← Confessions of an Implementer
Confessions of an Implementer
S2E52 | Special Episode: How Your Greatest Strength Can Derail You with CAPT Jason Motes
01:10:10
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- [00:00]
Dr. Jason Moats
When I realized that I had the direct ability to impact the livelihood and well being of others by caring for them on an exceptional basis, that was the turning point for me.
- [00:16]
Ryan Hogan
Welcome to Confessions of an Implementer. I'm your host, Ryan Hogan. We share unique stories of EOS implementers and the companies they've transformed to give you a rare glimpse of into the successes and challenges of the system in action. Let's jump in.
- [00:30]
Ryan
I heard you like to pick up hitchhikers off the side of the road. Like, where, where did this come from?
- [00:37]
Dr. Jason Moats
Just to be clear, I don't, I don't. I'm not in the business of just. I'm not picking up hitchhikers anymore. I. The last one was a bad experience. It was in Kentucky, 2022, 2023 timeframe. But I got a text message about, I wouldn't say this person was a hitchhiker, but she was a high school classmate in Long beach and she was in distress. And I didn't know, I don't believe I knew she was in distress, but for whatever reason, I pulled over and asked her if she needed a ride. She, she needed a ride and it's taken her. I mean, we're talking 1995. Wow. So 31 years to find me and send me a message to say, you don't know this, but you picked me up when I was in distress and she was running from something. She was in high school. We both were. So I didn't have the mental capacity to understand what distress was by any stretch. But in a strange, shorter way on this very, you know, this very interesting question, it, it sort of brings the, the picking up of the hitchhikers back to full circle because, yeah, I've done it a few times and I think I probably just have a big heart. You know, I've never, that I've never had to hitchhike. Certainly taking my share of Greyhound rides, which feels like you're hitchhiking, especially when you're asked to not get back on the bus at a particular stop. I like to help people. You know, if I see someone in distress on the side of the road, I'll typically pull over. You know, what I do in the Navy, I was in San Diego, but I needed to stop by the rental car center in San Diego to pick up an electronic device that I had left at the San Diego rental car counter weeks ago. It had just been waiting for me to come back. So I'm like, oh, I'm passing by. It let me stop by. I go into the rental Car center. Mind you, I've had a rental car from Long beach for just a couple hours. Long beach to San Diego is 80 something miles, maybe 90. I pull out of the massive rental car center in San Diego at this big intersection of whatever that is in pch. I cross into the intersection and the car shuts down and it's electronic gear shifter. Like you can't force it into neutral. I can't even start the car because it's out of gas. So they rented me a car with like, you know, no gas and shame on me. It probably was just moving so fast in the moment. I'm usually not that unaware, but shame on me. I didn't notice the car wasn't pool. I was in distress and like, well, how ironic that I'm walking distance, I mean even closer than walking distance to the national rental car facility and I can't even push the car to it because it's stuck. And you know, cue the middle fingers, all the horns. Everyone's got a problem with me. And I'm in the uniform even worse.
- [03:28]
Ryan
Probably last year there, there were some, some stuff going on.
- [03:31]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I'm in uniform. So I'm like, I'm trying to, you know, like cover my rank tab. Like so I finally just. This thing is in the mid lane n nudged into the intersection, not fully into it, but pretty, pretty certainly across the crosswalk lines where you would get a ticket. And I finally just got, I hit the hazards, I got out and I went and stood on the sidewalk with my arms crossed and I just watched everybody drive by this car and flip it off and honk the horns. I'm like, you know, welcome to California. Wouldn't it have been nice for someone to help me do something now? Couldn't put the car in neutral. I'm not sure what we could have done, but it would have been nice. And no one offered. And I'm just thinking to myself, standing there on the, on the corner of whatever in pch, my arms crossed, laughing in my head as people are just honking at this car that's vacant, thinking to myself, I've helped a lot of people and I can't get a single person to stop and help me. You don't do it for that reason, but it's because I wouldn't want anyone to have that feeling. Now the, the gentleman in Bowling Green, Kentucky a few years ago, I, I saw him when I was pumping gas. I saw him when I went into the gas station. It was like a loves travel stop, you know, with the heart it was a loves. And I. I noticed him at the counter, and he was buying a monster, and he had all. He had his cash wadded up in balls, and he's putting them on the counter and trying to, like, unwrap them. So I'm like, I'm just hoping he can hurry up and unwrap his dollars and pay for his monster so I can pay for probably my monster and get back in my car and get up the interstate. I was coming from Nashville, Tennessee, heading north. And by the time I got to the counter, he's already outside and he's sitting on the ground. And so I knew something, like he was hurting from something. And I just was like, brother, where are you going? He said, I'm trying to get to Louisville, Kentucky. I'm thinking in my head, you know, I don't believe in luck, but, you know, I hope you get there. I start walking to my car, and I remember putting something in my trunk or getting something out of my trunk, and I'm like, let me ask him if he needs a ride. So I walked over to him and I started asking him some questions, like, where are you coming from? Where are you going? What's going on? He was in his probably early 40s, late 30s. And he told me, you know, he had been in some sort of halfway house or something somewhere there in middle Kentucky. And I was just like, you know, I got a rental car. What's the worst you can do to me? Let's go. So I asked him, do you have anything on you that would get me in trouble? He said no. Took his word for it, put his stuff in the back, and we started heading north. And I'm telling you, this was a loves travel stop, like, right on the highway. No sooner than I had turned out of there and onto the highway, things changed quick. And they just, you know, unfortunately, at that point, I was locked in. So it was an hour and a half drive. Ish. And I got, you know, I got his whole life story and then some. And his life story, you know, it changed multiple times. And he'd been through some things, but driving there on the interstate, just trying to make sure, he had some animated moments where he really got excited. And I just, you know, wanted to be calm and get him where he needed to be. But the problem is he didn't really know where he was going. So we started talking about family, and I was able to get a phone number from him of his sister. And so I got him to, like, a Walgreens parking lot, and I Pulled over and I texted her the number, not knowing if it would go through or whatever, but I texted her and it had the blue arrow, so I knew it was going to iPhone. I'm like, okay, we're, you know, we're working with something that's a little bit more legit than the green Arrow. No disrespect to the Android users, but he, he gave me his number. I texted her, she texted me back in a few minutes. I said the. This is my name. I have. Somebody actually had the same name, same first name. I picked him up in Bowling Green, Kentucky. He says you're his sister. And she texted me back, we've been looking for him for over a decade. I'll be right there. So I took a picture of him, I sent it to her, and, you know, the rest is history. And I still check in on her. She's. They've lost contact with them again. But the point is, like, taking him in that moment gave her a lot of closure, as I learned over the course of the next few weeks.
- [08:04]
Ryan
You said some things when you said covering up your, your rank. I'm. I'm going to come back to that because there's other stories that I know about with that as well. We're going to come back to that. But where, like, where does this come from? There are several instances that, you know, you're a nice counter. So for people that don't know that, that are listening at this point. You were my commanding officer at Mesron 11. You were part of the unit, especially as it was going through the organizational shift and everything else you've since departed going on doing, doing bigger things, which is great. My, My experience with you has been incredible. Like, a part of it has been the comments that you'll use when you're addressing everybody of, like, this is where you belong. You like hand walking fit reps and evals directly to pers. These are things that, that most don't do and, and most people don't pick up hitchhikers, by the way. So, like, where. Where does this come from?
- [09:04]
Dr. Jason Moats
I don't know. I mean, I got art to serve, you know, really always have. So I truly believe in, in the service that comes with, you know, wearing the uniform. You. There, there's something there. It's. It's not just raising your right hand and getting college paid for. It's. It's deeper than that. And everyone's got their purpose. And I worked at a MEPs for many years, so I got to see the gamut of the stories of young men and women, you know, joining the military to wear the cloth of the nation. So I. I saw it all. I don't know. I just have always had a heart to serve. I was an exceptional server at Red Lobster at one time, too, which.
- [09:39]
Ryan
What did you do at Red Lobster? It.
- [09:40]
Dr. Jason Moats
Just serve, serve tables flying in shrimp. I was the only one on staff that would go pick him out of the tank because I'm from Long Beach. That's what you do. But I don't know. I just had a heart to serve, and I enjoyed it. And I do believe that, that the men and women that join our military, they do it for a purpose. Everyone's got a purpose, you know, and some people never figure it out, and I hope that that changes. But the sooner you figure out what your purpose is in life, the more you can do what you were intended to do. So from my standpoint, you know, my purpose is to pour into others and remind them that they're here on purpose and their best days are right in front of them. And there's a lot of faith that goes into that statement, but it just. It's very natural for me. I don't think anything of it. You know, I've never really got any pushback from the troops and how I care for them and those kinds of things. Picking up hitchhikers, though, Ryan, is. It's risky. And people don't like it when I tell them about it. You know, it makes people uncomfortable. What do you want to do?
- [10:44]
Ryan
12 out of 10 would. Would recommend you. You just talked about your. Like, my. My immediate follow up was going to be, what's your purpose? And you just. You just rattled it off. Like, how. How did you come to that? Like, was this. Was this a. In your teens, you were just like, you know what? This is my purpose in life. Did this come later? Like, what was the process to come to your own. Your own purpose?
- [11:05]
Dr. Jason Moats
I think, you know, as a teenager, I. I'm not sure, like, I wanted out of Long Beach, California. I went off to college just to kind of get away, you know, be an athlete. I wanted to just get away. I think I probably didn't really develop a deep sense of service to others until I got, you know, to be a little bit older. And, you know, they say in leadership, heavy is the crown, and that. That means so many different things to so many people. But it wasn't until. It wasn't until we. As a. As a reservist, I was part of, you know, an East Coast MIZRAN at the time, a Coastal River Reign squadron. It wasn't until we deployed as a unit, when the weight was on my shoulders, to get everyone together in Jacksonville, Florida, pick the right couple hundred people, bring them together, build a cohesive unit, a lot of which didn't know each other. They came from different parts of the squadron, which was disaggregated across the east coast to bring all these reservists together that are doctors and lawyers and mailmen and postal workers, airline pilots, executives, teachers, police officers, firefighters, just come from different parts of the country, different walks of life. But to bring them all together and bring a cohesive unit was really, really hard. And then getting everyone certified and trained as a unit, not just as individuals, but as a, as a unit to go and do the mission overseas is really hard because you can't go over there until you get the check. And then you get everyone over there safely and correctly and you get all your weapons and all your gear over there safely and correctly. And then you've got another challenge. Phase two, you've got to get the mission done saf incorrectly. It's really hard when it's all over. You bring everyone home and you bring them back to, you know, America, the States, back to their homes, their families, their employers, safely and correctly. It's really hard. And I think in hindsight, that whole deployment, which was pretty well documented and we've got, you know, we have a lot to say about it. We, myself and some of the other leaders involved. But that deployment, that deployment was a turning point for me. It was a catalyst. That's when I realized that I truly had the ability to impact others. I think that was the catalyst for me, if I had to pinpoint it. So around 2017, 2018, when I realized that I had the direct ability to impact the livelihood and well being of others by caring for them on an exceptional basis. That was the turning point for me and it was the truth. So where does walking paper into Millington come from? It comes from having all of those first class petty officers that I wanted to see make chief. Lots of them, you know, over 30 of them taking their paper at the end of that deployment and hand walking into Millington and watching them scan those documents in the printer in their scanner in the back of their office, one by one and getting to their records in time for board. That, that, that's where it came from. And then seeing the fruits of that labor, seeing the people make chief over and over and over and over, you know, that was, it was really hard and it was very fulfilling. But that's, I think, where all of the stuff that I would have done, naturally, the pulling over, the helping people push cars down the road, going, get someone gas, paying for someone's chick fil A, you know, little stuff like that, that's all potpourri. But I think that the, the deployment is where the light really clicked on for me and I was able to see. Start to tangibly see the fruits of my labor.
- [14:45]
Ryan
When you think about that cohesion. So, like the. It's like you're talking a lot about leadership with heart, leadership with care, leadership with empathy, like, specifically for that deployment, when you think about the cohesion and everything else that you were able to create, where this light bulb went off, like, what were the actions, what were the things that you were doing that were kind of validating all of these other things that you had done maybe externally or just in your civilian world, and now you're like, oh, crap. Like, this is the magic sauce.
- [15:18]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah. I think when we brought them all together for the first time in Jacksonville, Florida, I was very, very intentional about who I picked as the leadership team. And I knew in these kinds of environments where you have a squadron of 700 plus people and you can just sort of pick and choose, I knew we didn't necessarily need pick the most qualified, but I wanted to pick the most talented for the mission. I didn't pick a lot of people to go with us that had done that same mission in years prior because I didn't want people to say that's the way we did it. I wanted, you know, fresh people. We took a few and I was straight up with them, like, hey, I picked you, you're here, you were selected, and I'm glad you're here, and thank you for raising your hand. You're here in part because of your experience. You've been over there. But just notice, look to your left and to your right. Not everybody has your experience. We're not bringing you back to tell us how to do it. We're bringing you back because we know you can do it and you can be a leader. I think bringing them all together, everyone together on the first, you know, the first visit together, which was a couple weeks in length and, and really pouring into what my leadership philosophy was, which was, do your job, play by the rules. These are independent things, by the way, you can do your job without playing by the rules, and vice versa. Refuse to lose. Literally, refuse to lose. Don't quit on me. And then, you know, I said, love each Other, take care of each other. Don't, don't gossip about each other. These things. As you know, we're in my standing orders. This stuff has been operationalized for years, so I know it's stone cold, but really lift each other up and look out for each other. When you see someone, you know, banging on your buddy, don't let it happen. Stand up for him. And so we kind of brought everyone together and at the end of that two week period, we just sort of lived that model. I went away to go overseas and do a survey on where we were going. And when I came back, they had a welcome back cake. And on the cake they had a square with those four tiles, color coded tiles with those four pillars. And so I knew that, okay, they're together, this group is together. We told everyone that we were going to make it meaningful for them. You raised your right hand to do this mission. You didn't have to. Some of them waved. Some of them had to step away from their. They all had to step away from their careers. Some of them had to put school on hold or whatever. But I really challenged everyone on the mission, like, whatever you're doing this for, do not come home without having it. Get it done. If you're going to earn your pen, come home with your pen. We'll help you. If you're going because you want to promote, let's get you promoted. If you're going because you want to advance your qualifications, let's get your qualifications advanced. You will not come home from this deployment empty handed. And we took inventory of those things. We metrically took inventory of these things. And I had a number two who's an exceptional person and friend. His name is Peter Zeller, and he helped me immensely in that deployment because he was able to manage these metrics and really like, he understood what I was getting after. Former Squadron 8 CEO, just an amazing human and leader and together, you know, along with our sel, who's a dear friend, we just ruthlessly went after these metrics and made sure that whatever they were looking for to get meaning out of that deployment, they came home with it.
- [18:46]
Ryan
Did you have them document like, is that, is that one of the things that you talked about ahead of time is like, I want you to document your goals.
- [18:54]
Dr. Jason Moats
We had it written down. We had the chiefs mess really like dive into this. I, I challenged the Chiefs. I'm like, I'm a very personable, sociable CEO and the troops are going to feel comfortable coming up and talking to me. It's just the Way it always has been. I don't make the rules there. It's just the way it is. But I should never know more about your troops than you. So I sort of threw down the gauntlet from the get go. I shouldn't know your troop has issues at home. You should, or I don't mind knowing, but I shouldn't find out about. You do. So I really challenged them, like with those kinds of statements, and it worked. I mean, we just really had a exceptional group of leaders that helped us go over there and get it done. And we were very, very busy. And I'm telling you, with the exception of maybe one individual, everyone came home with goals accomplished. Some were just uncanny goals. You know, I mean, one person's like, I want to buy a Ford Mustang. Came home and bought one, thought it was a waste of money, but that's what he did.
- [19:56]
Ryan
They hit the goal. That's funny. Oh, gosh. Hopefully not off Little Creek road. And at 17 and a half percent
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Dr. Jason Moats
interest, like you live in Chicago, you want a Ford Mustang, it's like two wheel drive. What are you doing? Whatever.
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Ryan
Would you consider yourself a by the book guy or.
- [20:16]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I'm by the book. You know, the, the rules are the rules when it comes to safety. Okay, so you know this, Ryan. Like regardless of military or corporate or wherever you're leaning you're going, leaders have to be able to read between the lines. You know, there's black and white, but a police officer pulls someone over, they don't have to write them a ticket. They're allowed to use discretion. I mean, if I was a police officer, would I write my mom a ticket? Probably not.
- [20:51]
Ryan
You had to think about that way too long.
- [20:53]
Dr. Jason Moats
No, I wouldn't, I wouldn't. But the point is, like, there's discretion. The rules stay, you know, if they're speeding, you're allowed to write them a ticket. And there are some things that you just can't, you can't do. But when I say play by the rules, you're talking about a squadron and a community that ran really loose and fast and people get hurt. And I wanted absolutely no part of that to the point where I'm not a risk averse individual by nature. I'm pretty chill. But I know what good looks like. And I am not in the. I have no interest in breaking rules to save time to cut corners. That's how people get hurt. And if I tolerate it from the onset, I won't be able to undo it when I'm not out there on the Water. I'm outside the wire watching the mission. Can't have it, or I won't be able to sleep at night. So there are some things you just can't budge on. If you're not. If you're not cleared to do something, you don't do it. It's that simple.
- [21:55]
Ryan
How do you know when to budge and when not to budge? How do you. How do you know when to write that ticket and when, when not to?
- [22:01]
Dr. Jason Moats
For me, it's a conviction of what's right and what's wrong. You know, you're not going to operate machinery under the influence. That's wrong. Someone can get hurt. You know, those. Those are the kinds of things that. That I won't budge on. But there are times when you know you're doing the right thing for the right reasons. You know, maybe someone is struggling to pass a swim exam, and maybe. Maybe it's seen as favoritism that you're going and finding them different swim instructors and evaluators to help them. You're going above and beyond because, you know, passing that particular portion of the swim exam is going to help them achieve a particular goal, using a real example. So we go and we find the right instructor that can relate to the individual in the water, and all of a sudden the individual's swimming crazily like Nemo. That's. I don't know what the instruction says. The instruction says, you know, you get one, two, three tries. I don't know. But the bottom line is, like, that's called going above and beyond. I'm not willing to pass up someone that needs help or as open and honest and transparent about where they need help that just, you know, that. That pulls the dark strings and just. You just want to help. What are you supposed to do? You're either interested in helping people or
- [23:19]
Ryan
you're not when you think about addressing the issues. So, you know, a part of, like, the coloring outside lines or maybe going above and beyond where to use discretion and where not. And you've had this rightfully kind of this zero tolerance when it comes to safety, and I think, like, this is applicable especially in business and business leaders is like, where. Where and when do you address deficiencies? So as a business leader, like, is this a. When they see it, they stop that person and correct them. Is this the pool?
- [23:54]
Dr. Jason Moats
The.
- [23:55]
Ryan
You know, in the Navy, we would say the chief or, you know, maybe it's the manager on the civilian side. But what's your philosophy on. On how to. How to address deficiencies?
- [24:06]
Dr. Jason Moats
I mean, it's feedback. If it's a bonafide deficiency, then it has to be addressed. Otherwise, someone's just walking around with spinach in their teeth. They have no idea, and they'll keep moving about as if they don't have the deficiency, and they're just, you know, they're going to do harm to themselves and potentially their peers, whether it's, you know, military or business or whatever. So you have to address it. That's the. That's the principle of feedback. It has to be timely, it has to be relevant. It has to be appropriate. Shouldn't be personal, you know, factual and unemotional. It has to be actionable, and it has to be specific. And I think if you follow sort of that model, you know, timely, actionable, relevant, appropriate, specific. When you're giving feedback, you're. You're moving in the right direction. Assuming the person giving feedback is also willing to receive feedback. Feedback. That's the human dynamic. No one is going to want to take feedback from someone that won't be. Is not interested in taking it themselves. So, you know, when I coach people and when I'm teaching leadership classes, it's like, hey, be very careful with feedback, because this is an exceptionally powerful tool. But if you can't first take feedback, you're in the wrong business because people will sniff it out. They'll see right through it.
- [25:29]
Ryan
What about you talked about the delivery of that feedback? Like, there's a lot of people out there, and I'm in this camp where, like, you have to force yourself to give feedback because it's. It's uncomfortable to give feedback. Like, what are some ways that you've been able to kind of, you know, maybe you don't have that issue, or maybe you figured out a way to kind of disconnect from that. But how do you take the emotion out of it of, like, versus just delivering it and, and moving forward, I
- [26:00]
Dr. Jason Moats
go the extra mile, probably instinctively. Maybe there's some Colby stuff there. Shout out to Colby. I love you guys. I'll give you an example. I had someone, I'm, you know, just thinking about that deployment because it's top of mind. Hey, a really, really talented leader. More of a, you know, junior level leader, but very well respected. Well respected. And this particular individual was sort of bumping their gums, complaining about decisions that have been made, you know, good decisions. All decisions are open to criticism, and that's just the way it is. But this particular individual was, I think, going a little bit above and beyond to disclose their displeasure with Decisions. And so I asked to speak to the individual sort of one on one. And I sat the individual down and said, love you like a brother. I truly do. You're here because I wanted you here. You're here because you deserve to be here. I need you. But the word on the street is you're not happy. And I think he was a little bit taken aback. And, you know, I didn't, like, take any shots. It just said, the word on the street is you're not happy. And so I wanted to address it in a moment, really, without really probably understanding the tenets of giving good feedback. I wanted to address it in a moment because I knew he'd be embarrassed. I don't think he was. But I just told him, like, when you do that, you're undermining everybody and you're actually bringing, you know, you're getting the reverse effect yourself because you're surrounded by really, really smart, brilliant people. Your peers were hand selected because they're exceptional. They can see right through it. And I need you to not be looked at as someone that does that when you're out there leading, which is what I brought you to do. So it just kind of like stopped. Never had a problem again. Probably a master chief today, maybe.
- [28:11]
Ryan
What's really interesting about that topic is what I see on the civilian side all the time. Maybe in some of my own companies, historically, not this one, but when a decision's made and someone disagrees with it, they often let other people know that they disagreed with that decision. So when they carry it out or execute based upon it, it's like, well, this wasn't my decision, but this is what we're going to do. And what we're taught in the military is like, that stuff happens behind closed doors. And the minute the decision's made, like, it's your decision and you own it. How do you own a decision that you vehemently disagree with?
- [28:47]
Dr. Jason Moats
Again, you know, authenticity. People are going to see right through it. Very, very careful with your words. So, I mean, I could think of 700 decisions and, you know, layoffs. You know, how about. How about laying off hundreds of people over and over and over and over and over? I didn't agree with any of them. I didn't like it, but I had to do it. I think that the best, from my perspective, to each his own here. But I think the best way to lead when you're dealing with a decision you may not agree with is to just do it with empathy. And, you know, really here, like Ryan, for Real, you got one of two things. You can do it probably one of three ways. Academically, you can let it be known you don't agree with decision, in which case you just undermined and basically gutted the whole purpose. You can lead through the decision and carry it out because that's the marching order and that's what you're supposed to do. You can walk away. You really can only do three things. So when you're faced with that, you know, ask yourself, how do I want to be seen? Because carrying out unpopular decisions is just par for the course. It doesn't matter what you do in life, it's the way it is. And again, you know, you can take a stand and leave. You can do it and execute it superbly or you can do it and try to execute it superbly, but while also making it clear you're not happy about it and in which case you'll, you'll taint the water. You know, people are impressionable. And when you're in a position of leadership, gotta be very careful.
- [30:28]
Ryan Hogan
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- [31:50]
Ryan
You talked a little bit about this idea of like authenticity. What is authenticity to you? And also like some of the, some of the things I'd like to understand kind of about your background is like, was this a Recent discovery or have you always been. Well, it wouldn't have been Captain Moats 20 years ago, but, like, has it always been Jason Moats or, or has. Have you gone through an evolution to get into your authentic self?
- [32:16]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I've been through an evolution for sure. I'm in the leadership assessment business. And of course, the cognitive, the effective assessments, the cognitive assessments, like, I've learned a lot about those things. And as a byproduct of learning how to do assessments and how to debrief these really effective assessments, I've had to learn a lot about myself. Again, don't give feedback if you can't receive it. Shouldn't probably be assessing people if you haven't really taken the time to understand how it applies to you as well. So I think the first thing when it comes to authentic leadership is really just understanding who you are and being okay with who you are, frankly. You can't change the color of your eyes. I can't be from somewhere I'm not from, and I can't makeup experiences that I don't have. You just, you are who you are and you, you do with what you have. And don't try to be something that you're not. You know, like I said, going back to the here on purpose because we have a purpose is all about swimming in the lane that you were intended to swim in. I'm not a sprinter, I'm a long distance swimmer. I, I, I, I'm done. After I sprint, I can't go any further. That's not, that's not me. It's not my DNA in so many words. And I think, like, if you try to fit yourself into a mold that you're not, you'll get by for only so long. Take it to Colby. If you start using the strengths that are not your, your superpowers. I'm a fact finder. I'm not an implementer. So if I start implementing from the scratch using, you know, the Colby numbers, I'm going to burn out because it's not who I am and I'll be unsuccessful. Now, the flip side here, Ryan, is that being who you are inherently comes with blind spots. This is where people really, really get derailed, especially people in high levels of authority and responsibility. Blind spots are real. We all have them. You can't get away from them. If you really want to be authentic, you have to understand your blind spots. You have to understand them stone Cold or you will get jammed. There's a reason why the book is called why CEOs Fail and Not why junior managers fail, because junior managers have no stress. Like, what are they even stressed about?
- [34:40]
Ryan
Tell me what to do. I'll go do it.
- [34:42]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, yeah. I'm just glad I got a job. That's not reality. For CEOs, commanding officers, commanders, that's. That's Sesame street thinking. They get real pressure, real stress. And so the book is called why CEOs fail, because they're the ones that, comparatively speaking, feel all the stress. And so the things that got them so far in life, their inherent strengths, all of a sudden become career derailers because they overuse them. This is Hogan 101. These are dark behaviors. So for me, authenticity is about understanding who you are so you're not projecting something that you're not. And you're aware of your blind spots. That's the ultimate. To me, that's the ultimate mark of authenticity.
- [35:26]
Ryan
The blind spots is a really interesting thread. And when I think of blind spots, maybe it's like a 360 assessment. And you've got other people. If there's a leader out there right now that's authentically themselves and falling victim to their blind spots, what is. What is a good way that they can go out and start to figure out what those blind spots are?
- [35:50]
Dr. Jason Moats
Well, the 360s are great. Of course, I have my favorites. You want me to throw on a plug?
- [35:56]
Ryan
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll go after them for sponsors after this.
- [36:00]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, it's Wiley leadership practices inventory 360. It's based on the book the Leadership Challenge. It's exceptional. You know, the five. The five behaviors, if you will. It's so exceptional that the U.S. navy uses it at its Navy Leadership and Ethics School. It's what commanding officers get before they go and be commanding officers. And the Navy's not the only branch. I mean, a lot of organizations use the LPI360, so I like to start there because it's valid and reliable data that's really used to. To drive good change, good positive change, and to drive awareness. A key is awareness. But if you really want to dive into your dark behaviors and find out where your risks are. Hogan, H O G E N. Just like your last name, Hogan is the gold standard. Shout out to Hogan. Hogan Assessment Systems, I think, is their official legal title. They're based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They're. They're exceptional. They've got a very, very dialed in module. It's called the Hogan Development Survey, and it's all about understanding your dark behaviors. There's 11 of them, and. And they can really, like I said, they can really derail your career if you're not careful, because it's great to be diligent. But when you're so diligent that you can't get out of the weeds, when you really need to not be in the weeds, then you're overusing your ability to be diligent. So being diligent got you promoted, probably multiple times over. But there's a point where you have to sort of let go. You have to trust others to be diligent for you. And those are the dark behaviors.
- [37:44]
Ryan
Shout out to Hogan as well, not just because it's my last name. When I was going through the Stockdale Leadership Development curriculum, SLDC at the War College, we took all of them. And the Hogan assessment was the most comprehensive assessment I've ever.
- [37:58]
Dr. Jason Moats
I've ever taken. I love it.
- [38:01]
Ryan
I'll send you mine for. For an analysis after.
- [38:03]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I'm super curious.
- [38:07]
Ryan
This is going to feel like a hard shift, but I. But I feel like, you know, we've talked a lot about kind of the attributes of leadership, your attributes, the things that you value. And, you know, that's kind of like our soul and our mind. And the other aspect to this is kind of our. Our bodies. Like, how do you. How do you think about the intersection of, you know, physical toughness or physical resilience versus the mental resilience?
- [38:34]
Dr. Jason Moats
I think it's all connected. I think the mental, you know, 90% mental. But I think that for the most part, like, I think resilience is. Is involving of great sleep, eating right, exercising. You know, I start my day exercising. I'll try to exercise multiple times a day because I like to swim and I don't, as much as I don't like to do it. And I will swim early in the mornings. I do prefer to swim in the afternoons. I like to do other things in the mornings to get exercise. But these are grounding activities to help reduce stress levels. And, you know, it's scientifically proven. I'm not a physician by any means, but I think the data is pretty well out there and available that exercise promotes a lot of greatness. You know, it just promotes a lot of greatness. It gets the blood flowing early in the morning. It's. I can't imagine just waking out of bed and going to work. That's got to be tough. Unless you're going to like black rifle coffee or whatever it's called, or Starbucks and getting something super, super special. So, yeah, I'm very in tune with that I've sort of written about that I wear a garment. Garment keeps me grounded. I check it all the time. Want to make sure that my body battery is recharging and that my levels are where they're supposed to be. I think, I think fit leaders are just better leaders.
- [39:57]
Ryan
When you talk about these grounding activities, like, you almost started to talk about this routine, like waking up, doing this, doing that. Like, what if there's a, you know, a CEO business leader out there that's listening to this and they're like, what? I need to swap up my entire morning routine or evening routine? Like, what is, what does your routine look like? And how can someone build a better routine?
- [40:20]
Dr. Jason Moats
You know, I take this with a grain of salt because I don't do anything halfway. I think you probably, you know this, it's full throttle for me. It's. I'm either fully engaged or I'm just not. There's no in between. So for me, I have a routine where I like to be on the bike at 4 and done on the bike by 5, and I like to row for 30 minutes after. So I get straight 90 minutes. I think anything behind 90 minutes starts to get into the realm of, of other stuff that could affect the heart. And I stay away from that a little bit. But about 90 consolid minutes for me earlier in the morning so that I have enough time to decompress, eat, get cleaned up, get ready to start my day is great, plus reading. And then I do try to swim four days a week in the afternoon. And this really works well for me. I mean, I wouldn't have gotten through that deployment overseas without the pool. There was a pool, and I was so hot that the pool was chilled. It was so hot over there that they had to chill the pool. Usually if the chill, the pools are heated. But that pool kept me going. I was able to decompress in there. I was swimming. I would swim usually late at night. It works. That's my routine. But I think, like, what's the right answer? When's the best time to swim? When it's best for you. What's the best exercise to do? Well, I like swimming and rowing. I think pound for pound, those are good, good exercises. But that's just my opinion. I'm not an exercise whatever someone else probably is. So I would consult your professional exercise people. Professional
- [42:02]
Ryan
exercise. I, I, it was like a lunch or something and you, like, ran out and I think we thought you were going to lunch, but you, like, went all the way to the pool. On the base, over to go swim. I was like, oh, my gosh.
- [42:16]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, that's.
- [42:17]
Ryan
That's intense.
- [42:18]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I mean, it's just again, I, I've got kind of a. A bit of an addictive personality, if you will. And when I want, I start itching to do something, I go do it. There was a point in time where I was rushing home in the afternoon to run 20 plus miles. And I just, I would feel awful about myself if I didn't go run 20 plus miles on a Tuesday.
- [42:41]
Ryan
That's, that's, that's wild. It's Taco Tuesday. It's not for running.
- [42:46]
Dr. Jason Moats
That's just kind of the itch. It doesn't, It's. I'm getting over that.
- [42:50]
Ryan
I recently. Recently? Yeah, I guess recently. I don't know, within the last, like, quarter, started some therapy. And I didn't realize it, but one of the concentrations of my therapist is addictive behaviors, addictive traits, things like that. And so he started to go down this path. And once I did some research, I was like, oh, crap. Like, you know, am I. Is it the. The hammer for every nail? And he's just identifying certain things. But I've done quite a bit of reflection lately on like, entrepreneurship and, and all these things I do. And like, when I'm in, I'm in and when I'm out. And like, these are addictive traits. Addictive personality traits. Yeah, it sounds like you might have some of that too. Like where, where. And this might go right back to working out. But like, how have you either, like, tamed, let's say, channeled, like, how have you channeled some of. Of those traits where it's like, when you're in, you're all in for good instead of getting wrapped up in things that may not be so good?
- [43:52]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I mean, if you're asking do I rush home to hit the vape pipe? Is that what you're getting at?
- [43:58]
Ryan
Or maybe just rush home for 20 miles?
- [44:00]
Dr. Jason Moats
I, you know, I think exercise and eating right, like, I think those things are great. But I also believe in having an off day. A day where you can just have six big fat pancakes and whipped cream and syrup and all the stuff, chocolate sprinkles, you know, like, it's just a day to sort of pay yourself back. I once heard someone say that the work week is more like a marathon and not a sprint. If you think about, like a marathon, people tend to go and reward themselves after a marathon. Or people that compete in the Olympics. You'll hear often their interview Age, what are you going to go eat? Because a lot of them are like almost literally starving themselves of sugar, added sugars and stuff that they probably would be not good for them as they're preparing to set world records. I'm not an Olympic athlete, I'm not an Olympic level leader, but I do believe in, you know, taking a day and relaxing. And that's very therapeutic for me to just not have anything to do and it's okay to say no. I had a admiral mentor and he was just like, be very careful of what you say yes to because it can, you know, these things can compile and they can add up and they have their own branches and so really, really value and protect that. Time to just decompress. Now, for me, decompressing at the end of the day in the water is therapy. Even though I'm burning calories and exercising, I'm just sort of purging my mind into the water of all the nonsense that I have to deal with on a daily basis. And life isn't really that hard for me. Let me be clear, you know, I'm not out doing really, really hard stuff. But still there's a lot to deal with. So I think the decompression is good and sleep is healthy.
- [45:52]
Ryan
You said reading. Do you. Are you a fiction or a non fiction guy?
- [45:55]
Dr. Jason Moats
I'm non fiction. You know, I read a lot of books. I like stories, real stories. Every now and I'll come across again. Every now and then I'll come across like a leadership fable. Those are. Those can be good to get the message across. I'm reading one now. I'm about to publish a review on it. It's called Leadership and Self Deception. Great book. It's a fable. There's an author named Mark Miller, former executive at Chick Fil A. He had a book that I published a review on last year called Leaders Made here. It was exceptional. Of course. Of course. There's the book, the goal. Everyone that's gone through an MBA program has probably read the goal. You got it?
- [46:29]
Ryan
Yeah, that's right.
- [46:32]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah. You got your copy. There it is. Yep. I have the same one somewhere in storage. Or I donated it in one of those bins the library you're not supposed to dump books into. Yeah, don't do that. Don't put yearbooks in those bins. But yeah, for me, reading is definitely a form of decompression. Absolutely. Especially on the Kindle.
- [46:53]
Ryan
Now do you listen the books or are you swiping through on Kindle?
- [46:57]
Dr. Jason Moats
Well, because I Write these reviews. I will use the iPad and then mark them up with my Apple pen because I want to reference things as I write the review and capture important nuggets and quotes, et cetera. So I mark them up pretty heavily. I was doing that. I was carrying around a book using my pen as a bookmark. And I would just sort of get through it, flip through it as the week would go on. And it's really, frankly, the reason why I stopped is because it's, it's just a nuisance to sit there and try to type something while you're flipping through the pages and reading your notes. When I can just have the Kindle app on my Mac open, I can search my, my highlights. So everybody's got a system not to
- [47:39]
Ryan
go too deep on the goal. I like, literally this was maybe it's been within the last six months. Like I've had this copy for maybe about eight years and it just sat on the shelf. And then I had a business coach and he was like, go read the goal. And I was like, oh, I have the goal. And I had a completely different takeover. What this actually was because, like, you know, to me when I started opening up, it was like, about making operations more efficient. And then it was like, well, it's, it's actually about like the fundamentals of improving productivity. And then it was like, well, let's actually define productivity since we throw this term around. What's your, what's your take on the goal?
- [48:17]
Dr. Jason Moats
It's been a while since I read it, probably 16 years. I haven't forgotten it for whatever reason. When I think of that book, I think of Toyota, you know, great cars, by the way.
- [48:31]
Ryan
Agree.
- [48:32]
Dr. Jason Moats
Love the Tundras. But yeah, that's what I think of. It was for me, it was a great book. As I was preparing to transition out of active duty service into corporate America and thinking about having a business career. It was just a great book to start thinking about things that are real, real dynamics and improving your process. So what I take away from the goal and what I, I think as we talk about Get Real, Get Better, you know, that initiative in the Navy which you and I are both quite fond of for good reason. It's the understanding. This is my one line liner. It's the understanding. And the Navy knows this, by the way. It's the understanding that even the highest performing organizations have performance variability, period, bar none. You can't argue with that. I'll say it again. Even the highest performing organizations still have performance variability. It's not deniable. It's the reason why of the 32 NFL teams which are stacked, loaded with absolutely exceptional athletes, there's always a losing team. There's performance variability. And if you know performance variability exists, then why wouldn't you be trying to improve every process you possibly could? Why would you not be like literally performing surgery on everything you do continuously to try to make it better and find the gaps and seams and the broken systems? You might save somebody's life depending on your industry, or you might make your company the best in the world. Every bit counts, you know, inch by inch, mile by mile. So my takeaway from the goal is process improvement and this belief that I'm going to leave it better than I found it. I'm going to find a way to improve processes. I'm going to break things that aren't broke them broken so I can make them better. And that takes courage. But if you do it and you do it right, it'll pay dividends forever.
- [50:27]
Ryan
So one of the arguments that was thrown out, and to me this does have a correlation to the business side just based upon the financial component of it. But when I was going through SLDC and basically we studied Get Real, Get Better and we worked with the office to help them think through implementation and some of the other things. And I don't think we made a very big impact, but we were the graduate school plug in to just bring up things that they were probably already thinking about. And one of our professors made an argument about, you know, when, when he was looking at the invariability of performance across, specifically across different verticals, designators, ships, air, things like that, submarines. It was about budgets. And his argument was like, the ones that are performing the best are the ones that have the biggest budgets. Dead stop right there. And like what's, what's kind of your take on, on that of like his argument was you can, you can only be so good if you don't have the resources. But then you always hear about the Good News Bears or the Bad News Bears where it's like you can take a, a ragtag team and, and develop All Stars from that.
- [51:39]
Dr. Jason Moats
You follow college football. I know you're a terp, so I'm, you know, I actually have to be careful what I say because I don't want to virtual listener base. But you follow college football to some extent, right?
- [51:50]
Ryan
A little bit, yep.
- [51:51]
Dr. Jason Moats
Who just won the national title? Do you remember?
- [51:55]
Ryan
Maybe I don't. I was, I was going to say, but I don't want to be embarrassed
- [51:57]
Dr. Jason Moats
on this no, it's all. It's all good. They're in Bloomington, Indiana, the Indiana University Hoosiers. And this is not a team that has had a long history of success. This has been a. It's an amazing school, spent a lot of time on that campus. This is a team that has historically been a perennial loser. And it took someone with a GRG mindset, get real, get better mindset, for your listeners to come in and say, not anymore. This is broken and we're going to fix every single piece of it. And what that coach did, Kirk Signetti, is he went in and he performed surgery on every aspect of that organization. They didn't have to. Biggest budget, it's the Big Ten. So you can say, well, they have a lot of money, sure. But you compare them to the University of Michigan or Penn State or Ohio State or some of these like perennial powers, these blue chip organizations. That's not Indiana at all. Not even close. But what did they do? They came in and they like curb stomp teams, teams that they weren't supposed to beat, and they beat them badly. And a lot of it was bringing in the right people, not necessarily the most qualified, but certainly the best, most talented people for the pieces that they needed in order to make their system work. And a lot of it was strategically getting some of those resources, and a lot of it was fixing broken processes, which probably stemmed from broken mindsets. So he did it at IU in two years. Two years. In two years time, he came in and he won a national title in college football and upended the whole college football universe. Urban Meyer at the University of Florida in 2007 and 2009, was it 2006 into January 07 and 2008 into 2009 season won the national title. SEC Money, SEC School, University of Florida, long legacy of history. Old ball coach as their head coach in the 90s, won the national title. Steve Spurrier is who I'm talking about. Urban Meyer comes in there. They have no indoor practice facility. We're talking Gainesville, Florida. Okay, they do today, but in the early 2000s, they did not have an indoor practice facility. So they were, comparatively speaking, disadvantaged to their peers in other parts of the country and including in the sec. And yet they did it, and they did it pretty well. So resources are great, but it's more than resources. It's having that mindset that you're going to ruthlessly attack the broken processes to make probably the best use of whatever resources you have. I certainly haven't had the most resources when I've led my teams. Not to say that I've done a bunch of outstanding things, but I've never been constrained, mindset wise by resources because you're usually not going to get the resources when you need them anyways, especially things like that. The magnitude of those resources take time. So by the time you do get the resources, you've already sort of either won or lost. So you got to do the best with what you have. And you know, I come from Long Beach, California. All right. I'm not from the Hamptons. I'm not from, you know, the Hollywood Hills. Some people have to run a little faster because they got a later start. And that's again, that's just the way it is. You do the best with what you have and a lot of people can be very successful with that mindset. By the way, I've never been to the Hamptons.
- [55:32]
Ryan
I've heard about it. I heard it's great.
- [55:37]
Dr. Jason Moats
I've certainly been to Hollywood Hills and I've been all through up to Palisades and all those beautiful areas. I drove past OJ's house when I was in high school.
- [55:43]
Ryan
Was he on the Palisades?
- [55:45]
Dr. Jason Moats
He was in Brentwood. The house was gone, but it was in Brentwood.
- [55:48]
Ryan
Brentwood. Brentwood.
- [55:49]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah.
- [55:49]
Ryan
I've just, I've only been here for a year, so I'm still getting acclimated. But I was just in Brentwood last week, so I was, it was good.
- [55:56]
Dr. Jason Moats
Gorgeous area.
- [55:58]
Ryan
Beautiful.
- [55:58]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah. I mean, give me, give me the keys to the house and probably not going to say no to you.
- [56:02]
Ryan
Yeah, that's very true.
- [56:05]
Dr. Jason Moats
I'm trained Seal beach for Brentwood.
- [56:07]
Ryan
Okay. All right. Usually my last questions have to do with like, well, we actually, we will end with, with some self promotion. But before we get to that, what do you want your legacy to be?
- [56:16]
Dr. Jason Moats
Probably that he did the right thing. Probably that he took care of as many people as he could. It's good to be felt like you're being taken care of. And I know how it makes me feel. I want to be known as helping people fulfill their goals. My leadership philosophy, which I call fepa, you know, faith, effort, patience, persistence, authenticity. And it, it's what, it's been my party line for many years. Of course, that's my individual leadership philosophy. That's what I ask of people. You already know what I ask of teams. We talked about it earlier. It hasn't changed. Do your job, play by the rules, love each other, refuse to lose or go the distance. But yeah, I want people to feel like I came in and made a difference in their lives because I helped them, genuinely help them. I developed a genuine rapport with those that I've been around and help them through genuine care and concern, achieve their goals. And if you're doing that as a leader, you're really, really doing some great things and some it'll happen quick. There's low hanging fruit and some aren't. But the difference that you can make in people's lives. There's a book by an author named Chris Ritchie. He's a veteran. He works at Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama. He's a retired Marine Corps colonel. He wrote a book called the Invisible Medal. I reviewed it last year and wrote a review on it. It's published on my site, theleadersreview.com and the invisible Medal was all about doing the things that no one can really see to make the impact in people's lives. So shout out to Chris and the book. It was exceptional. I love it and I'll always promote his book for that reason.
- [57:56]
Ryan
Love it. And now for some of the self promotion. So like what are you up to? What are you looking for? And then we'll get into how people can get a hold of you.
- [58:05]
Dr. Jason Moats
Swimming. I'm still prepping for the Catalina Channel swim and looking forward to it. It's been a goal of mine since I was a child. I've written about that too. Just growing up in Long beach and seeing Catalina island and not knowing really what was it was always had a desire to make that swim, that 20 mile swim. So for me that'll be like full circle. What am I up to? I'm still, I still teach the leadership workshops. I'm still leading coaching for a particular part of the Navy, which is an exceptional program. We're very proud of it. Producing coaches at senior levels in the Navy that can go and coach our best on a leadership basis. I'm still doing the leadership workshops through academy leadership. So I am one of the facilitators for academy leadership. I'm an independent facilitator. We all are part of that organization, but we're independent firms like a franchise. So I still offer all the academy leadership stuff and proud to do it. My courses are throughout the year in different places. I've got one in Washington D.C. in August, Atlanta in September. That's a great one to go to. I think it's the third week of September again. Academyleadership.com Atlanta, Georgia and those are great, great courses because these are courses that are certified by SHRM they're certified by pmi, so people get their continuing education credits. I still do my coaching. Pretty much all of my students that go through my workshops end up getting coached after the fact. That's how we apply the learning. That's what makes it so effective. And then I love the assessments, man, I just love the assessments. I love the leadership practices inventory. 360 for what it is. And the enlightenment, Enlightenment that it offers, the insight that it gives the prospective leader. I love the Hogan assessment for the dark behavior module. In particular. I love Colby for people to understand what their instinctive strengths are. And, you know, the best way to. For anyone that doesn't know what Colby is, I was turned on to Colby by a gentleman named Admiral Ted LeClair, who's done a lot of Colby, and he said, hey, you've got to get out there and you got to go through Colby training. You got to go see what it's all about. And so the way I tell people what Colby is and understanding their instinctive strengths is if I lay out a bunch of Legos on the table of all different shapes and colors and I say, do something with these Legos. Some people are just going to stand there and look at them. Some people are going to start stacking them by color. Some people might start stacking them by shooting shape. Some people might just start building. These are the instinctive ways that we do. There's nothing wrong with standing there and staring at them. You're not a quick starter. There's nothing wrong with taking inventory of what you have. That's called being a fact finder. These are the ways that you instinctively burn energy and do. And I think it's critical for people to understand that about themselves, because if you're in a role that requires you to be an extreme fact finder or a quick starter, and you're not, you're going to burn a lot of energy just trying to keep up with the Joneses. And then Academy Leadership has an exceptional assessment. It's called Energized to Lead. It's one of my favorites. And it is a communications based assessment that helps people understand, in the context of being in a team, how they communicate, preferably socially and instinctively in crisis. Because how I talk to people may not be how I want people to talk to me. And you can create a lot of conflict. So I do a lot of communications based workshops with teams using this assessment as exclusive to Academy Leadership. Those are my Power four. So I love doing that. I work with mainly people, leaders in medical Device industries, since that's my background in other places, some law firms. I did something for Virginia State Bar last year that was great. So I work with any teams. I don't, you know, like niche myself. Leadership is leadership and you're either a leader or you're not. And if you have a heart to be one, then call me.
- [61:59]
Ryan
And for business leaders that are like, I need to bring cap moats through, through my organization, like, what, what problems are they experiencing? What are they seeing inside their organization where they're like, I gotta pick up the phone and call accountability.
- [62:15]
Dr. Jason Moats
Not able to deliver feedback. Don't understand how to coach people through the problem. Don't understand the importance of having a personal leadership philosophy. Don't understand the importance of being able to communicate across those dimensions of how people prefer and expect to. There's nothing worse than addressing someone and throwing them in reverse. It's pretty much over. So I work literally with teams to fix that in four hours. So if you're leaving the organization and you're not driving the results that you're trying to drive, you're not controlling costs in the manner you want to control. That's an accountability problem and maybe a feedback problem. If you're not getting the results that you want, but you have all the resources place, you have a motivation issue. I do all this stuff. I know this stuff like the back of my head. So I can pretty much fix any team or organization through that lens. Pretty confident.
- [63:02]
Ryan
When you work with teams, if it's the business leader and they're like, hey, I've got that problem, do you come in and help correct that problem for their team or is this inclusive? Is this the entire team including the leader?
- [63:12]
Dr. Jason Moats
Well, first things first, I'm going to consult them and figure out what's going on. Nine times out of 10, the leaders took the culprit. That's usually the case. The leaders like for me to come in and be the bad guy. And I don't mind being the bad guy and asking their teams tough questions. But before I do that, I'm going to be a bad guy with that leader. You hired me, but you're going to get what you paid for. I'm going to be very direct with you. I'm going to challenge you and you're going to grow from it. But you need to hear, doesn't take me for very long, you know, I mean, I earned a doctorate and stuff to be very good at this and proficient. So I'll come in, look under the hood, figure out what's going on. And then we'll, we'll just start chopping wood and get to work. And I, I got all the tools. I'm pretty proud of them. Stuff works, man. Stuff works. You just have a half. You have to have a heart to want to get better. Because if you don't, then it'll die in the vine and your people will leave. That's where people miss the mark. They'll just leave. People want to be led. They're going to go find an environment where they can be successful and they'll see right through you. If you don't care about them, they just leave. They'll go find someone that does. Human dynamic, brother.
- [64:19]
Ryan
It's very expensive to replace people. I think a lot of business leaders are. They think about the cost of the replacement, but not the impact that that departure had to the overall organization. Could be to culture, could be the processes, could be to future opportunities.
- [64:37]
Dr. Jason Moats
You already know the data and it all starts at the top. Adam Bryant wrote a book called the Leap from the Leap to Leader, and he had a quote in there that I just can't unhear. There is no such thing as a healthy culture in an underperforming organization. Sit with that. If you, if you are underperforming as an organization, something's wrong. And if you are telling yourself that you don't need help or that you don't need someone to come in and help you fix some problems or you're not willing to look in the mirror, then you're pretty close to not being there anyways. You might just start packing your office and packing your bags and figuring out where you're going to relocate to because someone's going to sniff you out. Especially if you're an executive reporting to a board, they're going to figure it out pretty quick. Boards are smart people and they'll replace you before they replace 200,000 people.
- [65:32]
Ryan
Yep. I love that quote by the. I've never heard that before. And like, that will stick with me now.
- [65:39]
Dr. Jason Moats
I knew it would. I didn't know. You know, of course, if you had a lot of quotes and wasn't sure. That's why I love these books, man. That's why I like, comb through these books for powerful quotes and I'll take the 10 or 15 most powerful ones and I don't really forget them. I post them on LinkedIn quite often to give the author their due, but also because this stuff just sits with you and it's like, oof, that's heavy. There's no such Thing as a healthy culture in an underperforming organization. Well, someone's gonna, someone's gonna hear this and they're gonna try to argue. And I'm just gonna. I don't know those people. I'll tune them out. I don't know you. I don't associate with people like you. So, you know, learning culture is what I'm after. Continuous learners. And if you're gonna argue with a statement like that and probably don't, shouldn't probably want to be on your team. I love you. I'll care about you. I'll pick you up on the interstate in Kentucky. I'll help you get to Louisville. But you need to probably take a hard look in the mirror first.
- [66:36]
Ryan
We're not picking people up anymore. We'll, we'll level, we'll do all of those things except for maybe pick them up.
- [66:42]
Dr. Jason Moats
At this point, it's really expensive to hire a Uber. And if you're ready, if you're driving a rental car, I mean, what's the worst that can happen? That's what insurance is for. I really don't mind. Just don't want to get, you know, in trouble. All right.
- [66:59]
Ryan
So someone just listened to all this?
- [67:01]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah.
- [67:02]
Ryan
Amazing how. What's the best way for someone to get a hold of you if they want to explore either some of these assessments changing their culture, but just have the first conversation.
- [67:12]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, just find me on LinkedIn. Just. I think it's just LinkedIn.com Dr. Jason Moes. I'm on there. You know, my stuff's not hidden. The name of my firm is Validity V A L I D I T A dot org. You can find me there and fill out something. I'm not hard to find. So you can find me on Academy Leadership's website too? Yeah, that's probably the best way. LinkedIn. I usually get hit on LinkedIn and I've got like a link tree on there or something where someone can schedule time or figure out how to get a hold of me through a consult. And people do. I have a calendly website and people will book a consultation or come to my course. Just get on the website and come to my course and see what it's all about. It's a tax write off. Why not come to Atlanta, let's go to a Braves game or to dc. I'm going to probably cancel the one I have coming up in June in Long beach just because I've got a conflict. But I love to do it in my hometown.
- [68:15]
Ryan
Just out of curiosity, before we wrap up. Where'd the company name come from?
- [68:20]
Dr. Jason Moats
Validity. It's an acronym. It stands for Veterans Advancing Leadership by Improving Diversity, Integrity, Trust, Ethics, and Accountability. So these are all things that I believe are part and parcel of leaders. And you've heard me say it, man. Leadership matters. The leadership continues. It doesn't stop. It's. It's never going to get easier. If you've heard the coach at Duke University, Carol Lawson, talking to her girls in that viral YouTube clip, life just doesn't get easier. It's only going to get harder. She talks about, you know, people just trying to get their bachelor's degree so life can get easy. Well, that's not the way it works. It just gets harder. Like, life just starts to snowball. It gets harder and harder. So the leadership absolutely continues. And it matters. This stuff pays dividends if you're willing to invest the time and put forth the effort and have faith in the process and again, you know, have patience and persistence and be yourself. Validity is a plan. Words. It's a valid process. This stuff works. And I'm a veteran proud one, too. So 10% of every dollar we generate gets donated back into the veteran transition space. And the client choose. The client chooses where it goes.
- [69:26]
Ryan
That's awesome.
- [69:27]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, man. It's my way of getting back.
- [69:29]
Ryan
I think that's. I think that's a wrap. That was, like. This has been an incredible conversation. I've got two whole pages of chicken scratch now to go back over and, like, four books. But thank you so much for taking the time to come on, share your. And I realize it's late for you, so coming on and sharing your expertise.
- [69:49]
Dr. Jason Moats
Yeah, I mean, I'm not Europe. Yeah, man. Ryan, I really appreciate it. I'm glad we finally were able to make this happen and connect. I'm happy to talk about this stuff in more detail. This is my life, so take it pretty serious.