[Music] hi welcome to inside strategic coach with Dan Sullivan this is a bit of a Twist on the show my name is gour Vickman in today for Shannon Waller Dan how are you how are you g I'm thankful that you're here I'm also filled with gratitude for being here and filling in for Shannon today Shannon will be back on the next Trio of episodes Dan as we enter the holiday season in the United States Canadians always find it a bit peculiar that Thanksgiving in the United States is so close to the holiday season so it's almost like a double shot you get to see your family once and then a few weeks later you see him again one of the things that a lot of families do is they gather around the table throughout the holiday season seasons and they Express gratitude what are they thankful for and gratitude comes up a lot in your conversations being thankful for certain things but you had an interesting Twist on it in terms of why gratitude is so important for the entrepreneur it's important for everyone but maybe no more so than for entrepreneurs why is that well it's really interesting because I find from coaching for 50 years that entrepreneurs tend to be a lot more grateful for their work lives than people who haven't created their own companies and I find that entrepreneurs know what it's taken on their own part to grow their company but they're also enormously grateful for the teams who allow them to kind of elevate themselves continually to focus more and more on where the most profitable parts of their business are and their team members want them to do that for a lot of reasons because team members who have an entrepreneur who's always focusing on what comes next that's even more higher TopLine in terms of revenues but bottom line in terms of profits because it guarantees their on going jobs you know what they're working on there's not going to be any disruptions and the other thing is that entrepreneurs are enormously grateful for their check writers the people who actually Finance what they do I get a double dose of it as you mentioned Gord because I get two thanksgivings because I live in Toronto I've been here since 1971 so that's 52 years and Babs has been here since 1976 and we've been together for 40 years and we're very grateful for that but gratitude is a very very interesting emotion I'll just give you one unusual thing about gratitude it's an emotion that precludes all other emotions especially all negative emotions you can't be complaining and grateful at the same time you can't be envious and grateful at the same time you can't be anxious and grateful at the same time so it's a universal so negativity Eliminator gratitude we do a an exercise I do and every other team member and strategic coach starts every meeting with a positive focus of something you're excited about and implicit in that is that you're grateful for it something you're grateful for opportunities something needs really happen but it's all in the positive Zone and then after we've actually had the meeting and all of our meetings are very project oriented and we make progress you know we're clearer we feel more capable we feel more confident about that and then at the end everybody finishes off the meeting by saying here's what I like best about this meeting so it opens with positive and then finishes with positive and that's just uniform that standard operating procedure and strategic coach one of the things I've heard clients say quite a few times is they carry the coach tools beyond their work life into their family life as well and I've heard more than one client say on a few occasions that they start dinner not just Thanksgiving or Christmas or the holidays whatever you're celebrating but they start dinner every night with their family with a positive focus and they're getting their very young children into the swing of doing a positive Focus I start my day I have this thing it's sort of a Twist on the positive Focus I just have a little sticky on my Mac desktop and at the top it says life is great and then I have three bullet points so I start every day with life is great it's a neat start to the day because anything that you may have dragged from the day before you're right it just sort of washes away and then you start your day on a positive footing and a positive note I don't know I found it infinitely helpful and I wasn't doing that before I met you that was the inspiration for that is this something you've always done we know a lot about your childhood because you've told us a lot of stories here on the podcast and throughout your work at strategic coach but is this something that you had growing up were your parents tuned into this or did you figure it out later on on your own yeah I think that I was consciously clear about it right from the start because I had a dream childhood I mean I go to conferences where they are entrepreneurial conferences I don't go to conferences that aren't filled up with entrepreneurs what I notice is one of the big drags for a lot of entrepreneurs is they're trying to get away from their Beginnings you know they're trying to escape from you know maybe it was a matter of scarcity they didn't have enough money you know they grew up in families that were kind of fixed in terms of what the parents expected life is going to be and everything else my experience is the entrepreneurial Instinct starts before 10 years old and it's demonstrated in what they choose to do with their time very early in their lives and usually when the other kids are out socializing or they're into early romantic relationships and then they have lots of play which I'm a great fan of but entrepreneurs generally you can see the Instinct towards money making because the children who are entrepreneurial minded know that money is the key to gaining independence and if they can make their own money I've know a lot of entrepreneurs they had a sense that they were a cost to their parents and they tried to establish independent income so that their parents didn't see them as a cost so they you know all sorts of jobs I cut lawns I was a paper boy I was a caddy that all happened before I was 16 or 17 years old so I think entrepreneurs live in a different world in terms of things you can be grateful for you know and they're grateful for their skill and they're grateful for the opportunities that they personally can open up for themselves one of the things I've noticed with very few exceptions I've personally coached 7 th000 entrepreneurs there and abouts next year is 50 years since I've been coaching August of next year 2024 I'm 50 years actually this is the way I'm making my life the thing about it is it was lonely it was very lonely people would look at it from the outside they would say boy you had a really tough first eight years from 1974 to 882 I was bankrupt twice I went through a divorce but I see those experiences as uniquely valuable because they were course Corrections for me I didn't have my thinking right I didn't have my value creation proposition right I didn't have my business model right and when I met Babs bab Smith who's my partner in life we've been married since 1986 but the moment I met Babs I had that other partner that I needed and you know all my GR gratitude starts with my gratitude for my relationship with Babs now I'm going to reverse the the flow of the conversation here Gord I won't start with your gratitude about what you're doing in work but I'm going to move you outside into your personal life and I'm going to ask you is there anything Gord that you're grateful about this year well this year has been the most transformative of my entire life and that's not Hyperbole and it's not even a mild exaggeration my wife and I had a baby on May 17th at 11:09 p.m. and his name is Gabriel life changes and one of the things that is neat I think my favorite thing about being a father this is the first and I was in my 40s when he was born so I'm a bit long in the tooth to be having children but my energy is good and I feel like I'm doing a pretty good job we learn on the fly a lot of books were recommended to me about this and you got to read this book and that book and this book and that book I didn't read any of them I just learned how to change diapers by changing diapers and I learned how to feed a baby by feeding a baby and I learned how to calm him down by just calming him down so that would be the ultimate you know shining star of gratitude in my life and it does change everything and you had someone else involved in that too didn't you yes you need two people for this unfortunately no fortunately yeah yeah oh there you go fortunately you didn't do the hard part I believe there's some kind of lizard somewhere that can actually become pregnant without a male present I don't know if I just totally made that up but I read some science things and there's some lizard that they discovered became pregnant in a cage and there was no male anywhere near her so we are not lizards and yeah we know humans who are striving to be lizards but you know they're not good lizards there are some lizard people especially in the Internet space but that would be my ultimate symbol of gratitude because as I mentioned this has been the most transformative year and my favorite thing that I'm looking forward to is just and parents can relate to this this is not just me talking about me seeing the world through your child's eyes you know Christmas and New Year's and the holidays of Thanksgiving you get to experience that for the first time again with this new little person who's never gone through it we went to a farm last weekend for a little family outing along with a few people here a strategic coach and my son saw a cow for the very first time I've seen many cows in my life and it was no big deal it was like me another cow how you doing cow but for him it was wild the pupils of his eyes just dilated like saucers and he just stared at this cow and then I was thinking well this is the first time he's ever seen one this is the first time he's ever seen an animal in the flesh Beyond The Cat That wanders around passive aggressively cuz our cat's mad that he's here unfortunately I told both of them you guys better start getting along cuz neither of you were going anywhere for a very long long time so seeing the world through your child's eyes again was a moment of gratitude for me as well and I think that was you know it's interesting it's a difficult job but again having that gratitude and you know living in a a place where we have mostly peace and mostly Tranquility having some stability and Security in life and now having a wonderful beautiful little family I just couldn't have asked for anything more 23 was a bit of a lucky number for me even before my son was born in 2023 I'm not sure why I suspect it's because when I played hockey as a child the first sweater they ever threw to me on the Copper Cliff flyers in Northern Ontario Canada I was number 23 oh and I still have that sweater and then you know many many moons later my son was born in 2023 I'll talk about what you're doing as a unique ability and individual involved in unique ability teamwork in coach but one of the things that I want to point out gratitude doesn't happen naturally it has to come from inside the individual it has to be created inside of the individual gratitude is a very interesting word from this standpoint it's Allied very closely with another word that's called appreciation and appreciation is a unique word in the English language because it refers to value in the sense that the term in the stock market is called stocks appreciating you know when a precious metals gold is appreciating home prices are appreciating that's a clear statement that the value of this has increased but my feeling that's totally generated from the inside what seems valuable to some person has no value to other people which indicates me that the value isn't actually in the thing the value is in an appreciation that takes place inside the individual that this is really really valuable my feeling is that everything we're grateful is because we appreciate the value of that thing and the other use of the word appreciation which in one realm it's got an economic meaning but appreciation outside of that simply means that I really value this I value my family I value where I live I value what I'm doing and again it neutralizes and eliminates all negativity it does I heard something many moons ago I wish I could attribute this to whoever said it but I'll just borrow it for the purposes of this conversation and it was you don't attract what you condemn so if you're in the habit of condemning and we see this a lot and this is not to get political but those who condemn success those who condemn wealth especially those who condemn anyone who has something that they don't want and Dan you've mentioned before on a few different podcasts that successful people have a belief in not only luck but a little bit of magic and you've talked about signals out to the universe before now some people might say oh this is pretty woo woo this is what you know they're getting into some space connect kind of stuff but I do believe and I suspect you do too stop me if I'm wrong that when you do condemn certain things you are sending powerful signals out into whatever Universe you're currently living in that you don't want that thing so if you condemn success you're telling the world I don't want any of that when you condemn wealth you're sending powerful signals out into the universe that you don't don't give me any wealth don't give me any wealth because I just told you I don't want it am I on planet Mars here or is that something that you think am I on the right track yeah one of our main Concepts in coach is called the Gap in the gain there was a new workshop I'm in Chicago today which is our big Conference Center is actually Chicago because the largest percentage of our clients are from the states and they fly in from all over the states and I'm grateful for Chicago because it's one flight from anywhere to get to Chicago it's the only city in the United States that you can get more places with one flight to Chicago than any other place we were just sitting around and one of the new clients first workshop and he said you've written a lot of books books and I think at last count it's 53 the one we're doing right now is number 53 and they said of all the books if you could only start again with one of the books which book would it be and you know there's a lot of big Concepts out there that were known for and I had to think about it because I hadn't been really asked the question before and I said um I'd start off with The Gap and the gain and the Gap and the gain indicates how you meure measure your progress how you measure your forward movement and a lot of people put themselves in a position that no matter how much they succeed they measure it against the ideal and they thereby eliminate all the value of what they've just achieved and from the outside it looks like they're very successful but from their standpoint it's their failure because as much as they've achieved it counts as nothing against the ideal because the ideal is like the Horizon you know you're never any closer to the Horizon you're never any closer to the ideal what you really would like to have which you've never actually told yourself you know it's just a thought you know I can see myself where everything is ideal and it's all made up you're comparing actual progress against a a madeup abstraction the other way is when you succeed immediately turn around and say how far have I come since I started this project well I've made a lot of progress it might not have been as much progress I want but it's a lot further ahead of where I was and throws you into a instant emotion of appreciation but not only that not how much you succeeded but everybody else who helped you we work in teams I mean whether you admit it or not nothing significant gets achieved just on rugged individualism you know and everything like that so talk to about now let's switch back to your role as manager Supreme of many podcasts in the Strategic coach Universe our vast podcast Global Universe in which we have zero competition well grateful that I had more than a lump of clay to begin molding I had a somewhat of an idea of what I was going to be coming into and what I was going to be working with but I was never starting from scratch now I knew about strategic coach a little bit I knew who you were before I joined the organization and it would be exactly 5 years October 2023 so I'm going to talk to you about this 23 thing you know yeah there's something there so gratitude for having supremely talented wickedly successful extraordinarily compelling here as I pile it on for you entrepreneurs to work with learn from produce and promote there was a lot to work with and I know others who you know rolling the ER uphill with much less I mentioned earlier the lump of clay so here I came into the organization had plenty to work with there was lots to mold and there was just there were Limitless things Limitless opportunities with the entrepreneurs that you work with and host shows with there's you know our show that we do podcast payoffs the show with Shannon inside strategic coach that I'm graciously filling in for today humbly filling in for today the show you have with Joe polish Mike canings Peter diamandis Jeffrey mof Mar young there's just Lots there for someone like me who's an audio professional Steve Steve cry apologies Steve crry as well there's plenty to work with so the gratitude that I could express in terms of my role here as strategic coach is we will never run out of interesting things to talk about and we're so glad you're with us and joining us today it's just Limitless there's plenty for me to work with as a professional I have an abundance of riches in terms of someone who produces podcasts and wants to make them shine and share them with the world there's lots for me to work with yeah if I could pinpoint and single out the single most I wouldn't say maybe important or the single most pronounced nugget of gratitude that I have is that we have an abundance of riches here a strategic coach yeah and just to play a little bit of history for our podcast listeners and viewers is that we put out a job offer into the marketplace and we used a tool of ours called the impact filter to set up just exactly what the job was you know laying out that we're looking for someone who can help us achieve this and this and this and this so I met you after about three or four stages of this process but when it got down to just you I created another tool which is called the 4x4 and I said this is how you have to show up when you're working with me you have to be alert you have to be curious you have to be responsive and you have to be resourceful and then we want to see things happen faster easier cheaper bigger so there four components one of them is performance that's the first one the other one is results over there and then I have one called being a hero and if you really want to be a hero here's some things I'd really like to see you pull off and then I have another one drives me crazy and just to put you unnotice here don't go to any of these things you know because it'll drive me crazy and I don't care how good boxes one and two are if you drive me crazy you're gone and so I sent that to him and this before I hadn't met you before and you came in and right away you said well I got the clear picture of what you're looking for here's what I'm going to produce in the first six months I'll do this I'll do this I'll do this I'll do this and then we were conversing and about halfway through our first meeting with another person elanora was with us and I said in case you're wondering Gord the answer is yes and he said yes what are you doing I said well I thought sometime during this hour you're wondering gee I wonder if I get to be the Podcast manager and I just wanted to let you know that the answer is yes you will be the Podcast manager and I said I don't think we have to talk anymore and then you left the room and a few people around the table just sat there in stun and silence so yeah gratitude for that document and entrepreneurs in strategic coach will be familiar with the 4x4 fantastic document when you're looking for team members or looking for collaborations any kind of thing because it just lays everything out that's a document that I'm grateful for and I'm sure a lot of team members are grateful to receive that because the whole point of it is there's no ambiguity in terms of sitting around wondering GE I wonder if I'm really hitting what I need to hit here and doing what I need to do and I'm wondering if I'm on top of things that 4x4 document that coach members will be familiar with yeah has stood you know I Tred to be a person that what you see is what you get there is no secret Dan there is no hidden Dan Dan has no secret agendas I said I'm putting on the table everything I want to achieve and I realize it's all teamwork and to be the podcast manager I can't tell you anything about your job I can tell you what the results are That I Want from your skills but I have no idea if I knew how to do it we wouldn't be having this conversation you know and what came into play here was your 20 years in the broadcast medium and my sense is that podcasting along with social media and a lot other media are replacing what we've thought of broadcast media where you're talking at the audience and I want to have a relationship with the audience and you're the one who really clarified that in my mind what we're selling on our podcast we're not selling strategic coach we're not selling you know books we're not selling anything that people can purchase we're selling a relationship that you may like inviting me and you know all of our podcast series and our team you might like to set aside time every day wherever you are in the world just to tune in on a conversation yeah and I'm grateful for that yeah but just specifically Gord I'm going to ask you another question just in terms of a year ago to now what are some things that you're really grateful for that have been specific jumps you know could be technological could be the way we're thinking about it could be our reach numbers and everything else so just in relationship to the last year what pops out for you grateful for AI and I don't mean robots that are coming to get us I mean AI as I've experienced it thus far has allowed us to remove the mundane and speed up expedite and eliminate the things about the production process that were not particularly fun allowing us space time and mental clarity to work on and experiment with things that were not possible before due to time constraints that's what I'm most grateful for in terms of those who create those tools as an audio professional and someone who produced podcasts me and everyone else on our team having been able to begin to experiment with those AI tools that's what I'm most grateful for in terms of my role and the output that we're producing here yeah would you say you're more excited now than you were when you first started absolutely because none of this was existed none of this existed none of this existed we had a dark room and I just did a podcast and that's over and that goes in the dark room where it goes from there only a few I have no idea what happens to it and everything you know I'll pay you the compliment that I pay to almost everybody on my team and I said I just want you to know you know know when I'm not with you I'm not thinking about you I don't have the least bit of concern about what you're doing how you're doing it what you're achieving it so I'll pay you that compliment Gord when I'm not actually working with you I don't give you any thought you know some people may consider that an insult but Dan that is high praise and I truly appreciate our teamwork yeah Dan any final thoughts here because for those listening in the United States it is the holiday season as I mentioned off the top Canadians think it's mighty goofy to have Thanksgiving and Christmas so close together Canadian Thanksgiving is in October but in the United States you have Thanksgiving just a few weeks later you have Christmas so we are into the holiday season here for our listeners in the United States Dan any thoughts on gratitude anything that you well interesting when I got to Canada which was 52 years ago and I will say I'm very very grateful for Toronto because Canada for me means Toronto and Toronto is just a really cool City it's not like a big What's called the GTA the greater Toronto area it's tripled in size since I came in 1971 and what I appreciate it's amazing to be for half a century in a city that just always grows okay it's very very interesting because it's a global City in terms of its connections you know it's a prime immigration from other places is favorite a lot of people from other places want to come to Toronto but Toronto more than Canada and the reason is the government is relatively speaking it's great government you know just comparing against other places in the world the economy is sound it doesn't have the Dazzle of a lot of the US cities and the only thing I find really amusing is that there's certain sections of the Toronto media that always use Toronto worldclass City and I have to laugh at it because I said you know I've been in New York a lot I've been to London a lot I've been to Tokyo I've been to other cities and these are really worldclass cities and you know that because they don't call themselves a worldclass city if you are a worldclass city you do not call yourself a world class City other people call you a world class City Toronto's a great city as far as I'm considered but for you know the opportunity just to create a business here the kind of team members you can have in this city but as long as Toronto keeps calling itself media people who call it a worldclass city it won't be a world class City I guess until after their funerals but our American clients really love to come to Toronto and it's a real City downtown you know it's not spread out and I I really love it here and I've lived two-thirds of my life I'm an American to the Bone but I call Canada America's biggest gated community you know you have to check with the guard and certain things you can't bring into the country and and let them know when you plan to leave but it's been wonderful living here and allowed us to Branch out to the United States to the United Kingdom which I love I love London I love where we go in the United States the big thing I'll say about this is all the people who say America is declining America is falling apart Canada is declining Canada is falling apart Great Britain is falling I would say it doesn't have anything to do with what you're talking has to do you don't have the ability to appreciate and you don't have the ability to be grateful Dan I'm appreciative and grateful for our time together and it's always a blast and any final thoughts no I'm grateful Shannon was called away on an emergency to fill in somewhere else that I get to do inside strategic coach with Gordon and he's got a great voice I mean God you know I mean this is the voice at strategic coach so anyway it's been a pleasure thanks Dan