they love the Atlanta Braves they watched every one. So man they were living and dying with you, as was the whole brave nation there. How late did you stay up Terry celebrating that World Series victory. Tell us about that night.

Terry McGuirk 22:21 

Oh my gosh, there was no sleep that night. But there wasn't much sleep for the 30 nights before it either. You know, during the playoffs, you're playing late games, the games are on late. Many times you're out of your timezone. You're in the clubhouse afterwards, for whatever reasons talking to players, or the manager or the general manager. And if you're dedicated to sleep, you're probably not in the playoffs and you're probably not in the baseball business. But that night I remember, you know, it's probably two or three in the morning. And I finally got around to looking at my phone. And I think I had like 300 emails and texts, all from friends all with great wishes and all the sentiment that you live your life for. And I said to myself, I am not going to bed until I've answered every single one of these tonight, and sat in the clubhouse and answered them for several hours after it. It was one of the most fun moments of my life.

David Novak 23:13 

That's a great story. I knew it was gonna be a little challenging to get you to talk about 2021 Because you don't rest on your laurels in any aspect of your life. You're a guy who's always pushing forward. And here we are. Now we're heading into the 2022 season and you have another big change that you've got to deal with. You lost your best player first baseman Freddy Freeman to the Los Angeles Dodgers. How do you handle a change like that, Terry,

Terry McGuirk 23:38 

that was really a cause celeb through the whole winter and the lockout. And unfortunately, we were not able to talk to him for three months because of the lockout. As the lockout ended, we came back to he and his agent and we upped our bid, which arguably was going to make him the highest paid first baseman in baseball. And it just so happened that there wasn't a meeting of the minds, and probably some misunderstandings, probably some expectations that were maybe not realistic on the agent side. But we all did our job. We all did our best. And I love Freddie like a son. He's been to my house and spent a weekend and it was really really hard to see that end like it did. But our general manager Alex had a plan B in his pocket. And as you've seen, we've brought Matt Olson over from Oakland who was arguably, if not up to Freddie's level, the second best first baseman in baseball, and had been an all star a Gold Glove and has not disappointed as he started the 22 season. In fact, I think I read his on base percentages, the highest the start of season in the history of the Braves, so he's done pretty well. You know,

David Novak 24:57 

as we speak, the Braves are off to a slow start. You're five and six, you know, how do you feel about the prospects for this season following such a tremendous 2021? And, and how do you handle the pressure you gotta feel, to repeat?

Terry McGuirk 25:12 

Oh, actually, I'm sort of amazed that we're even five and six with all of the celebration that happened in our first homestand, there could absolutely be no focus by our players on the winning and the processes that we talked about. And we had every night was another major focus on the past World Series and on their past achievements. And these are not the right mindsets that you want to put your team in. But they're necessary. They're for the fans there for the organization, we gave rings out to not only all the players, but we gave rings out to the 500 front office workers who did all the work and came back in the pandemic and worked hard to make sure all the fans were well received. You know, everybody pulled on the rope together. And so we spent the first week absolutely celebrating, I'm glad it's over. Getting on the west coast where we can start to focus on baseball, we've actually played very well. And you know, you alluded to last night's game, a two to one loss. In San Diego, we played really good baseball, and we had two rookies go for us, you know. And there, there were actually two guys who were drafted in 2020. And are the two of only five guys who have made it to the majors since that draft, and the other three were in the top 10 picks in the draft. And these guys were in the fourth and fifth round, which goes to that taking of the players and getting the best guys off the vine that weren't necessarily the most popular choices. And here they are winning games on the West Coast and early in their career they won in their first round.

David Novak 26:53 

So do you feel any additional pressure this year after winning last year? Terry,

Terry McGuirk 26:57 

I don't, I think the expectation is that we won't win. And that it's almost impossible to repeat. I think the Yankees and 98 are the last ones to do it. So you know, if we were to get ourselves in position, I think most people would be betting against and you look at all the power rankings, we're not in the top five or six. I love it, it just sort of takes some of the push away from focusing on your knitting. And we can go back to business because there aren't very many expectations. Our fans are wild. I mean, we have had the most amazing response from the region and the city, we sold out almost the entire first homestand of seven games, and the likelihood of coming close to that level throughout the season is pretty good. If we pin the needle on our stadium for 81 games, we'd be at about 3.3 million fans. And I think we'll get very close to 3 million this year. So it's an amazing performance by our fans.

David Novak 27:59 

You know, you mentioned a little bit earlier. So I'd like to shift to it. And you oversaw the creation of a brand new stadium truths Park. Tell us how you thought through the fan experience as you built the stadium.

Terry McGuirk 28:09 

I've personally been through, that was my third stadium, Atlanta, Fulton County, when I first got involved with the Braves when I was running Turner, and Turner Field which we took over in 96. And then this one. And so we pretty much knew not only from our own experiences, but we'd been to virtually every stadium in the country and seeing all of the pluses and minuses and successes and failures. And we knew that we were really lacking in our fan experience, both in premium seats. And in the pre and post game outside the stadium. You know, these were things our fans really wanted. And so we were lucky enough to find just under 100 acres in northern Atlanta at the intersection of three major highways. The land had been sitting fallow for 50 years, because it had three major pipelines running underneath it. And we went to the pipeline owners and asked them if they would resect the pipeline around the edge of the property. When we told them the project, they were excited about it too. And they said yes. And it was actually pipelines owned by the Koch brothers. And they hardly ever do this kind of thing. But they did it for us. And to this day. It's the key that turned the lock that allowed us to do this.

David Novak 29:28 

And then you created the Battery Park around it to create the fan experience pre and post game. You know, what was the big challenge in that, Terry?

Terry McGuirk 29:36 

Well, we were all at this point baseball guys. We were not developers. We knew what we wanted. And we hired some developers and we got into it. By the time we were starting to break ground on the stadium. We sort of switched to self developing and we were able to figure out what needed to be done. We had a big idea about retail in this big Excuse project, we had 530 apartments and some big office buildings and many restaurants. But retail died literally while we were doing the project. And we had to sort of shift. You know, we were not real estate developers, but I thought we did an excellent job at figuring out what our fans wanted how to go get the right places. You know, I remember being in San Diego, just outside of their stadium nearby in the Gaslight district, there was a yard house there. And it fit beautifully with all of the baseball themes. And the first thing we did is we went to that corporation and we got a yard house 100 feet from our stadium entrance. And so we did that kind of thing. On and on. We just did what we thought would be good. And it

David Novak 30:46 

worked. Yeah, absolutely. And everybody raves about it. Now I want to take you way back, Terry, tell us about your upbringing and share a story from your childhood that's really shaped shaped the kind of leader you are today.

Terry McGuirk 30:59 

I was a little league player and I stunk I can remember pitching and walking five guys in a row and the manager coming out and putting me in centerfield. And I cried behind my mitt, you know, who would have ever thought I baseball business. But I was a sailor growing up. And you know, sailing competitively does a lot for you, and makes you understand how to make everything work on your own. When I was in college, I played sports, I was captain of my college football team. And we went undefeated. And those are things that helped mold you and help give you sort of that when you have to dig deep and your young career or your old career when you're not successful. You have some things to dig into that help.

David Novak 31:41 

So as I understand that you were a really good sailor and you actually considered at one point becoming a professional sailor, and then you you happen to meet the legendary Ted Turner and ended up working for him tell it can you tell us that story?

Terry McGuirk 31:56 

Well, I did work for Ted right out of college only because my parents had moved to Atlanta and my father was in the television business, but he promptly picked up and moved back to New York. And I was left there. And I sort of, you know, there was something about this guy Turner that I was really fascinated by. And when you come out of college, you know, genius could bite you in the nose. And you wouldn't know genius, if you saw it. But it wasn't too long into my working with him that I began to say, This guy is thinking things doing things. And he is trying to conquer lands that I never even dreamed of. And everybody is molded by somebody and Ted has his dark side. And you know, he's not somebody you want to be around every day. But the thought processes and the genius that I got to experience working 25 years with him. We never once had an argument we got along brilliantly. I probably talked to him every day for 25 straight years, a lot more I'm sure that his family or anyone else that are supposed to be doing that kind of thing. So it was a pretty magical experience going through the media business as we went from a broken down UHF television station in the middle 70s with 30 employees to doing business in 120 countries and 20,000 employees around the world. And it was some journey.

David Novak 33:19 

You know, Terry, I you know, I don't know if this is true or not. But I heard this through the grapevine that when Ted Turner bought the Atlanta Braves, he actually sent you to spring training to try out as a player. And you actually got offered a minor league contract. Is that true? Or is that just folklore.

Terry McGuirk 33:37 

That is true. It is sort of the craziest story maybe of my relationship with Ted. But I think Eddie Robinson, who was the general manager of the Braves, in 1976, as we went to spring training that your thought this up, because Ted had never been around baseball, he didn't know any rules. He literally didn't know a block from a walk. And, you know, he was a quick learner and he wanted to try and learn the game. Now that he owned the team. But he, you know, is embarrassing. You can't just walk in and ask a question I already so we knew each other well enough. And so they cooked up this idea where I would be a non roster invitee left fielder, and the beauty of that is no one really wants to be your pal, because they know you're gonna get cut. So I was able to sort of work in anonymity. But there I was, every day in spring training for three weeks, we went through it and every night. The idea was Ted and I would go have dinner and he unleashes targeted questions that he'd write down all day. And as I said, after about three weeks, he had it down. He really did. And the foolishness of it. They said, Listen, if you really want to give this thing a try, we'll put you in the minor leagues. I said, Are you kidding me? Get me back to my office when I was 25. So you know, but I was too old for the minor leagues, you know, and it would today it would be ridiculously old.

David Novak 34:56 

Terry, you had such an amazing career. You're still go On big time, and but you start out in sales and you work your way up the organization and you ultimately come chairman and CEO of Turner broadcast system, what do you think it is that you did that separated you from the pack and helped you rise from the organization? And did you have sort of a hinge moment in your career that really kind of opened up the door to that riser was just one move after another?

Terry McGuirk 35:21 

Well, that's a really good question that I don't know exactly the answer to. But I'm sitting here on my desk. And I've got a Rubik's cube right here. And I, I've used it in talks to our employees before. And this came from Ted, I remember bringing the answers back on questions or missions that I was supposed to be on that I couldn't accomplish. And there was no such thing as not accomplishing a mission or bringing back the answer no, to a question. And I learned that if less, I had examined a problem or a mission in every possible way, and looked at it in a 360 view. But the worst thing to do would be, you know, it's embarrassing to come back. And this guy would take the problem and say, well, here's how you should have handled it. Here's what you should have done. And here's how you should have looked at it. Well, within a few short years of working with Ted, I was able to probably make a decision exactly as he would, in almost all of those kinds of situations. The analogy to me is taking a Rubik's Cube and looking at all the sides. And if you don't look at every part of a problem, and every way you can solve it, you're failing yourself and your career, and you're probably not the person that is going to get the battlefield promotion that you certainly want.

David Novak 36:35 

Terry, as you are conquering the media world with the likes of Ted Turner, I understand you actually had the opportunity to have dinner with Fidel Castro. And Gorbachev, I got to hear these stories. Tell us about it.

Terry McGuirk 36:50 

Gorbachev is one of the wonderful men of our lifetimes. And Ted got to know he and his wife Ray's pretty well. I was with him a couple of times in Moscow and St. Petersburg, where we had CNN very prominently in the studio there. I was around for a couple of dinners and private meetings and his vision of Russia. So opposite of this guy, Putin.

David Novak 37:13 

Man, Terry, you are so right about that. Well, tell us about the time you spent with Castro.

Terry McGuirk 37:19 

Well dinner with Castro in Cuba, in Havana at the Miramar mansions, right next to the palaces is incredible. It was like six people at our table. I think the reason he did it is he was in love with Jane Fonda. And she was at the table. And this was 1990. He told us that he worked out to her exercise videos. He said he read six books at a time when I went I was told that you pretty much have to bring all your creature comforts, which they were right. I brought a case of California wine. And we did not know that we this was all sprung on us. So I'm literally at the table and I have two bottles of really good California Chardonnay at my feet. And they're serving this Cuban swill that they pass off for wine. And I can tell nobody was drinking, it was not good. This is the time when the CIA is trying to kill Castro at every turn your eye, he's literally one foot away from it sitting next to me. I pulled this wine bottle up on the table. And I have an opener, you know this, I brought everything myself. Unbelievable. So I go and I show it to him and I open it open the bottle and I pour myself a glass don't don't come. He holds his glass up. Like he wants me to pour some for him. All of a sudden here this wild size around him. He has tasters. Nobody is ever allowed to give him anything to eat or drink that hasn't been tested. He sort of looks around, I pour the wine into his glass, the two of us clink glasses, and we both drink it. And to this day, I'm still amazed that that happened.

David Novak 38:59 

That's such a great story, Terry. And you know, the Turner Empire had all kinds of successes. But there was also a lot of spending on a lot of different things and a lot of different companies and avenues of potential growth. And there was a time that the company almost went bankrupt as I understand it. Tell us you know how that happened? And what was your role in keeping that company on its feet? Because I think that's when you had to pull out the Rubik's Cube?

Terry McGuirk 39:23 

Well, you know, technically we probably did hit the rocks, but it was after some grand gesture acquisitions. And Ted always wanted to grow a little faster or a lot faster than probably we should have. And in the mid 80s, he took a wild run at CBS with Mike Milken. And you know, that was the time of junk bonds where you could buy things sometimes without having the wherewithal. But right behind that unsuccessful move. In 1985 and 96, Ted's successfully completed the MGM deal. I remember we went from 200 million in debt Up to $2 billion in debt overnight, which put all kinds of new pressures on the company. And a lot of the debt was sort of in a PacMan mode where if businesses were not hitting at all cylinders, this guy could Korean would get more stock. And if we were unsuccessful, he would get the company. I don't think Ted totally got that because his eye was on the prize. And he always knew that he could succeed at anything he set out to do. And this was one time we didn't grow fast enough. And it was probably unrealistic growth that was expected. But I remember going to see John Malone in the Christmas of 1986. And he always worked between Christmas and New Year's, and I always went to see him and those weeks, and while I was out there, he said, you know, you're gonna go bankrupt, you can't sustain it. And it's happening quick. Now, he was pretty much the leader of the cable television industry, of which Ted had driven a lot of growth and had a lot of loyalty. And they didn't want to see Ted go down. And so I literally went on the next plane back to Atlanta, met with Ted. And the CFO, Ted sent me in the CFO back because he couldn't believe it. And John demonstrated to the CFO that we were going bankrupt. And six months later, early July 1987, Malone, and Time Warner led a rescue of Turner Broadcasting, Ted went from about 83% to 35% of the company. And they put in a class of shares that pretty much hamstrung Ted from being quite the maverick that he used to be. And I don't think he ever really recovered. We did some great things. After that. We bought Anna Barbera, and then the Cartoon Network, TNT, host of international networks. But this was sort of linear growth for Ted and it didn't fulfill what he was looking for. And so when he had the chance to merge with Time Warner in 95, he jumped at it, again, a chance to sort of grow faster than we should have. And I've always made the argument to him that he would have been a far richer and happier guy if he'd stayed independent. I think that turns out to be absolutely true in hindsight, but he had a few fun years, and that it turned pretty sour. The merger of Time Warner with AOL, and Owen was the sort of culmination of a lot of bad management, where they lost 200 billion of the shareholders money. And I got out sort of just before that, and Ted wrote it down very unhappily. That's the long story.

David Novak 42:38 

Well, good move on you for getting out in time. What was it that made you get out, Terry, what made you say I don't want a part of this AOL deal.

Terry McGuirk 42:46 

I was running Turner Broadcasting. I'm the Chairman CEO. And I think we went through 14 months of due diligence. And there was, every day host of AOL errs would show up and criticize the company and the growth, you know, we were growing at 20% a year, think every one of my years as CEO, we compounded at 20%. And their idea was 30, or 40%. Or you're not on internet time businesses. And so we were being shunned by this new management group. And technically they did take over the company. So it was apparent that the ways we were doing things were looked at as bricks and mortar kind of old world businesses, when in fact, we were killing it. And it wasn't too long after that merger, that the theory that they came to all of the Time Warner assets with failed and Time Warner went back to being time wondering,

David Novak 43:41 

yeah, you know, Terry is such a fascinating story that you have what you've done with Braves and your past career, we could spend forever just talking about what happened at TNT and you know, all the learnings that you gained there. But there's been a lot of fun. And I want to have a little bit more before I let you go here with lightning round of q&a. Are you ready for this? I'll try three words that best describe you.

Terry McGuirk 44:05 

smart, handsome, fast? I don't know. Come on.

David Novak 44:11 

Well, I agree with everything but the handsome part. Okay. If you could be one person for a day besides yourself? Who would it be and why?

Terry McGuirk 44:19 

You know, I'm a history nut. You know, I love American history. And, you know, the great civil war generals, Ulysses S. Grant is in the Abraham Lincoln period. I mean, wouldn't that be amazing to have the command of a battlefield in a civil war in Gettysburg, or you know, wherever. So that's the general theory. Your biggest pet peeve. My pet peeve is people who have capabilities and their wits about them and don't have the drive to accomplish. It's all there. David, you've been so highly successful, you know that. You just can't have people in the room that don't see the world like you do about how You conquered new lands, new worlds and achieve and it's unfortunate sometimes, but that's what these business in this podcast is all about. Really?

David Novak 45:10 

What's something about you that few people would know, Terry? Besides you playing racquetball with Hank Aaron,

Terry McGuirk 45:15 

I'm a real family guy. I love being around kids, I have soon to be 15 grandchildren. And you know, one of the byproducts of getting out of that AOL moment in 2001 was I got to go home and be with all my teenage kids and go to every game every play. And so those are the important things in life. And if you miss those, and they run in such a juxtaposition to the kinds of things that we're all trying to do. I was with a investment banking leader this week, and I watched, you know, painfully is, you know, he, he was on his missions and not with his kids. And it's hard to do. It's just a hard balance too many,

David Novak 45:55 

your favorite baseball player of all time, Hank, Aaron, no question. Number of games, you go to a year,

Terry McGuirk 46:01 

I go to about 100 a year have been going to you know, I've probably been to more baseball games since 1976. than any man alive other than somebody who's a lifer. With a uniform on. I've been to a lot.

David Novak 46:16 

Well, you deserve to be on the executive committee of Major League Baseball and, and you've been described by many as the Mr. Inside of baseball. How do you see the responsibility Terry to the game of baseball itself? Now? How do you see your responsibility?

Terry McGuirk 46:31 

Well, one of the joys of baseball is the quality of the people I get to interact with. And I underestimated that when I committed to being a full time baseball guy, and oh, three, and what a joy, what a reward. And so I look forward to the meetings, I love going to the owners meetings and sitting around the room with some really, really smart people. My background gives me a I run the Media Committee for baseball also, and gives me a nice perch to help them chart the future. And, you know, we're sort of launching off on a new generation, you know, we've gone from cable TV, to the internet, to the digital to now the streaming world, and it's changing everything, and especially in how sports rights are used and exploited in the future. So I'm in the right place at the right time for that,

David Novak 47:19 

you know, if you could give aspiring leaders one bit of advice, Terry, what would it be,

Terry McGuirk 47:23 

you know, just stay balanced. If you're an aspiring leader, you're obviously a smart guy, or a smart woman and the conflicts that are coming at you and from ethical and character standpoint. You know, I think at the end of the day, character matters so much more than you give it credit for when you're in your 30s. And if you stay true to yourself, and just follow your own judgment, you almost always end up in the right place. And if you don't, you shouldn't have been in the other place to begin with.

David Novak 47:53 

You know, Terry, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to be on this podcast. And you know, you are a person who has the character that you just mentioned, and you're a person that you know, a lot, I have a lot of friends that are mutual, and everybody admires you, because you are that man of character. And thank you very much for being with us today. I appreciate it. Back at

Terry McGuirk 48:14 

you, David.

David Novak 48:23 

What a fun conversation with my friend Terry, the guy knows what it takes to make big things happen. Now, I'm sure you've heard me talk about the concept of the single biggest thing, what's the single biggest thing that you can do to make the greatest impact on your business? All right, I want to give you a little coaching this week as a part of your weekly personal development plan. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to go around to the key people in your company, the key people on your team and ask them this question. What's the single biggest thing that you can do to make the greatest impact on the business, then you should think about their responses. And then you should think about how you're looking at the business. And see if you can really isolate that single biggest thing that will have the biggest impact for your team and your company. And then the job that you need to do as a leader is to align everybody on the team around that single biggest thing and make sure that you do everything it takes to give you the best opportunity to win. That's exactly what Terry and the Braves did. They knew they needed to make changes and they did it. From the front offices to the coaching staff to the field. They focused on what needed to happen to contribute to the overall turnaround. And ultimately, it led to a World Series when so do you want to know how leaders lead? What we learned today is that great leaders know where they need to go. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead you 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 in each episode that you can apply to your business so that you will become the best leader you can be. I'll see you next week.