The “Secret” to Leadership with Author Mark Miller

What does it actually look like to build a leadership culture that lasts — not just talk about it, but live it for decades?

In this episode, I sit down with Mark Miller — bestselling author, former Vice President of High-Performance Leadership at Chick-fil-A, and one of the most respected voices in leadership development today. Mark began his writing career by teaming up with Ken Blanchard, co-author of The One Minute Manager, to write The Secret: What Great Leaders Know and Do  — a book that has since become a cornerstone resource for leaders around the world. Over 25 years, Mark and his team invested tens of millions of dollars searching for and validating leadership principles that actually work in the real world. 

We cover a lot of ground in this conversation. Mark pulls back the curtain on his own leadership journey — from starting as an hourly team member to spending the last two decades of his career focused entirely on serving leaders and helping them grow themselves, their teams, and their organizations.  We dig into why so many organizations fail to prioritize leadership development even when they know they should, and what it costs them when they don’t.

Then we get into the heart of The Secret itself — the SERVE framework — and what it actually looks like to execute each element at a high level inside a real organization.

If you lead people, this conversation will challenge the way you think about your role.

Get Mark’s new book The Secret 4th Edition:

 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FHJYP531?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_ud_dp_QDXTKB9SWF8C9X5J01Z6&ref_=cm_sw_r_ffobk_ud_dp_QDXTKB9SWF8C9X5J01Z6&social_share=cm_sw_r_ffobk_ud_dp_QDXTKB9SWF8C9X5J01Z6&bestFormat=true&language=en-US

Get more info on Mark and his company Lead Everyday: https://leadeveryday.com/

Reach Mark on his cell: 678-612-8441 or email him mark@leadeveryday.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:32

All right, and welcome back to the Second Mile Leadership Podcast. We are your host, Jason and Isaiah, and we have quite a treat today. We have a very special guest, and one that is near and dear to Isaiah and I, as well as the entire Chick-fil-A family, because he is a Chick-fil-A legend. And he has a 40-year career with Chick-fil-A. And he was actually, and I'm sure you get brought this gets brought up a lot, the 16th employee to ever work for Chick-fil-A. But he has retired as the vice president of high performance leadership, where he was instrumental in building Chick-fil-A's renowned leadership culture. And for 25 years, he led initiatives investing tens of millions of dollars, which is incredible, by the way, to develop and validate leadership principles that have made Chick-fil-A what it is today. About 20 years ago, Chick-fil-A realized that they needed more leaders, and he described himself as, which I love this, the accidental author, and uh who started on solving internal leadership pipeline problems and ended up becoming a career for you, which it which is amazing. Uh his books, he's a he is an author, as I said, and his books have been translated into 32 languages, another incredible stat. And with over 1.5 million copies in print. His catalog includes The Secret, which we're going to talk about today, the fourth edition, The Heart of Leadership, Chestnut Checkers, Win the Heart, Culture Rules, Leaders Made Here, among a bunch of others. And in 2024, he created the Lead Everyday Company to further his pursuits to develop more leaders, which is a subject we are incredibly passionate about for anybody who listens to the show. So without further ado, we are absolutely thrilled to have Mark Miller on the show. Welcome, man.

SPEAKER_03 2:04

Well, thank you. It's a it's a treat to be with you.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Yeah, thank you so much. So I I told Mark before we started, we were going to start with a story, but I met you at the uh an event in San Antonio a couple months ago, and that's where I asked you to be on the podcast, and you're kind enough to say yes. And um, but you spoke at this conference. And I, you know, sometimes when you have people that, you know, we've read your books, all your books, and and you're a big part of the Chick-fil-A culture. And sometimes when, you know, you you know somebody from afar like that, you don't know if they're going to be who they say they are or they're gonna be, you know, who they're made out to be. So you give this talk at the approach, which is a Chick-fil-A conference I was at, and I was at your talk, and before the talk started, and there was a lot of speakers here, but before the talk started, you went around and shook everybody's hand who was in attendance to your talk, and there's probably 150 people, and you personally introduced yourself to everybody, which was that's impressive enough, but that's not the best part of the story. So you give the talk, which is great. It was on culture and it was amazing. At the end of it, you hung around and you invited people to speak to you, shake your hand, ask you questions. But we were you were given the talk where the lunch was being served. And you hung around during all of lunch, and then I watched you for a good 30, 40 minutes cleaning people's plates and taking taking their plates and putting them away wherever they, I don't remember where they all went, but you were cleaning tables as an act of service after already doing an amazing act of service by speaking and educating everybody in the room. And I remember I texted Isaiah telling him that story, and Scott Reed was with us, and I mentioned to him, like, man, that's impressive. And it was just it was really nice because it means Mark Miller is who he says he is, and it was a really cool moment to see that. So I just wanted to call you out on that and and let the audience know that because it was very cool to see.

SPEAKER_03 3:52

Well, thank you very much. Sometimes you get it right, and uh that felt I felt like the way I could add, um, I could add the most value in the moment. So that's what I did. Yeah, that's amazing. Well, people noticed, so that's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

That's a beautiful story, brother. When we uh Jason told me that like uh right after the conference, and I was like, dude, that that that's what you want in a leader. That's so cool. So cool. I I know some people may think that that's just a small thing, but it's just who you are as a person. I love that.

SPEAKER_03 4:21

Well, I appreciate that. Uh let me let me give you a little context. Um again, I said I would follow your lead, but since you shared that story, you know, that let's let's move past the fact I I cleared the tables. Let's talk about my motivation there. Um, a lot of people see leadership differently. And I want to I want to honor everyone's perspective and everyone's um uh point of view. But I had a consultant one day told me he was concerned about my leadership. It's a longer story, but the essence of it is he was really concerned about my approach and philosophy to leadership. And I, this is a high-powered guy, right? I mean, I mean, he leaders pay him for coaching and counsel. And he said, I'm just I'm really, really concerned. And I'm going, what what is it? And he said, when you walk in a room, you're not trying to take charge. And I said, Well, correct. I said, Why does that concern you? He said, Well, that's what leaders do. I said, Well, based on your worldview, that's what leaders do. I said, My worldview is every room that a leader enters, they should be asking the question, how can I add the most value in this situation? And I said, Sometimes the answer is take charge. That's the way you add the most value, is you take charge. But other times the way you add the most value is to take out the trash. And this guy is still confused to this day because he's he's he's pursuing a different paradigm. And again, that's his prerogative, but that's that's not the way I think about it. And uh it will impact the things you do if you're if you're really trying to figure out how do I add the most value in this moment, in this situation, sometimes you'll just clear tables.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

I love that. I love that. A lot of Jason and I's coaching centers around the idea that you have a tool belt. Um, and sometimes you need a hammer, sometimes you gotta lay it on people, but then sometimes you also need work gloves. And that that's that's a beautiful example of work gloves. And that kind of beautifully transitions into our like first kind of real question for you. Um, I know you probably get asked a lot of questions um just about leadership in general, but I want to add just a little bit of a twist to it. Um, so we know you started, was it in the warehouse or the mail room, or was it kind of both?

SPEAKER_03 6:52

Well, I got well, I was hired to work in the warehouse, and then on my first day, they said you also get to work in the mailroom because there weren't but 16 of us, and that included Truitt. I mean, it was it was a little bitty shop back then. And so, yeah, warehouse and mailroom.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

Man, so you got promoted to mailroom on the first day.

SPEAKER_03 7:11

I doubled my responsibilities on day one. Yeah, way to take charge.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

That's awesome. Yeah. We love it, we love it. Um, but my question center on that is what's the part of that journey that actually shaped you that no one really asked about.

SPEAKER_03 7:30

Well, not many people ask me about what what enabled me or led to me moving out of the warehouse and mailroom. I mean, because honorable work, I could I could have been doing that for 40 years. Uh, but the organization asked me to do something different. And and not many people ask me like how'd that happen. Did you apply for a job? No, I didn't apply for a job. Did somebody die and they needed somebody? No. Here's what I think happened. And I probably need to have a conversation uh with Dan Cathy because he was involved in this even this was gosh, almost 50 years ago now. Um, I'm working in the warehouse and I get a phone call and it's from Dan. Now, for those that don't know, Dan was the CEO, but 50 years ago, he was not the CEO. He was the head of operations 50 years ago. And he called me and said, Hey, can you help me with a project? And I said, Well, I'd love to. I mean, I'm brand new and I'm just a kid, right? I mean, you think, I mean, I'm literally a teenager and I know who he is, and he's asked me to help put in the project. I said, I think I need to ship these parts for operators. Because back in the day in the warehouse, a big part of what we did is we had replacement parts. So if one of the fryers went down, we would ship them overnight a thermostat and things of that nature. I mean, we did more than that, but but there was seemed to be, again, I was new, but I thought there was some urgency for me to respond to these operators. And I tried to convey that to him. He said, You're right, you need to do that. And he said, What are you doing tonight? And I said, Well, I'm I'm I'm in I'm going to school. Um, I was in college. And he said, What time do you get out of class? I said, 10 o'clock. He said, I'll meet you back here at 10 30. And I said, Okay. Wow. And so I was working during the day in the warehouse. I was going to school at night, and and a couple of these semesters, quarters back then, I was doing four nights a week. I was doing 20 hours at night.

unknown 9:42

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 9:43

And then I was coming back at 10:30 to help Dan with a special project. And I did that for weeks. And so I have a hunch that what got me to that next opportunity, it really didn't have anything to do with my talent or anything to do with my skills. It might have had something to do with the fact Dan said, Hey, this kid will work. This kid will work. I could have come up with a hundred reasons that I couldn't do that, but sure, I'll come back at 1030. And so I I've always said, what you lack in talent and skills, I've always tried to make up for it in hustle and effort. And I think that started 50 years ago. I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I'm going to work hard for you.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Well, I think that that that you know lends another question on, you know, that did you work that hard because, and I'm and maybe a combination of this, is that's because that's who you are, or did you care for the company that much? Because, you know, to me, the the the best mix of that is I always tell people my number one litmus test for somebody is how much do they care? But not just for themselves, but for the team and the organization. So did you hustle because that's your genetics and that's how you're wired, or was it because you have that much belief in the company?

SPEAKER_03 11:02

I think in those early days it was more of a wiring, not even a wiring. I think it's just the way my mama and daddy raised me. Um and because I didn't know the company. I'd worked for a short stint in a restaurant. I don't usually talk about that, it's too soon. Um, uh, even though it was 50 years ago. I I was awful in the restaurant. So we we don't even want to talk about that. Uh, not good with my hands back then, still today. Um I mean, I I came to love the the organization, you know, very quickly and very deeply. But this happened in the first 30 days after I I'm still trying to figure out where where's the bathroom, right? And and Dan's got me coming in uh working really the third shift. Um so so I think in the beginning it was just kind of the way I was raised that when you tell somebody you're gonna do something, you do it and you you do it to the very best of your ability.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

I love that. So that's that's what propelled you. So this is a question I love because I think people like, you know, you Martin Miller, he's a leadership, you know, guru, and and and there's this perception sometimes that guys like you can, you know, always get it right. But what is the most significant leadership mistake you made? And how did you how that maybe that no one even really knows about? And what effect did it have on the team, yourself, the organization, and so forth? Because that I think that brings a sense of of uh you know you're a real person to the table because we all mess it up.

SPEAKER_03 12:30

Yeah. Uh I know we're gonna talk about um the the book The Secret later, but in that book, we we articulate Chick-fil-A's point of view on leadership, and it's represented in five fundamentals. And again, we can get into as much of that backstory as you want, but but my biggest mistake um would probably now the people that work for me could give you a long, long list, and and I probably could too, but the biggest one that comes to mind immediately as it relates to the fundamentals of leadership is we discovered over the course of my career that the best leaders value results and relationships. And this is really hard for most of the people listening to this show, and and I can say that with confidence because I've been sharing this content with leaders all over the world for now about 25 years. And everywhere I go, leaders at all levels will admit to you that this is the hardest of the fundamentals. And the reason is we all have a natural bias. I say all, I think it's about 95% that either lean toward results or they lean toward relationships. Now, there's a small percentage, and I always tell those leaders, I don't even like you, because leadership is easier for you. For the rest of us, we're trying to figure out how to value both, even though one of them is not our natural bent, our natural inclination. Uh, if you want to maximize results, it feels a little counterintuitive. You don't just focus on results. And and this might be more obvious. If you want to maximize results, you don't focus exclusively on relationships. It's value results and relationships. And I am so performance um-minded, so uh results-oriented that I can forget the people. And and I say that with it breaks my heart to say that. It took me too long to figure that out. I mean, it's not that I it's not that I didn't care about the people. I just I looked past the people, I looked through the people. And I did that early in my career, and I know I did. And again, if I can talk to every one of them, I'd apologize for that. I mean, I wasn't mean spirited about it, but but I was like, what are we doing to drive results? And that was, that was, I don't think that's an unhealthy uh conversation to have, but I could have added more value to the organization earlier if I'd if I had understood. It's it's a little bit of you don't know what you don't know. And you know, again, some of it's temperament, some of it's wiring, some of it's the the role models we have in our lives, some of it's the way we're raised, but but uh I still to this day am working continuously to compensate so that I will value results and relationships. And I just I didn't I didn't I didn't get that uh as early as I would have liked to in my career. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Yeah. We uh Mark, we have a lot of listeners that either own businesses, um, work for Chick-fil-A, um a whole broad array of of people that listen to this podcast. And um I like uh viewing you and and reading all your books and hearing the stories about you, I would honestly say that you would uh lean towards relationships, but um I also see all your success. I'm like that that makes sense on the results side of things.

SPEAKER_03 16:01

And I'm working on the results side. I mean, the relationship side. I got the results side. I mean, I can't I can't turn that off, but it's it's the relationship side that I have to continue to work on.

unknown 16:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:12

Real quick, real quick question, Isaiah. Let me ask, I want to jump in before you ask the next one because I have a question, Mark. Did you find because this is what I we run up against a lot, and and just building on what you just said, and that is is we tend to judge each e uh other people through our own strengths. And I wonder sometimes if you you're such a uh uh have such a strong work ethic and and so much hustle in you, and you're very results driven. Did you watch people who maybe didn't work as hard as you? And that's where say maybe some of the lack of relational came from, is why are they not working as hard as me? So you kept charging instead of maybe, you know, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 16:47

Yeah. Yeah. Um I that might be beyond my pay grade. I may need to get a psychologist or a psychiatrist or some some professional to help sort through that. I I will say, even to this day, um I I it it bothers me when I see people that don't give full effort. I mean, it just bothers me and it always has. Um, I don't know which comes first, right? Is it my bias or I I don't know what totally plays into that, but I don't I I think we're all gonna be accountable one day for what we did with this life uh as stewards of of time, talent, treasure, opportunity, relationships. I mean, I think we're gonna be accountable. And so just the idea of not giving it your your complete and full best effort, that just it's so foreign to me that it still it catches my uh attention when I when I see people that aren't doing that. Now, I know there are a lot of reasons that people don't, and sometimes, and in many cases, the reasons people aren't giving their best effort is because of the leaders that they serve with. I mean, leaders have to call people to a higher standard, leaders have to cast a compelling vision, leaders have to create the context for people to care, right? Uh, engagement is is the way we would think about how much someone cares, is really how engaged are they. And leaders are responsible for the engagement of their people. So I don't assume somebody mailing it in, I don't assume that it's their problem. I start with it's a leadership problem.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

Yeah, it's great by yeah, that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 18:30

I think Chick-fil-A as a whole models the the whole relationships versus results so well because you I mean the results speak for themselves. I mean, Chick-fil-A is consistently um up there in sales. I mean, average unit volume is insane. I mean, all these things Chick-fil-A has results for, but then you also see the relationship side of things and and all the things that Chick-fil-A does for the local community, but then also like the world. Um what do you think like stops other companies from acting like Chick-fil-A and putting such a heavy emphasis not just on relationships, but also leadership development?

SPEAKER_03 19:10

Okay, there's a lot there. Uh, and let me, I probably should have already given my standard disclaimer. I love QA and I hate QA. Um, I I don't want anyone listening to um to misinterpret the significance of a question based on the brevity of my response, right? Because I mean, we could talk all day about some of these things. Um, and so just ask for a little grace here. I'll I'll try to add some value. Uh, I heard several questions there. Why aren't more organizations like Chick-fil-A? So here's here's what I would suggest. I'm not even sure that's the right answer, but why are so many organizations a shadow of what they could be? Because you may not want the hospital to look like Chick-fil-A. You might not want the bank to look like Chick-fil-A, but you want people to be well led and you want people to care, and you want, and you want them to to to do the things that add maximum value for the organization and the customer. But I it again, I don't know if this will surprise you or not. The answer is leadership. Leadership. I mean, John Maxwell popularize the idea that everything rises and falls on leadership. I think he's right. It's it's true in restaurants and chicken shops and banks and churches and uh professional sports teams. And I'm on the adjunct faculty at the joint uh war college. It's true in all branches of the service, all over the world. It's like if you don't get the leadership piece right, you're not gonna get anything right. And so I think that's the fundamental problem, is it's just a lack of leadership, um, which is is tragic. But we did a study just a couple of years ago, a global study, and we had leaders all over the world. I think we ended up with over 4,000 leaders from six countries, and 30% of them said they don't even have enough leadership currently. So you think about this, how can people be well led if the organization is saying, no, we don't even have enough to provide baseline coverage? So that's somewhat staggering. The more um dreadful statistic is half those leaders said they don't think they're ever going to solve this problem. Now, I think that's leadership malpractice, right? If if you understand the priority and the foundational nature of leadership, and and it in fact is the prerequisite for high performance. It's not the only thing you need, but it's the pre this the prerequisite. And you say you can't the only reason you don't have enough leaders is you don't have leaders focused on developing more leaders. Because what leaders focus on, you get it done. And and whether it's improving food cost or improving customer satisfaction, pick anything in your in your restaurant experience, you wouldn't say we can't get more cars through our drive thru. Well, you can if you put a leader on it. You wouldn't say we can't lower food costs. Well, you would if you put a leader on it. If you need more leaders and you put a leader on it, you can get that done. So um yeah, it's just there there's a there's a global crisis uh in leadership right now, which creates a perfect opportunity for your listeners to step up. Just step up.

SPEAKER_00 22:41

Yeah, it's interesting because you know it's uh it's a game of psychology in some ways, because I think our job is to to get a group of people mobilized towards a common goal. And the thing that mobilizes them is everything that leadership is made up of. So we talk about like what is the role of a leader or a CEO or somebody high up in an organization? Well, first and foremost is create a strategy that has clarity and then let everyone understand their role in that, as opposed to just telling them what to do. What is your role in this success? And then it's building a team of people, which is, you know, team building is its own topic that is so multi-layered, but then it's creating the culture around that that these people can thrive and succeed. And and I think when if you say that to somebody, yeah, it makes sense. That's that's very logical. But then in execution, it all falls apart. You know, so I think it it's it's wild to me that, you know, per Isaiah's question that people aren't front loading this. And I'll tell you where this question came from. So I coached some of the people up at the Chick-fil-A corporate office, like executive coaching for them. And I was talking to one of my clients a couple, three weeks ago, whatever it was, and I was asking him this question about leadership in his department at Chick-fil-A. And he's like, you know, Chick-fil-A, they value it, they love it, all these things, but but they that there's not a lot of time carved out for it. It's still just execute, execute, execute your job. And he he, I mean, he loves Chick-fil-A, don't misunderstand me, but he he's wanting more development and he's not getting as much as he wants. And it's it's like leadership. We we it makes sense, but it always takes the back burner to the whirlwind of the day.

SPEAKER_03 24:16

Yeah, yeah. It it requires intentionality, um, for sure. I mean, strategic intent is one thing, but to actually put to run the play, you you just got to have leaders who say, no, this is what we're going to do. I I talked to a CEO earlier today, and he was asking me, How do you how do you create a leadership culture? He runs five different, he has five different brands that he's responsible for, each has its own deal. And I said, Well, you're the CEO. You're wildly and ridiculously in charge. And if and if you want to create a leadership culture, it begins with a decision and the rest is execution. But you gotta have a leader that says, We're going to do this. I love that. That's great.

SPEAKER_00 25:04

Go ahead, Isaiah.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

Um so one of your big things is the serve model. And I love the serve model. I've coached that for honestly, like probably three years at this point, um, ever since I started getting kind of diving into your stuff. Um, I think people have started to take servant leadership and and maybe kind of mistreat the word a little bit. Um, and sometimes uh I think people can overuse it. Um, but I want to hear your thoughts on like how do you kind of judge if someone is truly serving or if they're like just kind of talking about it?

SPEAKER_03 25:41

Okay. Again, great, great questions here. Um first I want to affirm your your instincts. People have abused, misused, misunderstood, and actually tarnished the brand of servant leadership because there are a lot of men and women who are just awful leaders that are out telling people they're servant leaders. They're they're they're they're neither servants nor leaders, right? They're they're just awful. And it has it has become a tarnished brand, which one of our approaches to that, uh, I don't know if you've seen the book we wrote called Uncommon Greatness. And in that book, we say the path to uncommon greatness, which is an other-centered, um, bring the best out of others approach to leadership. The path to that is what we called uncommon leadership, which was a way to actually begin to reposition uh some of the things that we're talking about. Because, again, people have just seen servant leadership modeled so poorly for so long that it again, I say it's a tarnished uh brand. And so we're we're we're using it less and less because we don't want people to lose the concept because they don't like the label. Now, to your point, how do you know if someone's heart is right? Because that's really what you're I think you're asking. Yep. And I think that's a crucial question because as we have talked about for a long, long time and and published in several different um books, we've said if your heart is not right, nobody cares about your skills. And I think I can prove that to your listeners. Uh, you've probably known a man or woman who had the skills to lead that you chose not to follow. Say, well, why wouldn't you follow them? You just said you know somebody that's got the skills to lead. Well, you wouldn't follow them because you don't trust their heart. And so we we think you can actually see behaviors that are the reflection of a leader's heart. And we outline those um in this new edition of The Secret. And I'll just give you a couple of them. Uh, one is they hunger for wisdom because there's a there's an openness and there's a humility there, and there's a willingness to learn and grow. And they don't, they don't pretend they know it all. In fact, they know they don't know it all. So they're they're learners. Um, they expect the best, they have an optimistic spirit. Uh, it's really, really hard to be a successful leader if you're a pessimist. Now, I know there's somebody listening who has a pessimistic leaning or or they they tend to be that way. Okay, I got that. But you can learn to be more optimistic. And if you want to maximize your leadership, you're gonna need to do that. Uh again, there's several other hard habits. I'll share one more for sake of time. Um, and this, in fact, might be the first among equals, and it's to think others first. To think others first. And and you probably would understand my point of view on that. That's not where most of us start. I think there's something in us that makes us have a strong uh tendency to think about ourselves first. But if you can cultivate the ability to think others first, then you're much more likely to become a leader that people want to follow. Now, real quick, I'm gonna give you and your listeners one tactical um application here because again, I'll admit it's not always our first instinct to thank others first. So I want to I want to give your listeners something they can try uh to help help in this area. Here's here's the assignment. Think of it like an experiment. Try to add value to everyone you meet for the next 24 hours. I mean, look at your watch, all right, and say, for the next 24 hours, I'm gonna try to add value to everyone I meet. Now, somebody out there is gonna be quick to say, well, that's impossible. You got to listen to what I said. I didn't say to add value to everyone you meet, I said to try. And so if I'm trying to add value to you, Isaiah, who am I thinking about? I'm thinking about you. Me, Jason. If I'm trying to add value to you, who am I thinking about? I'm thinking about you. And and, you know, infinite ways to add value. You can encourage people, you can um, you can thank people, you can recognize people, you can coach people, you can correct people, you can resource people. If you're a person of faith, you can offer a silent prayer on their behalf. They're make you a long, long list. And here's what happens: it's the trying that transforms you. And you walk into every encounter thinking, I want to add value here, I want to add value here. Um I think that'll help people develop that think others first mindset. It will actually change your heart.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

I love that because you know, we uh Isaiah and I always say that the number one skill you can develop as a leader is to love people and and and to develop your heart because that drives everything we do. And if you even look at, I think Ken Blancher's book, The Lead Like Jesus, he talks about um uh heart to head to hands to habits, right? So when our heart is in the right place, it changes the way we think. And you talk about intentionality as a leader. Well, when our heart's in the right place, it creates that intentionality because we're you first instead of me first with everything. You know, but when you tell people the most important thing is to develop your heart, it kind of can fall flat because that's a difficult thing to train and difficult thing to learn. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 31:36

Yes, and it it doesn't get a lot of air time. Uh people don't people don't talk about it a lot for any number of reasons. But as you guys know, in the book, The Secret, we actually use the illustration of an iceberg. And we say about 10% of an iceberg is above the water line, and that represents the skills of a leader. And the 90% below the waterline represents the heart or character of the leader, and you need both. You you I know men and women with great character that couldn't lead themselves out of a room. Well, you don't want to follow them. And we've already talked about those that have the skills, but if you don't trust their heart, you don't want to follow them. So it's a both and it's it's skills and heart. But the heart is what determines whether people are going to follow you, which is why there's a disproportionate return when you start with the heart. You still got to develop skills.

SPEAKER_00 32:33

Well, yeah, absolutely. And do you think too? Because I uh, you know, Isaiah and I are huge readers and I love I love developing myself. But my the reason I develop myself and the reason Isaiah develops himself so heavily is so that I can be of more service to others. Because I don't want to limit my ability to serve because I don't have the knowledge or the skills. So it's almost there's a very synergistic relationship between the two that that my love for people drives my personal development and my skills so that my skills can be used to grow and develop them. And I think that's the spot where, and you said earlier that one leader that you worked with that said, you know, you didn't come in and take charge. And I think that is the mindset people have around leadership. So when they've been led that way, quote unquote led that way, and it's their turn to lead, that's what they model. And they don't think about it through this paradigm.

SPEAKER_03 33:19

Yep, I think you're absolutely correct. We we there aren't enough good role models out there for the kind of leadership we're talking about. But we're trying to change that.

SPEAKER_00 33:28

You're trying to change that. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

I appreciate all your work in that sector, my man. I appreciate it. Yep. Wait, the world, I I totally agree. I was uh I'll go inside the Bible just for a second, but I was reading the Nehemiah 4 just before we hopped on this, just because I was like, well, I'm waiting for Jason to hop on, I'm waiting for Mark for a second. Um, and it talks about like their basically the this town had their walls torn down um and they're about to get attacked again. Um, this guy's kind of giving a pep talk to to all of his followers, and he goes, like, remember the Lord, fight for him, fight for your brothers and your sisters, fight for your family. And then that's where it ends. And then it never in that speech did he say, fight for yourself. He said, fight for all the people around you that are your followers. Um, and I think that that's so important. I think so many people miss that because we're we're more and more becoming a little bit more like self-centric rather than um other centric.

SPEAKER_03 34:29

Yeah. That's what we're trying to combat.

SPEAKER_00 34:32

Absolutely. Hey, so let's talk about the book for a second. Um it it is the fourth edition, and I, you know, I have a few questions that as does Isaiah about the book, but I want to make sure uh we we touch on this pretty heavily here. So what do you think has caused a first, second, third, and fourth edition? What what what are you seeing? What is the evolution you're seeing that that makes you guys feel like you need to update the book and to keep up with the times? What was the impetus for that? Yeah, I'll give you the short answer.

SPEAKER_03 35:02

Um, let's talk about the fourth edition specifically.

SPEAKER_00 35:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:06

The publisher came to us and said, Hey, the book is still selling, which is which is fantastic. I mean, it's it's been almost two decades, right? So it's like, wow, that's that's great. And they said, Do you have any new content? Because I'm I'm not the guy, and I'm not throwing rocks, but I'm not the guy that says, Let's put a new cover on it and call it the fourth edition. It's like he said, and he and he knew that because we've had this conversation over the last two decades. And he said, Have you got any new content? And I said, I do, because the stuff we just talked about uh regarding the heart, it was not in the first three editions. Now, I say it wasn't in there. We had the iceberg in there and a reference to the importance of it, but there was a separate book. There is a separate book called The Heart of Leadership. And so Chick fil A came to me a few years ago and said, Hey, we got a problem. I said, We got a lot of problems. Which one do you want to talk about? And they said, our point of view on leadership is in two books, The Secret and The Heart of Leadership. I said, Okay. And they said, We've got corporate leaders and restaurant leaders who've read one or the other. So anybody who's not read both books has a truncated view of our point of view. And they said, can you put them together in one book? Now, in that particular request, they said, we don't want a parable. We've already got two parables. So that's why we wrote Uncommon Greatness. So when the publisher called and said, Have you got new content? I said, We actually do. We've now updated the serve model and we made that final E embody a leader's heart so we could bring the content below the waterline into the book. So as you teach this, I know you guys use it in the restaurant. Uh, you used to have to teach two books to teach the whole thing, right? To teach our point of view. And now we we think it'll be easier. We think it'll be simpler. It's just you're teaching that great leaders serve.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

That's good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:15

Glad I was there. Hopefully that'll make it better.

unknown 37:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

Uh something super popular, and especially in my age bracket, um, is what's called master classes. I don't know if you've heard of those before, but uh basically just kind of like a crash course on everything that that person has a specific area of knowledge in. Yes. Um, give me a crash course on the serve model because I think that's so helpful for all of our listeners.

SPEAKER_03 37:41

Wow. Okay. Crash. I mean, yeah, those I I have had a subscription to master class, and many of them are long and they're multiple volumes. So I'm gonna try to do this really, really simple.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

Take your time where you're all good.

SPEAKER_03 37:54

A micro class on uh the serve model. Okay. Um, a little context. 25 years ago, almost 30 now, uh, Chick-fil-A realized that we needed more leaders. And I don't know if any of you have ever been there, but when you have problems to solve or opportunities to seize, it's a very normal and natural response to put a leader on it. Well, we looked at our bench and said, uh-oh. Uh-oh. We hope this person can lead in the future. We think this person will be ready in two or three years. Our bench, in some departments, there was zero leadership bench. I mean, it was a mess. And so what do you do? In the short run, you give those problems and opportunities to existing leaders. But give full credit to our executive committee, we knew that that was a dead end street, right? You just burn up your existing leaders, burn them up, burn them out, grind them up. I mean, that you can't, the leaders are the lid on the enterprise. And so we had to figure something out. And so the executive committee asked me to figure it out. How do you accelerate leadership development? And what we decided is one of our primary challenges, and we ultimately decided it was our initial challenge, is we didn't agree on what leadership was or what it looked like. And everybody, by the way, everybody listening has a definition. But unless you've done the work to forge a consensus, those definitions are going to be different. And in the context of an organization, if you've got different definitions in accounting and finance and marketing and operations, and then like it, you can understand the impossibility of accelerating leadership development if you all disagree on what it what it means and what it looks like. And so I was asked to figure that out, put together a team of really smart people, which has been my approach to everything I've ever done. It's like bring in some smart people and let's try to figure this thing out. And we said, we have got to come up with our point of view on leadership with no disrespect to anybody else's point of view. We've got to know what our point of view is. And we made what I feel like was a strategic decision way back then. There were and still are a lot of academic, theoretical, and conceptual definitions of leadership. And that's fine. And they may add value in some context. We said we want a behaviorally based definition so we can tell leaders here's what you need to do. We did a lot of benchmarking, global benchmarking, lots of interviews with lots of really talented and gifted people. And we were stumped, honestly. Um, we didn't know anything about leadership development. Um, we knew it was important, but we were like, what do we do with all this? And somebody asked the question. It seemed very uh straightforward, even simple on the surface. They said, Well, what is it leaders do? Well, I think we came up with 1234 things that leaders do. I mean, it was like it did validate that leadership is real work. And I remember being quite depressed in the moment. I said, Can you see us going to the executive committee and saying we figured it out? There are 1,234 things that leaders do. We're now going to build the curriculum to support that.

SPEAKER_00 41:14

No, we knew we'd be a heck, that'd be a heck of an acronym.

SPEAKER_03 41:17

Ooh, it was crazy. And I remember, I remember it literally sucked all the air out of the room. It's like, man, this is this this is like the worst news ever. Like, this is what leaders do. And then somebody on the team said, Is there a short list? And we said, Well, that'd be nice if there were a short list. And so we reframed the question. We said, What has been true about great leadership throughout all of history? And we believe it will be true into the future. And we said, let's try to distill this down to what we ultimately called the fundamentals. And we came up with the five fundamentals great leaders, see the future, engage and develop others, reinvent continuously, value results and relationships, and embody a leader's heart. And um that's that's where we landed. Now, one PS to that story, we weren't sure we had it right. I mean, we acknowledged that we we did not know if we had it right. And and there was a little bit of angst of I mean, it was fear. It's like, well, what if we get this wrong? It's like, well, there's not that's a cheery thought, but it was a sobering thought. And um we're going, okay, what could we do to build our confidence that what we've come up with is is right? Put that in air quotes, it's right. And either, either coincidence or divine appointment, you can decide. I was gonna be with Ken Blanchard the next day, the the co-author, I mean, the he wrote the one minute manager and ultimately co-authored The Secret. And so I I said to the team, would you like me to run this by Ken? Now, your audience probably doesn't know Ken, but 20 years ago, he had three books on the on the bestseller list at one time, which at the time had never been done before. His one minute man his one minute manager book is still selling, it's probably sold 15, 20 million copies and still selling from way back when. So I said, I'm gonna be with Ken. Would you like me to to share this with him and get his perspective? And they said, that would be fantastic. Um and so I had the SERB model written on a piece of paper, five bullet points. And I said, Hey, Ken, we're trying to accelerate leadership development. Let me show you what we've been working on, and I just want you to tell me, do you think it's true, you know, valid? Will it stand the test of time? And did we miss anything? So I handed it to him and he read it and he said, This has got to be a book. Well, I blew him off and I said, Ken, everything looks like a book to you, which is why he's sold 30 million books. He said, No, no, no, no, no. He said, You were trying to articulate what great leaders do at Chick-fil-A. He said, What you and your team have done is you've articulated what great leaders have done throughout history, and it has to be a book. And so that's why I tell folks I'm the accidental author because Ken kind of thrust me into this writing game. And um that was that was a few books back. So that's my micro. Course on the serve model and how it became a book.

SPEAKER_01 44:32

I appreciate that. I'm sure our listeners will as well.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

Yeah, and I'm glad you brought that up because if you follow anybody on social media who talks about leadership or especially people in the restaurant game, they reference back to Chick-fil-A all the time. It is the gold standard. And and the the cool thing about everybody listening, and I hope everyone you know picks up on is Mark just gave you, you know, I I did not even mean to make this pun, but I'm gonna make the pun, the secret, because this is what Chick-fil-A did to get that part of the business right. So I'm so glad you shared that. And and uh a question I have for you is there anything that that has come up in the book or in any conversation you had that you get pushback on? Does anybody challenge anything from that book?

SPEAKER_03 45:20

Yes, those that look past the fundamentals, because not many people can debate the fundamentals.

SPEAKER_00 45:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:30

I mean, I mean, think about anybody who leads well, they do those things. I mean, we got that right, right? Which is why it's it stood the test of time, why it's still selling all over the world. Truth travels, we got that right. What people push back on is they skip the fundamentals and they say, but servant leadership doesn't work. Or servant leadership is a lesser form of leadership, or servant leadership is weak or weakness. And and I would say those people are just ill-informed. I mean, that may be their experience with their brand of servant leadership. So that's why we were trying to move past that language and say it's uncommon leadership. And most people could agree, leaders who do those five things, that's pretty uncommon. And so that that's the only pushback, is that it's it's more against an idea and a concept than it is. I I don't know that I've ever had anybody really challenge the fundamentals. It'd be like somebody saying blocking and tackling aren't really needed in football. It's like, well, no, you're not gonna challenge that because that is the game, right? Well, these five fundamentals are pretty much the game for leaders.

SPEAKER_01 46:50

I love that. I love that. Mark, I have one last question for you. Okay. Why should our listeners buy the secret at the fourth edition?

SPEAKER_03 47:04

Well, they may not need to, um, because we just gave them the answers. But if but if they want to go deeper, it's it's I think leadership is stewardship. And and you and I have been given an opportunity. If we have been given an opportunity to lead, I I want to do that at the highest level possible. So we've not described an inferior form of leadership. We have described a superior form of leadership. Traditional leadership is like the crop duster. And this is like the stealth fighter. I mean, this is this is so far above and beyond what most people consider traditional leadership. If you want to steward your opportunity well, you need to embrace the fundamentals. And if this book will help you, then yeah, you should go buy it and you should give it as Christmas presents and graduation gifts and stocking stuffers and do, yeah, give it to everybody in your organization. But but what's most important is not that you buy the book. What's most important is that you actually decide that you want to be a serving leader, not a self-serving leader. And the fundamentals are your blueprint to do that well.

SPEAKER_00 48:22

That's very well said. I love the humility in your answer. So I will I will do the opposite of humility for you, and I will say you need to buy the book because it's uh it's uh it it it it does, you know. I like I said earlier, Isaiah and I read a lot of books, and 75% are gonna be leadership-based books because it's my passion. And I wouldn't not tell you just to buy this book, I would say buy any of Mark's books because they will completely change how you think about leadership. And if you already think this way, it'll reinforce it. And one of the reasons I read a lot, and I think Isaiah is the same, is even if I do understand the concepts, these books give me different language to use. They give me a vocabulary to teach it with. And there's so much power in that because now I can look at a situation, diagnose it, and have a vocabulary to coach it. So even if you think you know these concepts, I still think you should buy the book in any book Mark has has has written because they are that good. And and um, you know, one of the stats you gave in the approach was that you had interviewed like 6,000 leaders when it was the whole thing you were talking about with the uh the 71% revealed that that leadership or a culture was number one thing, but they put it 11th on their priority list. But just the amount of research Mark does and the amount of effort they put into understanding leadership is almost unparalleled. So I would highly recommend you guys get the book. Highly recommend you get any book Mark has written, and I think it will take your leadership to the next level. So there, I said it for you, Mark. Thank you. Thank you. I mean it from the bottom of my heart, man. You do you've done a lot of good for a lot of people. And I can't tell you how blessed we are to have you on the show. And and thank you for coming on. I can't wait to share this with as many people as we possibly can. Well, it's been my pleasure.

SPEAKER_03 50:00

But before I go, can can I offer one more quick thing? I know our time's up. Let me give everyone listening my cell number. It's 678-612-8441. And if you would please put that in the show notes. Uh, if I can serve anyone listening uh in the future, just reach out.

unknown 50:22

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 50:23

That's the only leadership coach you'll ever hear give their cell phone. So that's pretty special, too.

SPEAKER_01 50:27

That is that is crazy. But I uh wow, that just that shows your heart. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 50:32

All right, guys. Thank you so much, Mark. And and no, absolutely thank you for all you do and all you've done, and we appreciate you deeply. And uh we look forward to catching up down the road. All right, take care.

unknown 50:42

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

Thank you, Mark. All right, we stopped recording. Well, it's stopping recording.