Latest / MountainWest Capital Network: Welcome to the Winners' Circle / Leadership Principles Built to Last | The Story Behind FranklinCovey with Paul Walker

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Leadership Principles Built to Last | The Story Behind FranklinCovey with Paul Walker · MountainWest Capital Network: Welcome to the Winners' Circle

0:02
Speaker 1: Once you get in, just focus on doing the thing
0:06
Speaker 1: you've been asked to do exceptionally well, and the next
0:08
Speaker 1: thing will take care of itself. The true differentiator when
0:12
Speaker 1: your technology is not differentiated. We believe that Franklin Covey
0:16
Speaker 1: will come back to the quality of the culture. If
0:19
Speaker 1: you're somebody who can not just identify a problem orn opportunity,
0:23
Speaker 1: but actually come in and help, the world is going
0:26
Speaker 1: to have plenty of use for you, and your opportunities
0:29
Speaker 1: will be unlimited.
0:35
Speaker 2: You're listening to the Mountain West Capital Network podcast, your
0:38
Speaker 2: gateway to the Winner Circle. I'm Sherry, the executive director
0:41
Speaker 2: of Mountain West Capital Network.
0:43
Speaker 3: And I'm Jason, President of the Mountain West Capital Network
0:45
Speaker 3: and managing director of Protivity. Every episode, we sit down
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Speaker 3: with Utah's most visionary business leaders to uncover the ideas, risks,
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Speaker 3: and wins behind the state's fastest growing companies.
0:57
Speaker 2: Mountain's Capital Network is best known for the Utah one hundred,
1:01
Speaker 2: our flagship event that recognizes the state's fastest growing businesses.
1:05
Speaker 2: But behind every number is a story, and that's what
1:08
Speaker 2: this podcast is all about.
1:10
Speaker 3: You're not just tuning in to hear what's happened you're
1:13
Speaker 3: stepping inside the Winner Circle to understand how it happened.
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Speaker 2: Today we have the pleasure of interviewing Paul Walker, President
1:21
Speaker 2: and Chief Executive Officer of Franklin Covey. Paul has been
1:24
Speaker 2: with the company since two thousand, holding a range of
1:27
Speaker 2: leadership roles. In twenty sixteen, he relocated to the company's
1:32
Speaker 2: Salt Lake City location, where he now serves with them today.
1:36
Speaker 3: Paul has served as a business developer, client partner and
1:40
Speaker 3: general manager of the UK operations. After relocating to Salt Lake,
1:44
Speaker 3: he led the company's Enterprise division before being appointed President
1:48
Speaker 3: and CEO in twenty nineteen.
1:51
Speaker 2: Paul has led the company through major digital transformation initiatives,
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Speaker 2: including the All Access Pass, which provides flexible and affordable
2:00
Speaker 2: access to Franklin Covey content, tools and technology for personal effectiveness, leadership,
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Speaker 2: and execution. He holds a Bachelor of Arts and Communications
2:09
Speaker 2: from Brigham Young University and lives in Salt Lake City
2:12
Speaker 2: with his wife and four children.
2:15
Speaker 3: Paul, Welcome to the Winter Circle.
2:16
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. It's great to be here, it's great
2:18
Speaker 1: to have you.
2:19
Speaker 3: So just to kick it off, I want to you know,
2:22
Speaker 3: just given you know how long you've been with Franklin Covey,
2:25
Speaker 3: you know what kind of started that connection? And then
2:29
Speaker 3: maybe just high level, what does Franklin Covey do? We
2:33
Speaker 3: just for those listeners, And I can't imagine that any
2:36
Speaker 3: listener doesn't understand like what Franklin Covey does. But I
2:40
Speaker 3: mean there's probably some maybe a limited amount that you know,
2:44
Speaker 3: maybe need to know a little bit more.
2:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, great, well again, thanks for having me here today.
2:48
Speaker 1: As was mentioned, I started with the company long time ago,
2:51
Speaker 1: two thousand actually a in a what we call today
2:54
Speaker 1: SDR Sales development representative role. I was a business developer
2:58
Speaker 1: back in those days, and that's how I started with
2:59
Speaker 1: the company. And then I've kind of grown up over
3:01
Speaker 1: the years. Interestingly enough, my first contact with the companies
3:05
Speaker 1: long before I ever knew that there was even a
3:07
Speaker 1: company called Franklin Covey. My dad worked for the New
3:10
Speaker 1: York Life Insurance Company, and when I was about ten
3:13
Speaker 1: or eleven years old, living in Seattle, he went to
3:16
Speaker 1: a management meeting in New York and he came back
3:18
Speaker 1: and I was the oldest of five kids, and you know,
3:20
Speaker 1: when your parents get home, you're clamoring for what's the
3:23
Speaker 1: souvenir and he had no souvenirs. And I remember, like
3:26
Speaker 1: my younger siblings were clinging to his leg in the kitchen,
3:29
Speaker 1: like what'd you bring? What'd you bring? And he could
3:30
Speaker 1: not wait to take us back into the family room.
3:33
Speaker 1: And our family had just recently got his first VCR,
3:36
Speaker 1: you know, playing VHS tapes, and Stephen Covey had actually
3:40
Speaker 1: spoken at this management meeting. They had New York Life
3:43
Speaker 1: had invited him in and Stephen was there to talk
3:44
Speaker 1: about paradigm shifts. And this had had this profound impact
3:48
Speaker 1: on my dad. And I still remember sitting there as
3:51
Speaker 1: a kid watching my dad as he put the VHS
3:54
Speaker 1: tape in and up popped this bald guy, Stephen Covey,
3:58
Speaker 1: and then it was recorded clip of his keynote talking
4:00
Speaker 1: about paradigm shifts, and my dad was just so into it.
4:03
Speaker 1: He misread his audience. We as young kids, had no
4:06
Speaker 1: interest whatsoever. But I just looking back on it now,
4:08
Speaker 1: I remember there was so much of what was what
4:11
Speaker 1: Franklin Covey and what Stephen Covey in particular was teaching
4:13
Speaker 1: had started to really become part of my dad's ethos
4:17
Speaker 1: and philosophy. So I grew up in a house like that,
4:19
Speaker 1: had no idea there was a company, and just graduated
4:22
Speaker 1: from college, was looking for a job right right place,
4:25
Speaker 1: right time, and I had the good fortune of joining
4:27
Speaker 1: Franklin Covey. Oh that's awesome.
4:29
Speaker 3: Now And just for those listeners, I mean, Franklin Covey,
4:33
Speaker 3: how would you describe the business?
4:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we are we're a leadership and organizational performance company.
4:40
Speaker 1: So we help organizations all around the world develop their
4:43
Speaker 1: leaders and not just developed leaders, but also then help
4:47
Speaker 1: those same organizations improve their performance. Any of you who
4:51
Speaker 1: have led, you know one of the difficulties is once
4:53
Speaker 1: you get the strategy set, you know where you're trying
4:55
Speaker 1: to go, getting everyone in the organization aligned, moving in
4:59
Speaker 1: the right direction, with the right level of speed and
5:02
Speaker 1: trust and good leadership and the ability to execute those
5:06
Speaker 1: actually become the hard parts of driving organizational performance. And
5:10
Speaker 1: we're the partner to companies all around the world to
5:12
Speaker 1: create those conditions. I love that.
5:16
Speaker 2: Gosh, Franklin Covey has been around for so long, and
5:20
Speaker 2: it's something that I feel like we should take a
5:23
Speaker 2: moment really to talk about the story behind Franklin Covey
5:28
Speaker 2: and how the company got started. I mean, employees have
5:32
Speaker 2: been there and leaders like you been there for years
5:35
Speaker 2: and years and years, like, what was the origin story
5:37
Speaker 2: of that?
5:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll tell you the story. I wasn't around to
5:40
Speaker 1: create an origin, right, So I've been here just for
5:42
Speaker 1: only twenty five years.
5:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, only only twenty five.
5:45
Speaker 1: Years, So more than forty years ago here in Utah. Actually,
5:48
Speaker 1: the company, the roots of the company were created and
5:52
Speaker 1: it was two different organizations back then. So up in
5:54
Speaker 1: the Salt Lake area there was a gentleman by the
5:57
Speaker 1: name of Hiram Smith and he built with some other
6:01
Speaker 1: people and founded a company that was the Franklin Quest Organization.
6:05
Speaker 1: So all of you, we're going to date ourselves here,
6:07
Speaker 1: all of you who grew up using the Franklin Planner,
6:09
Speaker 1: the leather bound Planner, Sherry. But that became a phenomenon.
6:17
Speaker 1: This is pre iPhone, pre BlackBerry, pre Microsoft Outlook, pre
6:22
Speaker 1: Palm pilot days when people literally planned their lives, went
6:26
Speaker 1: to work every day. And the organizational tool for more
6:29
Speaker 1: than one hundred million people, we sold over one hundred
6:31
Speaker 1: million planners was the Franklin Day Planner. And so while
6:35
Speaker 1: that business was going and that was actually the entity
6:37
Speaker 1: that went public, became a publicly traded company. The same time,
6:41
Speaker 1: down the road in Provo, Utah, there was a guy
6:44
Speaker 1: by the name of Stephen Covey. He was a professor,
6:47
Speaker 1: and he was on a quest to figure out what
6:51
Speaker 1: was it that made exceptional humans highly effective people highly effective?
6:58
Speaker 1: And he went and did a bunch of research which
7:00
Speaker 1: and distilled all this research down into something that became
7:03
Speaker 1: known as the Seven Habits of highly effective People. And
7:06
Speaker 1: it was interesting that in all the world, these two
7:08
Speaker 1: people were there. And what was true about both these
7:10
Speaker 1: organizations was at their core there were organizations trying to
7:13
Speaker 1: help change human behavior and try to instill these habits
7:17
Speaker 1: of human effectiveness that would then translate into all aspects
7:20
Speaker 1: of life, including at work. And the companies merged together
7:24
Speaker 1: a little over twenty five years ago to become Franklin Covey.
7:28
Speaker 1: So the company's been operating under that name for that
7:30
Speaker 1: amount of time. We're not in the planner business anymore.
7:33
Speaker 1: We eventually did sell that business, although you can still
7:35
Speaker 1: get a Franklin Planner, as you know, Sherry, But we
7:40
Speaker 1: sold that business many many years ago, seventeen or eighteen
7:42
Speaker 1: years ago, and really doubled down on and have focused
7:45
Speaker 1: on what I talked about earlier being this partner to
7:48
Speaker 1: leaders and organizations of all sizes and in all industries
7:51
Speaker 1: to help them measurably improve their performance. Yeah. I love that.
7:58
Speaker 3: I think the what you just described was solving problems,
8:03
Speaker 3: solving some things in really highlighting the why, and maybe
8:07
Speaker 3: you can expound on that, because I think it's really
8:09
Speaker 3: important for our listeners to understand what are you as
8:13
Speaker 3: you're going out and you've partnered with leading organizations throughout
8:17
Speaker 3: the world. What are you trying to focus on or
8:21
Speaker 3: are there some areas of focus or principles that you're
8:25
Speaker 3: trying to solve.
8:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely. As I mentioned a minute ago, one of
8:30
Speaker 1: the difficult aspects of leadership and the opportunity is to
8:34
Speaker 1: get that human part of strategy and of execution right.
8:39
Speaker 1: In fact, as we've already gone too far into this
8:41
Speaker 1: podcast without using the word AI, so I'll bring that
8:45
Speaker 1: up now because it seems like you have to do
8:47
Speaker 1: that every five minutes or so nowadays. But in a
8:50
Speaker 1: world where increasingly knowledge is going to be ubiquitous and
8:55
Speaker 1: available to all, we're all going to be able to
8:57
Speaker 1: access a lot of the same tools, and AI is
8:59
Speaker 1: going to help elevate the level of knowledge and insight
9:02
Speaker 1: for everybody for every organization that I think will become
9:04
Speaker 1: less and less of a competitive advantage. And so if
9:07
Speaker 1: the questions around what should we do strategically, where should
9:11
Speaker 1: we go? We're going to get a lot of insight
9:13
Speaker 1: from AI and from you know, other other partners out
9:16
Speaker 1: there in the world. And increasingly the technology is pretty
9:20
Speaker 1: much the same for everybody. I can get it from Anthropic,
9:23
Speaker 1: I can get it from Open AI, I can get
9:25
Speaker 1: it from Microsoft. The true differentiator when your technology is
9:30
Speaker 1: not differentiated and the level of knowledge and access to
9:34
Speaker 1: information that you have is not differentiated, I believe and
9:37
Speaker 1: we believe at Franklin Covey will come back to the
9:40
Speaker 1: quality of the culture, how high performing is that culture,
9:43
Speaker 1: the quality of the relationships, the ability to make decisions
9:46
Speaker 1: for teams to move at speed, if with a high
9:48
Speaker 1: level of synergy and coordination like those most human of
9:52
Speaker 1: human capabilities and skills, I think actually will become an
9:56
Speaker 1: even bigger differentiator for organizations of all types. And so
10:00
Speaker 1: that's the place where where Franklin Covey really does play
10:02
Speaker 1: and we bring as you mentioned this principles timeless principles
10:06
Speaker 1: of leadership of human effectiveness to bear as we help
10:10
Speaker 1: organizations shape and form their cultures. I love that.
10:14
Speaker 2: To me, it's just so fascinating. I mean, to be
10:16
Speaker 2: able to start as this, this is your platform as
10:20
Speaker 2: a company so many years ago, but then to grow
10:23
Speaker 2: into what you are now. And you've been there for
10:26
Speaker 2: a really long time, so you've been part of that
10:28
Speaker 2: growth and that change. And we're going to talk about
10:30
Speaker 2: that a little bit more. But so a second ago,
10:35
Speaker 2: you said principles based leadership, and I want to talk
10:39
Speaker 2: about that for a minute because I love we're always
10:41
Speaker 2: talking about AI just like you were, but it comes
10:44
Speaker 2: back to the people. That full circle comes back to
10:49
Speaker 2: the people behind it, and talk about that in practice,
10:54
Speaker 2: that principles based leadership.
10:56
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, like gravity as a principle in the natural world,
11:02
Speaker 1: there are principles that govern all aspects of our lives,
11:05
Speaker 1: whether we appreciate or understand them or not. The same
11:08
Speaker 1: is true about human interaction and about leadership. Something is
11:12
Speaker 1: simple as as an individual, as a human being, I
11:17
Speaker 1: have the ability to make choices. That's a fundamental principle.
11:23
Speaker 1: And when you understand that, and you understand that you
11:25
Speaker 1: have a choice and you can make a choice. You
11:27
Speaker 1: can make a choice to get on board or not
11:28
Speaker 1: get on board with a direction that my team or
11:31
Speaker 1: that my leader wants to go. Understanding that as a leader,
11:34
Speaker 1: that the people who work with you every day have
11:37
Speaker 1: that choice and they don't just have to do what
11:40
Speaker 1: you say. Therefore, how will you lead in a way
11:43
Speaker 1: that will get people to want to volunteer their best efforts,
11:46
Speaker 1: not just contribute because it's an expectation or because it's
11:49
Speaker 1: a condition of employment. Boy, I can tell you the
11:52
Speaker 1: outcomes for leaders who lead where they create the conditions
11:57
Speaker 1: every day for people to volunteer their very best effort.
12:00
Speaker 1: Those outcomes are completely different from the outcomes of somebody
12:04
Speaker 1: who comes in and says it's my way or the highway.
12:05
Speaker 1: It's very command and control and so understanding some of
12:08
Speaker 1: these principles, even as simple as the principle of choice,
12:13
Speaker 1: and so everything that we do, we're tracing back these
12:15
Speaker 1: principles because what's happening in the world right now is
12:17
Speaker 1: the rate of change is so fast, and to try
12:22
Speaker 1: to teach just a skill, the life cycle of that
12:25
Speaker 1: skill may be very short, the lifetime value of that skill,
12:29
Speaker 1: but the principle that underlies something actually can be enduring,
12:32
Speaker 1: and how you would apply that principle in different environments
12:35
Speaker 1: can be something you can cling to as a leader
12:37
Speaker 1: and apply over and over again.
12:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that.
12:40
Speaker 3: I'd love to get your insights, Paul, and thank you.
12:43
Speaker 3: These are just fascinated right now with some of the
12:47
Speaker 3: things you've highlighted, and I know you're exposed to some
12:51
Speaker 3: great companies in global leaders within a number of different sectors.
12:56
Speaker 3: But as it relates to helping business leaders moving from
13:00
Speaker 3: having good ideas to executing them consistently.
13:03
Speaker 1: What have you seen? What? What?
13:05
Speaker 3: What have you seen as far as maybe some good
13:07
Speaker 3: examples and maybe not so good, not so effective examples
13:11
Speaker 3: as far as moving from just having some good ideas
13:14
Speaker 3: to execution.
13:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that what we see is the first
13:20
Speaker 1: challenge with execution is that there are more good ideas
13:25
Speaker 1: than there is capacity to execute those ideas. It makes sense,
13:30
Speaker 1: and we've done quite a bit of surveying and research.
13:32
Speaker 1: We have a whole execution practice inside Franklin Covey where
13:35
Speaker 1: all that all that practice does is help organizations, once
13:38
Speaker 1: they figured out their strategy, get narrowed down to the
13:41
Speaker 1: fewest critical goals that would move that strategy forward, and
13:46
Speaker 1: this is where less is more. We're all busy getting
13:49
Speaker 1: people's attention mind share. This metaphor we have is that
13:54
Speaker 1: every organization is operating in a whirlwind, and that whirlwind
13:59
Speaker 1: is necessary inside your day job and inside the whirlwind
14:02
Speaker 1: of that day job or all the actions that you
14:04
Speaker 1: need to be taking just to keep the lights on,
14:06
Speaker 1: keep the current customer serve. Like if you look at
14:09
Speaker 1: your calendar, most of what you're doing every day is
14:11
Speaker 1: just maintaining the current operation. If a leader comes along
14:15
Speaker 1: and says, hey, I got five new ideas and each
14:17
Speaker 1: of those are going to be close to a full
14:19
Speaker 1: time effort, you leave employees caught. They end up with
14:23
Speaker 1: like a foot on the We used to go fishing
14:25
Speaker 1: a lot as a kid, and my dad would start
14:26
Speaker 1: to pull the boat away, and the most uncomfortable place
14:28
Speaker 1: is when you had a foot on the boat and
14:30
Speaker 1: you still had a foot on the dock and they
14:31
Speaker 1: were separating. You leave employees in that situation where they
14:34
Speaker 1: want to try to pursue the new things, but there's
14:36
Speaker 1: a huge demand and a lot of a nursery required
14:39
Speaker 1: just to maintain the existing operations. So you've got to
14:41
Speaker 1: be very careful as a leader to not introduce too
14:44
Speaker 1: many new, big strategic goals at one time. The research
14:49
Speaker 1: shows that if you try to execute ten goals at
14:52
Speaker 1: a time as a team, you'll get none done. Right.
14:56
Speaker 1: If you try to do three at a time, you
14:58
Speaker 1: might get one done, yeah, right, But if you do one,
15:02
Speaker 1: you can get that one done and you can really
15:04
Speaker 1: do it with excellence. And so I think the first
15:05
Speaker 1: part of execution is to really keep the focus narrow.
15:08
Speaker 1: Doesn't mean you can't eventually get to things. The metaphor
15:11
Speaker 1: here might be of an air traffic controller. As an
15:13
Speaker 1: air traffic controller, you know who's may out there in
15:15
Speaker 1: Salt Lake at the airport trying to land planes. There
15:17
Speaker 1: are a number of planes that are on their radar
15:19
Speaker 1: that they're responsible for, but only one of those planes
15:21
Speaker 1: is getting their finest effort and diligence and attention right now,
15:25
Speaker 1: and it is the one that is in the process
15:27
Speaker 1: of landing right this very minute. And then they'll go
15:29
Speaker 1: grab the next one and they'll bring it in, and
15:30
Speaker 1: then the next one. And I think there's something there
15:32
Speaker 1: for us as leaders to remember. They'll want to overwhelm
15:35
Speaker 1: our people, and I think most execution breaks down because
15:38
Speaker 1: there's just too many things we're trying to act issue.
15:40
Speaker 1: And it's a challenge because right now there's a lot
15:42
Speaker 1: of change and a lot of transformation required, and so
15:45
Speaker 1: I think a leader needs to measure two or three
15:48
Speaker 1: times cut once as they think about where to focus
15:51
Speaker 1: their team.
15:53
Speaker 2: You know, I've been listening to a few other podcasts
15:57
Speaker 2: that you've done, and obviously then you've in with Franklin
16:00
Speaker 2: Heavy for so long. How does a company like that
16:05
Speaker 2: go through the change and make those decisions of like, no,
16:08
Speaker 2: this is where the this is where the company is
16:10
Speaker 2: going next, and this is where we're changing, and this
16:13
Speaker 2: is our pivot, this is our growth plan. And keep
16:16
Speaker 2: somebody like you and others who have been with the
16:19
Speaker 2: company for so long sounds to me like once you
16:22
Speaker 2: work there, you don't leave. And you're a lot of
16:25
Speaker 2: great people, a lot of great talent. So what is
16:28
Speaker 2: that principle that keeps you there and gives you that
16:33
Speaker 2: feeling that, yeah, this is the right direction that we're
16:36
Speaker 2: going in. I'm just curious about that.
16:39
Speaker 1: We do have a great mix of really good, long
16:43
Speaker 1: standing people at Franklin Kevin and a lot of new
16:45
Speaker 1: talent as well, and I think We're in a very
16:48
Speaker 1: luxurious position that way, to have such enduring strength and
16:52
Speaker 1: also to be able to go get those fresh new
16:55
Speaker 1: perspective and ideas that come in and you really get
16:57
Speaker 1: a great synergistic outcome where one one plus one doesn't
17:00
Speaker 1: just equal to it equals something a lot more than two.
17:03
Speaker 1: To your question, that's part of my job as a CEO.
17:07
Speaker 1: I don't have a lot of responsibilities if you strip
17:10
Speaker 1: it all away. One is to work with the team
17:12
Speaker 1: and the board to make sure that we have a
17:13
Speaker 1: strategic direction that is clear and is winning. And I
17:18
Speaker 1: don't have all those ideas. Promise you that I have
17:22
Speaker 1: a lot of context and history and perspective from twenty
17:25
Speaker 1: five years, but I can't divine and see the future.
17:28
Speaker 1: And so that's where we as a team come together,
17:30
Speaker 1: and that's really kind of my second big responsibility is
17:33
Speaker 1: to make sure that we field the best team we
17:36
Speaker 1: can possibly field at the executive level, but also down
17:39
Speaker 1: through the organization. And that's where Jim Collins talked about
17:42
Speaker 1: first who, then what why When you get the right
17:44
Speaker 1: people on the team, and then you start to wrestle
17:47
Speaker 1: through some of those conversations where what are our real
17:49
Speaker 1: strengths today, How could we apply those into the future.
17:52
Speaker 1: Where do we not have the strengths we're going to
17:54
Speaker 1: need to be successful in the future. And the wrestling
17:56
Speaker 1: through that as a team. I think that's some of
17:58
Speaker 1: the most important work that we do because then downstream
18:01
Speaker 1: from that we can get everybody aligned and really make
18:04
Speaker 1: sure that. You know, we have about a thousand associates
18:06
Speaker 1: in the company, and the idea of getting a thousand
18:08
Speaker 1: people all aligned every day putting their best efforts against
18:12
Speaker 1: the fewest critical things. It's amazing how much progress you
18:14
Speaker 1: can make. But it starts with really spending the time
18:17
Speaker 1: to get really clear on what what should that future
18:20
Speaker 1: look like. It's not easy, but if you get the
18:23
Speaker 1: right people, it really helps.
18:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'd love to understand just from what you said
18:30
Speaker 3: just now and how that ties to being a public company. Right,
18:34
Speaker 3: So you're in a very complex not only from a
18:38
Speaker 3: regulatory appliance perspective, but also you have a responsibility to stakeholders,
18:43
Speaker 3: to the board. You mentioned the board, how is that going?
18:46
Speaker 3: Like what I mean, you know, especially with AI and
18:49
Speaker 3: there's a lot of there's a lot going on, cybersecurity, risk,
18:53
Speaker 3: you got other things that are required to be disclosed
18:58
Speaker 3: from a CEO perspective, from your perspective, you know, how
19:02
Speaker 3: is it being a public company? How you know what challenges?
19:07
Speaker 3: What are the things that you enjoy with with that
19:10
Speaker 3: responsibility as well?
19:13
Speaker 1: But you make it sound like I don't know if
19:15
Speaker 1: I could get out of bed tomorrow morning. Right Well,
19:17
Speaker 1: there is there is a lot, Yeah, there is. There is.
19:20
Speaker 1: There's a lot going on, by the way, I would say,
19:22
Speaker 1: just leading in general today, whether you're the CEO and
19:26
Speaker 1: it's a public company, it's a private company, whether you're
19:29
Speaker 1: a leader inside a company, it is more complex and
19:33
Speaker 1: more difficult to be a leader today perhaps than it's
19:36
Speaker 1: ever been before. I don't know. I wasn't leading, you know,
19:39
Speaker 1: in previous generations, but I know it's difficult right now.
19:42
Speaker 1: There's a lot on people's plates. To your specific question
19:46
Speaker 1: about being a public company, I don't really know any different.
19:49
Speaker 1: It's how we've been and maybe that's good. But you know,
19:53
Speaker 1: we have a incredibly supportive board. We're very fortunate, Franklin Covey,
19:57
Speaker 1: It's it's an incredible board. The mission attract really unique
20:02
Speaker 1: and incredible people, and that's certainly true of us. We
20:04
Speaker 1: have a very committed shareholder base as well. Again, this
20:07
Speaker 1: is the kind of this is This is the kind
20:09
Speaker 1: of business that we're in, the kind of kind of
20:11
Speaker 1: company that once it gets in your blood, it really
20:14
Speaker 1: is in your blood. We're the better we do as
20:17
Speaker 1: a company. We know that we're doing really a lot
20:19
Speaker 1: of good out there for our clients as well, and
20:21
Speaker 1: that's a unique, a unique thing to be able to say.
20:24
Speaker 1: So we navigate as best we can. As you can imagine,
20:27
Speaker 1: we're spending a lot of time on AI right now,
20:30
Speaker 1: thinking about what's AI? How does AI integrate into our products?
20:36
Speaker 1: What are the risks to our business, What are the
20:39
Speaker 1: opportunities for us to lean into out in the marketplace
20:42
Speaker 1: that AI is going to create for us? How do
20:45
Speaker 1: we use AI inside the company to become more efficient,
20:49
Speaker 1: more effective? So many of the questions I think that
20:51
Speaker 1: probably every CEO and every leadership team's asking. We're definitely
20:54
Speaker 1: asking and spending a lot of time on cyber Oh
20:57
Speaker 1: my gosh, yeah, we you know, you don't want to
21:01
Speaker 1: spend too much time thinking about that, and you're really
21:03
Speaker 1: glad you have some people who are on that every day.
21:06
Speaker 1: Thinking about security. Absolutely, it's so important right now and
21:10
Speaker 1: we're knock on wood, fortunate we have some great people
21:13
Speaker 1: on that inside our company.
21:15
Speaker 3: How do you how do you feel from an AI perspective?
21:17
Speaker 3: And I know you've you've highlighted some of those already,
21:20
Speaker 3: but how do you feel that's going I mean, how
21:23
Speaker 3: do you feel from a strategy perspective? You know, maybe
21:26
Speaker 3: walk walk us through. How does that look like for
21:29
Speaker 3: Franklin Kelly going forward?
21:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe in three three areas. So first, I believe,
21:34
Speaker 1: and I mentioned it briefly earlier, that AI creates a
21:37
Speaker 1: real opportunity for us in the business that we're in.
21:42
Speaker 1: As as more companies start to have access to a
21:47
Speaker 1: lot of the same things, what really becomes different is,
21:50
Speaker 1: and it creates a real competitive advantage for them is
21:54
Speaker 1: how well led they are, what that culture looks like,
21:57
Speaker 1: how you know many of the things that I mentioned earlier,
21:59
Speaker 1: And I think there's an oity those are the hard
22:01
Speaker 1: things to get right. And we're in a world right
22:04
Speaker 1: now where people are vibe coding their way into a
22:07
Speaker 1: lot of things. Can you imagine vibe coding your culture right,
22:10
Speaker 1: or vibe coding what that leader's going to look like?
22:13
Speaker 1: I mean, it's so critical who sits in those leadership
22:16
Speaker 1: roles and how capable they are. And I don't know
22:19
Speaker 1: what the employment picture is going to look like, but
22:21
Speaker 1: whether there's one hundred percent of the people employed or
22:24
Speaker 1: ninety percent of the people, and I don't know what
22:25
Speaker 1: that'll look like. My personal opinion is that actually AI
22:28
Speaker 1: is going to drive opportunities we can't even imagine right now,
22:32
Speaker 1: much like previous transformations have. But nonetheless, there are still
22:35
Speaker 1: going to be a lot of people who are coming
22:37
Speaker 1: in every day, and organization's success is going to be
22:40
Speaker 1: largely dependent on the quality of those people, the way
22:43
Speaker 1: they're able to think, interact, the judgment, the discernment. So
22:47
Speaker 1: I think AI is really a net positive for us
22:50
Speaker 1: because of where we play as a company. That's the first.
22:53
Speaker 1: The second we are using AI, and we'll continue to
22:56
Speaker 1: use AI in the client facing solutions we bring. We're
23:00
Speaker 1: we're a company that's so rich in data. We've trained
23:02
Speaker 1: over thirty million managers on how to become more effective.
23:06
Speaker 1: We know a lot about what are the conditions where
23:10
Speaker 1: great leadership takes place and where what happens when those
23:12
Speaker 1: are those conditions are absent and bringing that data to
23:15
Speaker 1: bear and having AI help guide those decisions for our
23:18
Speaker 1: clients as they think about succession planning and who's ready
23:21
Speaker 1: to be promoted and where are the skill gaps and
23:23
Speaker 1: how can you develop people? And you know, and we
23:25
Speaker 1: talked about execution earlier, we do thousands of team engagements
23:29
Speaker 1: a year on the topic of execution. And so we
23:31
Speaker 1: know in a particular industry, what are the behaviors and
23:34
Speaker 1: leading indicators that would actually lead to success against this
23:37
Speaker 1: particular goal versus what does it look like in this
23:39
Speaker 1: other industry, And so AI gives us these opportunities to
23:42
Speaker 1: mine that data and to integrate it more into our
23:45
Speaker 1: products and solutions. And then third, like everybody we were,
23:49
Speaker 1: we've got great opportunities as we think about how we
23:52
Speaker 1: operate the business and where there are opportunities to automate
23:57
Speaker 1: with AI the routine things so that our people can
24:00
Speaker 1: step up and work at a much higher level. Right,
24:03
Speaker 1: there's a lot of things we still ask people to
24:05
Speaker 1: do that we should be asking AI to do. And
24:07
Speaker 1: then we can take those people who are so capable
24:10
Speaker 1: and deploy them on something that's a step function greater
24:14
Speaker 1: in terms of where they could be spending their time
24:15
Speaker 1: to figure out the next big unlock for our clients,
24:18
Speaker 1: for our customers. So in those three areas, we're chipping
24:21
Speaker 1: away every day. It feels like it's a nine inning
24:24
Speaker 1: game and we're all kind of I don't know that
24:26
Speaker 1: we've made it out of the first inning. I think
24:28
Speaker 1: we're kind of first bat or look at first pitchtill
24:30
Speaker 1: right there's I think we're still early days on this,
24:33
Speaker 1: but it's exciting.
24:34
Speaker 2: It's great.
24:35
Speaker 3: I love your optimism and I love your energy. I
24:38
Speaker 3: think it's it's important for all of us to recognize
24:41
Speaker 3: what you just highlighted.
24:43
Speaker 1: Thank you for that.
24:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. So this is kind of a little divergent off
24:48
Speaker 2: off of the topic Bells. So I'm super interested in this,
24:51
Speaker 2: and that is you started right out of college working
24:55
Speaker 2: for this company, and what was your role.
24:58
Speaker 1: I was a business developer, so an insight sales setting
25:01
Speaker 1: appointments for salespeople.
25:02
Speaker 2: Okay. And then your next position was what I got.
25:05
Speaker 1: To become one of those account executives.
25:07
Speaker 2: Okay.
25:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what you wanted was to get promoted to
25:10
Speaker 1: that role. And somebody crazy enough take a shot on
25:13
Speaker 1: me and let me get promoted to that role.
25:15
Speaker 2: Okay. There's a lot of young people that listen to
25:18
Speaker 2: this podcast and so, and a lot of people that are.
25:21
Speaker 2: You know, we're in the graduation stage right now, a
25:23
Speaker 2: lot of graduations going on and kids wondering like where
25:26
Speaker 2: they're going to go next, and you know, they want
25:29
Speaker 2: that big job. They want your job right now. But
25:33
Speaker 2: when you got started, we're talk about that trajectory and
25:36
Speaker 2: at what point did you realize that one day I'm
25:40
Speaker 2: going to be leading this company.
25:43
Speaker 1: Oh, I didn't think about that un till quite a
25:45
Speaker 1: ways in. I think you're right though, there's a lot
25:46
Speaker 1: of the lot of the how do I say this
25:50
Speaker 1: politically correct, but there's a feeling among a lot of
25:52
Speaker 1: people that I should get that job right away.
25:54
Speaker 2: Uh huh.
25:56
Speaker 1: I have kids that are that age. Yeah, that one
25:59
Speaker 1: just graduated from college, which last a couple weeks ago. Yeah. Thanks.
26:03
Speaker 1: My advice to them is maybe I'll speak to them
26:06
Speaker 1: and then I don't have to worry about, you know,
26:08
Speaker 1: speaking to a lot of other people here. But is
26:12
Speaker 1: the most successful people that I've seen in my life.
26:16
Speaker 1: You could not have charted their path from where they
26:20
Speaker 1: started to where they are today. It wasn't this linear.
26:25
Speaker 1: I got this job and then that job and then
26:26
Speaker 1: that job. But looking back, what you can see is
26:30
Speaker 1: the clear evidence of one thing. Whatever job they had,
26:34
Speaker 1: they absolutely killed it. They came in and they they
26:40
Speaker 1: did that job better than anybody else, and it was
26:43
Speaker 1: the brand. Their brand became associated with excellence and quality,
26:47
Speaker 1: and people knew they could trust them and that those
26:50
Speaker 1: people delivered in that role. And that is the thing
26:53
Speaker 1: that unlocked and opened up the next position. Is sometimes
26:56
Speaker 1: the next position was not in line at all, something
26:59
Speaker 1: completely different. Yeah, and their career looked more like a
27:02
Speaker 1: Z than it did like a straight up you know,
27:05
Speaker 1: whatever letter goes straight up. But the thing that was
27:07
Speaker 1: true was that they they just did exceptionally well and
27:11
Speaker 1: whatever they were assigned to do, and the way in
27:13
Speaker 1: which they did it, the way they collaborated, the way
27:15
Speaker 1: they built trust, the way they partnered with people that
27:18
Speaker 1: became their brand. And then leaders above them couldn't help
27:21
Speaker 1: but say, we got to get so and so into
27:22
Speaker 1: that next job because we know they're going to be
27:25
Speaker 1: able to do that next thing. And so I would say,
27:27
Speaker 1: that's if I could give one piece of advice to
27:29
Speaker 1: my kids or anybody else who's at that stage in
27:31
Speaker 1: their career. Once you get in, just focus on doing
27:35
Speaker 1: the thing you've been asked to do exceptionally well and
27:38
Speaker 1: the next thing will take care of itself.
27:41
Speaker 2: I love that, man much, Thank you.
27:43
Speaker 1: That is just powerful. I hope my kids are listening
27:46
Speaker 1: right now, I know well, and not.
27:47
Speaker 2: Just kids like I just think that just goes like
27:50
Speaker 2: throughout someone's career. You do. You just need to do
27:53
Speaker 2: the very best that you can where you're at, and
27:57
Speaker 2: universe will will answer to that and saying yes to opportunities, right, absolutely, Fiz,
28:02
Speaker 2: you very well could have said.
28:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, say yes where it makes sense and keep going
28:09
Speaker 1: and growing and progressing and learning, and you couple all
28:12
Speaker 1: that together and you'll have lots of opportunities presented. And
28:15
Speaker 1: some of those opportunities will make a lot of sense
28:17
Speaker 1: and some might not. In my case, I also, you know,
28:20
Speaker 1: I was in the right place at the right time
28:22
Speaker 1: a number of times, right, And it's a little bit
28:25
Speaker 1: unusual to go from where I was to where I
28:27
Speaker 1: am today, So I don't discount the fact that there
28:29
Speaker 1: was a little bit of right place, right time.
28:31
Speaker 2: Also, Yeah, for sure, tell me how we talk about
28:35
Speaker 2: this Utah one hundred is you know why we're here today?
28:38
Speaker 2: The Winner Circle. Franklin Covey's been on the list three
28:42
Speaker 2: years over time, and I love companies that you know,
28:47
Speaker 2: no matter where you are on the list is one thing,
28:49
Speaker 2: But just being on that list time after time, I
28:53
Speaker 2: think is just a huge testament to the leadership and
28:57
Speaker 2: where the company is headed. But I want to know
29:00
Speaker 2: how being based in Utah has influenced or if it
29:04
Speaker 2: has it all, how Franklin Cobby operates that Utah thing,
29:10
Speaker 2: that Utah thing.
29:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, so all all pine a little bit on the
29:14
Speaker 1: Utah thing. Not being from Utah. So I grew up
29:16
Speaker 1: in Washington, but I've been in Utah for a long
29:18
Speaker 1: time now and I really enjoyed that. It's been a
29:21
Speaker 1: great place for me and for my family. And our
29:24
Speaker 1: company was founded here, its been headquartered here all the
29:26
Speaker 1: way along. So while we're a very global company, we
29:29
Speaker 1: have we have people representing us in over one hundred countries.
29:33
Speaker 1: That's incredible. So yeah, so we're out and about, Yes
29:37
Speaker 1: you are, but we have a good sized presence here
29:39
Speaker 1: in Utah. The culture is great here, It's a great
29:42
Speaker 1: place to recruit from. There's a lot of talent in Utah.
29:45
Speaker 1: Utah has been a very progressive state in terms of
29:48
Speaker 1: leading out on the tech front. I think that's been
29:51
Speaker 1: great for Utah, and certainly we've benefited from that being
29:54
Speaker 1: here as we've become much more of a technology company.
29:58
Speaker 1: We were the paper planer company, and now we're very
30:01
Speaker 1: much technology is in the middle of everything we do today,
30:04
Speaker 1: and this has been a good place to make that
30:06
Speaker 1: transition from. And so I think we've you know, it's
30:10
Speaker 1: been a it's been a great place to head have
30:12
Speaker 1: our company headquartered and to both recruit from and operate from,
30:15
Speaker 1: and then to cascade what we do around the world.
30:18
Speaker 2: Do you think that if Franklin Company would have started
30:20
Speaker 2: in another state, do you think you have the same trajectory,
30:24
Speaker 2: the same success. Do you think it would be different.
30:27
Speaker 1: I think we still would have. I think I think
30:30
Speaker 1: above where we're located, the need for what we're doing
30:34
Speaker 1: is a universal need. It's interesting we the very same
30:37
Speaker 1: principles that apply to a leader or to an organization's
30:42
Speaker 1: success and performance in Utah. Those same principles hold true
30:46
Speaker 1: in New York City and in Mumbai, India. Right, they
30:50
Speaker 1: just they you know, what it takes to lead well
30:53
Speaker 1: and to to get a group of people aligned and
30:55
Speaker 1: executing well is pretty universal.
30:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
31:01
Speaker 3: One thing that you said, I mean, just just a
31:04
Speaker 3: few minutes ago about leadership and skills and building someone's
31:08
Speaker 3: brand and building out quality. What other skills from a
31:13
Speaker 3: leadership perspective, if you were to say maybe one or
31:17
Speaker 3: two are absolutely critical for a successful individual, what would
31:23
Speaker 3: those be, Paul? I mean, you've seen I'm sure very
31:27
Speaker 3: effective and you've been surrounded by very effective leadership throughout
31:31
Speaker 3: your life, and obviously at Franklin Covey, and I'm sure
31:35
Speaker 3: there's a long list of that, but maybe just for
31:37
Speaker 3: there's a long list of those are listening.
31:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a long list. But I'll give you a
31:41
Speaker 1: couple first kind of a mental framework that we think
31:44
Speaker 1: about as we think about what is it that the
31:47
Speaker 1: best leaders do and who are the best leaders. It's
31:50
Speaker 1: a very simple framework. The first is who that leader
31:54
Speaker 1: is makes a big difference their character. So many of
31:57
Speaker 1: the holes that go blown below the water line, so
32:00
Speaker 1: to speak, of the boat are are problems of character.
32:05
Speaker 1: And I don't know about you, but I want to
32:06
Speaker 1: follow somebody who I believe has high character, and so
32:10
Speaker 1: who you are as a leader really really matters. The
32:15
Speaker 1: second piece of the framework is, then how do you
32:18
Speaker 1: think as a leader and that how do you think
32:22
Speaker 1: about strategy, how do you how do you approach decision making?
32:26
Speaker 1: So who you are, how you think?
32:28
Speaker 3: What?
32:28
Speaker 1: What, what modelsntal, mental maps and tools and frameworks do
32:32
Speaker 1: you have? So who you are, how you think makes
32:35
Speaker 1: a difference. Who you are and how you think then
32:38
Speaker 1: drives the third element of this framework, which is what
32:40
Speaker 1: you do right. And the best leaders we've worked for
32:43
Speaker 1: leaders that the way they go about doing leadership, the
32:46
Speaker 1: way they execute, the way they organize their teams, the
32:49
Speaker 1: way they align the work is different. Right, So who
32:51
Speaker 1: you are, how you think, what you do, those actions
32:54
Speaker 1: that you take. And then the fourth is the results
32:57
Speaker 1: you produce, and that the best leaders they are the
33:00
Speaker 1: best because of their character, who they are, They think differently,
33:04
Speaker 1: the actions they take are different from their lesser performing peers,
33:08
Speaker 1: and therefore the results they get. So that's one is
33:10
Speaker 1: thinking about in each of those four dimensions, how am
33:13
Speaker 1: I doing in each of those four years. The second
33:16
Speaker 1: thing I would say is, and we've done quite a
33:18
Speaker 1: bit of researching on this topic, the best leaders balance two.
33:23
Speaker 1: They possess two things, and they hold them in balance.
33:26
Speaker 1: They both expect a lot of their people and at
33:31
Speaker 1: the same time they care a lot about their people.
33:36
Speaker 1: It turns out all in our surveying that when you
33:39
Speaker 1: ask people on the team about their leader, these expect
33:44
Speaker 1: a lot, care a lot. Leaders are fairly rare, only
33:48
Speaker 1: seven percent of people sale. They work for a leader
33:52
Speaker 1: who both has very high expectations and it's clear that
33:55
Speaker 1: they expect a lot, but they also balance that with
33:57
Speaker 1: a high degree of care. Most people will talk about
34:00
Speaker 1: their leader leaning one way or the other, but to
34:03
Speaker 1: actually do both with the right level of balance, it's
34:07
Speaker 1: not an easy thing to do. So so that I
34:09
Speaker 1: would say, uh, and that that's that most of us
34:12
Speaker 1: tend to fall one side or the other. Right. We expect,
34:15
Speaker 1: we expect, we expect, we hold to account, we we manage,
34:19
Speaker 1: we might micromanage a little bit, and we don't create
34:21
Speaker 1: an environment where it feels quite right. It feels like
34:25
Speaker 1: my leader knows me personally, is and invested in me,
34:28
Speaker 1: is coaching me, is helping me develop, has my best
34:30
Speaker 1: interests in mind. Sore just kind of out to get
34:32
Speaker 1: the work done. And then maybe even more common is
34:35
Speaker 1: the leader who cares so deeply and so much. Boy,
34:40
Speaker 1: they create a wonderful environment, but our team does not
34:43
Speaker 1: win and and both of those Both of those lead
34:47
Speaker 1: to the first is good in the short run. Boy,
34:50
Speaker 1: that team might produce good results in the short run,
34:52
Speaker 1: but over time they will burn that team out. People
34:55
Speaker 1: will leave, people, we'd be dissatisfied, creativity will go down.
34:59
Speaker 1: The latter expect are caring too much and not expecting
35:01
Speaker 1: enough is also bad. Nobody wants to stay on a
35:03
Speaker 1: team that doesn't win, and so balancing those two is
35:06
Speaker 1: so critical and it's not easy. But boy, when you do,
35:10
Speaker 1: the numbers are off the charts in terms of the
35:12
Speaker 1: productivity of those teams, the engagement levels of those teams,
35:15
Speaker 1: the creativity of those teams. So here we are leading
35:17
Speaker 1: in this highly disruptive time with AI and everything else
35:21
Speaker 1: where we need new thinking, innovation, creativity, we also need
35:26
Speaker 1: to produce results, right, and so these leaders who can
35:29
Speaker 1: create the conditions where they both have high expectations and
35:32
Speaker 1: the team feels like their leader cares, those are the
35:35
Speaker 1: leaders I want to work for, and I think we
35:38
Speaker 1: all deserve to work for. And so those would be
35:40
Speaker 1: just a couple thoughts Jason, your question there. Thank you, Paul, Wow,
35:44
Speaker 1: I love.
35:44
Speaker 2: That so much. What do you think, in your opinion
35:48
Speaker 2: emerging emerging companies, merging companies that are just getting started, Like,
35:53
Speaker 2: what do you think their biggest challenges are right now?
35:57
Speaker 2: And how what is Franklin Covey doing do you think
36:00
Speaker 2: to looking ahead like to help assist in that challenge.
36:06
Speaker 1: I think as emerging companies, you go through pretty rapidly
36:10
Speaker 1: some life cycles. Yeah, right, you move pretty quickly from
36:15
Speaker 1: the founder and the founder in those early days knows
36:18
Speaker 1: everything about that business and in many cases built the business.
36:23
Speaker 1: You know, may have put their fingers on the keyboard
36:25
Speaker 1: and written a lot of the code, right and they've
36:27
Speaker 1: they've they're involved in every decision. But for that business
36:30
Speaker 1: to scale, it quickly needs to move from being all
36:34
Speaker 1: the ideas came from one person, the founder knew everything,
36:38
Speaker 1: the founder knew every client, every customer, had been involved
36:42
Speaker 1: in every decision, to learning how to cascade responsibility decision making.
36:48
Speaker 1: It's a very different type of leadership and very different
36:51
Speaker 1: type of culture that begins to get created as you
36:53
Speaker 1: make that jump from being you know, new early in
36:56
Speaker 1: the game to becoming more established. And I think that's
36:59
Speaker 1: where where uh, that's a that's a point where it's
37:02
Speaker 1: a challenge for a lot of leaders. Yeah, I'm not
37:05
Speaker 1: saying you have to give up control, but you're leading
37:09
Speaker 1: a lot more through influence, You're leading a lot more
37:13
Speaker 1: through shared vision, creating the right conditions for accountability. And
37:18
Speaker 1: so that's that's that those are again back to those
37:20
Speaker 1: are areas that Franklin Covey helps with that we we
37:22
Speaker 1: help create leadership capability at scale inside organizations.
37:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just thought that was something something to think
37:31
Speaker 2: about looking ahead. What do you think is next for
37:34
Speaker 2: I mean, you've created, you've been around for a while
37:37
Speaker 2: and you've seen some big changes. Jason and I earlier
37:41
Speaker 2: were talking about the all access past and how that
37:44
Speaker 2: really just transformed your company and you were huge behind that.
37:49
Speaker 2: So what what's down what's down the road? Can you
37:52
Speaker 2: give us a little look into that, like what's next?
37:56
Speaker 1: Well, hopefully what's next is lots more impact and lots
37:59
Speaker 1: more growth for frank and Covey at the highest level.
38:01
Speaker 1: And the way that we'll the way that we'll get
38:03
Speaker 1: at that is one, you know, we have this incredible
38:07
Speaker 1: core business that we operate, this leadership and organizational performance
38:11
Speaker 1: work that we do, and there's no end in sight
38:14
Speaker 1: to the need for that and just getting better at
38:17
Speaker 1: that doing more and more of that, bringing new solutions
38:20
Speaker 1: and tools to market, incorporating AI into that. Many of
38:23
Speaker 1: the things we've talked about here, So that's definitely in
38:25
Speaker 1: our future we haven't talked about. We have a really
38:29
Speaker 1: cool part of our business that represents about thirty percent
38:31
Speaker 1: of what we do, which is in the education space.
38:35
Speaker 1: And we've adapted our content and framework and tools to
38:40
Speaker 1: the K twelve education space, and the solution is called
38:44
Speaker 1: the Leader in Me. So all Access pass is our
38:46
Speaker 1: corporate tools and solution, and the Leader in Me is
38:49
Speaker 1: our education set of tools and solutions, and we go
38:52
Speaker 1: into primarily public schools around the country. We're at about
38:56
Speaker 1: eight thousand schools now around the world where they've adopted
38:59
Speaker 1: Leader in Me. And we're teaching these very same leadership
39:02
Speaker 1: skills to kids as young as kindergarten, first second, third
39:06
Speaker 1: grade all the way up into high school. And while
39:08
Speaker 1: these students are learning how to read, how to write,
39:11
Speaker 1: how to do math, they're learning these incredibly important human
39:15
Speaker 1: skills of communicating, setting goals, achieving goals, working well with others.
39:21
Speaker 1: And so these students that graduate and go on to
39:23
Speaker 1: college and then leave college and go into the workforce
39:25
Speaker 1: are much more career and life ready than the normal
39:30
Speaker 1: school system is set up to produce. It's just not
39:33
Speaker 1: what schools were set up to do. And so the
39:35
Speaker 1: leader in me becomes that real companion set of curriculum
39:40
Speaker 1: inside these schools. And so there's that's just one example
39:43
Speaker 1: of how the company has found ways to take these
39:46
Speaker 1: core principles into adjacent markets and we see a number
39:51
Speaker 1: of those in our future where there's an opportunity to
39:54
Speaker 1: bring these enduring principles of effectiveness human personal effectiveness and
39:58
Speaker 1: organizational effectivenes us to different markets and and uh uh
40:03
Speaker 1: and and different regions around the world.
40:05
Speaker 2: I love that.
40:06
Speaker 3: That's yeah, that's that's thank you for sharing the different
40:10
Speaker 3: sectors and the impact that you're making. I think that's
40:13
Speaker 3: uh tremendous. Maybe maybe last question that I'd have is
40:17
Speaker 3: if you could give your younger self one piece of advice,
40:21
Speaker 3: what would that be? And and Paul, we again appreciate
40:25
Speaker 3: your time. We know that your time is valuable, and
40:28
Speaker 3: we we just just been very impressed with your insights
40:31
Speaker 3: and your perspective. But as you kind of think and
40:34
Speaker 3: take a step back, what would you give your younger self?
40:37
Speaker 3: What advice would you give your inner self. The one
40:40
Speaker 3: piece that's a hard one. Oh my, and my kids
40:42
Speaker 3: hate it when I ask.
40:43
Speaker 1: Those kind of question. They're always like, you know what,
40:45
Speaker 1: I've got? Three Yeah, exactly, Dad, Dad, let us just
40:48
Speaker 1: pick among a few, but one piece of advice. So
40:50
Speaker 1: I don't know if I have the one, but one
40:52
Speaker 1: that comes to mind is the world is full of
40:57
Speaker 1: problem identifiers, it's lacking problem solvers, and it's or opportunity.
41:06
Speaker 1: So it's really easy, or it turns out it's easier
41:09
Speaker 1: to spot the problems or the opportunities. It's much more
41:14
Speaker 1: difficult and the more scarce resources somebody who can come
41:17
Speaker 1: in and actually do something about it. And in the
41:20
Speaker 1: world of AI and all the ringing of the hands
41:23
Speaker 1: about what's that going to mean? And are people coming
41:26
Speaker 1: out of college going to get a job and what's
41:27
Speaker 1: going to happen to their career? I will tell you,
41:30
Speaker 1: if you're somebody who can not just identify a problem
41:33
Speaker 1: or an opportunity, but actually come in and help and
41:36
Speaker 1: put your back into in your mind into helping solve
41:39
Speaker 1: that the world is going to have plenty of use
41:42
Speaker 1: for you, and your opportunities will be unlimited. And so
41:45
Speaker 1: I ared to go back and maybe remind myself I
41:47
Speaker 1: would be, you know, be a problem solver and an
41:50
Speaker 1: opportunity solver, not just an identifier.
41:55
Speaker 2: We love of the way you said that. I say
41:56
Speaker 2: things like that to my kids all the time, but
41:58
Speaker 2: not in that it's hard.
42:01
Speaker 1: It's hard. It's harder with your own kids.
42:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, no, it is like I didn't identify that problem,
42:08
Speaker 2: but you know what, I need you to come with
42:10
Speaker 2: a solution and then most will start there. It's beautiful.
42:13
Speaker 2: So yeah, I love that. So thank you so much
42:17
Speaker 2: for joining us today. It's been really great having you
42:20
Speaker 2: here and telling us more about Franklin Covey is a
42:23
Speaker 2: household name, it really really is, but sometimes I think
42:26
Speaker 2: people don't know exactly what it is, all the things
42:30
Speaker 2: that you do and where you're going. So we appreciate
42:32
Speaker 2: your time and our thrilled to honor your work here
42:34
Speaker 2: at Mountain West Capital Network.
42:36
Speaker 3: And for listeners who want to learn more, where can
42:38
Speaker 3: they finally connect with you at Franklin Covey.
42:40
Speaker 1: So we're all over. You can go to our website
42:42
Speaker 1: FranklinCovey dot com. You can find us on all the
42:45
Speaker 1: social channels. You can find us on LinkedIn. Yeah, and
42:48
Speaker 1: we'd love to have you. Anybody who wants to follow.
42:51
Speaker 2: Us, that's right, And to everyone listening, thank you for
42:54
Speaker 2: joining us. A special thanks to the launch Pod team
42:58
Speaker 2: Johnny Christine Brandon Cole for producing our show, Zachary Read
43:03
Speaker 2: for his vision and direction as producer, Katie Brown, our
43:06
Speaker 2: operations specialist, for keeping us in line and on track,
43:10
Speaker 2: Garrett Lawson and Kevin Jessup for serving as our podcast chairs.
43:14
Speaker 3: Don't forget to leave us a five star review. It
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43:21
Speaker 3: the leaders shaping our business future. There is nothing we
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43:28
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Winner Circle.