650 Leadership Lessons from the Masters

“The leader who acts like they have all the answers leaves no opportunity for others to help.” - Simon Sinek My previous mashup episodes have been exploding. Because of this, I wanted to bring you an episode on leadership. No matter who you are, or what you do, you will be in a leadership position at some point. Whether you are the CEO of a company, or a stay at home parent: there are people who rely on you to stand up and take charge. This can be a very confusing situation, as sometimes you may find yourself feeling like you can’t ask for help. You also may feel like you’re losing progress and need to keep moving forward. To give you the tools you need to lead in success I wanted to bring you back segments from Alison Levine, Simon Sinek, Nancy Duarte, and Cesar Millan. This collection of interviews, I felt, will give you some of the tools you need to really progress in your life. If you take these lessons, and integrate them into your life a little at a time, you will see results. I don’t expect you to memorize it all and I don’t expect you to make a sudden change. Integrate these lessons little by little and review them. Now get to it, and learn how to be a successful leader, on Episode 650. Som questions I ask: What if you have an employee that’s failing over and over again? (5:39) Why do you say “When you make progress on something, turn around and change direction?" (7:12) Does vulnerability create trust? (12:06) Who do you think is the most inspiring leader? (20:14) Did you (Cesar) always see yourself as a natural leader? (21:36) What if someone feels like they’re leading, but aren’t? (23:19) In This Episode You Will Learn: How to help your team learn and grow (5:15) The way you successfully reach the top (8:23) What will make you struggle the most in life (14:23) One of the greatest leadership tools (19:13) How to build confidence in human beings (24:04) Plus much, much more... Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 650, Leadership Lessons From The Masters. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:32Lewis Howes?

  John Maxwell said, "A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way." I am super pumped. This is episode 650, guys. 650 episodes. We continue to grow. We continue to expand our minds, to learn, to discover how we can tap into that uniqueness inside of us. And today, I'm bringing you another powerful episode with some of the biggest leaders that we've had on. People like Alison Levine, Simon Sinek, Nancy Duarte, and Cesar Millan. And this is powerful stuff, guys. They shared some deep lessons on leadership, on leading yourself, on leading teams, on leading the world and humanity.

• 1:17Lewis Howes?

  And I wanted to bring them all together so that you could have access all in one place about some powerful leadership lessons. And if you haven't caught the first episodes we did on spirituality, relationships, wellness, and business, these episodes are taking off as we've been taking some of the best insights from the last 650 episodes and putting them into specific topics from these different leaders to give you powerful insights. So you can go check out those as well at lewishouse.com/650. We'll have all the other episodes linked up in this series because so many of you have been requesting for them and getting extreme value.

• 1:59Lewis Howes?

  Before we dive into this powerful episode on leadership, I want to give a shout out to the fan of the week. And this one is from Senya, who says, "When I started listening to the School of Greatness earlier this year, I was..." Going through the hardest time in my life. There was family issues, career decisions to be made, fitness goals to be met, and the winter blues. Lewis is really providing a school of greatness. Every time I listen, I have a happier day. I begin to see things differently. And I am learning so much from the fantastic guests brought on the show every single day. So, thank you, Lewis, for giving us your wisdom and love. You are welcome, my friend, and you are the fan of the week. If you guys haven't left a review yet, we've got over 3,000 plus five star reviews of this podcast.

• 2:42Lewis Howes?

  We continue to grow and reach more people, and that's my mission for this show. Is to bring the most insightful and powerful ideas and people on to help you grow. To help you learn the tools to become happier, healthier, wealthier, more successful, wiser individuals. And to make a bigger impact in the world. That's what this is about. So, leave us a review over on iTunes or on your podcast app right now on your iPhone. As I'd love to hear your thoughts on how this has impacted you. Leadership is the key. Leadership is everything. If you don't know how to lead your life, you will never achieve your goals and dreams. If you don't know how to lead others and empower other leaders, you will never make a bigger impact on the world.

• 3:26Lewis Howes?

  That's what we've got in this episode, all about leadership with the masters.

• 3:39Speaker 01

  I think that you've got to give yourselves and your team room to fail. As long as you come back from it better, the next time around, failure is a pretty incredible learning experience. So, encourage people to fail. Don't just reward success. Reward people who are getting out there, taking risks and really pushing their limits, whether they succeed or not.

• 4:00Lewis Howes?

  I mean, that's great in theory, but what about, you know, if you're running a business and you have an employee that just is failing over and over again, it's costing you thousands of dollars. Do you continue to reward them for their creativity? Or at some point, do you get to the point where you have to cut them off? Or, you know, really kind of lay the hammer down so they're getting results for your company?

• 4:21Speaker 01

  I think that's a great question. And it depends on the position that person is in and how much risk tolerance you have at the time. So for example, if it's somebody in R and D that's trying to invent something, I mean, they may fail time after time after time until they get it right. But the progress and the product or the service or whatever it ends up to be through that success may end up bringing in a heck of a lot of revenue down the road. But if you just have someone that's failing because they're a crappy performer and because they have a lousy attitude, then you should absolutely cut that person loose. Because a bad attitude, I mean, and you know,

• 5:06Speaker 01

  that type of thing can be toxic in a work environment. And that's, that's different than someone who's taking risks and pushing themselves and who wants, who's willing to stumble and get beat up along the way for, in order to help advance the company and its mission and its goals. But if you have someone that's failing just because they're, they're not trying and they have a crappy attitude, I say, get rid of them.

• 5:30Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I like that idea. Now, you've got another, another piece of advice, which is also contradictory. You say, when you're making progress on something, turn around and change direction. So what's that advice all about?

• 5:44Speaker 01

  So, that's an interesting one. And it's one of the most psychologically challenging aspects of climbing a big mountain. So, we'll just use Everest for example, but it's, this would be a process that you would use on almost any Himalayan peak. So, when you go to climb Mount Everest, you don't just climb from base camp to camp one, to camp two, to camp three, and on up the mountain. You're going to spend about 10 days hiking just to get yourself to base camp. Once you get to base camp, you have to spend a few days and nights there to get used to the altitude because it's over 17,000 feet.

• 6:19Lewis Howes?

  Wait, 10 days just to get to the base camp, to the bottom of the mountain?

• 6:22Speaker 01

  Just to get to the bottom of the mountain. Exactly, exactly. I mean, 10 days, you're exhausted, you're over, you know, you're at an elevation of over 17,000 feet.

• 6:31Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 6:32Speaker 01

  So you're really feeling the altitude and you're just at base camp.

• 6:37Lewis Howes?

  Are you telling me you can't take a horse up there or a car?

• 6:42Speaker 01

  No.

• 6:44Speaker 01

  So, but I'll tell you an interesting little factoid is on the north side of Mount Everest, when you climb from the Tibet side, you can actually drive all the way to base camp. But on the south side, you have to hike in, and that's the route I took, is the route from the south side, from the Nepal side. So you're at base camp for a few days, and then you pack up your stuff and you climb up to Camp One. And you get to Camp One, and you spend the night up at Camp One, and then after you spend the night at Camp One, you pack up your stuff and you come back down to base camp again. Oh my gosh. And then you spend a few nights at base camp again, then the next day you climb to Camp One again, spend the night, and then you climb up to Camp Two, and you spend the night at Camp Two.

• 7:26Speaker 01

  And after you spend the night at Camp Two, which is even higher up on the mountain, after a night there, you pack up and you come all the way back down to base camp again. And then you spend more time at base camp again, then you climb to Camp One again, spend the night, climb up to Camp Two again, spend the night. The next day, you'll spend about nine or 10 hours fighting your way up to Camp Three, which is at about 24,000 feet. So you spend the night at 24,000 feet, and the next day, you come all the way back down to base camp. So as you're moving up the mountain, you have to keep switching direction and coming back to base camp, because you have to let your body get used to the altitude very slowly. It's this process called acclimatization.

• 8:10Speaker 01

  And if someone were to magically drop you off on the summit of Mount Everest, you could be dropped up there by plane or helicopter, something like that. You'd be dead in a matter of minutes from the altitude. Wow. So you have to move up the mountain very slowly, just so your head doesn't, you know, pop off when you get to very top. But the catch is that anytime you're above 18,000 feet, which is going to be any camp above that base camp. Anytime you're above 18,000 feet, your body is starting to deteriorate and your muscles are getting weaker. So it's this crazy catch 22. Yeah, it's so frustrating because you want to spend time up high to get used to the altitude,

• 8:52Speaker 01

  but you have to keep coming back down low so you can eat, sleep, hydrate, and regain some strength. So yes, it's very physically challenging to be climbing up and back down and up higher and back down again. But psychologically, oh, incredibly frustrating as well because, I mean, you know you want to be going up the mountain because you have to get to the summit, but you're spending so much time climbing in the backward direction. Down, exactly. And so it's really easy to just think, oh, my gosh, I'm losing ground. I'm not making progress. This is not the direction I want to be going. This is moving away from my goal. How can I get to my goal when I'm moving in the wrong direction?

• 9:32Speaker 01

  And for whatever reason, we always tend to think that progress has to happen in one particular direction. But that's not the case. Sometimes you are going to have to go backwards for a bit in order to make progress. And my point in the book is that you should not let this backwards direction discourage you or make you feel like it's a setback. You look at going in a different direction from what you anticipated. When you go in that different direction, just look at it as an opportunity to regroup, regain some strength, so that when you do turn around and change direction again, you're even stronger the next time around.

• 10:13Speaker 01

  Use that time as an opportunity to strengthen your skills so you can be stronger. And don't look at it as a setback and don't look at it as losing ground. Just look at it as part of the process of getting to where you want to be.

• 10:34Simon Sinek?

  Ultimately, the entire organization is weaker because of it, right? So when we trust each other, we're more likely to work together to protect ourselves from outside dangers or seize opportunities. And does this vulnerability create trust? Correct, because when we willingly demonstrate vulnerability, what we're demonstrating is trust. So let's just stick with the falling asleep analogy. That "I would fall asleep" demonstrates to you, my tribe member, my colleague, that I'm putting myself in a position of great peril, vulnerability. I cannot defend myself. I will be asleep because I know that you will look after me. Wow. Right? And the same goes for leadership. I was walking down Pennsylvania Avenue with a guy from Palestine, true story.

• 11:16Simon Sinek?

  And we stopped in front of the White House. I'm standing there looking at the White House. And he says to me, "The President of the United States lives there." And I'm like, "It's the White House." He's like, "No, no, no. The President of the United States lives right there." What he was saying is, in democracies, we trust our leaders, and more importantly, our leaders trust us. Yes, we all know there's tons of security around the White House, but it's not visible. There's no razor wire. There's no guys walking around with submachine guns. There's no signs that say, "You come here after 6:00 PM, shoot to kill order." You know, like, it doesn't... You could actually climb the fence. I mean, it's not a very daunting fence. In other words, the leader of our country lets us come right up to his house,

• 12:00Simon Sinek?

  where he actually lives. Like, it's not a fake. He actually lives there, right? And we let him... They let us come up to the house. Right. If you go to a dictatorship, you know, the people aren't allowed within miles of the leader's house, the quote-unquote leader, you know? The dictator's house. There is razor wire. There are tanks. There are guys with machine guns. And so there is no expression of vulnerability, right? So yes, it is absolutely essential for leaders to demonstrate vulnerability, because that vulnerability must be mutual. Not only if you fall asleep, well, I promise to protect you, but if I fall asleep, I trust that you will protect me. And so this goes not only physically, but also emotionally. The leader who acts like they have all the answers... By the way... They don't.

• 12:44Simon Sinek?

  Leaves no opportunity for others to help. And so people don't. And it's not because people are difficult or don't want to help. It's because they've been given no opportunity to because apparently the guy knows it all. Right. And this was one of the biggest lessons I learned in my own, my own life, which is when I struggled most in my life was when I thought I had to have all the answers because I was in charge, quote unquote. And if I didn't, I had to pretend that I did. I had to demonstrate confidence, even if I didn't have any. Right? The reality is the total opposite. It's when you admit that you don't know something that other people will come to your aid. Not because you're vulnerable and but not because they want to intimidate you. It's because you said you didn't know it and they do. And they're like, I know that I can totally do that for you. Like you can, you know? If you pretend that you know it, it's not that people don't want to help.

• 13:29Simon Sinek?

  It's that they just didn't think you needed it. And so the opportunity to express vulnerability is paramount to the building of trust. Doesn't happen overnight, like any relationship. I mean, think about boy meets girl, girl meets boy, you know? First, you know, you got fir a drink and everybody sort of shows off and, you know, puts their best face on. And, and then it's, it's as you get to know the person. So the walls come down a little bit, you know, the fears come out, you know? The insecurities come out and the things you don't like start to come out. And, and in time you start to build a relationship. The relationship between leader and follower and follower and leader is exactly the same thing. It is a relationship and it is, it takes time to nurture and look after. So how does someone in the? And it's born out of love.

• 14:11Simon Sinek?

  Love, love, I mean, and I'm not being, I'm not being cheesy. No, I completely understand. There's an amazing piece of footage. So there's a soldier who was just recently awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, which as we know is the highest medal in our land. He was embedded with a company of Marines and something very bad happened. You know, the Marines were overrun and he was carrying out the wounded to get them out of, out of the danger. And one of the medevac helicopters that came in to take away the wounded. Sheer coincidence, one of the medics had a GoPro camera on his helmet. So there's this footage of this soldier carrying a Marine on his shoulder,

• 14:54Simon Sinek?

  lays him on the floor of the helicopter.

• 14:59Simon Sinek?

  Bends down and kisses him on the forehead and then walks away and goes back to rescue more. It's all caught on, you can watch it on YouTube. Wow. Right? Now, if that's not love, I don't know what is. Hmm. Right? He bends down and kisses him on the forehead as if to say, I got you. We got you, you know? It's like what a parent does to their child. They kiss them to say, it's all right. It's all right. You know, when somebody's in the hospital, when someone's in pain, we touch them. We put our hand on their hand. We put our hand on their, on their leg and we, you know, we, we rub them and we say, don't worry, you'll be okay. Like that sense of touch, that is the greatest expression of love ever there, if there ever was. And this is, this, this opportunity, this demonstration of vulnerability, this is a soldier in combat. And most people don't realize this, but in the military, crying

• 15:44Simon Sinek?

  is just fine. It's just fine. And the Marines will call it often, they call it the intangibles. But, you know, every now and then you will get a Marine who will admit that the feeling they have is love. It's brotherly love. It's sisterly love. It's love for each other and it's love for core. It's love for my brothers and sisters and my family. I mean, that's, that's what it is. It's love. It is, it is the feeling. And I think that you have to build love. You have to earn love. You have to work towards love for the most successful, profitable, and by profitable, I don't necessarily mean money, but most sort of greatest opportunity for success.

• 16:21Lewis Howes?

  Hey guys, I want to take a quick break from this episode to tell you about one of the best sources I've ever found for running your online business. And that's why I want to thank our sponsor, weebly.com/greatness. Now, I'm always talking about having a great looking website. Now, that's one thing. But a great looking website that turns into a successful online business, well, that's beautiful. And that's what weebly.com/greatness does. They help you build beautiful, modern, easy to build online store templates. They have powerful e-commerce tools to help turn shoppers into buyers. They have integrated marketing tool to connect you to your customers and keep them engaged. They have tons of apps and features to keep your business running smoothly. Plus, the Weebly app lets

• 17:04Lewis Howes?

  you edit your site and manage your business from your phone. So you can do what you need to from wherever you are. And right now, you can go to weebly.com/greatness to learn more and get 15% off your first purchase. Again, that's W E E B L Y dot com slash greatness. Go there now to get 15% off your first purchase. Weebly. More than just a beautiful website. Now, let's get back to this leadership conversation.

• 17:37Speaker 04

  Storytelling is an amazing leadership tool. So if you look at the structure of a story, it's always about this protagonist who goes through something really difficult and is changed in the process. And as leaders, that's what we do every day, right? We can see a more ideal future and we are to drive, we call them travelers, we're to drive our travelers there. And it's hard. And we're asking them to go through hardships on behalf of the company or the organization. And so using speeches, stories, ceremonies and symbols is a way to create longing inside your travelers to help them want to go there with you. And that's the biggest barrier is most of the time your travelers will resist.

• 18:21Speaker 04

  They'll look at the sacrifice and say, this isn't worth the reward that they're offering and they'll opt out of your journey. And you don't want that, right? You want the right people with you along the way because leaders don't get them by themselves. They don't get there by themselves. You get there because of the people that come with you. And that's why it's really important to use these tools and have them in your toolkit.

• 18:41Lewis Howes?

  Who do you think is the most inspiring leader who is able to use all the tools necessary to bring his or her travelers on the journey?

• 18:49Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, I think it's so funny because I, there's kind of the classic, you've got Dr. King on the cause side. I think Steve Jobs on the corporate side. I think they both used all of the speeches, stories, ceremonies and symbols every day along the way. Yeah. And when they communicated, yeah. It's funny because when we first were writing the book, we called the people the troops, you know, instead of the travelers. And it's because, well, they're enlisted.

• 19:16Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 19:17Speaker 04

  They're in, and it sounded very leader follower. Like, it sounded too much like you just, a troop has to do what they were enlisted to do. Enrollment is very different because the people are self-selecting in, which is very different than being told that they have to. So I think if you have a journey, if you look at like Frodo, you know, his friend Sam, those guys chose to go along. They enrolled. They weren't enlisted, you know? And I, and I think that if you're a good leader. People will want to go where you feel they need to go. They'll know because you convey it in a way that's so beautiful. It'll create longing in them to see your future realized.

• 20:01Lewis Howes?

  Did you always see yourself as a natural leader? Or is that a skill that you've developed?

• 20:06Speaker 05

  I think my mom would say yes. You know, I think my mom would say, I'm always breaking the rules, the boundaries, the limitations, you know? And she always say, you know, you have to master the rules before you break the rules. And so you have to be a great follower before you become a leader. So you hear those things when you're little and you say, okay. But you don't understand why you're breaking it, you know? And so then you realize that you're breaking it because you were born to lead. And there's nothing you can do about it. It's just you're born to lead. That's the beauty of America. America immediately hone into that and that kid has that skill. But we don't have that in a tougher country. We don't have places where they can redirect that energy. So often what happens is they suppress that ability.

• 20:48Lewis Howes?

  Really? The talents, the gifts that you have?

• 20:49Speaker 05

  That's right.

• 20:50Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 20:50Speaker 05

  Yeah. Because you have to follow. You have to follow, you have to follow, follow, follow. And so then it's no, you know, they're constantly telling you what you're doing wrong versus what you're doing right. We are the only species that follow unstable pack leaders. Animals, it's impossible for them to follow instability. Impossible. They don't follow instability because instability leads them nowhere.

• 21:11Lewis Howes?

  So they'll do their own thing or they'll?

• 21:13Speaker 05

  Or they take over their relationship.

• 21:15Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 21:15Speaker 05

  So in my case, you know, in my case, you can clearly see how the dog is in control of their lives. So outside, we were talking to a gentleman that you introduced me and he said, my dog love, love for me to drag him. That's his perception.

• 21:31Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 21:32Speaker 05

  Why would a dog would like to be dragged?

• 21:34Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 21:34Speaker 05

  You know, and then he come out with, oh, he's doing sit ups. That's what?

• 21:38Lewis Howes?

  Straight to his core.

• 21:39Speaker 05

  It was all very intellectual, you know what I mean? It made no sense in the animal world.

• 21:43Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 21:44Speaker 05

  But in his mind, made a lot of sense.

• 21:46Lewis Howes?

  What if someone feels like, you know, I feel like I'm certain, I'm confident, I'm leading and I'm, I'm poised and graceful. But it's still like, feels like I'm dragging in some sense.

• 21:56Speaker 05

  My friend, animals don't lie. So you can think that you are, doesn't mean you are. Yes. If you come from ego, selfishness and envy, you're not going to be very clear about how you feel. A lot of times, people come from ego saying, "I am confident." But it's ego talking for you versus just being clear about it. Yeah, so that's why a dog is a perfect teacher of how you truly feel. They don't know how to lie. Only humans lie. They have no idea how to lie. They're the most honest man friend you will ever have.

• 22:27Lewis Howes?

  Wow. So how do we, how do we train confidence in human beings? Or

• 22:32Speaker 05

  Well, first, before you

• 22:33Lewis Howes?

  Erasing the ego.

• 22:34Speaker 05

  Before you train, awareness needs to rise. Without awareness, there is no possibilities, right? And then through that awareness, then the human takes responsibility. Then once the human takes responsibility, then you enter into surrender. That's when you can teach. You can't teach a mind. The thing knows everything.

• 22:56Lewis Howes?

  That's a fact.

• 22:57Speaker 05

  You can't. So, so fight, flight, avoid, and surrender. You can only teach the mind to surrender. The mind that fights, flight, and avoid, you can't.

• 23:05Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 23:05Speaker 05

  Yeah, you can't.

• 23:06Lewis Howes?

  So once they surrender, they're aware.

• 23:08Speaker 05

  Once you surrender, what happens is you open up. That means you're willing to follow.

• 23:16Lewis Howes?

  There you have it, my friends. Powerful lessons from the leadership masters. If you enjoyed this, make sure to share it with your friends. LewisHowes.com/650. We've got incredible people on this episode. If you want to learn more about them, go back to that link. You can learn about Allison, Simon, and all the other individuals. And check out their full episodes. We link them back on this podcast as well. Again, if you haven't left a review yet, we've got over 3,000 plus five-star reviews. Go leave a review. Let me know what you think to be shouted out as the stand of the week. I hope you enjoyed this one, as John Maxwell said it best. "A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way."

• 24:00Lewis Howes?

  We are here to continue to develop ourselves as leaders of our own worlds, as leaders of our relationships, of our families, of our workspace, of our businesses, and leaders of humanity. I'm so proud of you for all the work that you do every single day to become a better human being. And to support those around you. I'm inspired by you for putting in the work, doing the hard things, because it's not easy to do the work when a lot of people just want to be lazy and have things done for them. You are taking great strides in your life. And always remember, every time you listen to one of these episodes and apply these and execute the lessons, you're going to see great results. I love you. Thank you very much. And you know what time it is?

• 24:43Lewis Howes?

  It's time to go out there and do something great.