Leadership Evolution: Authenticity, Vulnerability, and Integrity with Daniel Ludevig

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And so I think integrity is one of these things.

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that you sort of bring with you to the grave, right?

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Like you're the only person at the end of the day who knows if you were living

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in accordance with your values and what your values were in the first place.

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authenticity is an assessment from the outside and it's vulnerability.

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Interestingly, that is somehow the bridge between these two, right

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Um, uh,

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How can profound questioning and deep listening transform your leadership

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style and your team today on seek, go create the leadership journey.

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We're excited to welcome Daniel Ludovic, a transformation coach and

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the founder of move leadership with a rich background, spanning psychology.

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Daniel has developed a unique approach to leadership that incorporates

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lessons from his diverse experiences, including facilitating post genocide

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community conversations in Cambodia and managing a hotel in Morocco,

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living between Berlin and Barcelona.

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I think he said is in Berlin right now.

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Daniel also leads the modern leader, a private members only

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leadership mastermind community.

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His mission is clear to empower professionals to become leaders worth

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following by enhancing their integrity, confidence, clarity, and resilience.

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Daniel, welcome to Seat Go Create.

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Thank you, Tim.

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It is great to meet you

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Great

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to meet you here too.

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It's early for me, late for you.

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Hopefully somewhere in between we can meet up and have a common

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energy and all that works for us.

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But, I appreciate you scheduling what's late for you and all, but, Hey,

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Daniel, we're, we're, I'm not totally.

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Pretending here, but we just meet.

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And I say, Hey, what do you do, which I've admitted is a superficial

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question, but if I ask you what you do, what would you tell me?

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You know, I'm so curious also how you'll answer this question

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because I think in our field, this is like the worst question to get.

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I was just at a bunch of, social party things here happening

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in Berlin this weekend.

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people ask me that and I still hate that I can't come up with

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an answer that sounds compelling.

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So what I say there is I'm a leadership coach who works with CEOs and founders.

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and then I see, that totally make their eyes glaze over?

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Right.

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And if it does, I sometimes even ask, did that make sense to you?

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Do you understand what I'm talking about?

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And occasionally people will play back and say, so like you're a career coach.

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So let's start with that.

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So you know what a career coach is.

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Okay.

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So let me tell you what is different than I do.

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Which is mindset and talking about how you develop people and how you support

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teams to really function well together and how you recognize that leadership

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is self development and that we're all on a journey of really, you know, self

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actualizing and you need people to support you doing that and holding up the mirror,

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whether you're an individual or a team.

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So somewhere within that conversation, if people are interested, they'll start to

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figure out what I actually do, but man, do I find it hard wrap that up and summarize

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it in three succinct, but somehow still.

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I like that initially know your leadership coach for leaders

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and founders and organizations.

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That's good.

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But do you ever get people and are you okay with this that

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say, Oh, You're a life coach.

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it's funny that you asked that because that came up also this weekend, you

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know, when I moved to Berlin from New York, I had actually never heard of

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coaching, certainly not life coaching.

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You know, I studied psychology, as you mentioned in my bio, you know,

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for me, being a psychologist was an obvious way to show up with this work,

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but I had never heard of coaching, even though coaching is quite big

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in the U S and when I got to Berlin.

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Everybody was a life coach, right?

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Like everybody and their mother was a life coach.

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And at the beginning, I found it very interesting.

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Like, Oh, this is, this is amazing.

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And then you start realizing that a lot of these people do not have

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any sort of consistency between what they preach and what they do.

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Personally are a mess are all over the place are a rollercoaster.

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And me, that at that time in my life, completely disenchanted me to coaching

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and in particular to life coaching.

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was about 10 years later that a friend of mine, after years of me facilitating

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teams and working in corporates you know, the way you facilitate is so coachy in

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a good way that you really should take a life coaching, you should really take a

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coaching class, a coaching certification.

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Just to become more aware of what it is that you're already doing.

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I signed up in 2017 for this coaching certification program.

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I ended up, signing up for the, initial fundamentals course, but then

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doing the whole two year journey.

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And I loved it.

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I absolutely was head over heels for it.

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I entered it at a completely different place in my life where I started to

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recognize what the value of this is and how useful the skills of coaching are.

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now, honestly, when people say, Are you a life coach?

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It doesn't really faze me because I always say I don't coach the person.

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I don't coach the problem.

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I coach the person.

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It doesn't matter to me whether we start with a corporate topic.

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We're very quickly talking about childhood and marriages and relationships.

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I do also recognize that there is some stigma to the, You know, the fact that

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there's no protection around the name life coach, anyone can call them that.

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And so there's no criteria for standards.

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Yeah, and I think that does make it tough because there's a low barrier

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to calling yourself that and it can water when you were just bringing up

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that example of people that will call them they're a hot mess but yet they

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want to Talk to other people about how they can solve their messes.

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And I don't, I don't listen neither.

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I don't think either one of us would claim perfection.

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So that's not what we're trying to say, but you, but you do have to have

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a little bit of your act together.

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It reminded me of, we were in a church for a while and the, the pastor and his

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wife went through a pretty ugly divorce.

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And then later the wife was starting to do marriage counseling and marriage coaching.

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As a twice divorced, whatever.

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And I listen, people go through stuff.

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I'm not, that's not what I'm saying here.

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I think she probably could have coached some people on some stuff.

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I'm just not sure that marriage would have been it.

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You know what I mean?

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Well, she went through the divorce.

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I mean, at the same time, while of course it's amazing when you have

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a coach or a therapist or a leader that walks to talk and that is

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living, what they also are teaching.

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At the same time, I also don't think it's a prerequisite for great coaching, right?

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Because the skills of coaching or of being a therapist or being maybe with

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leadership is a little bit different.

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You don't really need to, first of all, self disclose a lot at all, right?

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I mean, I have known so many therapists and so many coaches that don't share

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a lot about their own life, but they are incredible listeners and they are

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incredible sound borders and they know how to hold space for someone to reflect and

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they know how to offer input and intuition applying that same skill set to your own

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life is a completely different skill set.

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I think with leadership, this aspect around authenticity and

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integrity and consistency, which I'm sure we'll talk about is.

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More important these days than it was in the past because people expect, you

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know, that you're consistent in and out, but as a therapist and a coach where

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that wall between you and your client or your patient is still relatively normal

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and even sometimes helpful to maintain.

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I don't know if I would say just because someone's life is personally a mess,

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there's nothing that you can gain from working with them professionally.

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I'm going to tell you, you kind of gave your response.

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And sometimes when people ask me what I do, this would be my go for the jugular.

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Response.

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Okay.

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I

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I'm going to say it and I'm gonna let you comment on it, but

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I say something to the effect.

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And sometimes I work within spiritual circles because I do work with ministry

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and the leaders I work with usually have some degree of faith component involved.

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And so my comment, if you say, Tim, what do you do?

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I reached down inside.

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Leaders and organizations and pull out the greatness that God put

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there at the beginning of time

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mean, damn, obviously.

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It's a genius description,

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is it, I don't know,

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is, it's, it is.

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I mean, to me, this speaks to the idea also of purpose statements, right?

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So like my purpose statement that is behind my work is I transform

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dark into lightness with care.

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I transformed dark into lightness with care and kindness.

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I transform darkness into light with clarity and kindness.

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That's what my two things are, right?

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Because for me, those two aspects, right?

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Care or kindness or compassion or empathy or whatever you want to call it.

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really nicely With clarity and with understanding and with comprehension

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and with things making sense.

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And I just noticed that I have a gift in these things and that the ultimate

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thing it's serving is this shift from confusion and darkness and ambiguity

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and things feeling messy to a place of

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Lightness and a sense of accessibility and a sense of understanding.

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And that is not something I would say, you know, at an opening introduction,

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but it is at the core of what I'm doing.

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And I think your introduction is on that same frequency, right?

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Which is it's like the essence of what you're doing is to reach down and help

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people get back in touch with that long lost potential that was there all along.

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in the right circle, I think starting with that and opening

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with that can be incredible, right?

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Because people will totally get what you mean.

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in the wrong circle, people look at you like you're totally

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or they start stoning me or throwing stuff at me or whatever.

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you bring up kindness and truthfully within church circles, kindness is not

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a factor in a lot of those environments.

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I I posted something the other day that I had more.

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F us thrown at me than I've had in a long time from people

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that should be more Christlike.

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I don't want to go down there.

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Let's let, I want to, I don't want to go down that path.

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I want to go down to another path that you brought up something earlier, Daniel

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and I, and I think it's going to allow us to have some great conversation sort of

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really related to what my mission, I just kind of said I was, and that is, it sounds

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as if you didn't call yourself a coach for a Quite a period of time in your career.

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But then when you did it sort of clicked.

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See with me, I always knew I was wired to coach.

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In fact, I wanted to be a teacher and a coach found out both my parents were

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educators, found out they didn't make much money, tried to go another path.

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But every time I came back to coaching, when you.

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Clicked with coaching.

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Did you feel as if it was something that you have probably had that was innate,

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that was with you from the beginning, or was it something that you developed?

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Yeah, it's a very interesting question.

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It links to a bigger topic that I'm exploring in the last couple of years

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around integrity and coherence, which I can also talk about separately.

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something about noticing how we jump in life to different identities that

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sometimes allow us to expand our ability and expand what we offer

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and expand how the market sees us.

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and I have tried to do that in different ways.

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Some which were successful and some which totally belly flopped.

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And at other times noticing that actually the more I can kind of bring

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things in line and simplify and try to really come down to like the core

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basics, the more in tune and in line and in my own integrity I actually feel.

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And coaching one of those things Where when I discovered it and

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when I really started studying it, made me feel totally coherent.

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Like it was an encapsulator of things that I had been doing for years.

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I was the 13 year old in middle school who was asked to be part

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of a peer counseling group for other, you know, middle schoolers.

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By the principal or whatever, because I was so interested in this topic.

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You know, I've been asking my parents since I was 10 that the only

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thing I want for my birthday is a subscription to Psychology Today, right?

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Like this was innate in my being.

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I've said I've wanted to be a psychologist since I was a kid, but

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when I actually studied psychology and understood this distance that is

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expected between you and your patient, it was tremendously disappointing.

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Like I really didn't find myself attracted to that.

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Coaching, and in particular, the kind of coaching that I was exposed

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to, which is this coaching school called Coactive Coaching, CTI, it's

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very much about two people in a conversation and an exploration together.

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My intuition that I drop into the conversation, my thoughts,

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my pictures in my head.

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Are as valuable as yours, even if you are the client, because it

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stimulates the conversation to continue growing and moving and developing.

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And while everything that I offer is in service of you and I'm

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not attached to it, and you can completely disregard it as irrelevant.

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It still enables me to be fully present, not just with you.

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But also with what is happening in me.

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And I loved that it gave me a permission and a language and a set of tools for

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how to bring more of myself into not just coaching one on one, but all of the group

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work with that I was doing before that.

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And then, what I have found is that I'm able to stand up in front of groups and

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work with groups, whether it's intact teams that I work with for years or,

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you know, one off session that is just a training and I can bring more of myself.

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I feel.

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Not just the permission, but the benefit of sharing what is happening in me

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in this moment of so many stories of situations where I've shared, this is

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what's happening inside me right now.

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And it has opened up people to start speaking and sharing in a different way.

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As a result, I don't think I would have done that before.

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to me, it felt like a summary of the kind of facilitator that

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I was already starting to be.

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and gave me a framework for how to do that in a.

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Reliable way.

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I think what's really cool about all that you just said, I was thinking

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back on some of the things in my career when I started corporate, they

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had this class called facilitation training, learn how to be a facilitator.

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And what I recognized is that this should be foundational

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leadership, you know, one on one.

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This was a long time ago, Daniel.

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And I think it was when maybe culture was starting to transition from more

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of an authentic leadership type, this is my way or the highway type world

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to maybe a little more collaborative that we see, I think, more of today.

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There's still remnants of, maybe an authoritative way out there.

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We can talk about leadership later, but I really felt as if facilitation

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was then kind of the gateway into the collaborative that I believe.

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And it sounds like what you just said is, is what coaching is.

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Yeah.

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It's questioning.

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It's asking questions.

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It's I don't, I don't know everything.

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I'm not a consultant, even though I know some things about some

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industries and I can give some advice.

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If you say, Tim, what are your thoughts on this in real estate?

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We've had real estate companies.

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I can talk about that.

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I really do think that the answers lie within you.

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Or the team.

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And it sounds as if that's your approach, right?

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I, one of the principles of the coaching, education that I went

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through is that people are naturally creative, resourceful, and whole.

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not broken.

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I really hold that as truth, both with individuals and teams, like whether

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it's an individual or team, they have all of the resources to do that.

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To move through that and move beyond it.

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And part of my role is to just help them see things in a different way

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or shift their perspective or get access to things in a different way

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that allows them to get unstuck.

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And that's these amazing questions and intuitions that you're

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suggesting as well that we can offer.

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The other piece of that is what I've more recently been exploring that has

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a lot to do with also trauma work and understanding childhood patterns and how

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they show up in today's, personalities.

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it's really honoring that.

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All of the places where we get stuck in our life and the patterns that

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show up in the behaviors that show up that seem so unhelpful and so and so

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potentially self sabotaging came from a time where those behaviors once were

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super helpful where they were protective and where they were functioning.

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In order to look out for ourselves in whatever way was necessary at that time.

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And the more I lean into that and understand that when a client, especially,

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you know, an organization shows up dysfunctionally or a way that I would

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label as dysfunctionally, you know, puts a lot of pressure on me is rapid in

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terms of, asking for immediate turnover of proposals or pitches, or when we jump

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into, planning a session is micromanaging and is trying to over engineer everything.

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I always have two ways that I can respond to that, just like I would have

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two ways to respond to an individual.

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I can be really pissed off by it, and I can assume that they're messed up, and

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they're broken, Or, I can get really curious about how this part of them that

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is showing up is perfectly designed to protect them and enable them to survive in

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the current circumstances that they're in.

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And that is a huge perspective shift because the second option here Enables

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me to really honor that people are creative, naturally resourceful and whole.

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And the way that they're showing up is beautiful, even if it's completely

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dysfunctional in the present time.

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And that means that people don't need to be fixed.

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It means that I don't need to heal someone.

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It means that they're not broken.

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It just means that they need to recognize that whatever.

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Behaviors are currently at play, serve to function once are not serving that

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same function anymore and need to be reoriented to serve something else.

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So that triggered something that I wasn't, yeah, I'm going to go here a little bit.

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And that is, I was just talking in the meeting I had earlier.

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I've at times have a Jekyll and Hyde inside me.

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I could be extremely optimistic, look at people and say, Daniel is

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the greatest thing ever, and there's greatness all over him, et cetera.

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And then I could also do like what you just mentioned.

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I can also say, you know, but Daniel's been living in this

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world for X number of years.

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There's a good chance he's had to deal with some stuff that may have caused

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some trauma that may have caused some issues that may have taken a chunk out

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of his soul or, you know, whatever.

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and I kind of do this back and forth.

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In fact, I was, like I said, working with an organization earlier and

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I'm realizing that COVID has caused some trauma to the leader and the

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leadership team of this organization.

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And I'm not sure they're aware of it.

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I mean, we're discussing it, but it's just, they went into a mode.

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When COVID hit, did they survive?

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They did well, but I think they're suffering for some

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trauma coming out of it.

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so I'll I'll pose this sort of as a question, especially with someone who's

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got a background as in psychology is do you find yourself being, yes, optimistic.

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Everyone's great.

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I got greatness.

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I'm with you on that, but then when you kind of go, but there's probably also some

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issues here that need to be addressed.

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Yeah, it does make sense, do I experience these two polarities, right?

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That

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A dichotomy, a dichotomy at times.

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Yeah.

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right?

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And maybe the twist on that is that I don't see them as a dichotomy

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or as two ends of a spectrum.

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I see them as one in the same, right?

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It's for me.

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It's not an or it's an and people are great because of the

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things that they've experienced.

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And some of the things that we experienced show up in behaviors.

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That are socially acceptable and even socially applauded and others don't.

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So many of the leaders in the organizations that I work with, who

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are senior leaders, who are partners, who are CEOs, the behaviors that

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they exhibit that enabled them to get to that level came as a result of

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the traumas that they went through.

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Needing to, for example, block their emotions and just get stuff done

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as fast as possible so that their identity and sense of self worth and

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validation was attached to external results instead of internal well being

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because they weren't able to offer internal well being and they weren't

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able to guarantee internal well being.

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Their system created a pattern in which they were able to

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identify with external results.

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And we live in a world.

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Where people are rewarded for being really good at creating external results.

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behavior pushes them forward successfully in leadership.

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There are other behaviors that we're not in a place right now where the world

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accepts that as a great thing, right?

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Having people who are really in tune with their emotions to the point where they

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can sense the emotions of an entire room before you even start speaking, right?

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These are behaviors that in mainstream society are not

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what we reward people with.

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I mean, there's a couple of people here and there who are, you know,

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predictors of futures or, you know, ministers or in special positions.

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But if the majority of people were to demonstrate those

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behaviors in a business meeting.

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they would get slapped on the wrist for it.

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There's no place for that.

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But those behaviors also came out of pattern or a need for adaptation from

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whatever we went through in childhood where they actually tapped into more

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of their emotions and tapped into more of their feelings or tapped

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into more of their sensitivities as a way of being able to sense the

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environment around them and always know when they're safe and not safe.

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So I think it's quite whether we actually think that a particular set

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of behaviors are good or not, all behaviors, all personality is a result

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of the personality that needed to form in order to survive childhood.

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the choice that we get to make as adults is whether that personality is

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still valid for us, is still helpful for us, we still want to abide by it.

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whether we decide, you know what, this has actually been great when I was

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younger, but I don't need this anymore.

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And it's time for me to heal, understand it, and move forward with something else.

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Right.

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And I, what's so good about that is that that's where things like

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self awareness, having a coach, different, you know, counseling,

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all those things come into play.

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I think you gave me an opening that I'm going to step through this door that I

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wanted to do because you've got a couple things on your bio that are intriguing.

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Like running a hotel in Morocco and psychology background and, the

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work you did in Cambodia, but I'm going to pose the question this way.

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You just mentioned that experiences go into who people are currently.

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And so I think I'm going to lob you.

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I hope it's a softball.

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I hope it's not a curve ball, a softball that I'm going to ask,

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what are a few Situations, events, experiences in your life that have been

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most impactful to who you are today.

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success, failure, and, and what we actually, one of our taglines here

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as we redefine success is because of, I'm really annoyed at times with how

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culture and society define success.

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And so I've been trying to kind of beat on it.

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I don't know that I've done a good job, but that's my way of saying

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we're not looking at the high points.

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We're not looking at the low points.

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We're looking at the impact points is what I'm looking for here.

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What are some things that are, that happened along the way or you

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experienced or you lived or whatever that made Daniel who he is today?

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How old are you now?

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40.

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I'm 40 now.

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Gosh, how's that working out for you?

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You excited about it?

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I

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turned 60 recently.

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So we're, we're, uh, I'm, I'm 20 ahead of you and I'll, I'll let you know.

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It's awesome.

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that.

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I mean, I, in terms of the age thing, just hear more and more

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often and believe it myself that it just gets better and better.

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I meet so many people who say they're just starting their peak at 40 rather

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than it, being 10 years behind them.

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I've always been interested in relationships and friendships with people

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who are wiser than me and who I can somehow absorb their experiences and their

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wisdom to enhance how I'm living my life.

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40 for me feels like an awesome start to a new decade and nothing

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that I was really afraid of.

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To answer your question, which I think is a beautiful question, there's so

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many experiences that come to mind.

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So I grew up.

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In New York with a Russian Polish immigrant family.

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my brother and I are first generation American father is

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from Russia, mother's from Poland.

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And for us, I think what that meant is that there was a lot of focus on

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establishing roots on being successful on making money on trying to live

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the American dream that were very much about action and about the

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future and about making sure that.

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You are, you know, you have your foundation in place and so that developed

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a lot of my drive for getting things done and it developed a lot of my drive

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for thinking things through, it did not harness a lot of my drive for emotions,

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nor did it harness my drive for creativity or, you know, open ended thinking.

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So I noticed for myself, for example, that.

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You know, I grew up in a, in an environment where both my parents

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were also classical, musicians.

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So my brother and I were playing a lot of classical piano when we grew up.

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And I remember really clearly at the age of 10, I had started when I was

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seven piano because I just, because my parents said, if you don't practice,

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we're not paying for lessons anymore.

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Right.

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And I quit for two months.

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And after those two months, I came back on my own terms and

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said, okay, I really do miss this.

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And I want to practice on my own.

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And I did, I found my own rhythm with practicing, but that practicing I

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noticed was always focused on concerts.

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It was focused on performing in front of other people.

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It was focused on competition.

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I mean, it was something I was doing at quite a high level, but it was

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extremely And when I think about all of the literature that's out there

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on fixed versus growth mindset, I was completely brought up in a fixed

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mindset environment in which I was rewarded for doing well, for having my

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shit together, for being disciplined, for practicing before my lessons, for

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performing well, for getting good grades, And not necessarily for effort, right?

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And not necessarily just because it was fun and not necessarily just

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for like that, because that's not the environment that my parents

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grew up in themselves, right?

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And that's a hard thing to teach if that's not something innate to you.

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I think that today when I look at, for example, My drive for getting stuff

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done, my insane OCD, my organization in my apartment, the way that I prepare

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for workshops, there's a lot of success that comes from it, but there's also

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a lot of burden and hardship and stress and pressure that it puts on me

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and other people to really focus on.

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Perfection and to really focus on achievement and to really care about

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what other people think of something that I've delivered or done it is a

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multi year, you know, nonstop process for me to start figuring out how I can.

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Disentangle myself and my sense of identity and my sense of self worth for

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example, what other people think of me.

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And instead notice that my identity is solid and is

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constant regardless of whether my performance is good or not, right?

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Regardless of whether I achieve something or not.

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So I think, you know, that pinnacle event, for example, then coming

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out, you know, somewhere between the age of 13 and 17 is gay.

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Obviously has a huge impact on anyone who does right.

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Finding that way of identifying within a community that isn't necessarily mine.

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I came out multiple times.

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And when I really came out around age 16, to my school, I dove into

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Establishing a gay straight Alliance.

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I've put all of my energy into creating a community that helped

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other people come out and other people change the rules of the school.

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I did very little focus on myself there.

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It was when I got to college and even when later, when I moved to New York,

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and then again, when I came to Berlin, that I felt like I had to keep coming

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out over and over again to deeper layers of what that really meant, because I

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actually was very afraid of not belonging and very afraid of standing out and very

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afraid of being rejected and very afraid of not feeling safe for being different.

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And that is both.

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Allowed me to be very aware of topics around safety and inclusion and being very

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hypersensitive to when people discriminate or reject or create boundaries that,

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you know, leave other people out.

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But it also means that I expend a huge amount of energy paying

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attention to those things for myself.

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And so these are just a few examples.

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I'm happy to share as many as you want, but where I find that, you know, it's

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like the personality that forms a version that people see of us today, we often

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can look at it when it's successful and say, Oh, well, that's just how they are.

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And fantastic.

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But behavior comes with a shadow side and every behavior came from a.

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situation where that behavior was needed to protect and now is

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potentially, you know, benefiting.

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And if we don't get curious about like you're asking,

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where did that actually come

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Hmm.

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We end up seeing a super one sided version of people without understanding the real

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depth of what's behind that behavior.

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so that was good answer because it was sort of process and I think

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that's going to layer some cool things with the conversation we're

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about to have about vulnerability and integrity and things like that because

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that identity is very important.

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But I mean, one of the things, and I don't know that this is going from a

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deep level to now going to something more superficial, but I was really.

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Asking, and I was really intrigued by things like running a hotel in

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Morocco or doing some other thing.

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It was that part of the process of finding that identity and coming to terms with it.

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Or I'll ask it this way.

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Were you running to something or were there times you were

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running away from something?

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I think it's a great question.

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the language that I often hear it described as is, are

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you being dragged or driven?

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perfect?

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And it's that kind of thing, driven is, motivated, it's inspiring,

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it's resourceful, it's sustainable and dragged is, you know, either

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pulling behind something or hiding from something or running away from

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something, you know, So Cambodia was when I was in my early twenties.

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Morocco wasn't when I was in my late twenties, that whole period of life.

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Is think for many of us being dragged away from things, we've grown up in

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a certain environment and I think our whole 20s are just starting to expand the

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boundaries of what we thought was possible and start to have new experiences,

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which might lead to things that we then want to actually move towards.

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But in the initial of that, it feels more.

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Like just trying to stretch wings that have never actually properly

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had the chance to expand, right?

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Like Cambodia thing was.

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was thrown on my lap, right?

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It was a internship that I saw a flyer for on my university campus.

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I jumped on the opportunity.

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It was looking at how, you know, genocide histories can inform collaboration

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and peace and reconciliation.

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And I just applied for it and it ended up being this massively important experience

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for me because it was intercultural and it showed me the part, the power of arts.

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The Morocco thing was also serendipitous.

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I met.

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A yoga teacher who was teaching in Morocco, who I started dating, I went

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to visit him instead of staying for a week, stayed for a year and a half.

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And we ended up opening this hotel that we had stayed at.

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and when we returned to it was abandoned because the owner

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couldn't pay for their rent.

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And we ended up opening up this yoga, vegan dance retreat center there

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and having this crazy adventure.

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of those things were me running towards something like to me, the running towards

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something requires a certain level of consciousness and intentionality.

Speaker: 00:32:15

About what I want in life and what purpose I have and what I'm trying to

Speaker: 00:32:19

serve or what values I want to live or what kind of coherency I want to have.

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I was completely unaware of all of that in my twenties.

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If anything, what I was aware of is I want to have adventure.

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I want to be open.

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I want to try to live a different kind of life than the New York corporate, you

Speaker: 00:32:34

know, hierarchy ladder that I was very familiar with and wanting to kind of shake

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up and perhaps in the moment, those things felt like running towards something,

Speaker: 00:32:44

but when I look at it now, it was more.

Speaker: 00:32:47

Running away from security, running away from stability, running away from

Speaker: 00:32:52

predictability, running them away from, you know, a sense of monotony, right?

Speaker: 00:32:58

These were the things that I really just wanted to create a profile and a

Speaker: 00:33:01

life that felt interesting, that didn't feel average, that felt, Different

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that felt like I'm doing something cool and not just, you know, this

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like normal thing that everybody, you know, around me was doing.

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And I think that's more of a running away.

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I think that's a trying to, you know, break apart that is so

Speaker: 00:33:19

important in your 20s to do as you start to discover yourself 30s.

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There's so much about building up and discovering, what you actually want.

Speaker: 00:33:27

And I think it's only now, and I would be super curious to hear from

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your perspective, 20 years ahead of me on this journey, whether

Speaker: 00:33:34

that's what you felt too, right?

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To me, I just feel in the last couple of years, like I'm more aware conscious

Speaker: 00:33:41

and slowing down and through that space, starting to recognize what is it

Speaker: 00:33:46

I actually want in my life now and in the future, how do I say no to a whole

Speaker: 00:33:52

bunch of things that are not consistent with that so that I can really give,

Speaker: 00:33:55

an emphatic yes to the things that are.

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Yeah, I could address that.

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But there's a question that came to me here that

Speaker: 00:34:07

I come from.

Speaker: 00:34:10

a Christian culture that, in my opinion, doesn't operate in a Christ

Speaker: 00:34:16

like way a good bit of the time.

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And you brought up a topic about, the gender identity and things like

Speaker: 00:34:25

that, that I think I want to have something a little bit more mature here.

Speaker: 00:34:30

And I think you and I can have this.

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We, as a culture, and I think this is going to lead to things like

Speaker: 00:34:38

vulnerability, authenticity and integrity.

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I think we, my culture, let's just say the people that I might hang out with that are

Speaker: 00:34:44

Christians, are extremely judging people.

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I think in many ways, our culture's judging, but let's

Speaker: 00:34:53

just look at that subculture.

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and when I heard you talking about Cambodia and your 20s and things

Speaker: 00:34:59

like that, and maybe this is a lot of people in that age bracket,

Speaker: 00:35:05

were you trying to get away from people like me that might've been judging

Speaker: 00:35:10

you for, A lifestyle or something.

Speaker: 00:35:12

is that a fair thing to ask?

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Because I would get it.

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I would, I want to get away from some of it too.

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I told you before we started that I'm an open book and so I love the

Speaker: 00:35:24

okay.

Speaker: 00:35:25

first of all, I think the question is a very beautiful humbling from

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your side of wondering what your

Speaker: 00:35:32

Maybe.

Speaker: 00:35:33

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:35:33

right?

Speaker: 00:35:34

think the question is very beautiful and wondering about your role and the impact

Speaker: 00:35:38

that you have on the people around you.

Speaker: 00:35:40

Now you are in, South Dakota, right?

Speaker: 00:35:43

I was in New York.

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So, New York is a bubble, right?

Speaker: 00:35:48

And at the end I was living in, New York City, like, there is no

Speaker: 00:35:51

part of me that felt unaccepted or, judged or rejected for my sexual

Speaker: 00:35:58

orientation generally in New York.

Speaker: 00:36:02

However, what I did feel in New York is that I completely did

Speaker: 00:36:06

not fit into the gay scene there.

Speaker: 00:36:09

And that is not for reasons of judgment or reasons of, discrimination, but

Speaker: 00:36:14

rather because I felt that the gay scene I was experiencing there was one

Speaker: 00:36:19

sided, very superficial, very into a certain kind of exterior look, very

Speaker: 00:36:23

into money and status and connections.

Speaker: 00:36:26

None of which I, Felt I could play into and a currency, which I didn't feel I had.

Speaker: 00:36:31

And so I felt like a total outsider in that scene.

Speaker: 00:36:34

I never dated successfully in New York.

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I never really had close, gay friends except for one or two.

Speaker: 00:36:39

I never felt like I was part of their broader circles.

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So I think it's not, I wouldn't say interestingly that it would be judgment

Speaker: 00:36:48

or exclusion from people completely different than me that I felt like,

Speaker: 00:36:53

you know, but if anything, the judgment and the exclusion that I felt more

Speaker: 00:36:58

from people within my own community.

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And that is fascinating, right?

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Because that is human nature.

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That people who are discriminated against and who have gone through trauma and who

Speaker: 00:37:08

have gone through real crisis, when they then come into power very often, instead

Speaker: 00:37:14

of learning from their experiences and offering a generous hand to those who

Speaker: 00:37:17

need it most, the opposite, direction.

Speaker: 00:37:21

and use their power now to fuel and fill the void that they

Speaker: 00:37:26

felt when they were younger.

Speaker: 00:37:28

That's what I felt at the time was part of the reason I was leaving.

Speaker: 00:37:31

I mean, part of it was also the career stuff that I mentioned, just the

Speaker: 00:37:34

opportunity, And it was shocking to me when I came to Germany to see a completely

Speaker: 00:37:38

different way of gay men living their life, a completely different way of

Speaker: 00:37:42

identifying with sexuality, a completely different way of showing up that felt

Speaker: 00:37:46

so much more organic and natural.

Speaker: 00:37:50

And that's probably part of the reason why I've never even thought about going

Speaker: 00:37:53

back because every time I go back to New York, even though I know there's

Speaker: 00:37:56

multiple communities that live there and so many different types of people

Speaker: 00:37:59

on the whole, I don't see that, right?

Speaker: 00:38:01

I don't feel that I don't experience it in the same way

Speaker: 00:38:03

that I experienced it in Europe.

Speaker: 00:38:05

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:38:05

Interesting.

Speaker: 00:38:06

Daniel, you brought up earlier the fixed and growth mindset.

Speaker: 00:38:11

And one of the things that I've kind of meditated on, thought about, pondered,

Speaker: 00:38:18

I don't think we can divide people like the world attempts to divide people up,

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you know, tall, skinny, fat, short, white, black, male, female, straight,

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gay, whatever, all of those divisions.

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I think that the only way that we can really.

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Divide people is fixed or growth.

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And what I heard kind of a layer underneath you talking about was

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that, that even within some of these.

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Communities and cultures.

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It is, there is a fixed mindset, even though some might consider them more

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progressive or different or whatever.

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And I want to be around people that are growth.

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I want to be, I want to talk to you instead of going into maybe even a

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church world where they are so fixed in the way they think they look at things.

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They even.

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Address spiritual things.

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I would much rather hang out with people that are more growth minded.

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And I think we could get that fixed everywhere.

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Yes, no thoughts.

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And what, what would be the, what would be the difference for you?

Speaker: 00:39:24

So if you did hang out more with people who are growth minded, what, what

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would change for you or how would it

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I think the way it feels to me is that they're open to conversation.

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They don't believe that how they were created, lived, grew up, whatever, to

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the age of 20 is the way they're going to be for the rest of their lives.

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They are learning new things.

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They're open to looking around and changing their mind about something.

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Yeah, it does.

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it's interesting as we explore this conversation, this thread

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around, dichotomies versus yes.

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And that that has come up, you know, for me, it's somehow a yes.

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And in this situation, too, I think on the one hand, what you just shared about

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having people who are willing and able.

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To allow their sense of self and their identity to flex and evolve

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in the moment as they grow and to be present to whatever the stimulus

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is around them is amazing, right?

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To see people who are that present, who are that flexible, who are that

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open to just being changed, being influenced, being convinced, being,

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you know, whatever, in the moment of a conversation or, you know,

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whatever is going on around them.

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is awesome.

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At the same time, identity is a real thing, right?

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And where people come from, what experiences they've had, what culture

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they're part of, what has influenced them, what has shaped them, what

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they've gone through is also real.

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And to Ignore that or to, potentially disregard it or to just, deprioritize

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it over something else would be to also miss potentially the roots of where

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people are coming from and to understand why they're showing up the way they do.

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And for people to understand.

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Themselves, why they are showing up the way they do, we've seen this

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happen over the last few years.

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Also, in terms of identity shifts that people experience when, you know, before

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there was a lot of, you know, when I think about, for example, black lives

Speaker: 00:41:23

matter right before black lives matters.

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There was so much conversation around.

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Not at different skin colors as something you see, right?

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I don't see skin color was a normal thing to say and considered

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a positive thing to say, right?

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And then what black lives matter really brought up is if

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you don't see my skin color.

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Then you're also not seeing me, right?

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And if you choose to say you're not seeing my skin color, then you're actually

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ignoring a big part of me and just pretending that we come from the same

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background and that we come from the same opportunities and that we come from the

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same privilege when we clearly don't.

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I guess that's for me, the yes hand, right?

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Which is on the one hand, I would love that we are able to acknowledge our

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history, acknowledge what shaped and formed us and developed us and created

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the personalities that survives childhood.

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And, as adults, to embrace the possibility that I don't have to be

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defined for the rest of my life the history that brought me to today.

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And somehow there's a balance, right?

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Because if we completely let go of the history and just try to be a different

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person every day, ungrounded, we're uncentered, we're unconnected to, the

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things that really give us our gravitas.

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And if we completely get fixed on the identity, then

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we have no chance at evolving.

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think you brought up a word earlier called integrity.

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You used the word integrity.

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And to me, sort of how you just described that.

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Is when someone is aware of that they acknowledge it.

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They receive it.

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All of that is when they can operate in a level of integrity because A lot of people

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that are pretending to do something else.

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They're operating out of what they think.

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People pleasing, you know, perfect, whatever.

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We could throw a lot of words around here.

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I think social media throws a lot of gas on that fire to that.

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people think that they should act this way.

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But the reason I like you brought up integrity is because I, I.

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One of the things that bothers me about words like authenticity and vulnerability

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is I see people using it as a tactic.

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It's not a character trait.

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And so I don't have a question around any of that, but take anything I just said and

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run with it in whatever way you want to.

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Integrity, authenticity, vulnerability.

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And, and, but the big thing is, is that I really.

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Sometimes my generation, I'm one of the generation that we didn't use words

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like authenticity and vulnerability.

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In fact, we don't like them at times.

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I'll go ahead and say that, and I think one of the things I don't

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like is I perceive that there are people, and I know that there are

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people that are using it as a tactic.

Speaker: 00:44:09

Yeah.

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I mean, I, I like that you I'll comment on the word integrity in a moment.

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I like this observation that vulnerability in particular, which really has its

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name on the map, back in, you know, the 2012, 2015 is from Brené Brown.

Speaker: 00:44:22

It definitely has become a tactic that some people feel

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they can use to build trust.

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are tools and skill sets within the range of literature that exists on

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vulnerability that like a tactic you can use to build trust, but is exactly

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the opposite of what, the intention is.

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interestingly, that's where integrity comes up, because when you start

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noticing that you're using vulnerability, in other words, you're using it.

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You're disclosing something about your family or you're sharing something

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difficult, or you're talking about something that's emotional for the purpose

Speaker: 00:44:54

of building connection or for the purpose of getting loyalty or for the purpose

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of getting buy in, know yourself that you're not actually being vulnerable,

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You know yourself that you're using this to manipulate people's emotions.

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You know yourself that this is not what is actually meant for this.

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And integrity is the part of you that senses that you are acting out

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of alignment with your own values.

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And what I think is interesting about integrity versus authenticity, just

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thinking off the cuff of my sleeve now, as you mentioned it, is that integrity is

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something you can only sense for yourself.

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Authenticity is only something that others can sense about you, right?

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You cannot say to people, I'm an authentic person, right?

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That's not for you to decide, right?

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It's other P I mean, you may say that, right?

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You can say that, but that sounds totally baloney.

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In fact, anyone who says they're an authentic person, most likely.

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is not authentic person, right?

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But when other people describe you as an authentic person, then

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it's very believable because it's their experience of you.

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They've seen you in different situations.

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They see you when you're under stress, they see you, you know,

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between what you say and what you do.

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And then you get the, you know, badge of approval that we all, you know,

Speaker: 00:46:01

hope to get, which is that other people say, yes, this is an authentic person.

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This person walks their talk.

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This person does what they preach.

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This person shows up consistently in different environments.

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Integrity is not something that is easy for other people

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to assess about you, right?

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It's very hard for them to say, are you, you know, someone who is.

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Are you actually someone who is an integrous person?

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You know that, but no one else can, because only, you know, if

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you're really acting in alignment with your values or not, right?

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Even when you say one thing, but you know, deep inside that you actually mean

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something else, nobody else might know that what you're saying is a lie or is,

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you know, manipulative or misleading, but you know that for yourself.

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And so I think integrity is one of these things.

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that you sort of bring with you to the grave, right?

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Like you're the only person at the end of the day who knows if you were living

Speaker: 00:46:49

in accordance with your values and what your values were in the first place.

Speaker: 00:46:52

authenticity is an assessment from the outside and it's vulnerability.

Speaker: 00:46:56

Interestingly, that is somehow the bridge between these two, right?

Speaker: 00:47:01

the more you share about yourself in a truly vulnerable way, The more that you

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expose yourself, the more that you show up in risky situations, the more that you,

Speaker: 00:47:08

share what's making you feel uncertain.

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The more you're able to reveal what is actually part of you inside.

Speaker: 00:47:15

In other words, the actual integrity within you.

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And when you do that consistently and over time and in a way that feels real,

Speaker: 00:47:22

then people perceive you as authentic.

Speaker: 00:47:25

And in that way, vulnerability is somehow the connection between the journey from

Speaker: 00:47:29

kind of inside authenticity that only you know about, which is integrity.

Speaker: 00:47:35

To the experience that people actually have a view externally

Speaker: 00:47:38

of being authentic, which is then only for them to be able to judge.

Speaker: 00:47:42

Yeah, and I've had a lot of conversations about this topic with people that

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are, you know, operating in Silicon Valley and a lot of actually people

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in ministry and church circles too.

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And I've got a few words that I use.

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There's a word called hypocrite that I use quite a bit, especially in church world.

Speaker: 00:47:59

And it basically is someone who says one thing, but does something different.

Speaker: 00:48:04

I think it's not exactly what integrity is, but I think there may be

Speaker: 00:48:07

siblings, they might be related, But Daniel, the thing that is intriguing

Speaker: 00:48:13

to me is you, you've got a program.

Speaker: 00:48:17

We're going to talk about it here in just a minute on modern leader.

Speaker: 00:48:21

And it appears as if these topics, authenticity, vulnerability, and

Speaker: 00:48:26

let's, I would hope integrity has always been a part of leadership, but.

Speaker: 00:48:30

Maybe, maybe not.

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All of those things fit into what we would call the modern leader.

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Whereas if I go back to when I started coming on to the leadership scene,

Speaker: 00:48:44

mid 80s, when I had my first company and different things like that.

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I don't know Well, listen, like you said, authenticity and vulnerability.

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We didn't, I didn't hear about it till the, you know, 2000 teens ish.

Speaker: 00:48:59

So what else defines the modern leader or if it's more of those things,

Speaker: 00:49:05

because I think we've got some conflicts starting to arise between maybe old

Speaker: 00:49:10

school, my generation of the tail end of that boomer generation and what you

Speaker: 00:49:14

would be calling the modern leader.

Speaker: 00:49:16

And I'd love for us to flush some of those out here in the last few

Speaker: 00:49:18

minutes that we have so that We can understand some of the issues we

Speaker: 00:49:23

might be facing within organizations because it could be baked in.

Speaker: 00:49:25

So did that question make sense?

Speaker: 00:49:29

It does.

Speaker: 00:49:29

All of your questions

Speaker: 00:49:30

Oh, wow.

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Wow.

Speaker: 00:49:32

Awesome.

Speaker: 00:49:33

of your questions make sense.

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I think that it's an important distinction that you're making that authenticity,

Speaker: 00:49:38

which we've spent a good amount of our time talking about today, is not the only

Speaker: 00:49:43

quality that makes a modern leader, right?

Speaker: 00:49:45

There are a few qualities that in my book and from, the years that I've

Speaker: 00:49:49

been working in leadership development are what make someone worth following.

Speaker: 00:49:53

And for me, that's the metric, right?

Speaker: 00:49:55

Is what is it that you're doing?

Speaker: 00:49:56

That makes it worth people's time to follow you instead of someone else.

Speaker: 00:50:02

And undeniable authenticity is one of the three pillars

Speaker: 00:50:06

that that for me is based on.

Speaker: 00:50:08

And we've spent a lot of time talking about that today.

Speaker: 00:50:10

There's two others that I think are just as important in what

Speaker: 00:50:12

makes people worth following.

Speaker: 00:50:14

One of them is that they have an inspiring vision.

Speaker: 00:50:17

And the other is that they know how to strongly influence.

Speaker: 00:50:20

And those three things together, if I look at people who have vision, People

Speaker: 00:50:23

who know how to shape their environment through influencing and people know how

Speaker: 00:50:27

to show up authentically through that, those are the people that I keep seeing

Speaker: 00:50:30

other people want to gravitate towards, want to spend time with, want to follow

Speaker: 00:50:35

Cause I think those are not easy things to work on is part of what we work on in

Speaker: 00:50:39

this program called the modern leader, which is then how do you actually develop

Speaker: 00:50:42

the skills of having massive impact.

Speaker: 00:50:45

How do you develop the skills of having real growth and

Speaker: 00:50:49

consistent growth in your life?

Speaker: 00:50:51

And how do you have the skills to develop freedom and freedom in particular

Speaker: 00:50:54

from a mindset perspective, right?

Speaker: 00:50:56

So that you're not held back by of limiting beliefs or, you know,

Speaker: 00:51:00

constricting stories, but you're actually present in the way that you

Speaker: 00:51:03

were sharing, that you would like to people to be present when you

Speaker: 00:51:06

were talking about growth mindset.

Speaker: 00:51:07

So those are, for me, how I think about it.

Speaker: 00:51:09

It's really all about vision influence.

Speaker: 00:51:11

And authenticity and the way that you get there is by working on things

Speaker: 00:51:15

like impact growth and freedom.

Speaker: 00:51:19

All of those are good.

Speaker: 00:51:20

And all of those have, as I mentioned earlier, they have the positive with

Speaker: 00:51:27

people that operate with integrity.

Speaker: 00:51:29

But if there's someone who doesn't, I mean, you wrote, I wrote down the

Speaker: 00:51:32

word influence and I'm going, I see a lot of manipulation in leadership

Speaker: 00:51:36

today, which is, The dark side of an influence and part of it goes back to

Speaker: 00:51:43

what's the integrity of the leader.

Speaker: 00:51:45

I hate it too, Daniel, that I see a lot of it in churches and spiritual environments.

Speaker: 00:51:49

That's one thing that's really bothersome to me, but I also

Speaker: 00:51:53

see it in our political circles.

Speaker: 00:51:55

I also see it in some companies, not as much,

Speaker: 00:52:00

I just want to say one thing about just with this last piece that you're

Speaker: 00:52:03

saying, because people very often ask me once we get really deep into

Speaker: 00:52:07

talking about emotions or authenticity or influence or communication, aren't

Speaker: 00:52:13

these skills manipulating others?

Speaker: 00:52:17

And my response is always every psychological skill

Speaker: 00:52:20

can be used for good or bad.

Speaker: 00:52:22

Right?

Speaker: 00:52:23

The moment you understand how human nature works and what makes people emotional

Speaker: 00:52:27

and what makes people interested in you and what makes people loyal and

Speaker: 00:52:30

why they would get, you know, charged to do something, you can use it for

Speaker: 00:52:34

good and you can also use it for bad.

Speaker: 00:52:37

And I don't think that's a reason not to learn it.

Speaker: 00:52:39

It just means that when you pair it together, exactly as you were saying, you

Speaker: 00:52:42

need to find the right balance between what you are doing, how you are doing it.

Speaker: 00:52:47

And the why behind it, right?

Speaker: 00:52:49

And if the why is not in service of something good, that's a problem, And

Speaker: 00:52:53

we need other people to be able to spot that so that that can actually be

Speaker: 00:52:56

well.

Speaker: 00:52:56

And I also think that we need to go back to what I consider some Type

Speaker: 00:53:01

things, which is character, integrity, some of those things, because

Speaker: 00:53:07

I, I'll give you a good example.

Speaker: 00:53:10

I consider myself fairly grounded, but I noticed when it was kind of like my first

Speaker: 00:53:17

real vulnerability experience in life.

Speaker: 00:53:22

Uh, 08, homeless, bankrupt, all that kind of stuff.

Speaker: 00:53:27

When I decided to start podcasting, In 2019, the first episode Daniel

Speaker: 00:53:33

was titled on this episode on this podcast, by the way, you can go back

Speaker: 00:53:36

to the beginning of 275 episodes ago.

Speaker: 00:53:40

The first episode was titled homeless and bankrupt.

Speaker: 00:53:44

it was me finally sharing the story of what all we had been through.

Speaker: 00:53:48

And what I have found is that times I can repeat that story with a little bit

Speaker: 00:53:54

more glibness and less sincerity because it's the story that people want to hear.

Speaker: 00:54:02

When I'm interviewed on podcasts and things like that and I've noticed with

Speaker: 00:54:05

myself at times I repeat them without the honor and reverence That I should of

Speaker: 00:54:11

someone that that really had the impact.

Speaker: 00:54:14

Does that make any sense at all?

Speaker: 00:54:15

Unpack that in 30 seconds

Speaker: 00:54:20

Yeah, I think the biggest skill in leadership that we can

Speaker: 00:54:23

develop is self awareness, right?

Speaker: 00:54:25

And what you're demonstrating is ability to have a part of ourselves.

Speaker: 00:54:31

That is always observing ourselves as if from the outside, as if

Speaker: 00:54:35

it was observing another person.

Speaker: 00:54:37

And these little tiny moments where, for example, you're sharing a story that was

Speaker: 00:54:40

actually a super huge part of your life, you notice with that part of you that

Speaker: 00:54:45

is you're observing calm, steady self.

Speaker: 00:54:48

Actually, right now, I'm kind of telling you the story you want to hear.

Speaker: 00:54:52

I'm telling you the story.

Speaker: 00:54:53

I think you'll be impressed to hear.

Speaker: 00:54:54

I'm telling the story that feels safe to share.

Speaker: 00:54:56

I'm telling the story that I think is going to fit most in whole part.

Speaker: 00:55:01

That's the part that gives you the source and the inspiration to then switch that

Speaker: 00:55:05

story in the moment and say something like, which we all have been in moments

Speaker: 00:55:08

where this happens and it's so powerful when it does, where someone says something

Speaker: 00:55:12

like, you know what, I'm actually not being honest with you right now,

Speaker: 00:55:16

It's not the full story.

Speaker: 00:55:17

Let me tell you the full story.

Speaker: 00:55:18

And that observing self that can be in the moment and recognize, you are

Speaker: 00:55:23

operating at full speed, doing all the things you're doing, telling your

Speaker: 00:55:26

story, running meetings, leading other people, but it still is able to see you

Speaker: 00:55:30

as if you were running, you know, as if you were looking at someone else.

Speaker: 00:55:33

is one of the most powerful skills to develop in leadership, because when you

Speaker: 00:55:35

have that, then you are able to actually view yourself not through the lens of

Speaker: 00:55:40

what you're reactive to in the moment, but actually through the part of you

Speaker: 00:55:44

that does want to speak to your highest values, or the part of you that does

Speaker: 00:55:47

want to live your highest potential, or the part of you that wants to actually

Speaker: 00:55:50

be, filled with integrity to what you actually believe in, and the kind

Speaker: 00:55:54

of person you want to be versus what you think the situation needs you to

Speaker: 00:55:56

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:55:56

And the truth of it really is that that experience has forced, so much humility

Speaker: 00:56:05

on me that it has literally caused me to be a different person in so many ways.

Speaker: 00:56:12

Anyway, great response there.

Speaker: 00:56:13

I appreciate it.

Speaker: 00:56:14

Daniel, when I've got someone like you on that thinks in a deeper

Speaker: 00:56:20

level, you have great perspectives, many of them different than mine.

Speaker: 00:56:25

I want to ask this question, especially from a leadership standpoint.

Speaker: 00:56:29

when you look out over the horizon and we're recording this, I'm going

Speaker: 00:56:32

to timestamp it summer ish of 2024, late summer, released probably in

Speaker: 00:56:38

the fallish or something like that when you consider Leadership and

Speaker: 00:56:45

you look out on all these things.

Speaker: 00:56:46

Are you encouraged?

Speaker: 00:56:48

And if so, what are some things that encourages you

Speaker: 00:56:51

with that you see or are you?

Speaker: 00:56:54

Discouraged and if so, what are some things you see that discourages

Speaker: 00:56:58

you or a little bit of both Just this is sort of my final question.

Speaker: 00:57:01

We got one more thing We're going to wrap up with but yeah, yeah, I

Speaker: 00:57:03

mean You Encouraged or discouraged when you consider leadership

Speaker: 00:57:08

in in the age that we're in

Speaker: 00:57:14

I would say cautiously encouraged,

Speaker: 00:57:17

cautiously optimistic?

Speaker: 00:57:18

Yeah There's a little bit of a hedge.

Speaker: 00:57:21

I strongly believe that humans have this amazing ability to

Speaker: 00:57:25

flex and to adapt and to evolve.

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When danger is on their doorstep, and we saw this during covid and lockdown,

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right, that suddenly in a super short amount of time when danger was on

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your doorstep, people were able to resource and connect and to shift.

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And we came into this global sense of community, and we were

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able to, really adapt fast.

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And that, I think, is encouraging because.

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It shows that humans have the ability to shift really quickly

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and to change really quickly.

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Unfortunately, I think history has also shown that we don't

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learn well from history.

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tend to wait until danger is on our doorstep before we act.

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And we're not very good at predicting that something is likely to happen

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based on, you know, looking at what's happening in the past.

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I'm cautiously optimistic because I think the pendulum swing moves in

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such a way that we need things to get worse often before they get better.

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We need things to get so bad that we actually are affected

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by things personally, right?

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I mean, I live in Germany, you know, I'm Jewish.

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I'm super aware of the history here, right?

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I talked to lots of people about it all the time.

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It was.

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Nobody's intention to let the history that happened here happen.

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When you talk to people, they really weren't paying attention at

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all to what was going on until it was literally on their doorstep.

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And then they recognized, okay, this is really a serious problem now.

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Right.

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I don't think that particular element of human nature has changed at all.

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And I don't think we've learned from the moments where people reacted

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too late to say that things are not going to happen again in the future.

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I think humans need to go through a crisis like COVID, except A crisis

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around climate change, a crisis around inclusivity, a crisis around,

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resource sharing is so extreme.

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That then they act in an instant and unfortunately, it

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doesn't happen sooner than that.

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it happens better than not at all.

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Eventually we will go through that.

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So yeah that's good.

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I would have expected maybe a quick Cautious answer like that.

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but anyway, Daniel, tell, tell me all you want to tell me about the modern leader,

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about what it is, what you're trying to accomplish there, anything else you've

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got as far as resources or something that people would want to check out.

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And this would be a good time to give, you know, links, websites, anything like

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that, that someone can connect with you.

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Sure.

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So, you know, the reason I created the modern leader, by the way, is because

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it's difficult for people to work with me unless they come through a corporate.

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you know, the.

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Context in which I work with a corporate is something that's

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not available to a lot of people.

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I also found that leadership development, especially in the training

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space or in the coaching space is often missing the full scope of what

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people need to actually develop.

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So in the training space, these large flagship programs, two,

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three, four days, teach people a huge amount, and then there's no

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accountability support or follow up.

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And they forget most of what they learned in the coaching space.

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People evolve and they learn and they reflect.

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But it's not really an appropriate place to bring in a training

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program and say, this is the, you know, what you need to learn.

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what I created is a program that anybody can join.

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First of all, it's a super potent distillation of 15 years of leadership

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work in a members based program that is kind of like joining a gym, right?

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You get a trainer who accompanies you for years as you develop as a leader.

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There's training that you get based on your own needs and where you're

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at in your own leadership journey.

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There's also the support that you get from me.

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There's the accountability that you get from me.

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So you don't actually fall through the cracks with what you're learning.

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And then there's a community of like minded peers who are along

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their own journey, but supporting each other, motivating each

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other, keeping each other going.

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And for me, this has been an incredible view onto what it is.

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Might really until now have been missing, I think, in a lot of leadership

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development, which is how you make it sustainable and how you make it something

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that actually integrates into people's lives and is not just these one off

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things that are in separate places.

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So that's why I started it.

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There's an amazing group of people who are part of it from CEOs to companies,

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to others who don't have any leadership skills in a corporate sense, but are

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leaders in their individual lives.

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And I'm very happy to create the space for all of them to join.

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There's a separate founders group that we're joining for people who

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are founders of either scale ups or have exited, founding companies.

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And, you know, in terms of like following it or finding out about

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it, you know, everywhere where you look on social media, you'll find me.

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So if you go to Instagram, Daniel dot Ludovic is there.

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If you go on LinkedIn, it's under the same name.

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my website, which is move leadership dot com, which is my

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main brand name, you'll find a small blurb about the modern leader.

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So I don't really talk a lot about how people can access me in terms of

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coaching and facilitation and training because you really kind of need to come

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through a corporate lens to do that.

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But for anyone who's listening, who's not part of a company and just

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wants to actually take leadership development in their own hands and

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find out what it takes to become someone worth following, the modern

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leader is a perfect place to do that.

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And I would love to have a

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Very good.

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We'll include a link.

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I love what you said because I said this years ago when people say that they always

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sound like old dudes, but I was doing corporate training and things like that.

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And I loved it.

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I love getting up in front and training and all that.

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But Daniel, I realized that two weeks later I would bump into

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people that had been in the training and they would go, who are you?

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And I'm going, we spent two days together.

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And I realized that what we're talking about, like you said, has to integrate.

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It's got to be a process.

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It's why our subtitle is The Leadership Journey, not The Leadership Event

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or The Leadership Destination.

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This is a life journey and I, it sounds as if that's what you're incorporating

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in that organization, correct?

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that's spot on.

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the literature shows people remember 10 percent of what they learn.

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If there's no accountability and no structure and no follow up,

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how in the world, when you go back to your environment, you supposed

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to retain what you've learned?

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Not to mention that your environment hasn't changed and you have.

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And it's a tragedy of leadership development because so much money

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is spent on these massive programs.

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the impact in terms of connection is great.

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Networking is great.

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Developing, a collective field of colleagues is great, but actual leadership

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development, it just isn't surprising to me why we see so few leaders.

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In corporates that actually are worth following because they haven't

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really had the leadership development and leadership training that would

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Is the language of leadership the same all over the world?

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You know, that's an interesting

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Sorry, I thought we were wrapping up, but I thought of that.

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I said, you know, you're obviously worldwide

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That's a very interesting question.

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You know, I've run programs of leadership truly around the world in every continent,

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Certainly not seen a difference in terms of the ambition of leadership,

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but I do see that there are major differences in terms of how you get there.

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So if the ambition of leadership is, for example, to help people actualize their

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potential to help people be able to be the best at what they're doing to help

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people feel that they're part of a cause to be able to shift attention from where

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it currently is to where it should be.

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Be whether that's for an individual or group, right?

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All of these are aspects of what I think are so important about leadership.

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The need for that is universal, but the way you get there and what

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is possible and what is effective is both cultural and individual.

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Does that

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fine.

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Yeah.

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Whole nother episode there, Daniel.

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I, uh,

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I appreciate this.

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We're seek, go create those three words.

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Last question.

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Which word resonates more with you right now?

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Don't overthink it.

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Seek, go or create and why?

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I'm definitely in the create part and to link it to what we spoke about before.

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I think teens and especially your twenties are seek.

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I think my thirties were very much around go, go, go, go, go.

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I mean, I really went crazy in terms of what I've done in my thirties.

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But interestingly, I feel like my forties are about creation, like really

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creating the life that I actually want.

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And that is based off of so much of what I've searched for and

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so much of what I've Try it out.

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So for now, it's great.

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And maybe that's for the rest of my life, or maybe it repeats again.

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you tell

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Well, be

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careful because I'm circling back to seek.

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I'm spending more time seeking being quiet still and listening.

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And anyway, it's all good.

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Daniel, I appreciate so much this conversation.

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I appreciate what you're doing.

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I appreciate the modern leader.

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I appreciate you educating me and my generation on vulnerability.

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And authenticity and giving me great things to think about.

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I appreciate you sharing at a deeper level, some things that we could have

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avoided because it was helpful for me.

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And I'm glad we were able to have the conversation because I think many

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people in my circles won't have it.

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I'm hopeful they're still listening that they need to

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listen to these conversations.

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And so I appreciate that greatly.

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We are SeekGoCreate.

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We have new episodes every Monday and we're on YouTube

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and all the podcast channels.

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And I'm going to ask for y'all to continue support us.

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If you're listening in, you can go to SeekGoCreate.

Speaker: 01:06:28

com forward slash support, and you can provide support, financial support.

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Until next time, continue being all that you were created to be.