Chapter 1: The Charismatic Leader

Mark Cole:
Welcome back to the Maxwell Leadership Podcast. Our podcast is the one that adds value to you so you’ll multiply value to others. My name is Mark Cole and today John Maxwell is sharing chapter one of his brand new book, the Charismatic Leader. I can’t wait for you to hear it and learn from it today. I’m really excited because as John shares and you can hear him reading and talking about a concept that is passionate not only to him, but it’s passionate to us at Maxwell Leadership. But I’ll tell you something more. It’s something you’re passionate about, the idea of being effective with others. Now, after John’s lesson, my co host, who is absolutely a charismatic leader herself, Traci Morrow, will be joining me to sit down and talk not only about this chapter, but how we can apply John’s advice in our life and in our leadership.

Mark Cole:
If you’d like to download the free bonus resource for this episode or even watch this episode on YouTube, go to MaxwellPodcast.com/CharismaticLeader. Okay, it’s time. Grab a pen, grab some paper. Here is John Maxwell. Foreign.

John Maxwell:
Put your focus on others. I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know, the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve. Albert Schweitzer said those words. Truly charismatic people care about others and focus their attention on them, not on themselves. In my book Winning With People, I discuss the big picture principle, which states the entire population of the world, with one minor exception, is composed of other people. We must get outside of ourselves, see the bigger picture, and start putting other people first. If we want to live our best life and become better leaders, everyone else in the world matters, not just us. If you never thought of life in those terms, then it’s time to give it a try.

John Maxwell:
When individuals think of themselves as the center of the universe, not only are they in for a big disappointment when they discover it’s not true, but they’ll also alienate themselves from everyone around them. That makes it difficult to lead people. I’ve never met a person who works well with people, who has not mastered the ability to keep their eyes off of the mirror and serve others with dignity. How focusing on others helps you Most people would readily admit that unselfishness is a positive quality, and even the most egocentric individual possesses the desire, I think, deep down, to help others. The problem sometimes is changing our behavior so that we get in the habit of focusing on others instead of on ourselves. Here are three thoughts to help you remember to keep your focus on other people where it really belongs. Number one, Focusing on others will give you a sense of purpose. Purpose if you like to stream old black and white TV shows, you may have come across Danny Thomas, the entertainer who starred in Make Room for Daddy.

John Maxwell:
Thomas observed, all of us are born for a reason, but all of us don’t discover why. Success in life has nothing to do with what you gain in life or accomplish for yourself. It’s what you do for others. Not only did Thomas believe that, but he also lived it as a successful entertainer and television star. He could have done nothing but enjoy the benefits of his achievement, but he desired something more. He founded St. Jude’s Hospital, a research facility that focuses on treating children who suffer from catastrophic diseases, and Thomas dedicated much of his life to supporting it. It helped him enjoy a greater purpose.

John Maxwell:
Put your focus on others and a greater purpose for your life and leadership may reveal itself. 2. Focusing on others can give you energy. Continual focus on yourself will drain you of energy. In contrast, focusing on others usually has the opposite effect. My friend Bill McCartney knew this when he was the head football coach for the University of Colorado Buffaloes in the 1980s and early 1990s. Coach Back had heard that most people spend 86% of their time thinking about themselves, but only 14% of their time thinking about others. Yet he knew instinctively that if his players focused their attention on people they cared about instead of just on themselves, a whole new source of energy would be available to them.

John Maxwell:
In 1991, Coach Mack decided to use this information when he was facing a great challenge. Colorado was scheduled to play its arch rival, the Nebraska Cornhuskers, on Nebraska’s home turf. The problem was that Colorado had not won a game there in 23 years. But Coach McCartney believed in his team and looked for a way to inspire them to achieve. In the end, he decided to appeal to their love of others. He did it by challenging each player to call an individual that he loved and tell that person he was dedicating the game to him or to her. Coach Mack also encouraged the players to ask that person to watch every play, knowing that every hit, every tackle, every block and every score was being dedicated to him or her. Coach Mack took one more step.

John Maxwell:
He arranged to distribute 60 footballs with the game’s final score written on them so that each player could send a ball to the individual that he had chosen. The result? The Colorado Buffaloes won the game. The final score written on the footballs was 2712. 3. Focusing on others can give you A Sense of Contentment I’m told that psychological research shows that people are better adjusted and more likely to feel content if they serve others. Serving others cultivates health and brings about happiness. People have instinctively known that from centuries even before the science of psychology was formally developed. For example, look at the wisdom and humor found in this time honored proverb.

John Maxwell:
If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a month, get married. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, Help others. It may seem counterintuitive, but by focusing on others you not only help them, but you also help yourself. You feel better about who you are and what you do. You help the people you focus on to feel better about themselves and perform better.

John Maxwell:
You increase your influence with them and you make the world a better place. Who doesn’t want all of that?

Mark Cole:
Get ready to become the leader you’ve always wanted to be. Learn to influence and connect with others through the ability to cultivate charisma. In John C. Maxwell’s latest book, The Charismatic Leader, you’ll learn 21 skills to connect with people and raise your leadership bar to the next level. You’ll also learn how to make others feel valued and seen, ultimately increasing your influence and ability to connect with them. By adopting these principles, leaders can naturally become more engaging and open doors to new opportunities for effective leadership and collective success. Visit MaxwellPodcast.com/CharismaticLeaderBook to order your copy today. Hey, here’s a quote that I picked up here from John that I want to remind you of right here.

Mark Cole:
If you want to improve your world, then focus your attention on helping others as today as we really dig in. Traci, again to a subject I think you’re incredible. Not just because you are great from stage or because people like to be around you, but you use the energy, you use the contentment of serving others to the advantage and the sense of fulfillment that you have in from leading. And so I love this standout statement. If you’ll put your focus on others, life will be more fulfilling. And today that’s what we’re talking about. This is an incredible book. Pick it up.

Mark Cole:
I’ll tell you more how to do that later, but let’s dig into the Charismatic Leader together.

Mark Cole:
Traci, I am excited. Thank you so much for those kind words. But John comes right out of the gate with two back to back quotes on happiness and love those quotes. And I was thinking about you Mark as a Charismatic leader. You have the unique position of having such close proximity to John, but also leading the legacy of his legacy company, but then also mentoring world leaders and American leaders. I mean, people around the globe. And you have seen many examples, I’m sure, of people who find their happiness from serving other people and people who don’t find happiness because they make it all about kind of serving themselves. So charismatic leaders and not so charismatic leaders.

Mark Cole:
And what do you think it is that makes 1, 2 equally maybe talented, genius, brilliant, capable leaders, and one seeks out ways to serve others, and then maybe somebody else chooses or doesn’t make the choice to seek out the happiness that comes from serving others.

Mark Cole:
Yeah. You know, I love the question. I love how you framed it, Traci. I think it comes back to insecurity or maybe scarcity. I’ve watched people that have all the goods to be charismatic, to be likable, to be that magnet of a leader that like John Maxwell is or Tracy Morrow is, and that you just got this magnetism that people do. I’ve watched a lot of people, Tracy, squander that because of a scarcity mindset. Well, what if I make others the hero? Will I get overlooked? Well, what if I serve others? Will I not accomplish my own objectives? They put it into the form of a stewardship issue. Well, I’ve been given all of this.

Mark Cole:
I better do something with it. And we allow that scarcity or that insecurity to begin to rob us of the joy that happens when we truly lift the opportunity or lift the effectiveness of the people around us. My question to all of us listening to the podcast today, and I’m a listener right now, is what area of my life could be more effective if I stopped operating with a scarcity mindset? What area of my life am I holding onto so tightly that by squeezing it, I am not allowing others around me to experience the joy of the opportunity or the abundance of the blessings we already have. And too often, I put my charisma, my magnetism over to the side because I have a scarcity mindset of what could happen if I don’t hold tight to the things that I have in my possession. I think that’s the biggest thief, if you will, of the magnetism or the charisma that’s in all of us.

Mark Cole:
Boy, I hope some people turned off, and if you haven’t yet, just turn it off and sit with that for a little bit and really sit with that question that Mark just asked, because I think it could be life changing for you. I think Sometimes we listen. We want to listen to the whole podcast instead of really letting that standout question that really takes the lesson and makes it very personal for you. And I think what Mark just asked could really be a game changer for, for a great many people in our audience. It certainly could be for me. In fact, I’m just gonna pause this right here. Yeah, kidding, kidding. If you saw me on YouTube, I’m putting a pretend pressing pause.

Mark Cole:
But you know, Mark, John goes on to talk about how focusing on other people helps you and how focusing on others will give you a sense of purpose. And you’ve talked very openly and honestly about your early days in your leadership journey, how you kind of disqualified yourself based on whatever happened in life and life happens to all of us, doesn’t it? And so how, how would you say from a very personal place, asking you to go personal and you’re so gracious to always take us on that journey with you. But how would you say that, how you personally were able to get out of your head and into your purpose to get you out of the disqualified, like, because I have to under. I have to believe that out of the people around the world who are listening right now, there are people who have disqualified themselves for one reason or another and they are not living in their sense of purpose right now. And they have charisma and they have all this God given purpose in their life, but they have disqualified themselves. What was it that you personally were able to do to get you back living in your purpose?

Mark Cole:
You know, it’s so interesting. Thanks for just reminding me, to be honest with you, of what it felt like for about three years. Traci, I got to spend recently I went down and spent some time with my mom who just turned 96 years old.

Mark Cole:
Wow.

Mark Cole:
And I was reminded that day, as I am today, with your question of how rich my heritage is in the area of charisma. Because my family modeled to me early on on how focusing on others truly was a God given sense of purpose. How John made the quote in the lesson today, except for a trivial exception, the world consists of other people. I mean, there’s one little small exception to that rule. But the world consists of everyone else. And you know, Tracy, I must say, in answering the question right here, I have been blessed beyond measure to have a foundation of understanding. True purpose comes from helping others achieve and accomplish their desires and their heart and their sense of fulfillment, their sense of destiny. It was modeled to me before I was born.

Mark Cole:
It was modeled to me throughout my entire formative Years. Yet you come to a place to where, for me at least, I came to a place to where I lost my way in that. And I began to focus on myself, what I could acquire, what I was not getting, what I was not receiving from those around me. And I became very self absorbed in my life to the point guess what self absorbing does? You reach the end of it. Because we all are finite until we expand our potential by joining forces with others, every one of us. I don’t care how good you are, Mr. Mrs. Podcast listener, you are finite in your opportunity unless you learn how to link arms with others and dream with the people around you.

Mark Cole:
So I came to that end myself. Because focusing on myself what I wasn’t getting, what relationships around me was not doing for me, all the things that I wanted that I didn’t have. And I became so self absorbed that I reached the end, that dead end, crash and burn that I’ve watched others, including myself come to. And so then what do I do? I naturally, I naturally pulled back and said, well then I don’t have anything to offer because I made the mistake the first time of making it all about others and then made it about myself. Now I must truly only focus on myself. And so for three years I joined John Maxwell’s team. And for three years I didn’t want a leadership position. I didn’t want to do anything that benefited others.

Mark Cole:
I just wanted to come do a good job, earn a good living and go home and not feel the weight or the responsibility of focusing on others. Guess what? I was just as unfulfilled in that three year period as I was the previous two year period of being focused 100% on me. Both was focused 100% on me, one was focusing on me. What am I not getting? What should I be getting? Why is everybody around me not bringing to the table what I wish they would bring to the table? Then I went through a series of crash and burn and say, well, now I have nothing to offer. I have nothing to offer. And I still stayed focused on myself. And it was at a point, at 33 years of age, I’m sitting in a year end review, little cone of silence to where I realized that the only fulfillment I was going to have in life was fulfillment that I could get by helping others accomplish what they want. And it was in that moment, Traci, that I now come up with a life purpose that flows off my tongue.

Mark Cole:
But I fought hard for this statement. Mark Cole exists to motivate and inspire people to reach their full Potential. That statement may seem glib to some of you. It may seem surface to others of you, and it may seem very trite to still others of you, but to me, it’s everything because it helped me realize there’s not going to be fulfillment in my life. I’m not going to have that sense of purpose if I’m not helping others accomplish and achieve what’s inside of them. You know, I woke up this morning super excited because the podcast gives me the opportunity to reach through a new medium to help you realize your potential, cultivate that, and then extend yourself toward that. That’s the purpose of this podcast. You might say that statement, we are the podcast that adds value to people who multiply value to others.

Mark Cole:
That is everything. To Tracy, to myself, to John Maxwell. That is our sense of purpose, our sense of fulfillment.

Mark Cole:
That’s right. You know, before we started recording, we were saying how, just being honest here, that we are both exhausted. Mark has been traveling a long time. I’ve been traveling. We had our big amaz event. We had. Then we both headed off to something else. And so.

Mark Cole:
But what happened this morning, instead of sleeping in, I was. My eyes popped open before the alarm at 5am because I was just ready to go because we know we’re meeting to talk about all of this, and I love how you talk about purpose.

Mark Cole:
Tracy, full disclosure. Full disclosure. Okay. And Jake and you guys all will be able to attest to this in the studio with me, but we’re preparing. We’re listening to John. We’re yawning. We’re. We’re obnoxious about being tired.

Mark Cole:
Boy, you cut it on and cut the record on. And I realize there’s women and men that are leaning in wanting something to extend them to the next goal, to the next destiny within them. I haven’t yawned one time on you guys. And that’s not saying Traci is boring. It’s saying that it’s go time, man. This purpose and the charisma comes out of us because of the purpose, right?

Mark Cole:
It’s bigger. It’s bigger than us, you know, when it’s just us and we can be ourselves. But you know, something that you said there, talking about insecurities and pride, it’s. It’s two sides of the same coin, right? When we’re insecure, we sideline ourselves. But then when we are prideful, I heard a long time ago the saying that pride is insecurity worn inside out. It’s just the other side of the coin of insecurity. And so when we show up prideful, what we’re doing is we’re just showing our insecurity in a different way, because we need to show everybody how great we are when who cares? You know, I love that statement that John said. I’ve never met a person who has worked well with people, who has not mastered the ability to keep their eyes off of the mirror and serve others, not just serve them, but with dignity.

Mark Cole:
How beautiful is that? And serving people with dignity is an honor. It’s a privilege. And so he. He went on to talk about Mark, the football coach who you got his players thinking, not of the game and how they always lose against Nebraska, but that how could they think of playing for somebody bigger than themselves, play for a family member? And to play to. To present the ball to somebody who they really cared about. And I thought that was just so powerful because John is the master at this. He is so great at creating an experience to serve others. And so I might be putting you on the spot here, but can you think.

Mark Cole:
I’m certain that you can think of a time when John created an experience for others in your presence that was just so powerful and beautiful that it just made the people who showed up thinking, wow, I’m here to meet John Maxwell. And instead, he created an experience that made them feel so highly valued, where he didn’t think about himself, he thought about the people he was showing up to serve.

Mark Cole:
Yeah, so we did. This happens every experience, by the way, whether it’s Israel, which is what I’m getting ready to tell you about, whether it’s Greece, whether it’s. It’s a roundtable playing golf. John constantly does this. In fact, I’ll give you two quick stories. John gets these very, very successful people to come to our roundtables, to our golf outings, which all benefits our nonprofits, Equip and the Maxwell Leadership Foundation. And so we do three to five of these events every year. And John always calls me right before and says, mark, he says, bring me a bunch of $100 bills because we’re going to have fun.

Mark Cole:
And I go, okay. And I remember the first couple of times he would say, hey, bring me some $100 bills because we’re going to have fun. And I’d go, oh, what are we getting ready to do? This could get interesting. And so then he’ll get these very successful millionaires, billionaires, around a green. And While they’ve paid $40,000 to come to this event, 100% of the proceeds goes to our nonprofit and trains the next Generation of leaders with values. He offers them $100 for a putt from 15ft, from 20ft. And watching these guys that just paid $40,000 to be at this event shaking their shoes for this $100 bill is one of the funniest things I’ve ever experienced. They could go in their back pocket and forget making the putt.

Mark Cole:
But there’s something about this experience John was at. We were in Israel right before COVID back in 2000, and there was a leader in Israel that really wanted to meet John. I mean, a very well renowned, world known leader that wanted to meet John. John said, you can meet me, but you’re going to have to invite 50 of my friends with you. And the guy said, no, no, no, I don’t want to meet them. I appreciate that. I’ll give them a great experience, but I need time with you. And John said, I’ll give you time with me, but I’m here with my guests and I want to give them a great experience.

Mark Cole:
He literally said to this world renowned leader, that was a fabulous meeting. You can meet, but you’re going to have to give an experience with the people that I’ve come here with. I was privileged just a few weeks ago, Traci, as you were to be with Tim Tebow. He’s a friend of mine. My daughter chose.

Mark Cole:
Wonderful human.

Mark Cole:
Wonderful human. My daughter, unfortunate for me, chose his school of choice rather than my school of choice. She’s gone to the University of Florida. And so Tim made a fun little experience out of it on stage and said she finally now knows how to read as a college student because she chose the University of Florida. But one of the things that Tim Tebow did backstage is he brought a helmet, a University of Florida gator helmet, and he signed it to Macy and said, macy, the greatness is within you. He didn’t have to do that. There was nothing contingent in his speaking arrangement with us. But he remembered my daughter was going to a place and we had some fun with it.

Mark Cole:
And when I brought that home to my daughter, I could have bought her 50 of those. In fact, I would have bought her 50 that said the University of Georgia rather than the University of Florida. But the fact that Tim thought of Macy and signed that to her was going above and beyond. See, charismatic leaders, leaders that have great charisma, know how to take a moment and make it last for a lifetime.

Mark Cole:
Yeah, yeah. I thought that was a beautiful, beautiful moment. And speaking of our most recent International Maxwell Certification conference, I think this was a great example of this focusing on others to give you energy, and focusing on others to give you a sense of contentment. You spoke in front of 3,000 people, and I’ve seen you speak, gosh, a lot of different places in front of a lot of different crowds. But I felt like this was the most at ease I’ve ever seen you. You were on fire. You were very comfortable. You were silly.

Mark Cole:
You delivered a pat, impassioned message to the crowd. And I felt like this was this lesson in action. Can you talk a little bit in closing about what was going through you internally? Because I think you always think about the crowd, but I think there are some times when it’s almost visible, maybe it’s just because me, and I’m your friend, I think there are times when it’s more obvious that you’re mindful that you’re on John Maxwell’s stage, and then there are times like this where you are, like, thinking of the people you’re serving. So I think that’s very relatable for people to hear from you. What was going through you on with you internally to make such a. Like, a wow moment for you.

Mark Cole:
Yeah. So thank you for that, and thanks for giving me an opportunity here to talk about this podcast family. You may not be a part of our 56,000 certified coaches, speakers, and trainers.

Mark Cole:
And if not, why not?

Mark Cole:
Yeah, exactly. I don’t even know if I’m going to put it in the show. Note how you can do that, because the point is not to engage you. The point is to parallel for you that I see our podcast family the same as I see our certified coaches, speakers, and trainers family. Hey, you’re on a journey of growth and development with Traci and I. You’re on that journey with us. And so I’m going to not only answer your question, Traci, I’m going to go behind the scenes and let you hear a little bit of mine and John’s interaction afterwards. So.

Mark Cole:
And by the way, most of that, mine and John’s conversation after this International Maxwell Conference that Traci’s alluding to is because all of you want to become better communicators and better leaders as well. So the first thing first is your. The answer to your question. There was something really unique for me in this event, and I have spoken to lots of people many, many, many times, many different stages, but this one was really different. It was very different in that I did feel like I had a message that would relate with the audience, and I felt like that I had a posture of really wanting to help the audience. Oftentimes I communicate wanting to impress the audience. Oftentimes I take the stage hoping I don’t embarrass John Maxwell. But this particular time, I really felt I had some messages.

Mark Cole:
And it wasn’t just once. It was. It was three times that I spoke on different stages, spoke a lot of times at this event, but there were three messages that I felt very, very settled, very at peace with. And each time that I shared that, the feedback from very, very loving relationships, friends like you, Tracy, was how remarkably different than it was. And I think it’s because of this contentment thing that John references in the last point in this lesson. A charismatic leader focuses on others, and by focusing on others, it gives you great contentment. I cannot tell you going into this IMC and I’ve been to 50 of them, I cannot tell you the level of contentment I had before I ever took stage because I knew I had something that would help them. I knew my posture was to help them, and I knew the outcome would be helping them.

Mark Cole:
I knew it. And so it was great. It was fulfilling. It was all the things that you just mentioned. It was also extremely interesting to me that as John and I debriefed this, he and I jumped on the plane with his wife, Margaret, and the three of us went up to a commitment that we had up in Ohio. And he said, mark, I want to debrief with you your speaking this time. And he said, I can finally tell you things that I’ve been waiting for over six years to tell you about your communication. And he began to share with me the moments that I got back into myself, wanting to impress my audience rather than impact the audience.

Mark Cole:
He began to share with me and I said, now why can you tell me that day? He said, because you tasted contentment. And now you want to note the times to where you felt apprehensive right in the middle of a talk. And Tracy, I’ll tell you this right here. His coaching of me, he’s been coaching me six years of MainStage. More than that, he’s been coaching me a long time. For mainstage speaking, the impact of his coaching this time was more impacting than all the other times combined. Why? Because I was content. I didn’t feel like that I was trying to impress John.

Mark Cole:
I didn’t feel like that I had failed. I didn’t feel like I should have done better. I knew that I had done my best, and now I knew how I could improve and become better. And for the first time, maybe ever. But for the first time in a long time, I can remember John’s coaching me, which was very direct, very substantive in the things I could have done better. It was a gift to me rather than an offense to me. It was an opportunity rather than a discouragement. It was encouraging rather than that sense of cutting that you feel sometimes.

Mark Cole:
And I’m convinced that it’s this right here. Let’s go back to charismatic leadership. I’m convinced that it was because of the contentment that came from a sense of knowing what you wanted to communicate and knowing why you wanted to communicate. I knew what I wanted to communicate, but why I wanted to communicate. It was not to impress, not to stay away from embarrassment, but it was truly to offer that advice, that input that would make a difference for others. I wish we could go on and on. We can’t. The time is up.

Mark Cole:
But John would say it often like this. Hey, we gave you a chapter of this book. Don’t come back next week expecting another free chapter. Go buy the book. You want to get this book on how to be a charismatic leader. We will put that in the show notes how you can take advantage of this book. By the way, be charismatic by buying two copies, one for you and one for somebody that you want to help become a better leader within them. Sheila, you’re our podcast listener today.

Mark Cole:
You listen to the podcast Mindset Matters. In fact, you referenced that in your comment. You said, I just wanted to take a moment to express how much your podcast episode on Mindset Matters impacted my life as a leader. The insights and practical steps you shared have truly transformed the way I approach leadership. Come on, Sheila. That’s why we do it. Sheila goes on and says, you, emphasis on intentional thinking and clarity has made a significant difference in my effectiveness and my purpose. Thank you for the invaluable guidance, Sheila.

Mark Cole:
Thank you for taking time to give us the feedback. For all the rest of you podcast viewers listeners, we’ll put Mindset Matters into our show notes as well as another episode I really want to challenge you to listen to called the Heart of Leadership. We’ll put both of those in the show notes. We’ll see you again next week. Until then, go lead well, because everyone deserves to be led well.