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Staying Curious Is Hard; Here’s How We Practice It And Reward It · The Leader Mentality

• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Leader Mentality Show with Rob Clemens, and we have Nick DiStefano back with us.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, glad to be back, Rob.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Man, it's great to have you.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: You remember the first few times uh I said your name and I just butchered him completely.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's about why Death Stefano.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's what it's like most of the time.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um I tell people it's the Smith of Italy, except you just can't say it.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: The Smith Oh, right, right, right, exactly.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: There's lots of Di Stefano.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: There's so many of us.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's the equivalent of if you said, hey, Mr.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: Smith, and they're like, it's Smythe.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's Smith.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like I yeah, right?
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Gotta be difficult.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, listen, Nick, we're not here, believe it or not, just to talk about your name.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: I know it's disappointing.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: It would be great.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: But but listen, man, it's a new year.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: 2026 is upon us, and and you know, this is the time of resolutions.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, sir.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is the time of of bettering yourself and doing all those things that you you wanted to do in 2025, but you get a fresh start.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: What do you got on your or your list for this year?
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: What are you trying to do?
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: Man, so uh one of the things I've been trying to work on is writing more.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: Right, talk, I run my mouth for a living.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Trying to slow down and write more, right about journaling every day on things like feelings.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: I know it doesn't always fit into business, but we're talking talk a lot about that sometimes.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: No, that's that's one big thing.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then um, I've actually got a big uh race coming up.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm running uh an ultra marathon in another two weeks.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: So that's not this resolution.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: I've worked on that a little bit last year, but okay, okay.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um that's what I got coming up.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: An ultra marathon is longer than 26 miles or whatever a marathon is, right?
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: So how how long is this?
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: So this is actually a 24-hour race.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my god.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: So it's uh if if our elite listeners are familiar with Market Common, okay, and you know the the loop around the lake, the one that it's like a 1.1 mile loop.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this is a group of about 150 people that have registered.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: We're all gonna show up at 8 a.m.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah one morning and we're gonna run as many loops as we can in 24 hours.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: In 24 hours.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you guys are you get a whole group of crazy people.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there's a there's a whole bunch of yeah, right.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's like what is going on?
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: A bunch of people who thought that sounds like an awful idea.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, let's let's do that together.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, you you know, I'm enjoying my life, and I think I want to ruin that right now.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think this is a good way to you know spend a Saturday, right?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, like we'll see how many miles it is at the end.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have an answer as to what that is until the next time we're recording.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, well, I want to know.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I definitely want to know now, and I'm gonna tell you, I mean, ultimately, we do have a theme of the show today, so we'll dive into that.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: For those of you listening and you're like, these guys are just yammering on.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: But but listen, man, I'm interested in this.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: 24-hour race.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, okay.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you you what what if you get 22, 23 hours into this thing and you pull a hammy and you gotta step out?
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: Do you do you get to say you did it?
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: So you can say you did it if you finished just one lap.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's ultimately the winner is the person who does the most miles.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: And there'll be some folks that'll probably do uh you know, 120, 130 miles in 24 hours.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: I will not be anywhere near that.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, okay.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: But I would say even if I pulled a hammy, I will probably still just walk it as much as I can past that.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, you know, you know, so I need even my even my my training, I will not be running for 24 hours straight.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: I am not that physically fit.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: I am not, you know, an a you know, Olympian who is running this and doing 150 miles or something like that.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just for verification, can you show the the people at home your abs and then we'll decide.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's more like a keg.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that kind of a show, but that's okay.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, look, here's the thing you just told me, and I'm super pumped about it.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: I could join this, and as long as I run one lap, I can say I ran ultra marathon.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: I just go around telling everybody, I'm running ultra marathons left and right.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: I did like one mile.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm an ultra marathoner.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: People are like, wow, I I thought you hated running.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I do.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: I do.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, hey, listen, man, keep us posted.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's really cool.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm excited.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: Man, how about yourself?
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: What are your resolutions?
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so so my big things are I'm I'm normally a pretty disciplined guy.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a guy who lives by discipline, right?
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but my goals for this year were were pretty good.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I you know, we we're as you know, I own Carolina Bay's uh Real Estate and Construction, aka Carolina Bay's homes.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and this year we're really uh scaling up on the sunrooms.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, when we talk about scalability, that you know, this is a leadership show.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: How do you scale?
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you have to have systems um that you can teach to people, and and I'd say relatively easily is really nice to know.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you have to be consistent.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so we've spent a lot of last year, you know, really building the consistency up.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna do this like this, and then this person's gonna do this, and this person's gonna do this.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: So this year we're really trying to build that up so we spend a little bit more money on advertising for that, and uh big year ahead, you know.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to quite tell you what my number is, but I'm expecting uh somewhere around uh you know uh to grow by double at least.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: But what I hear is that there is a goal, and I think that's what you know, right?
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I have a I have a goal within my 24-hour race of what I'm gonna try and get to.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh you know, without that goal of something to aim towards to get to, it can often be just you kind of can get very easily go, I don't because you're not gonna see the progress, like you're not gonna double it tomorrow, right?
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's gonna take some time of like, how do I, you know, get curious about what I can change or how do I kind of figure out what is working well and what do I maybe need to learn, and and so it's it's cool, but you have to have the goal to get there.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta have a target, you know.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: They talk about uh a lot of how do you build motivation.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, motivation starts with the little dopamine releases you get when you accomplish things.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: So you we usually know when when you're talking to somebody who's kind of down to the dumps and you say things like, Well, look, you know, set yourself a goal and set one that you can attain.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: Don't don't do something crazy, but you know, hey, I'm gonna walk a mile today and you know, after work.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that's fine.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: When you do that and you accomplish your you get a little dopamine release, it makes you feel good, and now you're you're starting to trend.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: So in this way, I mean, yeah, you know, yeah, I I think, Nick, that the big thing is, like most people, I've set a goal, you know, when you when you're trying to get somewhere, I've set a goal, and you have to have little incremental measures in between to make sure you're on track for that.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: And um, at the end of the day, you know, look, uh, it gives you something to be proud of.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: So that's where we're at, you know.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: I love it.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: Well, listen, let's let's jump into what we're here today to talk about.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: And and maybe it even ties in with a little bit about goal setting and resolutions.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: So we have a uh a topic of the show today called how leaders stay curious and keep learning.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Now, now, thinking about this, so in my brand of leadership, uh, and and anybody who's listened to the show, you know, have an acronym for this.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I say the LN leader is learning continuously.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: This is a tie-in to this.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that great leadership, you you can't say, well, I know everything I need to know, and then you just stop, or you reject every bit of information somebody can give you.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: But I think the better question is not that learning's important.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: We're we're just going right past that.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: We're saying how to stay curious and keep learning.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: So what the heck do you say about that?
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I I love the word s in this topic of stay.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: Stay.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: So I have a new dog at home.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: She's eight months old, she's a black lab, and she is wide open.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: And we're working on right now, stay.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it's this idea of like you're gonna sit in one spot.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so for for me, when I think about staying curious, it is it is okay while you're still moving forward to still stay in that curiosity, that moment of wonder, of uncertainty.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: And we as leaders oftentimes are like, I gotta get past the uncertainty, let me go just go do this other thing because I don't know what I'm doing, I'm not sure, I feel lost, and we go, uh, I know how to do this thing, so let me go do this instead, instead of sitting a second and going, huh, what is this teaching me?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, huh?
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Why am I struggling with this?
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: Or huh, who else could I talk to about this to help me with it?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: And those are all curious questions, but if you don't stay and sit, you move right past the question opportunity.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm going to, and I love that.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: I, you know, and I don't want to get you too far off your topic.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you're good.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing about that.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: When you're in a leadership position, or what you know, I always say leadership is a trait, not a title.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: But however, when you're in what you perceive to be a leadership position, I hope people are looking at you, um, it's sometimes you you want to have all the answers.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: You want to be able to say, hey, I know what I'm doing.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: You have to, you want to feel confident.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is one of those things where you're saying, Well, yeah, but you gotta stay curious.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: And and I feel like a lot of leaders are gonna struggle with that because exactly what you just said happens.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: They say, Well, I I want to prove to everybody I know what's going on, but when you're being curious, that means you're you're looking at things you may not know the answer to right off the bat.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a good thing.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I think it's a great thing.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think I think when we stray away from it and we get uncomfortable with the uncertainty or the vulnerability or the I don't have all the answers, yeah, we lose the opportunity to be curious.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I think also we lose, I think curiosity builds connection.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think if I'm curious about what's I what I don't know about a person, about a process, about a new client, it's how I learn about you.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's how I um connect with you.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: And when I ask a better question or I ask something that gets you to talk about, you know, your passion, then I'm learning about you.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: And that is what I think many leaders don't like to do.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: We like to, like you said, know what's happening and you know, I know that these are my type of customers.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: Well, then I have this one customer that shows up and they do something that is completely in left field, and I think I don't want to work with this person.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: They're a difficult customer versus like, wait, what could I learn from them?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: Or what what are they gonna bring to our business?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: What are they gonna teach us?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: What are they going to you know provide us instead of me going, huh, I don't I don't really want to work with this person.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, I I I think that's a powerful thing.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: You you listen to Jocko a little bit.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: Jocko I was listening to a video of his the other day.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I played it for my team, and he was talking about the fact that you know he he tells a story of when he was in the military, and he said, All he's like the lowest ranking guy in the group, I think.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, All the people are looking through their their uh scopes on their rifles or whatever they had.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that's not the important part of the story, but he said they're they're kind of looking, and he said, you know, he he took the moment to look left and look right, and he could see the whole field in front of him.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: Curiosity there.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, everybody else is looking through the sniper, uh, through the scope, and he said, So what happened is you're so stuck on what your directive is that you never took the curiosity to say what's going on.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: He said he called another command, which actually got them what where they needed to be.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: So very powerful stories.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, can I can I jump in with another thing?
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: You said the thing about you're training your dog.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: I have always looked, I mean, yeah, and some are easier than others.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I I love talking about raising a pet to training employees.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean this because I always tell people when you're training a dog, the most beautiful gift you can get is when that dog pees on the floor when you see it.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: If you do not see it, you're reinforcing a bad habit.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: They think, oh, I can pee anywhere.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: But when you see it, you should rejoice in it.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: You're mad.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, no, no, no, no, no.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: But you rejoice because you're like, oh, I got a chance to teach them what they should have done.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I I think a lot of times that's it's such a beautiful opportunity.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: And just with a little bit of training, within a week, usually they know, okay, I learned what I'm supposed to do.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: But like it, you know, you're you're spot on because it's it's the same thing with curiosity, training employees, you know, a dog.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: The the one thing that I think is is key in all of it is like you're you're setting an expectation, right?
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: To go back to your goal, you're set, you're trying to create some, you know, standard operating procedures, trying to create some processes.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's not going to happen without individuals being curious about what the expectations are, about the process.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: If you just say this is what we're doing and this is how we do it, and right, but like a dog might get that, and you know, an employee might understand that, but it it's still there's like a level of curiosity.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: Dogs are curious, they want to see what's going on, they want to explore things, but like they still know somewhat of a boundary.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: So, like when I say come, and she's on the other side of the yard, I want her to come to me, but I still am going to give her the freedom to kind of go out there and see what's happening.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, sure, sure, sure.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I think the same thing with our employees.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, we just say, like, do this thing, end a story, and you're like, you never let them off the leash, you never let them explore, you never let them learn and grow.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's powerful.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's such it's such a I'm not saying our employees are dogs, but like the reality is like we all have to give people some of that freedom to learn and grow.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, create a culture of curiosity.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: Quite to the contrary, you see, we're we're we're definitely not standard dogs.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: What we're saying is we can expect more from a human than a dog.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: A hundred percent a long way.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so here's the thing what we're getting to.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: If you can train a dog with limited understanding of the world, that you don't go here, you go there, then you can certainly train an employee with consistency on the right thing to do, but we have to be consistent.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: So if if one day I'm I'm telling the dog, well, I'll just pee on the pad, I don't know, and then on another day I'm like, no, no, no, you gotta go outside, and another day I'm like, oh my day?
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: So the dog doesn't know, and I think employees are the same way, at least in give them some consistency and let them be curious.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: I I like that you said that.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think since we're talking about tips, yeah, and we're talking about how do leaders do this, how do you stay curious?
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think you said something there a minute ago that kind of came to my mind, which is as part of your standard operating procedure, you should have something in there that allows you to be curious.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: Nice.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: For example, 100% part of our standard operating procedure.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: Remember if you go back to college, they had strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's a SWOT analysis.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're sitting there and you're a leader and you haven't done a SWOT analysis for your business in a while, it's time to do it.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Go write it up on the board.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you look where you're at on each of those.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is a way to stay curious.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because when you're curious, you go, well, now what is the opportunity?
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: And you're forcing yourself into it.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: Make it part of your standard operating procedure.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: I like that.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it could be a that could be something you I think it's you can almost schedule opportunities to be curious.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: You can do a SWOT on a quarterly basis or a you know, an opportunity to do it, I don't know, let's say every twice a year.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever works for your your business and your schedule.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: But I also think there are opportunities for us to be curious more regularly than oftentimes leaders recognize.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: So, for example, we you know, we close a big deal, or in in my world, we we host an event where we're talking about leadership and development with people.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: We always, every time after we're doing it or complete it, we always do some type of an evaluation afterwards.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: That's curiosity.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: But if I just look at the information that I'm getting from it and I go, okay, cool, that's nice.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like we did great.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't ask, well, I wonder what's the reason they said this thing, or how could we have fixed this piece of the event, or how could I have made this part of the process faster?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, so that that is curiosity, but oftentimes we ask the questions of our clients, of our customers, for me, of the employees that we're providing, you know, professional development for, and then we get all the information and we don't do anything with it.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: Like, don't ask the question and be curious if we're not gonna do something with it.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so schedule those times to like actually talk about it.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: It goes back to the age old thing.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you're if you're like you had a great time, right?
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you had a great time.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what are you learning from that?
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, in essence, I've heard a lot of people who are doing these surveys and they say you rate it like this so you can get this response.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going, well, what good was the survey?
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Why are we doing it?
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's like if you've ever been somewhere and they say, please rate us a nine or a ten on this thing.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, You're not curious at that point.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: Like you're doing this because someone above you is telling you that you need to score a certain thing and it looks good.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: And you're not actually at that point, you're not learning.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: You become you, if you're not curious, you become complacent.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, you just continue to do the same thing, and you're like, Oh, you know what, this this is working, it's great.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, six months later, you're still doing the same amount of business you were doing before.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: So, so herein is a tip in itself, I believe.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's like, you know, as a leader, don't create things where you're rewarded for just doing the process.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: Reward people for maybe innovativeness in some cases.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, because if I tell you, hey, look, your performance is going to be tied to how happy you are with whatever I'm doing right now, I'm encouraging them not to be curious.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'm as I'm actually encouraging the opposite.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm saying you stay in a box.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: So let's reward innovation.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: And that's very cool.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm cooked.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: But but anyway, so back on, Lauren.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: So you said, you know, reward them.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I think one of the pieces of curiosity is we should reward people for being curious.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: We should reward people for learning.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: We should oftentimes we reward as leaders, we reward results.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: The result is an outcome, right?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: That we should I shouldn't reward you because just because you achieved this.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: I want you to know that you know you matter as my employee and as the person that I work with.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And not that you matter because you got this done, but you matter because you got it done because of your strengths and your talents and what makes you who you are.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you're curious enough to ask the question of the client that lands us another deal or that you know causes us to you know grow X, Y, and Z, whatever it is, if you embrace the curiosity, if you embrace the learning and you have then succeeded because of it, I'm gonna reward not just the success but the curiosity.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: I want to say, you know what, Rob, I really appreciate that you were curious in this specific instance, and that's the reason why we succeeded.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: Not just that we succeeded, great job on you know, landing this client, but great job on being curious and learning about this technique that led us to that.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like, you know, as I go through life, I try to be a balanced individual, and I feel like the one thing as we're talking today is we're trying to give some tips for again to go back to stay curious and keep learning for you and your staff.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so we're talking about this technique, and I feel like that the opposite of it is to be like too curious all the time.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so so so there's it's a powerful thing, right?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: So I would like the listener today who's listening and they're going, okay, curiosity's good.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Check, let's go be curious, like 24-7.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, somewhere between curious all the time and curious none of the time is right where you want to be.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: Standard operating procedures, not so much curiosity, other than maybe, you know, why are we doing what we're doing?
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think why is a great question, but doesn't mean you're like, maybe we should be doing something else.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, we're not saying that all the time, but I think it's a healthy thing and install it.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so we've had two tips so far.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, cure pure tips.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: Reward curiosity, have a skill of how you're gonna do it, schedule curiosity, schedule things.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I have one that works for me, yeah, and everybody's not a reader, but nobody has an excuse not to listen to an audio book.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: I like to read, but when I read, I like to read things that are a little outside of the box.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't just want to read like sales tip books all the time.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: But I heard a guy say to me one time, I I thought it was pretty smart, he said, I'm reading a hostage negotiation book.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: And he said that it was from an expert hostage negotiator.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I remembered the name of the book.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: Is it Chris Voss?
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's a fantastic book.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Never split the difference.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it might have been hostage negotiation.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, you know, like when you're when you're trying to convince somebody of something, the against all odds, there's Techniques and and I think it's that kind of thing where when I talk about the curiosity factor, it's like, well, I could just sit here and do the same thing I do all the time, but why don't I read something that's a little outside of the books?
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: I I got one from that one time, it was called Presidential Courage.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: I've talked about this on previous shows, not with us, but Presidential Courage.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: When I talk about being curious, I looked at what presidents had done, going back to some of the most famous presidents you've ever seen, Washington, Lincoln.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it talks about the challenges they had and the resilience they had to have to overcome them and how we review them after the fact, how we look at them a hundred years later.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a powerful thing.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: So when I say be curious, read new things.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: Get outside of your little box that you think you should be doing and and go into things that you can learn more, like uh, I guess uh things to make you a more complete person.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: But what what I hear and what you're saying too, though, is you're not just reading it and learning it.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: I think a key piece of it is you are finding ways to apply it.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, learn it and do something with it.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because it you can again be someone who is learning and and collecting information and listening to podcasts and reading all the books, and you have all this information, and then you never apply it.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: Are you doing anything with it?
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's a problem.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: And it's I think the application is where the curiosity piece really is truly at its, you know, creates the the most impact.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Is you think about it, if you are curious about what you've learned, you're gonna try and do something with it, and you're gonna then figure out did this work for me for our team?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe this idea that I just learned about this president sounds great, and this is what we need, and I'm gonna do this thing.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: But if you don't ever do anything with it, you don't know if it works for your people.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's no different than anyone listening to us right now.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, go and try it.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I would also say if you're curious and you try it, you don't try something one time and go, oh, okay, that didn't work, and then move on.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: Like at that point, you're not actually learning from it, you're just saying, that didn't work, it's not for me, and we move forward.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we have to try things multiple times if we're gonna learn and be curious.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: And um, so I I think that's a fantastic tip, Rob.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: While you were while you were talking about that, I had a chance, and and I agree with everything you said, but I had a chance to look at our upcoming show.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: Our upcoming show is resilience.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess I think the point of when you said what you were saying, I was thinking, well, we got to talk about resilience because curiosity, uh-huh, you can't just be curiosity without resilience.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: A hundred percent.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but because if you do, you'll just like, hey, that's interesting and move on.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting and move on.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta kind of try it and move.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, so you know, as we get into next week's show, we'll get into a little bit more about the resilience piece of it.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it's a good time for us to kind of review.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: So we we talked about the RSR program.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm probably trying to make sense.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know that we have an acronym for it.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's called the Reed, Schedule, and Reward Program.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: We're trying to build curiosity, but in all seriousness, um, look at the great presidents, look at the great CEOs.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody at some point, might have been Steve Jobs, I don't know who really invents the stuff, but said, you know what?
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: What if I could listen to my music digitally?
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: And and what if it was part of my phone?
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: And and that there's a curiosity that makes great, great invention and it inspires people.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, I think this is a very powerful lesson.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: Did we miss anything?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: Anything that uh you were hoping?
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: I I I truly I truly think that curiosity is a underutilized skill.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it's very easy as leaders for us to think, oh well, you know, you know, my kids are curious.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: I don't I don't need it's something that we don't think about regularly.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: Kid and kids are super curious.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: Like my eight-year-old asks me like 25 questions before we even get out of the car, and it's only a two-minute ride to school.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's like, yeah, but he's but he wants to know.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_01: He he has this desire, this like innate hunger for more information for and it's I mean, it can be like the most random question.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'll never forget the day he asked me a question that really made me think about what work is like.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: I remember driving home from school one day and he said to me, Daddy, who's your best friend at work?
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, What?
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like, where is that coming from?
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: But it made me think about like what is it like when we work somewhere?
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I got kind of got curious about when we have someone that I can say, like, I really enjoy working with this person.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to do a shout out to your best friend at work right now?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody else likes you up.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone else is like, screw you, Nick.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's Christina Jackson from now.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah, yeah.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: Who is my uh I'm only I'm drinking Christina.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'm saying she's I I love you, Christina.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: You're fantastic.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm saying that because he's on the board and she works for the foundation.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: So I shout out.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: Shout out to the McLeod Foundation.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's funny, dude.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: But no, really, like it's it's a question that like he was just genuinely being curious.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I think about if we just asked better questions or more questions regularly, we'd be better leaders.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: The world beats it out of you.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: When you're when you're growing up, the we bird, the the world beats it out of you.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: What I mean is we we are pods of information just trying to collect as we're younger, and and and I'll and I'll elaborate on that.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're in a leadership role and somebody says, why?
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why are we doing that?
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you you have the option of just shutting that down right there.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: You go do it, and but when you can say, look, this is the answer, and you know, let's not beat people down.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Let's give them a chance to really understand better things because I don't know about you, but when I understand something, I get more creative.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: You you give me something and I'm gonna really build out of it.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: I I'll say I read a book once and it was talking about learning with the five senses.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it talked about the fact that, you know, when you look at a baby, a baby really learns through putting things in their mouth.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: You taste, you hear, you smell, you you listen, you see.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: And it is something that as we get to being adults, we tend to just learn like visually and maybe audibly, or some combination of those, depending on how your brain works.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going, well, why why don't we why don't we feel things?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Why don't we test things?
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Why don't we?
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we just we grew out of it, we think we're past that.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: So uh the next time you're at the office and you got the stapler in your mouth, you heard Rob Clemens told you.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, my friends is leadership.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: Put the stapler in your mouth.
• 26:04
  unknown: All right, right.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, now I understand this thing.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: Now it's classic.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: Then they'll be in our emergency room.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right, exactly.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: So uh bad tips will Rob Clemens know.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: No, but in any way, well, Nick, let's call it a show for today.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: I love this, it's a great topic.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Stay curious, keep learning.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we do want to thank all of our sponsors, Caroline Bay's Real Estate and Construction, Caroline Bay's Homes.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: We also want to thank McCloud Health Foundation and uh just such a great program out there.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, yeah, man.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, and obviously, Nick, as always, thanks for being on the show today.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: We'll have you back on the next one.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll see you all next time on the Leader Mentality show with Rob Clemens and Nick DiStefano.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: You got it.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: All right, see you next time.