Latest / Unstoppable Success Podcast / 8 - Balancing Act: Collaborating with a Creative Director in Leadership Roles with Cornerstone Media Group's Marc Fishman

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8 - Balancing Act: Collaborating with a Creative Director in Leadership Roles with Cornerstone Media Group's Marc Fishman · Unstoppable Success Podcast

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the unstoppable leadership.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: Influence leaders in the game inside.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: We're leaders in the stoppable.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: We believe it's a lady.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Take away to the end of the show, and we will share with you how you can be our next guest.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: Take a look at the 15 to 20 minutes.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: Let's be unstoppable.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Hi everybody, and welcome to the Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight podcast, where we hear from influential leaders and their game-changing insights.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Jacqueline Strominger, your host, and today I want to welcome our amazing guest, Mark Fishman.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Mark is a director of marketing for Cornerstone Media Group by Day and By Night.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: He is a comic book writer and drawer, or I would say illustrator, I guess that's the best better way to put it.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: And as you can probably imagine, anybody who is in this type of position has amazing leadership, insights, and skills.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: So we can't wait to hear from you.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: So, Mark, why don't you tell us a little bit about um yourself, how you got here, and welcome to the show.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having me.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't know how to top that intro, but effectively, my 20 plus year career has been a slow journey from, as I I like to put it, from pixel pusher to people persuader.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: I got my start as an associate art director, which is a really fancy term for graphic designer, but it looks good on a resume when you're 22 or whatever.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: And over time, hilariously, I just had to give this whole spiel.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: I did a career day at my alma mater high school last week, and uh yeah, everyone was asking about that path.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, Started out as a graphic designer, but on when you're a graphic designer, you fall into a couple of different corporate ladders you want to climb, which one feels the best.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, a lot of people go towards what I would call like the developer programmy side, where there's quick money, good money, and most people will leave you alone because you're like the auto mechanic of the business, no one knows what you do, but the website works, so leave them alone.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: But that wasn't really my thing.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: I I took coding, I knew coding, but it's I tell people, please never pay me to code.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: So I was more or less the graphic designer that never stopped asking why.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, because of that, that led me more towards the marketing side.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: And eventually, whereas I used to be hired as a department of one, eventually business owners were starting to say, you need a team.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I want to free you up for your bigger ideas.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: I was able to really start getting into leadership about eight years ago and have balanced that leading and doing thing ever since.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's really great.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: I first of all, kudos for asking why.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: So kudos to you, big kudos, but also really kudos to the companies that you worked for or have worked with that recognized your potential and the fact that you're a more of a bigger idea person and could and needed a team.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious, what did that feel like for you when you were they were like, you need a team?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm uh initially terrified, but the way it goes, the base anecdote is I was working as a department of one for a great company that was headed out of Knoxville, Tennessee.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm here in the Chicago suburbs.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: But I came in for the biggest event that this company did once a year was with the Medical Group Management Association, MGMA.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a big show that had a lot of doctors and people in that profession.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: Company I worked for was a call center.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: And to be a call center in the middle of a show floor like that, it's funny to be like considered the outdated tech in a room full of just absolutely rocket science for Nymp for medicine.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but we had a service that worked.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: So while we were there, the drama hit, and our director of sales quit mid-show.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And on the fateful journey home, I'm with the owner, and we're driving back to her house.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And she rhetorically asks, What am I gonna do?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just my nature, the way I was raised.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Until you get anybody else, how can I help?
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: What do I need to do?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm here, let's figure something out.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: So we got back to her house and she said, I'm gonna make you director of sales and marketing, and I'm gonna need your first assignment is you need to go hire back the salesman that quit on me five years ago and he doesn't like me.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, so no, so uh my I thrown into the deep end of the pool, but it the best part about it is I came up from that and realized that I'm really good at talking to people because I enter the conversation not uh thinking as a boss, but thinking as we're we're we're we have to be a team, I have things that I'm responsible for.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: I need someone to be responsible for these other things.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: And if you can do that, I'm not gonna sit over your shoulder because I've spent my career having people over my shoulder.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: I know that doesn't work from the onset of building my team, both having to deal with salesmen and the marketers.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Now, luckily for me, my marketing team initially were two people that I've known since high school that serendipitously were looking for jobs when I was hiring.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: So the rapport there was already pre-built, and it was particularly lopsided in the right way in that they beat me up all the time and I could just take it.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: But when we hired our first graphic designer, young guy, none of us knew, basically just out in the burbs, and I just basically treated him the way that I would want to be treated, and realized that I've been in his position literally 10 years before.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't hard, in so much as that I knew exactly when I gave him an assignment, I knew to tell him when you look overwhelmed or when you feel like this is too much, wave a hand because in my position I'm lucky, I can help you out.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: I've also worked for folks where you don't have that backup for someone with a tactile skill, and what do you do?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: My my long-standing joke is I work 18 hours a day, it's just who wants to rent the first eight.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: So that was so two things that you said that are really quite really great learning, and I'm curious.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: So you said that when you you obviously you were good at at words, which is a huge part.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: Communication is one of the biggest things about leadership.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: And you then also said that you spoke to that person, I'm assuming it's a person that was there for five years before, and you told him that it's more of a team, not speaking to somebody as a boss.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: So huge insight there, and you know, for you to be able to do that.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm curious, is that something that was just innate in you, or did you have that leader?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: Did was somebody else a leader that you had that happen with that you was a mentor to you?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Let's say I I'll I'll say a little bit of both.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Growing up, I would say by the time that I was old enough to understand what it meant for my parents to go to work and what they did.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: My father managed a liquor store when I was a kid.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then by the time I think the summer before sixth grade, if I have my timing, he owned a store.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: And for one summer, I used to just travel up with him because I'm an only child, my parents didn't want me hanging around the house.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: So my dad said, I'll take the kid.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And not that I could do anything, I could basically sit in the back and watch a black and white TV, or I'd stock the candy if no one was paying attention.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: But I would grill my dad just on the ride up, on the ride home.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's just my nature to ask questions and be curious and try to figure stuff out.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember pivotally asking my dad one day because I recognized, oh, he he is the boss.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone answers to him, he signs the check.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: I asked him what he looked for in an employee, and he told me three things that have stuck with me my entire career: honesty, dependability, and loyalty.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And for him, it was pretty cut and dry.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Honesty, please don't steal from my store.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Dependability.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: If I ask you to be here on time, you're here on time.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: And loyalty.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: Again, it ties to honesty.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: Don't steal from me.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: But in all honesty, the loyalty side of it was more or less just a common sense thing.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I kept those three things in mind and told myself, when I get to be a professional, whatever that is, I'm gonna be those three things to other people.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Early in my career, I worked with a couple of micromanagers, the guys who would literally sit over my shoulder and move it left, move it a little bit more, move it a little bit more.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now what do you think?
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you turn to them and say, I think when I showed it to you the first time I liked it, but if you're happy, I'm happy.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: And they never liked that answer.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say that I bounced in between micromanagers to what I would call like beleaguered owners that couldn't manage me, but also couldn't manage me because they were putting out fires forever.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say uh as an eventuality, and I'll call her out by name.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: My boss Tracia, who I met at a company that we were working for at the time, they're now since they sold off to a competitor, but working for Tracia was the first time I had like an actual direct supervisor that wasn't the boss, like the owner.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was she was definitely middle management to manage the marketing team.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I saw the way that she managed a team because she herself was not a pixel pusher, she was not a copywriter, she was just a boss.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: And chip on my shoulder, me was like, Come on, what kind of job is that?
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: And then I watched it happen in front of me, like, oh, I understand now what it means to be a leader.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: She got the team ready every morning, she checked in with us throughout the day, she offered her constructive criticism, and she also helped us navigate the waters upstream when we had to deliver stuff.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: Me personally, since I was the artist there, I had a lot of stuff that had to go right to our big boss, and she was super picky.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: So Tracia would help me navigate those waters often.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I worked there, I'd say I stayed there longer because Tracia was such an amazing boss.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: I felt bad having to leave when I did, but it was a good move at the time, and even she saw it, and we've remained friends ever since.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I keep that in mind, like what my dad taught me versus what I saw.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I've had good managers in between.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: My first, very first job was at Domino's Pizza, and the manager there was awesome.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: I saw I saw in them what I saw in my father is a boss that was willing to roll up their sleeves and do the work at the same time, so that it wasn't like they're sitting in the cage throwing orders.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: It was I'm keeping everything running, and it's just that at the end of the day, I'm the one responsible.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: The boss is responsible for the output or whatever else happens.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: So you want everyone to be motivated to help.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's that seems it's to have that boss that is out there doing the work with you.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: So they're not just barking orders at you.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: You get to see like they're here too in the trenches doing the work because they know it's important.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's so great to hear your experience working in corporate.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: It's you've you obviously it's you've taken the good, you've taken the bad, and you've made it really good for you.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And you've taken that those parts.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: And you've had great influences in your dad, bosses that you've had.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're thinking when when you're thinking about this and you're thinking about as a leader now, how do you share and integrate your purpose and vision in your into your leadership and with your team?
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: I like to create a dialogue.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone has an equal opinion at the table, so long as everyone understands that if I'm in a leadership position, that whatever is decided on means that oh, I'm the first one to get my back padded, and I'm also the first one to take the smack in the face.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: So if I get to ideate with a team, come up with an idea or whatever it might be, then we sit down as equals.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone contributes, there's no bad ideas in a brainstorm, that kind of thing.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: And as we hone into the idea, whatever it might be, they know that they can trust me to walk that up the mountain and defend it and understand I represent a team, we talk as a team, and it's never about an individual contribution.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: I know, like my boss when I had my first job as director of sales and marketing was constantly after me with who said that, who did that, who did this.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I was always quick to defend and be like, it doesn't matter.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: Let's just worry about hey, if the salesman plural didn't hit their numbers, which one didn't do it?
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: None of us did it.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's not if there was a I told her often, if there's an individual issue, I will absolutely bring it.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: But if I sit and see from my vantage point that it's a team error or we didn't have the tools ready, we'll say that instead.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: The only time I'm really iffy on that is again, I'm an artist at heart.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: So if there's like a design question and I got an underling saying no, it should be orange, and I say it's red, it's probably gonna be red.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: But at least I'm I'm quick to tell them when something like that happens.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, I respect your opinion, it's gonna be this other thing.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're sitting in my seat, you can do the same.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's a couple things that you just said there that I think are so really important.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, respect and sharing and letting people know that's really big.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: So kudos, really big kudos to you.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then you just I love how you take that big equal team partner approach.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: And not it's something that not a lot of leaders do.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: So if I were to call it out, I would say one of your game-changing insights is making sure that you're using that team, which I call it's the acronym, which is Together Everyone Achieves More approach to your leadership style.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: How do you think your team reacts?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like when if you're thinking about how you are as a leader and leaders that you've had, if you could go back and say anything to anybody, what tip would you give them?
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: To some of the micromanagers that I've had in the past, I would probably just tell them a little bit goes a long way, that nitpicking to nitpick or to feel like you have to give feedback or else you're not doing your job isn't always going to be the case.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: The reason why I ended up in leadership in the first place is because I didn't stop to I asked why.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: But the reason typically was a matter of the function of whatever we were doing.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: If I was working on a website and they said, make me a graphic to sell this guitar.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: The first job I had in the professional world out here in Chicago was with a music retailer.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, make me a logo for this guitar, make me a thing for this guitar.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then here I am with the micromanager move left.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: And at some point you have to turn around and be like, at what point did the customer stop caring about where this logo ended up?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Does it communicate effectively what we need to say?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: Are we spending too much time and energy and resources on perfecting something that at the end of the day is not going to move the bottom line?
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the big picture questions that if I could go back, I would tell leaders that needed that hand up.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it's cool because I've seen in sep several cases, micromanagers of me have gone on to become amazing leaders in their own right.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe it's because they rode their underlings hard and then realized their moments, like I don't need to do this.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'd really hope for that.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: And what about somebody that you could say right now?
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: So here's one of the big things about that I feel, and I actually shared this, is that so many people run from corporate America.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: You do have a side hustle, side gig, which you know, with your comics, but you still are in corporate America, right?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: So you seemingly have had a great experience and not necessarily running from it, per se.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: So what would you say to people who are in that running mode?
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: Oh god, I I want to get out of corporate America.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: What leadership tip would you give them to maybe flip that switch?
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Learn to manage up first and foremost.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: If look at the reasons why you want to run away, for sure.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: If it's and I it's hard to speak from this perspective to say I don't know many people who escape corporate America to earn more money.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And if you are in a position to do that or the world is freer in nature, I'm never gonna stop anybody because that's one more slot for me.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: But I'd say for I have four kids.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: If they ever get to a point where they're asking me this question, I'd be saying the same thing to them.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: Manage up, look at the larger picture.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: If you're truly unhappy, you'll understand why you're truly unhappy.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: And if there isn't if there's no foothold or if there's no handhold for you up that mountain, this is what happened when I worked under with Tracia.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: She and I could see it together.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like I could work as hard as I want to there, but there was nowhere else for me to climb.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: So if I wasn't happy exactly where I was, then I needed to look for a different mountain where there was more of that ahead of me.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And the job I took out of that job was with the largest company I've ever worked for in my career, and will never work for a place that big again.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I learned when I got to that spot, hilariously, I worked in a place so large that part of what we did was attend quarterly meetings to determine the projects that we would work on, and I had to pitch the job they hired me for.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was hired as the app guy, make us apps.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: That was my job.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I had to stand in front of a room in the comp in the group and be like, I think we should make an app.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: And be like, okay, we'll get to that.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: Or like, okay, I don't know what I'm supposed to do now, but they still paid me.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was great.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: But I realized, okay, there may be corporations or spots where it's too big.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I would look at that.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: There it's a fine line, thanks to TikTok.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: There's actually some really great HR TikToks about managing up and being able to defend yourself and to do it in a respectful, appropriate way.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and at the end of the day, corporate or not, everyone's a person.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Just realize that structure is one thing, but everyone's human, so is your boss.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know any boss, honestly, at 501 that really cares about your coming and going.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: They care about when they get back in at nine o'clock that you're on your Zoom or you're doing your work and every other thing that they're worried about, it's for a good reason.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to sidetrack it too much, but I'll say I hold the leadership position in my comic book company in so much as that there's three of us, but the the other two guys look at me and say, Yeah, you just but one of one of them, and they're both my best friends of 30 years, he works for a big company right now and has for 20 years.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: And he's a stick it out guy.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: More credit to him.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't do it.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: He was venting to us yesterday on the chat that his boss was ribbing him, but not like in a haway, but like poking him because he dares to take his full hour lunch and a half hour break.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: He still puts in his full eight hours, he still meets every number he's supposed to, but he has to cart his kids around in the middle of the day.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: He's got a youngster who has like a daycare thing.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: And the funny irony is that his boss knows that a half an hour of his hour lunch is carting his daughter.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: So he gets home in time enough to slap a sandwich together before he's working through.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: And his boss is still every time he talks to him, he has to mention, by the way, you're the only team member who does this.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, how it's the kind of thing that if I get to talk to my my friend, he goes and vents, and all I can say is it may not be your boss, it may be the guy above your boss, or it may be the way your boss thinks this is how he shows value to the company.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: And navigate it if it becomes too much, it's a big company.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anywhere else to go?
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: Is there somebody above him that you can talk to?
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: And if not, can you just ignore him?
• 21:28
  unknown: Right.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's a challenge.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: When's your next performance review?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's so interesting because that stuff is like the that's like the nails on the chalkboard for me when I hear things like that.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Because at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter to me where whether or not you are coming in at six o'clock in the morning and leaving at three, because that's what you need to make happen for your life and Get things done.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: But if you get your numbers done, celebrate the person.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: I would think the boss should say the other way around, hey guys, guess what?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Your friend's name.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: Look how awesome he is because he's able to make his numbers and look what he's doing during his lunch hour.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: He's being a responsible parent.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: I would be like, kudos to your friend.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: Lift him up, not poke.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where I'm obviously we're on that same page.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: I would say to your friend, as that leader, the coach of me would be like, How much do you want to, how much do you want to take of that?
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: Or can you go to the your leader and say, and make sure you're aligned with the same vision, or maybe there's a spot somewhere with else within the company, if it's big.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, respectfully, like I said, it look for the why, figure out like where this is coming from.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because depending, if he's in a time-sensitive, like order taking processing kind of thing, if him utilizing the time the way he's doing is somehow causing another team member to have problems or whatever, there might be ways around it or whatever.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, like I'm very lucky at Cornerstone.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: How I know that I'm working for what will likely be the best boss, the only boss I ever need going forward, is he and I have already had that conversation when I was brought in.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Look, you're an adult and I'm an adult.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Cornerstone is centered in Atlanta, so they're on East Coast time.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: And he's look, I know you got your kids in the morning, you've got commitments, you got things going.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: I don't care.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking to you at 10:30.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: It is the middle of my work day.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: I have plenty of things that we've gone back and forth and we're working on.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: And he knows.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, Look, I know the work's getting done.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh if nothing else, in our interactions, every time he and I have played catch up, he's like, You're exhausting me.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: Stop it.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: Slow down.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: Can't.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's not another one, not so that's not the way I work.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, it is it's something common, I think.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: The world changed at the pandemic.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody, businesses recognize that, hey, we can operate and and remote work is not a benefit or of a privilege, it's just a matter of trust.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And if you have the right ways to track things uh as leaders, it's so much easier.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: People are in their own environments doing what you need to do.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: All you have to worry about is crossing the finish line when you say you will.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: No, that's and it's that's great.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's and you've got a great person that you're working with.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious, what legacy do you want to leave as a leader?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_01: And how do you ensure you're creating that legacy in your daily actions?
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Hard to not be selfish and say, I just want people to regard me as being someone they like to work with and work for in the past, with those folks that have served under me.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: I want them to think of me positively the way I think of Tracia or anybody else that I've worked for that I like.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: And as far as legacy goes, I hope that they pick up the same pick up what I was putting down, and when it's their turn to lead, they do the same thing.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: A favorite anecdote of mine cartoon, when I was in middle school, it was uh Transformers, but not the one with Optimus Prime, but whatever.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: But the version of Optimus in this particular cartoon, it stuck with me.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: There's an episode where one of the team members is being insubordinate throughout the episode.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: Every time there's some kind of fight, he's doing something that he's not supposed to, and it they get hurt because of it.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: And he questions the leadership of his Optimus, and that Optimus looks him square in the eye.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's the the point of the episode.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: He says, I would never give an order I wasn't willing to take myself.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: And even as a kid, I'm like, oh, okay, yeah, no, that that hits.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: I understand what that means.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: I don't give an assignment that I am not fully taking responsibility for.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: So even if I'm not capable of doing a particular thing, if I can't code a website, but it's my project, and I ask that developer to get things done, I know that it's my responsibility with to check in with them at regular intervals and to know and be mindful and plan that at the 11th hour, if they go, it's not gonna be done, man, that I know how to respond to that to them and to those people waiting on the website.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: Because either I can move heaven and earth and make this thing done on time, or it's not gonna happen.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: And now I have to start mitigating problems and figuring out how do I make the client happy, how do I get in front of this, make them understand there's a problem, we're working on it.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: If we're all human about it, we know like the best way to do these things is to just get out in front of it, admit it, and then honesty and communication, and as you said, honesty, dependability, and loyalty.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: It actually comes down to what you just said.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: In order to get in front of anything, be honest, share what's going on, and know that you're loyal to the customer, you're loyal to that, your client and who you're getting to get things done with.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's yeah, if you trip and fall in the middle of the road, you patch up the road behind you, period.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I've always operated in that way.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: When problems arise, they always do, and sometimes they're really stupid.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: The vendor didn't like it or something blew up on the printing press or whatever.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: But it's how you respond to that, it's how you show your customer, your boss, whoever the end user is at the end of that chain, how you will not repeat that mistake again.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: Or if it's something was truly out of your hands, how you might anticipate it next time and get ahead of it.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I've worked long enough in the industry when it comes to print collateral to know that you never print last minute, that you print so far ahead of your deadline that you give yourself that window, and that not only do you do that, you have a backup printer.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: That you let when the one that messes up, you've got somebody else that you can call on and be like, Yeah, I'm sorry, it's a pinch, but this is I only call you when this happens.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that kind of thing.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, oh my god, I used to do direct marketing for and I used to kick around and tell people that I killed trees for a living because I didn't did more direct marketing and talking about I'm just thinking about printing mistakes.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: It was something for the year I don't know, I the it was 2000.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what the 2000 was, but it was this funky too.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: And we got the printed piece, and one of the zeros was completely missing.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: In the year 200.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, where'd it go?
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: I swear it was there.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, I just remember thinking about that.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: We have to get this out the door anyway.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: But it's like, yeah, so great, great to be.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'll bring your I'll bring you right back.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: Print or print early.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: So thinking about leadership as also evolving, what areas or aspects of leadership are you still working on?
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: And how are you challenging yourself to grow in that area?
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um one area I'm challenging myself is to not put too much on myself in the interest of being considered the nice boss.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm always willing to take on way too much, and I'm apt to give too little to somebody on my team, figuring like, oh, I could always give them a little bit more after they do this back.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: But I know that employees, much like Liquid, will fill the the container they're given.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: So if I just have to be better about doing that.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing, too, for me is working on balance in in structures.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: In my station at Cornerstone, there is a person on the other side of the coin to me, a creative director.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: It that's rough on my head because in my own head, I'm a creative director.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: Marketing director, creative director to me are synonymous because they have always had to be.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: But here I've been introduced into the company saying Mark is handling the marketing, Cammy is handling the graphics and the creative directions and the things like that.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: And because so much of my personality and and who I am, having to navigate that and understand, first of all, neither of us are boss to the other.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: We are equal on the the chart.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: Navigating that relationship, being able to determine, okay, I'm gonna toss stuff over the fence to you, and I expect that you're gonna do the same for me.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: And just how we balance those things out, and then as we get into team building, which is going to happen in the coming months, understanding who these people are gonna be, which are they working for, what resource, and and who's going to carry those reins.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because it sounds like they'll be under my tutelage, my my line on that break.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm managing design team or if I'm managing marketers, plural, copywriters, whatever, that I give them enough to do always.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that one thing I'll say I'm always working on this, is making sure they understand what the mountain is and what they have to look forward to, putting myself in their position, just always remembering you're never hiring a piece of duct tape.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: You're not working with somebody who is only there to fill one particular hole.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think of it that way.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think, especially in the creative side, when you're hiring somebody in at that associate art director level, you're really hoping that you're hiring yourself a senior art director in the making.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: So that by the time two, three, four years have passed, if you're doing it, they're not looking at the next job over because it's such a big step in salary or benefits or whatever, that you're continuously giving them more that they want to stay.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: That it's the one thing that I you know throughout the world, I I'm an example of what not to do, and I've had to do this to survive.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: I've made so many lateral moves to go up because you've reached an impasse where the boss says, uh-uh.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: My graphic designer makes 60 grand a year and that's it.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, if you do that, then I'm gonna have a rotating cast of sixty thousand dollar a year people because as soon as they're worth sixty-two thousand dollars, they're gone.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we don't want that because I'm gonna spend all my time having to retrain and bring somebody back and do all that.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's you you'll shoot yourself in the foot.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the cost of hiring somebody and bringing somebody on or the cost of losing an employee in the workforce is a tr in in the US alone is over a trillion dollar expense in companies because having to do what you just said is to retrain somebody, take the Dale Carnegie approach, which is hire people that are smarter and train them to replace you so that you can keep moving up and then they can move up.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: Provide them how do you and I I guess this is one of those things, it's which I love to think of what you just said is bringing somebody in and hoping that and looking at them not for what they are at the moment you're hiring them, but where they could be in the company within three to five years.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's when I interviewed for the graphic designer back in the day, that was one of my questions.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: I laughed and asked, What are your greatest strengths?
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: What are your greatest weaknesses?
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: I don't really care, but go ahead and tell me.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: But then I would ask them, where do you want to be in your career five years from now, 10 years from now, 20 years from now?
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like, where do you see the top?
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: Do you see the top?
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it was for me a pretty easy way to disqualify people when in doing the interviews, if I got back a lazy answer, oh, I don't know, I'll see where life takes me.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: I can't work with that.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: I need to know a couple steps ahead so that I want to keep somebody engaged in their job.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: I've been burnt out and I know what burnout looks like and what it feels like and what it sounds like, and I've got to do something to prevent it from the get-go.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_00: I want them to come online every morning, same as I, or me, and look at our team.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, look, here's our morning stand-up.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: I I want to see a sea of smiling faces, or at very least, a sea of faces with thumbs up, and you're half asleep, but you're like, Yep, I'm on it.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: So that we don't ever reach them.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'm lucky in that in my time I've never had anybody quit on me, except for a few that didn't get past the early gates.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: And one gentleman who was like such a young go-getter that the millisecond he found something for significantly more money, he bounced, and it hurt for a second.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: I got over it.
• 34:43
  unknown: Right.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: All you can do.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: No, that is.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's all you can do.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: So, Mark, I have just loved our conversation, and you are a true amazing inspirational leader.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: I think that there should be more leaders like you out there who believe in that really the team approach of leading and partnering with people.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: But share with everybody where they can find you, follow you, share your comic links if you want people to get that too.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're interested in marketing services and that kind of thing, you can look me up at csmediagroup.com.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's cornerstone media group.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: You can look up my personal site, which is just my name, markallenfishman.com, M-A-R-C-A-L-A-N, F-I-S-H-M-A-N.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: And if you reach out to me there, uh if you get to the contact form, please read the copy and you'll have a laugh, I promise.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then if you are interested in comic books, uh my company's called Unshaven Comics for reasons you could probably see.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: And you can look us up anywhere.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: Just search unshaven comics.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: We are the ones that come up.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: We are an all-ages comic book company, by the way.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: So if you have kids, the books we sell, they're gonna like them.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're older than a kid, trust me, you're still gonna like them too.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I should say we're very excited about that.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Next month, we are unveiling our first video game.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my god, that is going to be fantastic.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna have to let me know so I can share that out to everybody.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, trust me.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: When I have the go-ahead from the developers, it's a ticker-tay parade that's just marching from one end of the country to the other.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my god, that's great.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_01: Congratulations, Mark.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: I truly appreciate you hopping on, sharing your insights, truly inspirational.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: And listeners, please take a good listen to this.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: Take Mark's advice.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: If you can bring some nuggets back to your leadership and to your leadership style, that's what we're here.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: We would love to change the way the world leads, one person and one leader at a time.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: So I appreciate you and thank you for listening to the Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight podcast.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Jaclyn Strauminger, and I want to thank you so much for listening to the Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight, Influential Leaders and Their Game Changing Insights podcast.
• 37:05
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• 37:15
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• 37:20
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• 37:33
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• 37:41
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• 37:48
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• 37:50
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• 37:54
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• 37:58
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• 38:00
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• 38:07
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• 38:22
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• 38:32
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• 38:34
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