The Real Test of Leadership Happens at Home with Randy Gravitt

Most leaders I know are crushing it at work and quietly losing at home. That’s not a win. In this episode, we sat down with Randy Gravitt, author of Winning Begins at Home, and we had one of those conversations that hits different. 

We got into why the real test of your leadership isn’t what happens in the boardroom, it’s what happens when you walk through your front door. If you’re serious about leading well, this one’s for you.

You can find Randy's book and access all the other amazing work he does in the world of leadership at https://leadeveryday.com/

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:28

All right, and welcome back to the Second Mile Leadership Podcast. We are your hosts, Jason and Isaiah. And today we have an incredibly special guest, somebody who has been in the leadership field for a very long time. And I know it's somebody that Isaiah and I have been very excited to talk to for a while now. So this is going to be an incredible episode. I hope everybody tunes in for the entire thing. I'm going to kick us off by telling you a little bit about this guest and what his background is, because I think it's, like I said, it's very esteemed. It's been it's been an incredible career. And then we'll we'll move on from there. But our guest today is Randy Gravit. He is the co-founder and CEO, which, by the way, we're going to talk about this, me's chief encouragement officer at Lead Everyday, an executive leadership coach, best-selling author and speaker. In 2014, Randy founded Integrate, which uh leadership, which is um an organization that builds teams of coaches and consultants dedicated to developing high performance leaders. Something, of course, Isaiah and I is very near and dear to our hearts. Uh, under his leadership, the organization served hundreds of clients across multiple industries. In 2024, Randy partnered with Mark Miller to create Lead Every Day, combining their decades of experience and research to help leaders at every level. And Randy has a new book out, which is called Winning Begins at Home. Isaiah and I have both had the pleasure of reading it, so we will delve into that today as well. But for now, I want to give a very warm welcome to our guest, Randy Gravit. Welcome to the show, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Hey, thanks, Jason. Uh glad to join you and Isaiah. It's gonna be a lot of fun. Pumped to hang out. And by the way, I must say, that's the nicest anybody's ever called me old. You said I've been leading for a long, long time. That's really good. That just means I'm an old guy, I've been around for a while. So uh more experienced. Exactly. Exactly. Hopefully we can we can have some fun together.

SPEAKER_02 2:11

Yeah, what one of the young leaders that works with us uh called me the most lived in the organization one time. So I'm known as the most lived because I'm older than everybody.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

I like that. I like that.

SPEAKER_02 2:21

Yeah. So uh to kick this off, uh before the show started, Isaiah and I were having a conversation, and and there's a really cool dynamic at play on this podcast. Uh, the people who listen to the show know there's a significant age difference between me and Isaiah. I'm 50, he's 26, I've been married 25 years, have four kids, he's been married three years, just had his first child seven months ago. And now we bring Randy to the show, who's a grandfather of nine grandkids, has four daughters, been married 39 years and in uh a week or so. And we're all at these different phases of life. And here we are to talk about a book that that specifically addresses what it's like to lead at home. And we got people who are leading at home at different phases of life. So I think it's gonna make for a very interesting conversation.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

It's gonna be a lot of fun. Uh and I think no matter what age you are, most people know this, but we don't think about it when we're in the midst of leading. We we know we want to get it right at home, and yet how many times do we spend all our time trying to win at work and we don't get it right at home and end up building something great in the workplace, but you know, kind of lose our family along the way if we're not careful. And so we always say if you win at work and you lose at home, I think you still lose. So we're gonna we're gonna see if we can't help people win outside of work today.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

Yeah, that that's that's amazing. And and the way I want to start this off is I'm a firm believer that if you can lead at home, it actually makes it easier to lead at work. I think the skills translate very well, but I think the skills are almost harder to implement at home. If we talk about having high emotional intelligence, being able to manage our ego, things like that. I find as a father of four and married 25 years, that's harder to do at home because there's so many deep feelings involved. And if I can do it well there, then I should theoretically be able to do it better at work. So I think it almost has to go in that order. Um, having said that, uh it'd be a neat idea to kind of go around the quote unquote room here and talk about, you know, when it comes to leading at home, what does that mean to you, Randy? Like how do you define that? What how does a let's talk to men specifically here for a second second, since we're we're three men. How does a man, if if he's never even thought about leading at home, he's never even crossed his mind, doesn't know what it looks like in real time, what what does that mean?

SPEAKER_00 4:36

Yeah, well, I may flip it upside down here. Uh and and the I love the question because I I think sometimes we we think that leading is being in charge. Uh sometimes even at home, we think I'm the man, I'm the husband, I'm the you know, father, what I say goes. And that's just that's just such an upside down way to to to try to get a family to to be uh really live up to their potential and be what they can be. And and I think we know that at work as well. We get a parking place or a business card or a corner office and a title, and we all of a sudden, if we're not careful, we can power up and think that I'm in charge, you'll do what I say. And and I think the best leaders really do flip at that on its head and they think in a different way. They they really think about being a servant leader. And and servant leadership has gotten such a bad rap through the years. A lot of people think, uh, I don't want to be the doormat. And that's not what I'm talking about when I'm when I'm saying servant leadership. The the servant leader is the one who does everything they can to help the people around them win. And sometimes I'll have to hold people accountable and I'll have to train people and challenge people and encourage people or parent people if I'm at home, you know, what whatever. But I I think the one who serves is is really the the the one who leads most effectively and ultimately creates a legacy. And something you said there, we were talking, you know, at the beginning about the the home part. I mean, you you said if you get it right at home, it makes you better at work. I believe that so much. I in fact, I think that your home, your marriage, and if you have kids, your parenting, but your marriage specifically, it is the greatest classroom to learn how to serve on planet Earth, if you ask me. And if you're gonna, if if you want to really learn about sacrifice, have some kids, you know you you guys were talking about being dads. Uh it's you you can get a PhD in it in service if you have some kids. Because they're sometimes it can be a thankless job, and and and yet it's so rewarding when you get that right. And so I I love this conversation. I think it's so important.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

Isaiah? Totally agree, totally agree. Um Randy, I love all that you said there because uh it it does take a lot of sacrifice, even just being in my very inexperienced uh age and and not uh being as as lived as y'all two. Um it's there there's already so much that that I've had to sacrifice within the last few years that I think a lot of guys in my age bracket that are not married um may not think that that you have to do. Um and so the centering kind of marriage around sacrifice and then using that principle to then go apply it to your business is so important because servant leadership applies at home and it also applies in the workplace. Um there's a one one of my favorite Bible verses talks about it is more blessed to give than receive. Um so the Bible is literally telling us, hey, like it is it it it can bring more happiness to actually serve your people and serve your family, and then also serve uh your employees at your workplace, then actually just like receiving and and everything being centered around you as the quote unquote leader. Um so I I mean, leadership applies everywhere. The three of us know this, but I I think it's such a good starting place to just kind of recognize hey, this is something that deeply, deeply matters at home. And if you can't win at home, um, but you're killing it at work, Randy, you say this a few times, but like you're ultimately losing. And no one wants to be losing in life.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

No, that I mean that's so true. And you mentioned that uh Bible verse. I just heard somebody talk about this recently, and and that word blessed, you know, we like that is that a Bible word or something? It actually the translation means happy. And so happy is the one who gives and not takes. It's and I think sometimes we think, well, I'll just get what I want and and not be a giver. And it shows up at at work as well. Like we want to extract value from our employees versus adding value. The best leaders are the ones that add the most value. They're the most valuable leaders, really. And and the same thing's true at home. If we show up, and and I always like to give leaders a challenge to like think like an offensive lineman. I don't know if you guys follow football or not, but if you think about football players, and I even even if I ask people, name your favorite football player, they'll they'll normally name a quarterback or or somebody who scores touchdowns. Nobody ever says, you know, the left guard for the Minnesota Vikings or the right tackle for for Ohio State. I mean, it those guys don't even, they don't their parents know who they are, but other than that, nobody knows who these guys are. And yet these are the players that that show up every day and they block and move people out of the way so somebody else can can really score. And I think that's a great picture for for a dad at home. We're talking to those young guys. If I'm gonna show up and or or even as a husband, you know, what does that sacrifice look like, Isaiah? And and you know, if I've been used to playing video games and hanging out with my friends all the time and I don't ever have any curfew or do anything, and now all of a sudden I get married, it it just changes everything. And so am I willing to lay aside those things that I may really enjoy, but but I enjoy more helping my my wife win. And if I can think that way and live that way, I can tell you one thing, that's gonna, that's gonna lead to a great marriage uh as opposed to, you know, I'm doing my thing, she's doing hers, and we're really, we're we live in the same house, but we're really not together. And I think there's a difference in proximity and intimacy. And when I when I think about intimacy, it's it's so, you know, we we we think about sex all the time, we hear the word intimacy, but but really when we talk about intimacy, we're talking about closeness. Do we have a relationship? And you can have a you can have a kid, you know, uh, you got a 13-year-old, you drive them to school every day, and you can be in the same car. If they're back there on their phone, you know, playing video games, whatever, and you're listening to your talk radio or whatever you got going on, your podcast, and you don't really talk to each other, then yeah, you're in the same car, but you're really not together. And the same thing is true, you know, I I know people who who live together for 40 years and they're really not, they're not together. And so I I think the the danger there is to is to be self-serving rather than a serving person. And if we can really lay aside our own, it it actually that leads to that that word happy, right? Yeah, I think we're a lot happier when we're a giver and not a taker, to your point.

SPEAKER_02 10:54

Yeah, it's it's interesting you you you say all those things, a lot of great stuff in there. And I think one of the things I notice being married 25 years, being 50 years old, and being around people in my age bracket who who are more seasoned in their marriage, this pattern shows up more often than than I think people realize. And that is, and I and I I think this is the opposite of the way it should be. That and again, we're speaking to men right now, and that is if if the marriage is, like you said, it lacks intimacy, it lacks closeness, or there's something that's not going right. We uh a lot of men tend to wait for the wife to step up and be the one that fixes it, or the the one to step up and do the work. But I think that that leaders go first. And if we're gonna be leaders of our homes the way we're called to be biblically, then it's our job as men to step up and lead that that that charge. And and like you said, Randy, it doesn't mean we're the boss, doesn't mean we're the authority figure, it means we're the leader. It means we're leading our family, our wives, our marriage towards something great. And there's a lot of elements that make up leadership, but I do think that the leader, the man has to step up and go first and not wait for somebody else to step in, mainly the wife, and and and take that role from them.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Yeah, that that's so good. That's a great reminder.

unknown 12:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

One of the uh one of the things I've heard from I'll I'll make sure I say doctor here, Dr. Jordan Peterson, is that um most of your free time is gonna be after you get off the clock, um, you're coming home at 5, 6 p.m., whatever it is. And then you just kind of have that 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. whenever you go to bed with your actual family. And getting that time right um is so key because I I think some people kind of live in this mindset of, oh, I'm just living for a next vacation or I'm living for the weekend or whatever it is. And of course, those are important. We all need to do those things. Um, but what is really important is getting that metaphorical 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. correct every single day. Yeah. Um, Randy, one of the things I've heard you talk about before is like it's it's kind of you do it before you actually get home. But one of the things I do is like I take a deep breath every single time I I park my truck in my garage, and I'm like, it's their time. Like I'm here to serve them, I'm here to love them. Um and being at this stage of life, having a seven-month-old, I mean, one month ago she could barely crawl, and now she's trying to stand every single second of every single day. Um, and it it flies by so fast, man. It's it's such a cool stage of life. But what I kind of want to ask you is how do you how do you balance that so well? Like how how do you learn to turn on the the the on and off switch? How do you how do you differentiate between the the work mindset and then also the the home mindset?

SPEAKER_00 13:40

Those are great questions. Uh Jason will tell you that that that little girl's gonna be running before you know it. So you you better get ready for that. Uh those are great questions. I think the key really is is is what I would say, be there when you're there. It it's it's exactly what you said. Having a place. I I like to I like to I have this stop sign at the beginning of my neighborhood. And when I when I pass the stop sign in the morning, if I'm going out to speak or going somewhere to, you know, to meet with a company, I like when I get there, I I want to go into work mode because I do want to do great work. It's not there's they're not mutually exclusive here. I do think you can win at both places. So the goal's not just to win at home. It it is to win at work as well. You do want to build something great. But here's what I've noticed about my work, and and I'm older than you guys, so y'all take my word for it. There's never been a day, I'm I'm I'm 61. There's never been a day in my work life where I've gotten to the end of the day and thought there's just literally nothing else to do. I mean, there's there's never been a day where all the work is done. So you all of you who are listening, it's a myth to think that you're gonna get it all done or you're gonna conquer it. And yet what happens is because it's not all done, I'm tempted to bring it home with me. And if I'm not careful in today's world, I'm I'm always accessible with email or text message or phone call, whatever. Technology, if you don't tell your time where to go, I'm I'm convinced technology will. And so it's we gotta, we gotta really make this decision. What are we gonna, what are we gonna prioritize at 6 p.m.? And and sometimes we can fool ourselves into thinking we're doing it right. I mean, you can you can be reading bedtime stories, Isaiah, to this little seven-month-old. You know, you may start reading to her uh in the next you know few months, you'll probably start reading these little books. You can you can read those books and be there and still not be there. You can be thinking about tomorrow's presentation or the email or when's the next podcast or I need to call Jason. And yet you're you're able to be in that that proximity, but really that closeness is not gonna be there if you're not really engaged. And and I and I understand, you know, how many more Dr. Seuss books can we read or whatever? But just having fun and and being with the person you're with, that presence part is so important. And and I think you nailed it. It's like find that place where you say, when I come back in the neighborhood, I'm gonna leave work at work and I'll go back and do great work tomorrow. But today, I'm I'm here now and I'm gonna be here while I'm here. And I know you'll need some time to to to set your life up where you can have some exercise and some rest and all that kind of stuff. But but if you've got connection time with one of your kids or or you're trying to have a conversation with your spouse, talk to your spouse. Don't be scrolling your thing and she's scrolling hers. And it's just, I mean, it I we can we've we're being robbed if we're not careful these days. And so finding that place, a lot of people tell me when I talk about this kind of stuff, well, I work at home. How do you, how do you handle that? And let's let's say you got the basement and the, you know, your office is there, whatever. That that's great. Well, you can pick a door jam and and that becomes your place. When you walk through that, it it's you're now you're you're entering back into your family world. And when you leave that, you can go back into your work world. I I love having that place, that visual place. It could be a a traffic light at an intersection or whatever if you've got a commute. But there there needs to be a place where we set our minds on what it is that is going to be most important in those next little few hours that we have. And then we'll go back and and focus when we go somewhere else.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

Yeah, that's 100%.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

That's great. And and there's a lot of uh tactical stuff there. And what I've noticed in at my age and at my stage of being married and being a father, my kids range anywhere from 15 to 22 years old, is that I think perspective shifts really put this into hyperdrive because the old saying that the days are long but the years are short. Like when you're young, that doesn't really resonate. And then when you get older, you realize there's so much truth in that. And I think when the days are long, you get caught up in believing that that these times are gonna last forever, or you have plenty of time to figure it out. And the older you get, the more you realize you don't got as much time as you think you do to figure this out. So it it almost forces you into having a better perspective and and allows you to be more present. I know when I was early in my fatherhood and being married, I was incredibly guilty of what you're talking about. I I've owned my own business for 27 years and and and I it all my mind was always on the business, always on my employees, things that you know, and I I, to your point, Randy, I was there, but I wasn't present. And I think that the older I've gotten, the more I've realized just what a mistake that was. And I worked really hard to develop my presence. So if you can have that perspective, and I love that, Isaiah, you have that at such a young age, because I didn't, that if you can develop that perspective and then implement these tactics Randy's talking about, it it's a complete game changer for your marriage and and your uh your parenthood.

SPEAKER_01 18:22

Yeah. Totally agree. I uh a little vulnerability here. The uh in like month two or three of our daughter being born, we were on a walk and my mind's just thinking about work. Um, because I took like two ish weeks for paternity and uh my mind's thinking about work, and then like my wife called me out on it and like didn't cry in the moment because we were out on a walk, but like get home and I'm I'm just bawling because I feel terrible. Um, and I'm like, dang it, dude. Like I this is exactly what I didn't want to do. Um but having someone in my life being my wife that that challenges me and pushes me and wants to be the best, wants me to be the best version of myself is so incredibly important. Uh, because without her, I would have never realized this. We would have gone a few years down the road, and then we would have just started to go different paths, and that that's not what I want at all. Um, so I I think it's incredibly important that you do have a spouse, maybe some friends, whatever that looks like, maybe maybe a Willie that we can touch on in a second, um, that will just kind of keep you uh within the guardrails, keep you in check. But love all the things that you just said there, Jason. Totally agree.

SPEAKER_02 19:32

That's great. And I'm gonna I'm I'm I'm gonna shift gears here a little bit a little bit because I want to talk about this topic with you, Randy. One of the things I know Isaiah and I both tell our clients is that if you want to be a great leader, of course, you have to lead yourself first. And you mentioned, you know, you mentioned I've heard you talk about it on a podcast and definitely in a book, uh, that you got to control the controllables. And I think the one thing in a marriage or as at work that we can control is ourselves. So as a man, trying to be the best husband and father you can be, I believe it starts with being able to lead yourself well. And there's a lot of uh uh aspects and levels to that, but I want to hear your perspective on that. What does it mean for a husband and a father to be a great leader of himself? And how does that translate into a better marriage?

SPEAKER_00 20:17

I I love this question because I think sometimes we we think I'm gonna control the controllables. I I've heard people say this for a long time, and I actually have changed that. I I want, if if somebody says I want to control the controllables, I challenge them to dominate the controllables. If it's something that's under your control, that to me is where you want to dominate it. You don't want to, you don't want to just kind of move into it and go, okay, I'm gonna take care of the things I need. No, you want to run the score up if you can, if you really can control something. So what can we control? We can control, do we show up in a positive way or do we show up in a negative way? I may, I may bring something from work home, but when I come plat past that place, if something negative happened there, I want to come back and and I wanna I want to still have a positive mindset at home. If I don't want to spill over something from there and let the residue spill onto everybody else. It's it's really how it's hard to have a positive family. We all want to have a positive family. It's hard to have a positive family with a negative dad or a negative husband. And so let's make sure that we're, you know, our that so that's something we can control. Am I really trying to be present when I'm when I'm with somebody, like we talked about a moment ago? Technology, again, I'm I'm kind of on this little war against, and I know I know we're using technology right now, and it's great, but if I'm not careful, it'll just suck all my time up. And so I don't want to, I don't want to give my life away to a screen. I I want to make sure that I'm with the people that I'm with. And those things are important. So I think there's there are some things I I know for me, I need to feel physically energized if I'm going to really give my best to my work and give my best to people so I've I can control whether I exercise or not. And if I don't get any exercise or I'm not getting any sleep like I'm supposed to, you know, we're most of us are undersleep, slept, and and and dehydrated and all those kind of things. Well, those are things that I have total control over. And there's a lot of things I don't have control over, but the things that I do, I that's where I want to run the score up. And it's gonna position me then to to be my best when I'm with somebody. And I get this wrong all the time. I mean, I'm I don't want to make it sound like it's easy, but there are some decisions that are easy. Am I drinking water like I should, or am I going on a walk if I need to? And I, and by the way, I can take my family with me. We can have, you know, some good connection on on some. Of those times together. We play together and all that kind of stuff. So I think I think all that stuff is a part of that. And to me, I think so many times if we're not careful, we just forfeit the these things that we could do. And then we wonder why we feel bad and we're we're not really, you know, we don't, we we feel tired, we're not energized. And it's really a lot of that is back on us. So I think that's where leading yourself first starts with some of those self-care, soul care, emotional care, all that stuff. If I'm not, if I'm not really taking care of me, I'm not gonna be good for everybody else. Now, I again, I don't want to mistake here that it's all about me. It's not. If I'm if I'm thinking correctly, how how am I gonna be my best so the people around me, I how can I be strong enough so the people around me can borrow some of my strength? Let's think of it that way. And and you know, you're you're the people around you, they're gonna have some hard times too. And so if you've got this this strength in you that's enough for the people around you as well, for them to borrow some and enough for you, I think you're in a good spot. And if everybody's around trying to do that in the family, I mean, family can be such a life-giving place, but but we all know family can be the hardest place on earth if we're not really thinking correctly. And so that was another reason we we wrote the book.

SPEAKER_02 23:40

Yeah, one thing I want you to elaborate on too. I think this to me falls under the umbrella of leading yourself. But you mentioned this in the book, it's one of my favorite concepts is assume positive intent. And I think that that's where a lot of husbands go wrong is they assume when the wife's not living up to their expectations that there must be a negative intent behind it. I know it translates to work too, but but how do you think assuming positive intent applies to leading yourself in your marriage?

SPEAKER_00 24:07

Yeah, I I think so many times we judge ourselves on what we do and we judge other people on what we what we think is their intent. You know, it's like we hold we we're at a whole different standard with what we hold other people to than what we do ourselves. And I think we could almost flip that. And and and if we're not careful, we can assume that somebody, you know, somebody's just maybe having a bad day or they had a conversation with somebody else and it got, you know, sideways, and then all of a sudden that spills on you. It it there's there's there's probably not, you know, they're not they're not probably when you show up show up thinking, hey, how can I ruin his night? That's not what's going on. And so and yet we can escalate some things so quickly. I say, I say sometimes we make such a big deal out of a small thing. And and we could just let that go, especially if we're strong enough and and secure enough and we've taken care of ourselves. We we should, you know, and and over time, by the way, I think this in some ways gets easier. I'll tell you, I'll tell you a funny uh story. I was doing an event a couple years ago, and uh somebody at at the event had introduced me and said that I was married, had been married at that time 37 years, and uh this girl comes up to me at the break and she says, Hey, I got some invite, and I had said something in the first session about how hard marriage was. Something came up about that. And and uh and I and and basically you can't be married to somebody for four decades and and it there not be some really hard days. I mean, it's a lot of great days, but there's gonna be hard days. You you know, Isaiah can tell you just even in a year or two here, there's there's still gonna be hard days. And so, I mean, it they show up pretty quick. And and so this girl comes up to me at the break and she says, Hey, I want to tell you something. She said, I my grandpa and my grandma were married 63 years. And I'm like, wow, that's amazing. She said, He told me there's actually a secret to to marriage. I'm thinking this ought to be good. Uh what you got. And she says, uh, he told me that only the first 40 years are hard. So so guys, the good news is I'm getting close. You guys got you got a little more. I tell you you got a lot of work to do here before it gets to make it easier. I do. I do think it gets easier as we go to understand that, hey, they're not they're not trying to make a big deal out of something here, and let's not make let's not make you know the old mountain out of a moh molehill idea. I I think that's that's just a good reminder uh for us. So I I think sometimes we do we do just really think that other people have it out for us, and that's that nothing can be further from the truth. That's just our own insecurity sometimes uh talking to us. Yeah, that's great advice. Isaiah?

SPEAKER_01 26:37

Yeah, I my mind goes to life isn't made to uh to be happy all the time. It's like like there there's gonna be disagreements. Um, we weren't put on this earth for it to be uh just completely joy and bliss all the time, but God does orientate things to make them joyful. Uh marriage is absolutely one of those things. I mean, if uh a firm believer, of course, I've only been in this for a little bit less than three years, but I'm a firm believer. I mean, this is like one of the happiest times of my life.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Yeah, let me let I love that. Let me interrupt. I think sometimes we think when conflict does happen, and conflict is inevitable. It's going to happen in every relationship. And by the way, I get I can't get along with myself half the time. So much less if my spouse or, you know. So conflict is gonna happen. I think what happens is if we're not careful, we will we will think the goal when we have conflict, the goal is is victory. Like I'm I've got to prove my point, or I've got to, I'd rather be right than get it right. That's not when we get into conflict, the goal is unity. It's not victory. It's it's can we get to the same place? In fact, I heard somebody say one time, if you win every uh uh spat that you have or every fight you have with your spouse, you're sleeping with a loser. So it's like that's not the goal. The goal is to help her win. The goal is to help my kid win. Can I can I open up a hole so they can score? And if I have that posture and I have that thought and I'm really thinking like a servant leader, and again, this gets really hard when you get into a, you know, something that you you there really is and it feels like there's an impasse. I I don't want to make this sound easy, but a lot of it has to do with my heart. Is is my posture correct and is my attitude correct? And am I believing the best about this person? And if I do, it's just amazing how it it just covers a lot of mess. You know, what's the old Bible verse? Love covers a multitude of sins. It's just it's love does really uh it covers some stuff up. And and and and by the way, I will say, let me let me add one thing to something that Jason said earlier. He was talking about uh almost all of us feel these places where we we didn't get it right in the past. And those are the places where, you know, you could even hear as he's sharing that's that's regret, right? And and I have these places, and Isaiah, you probably already have them as well. I even just you married a couple, you know, you were talking about a situation there a couple months into having a child. So these things happen. Here's the bad news for all of us. We don't get do-overs. We really don't. That's why it is good for Isaiah to get it right early, you know. Let's get on the right path. And for all the young people listening, you want to you want to get on the the it's it's almost like an investment account. The earlier you start, the more you have an opportunity for compound interest and all that kind of stuff to happen. Same thing's true relationally. That's important. You don't get do-overs. But I love this, and Jason, you you do too, that we do get startovers. And so it's it's like every day is a fresh day. If you messed up yesterday, you get up today. I and I understand there's consequences for things you've said and you've been too harsh and you've done this, you're detached, whatever. There are consequences for that. But but the cool thing is, especially with kids, a lot of times, if we if we come in a in a right posture, really trying to help them, love them, so many times that will get us on a right path. And those startovers are so powerful. And and you know, relationships really can transform over time. We've seen it.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

One of the things you you said there that I want to highlight is so much uh power in what you said is the the what's right versus who's right. And when I talk to young couples, that's one of the things that I tryly you mentioned this in in the uh Wendy McGins at home book a little bit too, which was was awesome. Is that you know, when you set a mission for your marriage, like what do you want your family and your marriage to be? You know, like I said, that becomes the mission. And when we put being right above the mission, that's when things go sideways. And we we want to win the fight, we want to be proven right. That doesn't accomplish the mission, that actually sets us backwards in the mission. And I think that if we can get young couples to think, or even veteran couples too, I mean, any of us to think that, you know, what do we want our marriage to look like? And then what are the best practices to get us there? It it takes away the ego part where I just want to win, I just want to be right. And the earlier we learn that message, I think the more uh successful and powerful our marriage can be. I will say that it's really difficult. And we're in the heat of the moment, we all want to be right, but I think that's where the emotional intelligence piece comes in to be able to detach from that and say, hey, look, it's not about whether or not I'm right, it's whether or not us settling this and how we settle it contributes to the success of whatever vision we have for our marriage. And I think that uh we need to use a lot of that uh or that the idea of that mission as our motivator. Excuse me, I talk about all the time. I remember when I was young, about Isaiah's age, I didn't have great emotional intelligence. I was an entrepreneur, I was young, I was stressed out of my mind, I was frustrated, I was anxious, I was all these things. And then I would come home and and I would somehow, some way take that out on my wife, right? Whether I would be snappy with her or detached, and that had its own side effect. And now she would withdraw and she would have, you know, be sad or she wouldn't be in the best mind uh uh uh a headspace after that. And then you realize when you do that enough, all I'm doing is is ruining the thing that's supposed to be most important to me. And I think that that when when we start to think like that and put the mission above being right, it it radically changes everything.

SPEAKER_00 32:07

Yeah, that's that's so powerful. I I think uh I was when you're talking there, I was thinking, how many times do we get in a conflict and we don't get our way or it's not going the way we want it to, and I have a point to make and you're I'm gonna, you know, and all of a sudden I'll just begin to escalate the my my and and by the way, sometimes escalating can mean, I mean, there are some people who will just stuff their emotions and they won't share, and then there are other people who are gonna, you know, my wife tells me saying it louder doesn't make you more right. You know, so I get I get that. It really it really that's just a good reminder. But if I'm not careful, I'll I'll just escalate a little bit. And then all of a sudden what happens, it's like you were describing there with your wife. They're gonna all automatically close down. And now we we can't have a relationship when one person is loud and one person is you know withdrawn. All we've done at that point is diminish the other person where we ought to be elevating them. And so I think when we understand that and we have that perspective to start with, now we have a chance because we're still gonna feel those emotions. We're still gonna dig in and feel like I got to make my point. And and then all of a sudden I remind myself, like, this is not gonna matter in 10 minutes, or it might if I if I don't do this correctly. And so being more harsh is not, you know, that's that never, it's never I I don't ever remember a time, guys, where somebody got really harsh with me, berated me, and I thought, man, that really motivates me to change. That's never happened one time. And yet somehow we think, but if I do it, it's gonna make them really they're gonna be totally different after this. And so I I want to give you a question. I want to, I want to share a question here that I think is so powerful. It's a question I ask myself all the time, which ties into what you're saying. If we'll just ask ourselves when we get into that moment, how can I live my life in such a way that the people who know me the best can love me the most? I I love that question because so many times the people who know me the best, if I'm at work or I'm in the work, you know, like they might respect me the least, or the the people that know me at home, they may respect, you know, how many leaders, the people that know them the best, they really like, well, dad, you're that way when you go out there in the public, but when you come here, you treat us this way or you're this way with mom. That is not what we want. We want to make sure that we're we're living in a way where the people who know us the best might not just love us the most, they might actually like us. And so uh a second question on that might be, what's it like to be loved by you? What's it like to be led by you at work? But what's it like to be loved by you? And if you really can't answer that the way you want to, whoever's listening, then you got some work to do. And and the the cool thing is the people around you are are wanting you to get this right, it just like you're wanting them to. And so if we can get it right, it can make it so great. But if we don't, uh it just it it really does fracture that home. And again, we can stay together, but still not be together. And and again, that's not the goal.

SPEAKER_02 34:57

So yeah, and I think what I think when you when you lead at home differently than at work, you're you're you're not authentic. It just becomes theater when you're doing it at work, and and I think that people see through that. So there's a lot of a lot of downsides to that. But but Isaiah, the young guy here, you're hearing all these these two old men talk about all these things. What's going through your head as a as a young married man with a new kid?

SPEAKER_01 35:19

Yeah, y'all y'all have probably heard this phraseology before, but uh the like the Instagram snapshot of your life, like what people post on Instagram is typically not how they're actually living their life. They they post the most polished picture, they edit it, they put a filter, they maybe put a little Photoshop in there, whatever it is. Um, but they're gonna show you the best part of their life. And I think sometimes the tendency, um, especially for men, is to do that at work. Like we're gonna bring our best, we're gonna dress the best, we we're gonna be polished, we're gonna have the highest EQ, we are going to be disciplined, we're gonna do all these things. And it's like, why are we not doing that at home? Like we should be doing the exact same thing at home, um, or else you're literally just living that Instagram snapshot at work.

SPEAKER_00 36:04

Um maybe maybe even more so at home.

SPEAKER_01 36:08

Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. That's good. And um I I've I've lived that before, so I I get it. And um I I think people understanding just the the I'm gonna go back to it, but Randy, I think you said it beautifully in your book. You said it in podcast before. Um, but like if you're if you're not winning at home, I mean like you're you're ultimately losing. Um and of course it's incredibly important to win at work, but if it's not the same, if it's if it's two different lives in a sense, um I think it kind of puts you out of a balance as well.

SPEAKER_00 36:45

Well, I I'll I'll speak to that for just a second. I think it's I think it's in in incongruence. I mean it's there's a it's a lack of integrity if you want to really think about it. The word integrity comes from our math word integer, which is a whole number. A person who lives one way at work and another way at home, or one way in public and another way in private, there's an incongruence. There's a lack of integrity there. There's a there's it's there's a disintegration, not an integration of life. And and so I think that's where we you know we we we fool ourselves into thinking I'll just behave, you know, while I'm here, and when I get high home, I can let my hair down and do what I want to. And nothing can be further from the truth at that point. We we that's where we have a disintegrated soul ultimately. It's just like our our heart is is not right. And we always say, uh, I think you guys interviewed Mark on here as well, but we always say if your heart's not right, nobody cares about your skills. It's it's like you you're great at work, but if you don't really have the inner part, that's the part that actually creates impact even at work. Is so many leaders I know disqualify themselves because they're they're great at leading meetings and building teams and solving problems. But when it comes down to, you know, positivity and taking responsibility and and learning and you know, being growth-minded, all those things, that's where we forfeit our leadership if we're not careful. And and I'll just say one last thing about that. It's we think sometimes that people's character implodes. I always say it it erodes. It doesn't implode. It's not just one moment where I blew my life up. It's this small erosion. I quit paying attention to positivity and I quit taking responsibility day after day after day. And and sometimes I end up in a room with somebody I shouldn't be in a room with, you know, years later, or I have this attitude that's toxic and and destructive and and or a habit that just it just it just destroys my life. How many, how many guys, you know, they're they're addicted to stuff, and it's just like that is not the life we want. And so I think the cool thing is, and and we don't get to do all that over, like I said, but we can start over and say, this is the kind of person I want to be. This is the life I want. This is why it matters. And hopefully at the top of that, why it matters is your wife and your kids and all those people that you live with, you do want to live in in such a way that those those people just adore you when you come home. They're like, I love when dad gets here. I love when my husband walks in the door, as opposed to, yeah, here he comes, what's he gonna be complaining about today? I and I I think we get that so backwards if we're not careful.

SPEAKER_02 39:11

Yeah, and I think a way to think of that too is is, you know, I've had the in my private business, I tend to coach people a little more advanced than age. And with Chick-fil-A, I just kind of have tossed in my lap. I'm coaching 40 people that are 25 and under. And it's been a very eye-opening experience in a lot of ways, and it's grown me in a lot of ways. It's been a very special experience. At the same time, you get a lot of people that age bracket who are looking to find their spouse and their, they're they're they're that age to get married, and they want to find the right woman for them if we're talking about men and vice versa for women. And my first piece of advice is if you want to find a great woman, you got to become the kind of man that attracts a great woman, right? So that's your responsibility. Become that man. And that's where all your energy should be going towards, where, you know, that that 5F framework, your faith, family, fitness, finances, and friendships, what are you doing to tend to those things? And I think it's that it applies to the house as too, the household as well. Is if you want your kids to run to you when you walk in the door, what kind of father do you have to be to deserve that? And if you want your wife to look forward to you coming home and that being the best part of her day, what kind of a man, what kind of a husband do you have to be for her to feel that way? Then it becomes our job to go do everything in our power to be that. And it doesn't mean we have to be perfect, doesn't mean we're always going to get it right, but at least at least it needs to be the pursuit that we're after if we want to uh expect those things to happen.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

I love that. I love I love the idea of trying to become the person that attracts the person that you're looking for. That's that goes back to that self-leadership thing. It's just such a powerful uh reminder. That's good, Jason. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 40:46

Thank you, Randy. I appreciate it. And and Randy, question for you here as we turn towards the book, because I know we're we're up against it in time. So you're talking to two guys who very much believe the same things you believe on this. We both read the book, we thoroughly enjoyed it. What I think and I think Isaiah and I probably know this answer on some level, but for the people listening, why did you think this was an important book for you to write?

SPEAKER_00 41:12

Well, I I one of the reasons was because I I I read a lot of books and I'm I'm a leadership guy as well. You know, we we have a company that that serves leaders and companies and teams, and and um I was having a conversation actually. This came out of a conversation I was having. I was doing some coaching with a with an assistant coach in the NFL and with an NFL team we're working with, and uh this guy had two little girls, and he asked me, he said, Do you think we could win this Super Bowl? They're trying to win a Super Bowl. He said, Do you think we win a Super Bowl and I and I won't lose my family? And I said, What tell me why you're asking that? And he said, I got these two little girls, my wife, we've been married for a little while, and he said, I won a Super Bowl. I he was a former player with another, you know, another organization. He said, We won a Super Bowl when I was playing. He said, When I remember when the game was over, uh the confetti's falling, and I'm looking around and the stage, you know, a lot of our coaches and players are there, and and and I'm looking at all these people whose lives are just kind of a mess. He said, We we we had a bunch of guys that had gone through divorces and a bunch of coaches that were just estranged from their spouses. And he said, I'm thinking, man, it it just feels like so much was sacrificed for us to have this. And he said, I'm just wondering, you know, is this possible? And here's what I asked him. I said, I I I think it is possible. I really do believe you can win at work and win at home. But I said, if you can't, why do you want to win a Super Bowl? And he said, I really don't. He said, I don't want to lose my family to in in this quest. And and the cool thing was uh he he was able to admit that, and their organization is committed to the right things. But when I look at, when I look at uh that situation, so many leaders are are saying the same things. We work with executives everywhere and CEOs and all these companies, and and they kept saying to me, the things you're talking about are helping us win it, you know, our operating system will use it, helping us win at work. But at home, like where's the deal? Like, what do I do at home? And I couldn't find anything for leaders. That I mean, literally, that's that's why we that's why we did winning against a home. I I thought there's just nothing out there. I mean, there's stuff on marriage and parenting, but nothing really for leaders to help us have this simple conversation as men, women, whoever, that we could, we could talk to each other about this and try to help our employees succeed, not just at work, but like really the thing that matters most to most people is what happens outside of work. I think the better, you said it earlier, Jason. I think the better we get at home, the better it actually makes us at work. And so that's that's why I did it. I thought, you know, I really I that's where I came up with a statement when I when I told this coach, I said, if you win at work and you lose at home, I think you still lose. I don't think the goal is to win, you know, a trophy and and blow up your family. I said, uh we got to be able to figure this out. And so I thought, I'll just create this simple little blueprint to help people have this conversation. And again, it's not rocket science, but uh I love the book because the first what 120 pages or so are the are the pair, it's the parable. And then the last 75 pages is literally a way for me to build a personal blueprint for my own family. What kind of family do I want to build? And I always say that that you know, families that last aren't built fast, but they are built. I mean, it's not, you know, Mark and I always say hope is not a strategy. You know, if you're sitting here thinking, maybe my family. Change, that's not going to work. You've got to, you've got to have a plan and you've got to think through this. And so hopefully this will become a tool that will help your your audience to have great families. Because I'm I'm so passionate about this. I believe the world would be so much better if we had more families that were thinking correctly. And unfortunately, not everybody's going to grow up in a great family, but whoever's listening, you have an opportunity to start your family in the right way or to change your family right now if it's gone down the wrong path and take responsibility for that. And unbelievable things can happen for generations to come.

SPEAKER_01 45:03

I love that. One of the things that I love in your book, and I don't want to I want to give too many secrets for those that are reading or will or will read in the future, but uh the importance of having a coach or a mentor in your life. Um, I think there's a stigma around like, hey, I need help. Um there's there's a stigma, especially about going receiving clinical help, but even the steps before that, just reaching out to a friend or reaching out to someone that's more experienced than you, um, that has more knowledge, there there is a stigma about that. One of the things I uh like I I work out a good bit and um I wanted to go do a couple personal training sessions. And like some of my family members and friends are like, why are you going to do that? Like you, you know how to work out. And I'm like, I do, but I I want to be better. Like I want to learn from them. And I I I don't just want to like kind of drift and do it, keep doing the same things that I'm doing. I I want to learn, I want to grow. Um, I think the same exact thing applies to marriage, to family, but then also the business side of things.

SPEAKER_00 46:05

Isaiah, that's so good. I can't tell you how many people along the way helped me and Laura as we were in, you know, in our marriage. And it doesn't have to be formal. I mean, we were we would we were in a small group with some older couples, or we were around somebody who had, you know, elementary school kids and they're surviving, and we got these old preschoolers, and like we're just at, you know, just all you need is somebody that's a little bit ahead of you, and you can pick their brain and listen to them and watch them. And it's amazing what you can learn. But think about this the best athletes on planet Earth all have a coach. Every one of them. Who I mean back in the day, I'm watching, you know, when Tiger Woods was playing golf, I'm thinking he he was winning and he had this coach, and I'm thinking, what what's the best guy on the planet gonna learn from a coach? Or or Peyton Manning. I I remember I was a I was a fan of Peyton Manning when he's a football player, and he had an old quarterback coach named Tom Moore. You can Google Tom Moore and look at him. He looks like a basically a hobbit. This guy's over there chain smoking, and and he looks, I mean, this guy's like, this what is this guy teaching Peyton Manning? And if you talk to Peyton Manning, he'll tell you that Tom Moore was a big part of his success. He submitted himself to somebody who had a set of eyes off the field that could see some things that you can't see when you get in that, you know, white hot action. And so if you're in your marriage and you're in this battle, you may need counseling, but you may just need a another couple that you can talk to who's who's kind of gone a little. I mean, that's one of the things I love about y'all's podcast is that you know, you you got both generations here represented. And here's the cool thing. You can you can learn vice versa. As well, I got I got some young guys on my team and and uh I I learn maybe more from them than they do from me at this point. And so I that's the that's the place where I mean that that idea of a coach is just so powerful or a mentor, however you want to think. Coaching you usually pay for. A mentor, you usually, you know, hopefully you can get them for free. But but I but I love the idea of having somebody that's investing in your life, whatever area it is, whether it's your fitness, as you said, or it's your marriage or your kids or your business, whatever. It's just it's just such a I'm I'm so thankful for all the people who helped me get where I am. I wouldn't be here without them.

SPEAKER_02 48:13

Yeah, that that that's great, Randy. And I'll say this too about you said the best athletes have a coach. They have a lot of coaches. They have nutritionists, personal trainers, mental performance coaches, the the sport they played, the different elements of the sport they play. So they don't just have a coach, they have a lot of coaches, and there's there there's no shame in that. And then and then as a great segue here to close things out is is if you can't afford a coach, I think the next best thing, or or not ready for a coach, however you want to phrase that, the next best thing is to maybe read a book by a coach because that that that's a very quick way to get their their best lessons downloaded into your into your brain in an efficient way, which is why I think every yep, every father, every husband, every spouse should should go get the book Winning at Home, uh Winning Begins at Home. It's it was an incredible read. Let me tell you what I like about it. Uh you already mentioned this, Randy, but first of all, uh Isaiah and I, like you, Randy, we're massive readers. I I read all the time. And and but I also find that a lot of people don't love to read, and it's really hard to get people to read. And one of the the best ways to get people to read is give them a book that's a parable because they're easy to read books and you can fly through them. Yep. It's so simple. And then what you do a really good job of in this book, it's not just a parable that flies, and and you're reading this book, you're enthralled in the story, it's got a baseball theme. Um, you know, so it's a really cool, cool background, a backdrop to the story, but you fly through that, you learn these lessons, and then the second part of the book is you learning how to apply them to your life, which not every parable does that. So uh it's a really cool book. And anybody out there who's looking to be better, and I would encourage everybody to think that way. This is an incredible book for you to reach out and and grab.

SPEAKER_00 49:54

That's great. Thank thanks for the plug there. Yeah. And we can help anybody, any any of your people, you just feel free to reach out. You can find us out there. So yeah, that's what I was gonna ask you.

SPEAKER_02 50:04

Where can they where's the best place to get the book and where's the best place to find you?

SPEAKER_00 50:08

Yeah, they can they can go to leadeveryday.com and well they get the book there as well, but all our stuff is there at leadeveryday.com and they can find me there if they're looking for um a speaker or anything. We're yeah, we if we can serve you, we'll we'll do anything we can to help. And uh you obvious obviously the book is available at Amazon as well. I think there's a I don't think I know there's an audio version uh as well. So if you're if you want to put it on two speed or whatever and get it's only a 90-minute read. It's not gonna kill you. I mean, it you'll you'll you'll love you'll love the story, and I think you'll see yourself in several of the characters if you read it, and then and then the activation guide in the in the end of it. Uh I think you practice your way to high performance. And that that was the heart behind that. We wanted to give you a plan to help you build a great family. That's a great way to end it.

SPEAKER_01 50:54

I think this book is gonna help so many people. Um there's I I can tell that just just me going through, I can identify with certain parts. Um, but what I want to speak to on you specifically, Randy, is just a lot of people want to orientate their lives in a I I change lives kind of manner. And you were literally during that. So thank you so much for all the work that you do with Lead Everyday, um, with Mark, with this book. I I truly believe that it's gonna change lives for the better. That's just such a beautiful thing. So thank you so much, man.

SPEAKER_00 51:24

Well, thank you guys. I I appreciate it. I've been I've just been around a long time as all, and and but I love the fact that younger guys are are carrying the torch and and you're helping encourage leaders, build leaders everywhere you guys go, both of you. I know Jason, you've been at it for a while, but Isaiah, love, love the fact that you're on the front end of it and and I know you're gonna make uh a massive difference for years to come, both of you. So I just I just continue to encourage you to stay faithful and and uh hope your show continues to reach people around the world. Thank you, Randy. That that's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 51:56

We appreciate you deeply, man.