Practical Wisdom for Leaders with Scott J. Allen, Ph.D.

Clarity: Business Wisdom to Work Less and Achieve More with Jim Vaselopoulos

• Scott J. Allen • Season 1 • Episode 277

Share episode

Send us a text

Jim Vaselopulos is a C-level business advisor and executive coach with a proven record as a leader, strategist, rainmaker, and expert in new business development. With his principled leadership, visionary approach, and effective execution, Jim has successfully established new companies and transformed underperforming organizations. 

As the founder of Rafti Advisors, Jim assists early-stage businesses in launching successfully, growth-stage enterprises in accelerating their progress, and established organizations in navigating complex challenges and strategic shifts. 

Jim teaches sales and professional development and frequently speaks on the subjects of leadership and innovation. He also volunteers regularly with business incubators and veterans groups. 

Jim is also the author of Clarity: Business Wisdom to Work Less and Achieve More and the co-host of The Leadership Podcast.

He graduated from the University of Illinois with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and earned his MBA at Marquette University. Jim is a dedicated husband and father of two wonderful children with his wife, Dana.

A Few Quotes From This Episode

  • “If you feel like you’re playing Whack-a-Mole, you’re not digging deep enough, you’re not curious enough about what the real root cause is.”
  • “When we talk about things that are symptoms, I’m not saying they’re not important…but the underlying condition is deeper.”
  • “Balance is not something you get once and keep forever. You need feedback, and you need to keep adjusting.”

Resources Mentioned in This Episode 

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

About  Scott J. Allen

My Approach to Hosting

  • The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.


♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.



Note: Voice-to-text transcriptions are about 90% accurate, and conversations-to-text do not always translate perfectly. I include it to provide you with the spirit of the conversation.

Scott Allen  0:00 

Okay, everybody, thank you for checking in Practical Wisdom for Leaders. I have Jim Vaselopoulas, and he is a C-level business advisor and executive coach with a proven record as a leader, strategist, rainmaker, and expert in new business development. With his principal leadership, visionary approach, and effective execution, Jim has successfully established new companies and transformed underperforming organizations. Jim is also the author of ‘Clarity: Business Wisdom to Work Less and Achieve More.’ He has a podcast, and it's called The Leadership podcast, so he is in the right place. And, you know what? The full bio is going to be in the show notes. Jim, I am excited for this conversation, podcaster to podcaster, passionate about leadership person to passionate about leadership person. So, we're going to see where the conversation takes us today, but what else do people need to know about you that maybe wasn't in that quick bio? What do you think, sir?

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  0:55  

First of all, thank you for having me on your show. It's always a joy. It's always fun. And I know, in our prior conversations, we just have a good time talking about stuff like that. I think the most important thing about me is I'm a dad, a brother, husband. More than anything, it’s just family. And my Greek heritage and my upbringing are really important to me. I think that formed a lot of my mentality, and I'm just thankful and grateful for the foundation that was put in place. And I just want to make sure that… I was super fortunate, and I could pass down some of what was passed on to me. And that's really what drives a lot of what I do today. 

 

Scott Allen  1:30 

That’s awesome. Your Greek heritage. My gosh, we had as a family just an incredible couple of weeks. About two summers ago, we were in Athens. We were in Nafpaktos. We were in Zakynthos. We were in, oh gosh, Meteora. Just kind of jumped around the country a little bit and tried to spend a little bit of time in each spot. But anytime we say to our children, “Favorite trip ever?” It's Greece. Here's the words, they say, “Those blues.”

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  2:02 

Yeah. The visuals are great. The colors are fantastic. The people are warm and friendly, and the food is off the charts. Yeah. 

 

Scott Allen  2:11 

And that's what I say to folks. I'm like, “Look, you can get an incredible meal for like €55 with a bottle of wine. The history, our kids love Greek mythology. So, it was hilarious, we were walking around Athens with an archeologist, and he's telling stories, and our girls were like, “Oh…” And I can't even name the gods. Like, “Zeus, oh, he did this to Mithra, and blah, blah, blah, blah.” It was so awesome. So, you've got the history, which is absolutely mind boggling. So, just an incredible time. Well, that's not why we're here today, to discuss Greece. That's a different podcast, but, oh my gosh, I could talk about it. So, you're talking with folks every week, just like I'm talking with folks every week. And I think what I love about this conversation is that we get to pick your brain a little bit and hear about what's on your radar. What are the hot topics for folks that you're speaking with? What's top of mind for them? What are you seeing right now?

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  3:06 

Every business is a little bit different. Every business is in a different phase in kind of their cycle, and their growth, and their establishment. So, people run in with different things. I think, as leadership guys, we always know that difficult conversations are tough to have. People usually don't fully commit to really getting through the issue at hand, they kind of always back off and wimp out a little bit. It's like, “No, you really can't do that.” And I think that is something that we're always helping people with, regardless of what it is. But some of the things that I think I help people with most is trying to get clarity on something to just kind of say, “Let's strip away what's not important right now and really focus on what is important.” And then I think another element that I think is easier sometimes for a third party or a coach or someone like myself to help with is to kind of sequence of events. To say, “Listen, all these things you're talking about are really important. Let's put this one at the top of the list, and here's why. And here's why we should be patient on some of these other issues.” So, sequencing, timing, and patience, I think, are the things that are hard for us as individuals to see when we're in the storm and it's easier for someone else to see. And so, I think being clear helps you be able to understand the proper sequencing timing and to be able to be patient when there's a lot going on. And I think, if there's a common theme today, it's ‘there's just a lot going on,’ right?

 

Scott Allen  4:26 

Yes. In your book, ‘Clarity,’ and, for listeners, we're going to have links in the show notes so you'll be able to access this, you tell this beautiful story about your father at the very, very beginning, but then you talk about organizations. And it's the symptoms. You come in and we've got things like accountability, agency, expectations, alignment, being too busy, conflict, culture, turnover and retention, profitability, growth. Those are the things that people bring you in to talk about, and those are some of the symptoms that, probably, some of what you just said isn't in alignment.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  5:02 

Yeah. And I think, sometimes… I didn't write a book because, like, “Oh, I feel like I need to write a book.” It's like, anytime I get into something and I start repeating myself a lot, I'm like, “I should probably take this as a cue. This is a pattern, and I want to kind of codify this pattern.” And so, these are the things that people were running into trouble with the most, the things that I know that I struggled with in my career at different points with different companies. And I think, when we talk about, let's say, getting that clarity, I was trying to strip away. And I think there's a reason why I follow this process of saying, “Here are these things that are symptoms.” I'm not saying they're not important. If you have a fever, a fever is important to take care of. If you have left arm pain, that's something you should probably look into pretty quick but it's not really the core problem. You may be having the onset of a heart attack, or you may be having the onset of the flu, or COVID, or something like that. The underlying condition is deeper. And I think, a lot of times, we recognize that with ourselves with health problems, and so we say, like, “Okay, treat the symptoms,” or sometimes we ignore the symptoms. But, in business, we usually take action on the symptoms and then think we're done. I'm always really trying to push people to be a little bit more curious. As an outsider, it's easier for me to ask questions and to dig a little bit deeper, so let's get down to the root cause, or the true underlying issue that is at hand so that we can really make a lasting impact. Otherwise, you're just perennially treating symptoms. You're taking another aspirin, you're taking another pill for this or that. It's like maybe diet and exercise are the solution. And, “Well, I don't want to hear that.” “Well, it's what you need to hear.”

 

Scott Allen  6:40 

Take us on a story about that. So, you walk in… And I know you've got some stories and some characters and case studies throughout the book, which are great because you follow some of these individuals, but let's talk a little bit about that. How does it work when you encounter this? You see the symptoms, but people, again, are focused kind of on those symptoms. And take me through that process with some of your clients. I'm just really interested in knowing this.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  7:05 

I think there's these kinds of stories we have in the book about these fictional characters, and they're kind of an amalgam of personal experiences and things like that. But one of the characters, the heroine of the story, because there's a heroine that's a thread through the book, bears a lot from a particular client to mine, and she knows who she is. And she's an amazing woman, and I love her to death. When we first started working together, it was like many clients I work with, it’s like just Whack-a-mole. Dealing with this problem, and as soon as you take care of that, another one pops up, and another one pops up. It was like, “Oh my gosh, people are quitting. We got to deal with that. Oh my gosh, now we have money issues because we're paying everyone a bunch of money. Oh my gosh, we've got people who aren't doing what they're supposed to be doing. I'm having trouble with accountability, and I'm paying a lot of money.” And it's just one after another. It finally came down to, “Okay, let's stop playing Whack-a-mole with the symptoms. Let's get down to what is the root cause.” And part of it was she as an individual needed to re-engage as a leader, instead of just letting other people do all the leading for her. It was her presence and imposing her desire and her will on the organization with a little bit more force than just saying, “I've explained it to you, why did you not get it?” And I think that was the turning point because once we got to that, and she decided to engage, her problems started just evaporating because they weren't really the problems. They were the symptoms. So, if, let's say I have left arm pain, I lower my heart rate, I do whatever the Apple Watch tells me to do, it doesn't mean my heart's healthy. But if I go in and I say, “Listen, the root cause is, hey, you need to eat better, you need to lower your cholesterol, you need to do all these other things because your heart needs to be healthier. Let's get a healthier heart. So, we're going to exercise, we're going to build your cardiovascular strength, we're going to eat better, and we're going to maybe do something to lower our cholesterol.” These symptoms tend to dissipate because I've dealt with the core issue, and the core issue in that case was really re-engaging forcefully, not in a dictatorial way, but just asserting presence and asserting will, and these symptoms dissipated. And it was a miraculous kind of transformation of the organization. I think that happens, more often than not, when people don't get sidetracked by the symptoms and playing Whack-a-mole. So if you feel like you're playing Whack-a-mole, you're not digging deep enough, you're not curious enough about what the real root cause is.

 

Scott Allen  9:27 

Well, and at times, also, you're part of the problem. Leadership is such a beautiful mirror, like parenting is a beautiful mirror, where it's very easy for an incident to occur, me to externalize and blame other, “They're not. They didn't. They won't. They can't. I said…” But it's very, very, very difficult for us to look inward and say, “Okay, what do I own in this? I'm a little bit of a whirling dervish. I haven't put systems in place. I'm not rigid with having a weekly meeting where we actually go through our KPIs, or go through our objectives, or really revisit. And, in the meeting, hold people accountable. And so, you start to kind of unearth some of what that individual, if they're open to it. And I imagine something she discovered was that she was, in some ways, part of the problem. 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  10:16 

100%. “Let's just be a little bit scientific about this, what's the common denominator here?” “None of my people are accountable.” It's like, “All right. Well, are they all at fault, or maybe there's… Let's do a little Pareto chart here, there's something that's rising to the top here.”

 

Scott Allen  10:30 

(Laughs) Let’s do a fishbone analysis and figure this out. And it's interesting too, how the human being will play… I had a guest on, his name's Robert Livingston, and he had this quote. And I'm not going to get it exactly right, but he said something to the effect of, “When it comes to mental gymnastics, most of us are Olympians.”

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  10:48 

I love that. 

 

Scott Allen  10:51 

Isn't that great? 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  10:51

Yeah, that's awesome.

 

Scott Allen  10:52 

And then what I hear sometimes in organizations is, “Oh, I just can't stand Gen Z's. They don't want to work.” And so, to take myself psychologically off the hook, I will blame, literally, entire generations of people so I don’t have to kind of look in the mirror and say, “What could I potentially own in some of this?” And again, I'm not speaking from a place of, “Oh, I have this all figured out.” It's just an interesting dynamic that I bump into often.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  11:18 

We're so fallible in the way we like to get the answer. What is the recipe? How do you do this? And there are countless articles that are on LinkedIn every day and on Facebook about like, “Here are the three things you need to do. Here are the five things you need to do.” And the reality is what they always leave out is what's the context? For whom? In what situation? Everyone is different. And a great leader has a lot of gears. They know how to motivate particular people, and who needs maybe a little bit of tough love now and then, who needs a little bit more support and time to develop. And that is the kind of thing that can't be written down into an article. It's like, “Here's how to be a great leader.” In different circumstances at different times, based on what the conditions are, and who the people involved are, you need to be a different person. So, being very adaptable. It's one thing to be adaptable, it's another thing to know what form to take and what moment. So, you need to really listen carefully so that you can understand the situation. And I always talk about this, like, you gotta maintain balance. Balance is not something you, like, “I read this article, now I'm a leader. And if I follow these three things, it's good.” Balance is a state that you can achieve, but it requires tremendous work and feedback to maintain. You don't have, let's say, the feedback, you can't maintain your balance. And so, I think that's what everyone forgets, is that, if I'm going down a hill fast, it's easier to maintain balance. And if I'm maybe going up a slope on a bike, and I've lost some speed, I need to manage my balance differently. Leadership's the same way. Sometimes I need to coalesce around an idea and maybe not have as much divergent thought. Sometimes I need to have lots of divergent thought. It's never like, “This is the right amount all the time.” It's like driving your car in third gear all the time. It's hard to start, and it's hard to go fast. You can make it work. It's not really effective.

 

Scott Allen  13:19 

Yeah, there's a scholar, Barbara Kellerman. She was at Harvard and Kennedy School, and she calls it her leadership system. That it's kind of a relationship with leaders, followers, context. So, you brought up context; critical element. And there's just an infinite number of variables in those three things that I just mentioned. As a leader, are you skilled at, to your point, staying present, being mindful, understanding your options, balancing some of these polarities, or dichotomies, or paradoxes, we could say? Because, in certain situations, you may be overly empathetic, and actually part of the problem because you're not getting people accountable. In other situations, you may be leaning too hard on accountability and lacking empathy, and that's why you're losing people. But the infinite number of elements that are required of a great leader, put on top of that the expertise around the business, whatever that entails as far as where they're headed as an organization in that front, so it really is Herculean when you think of… And especially with, oftentimes, no training, or low levels of training. Especially when it comes to the leadership piece of it, people aren't walking in experts in all of these different facets of leadership, skilled in inspiring a team, building a team, holding people accountable, difficult conversations. “What leadership style should I use in this moment? Oh, I should be a little more democratic, but not too democratic.” “How do I create psychological safety so the team talks?”

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  14:48 

Well, what's fascinating to me is we learn by mimicking. At a very young age… And one of the interesting things about the pandemic is they said, with younger children that couldn't see their parents' lips, they really had a deficiency in learning how to speak and things like that. They delayed responses in those regards. We mimic what we see and observe. Just like you are what you eat, in many ways, we are what we observe. So, let's take a look at, as a society, what we're observing. Let's take a look at, let's say, is there any really good leadership lessons being learned in a show like Survivor? I'm not saying it's bad television or it's not entertaining, but that is really not the way to be a great leader. But that's what we absorb, and so that's what people buy into. But there's no police officer whose life looks like what it is on TV. You talk to any police officer, there's lots of paperwork. There's no lawyer that spends that amount of time not in front of a computer and in the courtroom. There's very few doctors that live that kind of glamorous life. And I think a lot of people have such a terrible view of salespeople because they always get such a bad rap on TV, and stuff like that, the used car salesman. It's not to say that there aren't terrible salespeople out there…

 

Scott Allen  16:05 

Sure. And doctors, and [Inaudible 16:07] Let's take 10%... Well, no, that's too much. Let's go 5% of any profession, probably ruining it for the other 95.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  16:16 

Exactly. But what are we ingesting? And what is giving us a false sense of understanding of what's going on? And what do we end up mimicking? And which is why I often see people who have leadership training. There are many people who do that, but let's just take a look at something where you can take a course on, let's say, negotiating. Most people never take a course in negotiating, so when they go into a negotiation for the first time, or even if they're experienced, they have no idea what to do, and they mimic stuff they see on TV. And then it's just a train wreck because that's the only thing that they've been exposed to. We kind of are what we consume, which is why we often say leaders are readers. What are you consuming? And if you really haven't consumed anything, are you thinking that leadership always has to be George Patton leading a column of tanks into battle? Sometimes maybe, but not all the time. And I think that's the fallacy of how we screw ourselves up by ingesting too many bad models.

 

Scott Allen  17:16 

Even some of the books that we can ingest. Okay. I'm gonna pick on a book right now that I actually respect in many ways. I'm going to go with the book by Jocko Willink, ‘Extreme Ownership.’ I'm listening to this, and I was listening to it so it's like Batman's reading you a story. It was great. And I have insane levels of respect for what he said, but I thought, “Oh my gosh, I can just see manufacturing floors and departments in small businesses throughout the country in the world where people are going out and trying to be ‘I'm an Extreme Ownership guy, and that's the culture I'm going to try and yell.’” And so, what I really respected about Jacko and Babin was in their second book, ‘Dichotomies.’ Have you read it? 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  17:59

I haven't read that one yet. No.

 

Scott Allen  18:01 

It's good. What I really respect about them is that at the beginning of that book, they're like, “Look, sometimes when what you write goes out into the world, you learn. And what we learned was that this extreme ownership can be taken to an extreme as well.” So, that is all about these ‘Dichotomies.’ And so, they go through these different dichotomies. We could call them polarities, we could call them tensions. Two ends of the same spectrum; leadership and management, or empathy and accountability. So, he says, “Look, we’ve got to balance these things.” And we need to be paying close attention, as you said, to what's appropriate for the situation. Sometimes we need to move the needle a little bit, and swing a little less hard, or pay closer attention to this side of the coin, so to speak. So, I really, really appreciated it. But yeah, you have John Maxwell's ‘21 Irrefutable Laws,’ again, some really good stuff in there. A lot of kind of face validity as far as… And 21 irrefutable? I don't know.

 

(Laughter)

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  18:59 

That's a strong statement, but what I've found, because I've been doing the podcast for a long time, that stuff sells. 

 

Scott Allen  19:08 

Yes. That's it. I was just gonna say it, it's marketing more than it is…

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  19:12 

Yeah, I agree. Through all the years, we've been doing the podcast, Jan and I. We've had so many people on the show, and some of the people, like the best minds on leadership, have the least amount of exposure externally. “Wow. This person really gets it. They're amazing. They're a great leader. I didn't have my own company, I'd quit and work for them tomorrow.”  Just like, “Wow, I want to follow them.” Their business suffers because they're unwilling to take extreme positions because they realize you just can't be that way. That's not the way it works. Then there are other people who have a fraction of the understanding or the true leadership mentality, but yet what they say and how they say it is so compelling and extreme and controversial that it's like, “Hey…” And I think that is one of these societal problems wrestling with right now, is in the din of all this messaging that's going out there, for you to be heard, you have to ring your dinner bell loud. And so you can't just be like vanilla. You need to say something so extreme that it's just like, “Oh my gosh, that's amazing.” And people go, like, “Oh, wow. Let's all do that.” And it's like, “No. That's just too extreme.” It's like the diet fad. “You should eliminate all of this except for kale from your diet.” It's like we always look at the people that live to be 100 and 105, and stuff like that, and they eat tons of stuff that people tell you not to eat, they just do it all in moderation. It's like balance. It gets back to this common sense stuff.

 

Scott Allen  20:44 

Yeah. Back to the blue zones. Back to Greece.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  20:48 

Yeah. Full circle. 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  20:50

It's an interesting space. And, again, you've got… So, even when someone is, leaders or readers, lifelong learning. What we're consuming is important. And again, I really, really enjoy Jocko's books. I enjoy Simon Sinek. I just recently finished a couple others that, quote-unquote, would be a little bit lighter, kind of more of like an N-of-1 type story, but it's good. It's really good. And, at times it's not sharing the whole story, or getting to the level of complexity of… And that's hard. That's really hard with this topic. It just is. And so, that's something I've been reflecting on a lot, is what's the right level? Because, top of the funnel, yeah, John Maxwell book can be great, but is Maxwell now going to take them on a journey where they get a little more complex in their thinking so that they can be set up to be successful? Because if we present it as it's just simple and easy, and these are the 21 Irrefutable laws, know these and you're good, I think we're also setting that person up to not do well potentially.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  21:55 

I remember in college, and I was getting an engineering degree. And it was quite a struggle for me, but I was always jealous because the professor would talk about these equations, and all this other stuff. It was hard. And there would be people, like, he'd be saying something in class, and I knew the equation we were talking about, and he'd said, “What happens if you increase the pressure over here?” And there's, like, a few kids at the beginning of the class who’d be like, “Oh my God,” because they knew what happened. Because they understood the equation, and I was just like, “Oh, no, give me some numbers. I'll punch it in, and I'll tell you what happens because I don't understand how this works yet, but I know the equation to use.” And so, literally, if you want someone designing bridges and systems in your world, you want the people who were at the front of the class, you did not want me because I was dangerous enough to be able to use the equation but I didn't understand fully. When we throw out, like, the 21 irrefutable laws, or the five maxims for this, or whatever it is, and you're just playing the game, plugging numbers into the equation, sometimes we create people who are more dangerous than useful. And so, you have to get that deep understanding. Reading a lot of different people is important. And I think one of the areas where I'd like to see people read more is not just on the pragmatic or practical portion of leadership, but it's the philosophical underpinnings. And I think a lot of times when you have a value system, and you have philosophical underpinnings, and I don't care whether it's Eastern philosophy or Western philosophy, to study a little bit about philosophy because that's the stuff that doesn't change. When we talk about things that are irrefutable, I think, let's talk about, let's say, the philosophical underpinnings of what it means to be a good person. What it means to live a good life. What it means to have integrity. And I think, when we talk about things that are irrefutable, those are the things that probably matter most in your value system and they're not necessarily in a lot of the leadership dialog today.

 

Scott Allen  23:55 

Yeah. That's why I'm kind of amazed at… Who's our friend who's really made stoicism so sexy?

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  24:02

Oh, Holiday? Ryan Holiday?

 

Scott Allen  24:04

Yeah. He's just made it… Just taken that kind of out of the dirt and made it just really the coolest thing in the world, which is great. I think it's awesome as well. But yeah, oftentimes, that's not the sexy stuff. It's not flashy. And, to your point, that some of the timeless wisdom, whether it's from some of the faiths, whether it's from some of the philosophers. And then, I think another challenge we have at times, and I'd love to get your thoughts on this, at times, there's an overly rosy kind of picture painted of leadership. And it's chocolate bars and warm fuzzies and tulips. At times you have to consider the work of Machiavelli, or your people will die, or your family will die, or you'll be taken advantage of. And so, there's this kind of bent towards it's always empathetic leadership, but it's always compassionate leadership, it's always authentic leadership. And I understand that, and I agree with that. And I think we have to have an appreciation for the spectrum because you're going to come across someone who is not of that mindset, and, in some cases, they might be building some of the most valuable organizations in the world, have a very different mindset than what we write about in the literature. Musk is not interested in compassionate and empathetic leadership, and so that's a thing. And we have to be aware of that, and we have to know that, and we have to explore some of that side of the work as well because I think we do a disservice by not exploring some of that spectrum.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  25:36 

Well, I think, like, our modern day Machiavelli in literature today, and probably, thinking, is Jeff Pfeffer out of Stanford. I think when he takes a look at the way he approaches things, he says, “Hey, your number one job as a leader is to maintain power. Because if you don’t maintain power, you can't continue to be a leader.” And so that sounds so evil and bad. And there are people who have co-opted that idea, whether it's from Machiavelli or not, to do horrible things. So, let's not just say across the board, but I think you can't undermine the logical nature of that thought process to say, “Listen…” You can't go in there and just be a martyr and just like, “Well, I lost power. I guess we lost.” It's like, “No. We really want to do things for the right reasons, and for the good of society, or the good of the people that I have a fiduciary responsibility to.” That is an important element. The other aspect that I think is really fascinating is… I'll never forget when I was young and early in my career, I had such a disdain for upper management. I thought they were so stupid at times. And then, maybe there were instances where they were. But as I climbed the ladder and I got into a position of authority and power, I started to realize, “Okay, there's always information I didn't have.” And it never became more real to me when I had a bunch of employees, and I was a partner in a firm, and we were talking about some employee that was let go and everyone was all upset about it because, “I can't believe they let them go,” and this and that. And, it's like, “If you knew the details,” you'd be like, “Wow, can't believe that person stayed around for so long.”

 

Scott Allen  27:11

Thankfully, they’re gone. (Laughs)

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  27:10 

But you can't share those details because those are the kinds of things that are protected by HR, and things, and other laws. And so, seek to understand, I think, is the great philosophical construct because if there's something that doesn't make sense to you, seek to understand and open your mind to possibilities that there may be information you do not have. And I think that is one of these ills that plague society today because people are seeking to retort, seeking to criticize instead of to understand. And I think if we just spent a little more time seeking to understand, we'd be in a better place. And having an open mind to say, “Maybe there's something here I don't understand.” And I think, especially with very complicated, complex problems, it's nice when they're simple. They're never simple. There's always something that you didn't consider. There's a third level to the chessboard that may not be visible to you.

 

Scott Allen  28:10 

(Laughs) [Inaudible 28:10] is not visible to you. Or the fourth level, at least, isn't visible to you. There's a level.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  28:18 

Yeah. And I was the guy who didn't understand how the equation works, so it's just, wow. I wish I had that deep understanding.

 

Scott Allen  28:26 

Jim, as we begin to wind down our time together, is there anything else that you've been pondering or thinking about? Maybe it's been conversations on the podcast, maybe not. But what's been keeping your mind cooking lately as you exist in this space? 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  28:39 

It's an interesting question because I just started kind of work on what I think will be my next book. The process makes you think better, and I like the fact that it forces you to clarify your thinking and really be sharp with your mental approach on things. And so, really what is keeping me busy is the concept of intentionality, and that'll be the next book, ‘Intentionality.’ Because I think once you have some clarity, you can then be intentional. But what does it mean to be intentional? And where should you be intentional? I think those are things that really allow people to focus their scarce resources. And our scarce resources as humans are time, energy. To some degree, money. Where are we going to put our scarce resources for the maximum impact so that we can have a fulfilling life? So we can have an impact in the right places for the people who either we lead or the people we care about? That's what’s keeping me busy, and it's a good problem to think about.

 

Scott Allen  29:39 

I love that word almost as much as I like the word ‘curiosity.’ But intentionality. Wow, that'd be so cool, man, that you wrote the book ‘Clarity,’ and then the book ‘Intentionality.’ Boom.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  29:50 

It might be ‘Intentional.’ How about that?

 

(Laughter)

 

Scott Allen  29:54 

No, but I just love that word because it requires forethought. It requires some level of wisdom. It requires education. It requires experience. “There's intentionality in how I'm proceeding.” Back to what you said 25 minutes ago in the conversation, is there forethought and consideration, and is there a presence in my decision making about how to move forward? When I'm not getting the results that I want, am I going through the filter of what do I own in this first? That's, for me, kind of, intentionality. And there's a process there that helps someone guide themselves through some of that.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  30:29 

Here's a funny thing. People hire leadership coaches and folks like us because they have someone, they say, “This person needs executive presence.” And that's always one of these things, like, “You gotta help this person with their executive presence.” That's fine. I don't have a problem helping people with that, but I say the kind of stuff most people focus on is the candy coating. “I need you to look the part. I need you to speak the part. Stand taller.” Do all this. Do all that. The real bone structure beneath all that is if you are clear-minded and you act with intention, you could be wearing a hoodie, and it wouldn't matter. You could speak with a southern drawl and it wouldn't matter. Because if you have clarity and you act with intention, people are going to see something. That is presence. So, these are kind of the root foundational elements of really being able to lead people. It's not to say that… It's easier if you have the nice candy coating, but the candy coating alone without the bone structure beneath it is a little bit hollow and inauthentic. 

 

Scott Allen  31:36 

Yep, 100%. In that kind of structure could then also be the person's value system. It's just that foundation there. And, yeah. Okay. I always end the podcast by asking guests what they've been listening to, streaming, reading. What's caught your attention? It could be this latest season of Survivor. 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  31:56

It is not. 

 

Scott Allen  31:58 

It could be something else that's caught your attention recently. Although, Jim, it wouldn't be fun to see you on Survivor? The leadership expert navigating Survivor.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  32:07

I'd be terrible. I'd be terrible. 

 

Scott Allen  32:11 

(Laughs) You'd get on the show. You just need to say, “Look, I've been studying leadership for 27 years. I'm awesome at it.” They’d be like, “Okay.”

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  32:17 

I’d be the first week out. I wouldn't make it one week just because I just don't play games anymore. My kids would be so disappointed in me.

 

(Laughter)

 

Scott Allen  32:31 

You'd have to come back and, for 15 weeks, keep the secrets. And every week, they just watch you fail a little bit more. That's how it'd be with me in those physical challenges. “You couldn't stand on the pole, Dad?”

 

(Laughter)

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  32:48 

I know where I stand. 

 

Scott Allen  32:50 

So, what's caught your attention? What have you been reading, listening to, streaming? What might listeners be interested in?

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  32:55 

One of the people I enjoy listening to every morning is Peter Zion. He's a geopolitical strategist, I really enjoy his viewpoints on things. I wouldn't say I'm a disciple there sometimes. I'm like, “I'm not sure you're right.” But he's a good thinker and I like the way he thinks. And so, I'm a big, passionate believer in, like, how do other people think? Another person who thinks in an interesting way is Huberman, he thinks in an interesting way. And I'm not saying I support everything these people say, but I think another person who thinks in very interesting ways that I think is clear and clean and precise is like a Jordan Peterson. I think he's interesting. And I think sometimes he's just, “Okay, I see how you got to where you were going.” And I think there's a complexity and a simplicity to the way he does it, which I think is interesting to watch. And so, there are all kinds of people that do stuff. I'm always reading books to get ready for podcasts, and I'm always interested in books that kind of get you to rethink paradigms that we've fallen into. And I think there's a book recently, Leslie Zane wrote it. We had her on the podcast. I forget the name of her book, I really feel bad about that right now. But her concept was a fallacy we have in marketing where we've always been told for how many years in every MBA forum that differentiation is the key. That's really not the key. In fact, that works against you. Familiarity is the key. You want to be familiar first and then a little bit unique. If you're unfamiliar, you're too different, people won't adopt your idea. They won't adopt your product. And that's the antithesis of what's being taught in universities for decades now and still today. And I thought anytime you see someone who's got… No this has been dogma, but it's not dogma anymore. You’ve got to really rethink this. And it's not a new idea, but sometimes it takes academia, like, a really long time to retool and readjust. And I think this is one of those cases that we need to make sure that we adjust faster because dogmas get entrenched. People's careers are built around them, and that can be dangerous.

 

Scott Allen  35:00 

100%. Yeah. You'd mentioned the political or geopolitical strategist. There's another gentleman, Ian Bremmer, who's just really [Inaudible 35:10] to listen to. I listened to him with Scott Galloway a week ago, and I listened to him with the folks from Ted, and it's just amazing his mind. How he will take you on a tour of the world, and you can name a country, and he'll tell you what's going on and where they stand in the larger context and the options they have available to them. He's playing global. That's not even four dimensional chess, I don't know what that's called, even.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  35:35 

Yeah. I saw him interviewed on a different podcast, and it was just like, “Oh, this guy… Yes. More.” And I think that's the sad state of affairs today is, for me to listen to you, and even make a statement, like, I listen to this person on this podcast, like, “Well, I don't like this guy because I know the way he thinks.” No, I don't agree with everyone I listen to, but I enjoy listening to people who think well. It's a respectful argument. I played sports through most of my life, and played a little bit in my later days in club sports in college, you don't have to hate the people you're playing against. You can have such a healthy respect for the person you're playing against. You don't have to agree with them. But the reality is, like, “Listen, that was a good game, and I'm glad that you played us tough, and I may even be glad you beat us because you brought out my best in that game.” And so, somebody who thinks well is someone we should applaud. We don't have to agree with them, we just have to say let's be around people who think well, because, when you're not, you're probably not thinking well either.

 

Scott Allen  36:32 

And it helps you understand the other side. It helps you understand the other arguments, or different factions of the arguments, different perspectives of the argument. I couldn't agree with you more.

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  36:41 

100%.

 

Scott Allen  36:42

Couldn't agree with you more. And yeah, it's a fascinating context, and then landscape. And I listened to Huberman with Morgan Housel the other day, and that was a fascinating conversation. Psychology and money. So good. So good. And again, I don't agree with everything Huberman stands for, or, of course, there's imperfections out there in the media that I don't know where that stands. Lex Fridman, people are inflamed that he had Donald Trump on. Lex Fridman, some of his podcast episodes have been some of my favorite three hours of listening ever on a podcast when he's talking to a scientist about Planet Nine, and I'm just thrilled and amazed at the conversation. So, yeah, it's interesting. And something I'm working on in 2024… Actually, that was back then. In 2025 what I'm working on is how do I consume and get my information, but be informed, but not inflamed. And so, it's interesting. Peter Diamandis, futurist, he says, “Your mind is a neural net, be careful what you train it on.” I took that to heart. I was like, “Yeah, what am I exposing my mind to? And how do I stay informed so that I'm not misinformed, but not subject myself to a lot of the noise that's out there?”

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  38:00 

Yeah. Once again, it gets back to balance. I think a topic we've been talking about for years is diversity. I think we've got all our metrics of diversity wrong. I want diversity of how you think. That's what I want. I want diversity of the mind. Now, maybe your experiences and your cultural heritage shape how you think. That's great, but, at the end of the day, I really care about your perspective. I don't care about the other stuff. I'd like to be, as Dr. King suggested, colorblind. I want to be blind to all that. I'm more curious about how you think and why you think that way, and if you think well. And those are the things I think that matter. And so, if we don't have a diversity of information feeding our brain, it's eating a diet that is just all meat, or all kale, or all this, or all that. Probably not the healthiest.

 

Scott Allen  38:45 

Yeah. Definitely a dimension. When we talk about diversity, rarely do people's minds go to diversity of thought, diversity of background, degree, experience. And I think all of those are dimensions that are incredibly valuable in that conversation because, if we're working a problem, as many eyes as possible on some of these four dimensional challenges, some of these complex adaptive challenges, we need those different minds looking at it from very different perspectives to help us chart a path forward because no one has the answer. That doesn't exist. Sir, thank you so much for the conversation. I really appreciate your time. Thanks for the incredible work that you do. And you're on episode what?

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  39:28

I think we're pretty close to, I think, 450 right now, or something like that. And I think we've got you scheduled to come on an episode. I'm looking forward to that, that'll be fun. You'll probably be close to 500, somewhere in there, I don't know. We’ll see.

 

Scott Allen  39:42 

(Laughs) The leadership podcast, everybody. I'll put a lot of links in the show notes. Take care. Thank you so much, Jim. I appreciate your time today. Be well. I'll see you soon. 

 

Jim Vaselopoulas  39:51 

Thank you, Scott. Take care.

 

 

[End Of Recording]