Hey, what's up, everybody? Welcome in to Vision
Pros Live. I'm your show host, Jackson Callum,
founder of First Class Business, and I've got
Greg Kaiser in the house. of management mastery.
He's got a book on management and leadership.
He's got a great personality. We have no problem
going back and forth with healthy conflict. And
that's one of my favorite, favorite realities.
And I've got a leader who's willing to go in
and dive deep on, well, I don't know about that.
Well, what about this angle? And he goes, well,
I don't know about that, Jackson. What about
this angle? That's one of my favorite styles
of conversations because it's obviously diving
into both of our blind spots. And I don't think
there's a more healthy place that we can be.
on a weekly basis. Maybe not every moment of
every day, but I like to be there often because
I'm trying to lead millions of people and I won't
get there unless I'm able to see past my own
blind spot. So Greg Kaiser, thank you for being
a great guest. Thank you for being a great mastermind
buddy through email. We got our pen pal stuff
going and thanks for joining me. Talk about hidden
communication gaps that break great teams. Jackson,
thank you so much. A pleasure to be here. Really
looking forward to having another, let's call
it vibrant. Or possibly vigorous conversation.
Yeah, very good. Good second word choice too.
That's what I felt. And sometimes, my friends,
sometimes when I get these emails from Greg,
my inner ego comes out and is like, really? And
I'm like, wait. No, he gets it. He's not going
to run from this. We're going to talk. And I'll
put my email back and I'll be like, okay. Jackson,
channel your inner love. bring up the radical
candor and i think so many people hear that book
and they've never read it or looked at it and
they think radical candor means like extreme
hard bearing truth that's not what it is my friends
radical candor is you love somebody enough to
recommend change that's what it's about and that's
what i've so i've gone back and forth with greg
looking all right what changes can i possibly
um help greg with not inflict on greg and when
he returns back i'm like cool i i i see that
he's doing the same thing so again you got a
you got a special aspect of leadership greg that
you don't have to give you didn't have to go
through our wrestling matches through email but
you chose to and i just again i want to thank
you for that where did you learn that uh jackson
i'm an honors graduate from the college of hard
knocks many people have never heard of this school
yeah you know i i i'm a Self -proclaimed. Hopefully
I can back that up. Lifetime learner. And the
way you learn how to do things is through repetition
and trial. But then the flip side of it is you
have to be humble enough or have enough humility
to step back and say, oh, boy, that didn't work
the way I thought. Instead of saying, oh, these
people, they don't get it. Like, no, no, you
didn't give it to them. Go back, rethink your
approach a little bit and help them. And that's
a that's an iterative process. Yes, it is. That's
already a masterclass. We're going to wrap up
today and just close this episode. Now, my friends,
seriously, have your pen and paper ready, because
I can tell from what Greg already said and from
my own life, I'm going to speak for both of us.
We have both been through the good, the bad.
and the ugly of leadership and everything that
we talk about today we're going to be revealing
some secrets that took me years to learn that
took me that if i had just had somebody help
me see these matters my relationships would have
improved drastically my companies would have
scaled far faster with far better culture and
ultimately i would probably be leading millions
of people by now because of the people that i
was working with but i had to learn some very
hard lessons as a young visionary that didn't
quite understand how to pull these aspects together.
So we're going to try to nail down the one major
communication gap after we talk about several
of them, but we're also going to dive into some
communication gaps that you can fix right now.
Greg, let's dive into the first aspect of that
before we take a little break. Communication
gaps that quietly grow between leaders, managers,
and team members. And we're going to talk about
both. in -person work at workforces and environments
and online remote work forces because they're
very very different in my opinion i've had uh
how many years now 16 years working from home
and i can tell you there's a lot of good bad
and ugly to remote workforces but greg let's
start with yours back to it one more time what
are the communication gaps that quietly erode
or grow between leaders managers and teams yeah
so i think about this i like to put things into
structures, frameworks, whatever word you want
to use. And so the first thing they miss is,
are we actually communicating? And the communication
is exchange of valuable information as differentiated
from, say, chit chat. You know, when you and
I email back and forth, it's fairly intense.
There's some weighty things in there and you're
like, OK, that's information. I'm going to go
buy this book that he suggested. I'm going to
listen to this on Audible, et cetera, et cetera.
That's information. And then the other thing
people miss, and this is so basic, what direction
is the communication flowing? Are you listening?
Or are you actually sending the communication
out? Because, and this is the thing I try to
help people understand, the initiator of a communication.
owns the communication from that point forward
and they have to feel that that okay i initiated
this communication and i did it presumably for
some purpose i now own where this goes because
and you probably experienced this do me a favor
on this greg you you i feel like i'm i'm in a
pool and i tried to reach the bottom and i didn't
reach it but i'm like oh i want to um Help me
see the example, because what you said, I can
feel the depth, but I couldn't quite capture
it in a real life scenario. So what does that
look like, the initiator and the responsibility?
So the initiator, put it in a simple, you're
in a remote work situation since you brought
that up. And I personally experienced this. People
would talk in generalities on, we were using
Microsoft Teams, and I'd say, okay. Hang on.
Subject, verb, object. Break this down. Structure
that so the people that are on here know who
you're talking to, what you're talking about,
and then the object, what you want to happen.
Because, you know, I'm fortunate. I get to observe
these things fly on the wall. Until I learn how
these people interact. Then I start inserting
myself and say, OK, this might be helpful. And
I do this offline, Jackson, I don't do this on
the calls. I call him afterwards. OK, I have
transcripts of the meeting. Let's go over how
you explain this. You directed this to somebody
in Germany. And I took German for five years.
The language structure in German is different.
So you have to understand that verbs are super
important in German. Sentences hinge around verbs.
So you have to make sure you're not using some
American idiom that they don't understand because
they're going to be embarrassed to stop you in
the middle of a meeting with a bunch of other
people on the call. So confirm, after you say
something, confirm that they understood. This
is the action that we need to flow out of this.
Is everybody on the same page? And then you let
them repeat it back to you. And you might have
to prompt them a little bit. You don't have to
prompt them a little bit to get them to do that.
But once they repeat it back to you, then you
can very, very quickly say, I didn't exactly
get across what I wanted to. Or like, okay, nailed
it. Good. Let's move on to the next thing. And
this is harder in a remote environment because
people don't always pay attention as much as
they should. Right, right. And especially if
you allow videos to be off. But you also can't
see somebody's hands on their lap going like
this. You can't see the leg bouncing. No, but
what you see is this. You know they're looking
under the table. I worked with a great guy. It
was about a billion dollar company. Wouldn't
let a meeting start until everybody's cameras
were on. And he was nice about it and kind of
jokey about it. And he's like, oh, I see you
just got out of bed and you're still in your
robe and whatever, whatever. He only had to do
it a couple of times. People showed up ready
to play. They knew they were going to be on camera
and he tiled the screen. And he would just, it
was like sitting in a meeting room. He would
randomly go around and say, so John, what do
you think? Hey, you know, are you guys getting
this? And he'd point to somebody, say their name.
So all of a sudden, you know, when somebody says
your name, you snap to it. He was so good at
it, but he was a natural. You know, cause I talked
to him afterwards. I'm like, how did you get
that good at that? He's like, well, I worked
for Boston Consulting Group for 10 years. He's
like. We're really good at making sure people
are paying attention because they have to pay
attention to what we say. Like, OK, we've been
practicing this for 10 years. Like you didn't
do this yesterday. Right. Exactly. So there's
that combination of a natural with natural plus
10 years of of extreme exercise. All right. So
that's good. That's really good. And I like that
you talked about the repeat it back. Great. You
said you went to the Hard Knocks University.
It feels a little bit like you went to the Oxford
University as well. Subject, burden, object and
confirm action, repeat it back. I'm going to
put that into what I would consider layman terms
for us sports guys. I once had a therapist who
helped me realize just how bad communication
between human beings are. And he had a he had
a little bitty game that he played called pass
the ball. And so when you pass the ball, when
you're speaking, you've got the ball. So we do
this virtually in our companies where, OK. I've
got the ball. Here's what I'm saying. Subject,
verb and object. Right. Here's the challenge.
Here's what we're going to do about it. And here's
what we want the outcome to be. Right. Using
Greg's formula. When I finish that, I'm going
to give the ball to a team member. And I'm saying,
now it's your turn to tell me, what did I say?
So they have the ball and they speak back and
they usually say something completely different
than what I said. And now they give me the ball
back and I say, OK. That's what you heard. This
is what I meant. And then you might have to do
this five or six times in my marriage counseling
session. I think we did 15 the first time. And
I was like, whoa, we really, we're using the
same words, but meaning completely different
things. Say that again? Slow learner. Oh man,
of course. Slow and intense. Both, absolutely.
So that aspect alone, that's a very big one.
Let's dive a little bit deeper, Greg. We're into
a... uh another area of communication gaps that
quality girl i'll lead on this one you can color
commentate um in remote workforces my friends
i wish remote companies would lean into exactly
what i say here this this was a very hard -earned
lesson there's almost no culture in remote work
environments because people they don't want to
be on meetings too the meeting feels kind of
static because people don't know how to lead
remote meetings very well and so even if you're
best friends and we were, and my first one of
my first startups, we lived all down the street
from each other, but we wouldn't see each other.
But once a year when we go to a trade show and
we were busy, we're working, we all had our own
responsibilities to do. And so our zoom calls
after that first year, like we get to the trade
show conference and we're like, Oh my gosh, I
do still love you. I don't hate you. You know?
And we, you know, year two coming up on the same
thing, but with far more like, I don't know if
I still love you. Um, you know, and, and by year
three, um, and we, we fricking hated each other.
We were, we were all really mad at each other.
And so I went into, I went into video power marketing
after that a couple of years later and we were
remote, we were remote culture again. And I thought
through the nasty experiences that Adam and,
and Don and Jen and I went through at restaurant
connect. And I said, you know what? We just,
we just got to a point where every day was, Greg,
did you get it done? Okay, good. You got it done?
All right. You didn't get it done? Oh, man. Why
didn't you get it done? And it just became a
transactional relationship where everything we
were doing was so focused on, all right, let's
get out of this meeting because nobody wants
to be here anyway. Let's go and let's get it
done. Let's get it done. And there was no depth.
There was no moment where, you know what? Somebody
yelled at me on the phone and the guy in the
cubicle next to me goes. Whoa, man, like that
was harsh. Like, way to take it. And that builds
a sense of belonging. That builds a sense of
good feeling that you've got each other's back
in moments. Even if it's worse being in that
cubicle, there's something that happens with
the values, the virtues. So now let's go to what
we did at Video Power. At Video Power, we would
take time to talk about the good things in life.
we wouldn't just rush off the Zoom because everybody
hates Zoom meetings. No, we don't. People hate
Zoom meetings because they get static and focused
on transaction. And two, we decided that every
time that we had a conference, we would bring
everybody to the speaking session. Everybody
would come there for that three -day weekend.
We would have one day where we were doing a seminar
where everybody prepared their own little stuff
to talk about what we were going to move forward.
And the next day, we would all spend time together
doing something in the city that we were in like
like an activity we rode the roller coaster in
vegas um you know i went to the mob museum and
hung out there too um and then the last day jake
and i would go into the conference and crush
the conference and the team had the free day
to do whatever the heck they wanted if they wanted
to spend time together awesome if they wanted
to go to their own thing it was awesome but we
made sure that quarterly we were doing things
to bring the group together and if we couldn't
do it in person We would do it virtually. We
would do something fun virtually together. If
companies would fix that, they wouldn't get to
a position where people were quiet quitting and
checking out and not paying attention to Zoom
meetings and feeling like there's no relationship
because you're actively building a relationship.
That can help cure a lot of the communication
gaps that we struggle with desperately at Restaurant
Connect. Greg, your turn. I want to go back and
touch on one thing you said where you talked
about culture. And then you gave some excellent
examples, physical examples, like people listen
to you can picture it like, oh, I can see that
happening. I can see that happening. And this
is where culture is. Now I'm going to go half
theoretical on you. It's the cumulative result
of observed actions. So in your first startup
where you ended up not liking everybody. people
observe the actions. You may have had a mission
statement and a vision somewhere and all those
things, and these are our corporate values. Okay,
those are nice. We mess that up too. And they're
like, you know, they said these things and they
sound really good. You know, mom, apple pie,
all that kind of thing. And then the behavior
doesn't match. That's the people might listen
to what you say, but they really watch what you
do. That's where culture comes from. And that's
how people know how to behave without being told.
It was like, hey, we built this culture where
we trust each other to take a set of actions
consistently. That's a culture. Culture is not
the thing that's hanging in the lobby of your
corporate headquarters that you probably overpaid
somebody to put together for you that nobody
ever read. That's like, man, that's not getting
the people together. The example that you gave.
Everybody remembers that. They walk away and
they're like, we were together. We felt good.
We talked about the good things. They remember
that. Quiz them. Hey, what are our corporate
values? I don't know. To your point on that,
some people mess it up and only put it on a poster.
And some people messed it up and haphazardly
create their culture. And I would say Restaurant
Connect, we did that. I mean, we were able to
grow to 36 ,000 recurring monthly revenues after
three years, but man, it sucked the way we did
it. And it was just, it was hard and it could
have been so much easier. Our culture was built
around a mutual understanding that we were pretty
relentless and we were super dedicated to hospitality
at an extreme level. And so it allowed us to
move forward because at the end of the day, we're
all good. people with integrity um you know so
that that helped too at video power our culture
was developed i mean we were pretty much i don't
want to say bro marketers we're a little better
than that but we were we were young guys who
understood the value of work life balance and
family above all else and we i came in and i
set a tone that number one jake's role he needs
to be golfing as much as possible with executives
that's where he wins his deals and everybody
knew that kind of resonated for all of us and
so it was an unspoken reality that we could all
do something like that too we uh he needed to
be speaking on as many stages as possible and
podcasts as possible and so we knew the importance
of gaining authority gaining awareness getting
out there on stage and three he needs to be playing
the jazz piano at those events um because that's
where people fall in love with jake and again
we were all fairly talented in different aspects
similar to that and so we understood how to embrace
those realities and lastly i said guys um and
as long as we get our work done we have unlimited
vacation days and you can work whenever you want
um you know and so that that kind of on accident
set a cultural tone that was super helpful and
i would add that at restaurant connect i'm sorry
at uh first class business we do have a poster
culture um right something that I learned after
I was like, wait, we could have done even better
back then had we really intentionally paid our
dues with figuring out, well, how do cultures
work together at scale? And I'm a huge fan of
Patrick Lincione and his five dysfunctions of
a team. One of the posters we follow is about
his low performance teams versus high performance
teams. And then another one that we follow is
our own cultural values of. love patience persistence
consistency and reliability and it's my job as
a team leader to check in with people not to
do the random like hey do you know our core four
or five values um you know and and just make
it about the the memorization but it was uh chris
whitehood of of the iconic podcast man that guy's
an awesome leader as well and i was i was talking
to him about core values and i said how do you
how do you um inspired team to be accountable
to the, to like the workforce and for what they're
doing. And, and he says, just, he said, just
hold them accountable to the core values. You
know, and if they, if you see them doing something
outside of the core values and talk to them about
like, Hey, that wasn't in your case, Jack, that
wasn't very loving. You know, can we talk about
that? And have a conversation about. how we can
handle things through the means of that core
value and everything. I was like, whoa, dude,
like you just simplified everything for me. Now
all I have to do is go back to, oh, you know
what? That wasn't a consistent action. You know,
can we talk about that and why consistency is
important? So that's been really, really helpful
for bridging our communication gaps and also
making sure that I don't then freak out on people.
And it's like, okay, Jackson, you're freaking
out. Where's the love in what you're doing? And
I can be like. That's the inconsistency part.
Right. Yes, sir. So go ahead, Greg. So I'm borrowing
ideas as you talk, Jackson. So the thing you
did, possibly without thinking about it, because
you do it all the time, you drew this beautiful
compare and contrast picture. Organization one,
we became very transactional. Why didn't you
get this done? When's it going to be done? Organization
two. hey, you need to be playing a jazz piano
and you can golf as much as you want. That's
not hard for people to grasp. And then they see
you following through on it. You're at a conference
somewhere and this guy is actually playing the
jazz piano. They're like, no, he was serious
when he said that. He meant it. Versus the first
one, you didn't have anything to compare the
highly transactional nature of the way that organization
operated. to something better. And people, what's
the word I'm looking for? They feel it, like
they just intuitively feel it, like, oh, yeah,
I get, you know, compare and contrast is sort
of analytical language. You want them to feel
it. Organization one, this. Organization two,
this. Got it. Now, you want to bring somebody
in and talk about compare and contrast? It might
be helpful. When they say the two words, got
it. That's a hell of a lot better than compare
and contrast. Absolutely. My friends, we're going
to come back in. One of the greatest challenges
for visionaries in the early stages is you guys,
just like I did, thought, well, let's just follow
what the business world is doing. And the business
world is made up of 96 % of companies failing
within 10 years. So I don't tend to follow a
path where 96 % of people are going to fail.
I decided, you know what, let's find a new way
to do things Mark Twain style. We're going to
talk about how expectations. are one of the things
that absolutely cripples and crushes brands.
And when you got a world focused on quarterly
expectations, like no wonder businesses are doing
so poorly. We can do better than that. We'll
be back. We'll talk about it with Greg. All right.
Welcome in to Vision Pros Live with Jackson Callum.
I'm your show host. We'll be doing interviews
for visionary entrepreneurs and guest leaders
who are building fantastic visions out there.
Hey, what's up? Welcome in to Vision Pros Live.
I'm your show host, Jackson Callen, founder and
CEO of First Class Business, and I've got Greg
Kaiser here with me today. I don't know whether
to call this episode a mastermind session or
a mentorship. session. Greg's doing an excellent
job of mentoring me as we go. I've already learned
so much in the last 23 minutes of just exploring
what my path has looked like, seeing that journal,
but also hearing him talk through and help me
depict like, wow, these are other things that
we can learn on top of this. And I'm like, oh,
that's a good point. I need to talk to my team
about that. So there's a lot that we're going
to gain. We're going to talk about expectations
next and several other aspects of leadership.
that can help you lead your vision with precision,
grace, and grow it as well as possible. This
is about establishing a legacy, my friends. Before
we do that, I always want to give a couple of
extra value points. One is journeytowellnessplan
.com. Dr. Shannon and Dr. Justin Pierce, my hope
is that today this message has catch somebody
who's been struggling with some element of health
that they don't know how to resolve. Dr. Shannon
is somebody that has helped three of my friends
and family members. I've known them for eight
years and I follow up with people when I send
people a certain direction. And I asked all three
of them later how it went with Shannon. All three
of them raved about how she was able to help
them with things that other doctors were not
able to. And so that's one of those special care
points for me. If you know somebody in your life.
that is suffering you have an opportunity to
step up and make an introduction and let them
take it from there again thank you shannon for
all that you've done for my friends and family
then there's a practice makes permanent with
jennifer reed jennifer reed specializes in emotional
intelligence and spiritual intelligence and helping
facilitate that in corporate workplaces that
was something that i hadn't heard about before
as inter integrating sqm or spiritual intelligence
into a workplace i thought well that's kind of
taboo um that's something that i could see a
lot of people being resistant to well that's
my fear of the unknown talking that's not a progressive
individual thinking how might this benefit my
my workforce She's also worked in government
agencies for more than 20 years, including the
IRS. And if I think about cultures that could
be difficult to shift perspective and bring great
culture in, she's been training, in my opinion,
in one of the hardest places there is in relation
to leadership and helping people develop. So
the big reason why I would talk to Jennifer,
and when you're looking at hiring leadership
experts, cultural developers, I would recommend
asking them, what is... the reason like why do
they care what is it that they do this for um
some people will give you the transactional answer
of oh well um it's because i studied under blah
blah blah that they answer that way just thank
them for their time ask them to send you info
and move on if their story uh ultimately inspires
you then that's somebody you should consider
because they're they have a personal reason for
wanting to do this i will challenge you or actually
warn you have a box of kleenexes with you When
you ask Jennifer Reed, why does she do what she
does? You will see an absolute champion of EQ
and SQ and somebody who can help take your culture
to the next level. And if you don't know this,
taking culture to the next level is one of the
greatest financial impacts for good that you
can have on your company. Because when people
show up to work and they actually want to be
there, well, it's amazing how much better they
take care of the people that you're striving
to take care of. So let's move on to the water
project. The water project is something that's
near and dear to my heart at this point. um i've
got an empty glass here but i only have to walk
like four steps to get access to water i've never
been thirsty in my life these people in africa
there are millions who do not have access to
clean drinking water their kids have to leave
school to go get water for the for their school
these people have to leave work sometimes to
go find water and they don't know where they're
going to find it and when i found out about that
um i was i had to meditate on it but it was like
golly that's rough and i love that the water
project allows you to choose a specific community
and if you give 10 to 20 to that project they
will actually include you ultimately as kind
of an investor aware of what happens to that
project you get to see it come to fruition you
get to find out if they're building a sand dam
or a borehole well things i had never heard of
in my life before and i was like how neat and
transparent is this i see these kids celebrating
water like my kids celebrate christmas day and
i realized that We have a very, very cool way
to impact the world in a meaningful way by doing
so little. So as long as I'm going to rock this
microphone, I'm going to do it to do what I can
to help the 8 billion people out there. And so
my other request from you is if you have a cause
that inspires you. drop it in the comments. Let
us know about the cause. I will personally take
a look at it and see what I can do to help out.
I might even talk about it here on the show,
but I'll definitely talk about it with one or
two of my guests and see what's possible to make
things happen for others. And without further
ado, we'll go back to helping every single one
of you with building out your visions. And this
is one of the most important sacred topics. It's
why we talk about it all the time is how much
better can we become at leadership because we
can create a clear vision. a great culture and
an awesome set of leaders surrounding us. And
we have something amazing that we can now market
and our vision can take off and we can scale
it really well. So, Greg, welcome back to Vision
Pros Live. Jackson, even your sponsorship section
is completely consistent. So you're going through.
Well, we got to talk about EQ, you know, emotional
intelligence and people in the room start squirming
like. Can't we just go back to talk about the
numbers or blue collar talking about the numbers,
emotion stuff. Yeah. Like I'm a businessman.
This is what I do. I want to talk about EPS.
No, you know, there's a way to get there. Yeah.
But then the other one, cause you mentioned it
earlier and then you came back to it in that
section is this idea of mentoring. And this is,
you know, frequently you hear people say, well,
I never had a mentor, which is sad. Yeah. Because
the way I try to explain it to people is coaching
is technical. Yeah. Here's how you do this technical
thing. Here's how we put together our marketing
campaigns. And it has these activities and components.
Mentoring is about perspective. Well, you know,
I've seen a hundred marketing campaigns and I
can help you differentiate. the reasons why some
worked and some didn't. And it broadens the perspective
of the person being mentored. That like, hey,
this is the big picture. Here's how your part
fits in the big picture. You know, because marketing
campaigns are great, but then somebody has to
actually go sell somebody and then your accounts
receivable department has to track down those
invoices, make sure you get paid and all that
stuff. A mentor can help you see that big picture.
that when you're down mired in the technical
side, that's really hard to pull yourself back
up and say, oh, wait, I'm part of this big integrated
system. And it's the integration part that mentors
can really, really help with. Yes. And I was
lucky. I had a really good mentor early in my
career. And I didn't know what the guy was doing
at first. Every week he's like, hey, when you
get a minute, stop by. I'm like, why? You know,
because I'm at the highly transactional level.
I'd come in, he'd put his feet up on his desk.
Hey, what are you working on? And then he would
go through it and he's like, oh, well, do you
understand what happens when you get done doing
what you do? No. He's like, well, let me take
a minute to explain this. It probably took four
or five weeks or meetings with this guy. Before
I started actually asking him questions. And
then he really hit his stride. He's like, oh,
I'm so happy you're interested in that. He's
like, you know, that tells me that you're thinking
ahead a little bit. Now, let me help build that
up a little bit. This is why you need to think
ahead. And he was such a nice guy. Like he never
made me feel like because he was a VP and I was
entry level person. Why in God's name this guy
ever decided he was going to spend time with
me? God bless him. But he did. And that, you
know, because then I went back later and I'm
like, you know, I could do that for other people.
You can't do it when you're in your second or
third year of working experience. You simply
lack that broad perspective. I'll challenge that
a thousand percent. OK, a hundred percent. My
daughter is. Well, let's just go with my youngest
daughter. She's five years old. She's got five
years of perspective I don't have in life. I
happen to have 38 years of perspective that she
doesn't have in life or my teenage daughter.
She's got the same thing. She's got 14 years
on me that I don't have. And so I can learn from
everybody and anybody. It's up to me to choose
who I learn from. And so the mentorship opportunities
that exist, I don't think it's wise for us to
put limits on who can and who can't because all
8 billion people on this planet have something
that we can learn from. Even from a mentorship
role, if I want to know more about makeup and
hair, I'll go to my daughter. She's got me beat
in that category. So I want to appreciate what
you said. It's certainly very, very helpful for
us to make sure that we honor those who have
the greater experience, that have more experience
in life. But can we also make sure to... completely
maximize the opportunities to learn from those
who have less experience too. Amazon does this
well. So with Amazon, I learned that Jeff Bezos,
when they run their meetings, Greg, they have
the person who's newest to the company speak
first. And the reason why they do that is because
that person won't speak if everybody else has
already spoken. And so they start with that person.
That person's also the least tainted. And the
person who has less understanding of the bureaucracy
challenges that exist in the company. So they'll
say things nobody else would dare to say. And
that expands everybody's horizon to be able to
be more open to new ideas. So continue, though.
Well, let me do what we do, Jackson. Let me push
back. Yeah, of course. How did you get to age
38 by skipping your first five years of life?
You said you don't have that perspective. I don't
have her perspective. I don't have her perspective.
That's a context. A context is the way you understand
the situation you're in. So a five -year -old's
context for the world is very different than
yours because you got 38 years of really hard
experience. You've forgotten what it's like to
be five years old. Not at all, Greg. In fact,
that's another opportunity that I was going to
talk about. I was going to make a dark joke about
it. If you guys want your kids to understand
what the importance of a mentor is, you could
follow my dad's example. Just leave when your
child's four. That opens your horizon up to realize.
My first sales experience, I was three years
old. I ran into my parents' bedroom because they
were screaming. I jumped across the bed, pushed
them apart. And as peaceful of a loud voice as
I could, I said, stop. I was selling peace for
my home. And as a kid, with a dad who's an alcoholic,
you could end up very, very hurt in that situation.
But something about me, I had some type of alpha
experience within me to understand that that
was my role. That's what I needed to do. And
I spent the rest of my life selling peace in
different homes that I spent a lot of time in.
And so I've got, thanks to my dad, over 100 dads
in my life that helped me figure things out here
and there. And so I wouldn't say that it's a
lost perspective as much as it's an abundance
of appreciation for the reality that my five
years in America, for instance, was very different
than my friend's five years that live in Ecuador
or that live in Colombia or that lived in that
house across the street that seemed exactly like
ours, but probably wasn't even close. So there's
still an opportunity there to realize that. What
I have is not reflected as a lack just because
I appreciate the angle that somebody else comes
from. Well, and that, I would go back to your
example of, was it Bezos, Amazon, where they
get the person who has the least experience to
talk first? I can't remember the name of the
author, but there's a book out there called The
Ministry of Common Sense. Fabulous book, and
it touches on that. You can't let people be in
an organization for so long that the things that
are not working well are no longer obvious to
them. Because when you get to a high enough level,
nobody's going to tell you, hey, you know, I
don't want to bother you with this little thing.
They have to encourage them to bother them with
that little thing. Like, you know, I'm so far
above that. And I'm thinking about the next acquisition
our company is going to make and this and that.
And like, well, no, wait, the companies we already
own. are not doing this well because of where
they sit they just can't see it anymore so their
perspective is different i love that and you
and i won't agree on the context thing but that's
okay sure that is okay and i but i love what
you're saying because one of my team members
that's newer has forced me to open my eyes pretty
much forced me to open my eyes in ways that I
wouldn't in the past. I would sell past it. And
what I mean by that is I would justify some of
where our business was struggling in order to
focus on other areas. But this person kind of
put a hard stop. I was like, no, everybody who
sees this is going to be embarrassed about our
company. You've got to fix it. And so now we've
got a new quote because they beat into my head
over three months of me being slow and stubborn
and accepting it. But then I was finally like,
holy crap. OK, new quote for the company. No
more half -baked projects. um you know we we've
got to finish things um and get to the the end
so let's go back to expectations on this because
expectations are also um part of what probably
drove that reality but we've also got to be careful
my friends to put expectations in check um expectations
and as we we wrote in the description for those
of you here this is exactly i want to make sure
we fulfill on those realities talked about how
when they aren't clear strategy gets lost and
frustration spreads organization. While I would
also counter our own description, expectations
also lead to strategy getting overbearing, execution
slowing down because people are frustrated and
they start to quite quit. And that frustration
spreads across the organization, a huge storm
because as Shakespeare said, expectation is the
root of all heartache. Expectations, my friends,
is one of the greatest vices in the world. One
of the greatest invisible vices. It is the, if
we look for a synonym, of what i expect to happen
i have a sense of entitlement with that and the
entitled generation that is generation uh millennial
mind and generation z etc um there's a there's
a need to defend what we want and have but there's
an obsession that occurs when we decide that
i i should have this this is this is something
that's deservedly mine The virtue that mirrors
that that's almost never talked about anymore
is an old word called aspiration. And aspiration
means I can still want and care for things to
move forward. I can still be intentional about
moving it, but I'm no longer going to allow my
disappointments to dominate my attitude and my
character when my team is struggling to bring
said aspiration to fruition. I can now still
receive what I have with grace. while also still
being intent with I'm still going to accomplish
my goals. So, Greg, I went a little bit deep
there. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this
as well. Expectations, aspirations, and how do
we how do we help our team members not get to
this boiling point of frustration? Yeah. So and
you touch on all the things. So aspirations live
up at the strategy level. This is how we will
be competitive. This is how we'll win in the
marketplace. Well, that's aspirational until.
You set expectations and people go out and do
the things that are consistent with that aspiration.
So if you can keep coming back to that, it's
like, hey, this is who we want to be. This is
becoming. We're going to become this. We're not
this yet, but we're going to become this. Here's
how we become this thing. And you like there's
certain behaviors that are consistent with becoming
that thing. And people tend to miss that because
if you say aspirational. The connotation of that
word is we might get there, we might not. If
you take it back to expectation and allow me
to add a qualifier to it, it has to be a realistic
expectation. Realistically, I will never play
in the NBA. I'm six feet tall and I'm now kind
of old. That's not a realistic expectation. It's
a realistic expectation for me to go play pickup
basketball somewhere. Okay. But you have to help
people with that. So going back to the communication
part, people have to understand what you're communicating
about, the details. But then more importantly,
once everybody's on the same page, right, they
get this realistic view, they have to leave and
go back to their day job. with an understanding
of the actions that they'll take based on what
they've now agreed to. That's very different
than this is where we want to be aspirationally
to know like there are certain things I have
to do, D -O, do when I get back to my desk or
wherever it is, a work table, whatever. That's
really different and it's hard to do. Yeah, it
is. It's a real blast to stay up the aspirational
level. Well, there's there's an interesting opportunity
there. I'm a big fan of the movie with Ryan Reynolds,
Chaos Theory. And he's this like smart gold nut
who's all about time management until his life
absolutely falls apart. And he then starts to
to understand the values. It's a it's a romcom.
It's, again, pretty off the off the walls. But
he. Going back to the aspirational and the realism
aspect, I'm a big fan of both smart goals and
BHAGs. And so you guys can all look those up.
BHAGs being the big, hairy, audacious goals that
don't make sense to anybody. We wouldn't be flying
across the world in tin cans called airplanes.
If somebody hadn't created a goal, that was absolutely
stupid. And so the BHAGs, they're very important.
While, again, I agree that the SMART goals are
also important, I still think expectation is
a hidden poison. And that if we're going to lean
into something similar to it, let's go back to
the word hope, a word that we've also destroyed.
People used to say hope was a good thing. Nowadays,
if you say, well, I hope it happens, somebody
goes, what do you mean? Or they say, I hope he
doesn't screw that up. We use that word that
used to be a virtue. in a way that ultimately
degrades a situation. And so we have an opportunity
to lean back in and find out, well, what the
heck did hope actually mean? What is it supposed
to mean to us? And hope is meant to mean like
we have a secure belief that something is going
to take place. It is not a I don't think this
is going to happen. And so let me let me fear
and and worry and say, well, I'm just going to
give up before I even try. So there's there's
opportunities with that. Greg, I want to give
you a chance to talk about your proven framework
as well. And so we we've got the opportunity
to talk about this innovative managed framework
that builds consistency across teams without
sacrificing flexibility. Practical communication
systems that eliminate confusion, frustration
at work and translate strategy into action across
every level of the organization, which often
doesn't happen with strategy and turning these
businesses into clear execution across the teams.
This proven framework will help us have more
consistent leadership, which is definitely something
that. I need and that my team would benefit from
always. How do we get more and more consistent
in what we do? So, Greg, let's hear about the
proven framework. Well, and this is the fascinating
thing, because I call this thing the management
framework. Management is not as hot a topic as
leadership. I want to be a leader. Correct. OK,
you don't self -proclaim that. You have to go
do things. So I put this management framework
together. I won't bore you with all the Venn
diagrams and everything. The management framework
is, it's on there somewhere, Jackson, I don't
know where. It's a circle that has five components
and sitting up, so think of it as a clock face.
Up at 12 o 'clock, you have planning. This whole
management framework sits a lower level than
strategy. Strategy gets delivered to... a management
team and then the management team says, okay,
I need to go off and build plans. That's up at
12 o 'clock. Then you move around to three o
'clock on the clock face and you have people.
When I have a plan, then I can start to understand
what resources, people resources I need to execute
the plan. Then you come down to the bottom or
at 6 p .m. on the clock directing. People need
to know what to do. Like the first company you
described, it sounds like you spent a lot of
time directing. It was transactional. Do this,
do that, do this, do that. Then you come around
to 9 o 'clock or 9 p .m. on the clock face where
you have measuring and modifying. Well, how did
that work? We should probably talk about that.
Like, how did this work out? But anchoring this
whole framework is the thing we were talking
about today, Jackson. It's communication. That
is how you integrate or tie together. I like
to use the word synthesize, but somebody told
me that that word's kind of a turnoff, so I'll
use integrate. How do you integrate all of those
things? How do you integrate people and planning
and directing and improving results? You do it
by communicating with people. You don't assume,
well, everybody gets this. No, in fact, everybody
doesn't get that. When someone says, well, you
just don't get it. I always turn that around
to, they don't get it because you didn't give
it to them. Don't push it back over to them.
Stand in front of a mirror and say, they didn't
get that. That means somehow my communication
was inferior. And then you can start to pick
it apart and say, well, where did it fail? And
that's how you can really start to accelerate
how you communicate with people when you're sufficiently
humble to say, I didn't give it to them. That's
why they didn't get it. And that's, you know,
you could get into a whole different discussion
on that. But I know you've probably seen this
yourself. And as the leader, you get frustrated.
because it's so obvious to you the thing that
has to happen and the direction that you're trying
to take the team that it just frustrates the
heck out of people like no believe me if you
gave them what they needed they would be pushing
you for more right they would be following you
so hard they'd be like hey these people are running
up on me again like they're That's you mentioned
John Maxwell somewhere earlier. He's written
some of the best stuff on leadership that's out
there because he's super practical about it.
And, you know, he gives a concept or principle
and then he lays in the examples of, well, this
is what it looks like. So if you saw it, you
would know it. I'm like, oh, yeah, OK, I got
it now. You know, he makes that connection. And
for these leaders, quote unquote, that are frustrated
by their people that don't get it. they need
to go back and deconstruct what happened between
them originally delivering communication to this
lack of understanding part you're at now. This
is one of the most important lessons for me for
2026. So thank you, Greg. This is huge. I actually
don't think I mentioned John Maxwell, but he
is worth mentioning. I was reading him yesterday.
I apologize. Okay. Well, I'm a huge fan of Relationships
101, and I definitely listen to a lot of his
interviews. And I need to do more read on him
because every time I read him, I'm like, whoa,
this is amazing. So he's a big. But what's really
cool, Greg, about what you shared is it's knowledge
that's applicable in a new way for me and some
of my favorite readings. And I'll say the e -myth
with Michael Gerber. He talks about how leaders
or owners often delegate by abdication. And when
I read that, I had to figure out what the abdication
meant. And so I looked it up and I was like,
oh, like you're delegating something that you
don't understand and don't know how to do. I'm
like, yeah, of course that's going to go bad.
And he said, in the worst case scenario, the
person that you delegated to does super, super
well, but you keep putting more hats on their
heads. And what happens is eventually that person
burns out and leaves. And now you end up with
procedures, resources, and templates that you
don't know how they work. You've got something
scaled and now you've got no way to recover it
because you never learned how to do what they
did so well. And so it crashes and burns your
business. So the best thing you can do is learn
how to delegate responsibly. Gamify the process
of creating the systems. And so I'm looking at
your plan and saying this goes perfectly with
the e -myth, because if I put directing people
first, but I don't know what I'm directing them
on, then it creates two realities that I've gone
through in the last couple of quarters. One,
if they get confused about what the vision was
and frustrated about the experience, when I go
back and try to teach the plan again. Or teach
the plan that I thought I had given or clarified.
Now everybody's skeptical. Yeah. And so now it's
twice as hard to move the project forward because
I failed to honor them with the clarity on the
front end. And as visionaries, we are so guilty
of having such clear visions that we often do
that. Greg, I know we got to wrap up. And nobody
can keep up with visionaries, by the way, Jackson.
But I want to give you the final word on this.
So go ahead. Go ahead. Finish that thought too.
You said you're a visionary, right? Oh, yeah.
So the self -awareness part that might be helpful,
the super majority of people cannot keep up with
visionaries. And I know how hard that is, but
you're living it. We have to embrace it. Yeah.
If we don't embrace it, it's only going to create
new consequences in life that we may not want.
And so it's a super, super valuable reality.
I apologize I interrupted you. no no it's okay
um i was going to say um as we as we wrap up
i want to give you the last opportunity to speak
and on that thought process or rather the last
golden nugget greg if this was the last time
that you had the chance to get into visionaries
ears and to give them a piece of counsel what
would the council be right so this is the thing
so the work i do is i i Try to instill in people
management fundamentals. And most people don't
want to hear that. Like, no, I want the secret
sauce. I want the hack. Like, I want the shortcut.
I'm like, you know, I'm sorry, but there isn't
one. You build a building on top of a lousy foundation.
A couple of years, it's going to fall over. So
the thing I try to get across to people. particularly
people in the visionary space because they're
moving so fast, is management, which as your
company scales, you need. Management isn't one
thing. It's a skill set. It's a collection of
things. And in order for your people to function
at the best level they can, you've got to make
sure they have this skill set. You know, so when
you look at, let's look at sports. You've got
a football player, soccer for the Americans,
who can score goals better than anybody, but
plays zero defense and has no assists because
he never passes. That's not really a complete
player. There's some skills. They don't have
a skill set. They have a skill, a super valuable
skill. They don't have a skill set. The best
players are described as, well, they're well
-rounded. Well, there's a reason for that. They
can contribute. No matter who's around them,
they have a way of contributing. And that's the
one thing, if I can get across to people, say,
no, stop thinking about these surgical strikes.
I need a technical skill in coding. Okay. Your
coder's probably going to have to talk to some
end users. Can they communicate with other people?
That would be kind of helpful. Yep. Not usually.
They need it. Well, no, if they're looking at
your shoes, you know, they're interested. If
they're looking at their shoes, you know, they're
not interested. Interesting. Well, good. I worked
with a lot of them. And these management fundamentals
and skill sets. Greg's given us some great insight.
John Maxwell's got great insight. Michael Gerber's
got a great insight. Patrick Wanchoni's got great
insight. I didn't mention John Whaley. but i
wanted to he's one of my favorite leaders and
he talks about some of the silver lining of challenge
we have in life the silver road um that life
has often granted us um amazing amazing individual
and these um these skill sets these fundamentals
you can reach out to greg kaiser on linkedin
i'm sure you can find them on google quite easy
as well Of course, get the book on Amazon. My
friends, lean into those that you align with
from a mentorship standpoint. Mastermind with
them. Find out what they have, how you can implement
it. Allow them to see behind the curtains of
what's going on when you find somebody who you
trust. Because I can see and feel Greg's heart
in this process. I know that he wants to help
people as much as possible. Greg, you've done
that for me. Vision Pros, if any of you want
to join us on the show, click the button that
says Be Our Guest. Come and join us. the show.
We'll see you in the next episode. Take care,
everybody. And Greg, thanks again for blessing
my life. Terrific, Jackson. Really appreciate
it. Thank you for being here today. I'm really
happy that you tuned in to Vision Pros Live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions
as these episodes continue to move forward. This
is going to get more and more fun. We'll have
more and more engagement as well. We'll invite
people to participate in the show. And thank
you for giving us your time and attention. Have
an excellent time building out your vision and
becoming a vision pro yourself.