82 – How First Principles Guide and Impact Successful Partnerships – Part Two.

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Part Two of An Amazing Interview with Dr. Michael Gervais.

My extraordinary guest and special gift at the end of this very different year is to share a pretty incredible conversation with someone I respect and hold in very high regard, Dr. Michael Gervais.

Dr. Michael Gervais is a world-renowned high-performance psychologist and industry visionary. Over 20 years working with world-leading performers, Dr. Gervais has developed a psychological framework that allows people to thrive in pressure-packed environments. His clientele consists of the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks, countless Olympic medalists, MVPs from every major sport, world record holders, internationally acclaimed music artists, and corporate leaders. 

Dr. Gervais is the host of the popular Finding Mastery podcast that explores the psychology of some of the world’s most extraordinary thinkers and doers. Past guests range from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella to best-selling author Brene Brown and NBA coach Steve Kerr.  

Dr. Gervais and NFL coach Pete Carroll founded Compete to Create, an online and live master class for the mind. They have worked with more than 30,000 employees at Microsoft alone on the mental skills and strategies to unleash one’s potential.

While at Microsoft, I was privileged to be part of one of the first teams to work with Michael to apply his work and first principles to the world of business organizations.

I invited Michael to the podcast because I am a student and have recognized that many of the fundamentals and principles that he teaches specifically apply to and are “first principles” of successful partnering.

There is a lot to unpack in this two-part conversation. I hope you listen as Michael’s insights apply to both our business and personal development, including:

  • His work, journey, the spark, and his belief system.
  • His work with Microsoft’s Leadership Team, featured in Satya’s Book, Hit Refresh.
  • How the fundamentals and principles he teaches directly apply as the first principles of successful partnering.
  • Personal Philosophy, Mindfulness, and other core principles from his Compete to Create Workshops and Audible Book.

HIS WORK, JOURNEY, THE SPARK, AND HIS BELIEFS 

  1. HIS WORK  – Standing on the shoulders of giants, studying the science of excellence, sometimes innovating and helping others make sense of the world.
  2. HIS JOURNEY – As a kid, just trying to figure it out and how coming from pain, boredom, and anxiety led him on the path.
  3. HIS BELIEF–”Everything you need is already inside you.”

WORKING WITH SATYA’S LEADERSHIP TEAM

  1. SETTING THE TONE – Getting the leaders in the room to clarify commitment to Microsoft’s audacious vision and to better know the people and get to the truth. 
  2. MINDSET – A particular way you are approaching something. To perform under stress, you need to train the mind.
  3. EMPATHY –One of Microsoft’s backbone principles, how do you practice empathy, you need awareness. You don’t wait to practice empathy; you front-load it.

HOW HIS WORK APPLIES TO THE PRINCIPLES OF PARTNERING 

  1. COACHING GROWTH MINDSET IN PARTNERSHIPS– Mindset matters, as does human capital.
  2. HOW HE HELPS ORGANIZATIONS DEVELOP A COMPELLING VISION – it needs to be true, and there needs to be consistency, applying core principles to guide it.
  3. CREATING A SHARED VISION – See the brilliance in others, clarify and hold people to the set of standards to which we will hold ourselves.
  4. WHEN PARTNERSHIPS DON’T GO RIGHT- We need to be authentic and assess both accelerants and blockers. When we overestimated skills, there is tension.
  5. OTHER PRACTICES FROM HIS WORK– The importance of defining a “Personal Philosophy” and articulating first principles. We need to develop mental skills like we develop physical skills. Why knowing each other’s Personal Philosophy helps us “lock arms” in Partnership.

MORE FROM HIS TEACHINGS 

  1. THE FIVE FACTORS FROM MICHAEL’S WORK – Self-discovery, psychological skills, psychological framework, recovery mechanisms, mindfulness.
  2. HIS PHILOSOPHY – Every day is an opportunity to create a living masterpiece.
  3. BOOKS HE RECOMMENDS -See links* below to all the books we discuss in this interview.
  4. A FUN CONTEST FOR OUR LISTENERS – Michael and I are giving away two Compete to Create Master Classes – a $500 Value. To be selected, please answer this question, “Why I Want to Invest In My Inner Life?” and tag Michael on Linked In, Twitter, Instagram, and also tag @vincemenzione. We will announce two winners on Christmas Morning, 2020.

LINKS & RESOURCES

As with each of my episodes, I appreciate your support. Please tell your friends about Ultimate Guide to Partnering™ and where they can find us.

Please subscribe and listen on Apple, Spotify,  Google, Audible, SoundCloud, Stitcher, Player FM, almost anywhere you get your podcasts!

I’d love your feedback. Please provide comments or reach out to me at @vincemenzione on Linked In, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. You can also like and follow Ultimate Guide to Partnering Facebook page or drop me a line at vincem@cloudwavepartners.com.

Ultimate Guide to Partnering™ is a rich compendium of what makes successful partnerships.

This episode of the podcast is sponsored by Ultimate Partnerships. Ultimate Partnerships helps you get the most results from your partnerships. Get Partnerships Right – Optimize for Success – Deliver Results – Ultimate Partnerships.

Transcription By Otter.AI – Please Pardon Typos Below

Announcer 0:00
Welcome to the Ultimate Guide to partnering in this podcast Vince Menzione approven industry sales and partner executive brings together technology leaders in this forum to discuss transformational trends and to deconstruct successful strategies to thrive and survive in the rapid age of cloud transformation. And now your host, Vince Menzione.

Vince Menzione 0:30
Welcome to the Ultimate Guide to partnering. I’m Vince Menzione, your host, my very special guest. And my gift to you, at the end of this very different new year is to share a pretty incredible conversation with someone I respect and hold in very high regard. Dr. Michael Gervais, Dr. Michael Gervais is a world renowned high performance psychologist and industry visionary. Over the course of 20 years working with world leading performers, Dr. Dre has developed a psychological framework that allows people to thrive in pressure packed environments. His clients include the NFL Seattle Seahawks, countless Olympic medalists MVPs from every major sport, world record holders, internationally acclaimed music artists, and corporate leaders. Michael is the host of the popular finding mastery podcast that explores the psychology of some of the world’s most extraordinary thinkers and doers. He’s had an amazing range of guests from Satya Nadella to best selling author Bernie brown to NBA coach Steve Kerr, Michael and NFL coach Pete Carroll founded compete to create an online and live masterclass for the mind. They have worked with more than 30,000 employees at Microsoft alone on the mental skills and strategies to unleash one’s potential. While I was at Microsoft, I was privileged to be part of one of the very first teams to apply Michael and Pete’s work. In fact, the work that we did with Michael proceeded the work that he did with Satya Nadella his leadership team, which was featured in the book hit refresh. I invited Michael to the podcast because I’m a student. And I’ve recognized that many of the fundamentals and principles that he teaches specifically apply to enter first principles of successful partnering. There’s a lot to unpack during this conversation. Michael was extremely generous with his time. And in fact, we spent almost two hours in conversation. And because of that, I’m releasing this interview as a two part series. I hope you listen. And I hope you enjoy the second part of my interview with Dr. Michael Gervais. So you work with a lot of high performance organizations, Microsoft being one of them, where we both have done some work together. And when you work with an organization, particularly let’s talk a little bit about maybe some of your experiences with Satya and his leadership team, because I’m gonna, I’m gonna flip back a little bit here or rewind. When you were working with our organization, you were just getting started with Satya his leadership team. In fact, you were getting ready for your first big meeting. And you got all these, I’ll call it big egos in the room, right? People that were running, you know, multi billion dollar businesses, maybe aren’t on the same page, maybe not align? How do you set the tone for that? How do you then say, this is what success is going to look like? This is that brief moment? what success looks like? How do you condition it within the organization?

Dr. Michael Gervais 3:39
Well, I think part of that that leadership team, what is and was full of alpha competitors, you know, like highly intelligent, committed to growth, sometimes committed to their own growth at the cost of others. And some were all in for the shared growth. And so how do you set the tone really Sati is the one that needed to do that. And so there was an eloquent passing of the baton when he after he introduced me, and there was a moment, and this is in his book. So I’m not sharing something out of turn here. But there was a moment where his name of his book is hit refresh. If you haven’t read it, like I think he’s onto something deep. And so it’s like page five of his book, he says, when we sat down, and we did this work, and it was like, I think 15 of his direct reports. And I got to the philosophy part, and he stops and says, Mike, I want everyone we’ve got an incredible mission. It’s audacious, it’s big, it’s bold. It’s all those things, those buzzwords, and it’s gonna be hard. I want to know the people in the room, and I want us to know each other, and I want us to drill down to get to the truth of who we are. And then he goes, I don’t care, Mike, there’s a lot more that that you’ve got on our agenda today. You know, all these other mental skills, I want to spend real time here and so that was kind of a maturity in that day, and them together to spend the the whitespace to get crystal clear on their philosophy, and then to have the courage and the vulnerability to share it with the other alpha competitors. And then to double click and calibrate like, what did you mean by that? And, you know, that was a I think that’s a powerful moment for that team.

Vince Menzione 5:21
So did you work on individual personal philosophy first? Or did you try to create a philosophy or personal philosophy or philosophy for the team?

Dr. Michael Gervais 5:28
We started with the individuals. And Satya was already down the path of the value of mindset. So here’s the idea of mindset. We call it growth mindset, call it anything that you want, you put any adjective in front of the word mindset, competitive mindset, growth, mindset, artistic mindset, you know, it’s the adjective that, yeah, I’ve heard. Yeah, so he was already down the path of the value of mindset. And what mindset means is a particular way that you are approaching something, when that something could be life work, or home life or whatever, right? So there’s a, he was already down the path of the value of psychology. And here’s the thing about fill in the blank mindset is that it’s a cool concept, artistic mindset, creative mindset, growth, mind, great concept. But to have that on a consistent basis means you have to actually train your mind. So to have a growth mindset, over a cup of tea, or a glass of wine or dinner with friends is easy. But what happens when stress isn’t invited into the environment, because we’re not we’re not getting out of the world of high performance, or the world of happiness, high performance, living as joy and happiness and peace and grounded and connected, you’re not entering into that space without understanding how to work with stress. And so what happens under stress is, again, we fray and we blame, and we point and we try to save ourselves as opposed to be stay connected. So you have to train your mind mental skills, to be able to have the mindset in life that is going to take you to your potential. So that’s where we started the conversation. And everyone’s like, Oh, great. Okay, show us. And that’s, that’s kind of how that works.

Vince Menzione 7:08
I think at least, I love that. So, you know, I talk about successful principles of partnerships. And I have growth mindset or mindset in there is one of the key principles. Because I believe you need to come to the relationship with a belief, empathy and a belief that this is ultimately the relationship to one plus one equals three or more, the greater good of this partnership is better than us trying to go it alone. And to your point when stressed and enters the room, which invariably does, being able to stay on track with that partnership, right, not backing off and saying no, but then point finger pointing, saying, you know, we would have got that the museum business analogy here. But we would have got that deal if it hadn’t been for that person not doing what they were supposed to do. Right, but having empathy for the other and understanding that this is for the greater good. And maybe we didn’t get it right the first time. But we’re going to continue to evolve or iterate until we get it right.

Dr. Michael Gervais 8:06
But and then I would add, there’s two parts of that. That’s interesting. One is there’s an invisible handshake and business, the same with sport. And that invisible handshake is that we’ll do it as long as you produce. We’ll do it together as long as you produce. And, you know, it sounds ruthless. But that’s, I think, the truth of how sport works. And if you don’t produce in a couple weeks in an elite sport, you might not have a spot.

Vince Menzione 8:32
Yeah. Carson Wentz. So it’s, you know, yeah, can go there.

Dr. Michael Gervais 8:36
Yeah. But before, before we go there for a moment, let’s talk about empathy, right. So it’s a beautiful principle. It is awesome. It is great. It is one of the backbone principles at Microsoft. And because it’s one of the backbone principles of Satya Nadella, the CEO. Now we have to practice empathy. So a word on a wall actually doesn’t change culture, and it doesn’t change people. And so that principle needs to be practiced. And so that’s where I’m entering conversations like, Okay, how do you practice empathy? One, we need awareness. And there’s a whole set of practices, mindfulness being, you know, the kind of the center of that practice, meditation, if you will, that increases awareness of whether you’re being critical, or empathetic, or fill in the blank. And so if you want to practice step one, we need awareness. Step two, we don’t wait for moments to practice empathy, we actually Front Load the training of it. So this is where many people kind of get it wrong, is that they think and I’m saying this compassionately, is that the wrong approach is saying, here’s my principles. When am I going to practice them? Well, you need to set that so in sport we talk about front loading training your front load your physical training before match day you front load your technical training before Match Day. You also front load your mental training before match Do the same holds to true in general life, front load your mental training. So when you’re met in a moment that has demands on it, that you, you know how you want to be. And then you practice, because you’ve practiced that empathetic skill or awareness, skill or confidence skill, that when you’re met with some dance demand in the moment, you can be about it. So we practice in common environments, and then, you know, work our way up to, quote unquote, live bullets in life, which is called that high stress environments. And if you’re going to be in a, you know, if you want to have a high performance way of living, there’s going to be stress involved. There’s also stress involved if you’re just going to kind of kick up your feet not know where money’s coming from. And there’s a different type of stress. So how

Vince Menzione 10:41
do you coach that front loading, for instance, for two organizations working together? How would you think through that?

Dr. Michael Gervais 10:48
So this is actually what Microsoft, they had the same question. And they’re like, Okay, so this is working inside of Microsoft, you’ve, you’ve helped leadership with the value of training the mind. And then there’s been a cascade through the course that you built the online course that you built in the in person workshops, why don’t we take and it’s influenced culture? Why don’t we take our best practices and share them with our partners? Right. So yeah, I love that. Because now, the partners are going, Hey, how are you guys doing this change that you’ve gone through at scale? And I don’t mean tactical and strategic change. But there’s a transformation that’s happening from within people? How are you doing that? And there’s lots of ways and one of those ways is like, we’re helping people train their mind, here, we’ve got a training course, would you be interested in, you know, no cost, in some respects, you know, just a handoff, in those best practices. So I would say in for two partners to align in the value of that mindset matters. And maybe if you go a little bit deeper, you say, I don’t like this word. But it’s a placeholder for me, human capital matters, the humaneness inside the business, the people matter. And here’s one of the great things that if you can get alignment there, then you can train. And there’s solutions that you can offer people that are systemic, and not just principle based, and not just good words that land on walls, but are not expressed on a consistent basis. If you can get people line there, then we can do some training. That’s how I that’s how I think about

Vince Menzione 12:18
it. That’s actually really great advice. I could spend the rest of the episode here talking about it, in fact, on growth mindset, how about on shared vision, we talked a little bit that’s also fundamental to what I do with the work with organizations cool. Was there any thought in those conversations with Microsoft on it? Because I believe that a shared vision is foundational principle, to the successful partnership, like locking arms together. Mm hmm. We’re marching forward together, right? And so we need to know what direction we’re going. And so what does that direction look like? How, how do you help organizations here with their compelling vision?

Dr. Michael Gervais 12:53
Well, it usually begins with leadership and to for leadership to have a sense of what the future could look like. And for that to be real and true, it has to light them up. And so it’s not just necessarily one person that holds the vision, but that person that is the heartbeat of the vision, it has to be true to them. And then there’s a consistency, because it’s so true. And it touches them deeply. And it’s so invigorating of what could be that when they go into rooms, they are talking about it, they are living it, it is clear to them they are enrolling is not the right word, but they are living with an animated spirit that other people are like, Oh, that sounds I want to be part of that. And then the the roommate two that are the core principles there are going to guide you know, that’s that philosophical, personal philosophy, there’s core principles that are guiding it. And then underneath all of that, their strategy and all that good stuff, but aren’t from the humaneness part of it. Underneath that is like, Listen, I’m not saying you should have my philosophy or my vision. But when you have a vision, and you have a core philosophy about your life, and how you want to guide your thoughts, words and actions, and it maps up to this one, how about it, we’re going to get after it. But you can’t just borrow my vision and philosophy and make it yours. You have to do the work for you to have yours so that you can authentically say yes or no to the shared vision.

Vince Menzione 14:18
I love it. Yeah, I love it. Yeah, visions have to align with one another, like my vision as a partner might be to grow my business.

Unknown Speaker 14:25
Mm hmm.

Vince Menzione 14:26
But I’m also going to do it. I’ll use Microsoft as an example. I’m going to do it on top of Microsoft stack. And so the shared vision is I’m working with the Microsoft Teams and they’re saying, hey, yeah, your vision helps drive our vision. So then we have a shared vision and how we go, you know, do more good together.

Dr. Michael Gervais 14:43
That’s a partnership.

Vince Menzione 14:44
That’s a partnership. That’s

Dr. Michael Gervais 14:45
the partnership. You know, if it’s a one way deal, Well listen, I’m gonna gouge you on price because I can and good luck and it doesn’t feel good doesn’t really work. There’s maybe there’s a transactional nature in some of the some of our business dealings are just that but it’s like It’s, it’s not sustainable. You know. So, yeah, so you’re right on the money with it. And then if when you drop down to the individual level, and you do it at scale, we start to see some incredible change that takes place where this is what happened at Microsoft is that after we would do some work with folks, you know, whether it’s 200 people in a room or 2000, that take the online course, you know, per week, or whatever, is at the end of it, this kind of sentiment would happen. Wow, this is one of the reasons I love working at Microsoft, is because training from the inside out, actually helps me in every part of my life, and it’s going to definitely show up in my business life because I feel better. And so that that is one of the let’s call it the gold dust, you know, from doing this internal driven work?

Vince Menzione 15:49
Yeah, that’s absolutely. And I could speak personally to that. And I’ve spoken with many other people who’ve been through your training, and they’ve taken it, they’ve taken it to their homes, they’ve taken it throughout their lives, right. It wasn’t just something they did at work to make their jobs better.

Dr. Michael Gervais 16:03
Can we take a moment, put some handles on something, make it really concrete? Absolutely. Yeah. All right. So here’s one of the practices that I think is fundamental. There’s five main factors that I work from. Okay, so self discovery, psychological skills, calm confidence, focus, and deep trust of self psychological framework, which is optimism, control, like locus of control, meaning that you feel like you’re in control of your life and grit. So living with passion and perseverance towards your long term goals, recovery mechanisms. So sleep getting your sleep, right, your nutrition, right, your movement, right. And then mindfulness. So those are the five factors. And when we got to wisata, we’ll stay with this theme, just for continuity. When we got to the optimism piece, he’s like, yes. Because you know what, it is so easy to be the critic, it is so easy to find all the negative stuff. And again, that’s because that’s how your brain is wired to scan the world and find what’s not working, what is a threat or could be a threat. And so he says, right, let’s, again, this is in his book, so I’m not sharing something out of turn here. He says, as a leadership team, let’s double down on this. Let’s practice training,

Vince Menzione 17:16
optimism. So training optimism. Yeah. How do you do?

Dr. Michael Gervais 17:19
So why optimism, first of all, is that because optimism is at the center of mental toughness. And mental toughness has a little bit of a funky bad rap to it, like just grind and do whatever. I want to reorganize the way we think about mental toughness. Mental Toughness is closer to resilience, which is staying with it when it’s hard, adjusting and pivoting when it’s hard. That is what mental toughness is. And I’ve been fortunate enough across multiple domains to work with some of the best in the world at their craft. I haven’t met one yet. That is a pessimist. So what is optimism, it’s the fundamental belief that it’s going to work out, if I just stay in it longer. And I figure it out, and we figure it out together, it’s gonna work out. And so it doesn’t mean it’s magical thinking. It doesn’t mean it’s naive. But it’s a fundamental belief that we’re going to know when to cut bait. But but for the most part, we’ve done this front loaded work for strategy and mission and vision and philosophy and mental skills, and physical skills and technical skills. And we’ve got this work in place. Why would I give up right now? throw in the towel, just because it’s not going the way we thought it was going to go.

Vince Menzione 18:32
So optimism is person. I mean, I think of perseverance and grit when you’re describing optimist. Oh, they’re roommates.

Dr. Michael Gervais 18:37
Yeah. But optimism is its own individual skill. So optimism is the fundamental belief that it’s going to work out. And certainly that is at Ground Zero, for mental toughness, for resilience for all the things that you just mentioned. So mental tough, I’m sorry, optimism is the training of what could be good. And so out of you, Penn, there’s a very clear research that we can link to, which is, at the end of the day, write down three things that you experienced, that were amazing. That’s it, just write them down. And you write down a sentence of what you experienced today, that was amazing. Like somebody held the door open for you, or you had a great call with somebody. And then in parentheses, you write down the emotional component, what made that special, what made that amazing, and I call it the researcher of amazing, that’s just kind of a little fun way to think about it. And that’s one of the core practices that’s thought and leadership team installed for their meetings, is to share the risk to become researchers have amazing and it’s an awesome practice. The science is really pretty sturdy. And that’s something that I think maybe your community if they started practicing, would find that it’s also an inoculation to anxiousness and anxiety, same with depression.

Vince Menzione 19:50
And I think about that in terms of gratitude, right? I go through a personal gratitude exercise every morning, but I don’t talk about the why. Like you mentioned that it’s not just the item like hey, I had a Great cup of coffee, my wife made me a great cup of coffee. But I didn’t say why that was why I was grateful for that.

Dr. Michael Gervais 20:06
motional what’s the emotional linking to that? You know,

Vince Menzione 20:09
you’re linking it up.

Dr. Michael Gervais 20:10
Yeah, love or gratitude or something, you know, like, connected kindness? Yeah,

Vince Menzione 20:15
maybe every business meeting like I think about from a partnership perspective, I’ll translate it here is like we start every business meeting discussing maybe three things about the partnership that are really great, or three success stories and why they were important to us. Could you translate it there?

Dr. Michael Gervais 20:29
Yeah. Or I would maybe even start with one or two, work your way up to three. But here’s the deal. It has to be real. It can’t be like manufactured, it has to be real. And that’s where you anchor optimism into like a concreteness. Rather than this divide, hey, everything’s gonna work out. I know, we just spent $300,000 on this campaign, and we haven’t made any money yet. And it’s a no, no, no, no, no, it’s like, we got to anchor some stuff in reality, so that it’s just not fake. You know, like fake naive optimism is incredibly dangerous. And so it’s not making that mistake. But so it’s anchoring it in something that is true.

Vince Menzione 21:13
So what about when we unlock arms? Like the partnership isn’t going well, we start to go astray? How would you coach either an organization or individuals around that,

Dr. Michael Gervais 21:25
I would hope if you’re doing this, right, it’s not a surprise. So there’s conversations because you’re holding the other person and the other group of people call it a partnership with integrity. And you are coming from a place that have high regard for what we agreed to, even like towards the end of, of partnerships, there usually is some tension, because it’s not going the way that we hoped. And there might be some sort of unforeseen events that have taken place, or we overestimated skills and abilities or over estimated market, you know, value. And so it’s not going according to plan, there’s some tension involved in it. Hopefully, there’s no surprise, you’ve been working your way to it so that you can look to another person and say, I think we’re at that crossroad. You know, I’m wishing you guys the flat out best. And I’m sorry, this isn’t working anymore. And I wish it wasn’t the case. How can we detangle in the best possible way. And I want to support you from a distance. And right now though, I can’t continue to keep investing in the way that we’ve been doing it. Damn, we’re close. Yeah, something like that.

Vince Menzione 22:25
Yeah. And here’s the other thing, too. I think before you get there, if you’re identifying if you’re being transparent, that and you’re sharing Yeah, yeah. And you’re having the conversation like what’s blocking success? Like I talked about, you know, these are our objectives? These are key results, like, Okay, what are the blockers? Why are we getting to our results?

Dr. Michael Gervais 22:42
I would add to that vinta, I would say, in your practice of blockers, yes. And I say and add the accelerants. So what are the skills? And what are the practices that are accelerating our partnership, and if you have both of those on a regular basis, it’s a more complete model. And let me just give you a framework that I found to be incredibly useful for working with individuals that are best in the world is that when I look at their psychological skills, and whether it’s written or it’s in my mind, because we’re working in real time, and I’m, I’ve got an index of all of the skills, call it the capabilities of the other person, right, but I’m just looking at the psychological capabilities, and we can do it technical or physical, it doesn’t matter. And then let’s break them up into thirds, the top third, skills and capabilities, middle third and bottom third, the bottom third, they’re struggling with, okay, and the middle is interesting that it’s okay. But there’s some penetrability there that, you know, could be a liability. But the upper ones like, they’re great, Adam, we don’t need to sharpen just the upper ones, because they’re already kind of doing what you know, is is working for them. We don’t want to focus on the bottom third, you say why is that?

Unknown Speaker 23:49
Yeah. Why is that?

Dr. Michael Gervais 23:50
Yeah, when you focus on the bottom third, something interesting happens is that we start to hyperfocus on all the things that are not working. So then we build the sub narrative. And that sub narrative is things are not working, I’m not good at them. I’m not getting the return I want. And we start to create a, again, a secondary model that maybe I don’t have what it takes to get better, maybe this won’t work out. Because we’re just hyper focusing on growing a skill that we’re we actually are materially not good at. So where do we go, we go to that middle, and I start with the true middle, and then I work on to the lower of the middle. And so the true middle is to get some momentum like Oh, look, oh my god, that’s a capability I can get better at, let’s call it optimism. Let’s call it confidence. Let’s call it whatever. On the mental side. Oh, look, I can. Oh, wow, I’m seeing some return this. Great What else you got doc? And then we go to the lower of the middle. And

Vince Menzione 24:41
as you get stronger, you’re going after the harder to reach. That’s it. Exactly.

Dr. Michael Gervais 24:45
Yeah. Early momentum early wins, start there, as opposed to identifying all the things like the the weak link in the chain, start with the unsteady link in the chain, shore that thing up and that’s a philosophical approach to help thing people and organizations get better. It doesn’t mean it’s the only way. But I’ve found, when it comes to an internal narrative that we want people to have is that I can do more, there is more in me. And if I start with some early wins, I’m more likely to go down that path double down.

Vince Menzione 25:18
I just love this, Michael, this is gonna be so applicable to my business and coaching. So thank you for sharing this with our listeners course, you know, we haven’t talked about where we are right now in this world, right? We’re living in a time like no other. And I was wondering, from your perspective, what is this time been like, and what are the biggest maybe surprises or learnings you’ve had, since this pandemic started,

Dr. Michael Gervais 25:41
there’s a really unique constellation that’s taking place. And we are living right now, in many respects, in the most amazing social experiment that’s ever taken place in our lifetime, for sure, which is we’ve got incredible tension that is taking place in people’s way of living, and we’ve got a political divide, we have a pandemic, that is changing the way people operate, from a day to day basis, there’s a financial crisis, that we are teetering on, some 54 million people just the other day were reported to be go to bed hungry. And we also have a racial narrative that’s at the center of our discourse, which rightfully so, is needs to be solved. And so for me, it’s an awakening. In many respects, it is, I am, what’s the right word I am will make the statement and then I’ll try to get this tonal word right, is that I’m excited that psychology is reaching the front of the narrative and conversations because change is not going to happen. Unless psychology happens first, and revolution that we want Vince needs to start with a psychological internal revolution first. And so that’s important, but it’s coming on the heels of pain. But here’s what I know, is that the reason people change is because of pain. The way that we grow is through uncomfortableness. So pain is one of the great catalysts for change, we are feeling it from a national global perspective, there’s pain that’s taking place. So I feel that myself, my business has been affected, and I’m trying to pivot and adjust to my best ability is to continue to make the commitment to the employees that have trusted our shared vision, to the commitment to our partners that believe in us to be able to help them be better. And you know, I’m working 16 hour days, you know, and, and that’s just kind of the nature of it right now. So I am heartful with the pain that people are experiencing. And I’m hopeful that through psychology, we are going to help healing and then move us to our potential, which is this high performing nature of our ourselves and our community and our nation, and maybe the global rhythm of the world. So we need some help now. And we have abandoned and disregarded the psychology of the human experience. For far too long, there’s been a stigma that it is for the weak. And right now we have the extraordinary ease in sport and business, raising their hand to say, No, psychology is at the epicenter, and I’m practicing, I’m training I’m investing. And I hope you will, too. So that’s that’s that’s the exciting part of it.

Vince Menzione 28:29
You know, I’m maybe it’s the optimism in me, I feel like this is in many respects such an uncertain but such an, you know, potentially altering time in terms of we’re going to come out of this, I believe we’re going to come out of this a better stronger, and maybe it’s the leadership we’re seeing, maybe it’s the change. And maybe it’s the psychology to your point that we have this opportunity now.

Dr. Michael Gervais 28:50
And I definitely think that you are going to make a difference in your community from that approach. And so whether we’re able to collectively do it or not, there are people that can swallow their ability to create change in their environment. And when you swallow that responsibility, and then invest in the skills, the psychological skills to be about it, then we create change. And there’s only three things that we can train as humans events, we can train our craft, we can train our body, and we can train our mind, the best of the best of the best are not leaving one of those three, up to chance. So why should we?

Vince Menzione 29:28
Yeah, really, really insightful advice there. So Michael, what is keeping you up at night? Like what are you working through

Dr. Michael Gervais 29:36
adjustments that are being made for for my businesses are on, you know, I would never have predicted that these would be the adjustments we were making in 2020. So what’s keeping me up at night is making sure that I’m making smart decisions. To first and foremost, stay true to the shared vision that I have with my partners and those partners include the employees that have have trusted that we can do something Together, and their livelihoods are on the line as well. So what keeps me up at night is making sure that we’re spending our resources properly. And we are making informed intelligent decisions, to be able to take advantage of opportunities, but also not over index, you know, and over leverage our resources. And so that’s it. That’s the entrepreneurs dilemma. And I’m in it right now. Like, I’m not sitting on seed money, I’m looking for partners that say, hey, I want my people to have a sense of internal freedom, I want my people to be able to live in the present moment more often, I want to help my people have less anxiety, and so that we can get to that good stuff that we have committed to together. And I want my people to understand how to train their mind, those are the partners I’m looking for, and to be invest invested in them properly, is the entrepreneur, you know, spirit of this. So that’s what keeps you up at night. And it’s the commitment to others.

Vince Menzione 30:56
So if you had a billboard, we’ve talked about personal philosophy here we have, I haven’t asked you about yours, but maybe this will come out in this question, if you had a personal billboard that you could project a message to the world? And maybe it is your personal philosophy, but maybe it’s not. What would you say on it?

Dr. Michael Gervais 31:12
It’s a really tough question, isn’t it? You know, I’d want to run a campaign more than just one Billboard. But if I’m one billboard, I would love to just start with, you know, sharing, everything you need is already inside you. I love that, you know, I would start there, there’s hope. There’s curiosity about it. And there’s a sense of volitional control. That’s, that’s connected there. And then I’m ping pong in my head right now, as I’m talking because I also want to say, here’s my personal philosophy. And I’m not sure if it really resonates as a billboard, though, is that here it is, is that every day is an opportunity to create a living masterpiece. And I think that that doesn’t meet a billboard because it needs some explaining, I can shorthand it because I know what that means. Every day, meaning the rest of my life is an opportunity. And it also means now everyday means now is an opportunity. There’s optimism to create, I think that the creative approach to life is one of the highest orders the artistic nature of life, meaning that you understand form and structure and your breaking form and structure to create something new and beautiful and amazing. That’s true. So every day is an opportunity to create a living masterpiece. And then a living masterpiece is left up to interpretation. For me. It’s about moving to the edges of my capability and still holding true to first principles. That is what a living masterpieces for me getting right to the edges, getting on the frontier of where I’m not quite proficient, but I’m learning I’m lit up, I’m animated by it. And I’m holding true to first principles. So every day is an opportunity to create a living masterpiece. I don’t think that translates, though, on a billboard. So maybe it’s something more eloquent, like everything you need is already inside you.

Vince Menzione 32:53
Everything you need is already inside us. To me when you say that, to me is an uplifting statement. Like it makes me feel whole. Like when I hear that, yeah, yeah. Cool. It’s very cool.

Dr. Michael Gervais 33:04
What is yours? What would you put up? So

Vince Menzione 33:07
my personal philosophy

Dr. Michael Gervais 33:08
and or billboard wherever you want to play?

Vince Menzione 33:11
uplift, others, uplift others? Like, I feel like especially in this time, I become like I’m crystallized around, how can I be a bold inspiration, uplift others and create a legacy. That’s how I think through my world right now,

Dr. Michael Gervais 33:28
you know, this uplift others, like kind of sits at the helper in you. And I was in graduate school hadn’t yet earned my PhD. One of my mentors, you know, went around the room. It’s, you know, PhD programs are kind of small. So there’s just a handful of us, and he says, so you guys want to help others? And everyone’s kind of like dough? I’d like Yeah. And he says, um, What gives you the right? And then he looks right at me and goes, Jay, What gives you the right to help someone you think you can help someone in their life? I was like, Oh, my God, he’s looking right. He knows. He knows that. I don’t know what I know. He knows that I barely know how to help my own life. Oh, my God, he knows that I’m, I’m a bit of an imposter. And so he’s looking right into me. That’s, that’s like the over kind of sensitive nature that that’s a true statement for all of us. And so he says, All right, answer that question, Mike. What gives you the right? I said, I said, Doc, I don’t? I don’t know. You just kind of got me there. Like, I don’t know. But I do know that I want to work to figure out how to help people like I don’t know. And he goes, are you doing the work yourself? I go, What do you mean? He says, Are you sitting in, you know, on a pillow meditating? Are you This is 20 some years ago, that’s when I first got introduced to it as I go, No. He says, Are you going to therapy? Are you doing that internal deep discovery work? I said no. He says Get going on both and then answer the question. I was like, oh, man, I just got spanked down but it’s so good. Like what gives us the right to think we can help someone? Well, I don’t I still don’t know how to answer that. I’m doing the work. I’m still doing this every I still, you know Sit myself into a therapeutic relationship on a regular basis. And I share that with you out of my humility. Like I got smacked down when I said that out loud for Yeah.

Vince Menzione 35:11
Oh, you know, and I’m saying that now because I’ve actually gone back I’m doing I’m listening again to your compete to create after listening to when it first came out and I guess July Oh, the book, the audiobook

Unknown Speaker 35:22
and how to go, Oh, cool. Yeah.

Vince Menzione 35:24
And I’m going back and going well, maybe my personal philosophy isn’t what it used to be. And, yeah, I’m still working on it a little bit. And I’m also going through some of the training like, okay, mindfulness, I need to work on this. I don’t do I don’t have a great meditation practice that I do. Like, I had to do at least a one minute, I got to go back to doing the one minute long.

Dr. Michael Gervais 35:41
Let’s go Vince. Yeah. You know, hey, Vince, can I do this for you? Can I now that you’re in the book, and you’re doing that, that’s cool. But can I give you and maybe two of your listeners? Can we do a little fun? Maybe competition? You know how much I love competition and competition? Yeah, it’s not standing over someone celebrating their weaknesses. It’s like you and I working together to find our very best is that maybe we have a little competition in your community where we give away two courses. And it’s that you know, week course that I’m talking about the eight week course, you could finish it in four, if you wanted to be really kind of progressive. But can we give that away in some sort of social competition where people like tag you tag me tag finding mastery on Instagram and whatever, and then we go, and if they just right, I’m spitballing with you a little bit. But if they it’s a $500 course, I want to give two away to your your people, if they just say why they want to invest in their inner life.

Vince Menzione 36:34
I love that. Yeah, we’re gonna do that. Let’s we’re gonna post that. Okay. All right. Let’s do that. When people listen to this, they’ll know. But we’re also going to post it on LinkedIn and Twitter. We’ll figure out a way to do this after we’re done today. Oh, that’s fun. Yeah. And then we’re going to put some links to some of this great material and conversation. I am going to ask you one more question. I recognize how valuable Your time is. And this has been a great conversation. I wish I could spend the entire day with you, Michael, if we could, even though we’re on different coasts right now, but both near the beach.

Dr. Michael Gervais 37:02
I’ve enjoyed this conversation, too. So thank you.

Vince Menzione 37:05
It’s been great. So I’m, I’m thinking about what if you were having a dinner right now you’re, you’re able to invite some guests. It wasn’t COVID. And you can invite any three guests present? Or from the past to attend this amazing dinner? Maybe it’s going to be on the beach in the LA region or someplace else? Who would you invite to that dinner? And why?

Dr. Michael Gervais 37:26
Oh, man is so good. Okay, so let me play. I’m gonna give you the categories. First, somebody who fundamentally changed the world from a spiritual perspective, like this inner dimension about life’s big questions, I’m gonna bring somebody in who was an absolute, artistic, full commitment to game changing craft, you know, and I’m going to bring somebody in, and I’m going to give you names in a minute. And I’m going to bring somebody in that just was a bit of a disrupter, you know, from a global perspective. So, so then I go through, okay, from the spiritual framework, am I bringing in my bringing in? I gotta bring in Jesus. Okay. Oh, I’d like to bring in Buddha’s pretty damn, you know, you know, like, wow, a fuchsia. He has some stuff now to Lao Tzu, the founder of Taoism. So, you know, like, man, but I want to bring in Jesus for just that kind of feel that that vibe that he possessed within him that changed the world, more so than, than almost any other religion. And I do have a challenge. I have a real challenge with religious structure dogma of a real challenge. I was spoon fed Catholic, and I have I have an incredible problem with the way that the formal structure has treated boys and children and women. Yeah, same here. And so. So but what I’m saying is like, I want to, I just want to be around that, you know. And so, the Trinity is amazing in the capture the living with the holy, the animation of a spirit, I’m about that. So right now I’m like, Okay, let’s go with Jesus. And then I think, Leonardo da Vinci. So, you know, I like Leonardo, obviously, he created so much one of the great inventors of the world, but he was gay, we think. And then at the cost of death, he still was true to, you know, loving other men intimately. And I’m like, Damn, that’s a principle based, like, what, you know, that’s a badass, you know, so like, I want to be around that too. And then, and then when I think about, like, the art, you know, he could certainly sit in that art piece, but he was so disruptive in so many ways that as an inventor, I’m compelled by that because he saw things that were not imagined yet. And then I think I’m bringing in Jimi Hendrix, right? Somebody that is like, or Bob Marley, one of those two, that was like a listen, I feel something and I can express it through voice. I can express it through an instrument and you know what the rules of society You should check those, you know, because there’s something rock and roll. There’s something, you know reggae about the structure that is disruptive, you know, the way that they live. So I think that right now, those are the three that if we had dinner tonight, and then I’m bringing you to say, you know, let’s, let’s do this together. You know, like, in honor of your question, let’s have a dinner party.

Vince Menzione 40:21
I love it. And I was gonna ask you, if I could join the dinner? I mean, look at those amazing guests, Jesus, in order to DaVinci I think we’re gonna have room for four, we have to have both Jimi Hendrix. And Bob Marley. I can’t just pick one. I mean, come on. Let’s make it. And they can jam a little bit together the kind of Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is so awesome. ask you one more question and books that you’ve read and gifted often, you talk about one of them in the audible book. But I’m just curious if there’s one particular book that like sits on top for you that you think about that you reference that maybe you gift, or you recommend to our listeners?

Dr. Michael Gervais 41:01
Yeah, Man’s Search for Meaning. Viktor Frankl is a game changer. And so especially the first half of that book, I think the first half of that book is, it’s just so good. You know, and then I’m more interested in the books like that’s, that have stood up over time, as opposed to some really good reads that I’ve read lately, that are fun and so digestible, that they’re, they’re good, but the ones I want to share are the ones that have stood up over time. So Man’s Search for Meaning, you know, that stood up for, you know, a couple decades that I think is, is a right on the pulse of things. And then the books that I like giving, it’s gonna sound weird, but I like giving out the Gita, the Bhagavad Gita, I like giving out loud to the Tao de Ching, they are both beautifully complicated stories and parables about wrestling with the deep questions in life. And so I think that those are really amazing. And then if we lighten it up a little bit, I’m fascinated by Mother Teresa. I think that her commitment to breaking the rules, and the rule was don’t touch people that are like, have leprosy and Don’t go Don’t go to those environments. Because you’re going to contract something, you know, that is unhealthy. But she’s like, now listen, I’m gonna be in service of all people. And she was probably the most famous woman without a PR firm. She just did the work. And it was counterculture, you know, in service of others. So I’m fascinated by her. And so anything that kind of touches her, her biography, and her essence, I think, is really cool. And then I’m looking at my bookshelf right now to see kind of what grabs my attention, but those are those are some big kind of heavy ones. And those are Yeah, but also I would do more than I do. Tom Sawyer. I think it’s just Tom Sawyer. Yeah. Like, you know, it’s just so well written and stood up for ages. And Tom Sawyer is like, interesting Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, like, if you probably haven’t read that since like, high school or whatever, but

Vince Menzione 42:58
I was going to think when it was probably eighth grade. Yeah, yeah. Right. So

Dr. Michael Gervais 43:01
yeah, I like I love I’m reading it right now rereading it right now. So it’s top of mind for me,

Vince Menzione 43:06
we’re gonna put links to all of these books in our show notes. And man search for meaning is also one of my all time in fact, I’ve come back to it now because of this time that we’re in, right. I can’t we can’t equate this to what he went through. Viktor Frankl, Dr. Viktor Frankl went through, but in some respects, we’ve all had to deal with uncertainty. Just you know, having to come through this time.

Dr. Michael Gervais 43:27
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, you know, and here’s another if you’re just gonna do links, here’s a fun Bruce Lee. I’m looking at my shelf, Bruce Lee, the Artist of Life. Cole, you know, kind of gets right to the center. Zen in the art of the motorcycle maintenance is really cool. And any book by Jon Kabat Zinn, and any book by tick, not Han, I just can’t quite get enough of those two. I think there’s so compelling. I love this.

Vince Menzione 43:51
Michael, you had been such an amazing guest today. Now,

Dr. Michael Gervais 43:54
please,

Vince Menzione 43:54
I can’t wait to share this with the world. I want to thank you again for your time for making time to join us there any closing comments or advice you have for our listeners,

Dr. Michael Gervais 44:05
I want to say first, thank you for creating the space for me to jam and riff on things that I’ve, you know, I’ve been thinking about for the last two and a half decades. And so thank you for creating the space to share. And I don’t really love advice, because I haven’t lived in the shoes of the other. So what I like to do is just remind people that everything that they need is already inside them. So that the path of mastery is really about committing to learning. It’s the goal is the path and to do it in an accelerated clip and hold yourself with dignity and others with regard as well. is kind of that internal approach to like figuring it out, as opposed to figuring out for some other end game. So everything that people need is already inside them. Start there, get their breathing, right. Get their meditation practice, right. Get Your sleep, right? If you can’t get your sleep, right, get your nutrition, right. You can’t get your sleep and nutrition, right at least make sure you get your thinking game, right? investing in optimism, investing in a deep commitment to the present moment. And then I’m going to circle back around and get your breathing, right, get your sleep, right, you know, keep working on those. And what sits underneath all of that is your personal philosophy, your purpose of life, and write those things down. And then if that feels like overwhelming, like, what the hell, because that’s why we created the course because it feels a bit that way. And so hopefully, we can drive people there and drive people to the final mastery podcast for a little bit more of these types of conversations with other bright minds. So, you know, thank you.

Vince Menzione 45:39
Thank you, Michael. So appreciate you. Thank you. As with each of my episodes, I appreciate your support. Please subscribe on your favorite platform, like comment, tell your friends about Ultimate Guide to partnering and where they can find us and i’d love your feedback. Please like the podcast and provide comments or reach out to me at Vince Menzione on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. You can also like and follow Ultimate Guide to partnering on our Facebook page, or drop me a line at Vince m at ultimate dash partnerships.com this episode of the podcast is sponsored by ultimate partnerships. Ultimate partnerships helps you get the most results from your partnerships, get partnerships right, optimize for success, deliver results. For more information, go to ultimate dash partnerships.com

Announcer 46:36
thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Ultimate Guide to partnering with your host Vince Menzione online at Ultimate Guide to partnering calm and facebook.com slash Ultimate Guide to partnering. We’ll catch you next time on The Ultimate Guide to partnering

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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