C (5:19)

Why?

B (5:20)

Because they already know more and are a better leader than the person they're trying to follow. So if you're wanting to create and develop other leaders, then I want to encourage you that you have to show the leadership skills that will have the respect that will draw people to you. It not only takes a leader to know a leader, in other words, to be able to find them, or it takes a leader to show a leader to be able to example and model. It takes a leader to grow a leader. I have an expression that just simply says you cannot give what you do not have. In other words, I can only teach you. I can only pour into you what I know myself. Now, this is essential because if I'm going to really grow you as a leader, I have to be a leader that grows. People do what people see people, not what people hear. This is the big mistake that leaders make. Often they honestly think that people do what they hear. And so they tell them all these things that they want them to do. And when the people don't follow through, sometimes leaders say, well, what happened? I told them what I wanted them to do. Well, the problem is you told them, but you didn't show them. You didn't model the way. They couldn't look at you and say, I can do this because I've watched you do this. There's no credibility, there's no moral authority in that type of leadership. So this is huge. If you really want to create other leaders. It takes a leader to know a leader. It takes a leader to show a leader. It takes a leader to grow a leader. And then number four, finally, leaders know the value of developing other leaders. That's what makes great leaders unique. They know the great value in developing other leaders to add growth lead followers, to multiply growth lead leaders. In other words, in your leadership, the more leaders that you find, the more leaders that you develop, the more leaders that you add value to, the quicker your team and your business will grow. Now, can you grow your business by leading followers again? Of course you can. But you can grow your business so much faster, so much better by developing, training, equipping, pouring your life into leaders. When I was in college, my life was changed one day in a class when I heard my professor talk about an Italian economist named Alfredo Pareto. And this incredible economist from Italy said this. He taught the pretto principle, sometimes known as the 2080 principle. Preto said, if you would take 10 people and you would put them in order of their production, in other words, the number one person on your team would be your best producer, give you the great results. If you could do that, okay, if you could take and put the best producer, number one, the second best producer, number two, all the way down to number 10, would be the least of the 10 as far as production and results. Here's what Breto said. If you would just take your top two, not all 10, just the top two on your team, and you would take those two and give them 80% of your teaching, 80% of your time, 80% of your time, of the training, if you would spend 80% on the top 20%, that 20% would give you an 80% return on everything you needed. In other words, Pareto taught me as a very young student in college that I don't need to spend time with everyone, but I do need to spend time with the people that produce and return the greatest. Now, here's what's beautiful. If you spend most of your time with the top 20%. They'll not only give you 80% of what you need on your team and in your business, but then let those top 20% mentor and train the other 80%. Everybody gets trained, everybody gets helped. But you spend your time with your top two producers out of 10 to get the high return. Now, if you'll do those four things, you will have a great strategy to develop and create other leaders. What are those four things? It takes a leader to know a leader. Number two, it takes a leader to show a leader. Number three, it takes a leader to grow a leader. And finally, leaders know and value what happens when you develop other leaders. Do those four things and you'll begin to create and develop leaders around you.

D (10:25)

Hey, podcast listeners, many of you listening right now would probably love the autonomy that comes with owning your own business or becoming a coach that helps other businesses succeed. Well, we have a phenomenal strategy where you are 100% in control of your own business, earning income on your own terms, and have access to the people, tools and resources you need to build a thriving leadership development business. When you become a Maxwell Leadership Certified Team member, you join a global community of entrepreneurs led by our expert team of mentors and faculty, including John C. Maxwell. You'll also get one of the top leadership certifications in the world next to your name, giving you the boost you need to get started. Visit us online@maxwellleadership.com JoinTheTeam to find out more.

A (11:28)

Hey, welcome back, everybody. I'm in the studio with Chris. I'm very excited. I'm reminded of a quote that John uses often. He says the single best way to impact an organization is to focus on leadership development. We've run across a lot of clients, a lot of partners, Chris, that you and I have, and we've never been hit with the problem. I have too many leaders. It's always, I don't have enough. They're underdeveloped.

C (11:53)

I.

A (11:53)

Who are the leaders? Can I get some leaders? And so we spend a majority of our day working through how to develop leaders. So I'm super excited to sit down with you today and talk about John's lesson.

C (12:06)

Yeah, this is. We were just talking a minute ago about this is our man. This is our passion. Right? It's our vision. We want to add value to leaders so that they can develop other leaders and multiply them, which is the key. This is something that's been hard for me my entire life because I want to be an individual contributor. I want to lead teams. But am I really developing and multiplying leaders. And I think this is really what kind of separates the leaders that have a legacy versus the leaders that just have a team. And I think it's in the development side of things. As you mentioned, we go around the world, companies, individuals, and we find that John talked about the Pareto principles. He was kind of wrapping up. And what I find, and you probably would agree with this, that 80% of the leaders are directing and managing people. It's a, it's a response, it's, we're going to react versus a long term mindset of equipping and empowering people. And I think if you can understand this and multiply that as a leader, it changes the organization, it changes your family, it changes those you have influence with. And so we're going to dive in because I want to get your perspective on what does this look like for you as owner, as CEO, as a husband, as we will say this on here, I'm not sure G. Paul is what they call Mark at home. What does that look like? And so John starts off by saying, hey, the first thing you got to do is you, you got to know what a leader looks like. As you're running companies, as you're running teams, as you're out traveling the world. What, what does that look like for you? How do you go about identifying someone's potential versus maybe their current position, knowing that then, hey, this is someone that John, yourself, our team, wants to pour into and develop in order to multiply.

A (13:55)

You know, it's such a, such a good question. And John does it intuitively that he doesn't teach it practically. And so let me explain this. John says often, Chris, he says, I put a 10 on everybody's head. And you know what? That sounds really good. Guess what? He puts a 10 on everybody's head.

C (14:13)

Which is why you wouldn't let him hire for a long time. And by the way, now we don't let Mark hire either.

A (14:17)

That's exactly right because John's taught me how to see a put a 10 on everybody's head. But you know, very quickly John can take the 0 off and put a 1 on that person or very quickly he can even erase the one and leave it as a zero. He's just as much as he has a propensity to believe a 10 on everyone, he has a quick assessment after given an opportunity whether somebody's going to step up or not. That's a genius that I'm not sure if I can teach, but I can definitely highlight because I've seen John, do it. We really do. But I think in that is the secret to your question. How do we develop leaders? How do we know leaders? How do we find leaders? You got to believe there's leadership potential in every person. You got to start with a foundation of belief. I believe there's leadership in there. Because if you don't start with belief and you're waiting with skepticism to figure it out, their first disappointment is going to disqualify them before you ever gave belief in them. Think about my kids. Think about my kids, my grandkids. Think about your kids. I take leadership development and oftentimes I hang it up and put it in my car to pick it back up tomorrow on my way. And I don't even bring leadership thinking into my home. Now, I'm embarrassed to say that I'm raising three little future men that have a chance to change the world. And this incredible princess that has a chance to change her world, I'm raising them right now. I gotta be honest with you, Most days I go home, I see them as my grandkid, and I don't put on my perspective that there's leadership quality within them. You know what's even worse than that? You and I, perhaps I'll say, me, I don't go home and see in my significant other leadership opportunity, I see conflict, I see tension. I see telling me what to do. I see reminding me things I need to pick up. I don't at all put leadership. Therefore, how well am I at developing leaders at home compared to leadership at work? And I'm not sure it's the same. But I think it starts because I don't start at home seeing the leadership in my grandchildren. So when we're going around and we're wanting to find leaders, as John talks about, it takes a leader to know a leader. We want to locate that leader. The first thing you've got to do is you got to put all your biases, all your past wounds, all the people that's messed up with you, all the things you don't like personally about somebody, and you got to find the leadership attribute in them, because trust me, gang, and I'm looking at you in YouTube land, it's in there. And if you don't believe that leadership potential is in every person you're leading, you've missed the first obvious step. Belief starts the finding. Now, I gave you a lot there.

C (16:54)

Love that, it's good.

A (16:55)

But in finding a leader, I think you as the leader, as the key person, as the person that's Looking for the leader, the CEO of Leadership Pursuit. You've got to determine what leadership looks like to you.

B (17:08)

That's right.

A (17:09)

So for me, finding a leader is somebody that's hungry to learn, it's teachable. It's somebody that says, I want to learn. It's somebody that has a passion to grow. It's somebody that believes in the power of relationship. A solo person is good for something, but they're not good for leadership. They're not good for leading a team. I have very solo minded people on our team. They're very hard to promote for me to leadership because they're going to continue thinking about themselves when leadership becomes about serving. Which takes me to the fourth thing. I think every great leader in the pursuit of finding a leader has a servant's heart that says my leadership propensity should be about serving and developing leaders in others. That's why John's very passionate about that. And then the fifth thing that I would tell you is it's people that can produce people that can get things done. Now, I said things, but really they can get things done. Okay.

C (18:06)

No matter what it is.

A (18:07)

No matter what it is. There's another way to say that that's not appropriate for our podcast here, but they get things done and great leaders know how to get things done. So when I find somebody that doesn't have a leadership position, never had a leadership position, but they know how to get things done, I quickly try to figure out, whoa, why haven't they ever had a chance to lead? Because they know how to get things done.

C (18:27)

Yeah. It's so funny you say that because before we started, I went through and I said, what are the attributes? This is the question I asked myself that Mark, you would look for in a leader that you know, as John says. Right. We see other people as we are at times. And so we're looking for that lens, we're looking for those attributes. And here's what I wrote down for you. Initiative, which is spot on. What you talked about. Resilience.

A (18:51)

It's a great one.

C (18:52)

That's a great one. Especially with the fact that your leadership run has resembled that it still does every single day. Willingness to learn and take risks. I wrote down that learning component has to be part of it. And then to have a positive influence. Influence through producing with others.

B (19:09)

How do you.

C (19:10)

How do you produce with others and still have a positive connection and environment? So I don't know if we were five for five, but it's really close.

A (19:17)

The resilience one is the one That I wish I had a little bit more.

C (19:20)

Still, though, like, even the five that you gave are right from your heart, because Mark didn't know that we were going to go in that direction, that deep with that. That's just right off of who Mark is. And so we could. We could have an entire podcast just around those five, because those are the type of leaders that Mark is looking for, because that's. He knows that as a leadership attribute before then he decides those are in my top 20%, that they are then going to be in line for me spending time and developing in order for them to be able to multiply throughout your organization. I agree. Totally love that. Now John goes on and he talks about, okay, the leader has to model it and he has to then be able to develop people. I've learned this from you, and I then try to do this with my team. And I'm sitting here now thinking even about my family and my relationship, because I think you're spot on. Why don't we take exactly what we're doing, I know, 22 hours a day, and then spend the other two hours doing this. But this is key. And you do this with our team every time we have the opportunity to meet. You come in the first, literally 15, 20, 30 minutes, depending on where you're at. You just talk about what you're learning. You go, let me tell you what I'm learning. Here's what I'm studying. Here's what this means to us as an organization. And when you're doing that, you're modeling it. It's contagious. But you're also developing us because you go, hey, guys. You don't take notes, but you might want to, right? Because I spent some time with John and some learning, and I heard this, and I heard this, and I have a on my remarkable a Mark Cole category for meetings with just leadership thoughts. And it has made me increase my leader, which then what do I do? I take that and try to multiply it with my team. Where did that come from? And how important is that for our leaders that are listening, that are watching? And remember, we define leadership as influence here. So as Mark so eloquently talked about, this could be your peer group. This could be your family. You don't have to lead an organization or own it like Mark does. How important is it for those individuals to be sharing what they're learning on a daily basis in order to be able to multiply people around them?

A (21:24)

Boy, so you just gave really the true answer in how you used Your remarkable and what you were talking about specifically to me. And so I want to really highlight what you're doing and I want to do that in a very candid way, as I always like to do. I think every leader has a focus in a particular season of time. We call that around here, the podcast world, we call that a word for the year. We call that a yearly focus. We call that a seasonal objective. There's a lot of different. We talk about this, that a leader has one thing on her or his mind at any given moment and everything is going to weave into that. Their leadership, their personal life, their thought life. Everything's going to weave into that one big objective that they have in the years to where I want to develop leaders. There is great intentionality and you just referenced one for some of us leaders. I took a sabbatical, if you will, from developing leaders last year and I went very deep in 2024 and saying, Mark, there's some areas that you're misaligned. What are the things you need to stand on? That was my word for the year. Those of you long standing podcast listeners, you know that my word last year was stand. What are the few non negotiables that Mark Cole, the leader, the man not just isolated leader, needs to stand on? Man, it was so rewarding to put that focus on it. My processing last year was not as much developing leaders. Now it's always the sub story if it's not the main story. This year, as I'm coming back into developing leaders, getting back engaged with my leadership team, you're feeling that, sensing that, oh my gosh, what does that mean? We've got all that going on here. What I just started is what you just described with remarkable every leader. This is what Chris has said. So I'm just telling you what I just picked up on that I've got to get better at. Every leader has a list of the core people she or he is leading. And that list is constantly being added to every single week, every single day. Here's what I mean. Technology has made this much easier than in John's time of leaving. I have a tab on my phone for every leader that I feel tasked to develop in any given year. High potentials, direct reports, people that I don't even know yet, how we interact. But I met them and on that list I keep things. What do I need to discuss, what do I need to transfer? And how can I add value? And ever so often, if not every day I'm looking through my list at those people and just thinking about that and then sending it. I do that for a group. If there's a group of leaders that I'm leading, I do that for the individuals that I'm leading. Just last week, excuse me, just last night, I added a list on my calendar that said, hey, how are you interacting with Chris Goede? You don't even know this, and you just brought that up. How are you interacting with Chris Goede this year? This year is a critical year for me, for you, for us. What are you doing to develop Gris in light of that? So when we come in the podcast today, I asked you a very penetrating question. Hey, Chris, when is the last time when you're going to call me and tell me what I need to know? That was a very leadership question. It caught you off guard. You said, about what? About this, about that. And I said just what I need to know. Leadership leaders. People listening into this podcast that want to be a leader. When you lead people well, and we sign off, almost every podcast with everyone deserves to be led well, you don't lead them well reactively. You lead them well proactively. What is your plan of adding value of holding accountable and increasing the performance, the ability of that leader in your life? And you need to have a tab for that. You said that. I'm just living it. So catch that podcast listeners, because that was brilliant.

C (25:11)

Yeah, that's good. Well, I think that. But remember, we talk about this. We have to live it out as leaders and as influencers. And we gave you just an example of Mark leading an organization, traveling all over the world, doing all kinds of things in John's space, and then coming back and leading the organization, but being intentional about making sure that you model and develop that if you want to develop leaders. And that's what John's talking about here. Finally, let's talk about this. John ends it with leaders know the value of developing other leaders. The value of that shows up in many, many different ways, personal relationships, but it also shows up in the organizational culture. So let's talk just about the team culture, the family culture, the friendship dynamics, however you want to relate the principles of which we're talking about today to where you are in your leadership journey. What are other ways than what we just talked about, knowing the value of that? Because like you talked about man, John is the he 100% understands the importance of multiplying leaders at the top. We talk about his legacy often. And I said, as we were kind of kicking this off, I said, leadership multipliers leave legacies not just teams. And we talk about his legacy all the time. How are we able to do that? Because he's multiplied himself over and over and over again. So there's a value to doing that for you, that value. Let's talk about it. In regards to the culture of the Maxwell leadership, maybe another circle of influence. Why is that so important? How do you go intentionally about doing that other than the example that we just shared with your direct reports?

A (26:50)

Yeah. So I, I think understanding and I'm going to go the direct reports, Chris, a little bit longer, but this will apply to the organization at whole. So I, I heard that distinction right there. But if you'll indulge a couple more minutes on leadership and staying with that. Developing leaders, rather than developing a leadership culture to invite people to step into, I want to stay on the perspective of a minute of a leader. I think that when I look for a leader, this is different than how do you know a leader? How do you find a leader? When I'm trying to develop people for a specific task, for a new opportunity, for a transition, for whatever the bigger challenges of leadership that come our way, not status. Ho hum. Yesterday, managing yesterday's success. I'm talking about leading people to new frontiers, to new ideas. There's three things that I'm looking for. I've never taught this before, but I knew I wanted to share it in today's podcast. The first thing that I am looking for in a leader that I value, because we're talking about right here, valuing leaders. What do I value in a leader and what do I want them to in turn add value to the people they're leading. The first thing, the number one thing, is perspective.

B (28:01)

Perspective.

A (28:03)

Their perspective. Their ability to quickly sense and seize a bigger picture in any problem and in any opportunity, their ability. You know, one of the reasons I told you, hey, when are you going to call me and tell me, I want to hear what you're thinking, what you're saying. I want to see, I want to see if you've got my big, big picture. Because I'm giving a big picture right here. This is a moment. This is a time for us to embrace the bigger picture. So I want to hear it. Missed you in the last meeting. You know, all that. So when you don't have, we're in a remote society, when you don't have that instant feedback from a leader to see what their perspective is, leaders go find a way to get it. I just did that in today's studio session. I want to hear it. Perspective is important because a leader's ability to get above the chaos, the minutia. Minutia, minutia, minutia. To see something bigger is directly proportionate to how quickly they're going to help you lead to the next opportunity to lead out of the current mess. Their perspective. So I'm constantly valuing other people's perspective, good or bad or indifferent. It's a mirror for me. It's an indicator for me. I value another leader's perspective. The second thing that I value is their people skills. How are they with their relational ability? Do they have the relational equity inside of their leadership tank to take people on a journey, or do they only have enough relationship to keep things safe? What's their relational ability if they don't have the people skills to take you? Just recently, Chris, we could talk a lot about this. You just led a team through a very, very difficult time. You know the reason you could do that? Because you had a 10 out of 10 in your people skills, in your relational skills. It was in your tank. I'm constantly, when I'm developing leaders, and especially developing leaders to go somewhere, not just developing leaders as a byproduct, but I'm developing the. I want to know their perspective, their ability to see the bigger picture, their people skills, the ability to take people to a picture that people can't see. They're not designed to see. They won't see it. They'll get to the plateau and go, wow, this is beautiful. And go, yeah, I told you that. I've been telling you that. Wow. How did you know? Because I could envision it without touching it. People skills. Perspective without people skills will just let you take a walk by yourself.

C (30:20)

That's good.

A (30:21)

Perspective with people skills will let you take people with you, but then that takes us to the next one. One is their ability to produce. Production is you take people that can take you to the next level. Because let me tell you this, where I'm going right now, I am more aware of this than I've ever been. I don't need people's approval, but boy, I need people with me. It's my responsibility to see that change, to see the bigger picture. It's my responsibility to find the leaders around me that will see it. It's my responsibility to, to encourage people with what that be. It will be. But it's the people around me that will help gather people and take us there. That's. You go back to the old, old leaders of long, long ago, and they broke people up. Moses, the Great Israeli or the great Jewish leader was all about getting people in smaller groups so they could take people with them. But this idea of production, it's the people that can and understand that the level of my success depends on others. The level of my success is not how much of a unicorn or a lone ranger I can be to accomplish that mountaintop. It's my ability to cast a vision that engages people, that lets them produce the results to get there. And it is in developing leaders, if you will look at the perspective of the people you're leading, if you will hone that, develop that, if you'll look at their people skills, if you will expect them to lift their level of people skills, and if you will hold them accountable to production, you can get where you need to go with leaders beside you rather than get where you want to go and look behind you and see the carnage, the wake, the destruction behind you. A lot of leaders can get to a plateau, but when they look around, there's more devastation to getting to the plateau than there had to have been there.

C (32:13)

There will be. Wouldn't you agree? There's going to be always some devastation. Right. When you go through that as you develop leaders. But I love the way you laid this out in regards to. And I'm going to give you my lens real quick as just kind of candidly responsive. Mark knows, and those that know me, I always think in terms of the five levels of leadership.

A (32:32)

Yep.

C (32:33)

So I'm sitting here going, man, Mark just gave me levels 1, 2, and 3. The perspective is kind of that first I got the title. This is. But what is their perspective? Can they see and sees and. And sense things? Level two, what are your people skills? Level three, what are we gonna do to produce? And as you work your way through these, you gain your level of influence. So stay with me for just a second. You're going, hey, so yeah, the first one, that's great. You got that. But you don't have these other two. So you don't have a great enough level of influence to go on this journey with me. Oh, maybe two. Now you got two levels of influence. And so we're going up all the way and I'm going to end right here and I'll throw it back to you all the way to where we look at John as this level five pinnacle leader. And when I see anybody that has level five influence, what I see is a group, a team, a stadium full of people that are developing other people.

A (33:26)

Yes.

C (33:27)

You just gave us very tangible, actionable things to be Looking at at different levels as we are trying to identify and understand the value of us developing those other leaders so well. And we could do three podcasts from these three different topics right here and what you gave us. So wrap us up and close up for today.

A (33:47)

Well, the subject title of today's podcast is how to develop Leaders. It's what we do. And it's level four of the five levels of leadership that you referenced. And here's what's so interesting, Chris. We mystify, we like put kind of very hard, how do I develop leaders by doing 1, 2 and 3? Well, by doing levels 1, 2 and 3. And by the way, when you do levels 1, 2 and 3 at today, we called it perspective, we called it people skills, we called it production. When we do that, well, level four doesn't become mystified, it becomes natural. And it happens. And then level five is the pursuit of all of us to leave a legacy. Well, let me say this right. We could go a long way on this. Chris Goede has another podcast that I'm going to interject right here called the Maxwell Leadership Executive Podcast. It's one of our Maxwell Leadership family of podcasts. And he and his team in that podcast really deliver executive application and tangible team orientation content, specifically around five levels. But they extend it beyond other things. They see the world through five levels. And I want you to go check that out. You need to be googling that. You need to go find that and make it. It's free. It's our gift to you that wants to lead at an executive level. And so you're going to want to go do that and get a lot more insight from Chris and his team around the five levels. Also, I want to challenge you today that if you would like to take a deeper, more intentional journey into the world of leadership, we have a digital product on the 21 irrefutable laws of leadership. For those of you watching by YouTube, I'm holding this book up. This is John's highest, most influential. There's over 4 million copies sold. And this book has been truly impacted. We created a digital product, typically that's $1,050 and we're running it for a podcast family for $199. You can use it's in our show notes. You can use the promotional key of podcast and be able to get that steep discount because I want that to help you. I want that to encourage you, if you're ready, after today's podcast, to develop other leaders. A lot of our podcast is about developing yourself today. It's about developing other leaders. The 21 laws and that digital product will help you there. We have a comment from Bruce and Bruce said he was impacted by the podcast how to Be a Real Success Part two. That's a great podcast. I challenge you to go listen to that. It's in the show notes, bruce said. I'm in the Maxwell Leadership Certified team. More about that later. It's a great community that we have, he said. I'm reading and devouring John's materials and I find the podcast so uplifting and encouraging for me on my journey. Thanks for taking the time and making the time to prepare and do these podcasts, Bruce. Our pleasure. We do it because everyone deserves to be led well.

E (36:50)

Are you ready to elevate your leadership to new heights? Join the movement towards High Road Leadership with John C. Maxwell's latest book. In High Road Leadership, John explores the power of valuing all people, doing the right things for the right reasons, and placing others above personal agendas. Learn how to inspire positive change and bring people together in a world that divides. Order now and receive exclusive bonuses including a keynote note on High Road Leadership by John Maxwell himself and a sneak peek into three impactful chapters. Take the first step towards becoming a High road leader. Visit highroadleadershipbook.com to order your copy today.