Feb. 3, 2026

EP335 - Kevin Ertell The Strategy Trap

EP335 - Kevin Ertell The Strategy Trap

EP335 - Kevin Ertell The Strategy Trap In this electrifying episode of the Jason & Scot Show, recorded on Friday, October 10th, 2025, hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg and Scot\t Wingo welcome a very special guest and longtime friend, Kevin...

Apple Podcasts podcast player icon Spotify podcast player icon Overcast podcast player icon PocketCasts podcast player icon Amazon Music podcast player icon Audible podcast player icon Youtube Music podcast player icon RSS Feed podcast player icon
Apple Podcasts podcast player icon Spotify podcast player icon Overcast podcast player icon PocketCasts podcast player icon Amazon Music podcast player icon Audible podcast player icon Youtube Music podcast player icon RSS Feed podcast player icon

EP335 - Kevin Ertell The Strategy Trap

http://jasonandscot.com

In this electrifying episode of the Jason & Scot Show, recorded on Friday, October 10th, 2025, hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg and Scot\t Wingo welcome a very special guest and longtime friend, Kevin Ertell. With over 30 years of combined history, the duo dives into Kevin's impressive career trajectory, his extensive experiences in retail and strategy execution, and the valuable insights behind his newly released book, "The Strategy Trap: Why Companies Fail at Execution and How to Get It Right."

Kevin's impressive background spans from starting at Tower Records to holding senior positions at iconic companies like Borders, Nike, and Sur La Table. He discusses his evolution in the retail space, the intricacies of establishing the first TowerRecords.com site, and his current role advising various businesses, including helping the Minnesota Timberwolves with their ticketing operations. As he unveils his book, listeners learn about the core theme: effective execution is the linchpin of successful strategy.

Kevin breaks down the key concepts of his book, structured around the "six C's" that are critical for avoiding common pitfalls in strategic execution—co-creation, clarity, capacity, communication, coordination, and coaching. He emphasizes the importance of bringing teams together in the co-creation phase to ensure buy-in and alignment on the strategy, a central pillar in fostering commitment across the organization. The conversation touches on the significance of clarity in communication and the necessity of creating a space for people to provide feedback and understand their roles.

Throughout the episode, Scot and Jason explore Kevin's practical strategies and actionable advice for leaders looking to strengthen their execution capabilities. Kevin offers insights on leveraging constraints creatively, encouraging listeners to view limitations as opportunities for innovation, much like how companies like Costco manage to maintain low prices while driving efficiency.

As the discussion unfolds, the trio delves into the nuanced nature of workplace culture, highlighting the benefits of psychological safety, the impact of social incentives, and the importance of regular communication channels to keep everyone aligned within the execution framework.

Moreover, they touch on fascinating concepts such as pre-mortems, a proactive method of anticipating potential failures before launching a project, differentiating it from the traditional post-mortem analysis. This mindset shift encourages teams to address concerns upfront, minimizing the likelihood of catastrophic missteps in execution.

As the episode wraps up, Kevin shares his hopes for the book's impact, inviting listeners to access "The Strategy Trap" at their local bookstores or online. He emphasizes the vital interplay between strategy and execution, urging leaders to recognize that a well-crafted strategy is only as strong as its execution plan.

Join us for this enlightening discussion filled with practical lessons, captivating anecdotes, and a wealth of insights from an industry veteran. Tune in, and let’s embrace better execution practices for a thriving business landscape!

Episode 335 of the Jason & Scot Show was recorded on Friday, October 10th, 2025

Join your hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg, Chief Commerce Strategy Officer at Publicis, and Scot Wingo, CEO of ReFiBuy and Co-Founder of ChannelAdvisor as they discuss the latest news and trends in the world of e-commerce and digital shopper marketing.

WEBVTT

00:00:23.135 --> 00:00:29.795
Welcome to the Jason and Scott Show. This episode is being recorded on Friday, October 10th, 2025.

00:00:30.455 --> 00:00:36.295
I'm your host, Jason Retail Geek Goldberg. And as usual, I'm here with your co-host, Scott Wingo.

00:00:37.555 --> 00:00:40.975
Hey, Jason, and welcome back, Jason and Scott Show listeners.

00:00:42.015 --> 00:00:46.735
Well, Jason and listeners, we have a real treat for you on today's episode.

00:00:47.395 --> 00:00:52.475
Jason and I have both known Kevin Ertel for about 15 years each.

00:00:52.695 --> 00:00:55.535
So that's about 30 years by my calculations, Jason.

00:00:56.475 --> 00:00:58.315
Yeah, it probably fell longer to Kevin.

00:00:58.615 --> 00:01:03.255
It did. It probably felt like 60. We get a 2x multiple. The two of us together are a lot to handle.

00:01:03.815 --> 00:01:09.095
And we'll get into his amazing career. But what's really exciting is he has

00:01:09.095 --> 00:01:14.555
a book dropping, and we were able to get him, due to that 60-year relationship,

00:01:14.555 --> 00:01:17.175
on the show to tell our listeners about it.

00:01:17.495 --> 00:01:22.435
The book is called The Strategy Trap, Why Companies Fail at Execution and How

00:01:22.435 --> 00:01:24.315
to Get It Right. Kevin, welcome to the show.

00:01:25.115 --> 00:01:29.915
Thanks, guys. Great to be here. It's been a bit since I was last on and I'm excited to be here.

00:01:30.215 --> 00:01:33.875
Yeah, yeah. We had the interns looked and they couldn't find it. It's been that long ago.

00:01:34.095 --> 00:01:34.215
Yeah.

00:01:34.515 --> 00:01:35.955
It predates recorded history.

00:01:36.675 --> 00:01:40.875
Yeah. It was chiseled on a tablet somewhere. We'll have to dig it up, literally.

00:01:42.245 --> 00:01:45.905
Yeah. So as you alluded to, Kevin, this is not your first time on the show.

00:01:46.265 --> 00:01:51.385
If memory serves, the first time you were on this show, you were with Sir LaTabla

00:01:51.385 --> 00:01:52.505
at the time. Is that correct?

00:01:52.985 --> 00:01:57.045
Yeah, that's right. It was, yeah, back in 2015, I guess. But yeah,

00:01:57.205 --> 00:01:58.425
a few things have happened since then.

00:01:58.745 --> 00:02:05.145
Yeah. And weirdly, our careers like overlap and coincide for many years before

00:02:05.145 --> 00:02:07.505
that, which maybe we'll explore another time.

00:02:07.505 --> 00:02:14.365
But as we always like to do on the show, kind of remind the listeners what your

00:02:14.365 --> 00:02:18.825
e-commerce journey was prior to writing the book.

00:02:19.225 --> 00:02:22.905
Yeah, I mean, I spent most of my career in retail. I started,

00:02:22.905 --> 00:02:26.425
you know, on the very ground floor as a clerk at Tower Records.

00:02:26.705 --> 00:02:30.745
And I really had all my formative years there. I spent 20 years at Tower Records,

00:02:30.865 --> 00:02:34.525
started as a clerk and left as a senior vice president and led the team that

00:02:34.525 --> 00:02:40.445
built the first TowerRecords.com, you know, when it was mostly people on dial-up modems coming in.

00:02:40.725 --> 00:02:45.205
And I remember, you know, kind of obsessing about the image sizes that,

00:02:45.205 --> 00:02:46.685
you know, would download quickly.

00:02:47.606 --> 00:02:54.126
And fun fact, Tower Records was, of course, like an icon, a public pop culture

00:02:54.126 --> 00:03:01.926
icon, but it was run by one guy that owned 100% of the company and it was wildly successful.

00:03:02.326 --> 00:03:06.086
And he, inside baseball fact, he did not like ties.

00:03:06.746 --> 00:03:07.746
No, he did not.

00:03:07.986 --> 00:03:11.886
And so if you were so silly as to show up in his office wearing a tie,

00:03:12.126 --> 00:03:18.846
he would cut it off and pin it to his wall. And I know this because one of my ties is on his wall.

00:03:19.326 --> 00:03:22.566
Oh, I don't think you ever told me that. You got your tie cut off.

00:03:22.806 --> 00:03:29.566
Yeah, and I was totally punked. My co-workers who sent me like a lamb to slaughter at this meeting, like,

00:03:29.966 --> 00:03:33.606
I guarantee you were completely aware of what was going to happen and like,

00:03:33.706 --> 00:03:38.546
led me to believe that I should wear a tie to meet the billionaire owner of Tower Records.

00:03:38.846 --> 00:03:42.286
Hey, you know, I mean, a lot of people consider that a badge of honor to be

00:03:42.286 --> 00:03:45.546
in that case of ties. So congratulations to you on that for sure.

00:03:46.306 --> 00:03:51.406
I'm certain it was not the nicest time. So I distracted you,

00:03:51.466 --> 00:03:56.486
but of course, beloved, beloved music store featured prominently in a lot of

00:03:56.486 --> 00:03:58.086
America's greatest movies.

00:03:58.606 --> 00:04:01.446
Yeah. And I mean, just it was the greatest company to work for.

00:04:01.526 --> 00:04:02.766
I absolutely loved my time there.

00:04:03.226 --> 00:04:06.626
But, you know, as you said, it came to an end. So then I went to Borders,

00:04:07.206 --> 00:04:10.726
you know, which was still doing really well at the time. And I first went there

00:04:10.726 --> 00:04:15.086
to lead the building of the loyalty program, Borders Rewards,

00:04:15.286 --> 00:04:17.546
and then also led Borders.com.

00:04:17.786 --> 00:04:22.286
Did that for a while, left there and moved on to the vendor side for a little

00:04:22.286 --> 00:04:28.206
bit as the VP of retail for 4C Results, a company that measured customer satisfaction.

00:04:28.206 --> 00:04:33.326
And so I worked with more than 100 retailers and helped them understand customer

00:04:33.326 --> 00:04:38.706
satisfaction and how to respond to what they learned about what their customer

00:04:38.706 --> 00:04:40.106
experience was and how to make it better.

00:04:41.520 --> 00:04:47.380
From there, I went to Online Shoes as a CMO, got me to Seattle and moved on

00:04:47.380 --> 00:04:49.320
to Sur La Taub from there when we talked.

00:04:49.500 --> 00:04:54.540
And at Sur La Taub, I ran digital, but also marketing and technology for a while.

00:04:55.200 --> 00:04:59.380
And then I moved to Nike and I spent seven years at Nike, three different jobs there.

00:04:59.760 --> 00:05:04.940
Initially as sort of the GM of the digital business for the running category globally.

00:05:05.260 --> 00:05:10.240
Then I led global online or global digital operations. And then the last job

00:05:10.240 --> 00:05:14.240
I had there was leading global retail operations. So stores,

00:05:14.260 --> 00:05:16.620
a little bit of a full circle all the way back to that.

00:05:17.020 --> 00:05:20.720
And Kevin, for all of our young listeners that only wear contemporary shoes,

00:05:20.840 --> 00:05:22.020
remind us what Nike does.

00:05:22.640 --> 00:05:23.260
Yeah, right.

00:05:26.240 --> 00:05:30.380
You know, a few shoes, a little apparel, sweatpants, that sort of thing.

00:05:30.920 --> 00:05:31.940
That's a great idea.

00:05:32.420 --> 00:05:33.460
Yeah. You've heard of it?

00:05:34.180 --> 00:05:38.060
I have. You could probably have a mild success in that industry.

00:05:38.320 --> 00:05:41.240
Yeah. Seems like it did pretty well. They've done well for themselves.

00:05:41.480 --> 00:05:43.340
As long as you don't hire any eBay people to run it.

00:05:45.080 --> 00:05:45.400
Oops.

00:05:45.700 --> 00:05:47.640
This is where I'm going to go no comment.

00:05:48.520 --> 00:05:48.840
Fair.

00:05:49.740 --> 00:05:53.220
Pleats the fifth pretty early. This may be a record. Yep. Okay. I have to get this.

00:05:53.380 --> 00:05:54.960
Yeah. I'm going to have to on that one.

00:05:56.723 --> 00:06:01.343
And then after I left there, I started Mystere Advisory, a consultancy where

00:06:01.343 --> 00:06:05.743
I focus on three things, helping people with strategic execution,

00:06:05.963 --> 00:06:06.863
which we'll talk more about.

00:06:07.083 --> 00:06:13.543
I do executive coaching and also do some advisory work with a variety of different

00:06:13.543 --> 00:06:14.943
companies, software companies.

00:06:15.823 --> 00:06:19.923
And all that's led me actually to what I'm doing right now also is working with

00:06:19.923 --> 00:06:23.103
the Minnesota Timberwolves and leading the ticketing business there.

00:06:23.783 --> 00:06:26.183
Oh, neat. I didn't know that. That's new information.

00:06:26.183 --> 00:06:27.003
Breaking news for.

00:06:27.003 --> 00:06:33.023
Me and all of this is a side hustle for your main gig which is a musician is that correct.

00:06:33.023 --> 00:06:38.343
That is correct yes all supporting that yeah still playing music all the time

00:06:38.343 --> 00:06:43.343
and working on getting a new band together here in cleveland and of course you

00:06:43.343 --> 00:06:46.563
guys i think have been there we play that gig every year in new york right after

00:06:46.563 --> 00:06:49.703
right as part of nrf and we'll be doing that again this year at the cutting

00:06:49.703 --> 00:06:51.703
room in new york looking forward to that that.

00:06:51.703 --> 00:06:55.803
Is the The best event at NRF when I can stay up late enough for it.

00:06:56.363 --> 00:06:59.503
Yep. Drink your coffee. Have an extra one.

00:06:59.683 --> 00:07:07.143
That is a safe bet. And I believe you've even passed the music bug on to the next generation.

00:07:08.723 --> 00:07:13.423
Oh, it might. Yeah. Not so much in my house. They listen. They don't play.

00:07:15.063 --> 00:07:19.143
Awesome. So we want to jump into the book, but before we get too deep,

00:07:19.303 --> 00:07:24.503
just please tell me it's not a deep dive case study in all of my failures.

00:07:26.883 --> 00:07:32.303
Absolutely not. In fact, you do appear in the book as a kind of a hero, really.

00:07:33.183 --> 00:07:35.643
Yes. So, it's a fiction book. Awesome.

00:07:39.343 --> 00:07:40.623
It's entertaining reading.

00:07:41.543 --> 00:07:47.963
I was certainly entertained. So, before we jump into the content of the book,

00:07:48.223 --> 00:07:51.403
like, Like, you know, Scott, Scott kind of alluded to it in the intro.

00:07:51.783 --> 00:07:54.203
What, what inspired you to write a book?

00:07:55.811 --> 00:07:56.431
Is it the money?

00:07:57.331 --> 00:08:00.871
Yeah, right. I had thought about it for a long time.

00:08:01.031 --> 00:08:06.131
And, you know, I've been writing blogs for a while and sort of got a few people

00:08:06.131 --> 00:08:07.131
had said I should write a book.

00:08:07.251 --> 00:08:10.511
And I finally just decided, you know, to take that seriously.

00:08:11.191 --> 00:08:14.351
And then I really had to think about what was a topic I wanted to write about.

00:08:14.491 --> 00:08:18.251
And something that I'm really passionate about is the fact that,

00:08:18.351 --> 00:08:21.871
you know, most strategies fail. And there's a lot of data about that.

00:08:21.951 --> 00:08:24.311
And the number one reason they fail is poor execution.

00:08:25.231 --> 00:08:28.891
So I really wanted to focus on that. And, you know, I mean, there's a million

00:08:28.891 --> 00:08:33.351
books about strategy and how to write a strategy, but there's not that many

00:08:33.351 --> 00:08:35.511
about execution, funny enough.

00:08:35.731 --> 00:08:40.631
And most of the ones that are out there are written by consultants and academics.

00:08:41.251 --> 00:08:45.791
And so I wanted to write this really from an operator's perspective and really

00:08:45.791 --> 00:08:48.891
somebody who's sort of been there and has the scars from it.

00:08:49.091 --> 00:08:51.991
But I also didn't want to just make it, you know, my perspective.

00:08:52.271 --> 00:08:57.211
So I interviewed more than 60 operators, people who had been there and done

00:08:57.211 --> 00:09:01.691
that across a ton of different industries. I actually started in retail,

00:09:01.691 --> 00:09:05.851
but as I started to ask people who they knew who were successful executors,

00:09:05.891 --> 00:09:06.971
it just sort of passed me on.

00:09:07.031 --> 00:09:10.671
And before you knew it, I was talking to people in just about every industry

00:09:10.671 --> 00:09:14.971
you could imagine, you know, in content, media, tech, healthcare.

00:09:15.471 --> 00:09:19.571
I talked to a guy who does like public utilities in Australia,

00:09:19.931 --> 00:09:21.771
you know, so really kind of covered the gamut.

00:09:22.331 --> 00:09:26.971
And what I found in doing that is it just was a lot of commonality in the things that work.

00:09:26.991 --> 00:09:31.711
So that's what got me really inspired to kind of make this a book to put it out there.

00:09:33.296 --> 00:09:37.056
Cool. One of the things I like about it is how you structured it.

00:09:37.236 --> 00:09:41.076
So you've got kind of two chunks, you know, phases, phase one,

00:09:41.256 --> 00:09:43.256
setting the stage and phase two, showtime.

00:09:44.076 --> 00:09:49.776
And then you go through basically, you have six C's and each one is basically

00:09:49.776 --> 00:09:54.976
a C word and how you and then a trap that kind of goes along with it.

00:09:54.976 --> 00:09:57.216
So for example, I'll just pick one.

00:09:57.456 --> 00:09:59.716
Part two, clarity, escaping the complexity trap.

00:10:00.596 --> 00:10:05.796
Part five, coordination, closing the silo trap. And the reason I like this is

00:10:05.796 --> 00:10:08.256
this, it's kind of book, some books you read once you're like,

00:10:08.336 --> 00:10:09.536
okay, I had some good takeaways.

00:10:09.796 --> 00:10:13.856
And then others, like one of my favorites is this Ben Horowitz book called Good to Great.

00:10:14.076 --> 00:10:17.576
And it's, it's kind of similar where it's like a collection of case studies

00:10:17.576 --> 00:10:18.596
so you can read them linearly.

00:10:18.916 --> 00:10:22.196
But then you're always like, what was that case study? Oh yeah, it was in that book.

00:10:22.296 --> 00:10:26.416
And then you can jump right to it. Cause I, cause I feel like people could read

00:10:26.416 --> 00:10:31.436
this and then be, they, a lot of times you don't know you're in the trap or it's coming.

00:10:31.596 --> 00:10:34.376
So, so I think they'll, they'll get into the trap and they'll be like,

00:10:34.516 --> 00:10:36.896
I think I'm in one of those things Kevin was talking about.

00:10:36.976 --> 00:10:39.916
And they'll look it up and be like, oh crap, I'm in the ivory tower trap.

00:10:40.096 --> 00:10:43.076
And then, then you give them, you can like help them get out.

00:10:43.416 --> 00:10:47.636
So I think that'll be handy when, when people actually get their hands on this.

00:10:48.216 --> 00:10:51.496
Was that intentional? You try to make it a reference and a read?

00:10:52.116 --> 00:10:55.796
Yeah, totally. I mean, I very much wanted it to be practical.

00:10:55.936 --> 00:11:00.536
So I wanted to make sure that there were lots of how-tos in there and lots of

00:11:00.536 --> 00:11:04.816
things that you could take away and go execute right away, you know, kind of make it happen.

00:11:04.816 --> 00:11:10.836
So very much wanted to make it easy to reference, different sections that you could go to quickly.

00:11:10.836 --> 00:11:15.096
At the end of every one of those parts, there is a checklist that you can use

00:11:15.096 --> 00:11:18.296
to kind of go through and kind of see how you're doing and rate yourself.

00:11:18.696 --> 00:11:20.316
So yeah, I wanted to make it super usable.

00:11:22.089 --> 00:11:25.569
Yeah, I can even see, I've been in companies where we do little book clubs,

00:11:25.669 --> 00:11:31.969
and this would be kind of a good one for an executive team or even a team to

00:11:31.969 --> 00:11:36.469
kind of have as they felt like they weren't being as effective on the execution as they wanted to be.

00:11:37.109 --> 00:11:40.489
You should do the reading club follow-up. That way you can sell another book.

00:11:40.869 --> 00:11:42.329
Yeah, I love it. Let's do that.

00:11:43.189 --> 00:11:49.049
The workbook. so you kind of stated this but just so listeners can tie it together

00:11:49.049 --> 00:11:52.489
i'll ask the question what is the strategy trap.

00:11:52.489 --> 00:11:59.249
Yeah i mean the strategy trap is when leaders get kind of obsessed with the

00:11:59.249 --> 00:12:03.889
idea and even the presentation the idea maybe the slide deck but they don't

00:12:03.889 --> 00:12:09.409
spend nearly enough time focus on creating the conditions for the people on

00:12:09.409 --> 00:12:12.029
the team to actually bring that strategy to reality.

00:12:12.429 --> 00:12:16.849
And that is the fundamental problem that sort of leads to all the other traps.

00:12:18.347 --> 00:12:21.887
How do, so I've always had this trouble, this challenge.

00:12:22.087 --> 00:12:26.087
So I'll, I'll talk to them blue in the face about our vision and I'll even tie

00:12:26.087 --> 00:12:28.367
it into, you know, the plan and everything.

00:12:28.587 --> 00:12:32.767
And then we'll do these employee surveys and now everyone's always like this division isn't clear.

00:12:33.107 --> 00:12:37.147
I'm like every quarter I go through this, like, why is this not landing?

00:12:37.447 --> 00:12:40.007
What am I doing wrong, Kevin? Which trap am I in?

00:12:41.427 --> 00:12:46.887
Well, I mean, you know, this, the vision is only part of what you need to execute.

00:12:47.727 --> 00:12:53.527
So that in the end it's you know this you want me to go through the six c's

00:12:53.527 --> 00:12:55.707
would it help to kind of give the big picture yeah yeah.

00:12:55.707 --> 00:12:56.667
Let's let's hit the c's.

00:12:56.667 --> 00:13:00.547
You know you talked about the two phases setting the stage and then and then

00:13:00.547 --> 00:13:05.947
uh show time but in setting the stage the sick the first three c's are co-creation

00:13:05.947 --> 00:13:13.087
clarity and capacity and those three are super super critical Co-creation is all about, you know,

00:13:13.667 --> 00:13:18.387
bringing the team at multiple levels within multiple functions in to help develop

00:13:18.387 --> 00:13:19.807
and create the strategy.

00:13:20.447 --> 00:13:24.207
And what you get out of that when you do it that way is, you know,

00:13:24.267 --> 00:13:27.747
alignment and buy-in. You get people really kind of owning it a little bit.

00:13:29.032 --> 00:13:32.852
You get validation to make sure that this plan that you're putting together

00:13:32.852 --> 00:13:36.172
is going to be workable. And then you get commitment.

00:13:36.672 --> 00:13:41.112
And so partly people are sort of fully understanding the strategy then and then

00:13:41.112 --> 00:13:43.852
really buying into it and really saying, I'm ready to go.

00:13:44.572 --> 00:13:47.832
Clarity is about simplicity and it's about meaning.

00:13:47.852 --> 00:13:52.412
So it's about helping people understand it, but really understand and connect

00:13:52.412 --> 00:13:56.872
their personal meaning to it, which really helps retention right on it.

00:13:57.412 --> 00:14:00.552
And then capacity is super critical you can't

00:14:00.552 --> 00:14:03.772
just drop any new strategy on top of people's existing work

00:14:03.772 --> 00:14:08.492
and just expect it to get absorbed within and and so that becomes a real problem

00:14:08.492 --> 00:14:12.512
if you don't do that so taking the time to create space for it really really

00:14:12.512 --> 00:14:16.992
matters those are all setting the stage that gets you set to kind of move into

00:14:16.992 --> 00:14:20.472
showtime and actually start to go on this thing and so the three c's there are

00:14:20.472 --> 00:14:23.272
communication coordination and coaching,

00:14:24.012 --> 00:14:28.652
communication you know is an is a non-stop thing so to your comment a little bit.

00:14:29.567 --> 00:14:34.107
I actually heard this. I was at a Nike conference a few years ago,

00:14:34.147 --> 00:14:41.587
and Kara Lawson, who's the head coach of the Duke women's basketball team and a former WNBA player,

00:14:41.947 --> 00:14:46.087
she talked about her concept she tells her players of early, loud, and continuous.

00:14:46.087 --> 00:14:50.727
And she's talking to them about that in the context of basketball you know hey

00:14:50.727 --> 00:14:54.647
like you got to tell people if a pick is coming get there early the arena is

00:14:54.647 --> 00:14:58.787
really loud so you've got to be loud and you got to continually talk about it

00:14:58.787 --> 00:15:00.167
because they didn't hear it the first time,

00:15:00.687 --> 00:15:05.707
and i think that applies to when you're communicating a strategy to get in there

00:15:05.707 --> 00:15:10.907
early talk about it even before that vision or the idea was was fully formed

00:15:10.907 --> 00:15:12.667
you know so people can understand the why,

00:15:12.907 --> 00:15:16.667
but then be loud, talk about it in every forum, in every way,

00:15:16.907 --> 00:15:19.107
and in every different method you can think of.

00:15:19.487 --> 00:15:22.047
And then continuous matters because you can't stop.

00:15:22.507 --> 00:15:26.007
There's like this thing called the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve that says people

00:15:26.007 --> 00:15:31.167
forget 90% of what they heard within 30 days if it's not reinforced all the

00:15:31.167 --> 00:15:32.747
time. So you kind of have to do that.

00:15:33.287 --> 00:15:38.287
Coordination then is about having checkpoints and just ways along the path to

00:15:38.287 --> 00:15:41.727
make sure that you're sort of organized and implementing this thing and people

00:15:41.727 --> 00:15:46.067
understand the why and what their component of it is at any given moment and

00:15:46.067 --> 00:15:47.267
how it fits in the big picture.

00:15:47.947 --> 00:15:52.387
And then the last but not least is coaching, which is a component of leadership,

00:15:52.387 --> 00:15:57.447
but not all of leadership. It's a specific one about creating culture and how

00:15:57.447 --> 00:16:01.687
do you do motivation and incentivizing people to do the work.

00:16:01.767 --> 00:16:05.907
But all of that reinforces the vision that you're talking about at the beginning.

00:16:06.147 --> 00:16:10.787
So I find having that structure across all those six C's helps people understand

00:16:10.787 --> 00:16:14.367
the vision better, helps them understand their role in executing in that vision

00:16:14.367 --> 00:16:17.027
and reminds them and motivates them along the way.

00:16:17.664 --> 00:16:22.684
Yeah, I think I'm already stuck in the first one. So you can't just tell people

00:16:22.684 --> 00:16:24.604
what to do and they just do it like the whole.

00:16:24.724 --> 00:16:25.204
Yeah, not so much.

00:16:25.624 --> 00:16:31.284
I was going to say, like, I didn't want to pick on Scott's incredibly successful managerial style.

00:16:31.284 --> 00:16:35.364
But when he did that survey and they said the vision isn't clear,

00:16:35.644 --> 00:16:39.724
what they actually meant is they didn't get a chance to co-create that vision.

00:16:39.864 --> 00:16:41.064
And so they weren't committed to it.

00:16:42.484 --> 00:16:45.084
It is entirely possible. Exactly.

00:16:45.084 --> 00:16:51.084
Had you read Kevin's book, we could only imagine how successful you could have been.

00:16:51.344 --> 00:16:53.444
I know. Maybe this time. We'll see.

00:16:53.604 --> 00:16:54.604
Yeah. Let's start over.

00:16:55.824 --> 00:16:58.264
I think you just did start over, didn't you, Scott?

00:16:58.504 --> 00:17:02.904
Yep. Yeah. I will actually, well, we already have a vision, so I've already skipped.

00:17:02.984 --> 00:17:08.744
Yeah. And he's not letting any of his coworkers share in the co-creation.

00:17:09.184 --> 00:17:12.684
They're just desperately trying to hang on to the Scott rocket ship.

00:17:12.684 --> 00:17:17.024
I will as long as they come up with the same thing I did yeah yeah co-creation,

00:17:17.664 --> 00:17:19.844
is that how it works Kevin yep.

00:17:19.844 --> 00:17:20.724
That's exactly how it.

00:17:20.724 --> 00:17:21.564
Works okay,

00:17:24.004 --> 00:17:28.224
let's pick on Jason now I feel I feel attacked yeah.

00:17:28.224 --> 00:17:31.824
Yeah you guys are practitioners I just talk about this stuff I very explicitly.

00:17:33.024 --> 00:17:37.824
You just drop all you do is spit strategy and disappear must be nice.

00:17:39.424 --> 00:17:45.304
At my office I'm known as the pelican because I My main role is to fly over,

00:17:45.664 --> 00:17:48.744
drop something down, and then fly off.

00:17:49.724 --> 00:17:49.884
Nice.

00:17:50.144 --> 00:17:53.404
Okay. It's better being known as a pigeon, I suppose.

00:17:53.744 --> 00:17:55.544
Yeah. You can see why no one's reading my book.

00:17:58.244 --> 00:17:59.024
Pretty short.

00:18:00.024 --> 00:18:00.524
Yeah.

00:18:00.804 --> 00:18:01.644
Which one of these...

00:18:03.646 --> 00:18:06.326
A lot of times you kind of think about writing a book and you frame it up and

00:18:06.326 --> 00:18:07.606
then you write it and you're like really good.

00:18:07.786 --> 00:18:10.086
Which one was kind of like your favorite? If you had to pick a favorite,

00:18:10.226 --> 00:18:12.226
what was your favorite part?

00:18:12.426 --> 00:18:12.646
Wow.

00:18:13.006 --> 00:18:13.266
Favorite C.

00:18:14.046 --> 00:18:18.386
I guess it probably is co-creation because I do think that's foundational, you know?

00:18:18.526 --> 00:18:18.626
Yeah.

00:18:18.626 --> 00:18:22.886
And I think that without it, it's really difficult to get to the other ones.

00:18:22.886 --> 00:18:31.786
And also, when you co-create in a good structured way, it really sets the foundation

00:18:31.786 --> 00:18:33.686
and superpowers all the other Cs.

00:18:33.826 --> 00:18:38.826
So I suppose co-creation, that's a good one. It's a fun one. But I love all my babies.

00:18:39.266 --> 00:18:42.906
So is this a, are we having a facilitated conversation?

00:18:43.466 --> 00:18:47.966
Are we, you're like, you delegate to the team, come back to me with what you think.

00:18:48.086 --> 00:18:52.866
And then you basically veto it. Like how, what is the, uh, I know that's not

00:18:52.866 --> 00:18:54.686
the right structure. What is the right structure?

00:18:55.286 --> 00:18:58.326
Yeah, I think it's iterations and it's, it's working with people.

00:18:58.546 --> 00:19:02.206
It's, it's having, you know, you might start with a small group of people,

00:19:02.386 --> 00:19:06.046
although I really like to have that small group of people be representative

00:19:06.046 --> 00:19:09.406
of different teams and even different levels to some degree,

00:19:09.446 --> 00:19:15.926
because you're getting a more well-rounded initial kind of take at your strategy when you do that.

00:19:15.926 --> 00:19:21.166
And you also start to build, you know, advocates and even find some detractors to bring into that.

00:19:21.726 --> 00:19:25.826
But there is multiple phases that you want to start with that group and then

00:19:25.826 --> 00:19:28.706
start to share it out and get more feedback and more ideas.

00:19:29.366 --> 00:19:32.726
There's one person I interviewed in the book, Amber Taylor.

00:19:33.897 --> 00:19:38.537
I used to work with at Nike. She has this great concept I love called a proposal to hate.

00:19:38.917 --> 00:19:43.157
And so, she would take, you know, kind of the initial idea and she would take

00:19:43.157 --> 00:19:45.617
it out to people and say, this is a proposal to hate.

00:19:45.737 --> 00:19:49.517
I want you to tell me what's wrong with it. You know, she would give them permission to do that.

00:19:50.197 --> 00:19:55.237
And I think that's super valuable. You know, Jason, you and I talked when I

00:19:55.237 --> 00:19:58.457
interviewed you for this book about the six thinking hats.

00:19:58.657 --> 00:20:01.097
Yeah. That's the black hat. Yeah.

00:20:01.417 --> 00:20:04.337
I mean, that's one of the hats, the black hat, right? But the six...

00:20:04.337 --> 00:20:06.617
I am a huge fan of six thinking hats, too.

00:20:07.517 --> 00:20:08.517
Edward de Bono.

00:20:08.857 --> 00:20:14.197
Edward de Bono. Yep. That's the guy. And you've had experience with it, as have I.

00:20:14.397 --> 00:20:18.917
And what's great about that method is that you sort of...

00:20:19.497 --> 00:20:23.437
You can take some of these ideas, you know, the core of a strategy,

00:20:23.557 --> 00:20:26.277
the vision maybe, and you start to get a group of people together,

00:20:26.277 --> 00:20:27.697
but you structure their thinking.

00:20:29.096 --> 00:20:33.916
You know, you have a metaphorical hat or maybe you get real hats and you put,

00:20:34.236 --> 00:20:38.676
you know, have everybody in the group don a hat, you know, the one Jason just

00:20:38.676 --> 00:20:39.856
references the black hat.

00:20:39.936 --> 00:20:43.956
And if you say everybody's got a black hat on now, when you're wearing that

00:20:43.956 --> 00:20:48.816
hat, you only talk about negative things, only talk about the problems of this

00:20:48.816 --> 00:20:53.836
idea. So it's not just people randomly throwing in ideas. It's they're all focused on that.

00:20:54.276 --> 00:20:58.476
Or you have the white hat, which is like, what are the facts we know about this?

00:20:58.596 --> 00:21:00.216
We're only talking about facts, no opinions.

00:21:00.396 --> 00:21:04.376
And there's a couple other different hats that you put on in this context,

00:21:04.436 --> 00:21:10.056
but the idea is that you're getting everybody to be thinking about this idea,

00:21:10.216 --> 00:21:14.276
whatever strategy you have with the same perspective at the same time.

00:21:15.016 --> 00:21:16.716
Jason, you could probably talk about it.

00:21:16.716 --> 00:21:20.816
Yeah, I think you nailed it. I mean, traditionally when you have an unstructured

00:21:20.816 --> 00:21:25.816
conversation with a group of people and you say, hey, I want to talk about what

00:21:25.816 --> 00:21:30.016
success could look like in my new company, while you're talking about that success,

00:21:30.336 --> 00:21:35.496
one of the people who's not bought in is just thinking about all the ways that

00:21:35.496 --> 00:21:41.116
this idea is going to, or is likely to fail because there's not a structure, right?

00:21:41.236 --> 00:21:45.096
But so when you, you ask everyone to put on the black hat and then everyone

00:21:45.096 --> 00:21:49.796
gets to, gets permission to be super negative without being a jerk because it's,

00:21:49.876 --> 00:21:51.496
it's the literal assignment.

00:21:51.816 --> 00:21:55.656
And then when you take off that black hat and said, now I want to talk about

00:21:55.656 --> 00:21:57.976
like what success looks like.

00:21:58.216 --> 00:22:03.696
Well, they just took the black hat off. And so you've kind of taken that ability

00:22:03.696 --> 00:22:09.536
for them to be sort of sabotaging the brainstorm about success or,

00:22:09.556 --> 00:22:11.916
you know, about expansions or about different things.

00:22:12.036 --> 00:22:20.056
So I really like that. I'm a fan of cognitive psychology and like I love that you pick co-creation.

00:22:20.997 --> 00:22:25.837
Because kind of going with retail metaphors, there's a super fun cognitive bias

00:22:25.837 --> 00:22:29.357
that literally got named after a retailer. It's called the Ikea effect.

00:22:29.717 --> 00:22:35.117
And essentially the principle is, if I take two identical tables and one of

00:22:35.117 --> 00:22:40.677
them I build for you and just hand to you, and the other is a kit of parts and

00:22:40.677 --> 00:22:42.937
you have to struggle and build the table yourself,

00:22:43.737 --> 00:22:46.097
guess which table you like more and value more?

00:22:47.157 --> 00:22:52.017
The table you helped co-create, even though, So even if at the end they're identical

00:22:52.017 --> 00:22:56.457
tables, the table with your blood, sweat and tears in it, you,

00:22:56.597 --> 00:22:58.937
you have more love for, right?

00:22:59.077 --> 00:23:03.437
And so, you know, in that same way, like having, having these,

00:23:03.577 --> 00:23:09.937
these strategies or having these ideas and, and, you know, empowering people to feel like they,

00:23:10.177 --> 00:23:16.057
they were following the key instructions to get to that idea makes them more committed to it.

00:23:16.217 --> 00:23:19.997
Right. And then there's kind of a related cognitive bias called the endowment

00:23:19.997 --> 00:23:26.357
effect, which is whether you built it or not, if I get you to think you built

00:23:26.357 --> 00:23:28.337
it, you'll value it more.

00:23:28.437 --> 00:23:33.717
If you imagine owning something, if you imagine that you're an owner of this

00:23:33.717 --> 00:23:40.777
company or this idea, then you will value it much more than if you don't. Right.

00:23:40.917 --> 00:23:45.357
And so in retail, what we're often trying to do is get customers to look at

00:23:45.357 --> 00:23:47.557
that product and imagine that they already own it.

00:23:48.197 --> 00:23:48.317
Yep.

00:23:49.672 --> 00:23:52.932
Yeah. And that, and they, they will value it much higher in that scenario.

00:23:53.012 --> 00:23:54.972
So yeah, it's super important.

00:23:55.632 --> 00:23:56.772
Scott, are you taking notes?

00:23:57.172 --> 00:24:01.272
I am. I'm still writing down the hats. So I'm, I'm kind of way behind you guys.

00:24:01.632 --> 00:24:02.772
Yeah. One other thing about that.

00:24:02.952 --> 00:24:06.392
Now in Scott's version, all six colored hats are going to say refi, bye.

00:24:07.992 --> 00:24:09.932
One of them might be a South Carolina hat.

00:24:10.572 --> 00:24:11.152
Ooh, good.

00:24:11.292 --> 00:24:11.492
Yeah.

00:24:12.112 --> 00:24:12.292
Yeah.

00:24:13.372 --> 00:24:17.972
What on the hats, one other point about that, that I always think is interesting

00:24:17.972 --> 00:24:20.932
too, because you called out the one, the person who's negative and you gave

00:24:20.932 --> 00:24:24.552
them permission to be negative and that gets you really good value.

00:24:25.292 --> 00:24:31.012
What I have found interesting when I've implemented that too is that you also

00:24:31.012 --> 00:24:34.652
have people who are super optimistic and they can never see anything wrong with it.

00:24:34.732 --> 00:24:39.972
So when you get them to put a black hat on, it forces them to see things differently.

00:24:40.152 --> 00:24:44.372
And then the same is true when you give the yellow hat, the optimism hat to

00:24:44.372 --> 00:24:45.972
the person who's always negative.

00:24:46.192 --> 00:24:50.812
It starts to expand their minds and their way of thinking about it so not only

00:24:50.812 --> 00:24:54.872
are you getting better insight into your strategy and your ideas but you're

00:24:54.872 --> 00:24:58.492
also really sort of changing the thinking of the team as you're going about

00:24:58.492 --> 00:25:02.612
that which is which has been pretty valuable too yeah.

00:25:02.612 --> 00:25:08.612
The okay let's is that a good time to wrap up co-creation or anything.

00:25:08.612 --> 00:25:09.632
Sure we should learn about.

00:25:09.632 --> 00:25:13.152
That okay Yeah. Cool. Jason, over to you.

00:25:13.872 --> 00:25:18.132
Yeah. So, Kevin, you kind of make

00:25:18.132 --> 00:25:22.092
this, I want to say, relatively easy to understand because it still is...

00:25:22.772 --> 00:25:25.472
It's a dense book. There's a lot of interesting thoughts in it,

00:25:25.532 --> 00:25:29.472
but you give this kind of framework which helps, at least in my mind,

00:25:29.612 --> 00:25:33.532
it helps kind of distill it down.

00:25:35.144 --> 00:25:45.924
But I'm kind of curious, how do you see the book being used in places that traditionally

00:25:45.924 --> 00:25:50.784
are launching traditional strategy and getting those bad results?

00:25:51.824 --> 00:25:57.244
Can I iterate here? Can Scott just learn that he's making a mistake about not

00:25:57.244 --> 00:26:01.444
co-creating his strategy and that will move him one step closer to success?

00:26:01.444 --> 00:26:05.544
Or does he sort of need to embrace all six C's in order to be successful?

00:26:05.964 --> 00:26:11.384
I think definitely people can jump into any of these C's and use those directly.

00:26:11.744 --> 00:26:15.044
You know, clarity is a good example, you know, and Scott, if you said people

00:26:15.044 --> 00:26:19.264
were maybe not understanding or not remembering, I think then some of the techniques

00:26:19.264 --> 00:26:24.024
in clarity might be a good place to just jump directly into and talk through

00:26:24.024 --> 00:26:25.424
some of the things that we have in there.

00:26:26.304 --> 00:26:29.724
You know, in the showtime section of thing around communication, coordination,

00:26:29.724 --> 00:26:32.644
there's a lot of techniques in there that you could take from something that's

00:26:32.644 --> 00:26:35.644
existing and just refine your capabilities and build on

00:26:35.644 --> 00:26:40.464
it and take some ideas definitely you know i think you don't have to read the

00:26:40.464 --> 00:26:43.684
book from start to finish and exactly the way it is you could jump into the

00:26:43.684 --> 00:26:49.344
areas that you felt maybe you had the most opportunity to prove in for sure

00:26:49.344 --> 00:26:55.624
although i'd love you to read it from start to finish you.

00:26:55.624 --> 00:27:00.464
You you talked to was it 60 we you talked to 60-ish folks, what were some of

00:27:00.464 --> 00:27:03.944
the most, and you can't say Jason, what were some of the most.

00:27:04.004 --> 00:27:07.324
Uh, I think it was a safe bet he wasn't going to anyway.

00:27:08.984 --> 00:27:13.984
What were some of the most intelligent, no, uh, what were some of the,

00:27:14.204 --> 00:27:16.104
you know, sometimes you go into those things and you're like,

00:27:16.204 --> 00:27:17.624
okay, I kind of know this person's story.

00:27:17.724 --> 00:27:20.844
And then you hear a real, you know, zinger comes out of left field.

00:27:21.124 --> 00:27:23.864
What did you have? Tell us an experience, something like that,

00:27:23.984 --> 00:27:26.184
that, that really kind of came at you from the side.

00:27:27.591 --> 00:27:33.851
Yeah, let's see. That's a good question. You know, one person I talked to was

00:27:33.851 --> 00:27:38.271
Joe Megabo, who's, you know, now the CEO of CPAP.

00:27:38.451 --> 00:27:41.671
He's been kind of in a variety of sleep-related companies lately.

00:27:42.651 --> 00:27:47.411
But he actually told me a pretty good story about analytics and I didn't actually

00:27:47.411 --> 00:27:51.391
realize that he started his career in analytics. And he talked about the framework

00:27:51.391 --> 00:27:55.031
he used to take on analytics projects.

00:27:55.291 --> 00:27:58.711
But I really liked kind of his approach to how he thought about that.

00:27:58.831 --> 00:28:00.591
It was very structured, which was good.

00:28:01.091 --> 00:28:04.611
But he really kind of got into some of those concepts I talked about,

00:28:04.631 --> 00:28:08.051
about, you know, you could do analytics about a million things,

00:28:08.111 --> 00:28:11.671
but how do you sort of sort through and say, what do we really need to focus on?

00:28:12.071 --> 00:28:15.191
What is actionable that we could be doing, not just interesting?

00:28:15.791 --> 00:28:18.671
And, you know, how does it fit within the capacity that we have.

00:28:18.871 --> 00:28:23.071
So, I thought his approaches on some of that stuff were not where I was expecting

00:28:23.071 --> 00:28:24.651
he would go that were really valuable.

00:28:26.216 --> 00:28:27.836
Where did that land into the book?

00:28:28.456 --> 00:28:33.096
That is in the capacity parts, I believe.

00:28:33.816 --> 00:28:34.476
Okay, cool.

00:28:35.196 --> 00:28:38.236
Shout out to Joe, who is another legend in the industry.

00:28:38.396 --> 00:28:43.636
I know he's done a bunch of sweet gigs lately, but I think of him as an apparel guy, right? Wasn't?

00:28:43.996 --> 00:28:46.396
Yeah, he was at American Eagle. American Eagle.

00:28:46.576 --> 00:28:46.696
Yeah.

00:28:46.856 --> 00:28:51.516
But he was like Expedia before that. So he's kind of jumped around different industries as well.

00:28:52.256 --> 00:28:57.976
Very cool. what so there's not a lot of pictures in the book kevin i if i have a criticism,

00:29:00.236 --> 00:29:05.136
yeah there there could be more images but there are some interesting visuals

00:29:05.136 --> 00:29:09.496
there's some interesting charts and one that i'm remembering is it the derrick

00:29:09.496 --> 00:29:15.396
sievers chart derrick sievers yeah sievers oh gosh see i should have listened to the audiobook it.

00:29:15.396 --> 00:29:16.716
Hasn't been created yet but.

00:29:16.716 --> 00:29:21.176
Yeah and i assume you're you're gonna narrate it yourself when it is yeah.

00:29:21.176 --> 00:29:21.996
I think so yeah.

00:29:21.996 --> 00:29:23.296
Yeah i I insist on it.

00:29:23.676 --> 00:29:25.676
Okay. Well, then it's decided.

00:29:26.216 --> 00:29:27.776
Nice. Tell us about that.

00:29:29.245 --> 00:29:32.605
Yeah. I mean, Derek's an interesting guy. I've known him for a long time,

00:29:32.725 --> 00:29:38.305
but he has been like an entrepreneur and an investor. He's a TED Talk speaker.

00:29:38.805 --> 00:29:43.405
So, he gets a lot of people coming to him with their ideas and they want to,

00:29:43.425 --> 00:29:46.365
you know, kind of work with him to create an idea.

00:29:46.545 --> 00:29:50.625
And he has a story he talked about where this guy kind of came to him and was

00:29:50.625 --> 00:29:52.285
like, I got a billion dollar idea.

00:29:52.505 --> 00:29:55.425
And Derek's like, okay, great. What is it? And the guy's like,

00:29:55.905 --> 00:29:58.005
online dating with music.

00:30:00.645 --> 00:30:03.845
And Derek was like cool what else

00:30:03.845 --> 00:30:06.825
and the guy was like that's it you know you're the tech genius that's the

00:30:06.825 --> 00:30:10.845
idea let's just go and we'll split a 50 50 kind of it so

00:30:10.845 --> 00:30:16.085
Derek kind of was he took out his notepad and he kind of wrote this chart out

00:30:16.085 --> 00:30:21.665
and he had on one column the idea quality and he wrote kind of you know weak

00:30:21.665 --> 00:30:26.925
so so good brilliant and then he wrote another column called execution quality.

00:30:27.245 --> 00:30:29.845
And he wrote like, you know, weak, so, so good and brilliant.

00:30:30.145 --> 00:30:33.745
And he kind of drew out a score for each of those with the idea.

00:30:34.045 --> 00:30:39.365
It was kind of, you know, weak ideas are worth one, so, so five, brilliant 20.

00:30:39.725 --> 00:30:44.245
But the dollars he put on the column next to the execution quality,

00:30:44.545 --> 00:30:46.705
where he wrote those one to 10 million.

00:30:47.185 --> 00:30:51.345
And he basically said to the guy, look, you know, if you want to make a business,

00:30:51.625 --> 00:30:53.065
you got to multiply these two.

00:30:53.245 --> 00:30:57.565
Ideas are just the multiplier. and they're worth nothing without the execution.

00:30:58.690 --> 00:31:01.810
The guy kind of walked away a little defeated, but that was kind of the idea

00:31:01.810 --> 00:31:06.690
that he showed that the idea doesn't have nearly the value as the execution does.

00:31:06.990 --> 00:31:11.330
The combination is where you get there, but a brilliant idea doesn't take you very far.

00:31:11.590 --> 00:31:16.610
You have to have a real plan to execute it, not just let's do online dating

00:31:16.610 --> 00:31:19.010
with music and you go just do your thing.

00:31:20.090 --> 00:31:24.670
Yeah, that's amazing. I feel like that's a weekly conversation I have with my

00:31:24.670 --> 00:31:29.790
in-laws when they come to me with their billion-dollar shark tank idea.

00:31:31.410 --> 00:31:36.150
And I'm like, yeah, yeah. The idea is the least difficult part.

00:31:37.110 --> 00:31:42.610
Yeah. I mean, you can have a middling idea and great execution.

00:31:42.610 --> 00:31:45.890
You're going to be way better off than a great idea that doesn't go anywhere.

00:31:46.110 --> 00:31:49.670
Yeah. And let me give you an example of the online dating. So,

00:31:49.670 --> 00:31:54.570
you can laugh at me for this, but as many people know, I started my digital

00:31:54.570 --> 00:31:58.450
career at a super successful company called Blockbuster Entertainment.

00:31:59.470 --> 00:31:59.530
Yeah.

00:31:59.990 --> 00:32:04.590
And I got a real opportunity to work for an amazing entrepreneur named Wayne

00:32:04.590 --> 00:32:09.150
Heisinger who built a billion-dollar business three separate times in three

00:32:09.150 --> 00:32:10.610
totally distinct industries.

00:32:10.950 --> 00:32:15.890
And amongst the cool things about Wayne, he used to keep score by how many millionaires he made.

00:32:17.090 --> 00:32:21.230
And so we sold, I know it's a big joke, everyone likes to make fun of Blockbuster,

00:32:21.290 --> 00:32:27.410
but we sold Blockbuster for $8 billion and moved on like years before Netflix was ever invented.

00:32:29.270 --> 00:32:34.270
So we sell Blockbuster to Viacom, I moved from Florida back to the West Coast,

00:32:34.450 --> 00:32:40.110
and Wayne is like, hey, all this .com stuff is going on in the Bay Area right

00:32:40.110 --> 00:32:43.510
now, find some deals and we'll make some investments.

00:32:44.606 --> 00:32:48.966
And I'm like, oh my God, I just got my Wayne Heisinger golden ticket, right?

00:32:49.106 --> 00:32:52.946
Like, like I thought like this, I thought like this was the greatest moment in my life.

00:32:53.166 --> 00:32:58.286
And so you moved to the Bay Area and I'm, I'm looking for a deal to bring to Wayne, right?

00:32:58.386 --> 00:33:02.326
And Wayne's a guy that like saw the market for garbage trucks and bought and

00:33:02.326 --> 00:33:03.806
built waste management, right?

00:33:03.906 --> 00:33:10.206
He saw video stores and built Blockbuster, you know, used cars and built AutoNation later.

00:33:10.826 --> 00:33:14.906
So I get there, I'm looking at all these companies and I find the first company

00:33:14.906 --> 00:33:15.906
that I want to take to Wayne.

00:33:16.206 --> 00:33:18.866
And it's this company called Electronic Classifieds.

00:33:19.466 --> 00:33:24.626
And their, like, in hindsight, totally correct idea was, hey,

00:33:24.926 --> 00:33:28.346
digital and the internet are going to totally disrupt this hugely lucrative

00:33:28.346 --> 00:33:32.086
business that newspapers have called classified ads.

00:33:32.826 --> 00:33:38.486
And our proof of concept is we're launching an online business for the most

00:33:38.486 --> 00:33:42.386
popular category in classified ads, which is dating.

00:33:42.806 --> 00:33:45.726
And so this proof of concept is called Match.com.

00:33:46.026 --> 00:33:46.426
Oh.

00:33:46.966 --> 00:33:53.926
And so I, like, side note, signed up for Match.com and my free lifetime username,

00:33:53.926 --> 00:33:55.446
I've been married for over 10

00:33:55.446 --> 00:34:00.026
years, But my free lifetime username on Match.com is Jason at Match.com,

00:34:00.866 --> 00:34:02.746
to put it in perspective.

00:34:03.066 --> 00:34:07.826
But I took Match.com to Wayne, and he's like, don't see it.

00:34:10.306 --> 00:34:13.506
And, you know, Wayne is no longer with us, I'm sorry to say.

00:34:13.766 --> 00:34:19.206
But let the record show that, like, their market cap has greatly dipped and

00:34:19.206 --> 00:34:20.386
is currently $8 billion.

00:34:21.086 --> 00:34:21.686
Wow.

00:34:22.626 --> 00:34:27.966
Yeah so it turns out like the idea is interesting but it it all comes down to

00:34:27.966 --> 00:34:33.006
that execution and how many companies like had that idea and you know,

00:34:34.271 --> 00:34:37.311
who it ultimately took our friends at Tinder to make it work.

00:34:37.831 --> 00:34:40.571
Yep. There you go. Yep. Execution's everything.

00:34:40.931 --> 00:34:44.811
Yeah. So no one thought this strategy book was going to help you find a spouse, but now you know.

00:34:45.171 --> 00:34:45.931
Yeah. Well,

00:34:48.111 --> 00:34:50.611
you never know where these conversations are going to turn.

00:34:53.191 --> 00:34:59.331
Another, another story I liked was Linda Carlisle. Maybe share kind of the story there.

00:35:00.491 --> 00:35:07.451
Yeah. Well, Linda is a communication specialist. And we talked a lot about communication and how to,

00:35:08.776 --> 00:35:12.856
you know, best communicate strategy to be executable.

00:35:13.916 --> 00:35:20.416
And she basically talked a lot about the idea that you would start with a big

00:35:20.416 --> 00:35:24.356
bang, like a lot of companies do and, you know, have a, you know,

00:35:24.496 --> 00:35:25.716
town hall or what have you.

00:35:25.956 --> 00:35:29.776
But then you have to really start to break down your communication and make

00:35:29.776 --> 00:35:32.696
it much more meaningful to people at every level they're at,

00:35:32.836 --> 00:35:37.156
you know, and empathy needs to be a big part of that. You got to understand where people are.

00:35:38.116 --> 00:35:42.536
When a new strategy is coming and is going to change things on them.

00:35:43.356 --> 00:35:47.616
Actually, in a side note from Linda, but a former colleague I had at Nike,

00:35:47.796 --> 00:35:53.036
Amina Warner, one time during change told me, you know, change is the death of the old.

00:35:53.896 --> 00:35:58.176
And I thought that was such a profound statement to think about when you're

00:35:58.176 --> 00:36:02.876
going to put change and communicate it, is that actually what they call the

00:36:02.876 --> 00:36:07.736
change curve actually follows pretty much the exact same path as the grief cycle.

00:36:08.176 --> 00:36:12.116
And Linda kind of got on that idea too, that you've got to be empathetic for people.

00:36:12.276 --> 00:36:14.676
You've got to understand that they're going to go through these different,

00:36:14.676 --> 00:36:22.416
you know, emotional stages as they're encountering new change and build a plan to recognize that.

00:36:22.636 --> 00:36:25.676
But then have plans that you can pass

00:36:25.676 --> 00:36:28.576
along to different leaders and have them be

00:36:28.576 --> 00:36:33.396
able to do the communication as well at a more individual level or a smaller

00:36:33.396 --> 00:36:41.516
team level to make sure that that vision or that big picture strategy is broken

00:36:41.516 --> 00:36:46.516
down and meaningful to people at each team level within a company.

00:36:46.716 --> 00:36:50.636
So people are locking in on it in a way that makes sense to them in language that they understand.

00:36:53.015 --> 00:36:58.955
That seems like totally sound advice. One of the questions I wanted to ask you

00:36:58.955 --> 00:37:04.955
was from the execution section, Kevin, and you introduced this concept of pre-mortems.

00:37:05.115 --> 00:37:07.955
And I have to be honest, like when I first started reading it,

00:37:08.095 --> 00:37:11.675
I was concerned because I actually, there's a super common thing that happens

00:37:11.675 --> 00:37:15.015
in my world where at the end of a project, you do a post-mortem.

00:37:15.495 --> 00:37:16.835
And I hate that idea.

00:37:18.835 --> 00:37:21.975
Right. Cause I mean, I mean, amongst other things, like the,

00:37:21.975 --> 00:37:26.935
the metaphor is just that like, whatever you do did died and now you're,

00:37:27.055 --> 00:37:29.715
you're evaluating why you accidentally killed the patient.

00:37:29.995 --> 00:37:30.415
Yes.

00:37:30.775 --> 00:37:34.855
And so, you know, and usually like sometimes those projects are successful and

00:37:34.855 --> 00:37:38.615
have good outcomes and other times they're not successful, but you have good learnings.

00:37:38.695 --> 00:37:41.575
Like, like hopefully in most cases you didn't kill anyone.

00:37:42.035 --> 00:37:46.175
Um, so, so I'm kind of, I think language matters.

00:37:46.315 --> 00:37:50.915
I don't love the word postmortem. And so then I'm reading pre-mortem and I'm

00:37:50.915 --> 00:37:53.995
like, I'm not sure I'm going to like this, but you actually won me over.

00:37:54.155 --> 00:37:55.615
So maybe you could explain the concept.

00:37:56.335 --> 00:37:59.955
Yeah. So pre-mortem, I mean, you talked about what a postmortem is,

00:38:00.095 --> 00:38:03.255
but the idea of a pre-mortem is to say, look,

00:38:05.255 --> 00:38:11.195
before we launch this thing, let's imagine the future and let's imagine that

00:38:11.195 --> 00:38:14.115
it went horribly wrong. Why did it go horribly wrong?

00:38:14.495 --> 00:38:20.195
And I think the value of doing it that way versus contingency planning is that

00:38:20.195 --> 00:38:24.255
it sort of forces the mindset to go, oh my God, everything went wrong.

00:38:24.255 --> 00:38:27.735
And now we're going to do the same type of analysis we would have done if everything

00:38:27.735 --> 00:38:33.535
went really wrong and be able to identify, you know, a number of different problems before they happen.

00:38:34.202 --> 00:38:38.882
And when I've done, I've done these things lots over the years and they always

00:38:38.882 --> 00:38:41.782
produce things that you hadn't thought of.

00:38:42.222 --> 00:38:47.082
And then that allows you to start to, to kind of work through the plan and make

00:38:47.082 --> 00:38:48.742
sure that you're not missing anything.

00:38:49.242 --> 00:38:52.202
So it's just the mindset really that, that helps you get there,

00:38:52.222 --> 00:38:55.582
but super valuable. Just did one of these a couple of weeks ago, actually.

00:38:55.742 --> 00:39:00.102
And it, you know, stuff that came out of it was, was surprised a few people

00:39:00.102 --> 00:39:03.502
to be honest, because people just weren't thinking of things. So super valuable.

00:39:03.762 --> 00:39:07.982
Yeah. And, you know, again, like part of my objection to postmortem is kind

00:39:07.982 --> 00:39:13.702
of you're like objectively evaluating your finished project in a negative light.

00:39:13.842 --> 00:39:19.522
But like here, you're kind of proactively thinking about what could go wrong.

00:39:20.322 --> 00:39:25.182
So I'm like the negative is kind of more in the context of the black hat thinking

00:39:25.182 --> 00:39:26.282
we were talking about earlier.

00:39:26.382 --> 00:39:30.802
But I also it kind of reminded me of another business tactic that's near and

00:39:30.802 --> 00:39:34.282
dear to all of our hearts. It's like, you know, Amazon's methodology, right?

00:39:34.382 --> 00:39:37.402
Where, you know, when they're selling in a major idea, of course,

00:39:37.482 --> 00:39:41.322
they famously want to write the one page press release.

00:39:41.602 --> 00:39:46.962
That's the, the sort of sick premortem success story, if you will.

00:39:47.202 --> 00:39:51.882
And so I kind of took your thing as saying like, Hey, an even deeper dive is,

00:39:52.002 --> 00:39:54.942
yeah, let's, let's envision what that success is going to look like.

00:39:55.002 --> 00:39:58.102
And let's make sure we understand that. But let's also like,

00:39:58.242 --> 00:40:01.742
you know, think about like, if we don't, if we don't achieve that success,

00:40:01.942 --> 00:40:04.762
what are the likely reasons that we didn't?

00:40:04.942 --> 00:40:07.742
Because if we can identify those upfront, we can remediate for them.

00:40:08.182 --> 00:40:09.762
Yes. Yep. That's exactly it.

00:40:09.862 --> 00:40:13.482
And, and I, I think that Amazon press release thing is also a great thing.

00:40:14.002 --> 00:40:16.942
I don't have that in the book when we should have, cause I really like it.

00:40:17.042 --> 00:40:20.942
And it helps with you with clarity and communication too, if you're sort of

00:40:20.942 --> 00:40:24.542
imagining how you would tell the outside world about your strategy.

00:40:25.273 --> 00:40:29.773
Yeah. Uh, that whole begin with the end in mind, I think is the,

00:40:29.913 --> 00:40:31.673
the thing I really like it.

00:40:31.733 --> 00:40:36.613
And I'll be honest, I've taken a lot of Amazon business approaches and use them

00:40:36.613 --> 00:40:39.633
in workshops with other clients because, you know, clients are always super

00:40:39.633 --> 00:40:44.053
interested in Amazon methodologies and there's a bunch of novelties,

00:40:44.173 --> 00:40:46.453
but I would actually say like a bunch of them don't work.

00:40:46.773 --> 00:40:51.013
Like when you just, you know, do it in a one hour exercise, right?

00:40:51.173 --> 00:40:55.853
Like, and so you take people they're not used to quietly reading six page narratives

00:40:55.853 --> 00:41:00.213
and you make them read a six page narrative and it's, it's painful to watch.

00:41:00.573 --> 00:41:05.953
Uh, and so, so like, you know, unless the whole culture is all in on something

00:41:05.953 --> 00:41:08.293
like that, it's really hard to make it work.

00:41:08.293 --> 00:41:12.613
But I do think that that, that notion of the begin with the end in mind,

00:41:12.753 --> 00:41:17.313
both the positive and negative end, like is super easy thing.

00:41:17.453 --> 00:41:21.913
You add that to any organization and you see they adopt it and they want to

00:41:21.913 --> 00:41:27.293
keep doing it because they like the the benefits come pretty easy and are pretty apparent yep.

00:41:27.293 --> 00:41:30.613
Love that yep and it definitely is a great mindset shift.

00:41:30.613 --> 00:41:33.373
Cool what one of

00:41:33.373 --> 00:41:39.513
the topics you raise is how to leverage constraints and as a startup guy this

00:41:39.513 --> 00:41:44.233
is the trick is we're always trying to unlike you guys that work at nike and

00:41:44.233 --> 00:41:48.593
publicist these eight trillion dollar companies we've got like a couple million

00:41:48.593 --> 00:41:52.633
bucks and then we we hit the wall so we've got to be That is the ultimate constraint.

00:41:52.933 --> 00:41:55.533
And we know the end of the life is out there.

00:41:56.553 --> 00:41:59.393
Don't you just keep going back to your investors and asking for more candy?

00:42:00.013 --> 00:42:03.513
Yeah, that works until it doesn't. And then, yeah, they want to see,

00:42:03.593 --> 00:42:07.453
this is where execution matters. They actually want to see results and stuff. It's kind of a bummer.

00:42:08.633 --> 00:42:13.413
And yeah, so talk a little bit about that in the context of the book.

00:42:14.831 --> 00:42:20.411
Yeah, I mean, I love constraints because I think constraints really force great

00:42:20.411 --> 00:42:25.931
thinking and they force great creativity and they actually create freedom, I think, ironically.

00:42:26.411 --> 00:42:34.131
Because once you know that you have limits, you can then maximize everywhere else, you know.

00:42:34.331 --> 00:42:36.711
So deadline is a great constraint.

00:42:36.931 --> 00:42:41.171
Budget is a great constraint. You know, in the book, I tell kind of a famous

00:42:41.171 --> 00:42:46.271
story about the Costco $1.50 hot dog and soda, you know, which the guy,

00:42:46.411 --> 00:42:48.511
Jim Senegal, the kind of founder of Costco,

00:42:48.831 --> 00:42:53.871
said that that price would never change. Someone asked him what it would mean.

00:42:54.071 --> 00:42:56.091
He actually used some more colorful language than that.

00:42:56.471 --> 00:43:02.551
Yeah, I think he said, if someone asked what would it mean if that changed, he said, I'm,

00:43:03.739 --> 00:43:09.259
So, but what did that do? It caused Costco to find all sorts of creative ways

00:43:09.259 --> 00:43:13.439
elsewhere to make up the difference or find ways to, you know,

00:43:13.519 --> 00:43:16.039
they initially outsourced a lot of the food,

00:43:16.179 --> 00:43:18.439
they ended up creating it on their own, but they, you know, they just did a

00:43:18.439 --> 00:43:22.459
number of things that they wouldn't have done otherwise without those constraints

00:43:22.459 --> 00:43:23.919
to make them more effective.

00:43:24.559 --> 00:43:27.419
So I think that kind of thing is really valuable Rick

00:43:27.419 --> 00:43:31.539
Rubin talks and he's got a book on creativity where he talks a lot about constraints

00:43:31.539 --> 00:43:36.419
and how it drives creative thinking when you tell people you know they have

00:43:36.419 --> 00:43:39.619
a limit to how much time they have on something or they can only use so many

00:43:39.619 --> 00:43:43.879
instruments on an album what have you but all of those start to force different

00:43:43.879 --> 00:43:46.459
kinds of thinking that ultimately leads to,

00:43:47.119 --> 00:43:53.279
more efficiencies or better creativity better more interesting results so I'm

00:43:53.279 --> 00:43:55.779
a big fan of them how do you like to use them scott.

00:43:55.779 --> 00:44:00.099
I don't i just like to live live in them i don't.

00:44:00.099 --> 00:44:00.699
Really like.

00:44:00.699 --> 00:44:04.759
Manufactured they kind of are manufactured for me already so how do you use

00:44:04.759 --> 00:44:10.039
it like have you used it in the corporate context like how do you constrain nike or.

00:44:10.039 --> 00:44:11.419
Well i mean it doesn't have to be a nike.

00:44:11.419 --> 00:44:14.819
Case study but like one of these bigger companies i i can't i've never really

00:44:14.819 --> 00:44:17.779
worked for a big company so i have a hard time imagining how you do you just

00:44:17.779 --> 00:44:20.899
like say this is the deadline kind of thing like there's a time constraint.

00:44:20.899 --> 00:44:23.779
Yeah deadline is a good one but a budget is too.

00:44:23.939 --> 00:44:26.799
Just because a company is big and they have tons of money doesn't mean you should

00:44:26.799 --> 00:44:32.679
spend it all or you should let things be open-ended because when you do that, you lose focus.

00:44:33.199 --> 00:44:36.459
So, you know, you still can put a budget limit on something,

00:44:36.659 --> 00:44:41.379
absolutely, to kind of force thinking and force people to be creative.

00:44:41.579 --> 00:44:44.439
I think being intentional about constraints,

00:44:46.154 --> 00:44:49.974
And like deadlines, like budgets, you know, try to think of something else.

00:44:50.134 --> 00:44:53.814
But anything like that helps galvanize thinking, I think.

00:44:54.034 --> 00:44:56.934
I see a lot of resource constraints. Like people will say like,

00:44:57.094 --> 00:45:02.774
hey, you greenlining this project, but you can only use this amount of people.

00:45:03.074 --> 00:45:08.434
Or you have to find a way to do it without disrupting this piece of our supply chain.

00:45:09.974 --> 00:45:14.954
And sometimes those are, I'll call them environmentally imposed constraints.

00:45:14.954 --> 00:45:19.134
Like the constraint is coming up because we literally can't afford to disrupt

00:45:19.134 --> 00:45:20.794
that supply chain, right?

00:45:21.234 --> 00:45:25.934
But other times they are somewhat like, arbitrary sounds too negative,

00:45:26.134 --> 00:45:30.594
but like they're constraints that are introduced for the purposes of constraining

00:45:30.594 --> 00:45:32.994
the project, not because the resources aren't available.

00:45:33.454 --> 00:45:36.894
Right. But those can be freeing if you think about it, you know,

00:45:36.974 --> 00:45:40.494
because once you know you have a limit that you can't change,

00:45:40.834 --> 00:45:43.974
then you stop worrying about trying to change the limit and you start worrying

00:45:43.974 --> 00:45:46.014
about how can you be successful within that.

00:45:46.274 --> 00:45:48.694
And that's where you get the value, I think.

00:45:49.274 --> 00:45:51.674
Yeah. No, I totally buy that.

00:45:53.200 --> 00:45:58.720
And it's rare in the real world that you ever get the opportunity to do something

00:45:58.720 --> 00:46:01.660
that's literally unconstrained.

00:46:01.780 --> 00:46:07.980
So, building muscles around working within those constraints seems pretty valuable.

00:46:08.300 --> 00:46:13.060
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's a great point. It's rare to be completely unconstrained

00:46:13.060 --> 00:46:14.800
and probably dangerous.

00:46:15.260 --> 00:46:20.820
Let the record show it only took me 48 minutes to make a great point.

00:46:25.700 --> 00:46:29.720
The the we talked about like

00:46:29.720 --> 00:46:34.880
a lot of the the stuff in the execution section in my mind the the next big

00:46:34.880 --> 00:46:41.520
section was kind of the the culture and communications um pillar if you will

00:46:41.520 --> 00:46:49.160
and to me this feels like the area like a lot of the other things that cause strategies to fail are,

00:46:50.260 --> 00:46:54.900
like not shocking like I mean they come up quite commonly but like it feels

00:46:54.900 --> 00:46:59.420
like the ones that are most underestimated to me and misunderstood are the culture

00:46:59.420 --> 00:47:00.520
and communication ones.

00:47:00.700 --> 00:47:01.140
Yep.

00:47:02.335 --> 00:47:07.175
Yeah, and culture, you know, how you set up the team to be successful,

00:47:07.355 --> 00:47:09.715
there's a couple things in there that are so important,

00:47:09.915 --> 00:47:14.255
you know, giving people psychological safety so that they can speak freely and

00:47:14.255 --> 00:47:18.215
tell you when things are going off the rails is super important.

00:47:19.195 --> 00:47:22.395
Incentives are super important. You know, when we talk about incentives a lot

00:47:22.395 --> 00:47:25.915
of the time, most companies, it's about financial incentives,

00:47:26.095 --> 00:47:28.255
you know, it's about bonuses and those kind of things.

00:47:29.015 --> 00:47:32.695
The reality is there's a lot of research that a lot of financial incentives

00:47:32.695 --> 00:47:35.235
don't actually change behavior over a long time.

00:47:35.315 --> 00:47:38.235
But there are other kind of incentives that are more cultural that do.

00:47:39.195 --> 00:47:42.795
Social incentives, you know, is one that I like to talk about,

00:47:42.915 --> 00:47:47.235
which is, you know, rewarding people, calling them out, making them feel good,

00:47:47.435 --> 00:47:51.515
making them feel prideful in front of their peers or peers calling each other

00:47:51.515 --> 00:47:52.995
out and celebrating each other.

00:47:53.215 --> 00:47:56.995
Those are social incentives that do drive behavior. And they're much more day

00:47:56.995 --> 00:48:01.675
to day. they get people, you know, kind of excited, the dopamine hits that they need.

00:48:02.055 --> 00:48:05.935
And then another one I think is a huge deal is convenience incentives.

00:48:06.275 --> 00:48:10.135
You know, we humans will go to the most convenient thing all the time.

00:48:10.555 --> 00:48:13.175
So how do you make things easy for people?

00:48:13.735 --> 00:48:17.895
You know, somewhat as part of culture, maybe part of some other processes you

00:48:17.895 --> 00:48:20.255
might put in, they'll gravitate to those things.

00:48:20.435 --> 00:48:25.035
They'll gravitate to the things that are more easy to do. So those are all things

00:48:25.035 --> 00:48:30.715
that can really drive behavior and galvanize team and focus that maybe aren't

00:48:30.715 --> 00:48:33.315
always the things that we're super intentional about.

00:48:34.075 --> 00:48:37.195
Yeah. And it's funny, again, like as I was reading that section,

00:48:37.535 --> 00:48:40.695
you know, I'm picturing all these retail moments and there's,

00:48:40.875 --> 00:48:45.695
you know, a almost universal thing that happens every morning in every big box

00:48:45.695 --> 00:48:47.635
retailer that has ever existed.

00:48:47.635 --> 00:48:50.255
Like there are these like morning team meetings.

00:48:50.575 --> 00:48:57.355
And whenever I bring new, new associates to, to their first retail account,

00:48:57.375 --> 00:49:01.215
and we go to a Best Buy morning meeting or a Walmart morning meeting.

00:49:01.635 --> 00:49:05.655
Everybody is shocked and uncomfortable because if you haven't experienced it,

00:49:05.795 --> 00:49:10.735
it feels a lot like the, the pep talk right before high school football game.

00:49:10.935 --> 00:49:15.995
And there's, there's like a lot of cheering and there's a lot of like peer pressure

00:49:15.995 --> 00:49:20.075
and there's a lot of like acknowledgements and affirmations.

00:49:20.395 --> 00:49:23.555
Like there are all these things that like, it would be easy to look at them

00:49:23.555 --> 00:49:28.695
cynically and say like, this is all sort of corny and, and forced behavior.

00:49:28.695 --> 00:49:33.955
But the reality is like what I've learned through a pretty long career,

00:49:33.955 --> 00:49:39.035
like the, that, that those meetings like set the tone.

00:49:39.435 --> 00:49:44.555
They, uh, they, they create a culture in which all of the members of that culture

00:49:44.555 --> 00:49:47.115
want that team to succeed.

00:49:47.335 --> 00:49:52.815
Right. And they, they're creating the, the circumstances for all those folks

00:49:52.815 --> 00:49:57.795
to work super hard for the next 12 hours for not a lot of pay and,

00:49:58.015 --> 00:50:01.895
you know, do their best to serve customers and make that, that retail environment successful.

00:50:01.895 --> 00:50:07.475
And it's, it's literally like the, the beating heart of most retail in America

00:50:07.475 --> 00:50:13.515
are these kind of like non-financial cultural motivators that,

00:50:13.615 --> 00:50:16.515
that, you know, kick off our, our retail day every day.

00:50:16.915 --> 00:50:19.995
Yeah. And I mean, I mean, I love going to those sessions, you know,

00:50:20.175 --> 00:50:22.255
I did Nike one of the last row with stores.

00:50:22.395 --> 00:50:25.895
I go around and do those all the time and they're super fun and they super motivating.

00:50:26.315 --> 00:50:30.035
You know, those aren't things maybe that you end up doing in a corporate environment,

00:50:30.595 --> 00:50:34.815
But there are opportunities within corporate environment to get similar on that and I think,

00:50:35.903 --> 00:50:40.843
Those regular team meetings are a great opportunity to use, for example,

00:50:41.043 --> 00:50:43.703
celebrations to reinforce the strategy, too.

00:50:44.003 --> 00:50:47.723
You know, so there you're kind of calling out when things went really well.

00:50:47.883 --> 00:50:51.203
You're getting peers to cheer each other on. But, you know, every time you have

00:50:51.203 --> 00:50:54.203
a celebration, you put it in context of the strategy.

00:50:54.343 --> 00:50:57.883
This was awesome. We did this because it moved us forward in the strategy.

00:50:58.551 --> 00:51:02.651
It's an opportunity to reinforce it all the time while getting people pumped up about it.

00:51:03.031 --> 00:51:07.931
Yeah. And I will agree with you that it's way less common at corporate headquarters

00:51:07.931 --> 00:51:12.991
than it is in the field. But I will tell you, if you work at Walmart for any

00:51:12.991 --> 00:51:17.091
period of time, you're going to stand in a room and do the Walmart cheer.

00:51:17.991 --> 00:51:24.691
And everyone's going to like, you know, emphatically clap and do the swiggly.

00:51:24.711 --> 00:51:30.031
And it's like, it's pretty funny. like it it it and it you know first people

00:51:30.031 --> 00:51:35.451
feel uncomfortable right but like pretty soon that becomes kind of part of like

00:51:35.451 --> 00:51:39.971
it it becomes uncomfortable not to get into the spirit of it.

00:51:39.971 --> 00:51:43.831
Well i mean i love that and that seems like walmart's doing okay.

00:51:43.831 --> 00:51:46.891
Yeah yeah this is what i really wish we had.

00:51:46.891 --> 00:51:47.931
A video podcast.

00:51:47.931 --> 00:51:53.931
Yeah hey i will we'll do a video podcast i will happily We've got some Walmart

00:51:53.931 --> 00:51:56.871
guests coming up, so I'll happily do the Walmart.

00:51:57.231 --> 00:51:58.071
Oh, you guys can squiggle together.

00:51:58.291 --> 00:52:02.251
There's a Sam's version of the cheer.

00:52:02.271 --> 00:52:05.311
Too. Do you also have a spark? What is it called? A spark?

00:52:05.331 --> 00:52:08.671
The spark is the Walmart logo, but yeah, that doesn't work into the cheer.

00:52:09.411 --> 00:52:10.311
Oh, okay.

00:52:10.491 --> 00:52:12.291
I'm curious about the squiggle for sure.

00:52:12.951 --> 00:52:18.491
Well, and the super inside baseball thing is, of course, Walmart was originally

00:52:18.491 --> 00:52:21.091
spelled with a hyphen, and the squiggly is the hyphen.

00:52:22.171 --> 00:52:29.531
So so it's after the l um but like in a subsequent rebranding the the corporate

00:52:29.531 --> 00:52:34.291
name is no longer hyphenated so but you still squiggle yeah but so you still

00:52:34.291 --> 00:52:38.051
do the squiggle in the cheer and then in the sam's club version you do the apostrophe

00:52:38.051 --> 00:52:40.291
which is also a funny physical gesture.

00:52:43.091 --> 00:52:43.891
This is good.

00:52:43.891 --> 00:52:46.551
Yeah i think you're gonna have to demonstrate this for us at some point.

00:52:47.766 --> 00:52:50.906
Yeah, that's darn it. That's going to be on the extended version of the podcast.

00:52:51.066 --> 00:52:56.646
You have to be a paid member in order to download the paid subscription just went through the roof.

00:52:56.826 --> 00:52:59.846
The extended version of the Jason and Scott show.

00:53:00.006 --> 00:53:02.186
People are paying for the squiggle and the apostrophe.

00:53:02.686 --> 00:53:09.066
Yeah. But, you know, obviously, we could take 30 hours to talk about the book,

00:53:09.146 --> 00:53:10.526
but we are coming up on time.

00:53:10.686 --> 00:53:19.366
And I do want to make sure we land the plane, like somewhat in the spirit that you land the book.

00:53:20.306 --> 00:53:23.966
You wrap things up by kind of talking about the future strategy.

00:53:25.206 --> 00:53:28.706
I don't want to spoil the book, but how can we talk about this, Kevin?

00:53:30.046 --> 00:53:37.706
Well i think the key to me is that strategy should be part of execution you know i mean,

00:53:39.106 --> 00:53:43.606
it shouldn't be sequential you shouldn't have a strategy and then figure out

00:53:43.606 --> 00:53:47.746
how you're going to go execute it the first step of execution should be actually

00:53:47.746 --> 00:53:52.746
writing the strategy and then as you're doing as we talked about co-creation

00:53:52.746 --> 00:53:56.466
and building that strategy that's actually how you're starting setting the stages

00:53:56.466 --> 00:53:58.646
of how you're going to execute it.

00:53:58.766 --> 00:54:01.966
Um, and you're making sure that you have an executable strategy.

00:54:03.126 --> 00:54:06.786
That's key to everything. I think that's, that's the mindset and that's the

00:54:06.786 --> 00:54:11.426
process and structure that is critical, I think, to make it happen.

00:54:13.660 --> 00:54:18.160
Cool. Let's wrap it up there. Kevin, if folks want the book, where can they go?

00:54:18.800 --> 00:54:21.900
The book will be available at bookstores near you.

00:54:22.080 --> 00:54:25.500
It'll be available pretty widely, obviously, on Amazon and all those,

00:54:25.660 --> 00:54:27.780
but it will be out there everywhere.

00:54:27.860 --> 00:54:31.720
So I hope you'll pick up a copy. I'd love to hear your thoughts if you do.

00:54:32.580 --> 00:54:34.720
And happy executing.

00:54:35.880 --> 00:54:36.760
Oh, nice.

00:54:36.760 --> 00:54:37.860
I see what you did there.

00:54:38.000 --> 00:54:41.560
Yeah. Yeah. Very good. Are you going to do like signings?

00:54:41.640 --> 00:54:43.940
Scott has embraced it too. I feel like I'm contagious.

00:54:44.500 --> 00:54:45.100
Yeah, yeah.

00:54:45.340 --> 00:54:48.760
What did you do the other day, Scott? Was it happy regenticking?

00:54:48.880 --> 00:54:49.440
Agentic converging.

00:54:49.520 --> 00:54:52.280
Yeah, agentic converging. Yes. Yes, amazing.

00:54:52.660 --> 00:54:53.640
I feel like I one-upped you.

00:54:54.200 --> 00:54:57.980
Well, as you have done for our entire history.

00:54:58.500 --> 00:54:58.720
Yeah.

00:54:59.100 --> 00:55:02.820
I'm okay with it. Kevin, I don't want to derail us at the very last minute,

00:55:03.000 --> 00:55:07.980
but like, have you talked to the publisher about implementing instant checkout on ChatGPT?

00:55:08.440 --> 00:55:12.880
Oh, wow. Yeah, I have not, but maybe we'll do that in the bonus material.

00:55:13.320 --> 00:55:15.380
Got you. If they need any help, I know a guy.

00:55:15.920 --> 00:55:16.260
Yeah.

00:55:18.280 --> 00:55:19.720
I don't know, for sure.

00:55:20.180 --> 00:55:24.840
Yeah. And on that cliffhanger, I encourage all the listeners to go ask a question

00:55:24.840 --> 00:55:29.080
about the book to Chad Chibiti and then ask if you can buy the book directly there.

00:55:29.420 --> 00:55:30.040
There you go.

00:55:30.060 --> 00:55:33.200
And if you can, you should buy it. And if not, maybe you should, you know.

00:55:33.960 --> 00:55:34.560
Go the old way?

00:55:35.000 --> 00:55:39.980
Yeah. Yeah. Go get one of the dead trees. um

00:55:39.980 --> 00:55:44.360
but as always kevin it's great to reconnect you know i've learned a lot from

00:55:44.360 --> 00:55:48.700
you over the years and i i'm i'm very appreciative that you're you're sharing

00:55:48.700 --> 00:55:53.440
some of that knowledge with the rest of listeners on the podcast and the the

00:55:53.440 --> 00:55:58.520
millions of people that will undoubtedly buy and and read the book as well so congratulations yeah.

00:55:58.520 --> 00:56:02.660
Thank you i hope that's true but thank you guys always a pleasure to talk to

00:56:02.660 --> 00:56:05.760
you guys and i learned tons from you as well yeah.

00:56:05.760 --> 00:56:07.660
Congratulations Thanks for joining us.

00:56:07.900 --> 00:56:11.260
And until next time, happy commercing.