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Interview With Bob Stobener On "Leadership Communication" #100 · How To Talk To Humans

• 0:03
  Larry Wilson: Hi, this is Larry Wilson, and this is how to Talk to Humans. This is the podcast that shows you how to improve your communication skills. Are you looking to get a better job? Are you looking to find a relationship? Are you trying to do things in your life that have frustrated you and eluded you so far? I can show you so easily how to change that. Now, I can only do it with humans.
• 0:30
  Larry Wilson: If you're looking to deal with vampires or zombies, extraterrestrials, this is not the show for you. But if you're really looking to improve your communication skills, I can show you what I've learned from 40 years in show business working with the biggest celebrities and superstars in the world. And their secrets are unbelievable. What I'm going to be teaching you during this course of this podcast every week are tools that you can use to communicate toward success. Hi, this is Larry Wilson. Thanks again for tuning into this podcast. Today I want to do something a little different than we've done before.
• 1:17
  Larry Wilson: I wanted to interview someone who was a communications expert in his own right.
• 1:23
  Larry Wilson: This is a guy I've known for many, many years, who I'm going to let him tell you a little bit about where his journey led. But I first met him when he was involved with Laughs Unlimited in Sacramento, California, and then he progress from there to a real job that I'll let him tell you more about. Please welcome my friend, Bob Stobner.
• 1:52
  Bob Stobener: Well, Larry, good to talk to you.
• 1:55
  Larry Wilson: Thanks, man. Thanks.
• 1:57
  Bob Stobener: Thanks for having me on.
• 1:58
  Larry Wilson: Of course, of course. You know, I think it's particularly interesting because when you moved beyond Laughs Unlimited, you still were using communication skills, right?
• 2:14
  Bob Stobener: Well, I think that's been a part of everything that I've done over the years. And I, as a content creator, that's. That's always in the back of your mind as you're getting. You're trying to get something across. You know, whether you're doing, you know, writing or images, graphic work or video work or, you know, anything in the creative arts. That's the prime goal.
• 2:38
  Larry Wilson: Absolutely. And no, I mean, I think this is fantastic because I suspect there's a lot of people listening to this who are content creators, and they may.
• 2:50
  Larry Wilson: Some of them may struggle with this or be frustrated or feel blocked sometimes.
• 2:56
  Larry Wilson: But I think you're like a perfect example, like you just said, that in any creative endeavor that communication is key.
• 3:08
  Larry Wilson: Tell people who are listening a little bit after Laughs Unlimited. Well, tell me first. When you were at Laughs Unlimited, were you the main driving force between marketing and advertising there?
• 3:23
  Bob Stobener: Well, I Think it was a team effort. We were all trying to get, you know, the club as much publicity for the club as possible, to get as many people into the club as possible. We want to keep our national presence alive and be a successful operation.
• 3:40
  Bob Stobener: And so my role was pretty much in addition to running some of the clubs in the evening, as a partner in the operation. But my role was, you know, building our advertising vehicles, our, you know, our newspaper ads, help with the radio ads. We did some television shows, which I had a role in doing some editing work on and producing work on and things, things like that.
• 4:10
  Bob Stobener: So it's pretty much anything we needed to communicate to the audience outside of the club can have a role in that.
• 4:16
  Larry Wilson: Right. Well, but I think you're being modest now, because I remember very. Yes, I would.
• 4:23
  Bob Stobener: Larry, I know you well.
• 4:25
  Larry Wilson: I'm just telling you, I remember very clearly to this day. I remember a lot of the messaging of the advertising for that club was very, very well thought out. You know, I performed all over the country and I would make jokes about how bad it was in other places where you couldn't for the life of you understand what it was they were presenting. But like you say, even down to the graphics, you're responsible, aren't you, for that image of sort of a jester, kind of a cartoon graphic, Isn't that you're doing?
• 5:06
  Bob Stobener: Right. I had a. I had a background in cartooning, and so I brought that to the logo. And we use that in a lot of the advertising to put like, try to put some sort of a funny illustration, funny cartoon into the ads. And we had it in our flyers and, you know, just to try to give a personality to the messaging that we're trying to get out and promoting the club. So, yeah, that was part of it. We tried that helped us stand out a little bit.
• 5:37
  Larry Wilson: Absolutely. But it was very clear and it was not corny in any way.
• 5:43
  Larry Wilson: And it established sort of a baseline that this place is fun. It's about comedy. It had a wholesome quality to it. Like, this is a family place that you can bring someone on a date or, you know, anybody in your family to come see. And.
• 6:08
  Bob Stobener: Yeah, and we also, we also wanted to make it. Make sure it wasn't.
• 6:12
  Bob Stobener: We wanted to make sure it was professional, that it looked good. It looked like it was, you know, it wasn't just a hand scratch flyer, you know, that you might see on a phone pole or something. Tried to make it seem professional, which we were.
• 6:27
  Larry Wilson: There's no question you were. Now, I know you're laughing because you knew, you and Scott and these other people, you guys just jumped in, had no idea what you were doing. You jumped in and made it work. But what you're describing right now, I think is part of the reason it was so successful is that you had very clear goals in mind, did you not?
• 6:52
  Bob Stobener: I think success was our main goal and staying above the competition of everything else that somebody could do with $10 on a Saturday night. So we were, you know, we needed to stand out and we knew we had something unique in standup comedy, at least in our market at the time. And we wanted to make sure people understood what a comedy club and going to a standup show was going to be like. So we wanted to make sure that people got the message that this was going to be a lot of fun, that, you know, you would have a good time and that we were bringing really national entertainment to the local club scene.
• 7:29
  Bob Stobener: We tried to, you know, really bring in, you know, hey, he's been on the Carson show, she's been on David Letterman. You know, she, she guest starred last week on such and such sitcom.
• 7:42
  Bob Stobener: So I mean, we tried to, you know, Scott was great at booking the club for national level talent and we would add that to the promotions as much as possible. So the people got the message that, oh, this isn't just, you know, so and so from the office getting up and trying to do 10 minutes. This is, these are actual pros.
• 8:02
  Larry Wilson: Well, there's no question that you succeeded at it because the club was hugely successful. And I think the messaging that you're talking about came through very clearly.
• 8:15
  Larry Wilson: It, you know, you, I think you established a benchmark for clubs that some people tried to emulate, some people tried to bring their clubs up to the level you're at, and other people couldn't get close to it. You know, everything you're saying, I think came through so clearly in your, in your messaging. But then at the end of a successful run, I don't know, how long did the club run? 20 years, 25 years?
• 8:53
  Bob Stobener: Gosh, I believe it was 25 years.
• 8:56
  Bob Stobener: My participation was about 10 years, 10 to 12 years. But yeah, I mean, Scott ran it successfully for beyond that, and I think it ran into 25 years, I think.
• 9:10
  Larry Wilson: And then you moved on. Tell people a little bit about where you moved on to.
• 9:17
  Bob Stobener: I left Laps Unlimited because I was about to start a family, my lovely wife Cassie. And I kind of thought it was time that I try to get into something corporate with, you know, a little bit more. I don't Want to say stability, but it just felt like I needed to have a job with some more opportunity to get me some new skills. So I took a job with a company called Raley's, which is a west coast grocer and exceptional company. It was privately owned. I remember going in day one that I talked to some friends that worked there and they said, you can really do anything you want here because the owner wants to see us grow and give us a lot of opportunities. And I said, well, this sounds like a great place.
• 10:07
  Bob Stobener: I can bring what I was doing at Laps into this operation and to, you know, and leverage the experience I had and, you know, what I could bring to the table as far as skills. And it was recognized and I was very successful there. But I did a number of different communication projects, everything from graphic work, design work up to video work. And we had very large scale presentations, multimedia presentations and live events.
• 10:42
  Bob Stobener: And so everything I did at Laps kind of carried over to what I could do at Rayleigh. So it was actually great. Well, great experience.
• 10:51
  Larry Wilson: That's fantastic. I mean, because what I'm hearing you say is you were able to transfer all of those communication skills to the new enterprise.
• 11:05
  Bob Stobener: Yep, that's correct.
• 11:07
  Larry Wilson: Well, that's kind of the, the drum that I keep banging here is that, is that these skills are not specialized to one arena or one pursuit. That if you become good at them, if you really practice them the way you did that they're easily transferable to what would it seem at first blush to be a completely different business, but ultimately relies on communication.
• 11:43
  Bob Stobener: Yeah, and it's. And it actually goes beyond communicating through a medium like, you know, video, writing, audio, graphics, whatever. It goes to leadership and how you communicate with your teams and how you motivate your teams to be able to be successful. I mean, and communicating up. So whether you're communicating up or communicating down in the organization, you know, you have different audiences and you may approach the audience differently from based on their position in the organization, but it's still your level of success can still be consistent.
• 12:26
  Bob Stobener: I was had experience both as a leader for my peers as well as presenting and working with the top level ownership and management of the company. So.
• 12:39
  Bob Stobener: And in both cases, I got to a point where I was very confident and calm in doing so and it worked out well.
• 12:47
  Larry Wilson: Well, I mean, it sounds like you had a incredible opportunity there with that particular company, like you say, with an owner who really wants to see the thing grow and gives people freedom to do this, because I think you put your finger on something Here that other people perhaps take for granted that communication as a leader of teams of people is critical to an organization's success.
• 13:20
  Bob Stobener: Absolutely. And it's also critical to your personal success and, you know, both in terms of satisfaction, you know, and outcome.
• 13:34
  Bob Stobener: So.
• 13:34
  Larry Wilson: Yeah, I mean, it's funny because it seems, when you say it out loud, it seems so obvious, but I think people have a tendency not to realize the importance of it. If you had to. I don't mean to put you on the spot like this, but if you thought of one most difficult hurdle in leading people. Does one come to mind in leading people? Yeah.
• 14:05
  Bob Stobener: Well, number one, you didn't put me on the spot. Let me put it that way. Okay. I am not spotted on this. I'll think of something.
• 14:16
  Larry Wilson: All right. Take your time. Maybe if I will tell you that.
• 14:21
  Bob Stobener: I'll tell you this, Larry. I think in terms of being a leader and having team members work with you, I was just having this conversation with somebody else earlier today. It's so important to give the focus and attention to each of your team members on an individual basis and to have a relationship with them, because communication is ultimately a relationship.
• 14:46
  Bob Stobener: So it's a leader to talking to a team member who reports to them and getting inside of them a little bit and getting to know where they're at professionally and personally and what they want to become. I always said that in my role as a leader, it wasn't my job to make sure they're okay in their current role, but to prepare them for what they're going to do next. I constantly was asking them, okay, where do you want to be in five years? Not even thinking they'd be working for us at our company.
• 15:16
  Bob Stobener: It doesn't matter. Just where do you want to be in five years and how can I help you get there?
• 15:20
  Bob Stobener: So that's, you know, and that level of communication, to have be that transparent is risky, but it's. It's necessary because that means you're getting the buy in from your team member and you're. And you can establish that relationship. And communication has a lot to do with that.
• 15:38
  Bob Stobener: Well. And how well you can communicate it.
• 15:40
  Larry Wilson: I can't agree with you more. I mean, you're. You're singing my tune here.
• 15:46
  Larry Wilson: And it's interesting because what you're describing sounds like a match made in heaven for someone working for you in that situation. Did you ever have any people on a team where there was a difficulty because they had trouble acclimating to your style?
• 16:09
  Bob Stobener: Oh, sure, not so much my style, but they were just. I tended to get. In my experience, I was assigned the leadership roles to teams that needed.
• 16:20
  Bob Stobener: That were a little more difficult. They weren't, you know, there was either an individual on the team who was just not happy doing what they were doing.
• 16:30
  Bob Stobener: They just, you know, their attitudes weren't great. And so I was usually. Let's let Bob manage them. Okay, so this one individual in particular I'm thinking of.
• 16:44
  Bob Stobener: He was. We'd worked together for a number of. For some time, and he knew where his. I knew where he was coming from, he knew where I was coming from. And all of a sudden, I'm his boss, and I just went to him with my bit of, okay, what do you want to do?
• 17:01
  Bob Stobener: What do you want to become? Because he was stuck in a role that, you know, I could see he was just, like, running in place on it.
• 17:07
  Bob Stobener: But I also saw his interest in doing something completely different in our. With our IT department. And so I just, you know, try. I. We talked about it. An opportunity came, you know, on the IT team. And I talked to him and I said, you know, here's this great job. You gotta run for it, and you gotta try to get it. And he was saying, nah, he's not gonna try. He's not gonna even try. He was. So, you know, he was just out of sorts with his job. And I said, no, you really have to try for this. And so he ended up doing it. He ended up getting it. And he was. He's made it his career. So my communication with him and my. The time I took to solve his problem and to help him solve his problem, where he was in his career, that was. That established a completely different path for him.
• 17:58
  Bob Stobener: So that was, you know, a successful communication between. I solved his problem in that I got him off my team and I got him in a better place, much more happier outcome, and, you know, great satisfaction for me. And then I think I really did, you know, benefited the company because it was a better fit. So, you know, and that wouldn't have happened without really honest communication actually on both sides between me with him and him with me.
• 18:28
  Larry Wilson: So, of course, I mean, I know there's people listening to this now who are thinking, God, I wish this guy Stubner was my boss. I know I'm telling you the truth, that what you're describing is an ideal situation and your description of this. I hope that people listening, appreciate. Because you are kind of modest, Bob, and you have a tendency to downplay the importance of what you're saying, but you're saying that you had a problem with a guy on your team, and instead of just blaming him for stuff or vilifying him or trying to shunt him off on the things that you hated the most, you helped him find the thing that he thrived at.
• 19:20
  Bob Stobener: That was the. That was the outcome.
• 19:24
  Bob Stobener: And again, I think it's a matter of listening. Communication is, you know, a large part of those actually listening and connecting the dots on what they're trying to tell you or not tell you and, and, and responding.
• 19:41
  Larry Wilson: Incredible. Incredible. Well, you've succeeded here far beyond my wildest expectations. Well, you have, because I think a lot of times people hear me talking here and think, well, that's just Larry. And it doesn't really apply to anyone else. But I'm constantly harping on the fact that everything I'm talking about on this show is applicable to anyone who wants to improve their communication skills. And you just provided a crystal clear example of something that's not an entertainment but is equally valuable in a completely. A different arena, in a totally different place. But you showed how, using the exact same communication skills that I'm talking about, you are able to make your life better, make this employee's life better, make the company better.
• 20:49
  Larry Wilson: This is. I couldn't have come up with a better example if I wrote it myself.
• 20:56
  Bob Stobener: Thank you, Larry. I appreciate that. It was great to be on your show today.
• 21:00
  Larry Wilson: Well, thanks. I really appreciate having you and I hope to see you sometime live in person again.
• 21:07
  Bob Stobener: Alrighty. I'll be looking forward to it.
• 21:09
  Bob Stobener: Take care, Larry.
• 21:10
  Larry Wilson: Thanks, Bob. That's all for this week.
• 21:14
  Larry Wilson: I'm so pleased you take time to download this and listen to what I have to say. I think it's very valuable. I hope that you feel the same way. And if you do, please share this with your friends and family.
• 21:34
  Larry Wilson: Share it with your co workers, Share it with everyone you possibly know. Until everyone in this world learns to improve their communication skills, Think of what a fantastic revolution that would be this has been. Larry Wilson, I want to thank you for spending this time with me and I hope you found this information useful. If you're looking for more, you can find it@thewilsonmethod.com There's a ton of stuff there. In fact, if you want, you can even speak to me because I'm human. Send me an email@infowilsonmethod.com because I read every single one. I hope that you'll join us next week in this continuing journey and you'll be with me for the next episode of how to talk to humans.