The Art of Leading Complicated People (Including Yourself) with Ryan Leak

Mark Cole:
Hey, welcome to Maxwell Leadership Podcast. Our podcast is committed to you podcast family. I’m glad so many of you are return listeners, return viewers. You truly make every studio experience that I have extremely special because I’m sitting with you, I’m walking with you, I’m running with you. We’re driving down the road mad at traffic together. You’re my family. And I’m super excited because every podcast, we put our best into it because we want you to grow. We want to add value to you so that you’ll multiply value to others.

Mark Cole:
Today is no exception. In fact, I am so excited today, I think I’m going to explode. I’m excited because I’m doing something John Maxwell wish he could do. He called me this morning and I told him what I was going into studio to do with this podcast. He was envious and he’s not showing up. That’s an unusual part of the podcast number two. I’m excited because we’ve accomplished a first time ever. And if you’ve listened to any of these podcasts, you know, we’re big about first time evers.

Mark Cole:
We’re pioneers. We want to accomplish something we’ve never accomplished. And today that’s happened. And thirdly, I’m in studio with two brilliant, younger than me, better looking than me leaders. And that always makes me kind of feel younger, and it makes me feel relevant. Today, it’s no exception. One of my guests you haven’t met on podcast yet, but he really. His name is Jared Cagle, and Jared is our executive vice president of content and publishing here at Maxwell Leadership, and he’s joining me today.

Mark Cole:
And he’s joining me because also joining me is a Maxwell Leadership published author named Ryan Leak. And he’s been on the podcast before. I know, but he’s never been on the podcast with the authority, the moral authority of today. You see, he just released a book two weeks ago called how to work with complicated People. In other words, how to work with you. That’s really what he wrote the book about. But he wrote a book. And now three weeks later, I can look at the man, the myth, the legend, and I can tell you not only is he Ryan Leak, the speaker, not only is he Ryan Leake, the B ball player, not only is he Ryan Leek, my friend and writer and consultant of great teams, highly functioning, achieving teams, but he is Ryan Leak, New York Times bestseller in the house today.

Mark Cole:
Ryan, I am so glad you’re here. So glad you’re here. We are excited to have Ryan. I’m just going to tell you guys, I already have spoken two minutes too long. Because this 35 minute podcast, I promise you, you’re going to want to listen because many of you do, and then you want to go watch it because it’ll be highly interactive, but you’re going to see a guy that is passionate and empowered to help complicated people become highly functioning teams. I’ve heard you speak on this multiple times. I’m now reading the book I’m four chapters in. I should be further along, but I’m four chapters in, blown away by this book.

Mark Cole:
And I’m super excited you’re here today, man.

Ryan Leake:
It’s an honor to be here. I wouldn’t be here without you.

Mark Cole:
Well, I feel so humbled. I remember I was just telling you this, and this is a sidebar, a moment for us. But podcast family, I want you to have this moment with us. I remember over two decades ago joining John’s team and and I joined his team right after his first New York Times bestseller. And I’m gonna tell you, the joy, the sense of accomplishment. It’s a Grammy moment, right? It’s a Grammy moment. And to get on that phone with you a week or so ago after it happened, it was one of my favorite moments, Jared, wasn’t it? It was just really good. And so it’s good.

Mark Cole:
Congratulations. Thanks for letting us be a part of it.

Ryan Leake:
Absolutely. I remember what you said about probably a year and a half ago. You said, hey, we don’t need each other, but, man, imagine what we could do if we began to work together. And so it’s been a fun journey.

Mark Cole:
Podcast family, what Ryan just said is the best partners are the partners that don’t need each other but realize the value of one another. And this whole process has done that. In fact, when John and I looked at this book and I’m gonna just show you this book again, I went, is this an emoji emotion class right here? What is going on? And then I looked in and, guys, I’m just gonna show you a book. You haven’ many like this in the book. The colors, the interaction. It’s a brilliantly crafted book and we may even get into that today. I want to talk about the content because it’s really going to help our podcast family. But it’s a brilliantly concepted concept book that is jumping off of the bookshelves, and so many of our podcast families already went and Googled it and trying to find it.

Mark Cole:
You don’t want to go Google it right now because I just Looked at Amazon prices and we’re going to beat those on this right here. So give me just a moment with that. So seriously, Ryan, talk to me. Why this? Why now?

Ryan Leake:
Well, one of the things that we were seeing across all of the clients we work with, all of the audiences that I speak for, was that people were finding themselves sitting across from people that they considered to be difficult or complicated. As John Maxwell often says, we have to learn to disagree without disrespect. I think we’ve lost the art of being able to talk with one another. According to our research, most people’s go to option whenever they are encountering a difficult person, whether it be their leader or somebody that works for them, is they avoid them or they try to get rid of them, they try to ignore them in some sort of way. And so there was this idea, what I kept seeing in my head is people kept moving away from people. They kept avoiding the difficult conversation. I like to say it like this. Complicated people don’t often come with instructions.

Ryan Leake:
But now. Now they do.

Greg Cagle:
Now they do.

Mark Cole:
We now can understand you is what Ryan says.

Ryan Leake:
Now they do. And so I just think there can be so much division, so much, you know, if we don’t see things the same way, if we don’t believe the same things, well, then I’m just done with you. And I just thought, well, that’s just no way to grow. You don’t get better from avoiding difficult conversations. No, you get better by moving towards people with understanding and trying to get to know them a little bit more and being able to say, all right, well, you know, I’ve navigated some difficult conversations. That’s what actually makes you a leader. It allows you to solve bigger problems because you’ve been there and done that. But if you’ve spent a decade just ignoring people, well, then it’s gonna be really hard to follow you.

Ryan Leake:
Especially when things get tough.

Mark Cole:
It’s incredible. Cause it’s extremely practical. I marked something up right here. You said, why do you keep getting surprised when people are complicated?

Ryan Leake:
Yeah.

Mark Cole:
And you break down the expectation of complication. And most of the time people try to eradicate it. And you give some ways to work through it and to become less complicated. So there’s hope for us. But you also seem to normalize the challenge of complication. And that’s what I love about what you’ve done in this book. And I’m reading it now. Stop letting them surprise you.

Mark Cole:
Chapter number three. I don’t know what Yalls favorite chapter is. We kind of laughed about that while.

Ryan Leake:
Ago, that one is. Chapter three is my favorite.

Mark Cole:
Stop letting them surprise you. How many times leaders have we sit there and went, how can you, oh, you’ve done this before a lot. And so you really normalize complication. And once we demystify complication, I think you say something else. And I’m, oh, go looking for complicated. And you give people the chance to kind of debunk the concept that complication is bad. It’s just normal.

Ryan Leake:
It is. It’s human.

Mark Cole:
It’s human.

Ryan Leake:
It’s part of the human condition. On the other side of each and every one of us is complexity. We don’t want to feel like we are a hurdle to somebody else, but the reality is we are. We all are that. I remember in the process of doing this book, we were interviewing a public relations team and they said, hey, Ron, we’re going to have you in New York. We’re going to take you to la. You’re going to be on Good Morning America and all these different shows. And I said, well, I’ve got a pretty robust speaking schedule.

Ryan Leake:
I don’t know that I can even do that. And they didn’t know the title of the book and they wrote back, ryan, you are too complicated to work with. We’re going to have to pass. And I said, I understand that, but I got a book for you that I think can help you work with me. And so I think that when we start there, if we can start with the man, maybe on the other side of me, it’s not as easy or as ideal as I think it is. I think we’ve got a chance at really having some powerful conversations because we will always receive more from somebody that realizes that, that they have dropped the ball, that they have made some mistakes than somebody that’s always pointing their finger at us. And so when there’s a lot of humility there, I think you’ve got a shot at really building some powerful relationships.

Mark Cole:
You know, I’ve heard you now give the talk for this and more about that later, because I’m going to give you a chance to hear the talk, too. But I’ve heard you now, I think three times. I know two, but I think three times I’ve heard you dig into this content and the why now part of this. John Maxwell has a statement that says, I’m leadership sad. Now, the first time he made that podcast Family, I went, john, we’re selling a lot of books on this concept of leadership. Can you go a little softer on the sadness part? I don’t think people are going to buy a sad message. Right. But really what John was saying is leadership has become more about the individual’s agenda, the leader’s agenda, than it has been about serving the people that’s on it.

Mark Cole:
And so when I answer the question of why now and why I’m so glad to be partnering with you on this book. Thank you for letting Maxwell Leadership Publishing be a part of this book. My why now to this podcast family is a subject we tackle almost every single week. And that is the people around us deserve to be led. Well. And this book allows you to lead complicated people in complicated situations. Well. And so I want to thank you as a person really trying to solve the leadership sadness in the world.

Mark Cole:
Thank you for writing a book that is so practical.

Ryan Leake:
Yeah.

Mark Cole:
That we can use as leaders.

Ryan Leake:
Absolutely. I think one of the most important concepts from the book that I would want someone to walk away with is this idea that complicated people often have a complicated behind the scenes. And what can happen with any one of us is we can be misunderstood. Every single person that is listening, that is watching, has had a moment in their life where they were misunderstood. I’ve had many of those moments where I was misunderstood. And what did we all want our day in court.

Mark Cole:
Yeah. Exactly.

Ryan Leake:
To be able to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. No, no, that’s not what I meant. No, no, no, that’s not true. I know what you heard, but that doesn’t mean that it’s true. You never even investigated. You know how many times somebody has told us a story about somebody else and we just believed it?

Mark Cole:
Yeah.

Ryan Leake:
And now we believe this thing about this person. I can’t believe they would say that behind my back. You don’t actually even know that they said it. You just heard that somebody said that. But how do you know that they didn’t mishear that? Or how many times has there been a miscommunication?

Mark Cole:
And.

Ryan Leake:
And so as a leader, for you to have the resolve to go, you know what? I’m willing to bet that the underneath the hood of the complicated behavior I’ve experienced with this person perhaps is a complicated behind the scenes story that maybe there’s more going on with their family, maybe there’s more going on with their kids, maybe there’s more going on with something in their life that I can’t see that’s impacting the reactions and behavior that I can see. And when you become a more empathetic leader, it absolutely changes the game because now you’re walking into the office and you’re going. You’re not just seeing complicated behavior, you’re actually seeing humans that work for you.

Mark Cole:
So I’m going to get into the content of the book, but let me tell you why I love Ryan Leake, the author, great speaker, Speak how many times a year?

Ryan Leake:
120.

Mark Cole:
120 times a year. If you haven’t heard him, you need to find a place to hear him or you need to just bring him to your company. That’s what you need to do. And we’ll tell you how to do that in a little bit. We’ll get Ryan to tell you how to connect with him on social and getting him out there. But one of the reasons I love Ryan and his books, not only this book, but he’s already working on his next book, which is what good authors do, is his book is kind of Jim Collins meets John Maxwell. And here’s why I say that. It’s because he’s got so much research behind this.

Mark Cole:
He’s got so many. One of the ways he launched this book was to get 150 people to speak into the content of the book so he could make the content better. So he’s really going in and getting data and analyzing. And I love that because that’s Collins data meets inspiration content that John Maxwell does. And so I’m super excited about you as an author and I’m very excited about you as a reader, as a listener, as a follower of Ryan, because it’s going to give you research, it’s going to help you understand yourself and people, but it’s going to give you practical, relevant ways to deal with people with this content. So I’m proud of you, man. Proud of you. Let’s talk about, in the book, you talk about work.

Mark Cole:
Working with complicated people is inevitable. But how do leaders know when the problem is someone else and not themselves?

Ryan Leake:
Well, I think it’s both, and I don’t think it’s either or. I think there is something about starting with going, man, I realize that perhaps on the other side of me it’s a little bit more complicated and maybe not as easy for somebody else. Complicated is in the eye of the beholder. We learned that in our research. So what’s easy for you might be difficult for me, and what’s super easy for me might be difficult for you. And so. And that’s true with people. I think when you start with yourself, you’re able to really be able to see your team even better.

Ryan Leake:
And then I think you’re able to really have some conversations around hey, what are the things that would make our team a whole lot better? You know, we were at High Point University, and what does, what does Nito talk about all the time? Removing irritants. And so imagine if you had that kind of meeting where you’re going, hey, I realize that there are some things that I might be doing that might be an irritant to you.

Mark Cole:
Yeah.

Ryan Leake:
Is there something that I do all of the time that is actually getting in the way of you doing your job effectively? So now it’s a humble conversation to say, hey, how can we create the kind of culture that people look forward to showing up to on a Monday morning? I think people can dread coming into the office or they can absolutely look forward to it. It could be something that they wake up on a Monday, a Tuesday, and they go, I can’t wait to go do this work, because I know it’s going to add value to people. But most people, I find, they’re surviving. Yeah, they’re not thriving. And that’s one of the things the research showed us, is that job satisfaction can actually be increased, not because you change their job description, but because you change the dynamics of the relationships around them. And so we’ve discovered that people can pull off a very difficult job with people that they actually enjoy doing the job with, versus their dream job with people they tolerate.

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Mark Cole:
So, Jared, you might even speak into this in a minute because we work on a leadership team together. But I’ve heard John Maxwell say often, often. He said it on this podcast often. What’s it like to be on the other side of me? I heard you say the same thing from stage the other day. John probably has been quoting Ryan the whole time, by the way, but I heard you say that on stage three weeks ago in Texas. And then you not only gave me permission to ask that question, which I’ve been asking for a long time. You gave me the ability to anticipate and therefore free the other person up to tell me what my complications are. And so I’m just going to tell you, you’ve heard us use that comment, that statement a lot of times on, on this podcast.

Mark Cole:
But what Ryan just said and what I really took away from your talk recently was it’s not only good to ask the question, it’s great to anticipate so that you can free the other person that you’re asking that question up for telling you some of your complications. And Jared, you work on the leadership team with us, but we try to ask that around here a lot.

Greg Cagle:
Yeah, yeah. I think the questions are critically important to your point. You mentioned that question earlier that, hey, what’s it like to be on the other side of me? But also what are the things that I’m doing maybe that are getting in the way of you being your full self? You do that. John does that. The best leaders I’ve been around do that. And I think that one of my favorite things about the book, the research really showed us what we kind of already knew in some ways, but it gave us a launching pad to create some of those questions so that people can take those questions back to their team and ask the right questions. Right. Good leaders ask great questions.

Greg Cagle:
And so much of that in here is what you brought out, which is very accessible for leadership teams for sure.

Mark Cole:
So one of the things you do, Ryan, is you coach high performing teams. You speak a lot. You coach a lot. Now you’re writing brilliant New York Times bestseller books a lot.

Greg Cagle:
I love it.

Mark Cole:
So, number one, people want to hear you speak. People want to get you to come speak. People would like you to come coach their team on how to work together as a complicated team. How do we get in touch with you?

Ryan Leake:
RyanLeak.com.

Mark Cole:
That’s pretty hard. That’s pretty hard. RyanLeak.com is the way to get in touch with you. Good. So you do coach a lot of leaders at every level. And now let’s now assume the leader is not the most complicated one. It’s the people that we work with. What’s one common mistake that leaders make when navigating difficult personalities on the team?

Ryan Leake:
I think it goes back to that expectations deal. I think that sometimes you’re expecting somebody to change who isn’t trying to. And so in the book we talk about identifying somebody who’s Actually trying to change. Actually trying to grow. You’re listening to this podcast. You’re watching this podcast because you’re trying to grow. Ask yourself, are they?

Mark Cole:
Yeah.

Ryan Leake:
Are they listening to podcasts? Are they waking up trying to read books? Are they trying to get better every day? As we are always living with a growth mindset, it’s like, we’re trying to get better every day. Well, if you’re expecting somebody to change who’s actually not trying to, well, you’re just going to be standing in that line for a very, very long time. And so I see leaders get frustrated with people on their team. It’s like, why can’t they? Why can’t. Why can’t they? I’m like, because they just woke up today and said they’re just trying to be themselves. They’re not trying to grow into something else. I love when I meet friends from college and they say, hey, you’ve changed. And I say, yeah, because I’ve been trying to.

Ryan Leake:
I hope I’m different. I hope you don’t see me the same, and I don’t want to stay where I was. I’m trying to grow. Most people, they don’t. They don’t live with that growth mindset. So I think having those appropriate expectations is going to be huge for a leader to be able to say, to be able to recognize, okay, this is a person that’s trying to change, and I can help them grow versus a person that is actually okay with mediocrity. And then now you have a hiring problem, and so those are different things that you have to navigate.

Mark Cole:
Wow, that is brilliant. All right, so all of us leaders have this time to wear a complicated person. Not looking at you, Jared.

Ryan Leake:
Complicated. Yeah. We need to work something out. I’m happy to do a live workshop. That would be a great podcast. Happiness, guys, whatever we can talk through, let me do this. You got me in the building. You know what I mean? We’ll just do a live session.

Mark Cole:
Jared, thanks. This is his first podcast because I want to put our executive vice president of content and publishing on here. This is an intervention.

Ryan Leake:
Yeah, let’s go. Let’s do it. Now we’re talking.

Mark Cole:
We all have. Jared’s on our team. I’m just kidding. Brilliant human being to work with. We have as a leader. I’ve had this happen to me many, many times. Leadership team. It’s not right now.

Mark Cole:
It was in the past.

Greg Cagle:
Right.

Mark Cole:
But we’ve always been as leaders. We’ve felt stuck. We’ve got this complicated person that Delivers a bottom line. But they are so difficult and sometimes even toxic to your culture and to the team you’re trying to build. Can you help us with that? Does the book help us with that? Talk to me about that scenario.

Ryan Leake:
This is a big question. Yeah, I’m about to go in.

Mark Cole:
Okay, let’s go.

Ryan Leake:
You opened up the can, now we’re here.

Mark Cole:
Let’s do it.

Ryan Leake:
A couple of things. Number one, you have to have the conversation sooner than sooner than later. You, you cannot keep sweeping it under the rug while you, it just becomes a ticking time bomb. And the phrase I’ve been coaching leaders to use a lot is to be able to go to this person and be able to say, hey, I want us to have a thriving working relationship. Yeah, I want this to work out. I’m being very, very intentional about this conversation. But I’m just letting you know, on the other side of you, it’s been really challenging from the team. Now you can start using phrases like, hey, I could be wrong.

Ryan Leake:
I’m just gonna give you the other side of you, but I wanna make room for your story before I fill in the blank. So I’m not showing up to the conversation with all of my evidence and saying, hey, this is why you suck. No, you’re going, hey, I’m telling you what I’ve been hearing. I’m telling you what I feel. I’m telling you our interactions are a little awkward. There’s a hesitation there, there’s a pause. There’s some passive aggressive comments that I’ve received as that. But I could be wrong.

Ryan Leake:
But maybe that’s not what you’ve intended, but you’ve got to go in and have the conversation. The second interesting thing is, and I hear this word all the time, Toxic. I hear it all the time. My problem with the word toxic is I have never met a human being in my life that has ever said, hey, my name is Ryan and I’m toxic.

Mark Cole:
Wow.

Ryan Leake:
Nobody believes they’re toxic.

Mark Cole:
That is brilliant.

Ryan Leake:
Nobody. But we all know at least one. But they would also say, I’m not toxic. Like, nobody actually believes they’re the ones that are toxic. So at some point we all have to get in the boat to go, could I be the one that is actually toxic? Nobody wants to have that conversation because nobody thinks that they’re that. But you could be. And that is the tough pill to swallow for any leader that’s going, wait, I could be the one that is causing all of this trouble. The number one question I get asked by other coaches Is what do I do in a toxic culture? And the leader is the one that is toxic.

Ryan Leake:
It’s the number one problem for executive coaches.

Greg Cagle:
Now we’ve arrived at the conversation.

Ryan Leake:
But again, we use this word, and it is a buzzword in corporate America right now, especially. But the problem is, I’ve yet in counseling and coaching, call it thousands of people. I’ve never in one conversation heard someone say, man, Ryan, I. If you could just really help me, man, I’m just really toxic, man. And I could really use your help being not toxic. So it’s a popular word that no one wants to raise their hand and say, yeah, that’s me. So we either, a, have to find a better word, or B, we have to be able to look in the mirror and go, if that is me, how would I detox? How do I detox my culture? You can’t do it without having real, real honest conversations. I recently had a client who his top person on his team, big company.

Ryan Leake:
He asked for a transfer. He said, I don’t want to work for this guy anymore. And it was a surprise to him. It was a shock. And the transfer was denied. And so now I’m stuck with this person that I know doesn’t want to work for me. He said, so what do I do? I said, you go to them and you say, hey, I know you don’t want to work for me, but is there anything that I could do to make this relationship?

Mark Cole:
Wow.

Ryan Leake:
Don’t have the conversation. Like, really the options are they just quit? Sure. But I’m telling you, I talk to leaders all the time. They go, man, I love this person on my team. I said, how’s it going with them? It’s going great. And then they quit two months later. I can’t believe they left. I can.

Mark Cole:
Wow.

Ryan Leake:
And when they leave, what do they say? I used to work at a place that was toxic. Wow. So we’re going. Well, who is it? So I’m very slow to use the T word, so to speak, because it’s like, I don’t know that it’s the most helpful word. But I do think the more we have honest, vulnerable conversations to say, I want to be here 25 years. I want to work here for the long haul. And for me to be able to do that in an effective and honest way, I don’t ever want to have to talk about you behind your back.

Mark Cole:
Beautiful.

Ryan Leake:
I would love to be able to have conversations with you. I tell leaders all the time, every single person in your organization is navigating Their place in the organization, and they’re going, do I want to be here? How long do I want to be here? Man has this putting too much pressure on my family? I don’t know. And the level of relationship that you have with that person will determine if they’re having those conversations with you or without you. And I think we all have the opportunity to be the kinds of leaders that says, hey, I’ve got my finger on the pulse so well that I never have any surprise resignations. I know what’s going on with them. I know what’s stressing them out. I know what’s really pressing them and where they don’t think that they can make it. And I’m so dialed in that if they’re at a breaking point, I know it, but.

Greg Cagle:
Okay, all right, all right.

Ryan Leake:
I told you. He opened it. He opened it up.

Greg Cagle:
All right, all right. Because we got some note takers out there for sure, and they’re dying right now. So I just.

Mark Cole:
I’m gonna give you a reprieve.

Greg Cagle:
First of all, I want to say you mentioned 25 years with this company, Maxwell Leadership, Mark Cole as CEO, as owner today.

Ryan Leake:
That’s right.

Greg Cagle:
As we’re recording this podcast today, we’re celebrating that. So we got a New York Times bestselling author, and we’ve got a 25.

Mark Cole:
Year silver in the air.

Greg Cagle:
Silver is in the air, which is amazing. We are grateful for you. We congratulate you. It’s a huge day. What you’re talking about is positioning, framing. I want you to. And maybe you, too, because you’re here. You understand this concept very, very well.

Greg Cagle:
As a leader. Speak to the leaders out there. A lot of people we talk to, when they’re working with individuals or they’re working with teams, they’re concerned about what they say more than how they say it, how they frame it up. And everything you just said, the brilliance of everything you just said was the way it’s positioned, the way it’s framed up. You both came back from an experience recently with Nito Kubain at High Point University, and that quote was on both of your lips.

Mark Cole:
It’s all about how it’s positioned.

Greg Cagle:
Everything good in life is because of positioning.

Mark Cole:
What a quote.

Greg Cagle:
What an idea. That’s what was coming up off of what you were saying right there. I’d love to go deeper and speak to the leaders about what that looks like and why that’s so important.

Ryan Leake:
Well, you know, I can only speak for me on my side of that. It’s. I think people Appreciate when you address the elephant in the room.

Mark Cole:
So true.

Ryan Leake:
People will dance around an elephant for years. Years. It’s just like, man, let’s just talk about can be awkward. I don’t want to make it sound like it’s easy. Yeah, Just walk in our office and just start talking. It’s like, no, it’s not that easy. But the minute you cross that threshold, I think you become what you guys have been talking about for 25 years. You become an intentional leader.

Ryan Leake:
That’s what you’re doing. You’re saying, hey, I want us to have an intentional conversation. As your leader, I want to bring the absolute best out of you. And guess what? I also realize this may not be the place where that happens. It’s a big boy conversation. I hope that it is with me, but if it’s not, I want to help you get to where you’re supposed to be. That’s how much I actually care about you as an individual. And so I don’t want to have to hold on to you.

Ryan Leake:
I don’t want to lead with fear of, oh, my gosh, what’s going to happen with you? But it’s like, what’s going to be best for you and what’s going to be best for us? And how do we create win win conversations? That’s great. I think now we’re actually having a conversation.

Mark Cole:
Beautiful.

Ryan Leake:
Versus. Here’s your job description. I give you money, you go do work. I promise you that person is having private conversations with their spouse and best friends about where else could I be, you know?

Mark Cole:
So as you asked that Jared, brilliant response. I’m not going to try to top the response because that’s the response I want to give that response. What I will give you is personal applic, which is what I try to do on this podcast often. As you were talking about the T word, you don’t like to use the T word, but guess what? All of us love to use it when we’re talking about somebody else.

Ryan Leake:
There’s no question about it.

Mark Cole:
We like it. But when there’s a chance that it’s our culture leader and the team that we’re leading, we want to use different words. And so I love that you even tiptoed away from that. But this was the biggest takeaway for me in what you said in all of that. And, Jared, this is how I’ve tried to live. First, let me explain to you. For 25 years, my greatest fear as a leader is, what am I missing? I wake up in the middle of the night Asking myself the question, what am I missing? What does everybody else know that I don’t know that has been. Now I turn that question.

Mark Cole:
I try not to let it steer myself to insecurity, which is the backside of that question. And I try to drive it to learning, constant learning. So what am I missing? I turn it into an education lesson. What am I missing? What am I missing? I have never, as a leader, identified a toxic environment and ask myself the question, is it me? I never have. And this is confession to you guys, I’ve always, as the leader, said, there’s a toxic environment around here on my watch. What do I do with the toxic environment? I’ve never started in all my years of saying, what am I missing? What’s it like to be on the other side of me? What is it? I never start a toxic conversation as a leader with, is it me? I always start with, this is what it is, and this is what we’re going to eradicate. You arrested me today. And as a leader, I should first ask the question, is it me? Is it me that’s bringing the toxicity to this organization? What I do love about the book, it’s in here because I read it today.

Mark Cole:
You have a whole detoxing. You don’t use the toxic word maybe as much, but you have a whole detoxing session in here on how to get toxic situations out of complicated relationships. Now, you may want to speak into that a minute because it’s in the book and I’ve now already alluded to it. I. Or I’m going to the next question. You want to talk a little bit about detox? Okay.

Ryan Leake:
Yeah. So it’s. It’s. It’s called Expectations Detox.

Mark Cole:
Yes.

Ryan Leake:
And it’s. It’s about you just stepping away from what you’ve known for years and being able to walk into your office with fresh eyes. I love this idea of, hey, if we sold the company today and somebody came in and took over right away, what’s the first thing that they would change? Yeah, and why don’t we do that today? Yep, that’s true. It’s this idea of going, what are all of the expectations that I have for everyone around me? And then beginning to go, if I had to start over and I had to. And I’m looking at the business objectively, we see everybody else’s business crystal clear except our own.

Mark Cole:
Except our own.

Ryan Leake:
We can’t. Sometimes when I’m stuck, you know how many times I was working on this book and I was just stuck, just hitting my Head up against the wall. And then somebody else would ask me help for their book. And, yeah, man, great. I. I got a thousand ideas for everybody else. And then, like, well, what you gonna do? He’d be like, you know what? I don’t know. I.

Ryan Leake:
I’m just. I don’t know. Chapter eight. I don’t know what’s going on. It’s. I’m trying to, like, work, rework it, but. But really getting those fresh eyes to be able to go, man, if I. If I’m looking at our team objectively, I know I’ve got people that have been here 25 years and 10 years, and.

Ryan Leake:
And we’ve got some long tenure, but if somebody else came in right away, would they put them in a different position, but they let them go?

Mark Cole:
Yep.

Ryan Leake:
What would they do to free them up? What would they do to empower them? What would they. So you’re giving yourself that restart with those fresh eyes. And I think that it is a detoxification process of going, wait a minute. Maybe I’ve been expecting something from them that maybe that’s not what they even want to give anymore. The other thing that I think is important to understand, that’s a powerful concept in this book, is this idea of for forever. We would go by this phrase. If somebody shows you who they are, believe them. Oh, wow.

Ryan Leake:
Which is the famous Maya Angelou, for sure. But my challenge with that quote is that in its context, it makes sense. But sometimes somebody shows you who they are five years ago, and then you keep them in. In that boat. And so you don’t know.

Mark Cole:
That’s brilliant.

Ryan Leake:
You don’t know this. Okay, but at the leadership event we were at, we were at a leadership event together, I believe it was last week.

Mark Cole:
Yep.

Ryan Leake:
And it was a very small thing that they had on the schedule, which absolutely makes no sense to me to this moment. But it says, John Maxwell will interview Ryan Leak, which is like, this is the most toxic. Let’s use the term. Why. No, guys, it should be reversed. That makes absolutely no sense. Well, 12 years ago, I was working with an organization called Catalyst, and I was just volunteering, and they said, hey, Ryan, will you do backstage hosting and just interview a few people? And one of the people was John Maxwell. And I went to a friend at the time, and I said, dude, I gotta interview John Maxwell today.

Ryan Leake:
And my friend goes, you are interviewing John Maxwell? I go, yeah. And he wanted to do it. And I’m just like, well, dude, I don’t know. I’m sorry. They chose me. What do you want from it? And I’ll never forget it. He said, ryan, one day John Maxwell will interview you.

Mark Cole:
Come on, how do you like me now?

Ryan Leake:
And I was like, and I was like, I don’t know how, in what world, in what toxic world would that ever happen? And it happened last Tuesday.

Mark Cole:
That’s a great story. That’s a full circle moment.

Ryan Leake:
Yeah, it was a crazy moment.

Mark Cole:
There’s one more concept out of here I want to pull out. And then I want you to talk a little bit about writing the book and some of that that you learned in this book. You talk a lot about influence versus control. And often as leaders, especially followers of John and followers of your style of leadership, which is a servant based leadership, we get really disoriented as leaders between this influence, influence and between this control. Can you talk to us a little bit about that and how you break that out in the book?

Ryan Leake:
Yeah. You know, I think there can be this strong desire to have your hands around exactly what’s going on at all times. And you can have. You don’t even realize it. Once again, let’s call it the C word.

Mark Cole:
Yep.

Ryan Leake:
Okay. You talk about somebody that’s controlling. I don’t know that I’ve met that many people that are saying, hey, I’m.

Mark Cole:
Pretty controlling.

Ryan Leake:
But we all know somebody isn’t. That. That is what is so astounding to me. It’s just like, I’m not controlling.

Mark Cole:
It’s like, yes, you are.

Ryan Leake:
And so it’s so hard to look in the mirror and see these things. Maybe that’s the next book. You know, things you can’t see in the mirror. You don’t see anger in the mirror. Right. Angry people are like, yeah, I’m angry. You’re like, well, actually, I don’t know if you hurt yourself, but a little bit. But there can be a desire for control instead of having a desire to simply say, have influence.

Ryan Leake:
In other words, what our desire to do, especially with complicated people, is to change them, is to control them. Hey, let me just. Why don’t you just do what I just tell you to do? It’s like, yeah, even if they do, they’re going to resent you. They’ll just never tell you. And now you actually don’t have an actual relationship. You have a transaction. That’s what you have. But influence is saying, hey, you respect me enough.

Ryan Leake:
We have such a strong relationship that I would actually run through a wall for you because I respect you. And you’ve had that much influence on my life. You don’t have to force me to do anything. It’s a completely different emotion. I might actually do the exact same job, but I’m actually now doing it for the right reasons, because you weren’t trying to control me, but because I respect your life. You’ve had such an impact on my life. You’ve had such influence, man. Leading from that place versus control.

Ryan Leake:
You’re going to find yourself with the kind of culture and employees that actually want to work for you. I say it like this. People can get to work for you, or they can have to work for you. It’s levels of leadership. It is.

Mark Cole:
It is. It’s brilliant. All right, so again, RyanLeak.com is how you’re going to get more access to Ryan. Follow him on social. His social presence is brilliantly concepted, intentionally driven, and very intriguing. And so kudos to you, you and your team for doing that. I want to talk a little bit about this book. Writing this book was very different from you.

Mark Cole:
What number of book is this?

Ryan Leake:
That’s a great question. That’s a really great question. It’s a really great question because it’s technically nine, but in the world of legitimacy of what you can get on Amazon, it’s three.

Mark Cole:
It’s three.

Ryan Leake:
Okay, so we say three to nine.

Mark Cole:
So this book really stretched you. I love that. That’s quite the range, Ryan. That’s a story. What number book I gotta.

Ryan Leake:
Three to nine.

Mark Cole:
It’s complicated. So this book really stretched you and marked you. And because we have so many people that want to get a concept out, I want you to talk a little bit about the process of the book here.

Ryan Leake:
Well, you know, at first, we were. It goes back 19 months ago. Chris Robinson, Jared Cago, and Chad Johnson fly to Dallas. And we’re just talking about our relationship. Hey, what can we do together? And Jared brings up books. And I said, well, I’ve got a couple of different concepts. And there’s this idea of dealing with complicated people. And Jared goes, okay, well, are you going to solve complicated relationships at home? Are you going, like.

Ryan Leake:
Like marriage? Like, that’s pretty broad. And he goes, what about work with complicated people? So then we can really, like, hone it, you know? And I went, yes, now we’re picking the area where people spend the most time. And then we got very, very specific. And then Jarrett goes, hey, all right. Now, in terms of writing it, do you think you can, like, write it yourself all by yourself? And I was like, well, let’s give it a shot, right? And so I took a Month. And, you know, almost lost the marriage over it. Things got real, real complicated.

Greg Cagle:
Blamed it on Jerry.

Ryan Leake:
He gets the first chapter. He goes, man, this is strong. I’m like, I’m about to die.

Mark Cole:
It’s a one chapter book.

Ryan Leake:
Yeah. I’m like, I can’t. You know, this isn’t sustainable. And then what John really challenged me to do is he said, man, you gotta really build a team. And it went from a Ryan Leek book to a team book. But honestly, when we hit the New York Times bestsellers list, I was so excited for Jared. I was so excited for Mackenzie. I was so excited for Justin.

Ryan Leake:
I was so excited for Rodrigo. I was so excited for Zach. I was so excited for. I’m just thinking about all of the people that were a part of the team. It was like, it felt like an us win. It didn’t feel just like a Ryan win. And that was honestly a really, really fun feeling for me. Then we get to a place where it’s time to choose the COVID And at first, I went on chatgpt and said, hey, just give me some concepts, right? And I send it to Jared.

Ryan Leake:
Jared goes, oh, a little young. And I was like, I’m like, okay. And then he sent me some, and I was like, a little old. So I was like, where are we gonna do? You know? So we’re like, trying to find a happy medium. And we had some covers that. That were good enough. They did the job. They said the words, how to work with complicated people.

Ryan Leake:
It matched my brand, color, style guide, whatever. And then we have a gal on our team named Whitney. And she says, these suck. And I said, yes, Whitney, but you think everything sucks. That’s the problem. You don’t like anybody or like anything. No, that’s true. But she goes, let me introduce you to this artist.

Ryan Leake:
I don’t know him, but, you know, his name’s Rodrigo. And I was like, okay. I go on Rodrigo’s page, and I’m like, oh, this is next level. This is. And it’s all New York Times bestselling books. Like, it’s only bangers, you know? And so I’m like, oh, my gosh. And I see that he’s worked with a friend of mine, so I reach out to him and his team, and I said, hey, could you get me in touch with Rodrigo? And she goes, ooh, Ryan, you gotta work with Rodrigo. I was like, yeah, for sure.

Ryan Leake:
I was like, well, how much? And she told me the number. And I was like, for a book cover? Are you crazy? For a Book cover. Like, I’ve never. Like, that’s insanity. And then I met with Rodrigo the next day and he blew me away.

Mark Cole:
Wow.

Ryan Leake:
It was. I did not know what world class truly looked like until I met with him in the. And when I’m. And we just engaged with them, he sent us 27 options. I promise you, I could have closed my eyes and said, y’ all pick.

Greg Cagle:
Yeah, you said that.

Ryan Leake:
And they were all that good. Wow. And then it was like, well, they can also do the interior of the book. And I thought, well, we’re here and so we might as well. If we’re gonna do it, then let’s do it. And so we had to delay the release date. I don’t know how many times, six or seven times, because we just wanted to get it right. And that could be a tough, tough decision.

Ryan Leake:
Especially traveling and speaking. I would tell a thousand people every couple weeks over and over and over again, hey, the book’s coming out in August. Pre order it now. It came out in April. So the election all sor. Kept pushing it back, but it just challenged me to grow my leadership. It challenged me to engage with the publisher. I mean, we had many difficult conversations that I think made us better.

Ryan Leake:
And even being able to debrief, hey, how do we. We kept saying, we’re building a plane in the air. Well, now we know how to make planes. And now we know how to make them in a very world class way. And it actually changed the way that I write because now I write visually now, knowing that I have a visual director that can do it. And so how you align all of those pieces and then even working with your teams, it just, it stretched me in ways that I certainly didn’t anticipate long after the book was actually written. Because people always say, oh, I wanna write a book. That’s actually the easy part.

Mark Cole:
That’s amazing. Wow.

Ryan Leake:
It’s the. Okay, now how do I take this concept? Bring it to life in a way that other people can interact with it. Social media plan. I figured out Amazon ads. I mean, all of the different things that you, you have to do to market a book. A satellite media tour. I’d never heard of a satellite media tour. You know, all of these, these things that, that stretch me.

Ryan Leake:
And you sit in the studio for seven hours and you do 10 minute interviews for seven hours. It’s like I’d never done that before. So the fortitude, the focus, all of that, to be able to. To pull off a full book campaign while leading a team and driving us towards this goal that we hit was a journey in and of itself.

Mark Cole:
So I want to thank you again for letting Maxwell Leadership be a part of your baby and what you’ve done here. Jared, I want to thank you and your team for doing an incredible job. Podcast listeners, I want to thank you for listening today. I’ve got to ask you something, Ryan on camera.

Ryan Leake:
Yes.

Mark Cole:
I only got to four of my questions.

Ryan Leake:
That’s right.

Mark Cole:
So the next time you’re in Atlanta, that’s good. So you’re going to let me know so that we can do part two? Oh, absolutely. He committed to it. Y’ all hold him accountable. When you’re on the road and you see him say, I listen to the Maxwell Leadership Podcast. You gotta go do part two, because I got some more questions I want to ask you. Sir, I do want to wrap today in honor of your time, but I don’t want to rap in honor of my time. I want to stay right here.

Mark Cole:
But I’ll tell you this, just, you know, now, RyanLeak.com I want you to go just see all that he’s doing. I want you to follow him. I want to tell you something. I haven’t even told Ryan this. John Maxwell mentors people one on one. Like, really goes deep with people every single year. There’s been a couple of years over the last 25 years that I made the top five list of John saying, the top five people that I love mentoring this year. John Maxwell told me this morning, he said, mark, the person that I’ve mentored for the last year that has given me the greatest return of my time and the greatest enjoyment in being able to pour into has been Ryan Lee.

Mark Cole:
And I saved that for the camera to tell you, you’re the top, not in the top five. I made the top five a couple of years. You made the top, buddy. And so mentored by John. I wonder if John said that because he wants recognition of a New York Times bestseller. No, I’m just kidding. I know that’s not the case, but this is a guy that we’ve learned to love and appreciate and really get behind around here. Here’s what I want you to do today.

Mark Cole:
I’m going to challenge you. I try to do this every. At the end of every podcast. I try to challenge you to put into action this podcast. I’m gonna do it today, too. And I’m gonna challenge you not just to buy this book. I want you to go buy the book. But before you go where I’m gonna tell you to go to get a $10 discount on this book right now.

Mark Cole:
Before I tell you that, I’m gonna tell you I’m not interested in those of you that’s just gonna buy the book. Cause you’re just interested in yourself. I wanna talk to the people that wants to say, hey, it is I, I’m complicated. I’m buying me a book. But guess what? It’s you too, Jared. And I want you to buy too. So for every person that goes to Store.MaxwellLeadership.com by the way, we’ll put that in the show notes for those of you that are driving or working out. Store.MaxwellLeadership.com, and you use the promo code COMPLICATED.

Mark Cole:
And you buy two books, one for you and one for the real complicated person. That’s just between us. When you go buy two books and make a determination, I am not only going to apply this to me, but I’m going to like work with a complicated situation, a complicated person. We’re going to give you, it’s our gift to you. Thanks for being a part of this. It’s our gift to you. We’re going to give you a talk that Ryan did at an event just a few weeks ago at Maxwell Leadership IMC in Orlando. It’s the Day to Grow.

Mark Cole:
And we’re going to give you that. When you purchase two books today that’ll land in your email box, you’ll get to listen to Ryan talk about it. I promise you there’s a lot more in the book because I discovered man, I listened to you twice. I read the book today. I said, why didn’t he talk about that? Why didn’t he missed a good point. The stage that’s in the book. So those of you that are buying the book, he didn’t give the book away in the talk, but we’re going to give you that. And if you’re cheap and too self absorbed and only buy one, okay.

Mark Cole:
But for those of you that’ll grab two, we’re going to give it to you for $20 each book both. If you order one or two, we’re going to give it to you for $20. Book right now. We just checked Amazon, 30 bucks. So you’re gonna get a discount by doing that and you’re gonna get Ryan talking about it. I want you to go get the book because even complicated people deserve to be.