428. The High Performance Zone with John ‘Gucci’ Foley

Chris Dixon:

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to The ONE Thing Podcast. I'm Chris Dixon.

Nikki Miller:

And I'm Nikki Miller. And today, we have a very special guest, John 'Gucci' Foley, who spent 20 years as a Commander in the U.S. Navy and became a Naval Aviator, and was selected for the Blue Angels and became their Operations Officer and the Lead Solo Pilot. He is also the bestselling author of Fearless Success, and the host of the High Performance Zone Podcast, and the Founder of John Foley Inc. and the Glad to Be Here Foundation.

Chris, this was such a cool conversation. I mean, talk about energy. Guccim as we named and called him at the end, had some of the best energy I've ever heard. It's so clear why he's been able to lead teams, not only in organizations, but also within the Blue Angels.

Chris Dixon:

And you said it, amazing energy, amazing experience. It's awesome how he's taken this career of performing at the highest level in the world's top most elite performing jet team and used that to build a framework around how you can grow as a leader, form elite teams, and run a business at a high level.

Nikki Miller:

And there's such a correlation between excelling at what he did and excelling in business. And just this idea that excellence doesn't really know an industry or a name, it's really how people choose to show up in an organization. And, also, I love this idea that at the highest level, I mean, they're doing things that have the largest stakes, much more at stake than us on a day-to-day in business, and they're still using some of these very basic principles in order to excel. Namely, the biggest principle I took away, is that these people coming into these organizations, some of the best pilots in the world, still have coaches.

Chris Dixon:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think there's so much to take away from this conversation, so why don't we go jump in and talk to John 'Gucci' Foley.

Nikki Miller:

Let's do it. All right. Hello everyone, and welcome back to The ONE Thing Podcast. We are so excited, we've got a very special guest today, John 'Gucci' Foley, who, for 20 years was a Commander in the U.S. Navy and became a Naval Aviator, and was selected for the Blue Angels and became their Operations Officer and Lead Solo Pilot. Also, the author of Fearless Success, and the host of the High Performance Zone Podcast, and Founder of the Glad To Be Here Foundation. Welcome, John. We're so excited to have you.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Thank you, man. I'm glad to be here. And I guarantee you that statement will take on a deeper meaning for everybody that's listening.

Nikki Miller:

Well, we're super excited. I already told Chris before he jumps into all of the pilot references, which I know he's going to want to do on this, I have one very specific question that I've always wanted to know. How does one get their call sign? How did you become John 'Gucci' Foley?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, all fighter pilots get call signs. Let me give you a first clue, you don't get to pick it, and if you like it, it doesn't stick. So, one day, we're flying in Top Gun, in fact, I did some of the flying in that original movie, we're up in Fallon, Nevada, and things are going pretty well. It's a Friday night, we go, "Let's go out in town." So, you know, we're all going to meet in the lobby and everyone else is wearing jeans and t-shirts. I walked down wearing slacks, a button down shirt - here's what killed me - a thin black leather tie. That wasn't cool.

Nikki Miller:

A leather tie is bold. That's bold, John.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

It wasn't even cool in the '80s, right? And my teammates, they look at me and they go, "That's Gucci," and I flinched. See, now once you flinch, they know they got you. Now, it didn't help that I was actually living on a sailboat, driving an Alfa Romeo at the same time, too, so I gave them lots of ammunition.

Nikki Miller:

I love that. Well, now the kids say it, it's a saying "You got to stay Gucci." So, your call sign became a cultural phenomenon.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, and that's the crazy part. See, when I got it, it wasn't cool, and now it is. So, what's that karma? I mean, it went from I hated it to now it's cool.

Nikki Miller:

What really happened is that you won in the end, John. That's what happened.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

All right. All right. I'll go with that. I'm okay with it now.

Chris Dixon:

John, I'm at risk of making this whole podcast about airplanes and flying. I'll keep it contained because, as I mentioned to you before we started, I have a passion for flying. I went and saw the Blue Angels for the first time when I was 12 years old. My dad took me to the Air and Sea Show, the huge event they have off the Coast of Florida.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Fort Lauderdale.

Chris Dixon:

In Fort Lauderdale. I saw the Blue Angels, and that's when I began my flying journey. But I'm curious to hear how you got into it, and how you discovered, aviation and how it's grown into what you have today in your business and your books.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, here's what's classic because it's very similar to you. So, I was actually born in Germany. My dad was an army officer, and I love my dad, I wanted to be just like him. But he was an engineer and he is an army officer, so that's what I thought it was going to be. One day he took me to the air show - here's ironic, Chris - 12 years old. But my 12 year old story was Newport, Rhode Island. And I looked up in the sky, and you know, you've been in an air show, it's visceral. Man, you can feel it. It's like the biggest sporting event you're at. There's smoke oil in the air. You feel the jets. The crowd is all around you.

And I turned to my dad that day, I said, "Dad. I'm going to do that." A 12 year old kid, right? I remember distinctly that day, I can still bring it clear in my mind because it hit me in the heart, not the head. And I think that's a critical point for any entrepreneur out there, any successful person, you got to connect the heart and the head. And that happened that day. It happened in an instant. Now, was it easy? Hell, no. Are you kidding me? It took me 18 years, tons of obstacles. I got rejected three times for the academies. I accidentally shot a missile by mistake one day. I mean, I had all kinds of struggles getting to that day. But 18 years later, man, strapping in, in that blue jet with the gold helmet, and now it's about sharing those experiences in a way that helps others.

Nikki Miller:

I'm sorry, can we go back to you shooting a missile by mistake?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, did that catch your attention?

Nikki Miller:

I just saw you, like, trying to roll right over that.

Chris Dixon:

You were brushing over that.

Nikki Miller:

Yeah. You shot a missile by mistake, John. How did that happen?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, it gets worst. I almost shot down my own boss. So, who's ever out there listening to this thing, don't do this, man. I don't know what this is in your world, but it ain't good, man. It's not good.

Nikki Miller:

This person doesn't get invited back to the second interview.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Exactly. No, man. I got grounded. I mean, of course. Okay, so quick story. So, Navy fighter pilots, you know, after you go through the training, you get deployed on aircraft carriers. So, I'm deployed on my first aircraft carrier, it's called The Enterprise.

We're out there over in the Persian Gulf area. This is back when Iran was the problem before Iraq. Remember, they were mining the Straits of Hormuz. So, I'm leading some preparatory strikes, we know we got some stuff coming up. And I'm a flight lead of the squadron and of the carrier. And so, we're going to go out there and we're going to drop some bombs and then shoot some missiles. I mean, that was the game plan. And so, I briefed this thing and I dropped some ordinance. I pull off, my wingman joins me and he goes, "Hey, Gucci. You got a hung bomb." And I'm going, "What?" I look out there and there's bombs hung on my airplane. Well, you know, that's not a normal thing and they don't like you to land on the aircraft carrier with bombs bouncing around the flight deck, so you got to jettison this thing. It's called an emergency jettison procedure.

Now, I'm in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Normally, you would go through the checklist, you go through all these special procedures. I'm looking around, I'm like, "You know what? I'm just going to puke this bomb off." So, I don't break out my checklist, I reached up - there's this red guarded switch. There's a reason it's red. There's a reason it's guarded. It's the emergency jettison switch - and I hit the button. And the next thing I know, this missile comes flying off my jet, a live heat seeking missile. And I got to tell you, it goes right by your head and it's like shoosh, and I'm like, "Oh, shit. Come back." You know, I mean, if you ever had another shit moment, this is one of them, man, I got to tell you.

And it's a heat seeking missile, so it's going to go whatever it locks on. And my boss was flying a jet not far away from me. Luckily, it missed him, but it locked on the sun. Now, you think I got a problem on my hands, right? So, the bottom line is I land the jet --

Chris Dixon:

Yeah. A few problems.

Nikki Miller:

Yeah. I was just about to say, I can say I've done a lot of stupid things in my career, but I've never shot a missile at my boss.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

No. No, not a good thing. Not good at all. Luckily, it missed him. But anyhow, I land the jet and I go walking into the carrier commander, and he goes, "Okay. What happened?" And I go, "Boss, I blew it. You know, I had a hung bomb. I didn't break out my checklist. I ended up getting the switchology mixed up. And when I hit the button, the missile went and sent out the bomb." He goes, "Okay. Thanks for telling me. You're grounded." Now, grounded and pilot don't go together.

So, up to that point, things have been pretty good, section lead, division lead, strike lead. I'm working my way up just like any company. And this is a big setback. So, bottom line is why do you think that mishap happened? What do you think the root cause of that thing was?

Chris Dixon:

Well, you said not using your checklist, certainly that's one of them.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

That's one of them. I'm calling that a material cause. It's not the root cause, though. Keep going. Why do you think? So, you guys are The ONE Thing, so what's the one thing that caused that mishap? There's a bunch of circumstantial stuff, but what was the one thing?

Nikki Miller:

I have to imagine you not following the same process you do every time.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. That's definitely a piece of it. Now, you know what it is? Complacency. It took me three days to figure out that I had gotten too comfortable doing something I shouldn't be comfortable doing. Was it that I didn't follow my process? Yeah, absolutely. Was it that if I had done my checklist, I would have figured it out and broke the chain of events? But it was complacency. You see, I got too comfortable flying with live ordinance. Let me tell you, the first time you fly with live ordinance, little hair stand up on the back of your neck. Little hairs on my head, I used to have hair back then, by the way. But the bottom line is, I had gotten too comfortable.

So, here's the real question for everyone who's listening, what are you complacent about right now? Where is your blind spot in business, in life, in a relationship, it doesn't matter?

And here's the cool part of this story, so I was grounded. I had just applied to the Blue Angels. My commanding officer ripped up the letter, by the way. Which it's kind of interesting, have you ever have somebody pull a letter in front of your face and rip it up? That's truly what transpired. So, once I learned that, it took me a while. I ended up having to go to the Marine Corps. I was an instructor pilot with them, flew jets and taught people how to actually land on aircraft carriers. And then, I got a chance and I got selected for the Blues.

And they asked me in my interview, one of my interview questions was, "Hey, Gucci. Have you ever done anything dumb in an airplane?" That was the interview question. Talk about a setup. You know, we all get interview questions, right? So, how are you going to spin this? Spin it? No, man. I'm authentic. I said, "What? Are you kidding me? All the time. Let me tell you the time I accidentally shot a missile and almost shot down my boss." And they hired me. So, why do you think they hired me? Because of that story. Why would they hire you for that?

Nikki Miller:

Well, hopefully, you attached the lesson that you just shared with us that we can be reflective in the mistakes, which is what really matters at the day, right?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

There you go. It's not the mistake. It's what you learn from it. I mean, it's that simple. And I learned from it in my heart, again not my head. And you're not going to repeat that again, I guarantee you. But more importantly, I can teach it to others.

You see, the Blue Angels, we want not just fighter pilots. We want people that are instructors that can actually teach others. Your real mission is to inspire greatness in another human being. We call ourselves ambassadors of goodwill. That's the mission you want.

Anyhow, I normally don't tell that story, but you caught on to it, Nikki. You grabbed it.

Chris Dixon:

Complacency is a powerful lesson. I mean, I think there's a lot packed in there that you mentioned that everybody can relate to. There's an interesting analogy that I've been exposed to, do you remember the first time you drove on the highway and you're like, "Oh, my God. There's death everywhere. This is terrifying. You're doing 85 miles an hour. This person's texting." Well, when I learned to drive, no one had phones, but you know what I mean? There's chaos all around you. Now, you get on the highway and it feels like nothing. And that's true with everything and anything.

I've been around some extreme sports and people will just get complacent.

It's like cognitive dissonance. So, to your point, how do you recognize your blind spots, because no matter what you're doing, if you do it repetitively enough, you can become complacent.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Okay. So, Chris, you're dead on. And now let's bring it back to not only flying but business. So, there's a way that we fight against that. What do you think it is in business or personal? And I'll give you what I think.

Chris Dixon:

I think reflection is a really powerful tool to bring awareness, and having different tools for reflection and also having forms of accountability to help you see the label from inside the box.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Nice. Nikki?

Nikki Miller:

I would also offer the perspective, this is actually a reference I use really often when I'm teaching big companies about systems and processes. And I had the experience, I have a dear friend who was a commercial pilot who was one time my actual pilot on the plane. And I got to come in early and watch him kind of go through his whole process and he's doing this checklist, and I said, "Hey, Mike. Out of curiosity, how many times have you lifted one of these things off the ground?" He's like, "Man, probably, like, 10,000 at this point." And I said, "Why are you still following this checklist?" And he said, "Because if you don't follow part of your checklist -" I come from a real estate industry "- you get a bad review. If I don't follow my checklist, somebody dies," or I shoot a bomb off at my boss.

So, for me, I think the way that we work around this is by having those checklists and those processes that people follow in order to ensure that even when we get complacent, to Chris's point, when we normalize that we're still following all the things that made us successful in the first place.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. I love it, so I'm going to high five you. I'm going to double stamp that. Absolutely. There's a process and there's a mindset, and I think you need both, by the way. So, fundamentals hit the process. Aviation knows it, well, checklists and all that, you told it really well.

So, on the Blue Angels, though, we discovered that there's actually a secret sauce to doing this. Besides the idea that you brief every time you go flying so you don't wing it, and you hit those processes, you hit those checklists, what are the specifics. And that's fundamental in real estate, in anything, what are your fundamental checklists. Get that done and absolutely don't diverge from that. That's not going to make you great, by the way. That's not greatness. That's just fundamentals.

You know, Nick Saban called me up and had me speak with the Alabama Football Team, and we won the national championship that year, by the way. And I asked him, "Hey, Coach. What do you want me to talk about?"

He goes, "Look, you know what to talk about." He says, "You know I have fundamentals. I have a program. It's part of the process." What he really wanted me to talk about was the mindset, the mindset of greatness. See, that's the differentiator. So, I'm going to say yes to process, yes to all this. In the Blue Angels, we do that. Any other organization in the world, now I've spoken over to 2,000 organizations, I spoke with you all, Keller Williams, by the way. I've spoken to Microsoft, Apple, to all the VC firms, Silicon Valley, BMW, Mercedes Benz, you name it. Here's the key though, the key is not the brief, it's not the preparation, it's not the process. It's what you've learned from that. You see, it's what I call the Glad to be here debrief.

And you know the concept on debrief, that's not a new concept. But what we do better than any other organization in the world is we make that a connective experience. An experience, Chris, you talk about, where accountability is a given. It actually becomes personal responsibility. It's where you connect with your teammate. It's a leadership moment. You have a safe environment so everybody can lay it on the table, be brutally open and honest. Humility reigns, not egos. No withholds. All these things that you see in the corporate world, we found a process and a way to do it that actually allows you to overcome that.

But here's the cool, and this is the last thing on the secret sauce, it's Glad to be here. We celebrate our victories. We focus on the joy of being part of an elite team, the joy of being part of something special. And we end all our comments with the Glad to be here. That's why I'm wearing this shirt, it says Glad to be here. That's the secret sauce. You got to do all that other stuff, but if you want to be great and sustain greatness, you got to connect with the Glad to be here.

Nikki Miller:

Can you expand a little bit more on that? Just really talk about, John, where does the Glad to be here mindset come from and what does it really mean. If I'm using that in a business application, walk me through how I get my team to have a Glad to be here mindset.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. Beautiful, beautiful. Well, the first thing I say anytime I hear a question like that is, Be Gandhi. And why do I say be Gandhi? Be the change you want to see in the world. So, if you want your team to have this engaged - we hear the word engagement all the time - then you better be engaged. If you want your team to be Glad to be here, you better live a Glad to be here life. You better feel like I feel right now, man, I'm just grateful to be with you two. I'm grateful to be on this podcast. I'm grateful to share this information, hopefully, with thousands of people who can use it to make a difference.

So, number one, you got to be authentic. And Glad to be here is not a fufu fluffy statement. It's this combination of excellence, operational excellence with appreciation and gratitude. And you've got to add them both. So, we're highly self-critical of each other, of each, of us first. I am looking inward. You know, if you think about why is the debrief so important? Why do I do this every day of my life, not just in the business? It's because I know that I have to be self-aware first. If I'm self-aware, that's step one. Now, I also got to have the courage to lay it on the table. No withholds. You got to be willing to talk about your own mistakes first.

And that's what we do in the Blue Angels. We don't point out anybody else's mistakes. You look inward first. And it doesn't even have to be a mistake. Here's the mental piece, What could I do just slightly better? What could I have done slightly better for the outcome? Now, what you want to do is you want to make sure that this debrief and the way I teach this is it's not done just when there's mistakes. And you don't do debriefs just when you got a problem with your business. You have to put this into the DNA of your organization. It becomes your cadence of execution.

Just as you all said, it's so important to know your processes, to have the briefs, keep them simple, by the way, communicate well, all those standard things, but what you really need to do is have it in the DNA of your mind, What did I learn today? How did I grow today? And learning and growing is two different things, man. Learning is just I got some new knowledge, hopefully that's happening here on this. But growing is applying it. Growing is saying, "Hey, I know when this works and when it doesn't work". And then, the last, the third piece is giving. You better give. You got to give your knowledge. You got to give your time. You got to give your wisdom to somebody else. And that's really where it starts there, Nikki, it starts with giving.

Chris Dixon:

I have a saying - tell me if this resonates for you, John - to lead from the front, and I guess another way to say that is to lead by example. And I think that's an important hat to wear even in a team of peers, you all have to be leaders in your own way. And I love the way you described it.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

It's even harder there, by the way. Chris, I think you're right, you hit a key. The reinforcement doesn't come from the top. It comes from your peers. And that's sometimes hard. It's hard to be vulnerable in front of your peers. Heck, it's hard to be vulnerable in front of your spouse or your significant other. That's the absolute most important person.

Nikki Miller:

You said something earlier, too, which is I think a really important call out, John, which is, you don't just do these debriefs or you don't just be vulnerable when things are challenging. And I think that's a mistake that a lot of leaders make, is that they start coaching only when things are bad or wrong, or they start trying to be vulnerable only when things are bad or wrong, which typically doesn't work. We're most defensive when we've just done something wrong, or when we know we've made a mistake, or when we know things aren't going well. And that's often when a lot of leaders will try to start implementing something like this, which is almost always the wrong time. Is that what you see?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah, 100 percent you got it. So, I think what we have to do and maybe to give a better answer to your earlier question, how do you teach this, is you got to paint the picture first. Anything I do when I go in and work with organizations, not just with the keynotes, but afterwards, is we got to paint the picture for what excellence, teamwork, real high trust really looks like. What does the Glad to be here mindset look like?

I do that with video. It's actually easy for me because we go behind the scenes. You get to see me fly at 18 inches from a 22 ton jet upside down sometimes. You get to go into the briefs and the debriefs. You get to see not only what we're talking about, but get to see these high level people being brutally open and honest and vulnerable. It's kind of cool. It's really fun.

So, you've got to paint the picture first, then you have to adapt that and put it into your processes and systems. And I was just with Mayo two days ago, and one of the top neurosurgeons there, we're talking about how do you implement this because healthcare needs it really bad. And they get the checklist, they get all that kind of stuff, but the Glad to be here debrief is really the game changer. And he goes, "Gucci, I got it. This is it. This is what will be the success. Here's the one thing, if I bring this in as an extra step, an extra part of my protocol, another meeting, no one's going to buy it. We're already too busy. We already got too much crap going off. I've got to change the mindset that this is actually part of our protocol. This is just how we do business. It's as important as being prepared for something. And that's the key."

And the beautiful part is once you know how powerful this is - and we could do them quickly, by the way. We could do a debrief right here on the show here towards the end if you want - you can do this quickly and you can bring out feelings, not just facts. And I'll say that again, there's a lot of leaders who say, "No, no, no. I just want the facts." B. S. I need to know how people feel. I want to know you feel good about an event or not. And you got to have a safe environment, psychologically safe environment where people are willing to share because we all know most aren't. They're withholding something. So, anyhow, we got to break down those barriers, make it into a positive experience. It doesn't mean it's easy. Sometimes they're tough. And we connect the line, commit.

I'll say that again, this is the key, you got to connect as a human being. You got to align with your mission, and then you got to commit, and you got to be all in on this mission. And if you do that, then the process has become pretty much simple. They reinforce.

Chris Dixon:

There's an organic cultural development that needs to happen that you can inspire to create a place where people are willing, and to be vulnerable, open, and share. Leading from the front is really great way to do it - and your words were better than mine. But it makes me think about what you said earlier about because you called yourself Gucci, the doctor called you Gucci, it made me think about the call signs and what a cool thing the Navy does with their pilots to inspire some of that vulnerability right from the gate. Right as you go through the gate, it's like we recognize there's somewhere you're trying to hide and something that you need to get out. So, you really encourage that, so it just made me think - I don't think everybody in an organization should give their team members call signs. HR would go nuts - there's probably something that --

Nikki Miller:

That's actually exactly where I was going with this, Chris. I was like, I think that we need to give our whole team call signs.

Chris Dixon:

Okay. I love it.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Absolutely. And you're hitting on it because it builds chemistry. It builds camaraderie. You connect. And they don't have to be cool. HR is actually interesting, the Navy jumped down on certain call signs because some aren't HR compliant.

But the key here is that it be authentic and it build that camaraderie. I mean, check this out, so I just wanted to show you, this is the real deal. This is my Blue Angel helmet. A couple of cool things. First off, gold visor.

Nikki Miller:

That's so cool.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

All right. You ready for this? Gold visor, it allows you to look directly in the light and not blink. I think that's a pretty cool leadership metaphor, pretty cool sales metaphor. When the heat's on, when the pressure's on, you look directly in the light and not blink. The reason I brought it up though, was because there's the logo. We don't call it a logo. We call it a crest. Here's what's interesting, when you're selected for the team, you're not allowed to wear it. You're not allowed to wear it until your teammates and your peers tell you you've earned the right. You've got to earn the trust and respect of your teammates every single day. And in trust and respect, small things matter. But the whole reason I brought it up was, check it out, what's that say there, Nikki?

Nikki Miller:

Look at that, it says Gucci on the back.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Gucci on the helmet. That's it, man.

Nikki Miller:

That's so cool.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

You get your call sign on the back of your helmet. You get it on the airplane too. It's kind of cool to walk up to your jet and see your name painted on it with your call sign.

Nikki Miller:

I was just about to say, the problem in a regular organization is that we don't have anything cool to put it on. Maybe a jacket or a mug or something. I certainly don't have a plane that I get to jump into.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. But the mug, check it out. I'm going to send you guys two of these, Glad To Be Here mugs. How cool would this be with your call sign on it?

Nikki Miller:

Well, we got to come up now with a call sign before the end of this, John, because I'm into it. I want a mug with my call sign on it.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

All right. Now, who gets to pick it?

Chris Dixon:

Not you.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Not you.

Nikki Miller:

I was going to say both of you, right? I'm going to be on my best behavior from this point forward.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

And you got to earn it, man. And if you do something stupid, you're going to make it easy for us.

Nikki Miller:

Oh, man. I love that. Well, I did not wear my leather tie today, so I won't be competing with you. That's all I know.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

I don't know, you're looking kind of Gucci. I think you work. Look at that. Sunglass and everything. Come on.

Nikki Miller:

Can I compete for Gucci? You said something earlier that I want to come back to because I think that the Military has, in its entirety, long been a study for how to build and create culture really fast, which I just think is so fascinating. And there's so many ways that that happens, but especially when you're talking about these debriefs that you do and this idea of building psychological safety and having to have these really hard conversations in high, high, high pressure environments, how do you train organizations to do that?

Because I think this is an art that is so lost and so often not taught, and yet it helps us all to be better, to be able to communicate something that we would call it feedback, usually in a business organization, but that might be hard to hear. It's hard to teach people how to deliver that. It's also really hard to teach people how to receive it and then take action on it.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, first off, I love that you're on it. The word I want to go back to is culture. See, that's exactly right, is that what we're really talking about here is creating a culture of excellence and also a culture of caring. See, now that's the key, you got to have both. I don't care how good you are. If I'm working for you and I don't feel you care about me, or as the customer, if I don't feel like you care, I don't care how good you are. No one cares how good you are until they know you care first. So, that's the giving, that's the caring part.

Then, I do care how good you are. I want to know you're world class. I don't want to team up with people who aren't world class. Come on, man. And now if you're not there, that's okay. Let's keep working on it together. That's how we're in this thing together. So, it's all about a culture.

Also, you got to know your center point. I say center point, that's what we used in the Blue Angels as air shows as, as an alignment tool. You can say it's your mission statement. But it actually goes a little bit deeper than that, because center points can be both strategic and tactical. So, I got to get people aligned. We got to know what's our objective. And then, there's a ton of different roles.

We have a mover called the Loop Break Cross in the Blue Angels. I use this metaphor when I'm working with companies all the time. You got six jets, we're 18 inches apart, by the way, which is so freaking cool. You know, you don't realize when you're 18 inches from another jet, you can actually see the cracks in the paint of the aircraft next to you. Imagine doing that --

Nikki Miller:

You're giving me chills.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, I hope so. They gave me chills, too, because you got to be aware. And then, you can see these cracks in the paint, this is a 22 ton jet going 500 miles per hour. And then, the boss says up we go. And on the G, you go, all six jets going up into the vertical. I mean, vertical, not a passenger jet. Vertical. And then, you go beyond the vertical. You tilt your head back, you see the horizon come up. And you're 18 inches from this jet, now don't forget while you're doing all this, you're not kind of hanging out. Then, you're going down the backside. The G forces are coming on. And then, the boss says smoke already break, and you go into six different directions.

So, we did that every day. I mean, that was just one of 30 maneuvers.

But here's the analogy, so I got people with different roles, different responsibilities, same thing as you do as a company. We're all going in different directions, but we come back and we cross. And it's a beautiful maneuver where all six jets cross over this center point in a perfectly lined stack. And that's because, number one, we know what the center point is. We also are making continuous adjustments. I mean, if you ever watched the show, we're perfect. No. We're constantly off. We're just making adjustments quickly and we're making small adjustments. And then, we get to that point and when we stack it. Stack it means everybody's role hit at the right time for what the outcome. See, it's not just you doing your role. I don't care if five people do their role perfectly and we have one person off. We all care. It's not like, "Hey, I was fine. You were off." No. None of that crap. What can we do together? I want all six jets in a stack, and that's because we all own the outcome, not just our roles.

Chris Dixon:

And there's so much good stuff to take away there in the alignment in the business world and leading any kind of team. And you talked about alignment, the center point, and the small adjustments really stood out to me because I think it's something that gets missed so often. It's like, "Yeah, great. There's the plan. We're going to fly it. It's going to be perfect." And that's just never reality. And how can you make those small adjustments to, of course, correct and to recognize them and, as quickly as possible, make the adjustments. And that's something that I think it's overlooked very often in business planning how frequent those adjustments need to happen.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. Well, I'll give you one, Chris. So, classic, planning is important, right? I mean, it's important to put that, get specifics, and I want contingency plans in place, I want to know if I need a spur jet, all these kinds of things. But we used to have a saying, so we took it very seriously, it's not about the plan so much because that's fine. I want to be prepared. See, that's the difference. I'm talking about how do you be prepared? How do you bring your A game every single day? The morning you wake up, bam.

And I got a trigger I can teach you in seven minutes. My program teaches you quicker than that. But how do you get your mind totally focused and aligned in seven minutes? Because that's what I want. Now, the other thing that we tell ourselves in the brief is, the minute we get airborne, things change. I know that. I'm looking forward to the change. Interest rates are going to go up. The market's going to change, all this stuff. Hey, that's normal. I'm not going to fight that. I'm going to embrace it. And I know it's going to happen pretty dang quick. The minute I get airborne, it's going to happen.

Nikki Miller:

Well, I think this goes back we talked about obviously it's important to have the checklist and have the systems, but you also have to have the mindset around being agile. And then, you have to trust that the people around you, who are also on the way to this destination, that the team around you is able to make those quick adjustments and able to think for themselves when they need to move quickly. I mean, that's part of having the A team around you.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Oh, man. I love it. You used the word trust, and I'm going to go back to you because that's the key. We had high trust contracts. For me, when I came up with my opposing solo - we're the solo pilots. Solo pilots are the maximum performance demonstrators - my job was to break the jet. I want to break that airplane. I want to pull as much G as possible. So, I'm coming at my teammate a thousand miles per hour closure crossing within a wingspan. And I do that for simple contracts, which was Thumper, my wingman. I said, "Thumper, look, I'll be on the flight line. I won't be five foot left or five foot right." By the way, the flight line is the inboard edge of the left painted stripe on the runway. "I'll set the altitude. I'll give you the command to execute a full stick deflection roll. You have one job, miss me." The biggest game of chicken. It's the biggest game of chicken you ever played.

But, Nikki and Chris, that's the level of high trust. I'd point my nose at him and he'd point his nose at me, and we said, "You know what? I'll be consistent, you miss me." And sometimes that's really hard to do. But see, these are these high trust contracts that we already have in business. We already have these in life. You have these with your customers, by the way.

So, we teach about how to really make some powerful high trust contracts that allow you to execute at the highest level. And then, I'm instantaneously debriefing. I'm up on my back radio right after that going, "Mo, what do you got?" I got an observer on the ground because I want to know. I know what I saw, but I don't care what I saw. I want to know what the customer sees. So, we get immediate feedback, immediate feedback, and then we adjust.

Nikki Miller:

Well, I have to imagine that this is where this necessity to be able to control your mindset also comes from right, John? Because if you're going up and you are going nose to nose and you're going to miss somebody by a hair by doing this wild maneuver - that I could never repeat no matter how many times you explained it to me - I have to imagine that if you're not all the way there, that you're not only putting your life in danger, you're putting someone else's life in danger. And I'm sure that that's where this need for you to control that mindset comes from.

So, you said you could teach it faster than seven minutes, so walk us through how you do that every day. I want to know. Now, I need to know the secret. You can't just dangle that in front of me.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Okay. Okay. Well, I'll teach you what I do every morning and then you can decide if this works for you. I start by waking up happy. I mean, do you wake up happy? Ask the question, does anybody wake up happy? I want you to check your first conscious thought that hits your brain tomorrow morning. And I want you to see, is it a happy thought or is it what am I late to, what's the next problem I'm going to solve. So, you can train your brain to wake up happy.

So, bottom line is very simple, here's what I do, I do what I call my Glad to be your wake up. Try this, Nikki, try this, Chris, tomorrow. Very first thing when you wake up, just what are three things you're grateful for in the present moment. I want you to stay in your present moment. This is critical. So, to me, it was easy. I live in Sun Valley, Idaho, so I look out, there's snow. It's starting to snow here, by the way. It was 14 degrees. I got my two Rhodesian Ridgebacks, they're in bed with me. These are a hundred pound dogs. And I just wake up and I go, "Man. Just another magical day." I'm just absorbing my outside. I also say, "Hey, I feel good today. I'm strong. I'm healthy." So, anything that's in that present moment.

But then, here's what I want you to do after that. I want you to go back 24 hours and I want you to reflect, debrief on what happened yesterday. But not just what happened yesterday, I want to know three things that you're grateful for. Three things that happened yesterday, and I want you to think about people's faces. I want you to think about the interaction. Like tomorrow, I'll be thinking about you, both of you. And I actually can see your faces. I will actually bring those to my mind again and I'll say, "Wow. We had a great podcast. We had this great interaction. I'm grateful for that."

Like I said, I was just with a client, so I've got two briefing calls right after this for future events. And I'll say, "Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you for that information." So, again, 24 hours, now you can go back as far as you want, but I do this every day so I just go back 24 hours.

Now, here's the key as a leader. Anyone who's a leader, anyone who's on this, really just anybody, go forward in your day. Third step, go forward in your day and I want you to think of others, not just yourself. Yes, I use my calendar. But my bottom line is how can I be of service to somebody else? How can I show up? I call myself an angel of appearances. How may I appear not as I want, but as you need me? And if you think about that, that's intention, you got to put that intention in your mind. Then, when the moment happens, you're in the flow. You're in your natural state. So, I call that my Glad to be here wake up. Try it, see if it works for you.

Nikki Miller:

I'm going to try it and report back. And I love what you just said, because you said that I have to think about how other people need me, especially when you're in a challenging market environment, economy, market, whatever it is, think a lot of leaders, envision themselves as leaders the way that they would like to show up. And I always tell leaders that you don't get the privilege of being the leader you want to be. You have to be the leader that your people need at any given time.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Wait. You want to be a leader that what?

Nikki Miller:

You don't get to be the leader that you want to be. You have to be the leader that your people need.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Need. Love it. Good. Good. I like that. Way to go.

Nikki Miller:

And I think the way you organize this really has forethought around what do my people actually need. Because it's great to say that in theory, it's something else to actually say what is it that they need and how am I going to take action on that.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Yeah. See, that's mindfulness. See, what you're talking about, that word is thrown out there all the time, but this is real now. Mindfulness is being aware. I call it situational awareness. In a fighter jet, you'd better be situationally aware, not just of what you're doing, but where's the threat, what's going on around me. You need to know that stuff.

But I like what you said is, you know, as a human being, let alone a leader, are we mindful? Are we actually able to stop thinking about ourselves? Which, by the way, is hard to do for most people. And how are you willing to put yourself in someone else's shoes? They call that empathy. But this idea of wanting to be aware and curious - curious helps, by the way - and ask questions and be there for them, that's the difference between compassion and empathy.

The difference is very simple. What do you think the difference is? I mean, how would you define compassion versus empathy?

Chris Dixon:

One feels more intentional.

Nikki Miller:

Personal.

Chris Dixon:

Go ahead, Nikki.

Nikki Miller:

That's exactly where I was going to go, Chris. Well, I was going to go exactly there that, compassion to me says I feel for you, empathy to me says I have the ability to put myself in your shoes.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Okay. So, very similar, I love where you're going. So, the feeling for you and putting yourself in shoes, that's a technique. That's empathy. Empathy is can you feel what the other person's feeling. Compassion has empathy.

You got to have empathy to have compassion but there's one significant change, and that is you have to take action. Compassion involves action. Compassion involves wisdom. So, empathy is I feel for you. Compassion is what do you do, how do you support that person, can you share your wisdom. Now, sometimes the action is nothing, but that's an action step. Sometimes it's just put your arm around somebody and just be with them, fine. But most compassion means, "Hey, I need to do something" or you got to share. So, it's action. That's the beautiful part.

So, I'm always working on compassion. I'm trying to figure out as a leader how can you help or serve that other person. And it really works good for customers, by the way.

Chris Dixon:

Earlier, you mentioned something to the effect of the team will move as fast as maybe the slowest team member or if there's someone on your team that's struggling, I think there's something to that, too, in recognizing as a leader where you invest your time and identifying we, as a team, can truly only move as fast as the team member who's struggling. And I think you can naturally, as a team, start to maybe shift your focus away from because it feels like it's a drain, but truly you need to pour into to move everybody forward. And I think that comes from a place of compassion and understanding.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Oh, I love your thought, Chris. I don't think I actually said that. I think you heard that, which is really cool. That's even better. Because you heard my words in your own mind. I was talking about the five jets and one being off, and you took that analogy and you moved it to where you are, which is, by the way, incredibly powerful. I think that's good. And that's what you want people to do. You know, I want people to adapt and adjust.

But to answer your question, here's how we did it on Blue Angels, is, we cannot fly at 18 inches unless all six pilots can fly at 18 inches. I can't have five people there and one person be at 36 inches because it looks like hell. So, what we have to do is come together. Now, not everybody is at the same speed, so what do we do? We have an incredible coaching and mentoring program on the Blue Angels. When you get on the Blues, you're assigned a coach and this coach is there to help you one-on-one. Then, because of the methodologies that I teach on debrief, you're getting coached in the debrief but as a team, as an organization. So, we're doing one-on-one training, we're doing team training, and we're pulling this all together.

And if somebody's having a bad day, we loosen it up. We loosen it up but we work, we help each other and we get back together. And we all know that everyone's going to have a bad day. It's not going to be just that one person. So, I want to be attuned to how people feel, what's going on in their life, not just what's the next task I got to do. That's not it, man.

Glad to be here is you got to appreciate your people, you got to care, and you got to be authentic yourself. And that's the issue, man. Just be authentic. I'll work with you if you're authentic. If you're hiding something or if you got some other stuff going on, be authentic about it, we can work through it.

Chris Dixon:

You've got such an incredible career and clearly you've done some amazing stuff. What gets you out of bed today? Like, what excites you and gets your blood moving that you're focused on?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, believe it or not, this podcast. I'm not saying that just because it's the podcast. Because it's the medium that I can share whatever I have with others. So, it's always about how can I impact somebody else? What's the most efficient way? So, I call it learn, grow, give as one of my mantras. How can I learn today? How can I grow? More importantly, how can I give? Then, I realized I have the order wrong. It starts with giving. As long as I'm giving, all that other stuff will come there. So, that's the main purpose of my life. I think about passion, purpose, and presence.

But I have fun, so the other thing that gets me out of bed is I'm going hiking. Right out my door here, right after this, we'll hike up 2,000 feet. We're up about 10,000 feet. I live at 6,000 feet. I got my dogs, they love going out there. And we're in nature, man. We're talking about wolves and mooses and elk and all these things are running around. I had two moose bed down in my yard last night. So, I get out into nature. Exercise. Chris, I got to exercise. We all do. It brings endorphins. So, I'll hit the gym, I'll hit weights, but more importantly, I'm going to get my cardio up. I'm going to do something. Now, the snow is hitting, I can't hit the slopes yet. But in about a week or two, I'm hitting the slopes. I'm going to hellish skiing. I'm constantly pushing myself in a fun way. I'm not pushing myself to push myself. I'm like, this is fun, this is exciting.

And then, don't forget to say thank you at night. And that's my other thing is that, in the evening, I do that Glad to be here again, what am I thankful for and I rejoice. And this is critical, we all need to do this, rejoice in your own brain what happened that day. Did you have something to be rejoiceful for? That's the key. Stay in that Glad to be here mindset of rejoicing. You can't be depressed and have a Glad to be here mindset at the same time. You can't. Now, you can toggle back and forth, but you can't have those two thoughts at the same time.

Nikki Miller:

Gucci, you're just a cool guy. You really are. I'm like, this guy lives the life. I have to imagine you got to go out and find some even more cool things to go and excite yourself with. If you can get comfortable flying 18 inches away from a several ton jet, it's probably ever your quest to go and find something that gets the blood pumping, to your point.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Well, I'm loving it. I just drove my Harley up north here to Montana to go see Thumper. And my buddy calls me up, same kind of thing, he's a journalist and he goes, "Hey Gucci. Let's go see Thumper." And I'm saying, "Well, maybe." He goes, "No, no. On bikes." He's got a Ducati. So, I'm like, "Really?" I look at my schedule, I block off four days, bam. Damn, we're hitting there and the next day we're on motorcycles. We're going through two lane roads. I almost crashed, I went into a curve at 90 miles per hour. But I learned it. He said my left arm was shaking. The whole bike was swivelling. And he expected me to stop after that because I barely went over the guardrail. Stop? Hell no, man. I'm pressing to the next corner.

But the idea is just don't be stupid. When I say this stuff, it is easy to kill yourself. That's not hard. It's easy to run out of money in business. It's easy to be stupid. What's hard, and what I like, Nikki, and you're sensing it, is I like to push that edge, man. I know what it feels like to be on the edge. I love that. Now, here's the key, you can't stay there. You just can't.

I mean, I work with Olympic people all the time, these downhill ski racers, they get it because they're on the edge. Now, when you're on the edge, it's very uncomfortable. It's very uncomfortable. So, here's what I do, the minute I hit the edge on anything, I back off because that's control.

See, I know I control. I back off and then I hit it again, back off, hit it again. It's called nibbling the envelope. I'm constantly nibbling there. And that's what's fun. Man, when you're living your life like that, you know what it is? The grass is greener. Ice cream tastes better. Women are more beautiful. Guys are better. I mean, it's like you just walk out in the world and you go, "This is a cool place."

Nikki Miller:

Well, and to your point, I think it's about having the self-control and awareness to know I'm okay to dance on the edge, I just can't dance too far.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Absolutely. And it's growth stage. It's step-by-step. And then, there's times where you got to throttle back. I'm okay to throttle back. I actually like to be contemplative. You know, I'm writing my new book, it's called the Glad To Be Your Mindset. It's going to be how to give and live life in all its fullness. So, I'm having these discussions and I like thinking about it. I like reflecting back on that. So, it's a little both. It's a little both.

Nikki Miller:

Gucci, at the end of all of these podcasts, we always ask, what's The ONE Thing that you would want to leave our listeners with? If they could get one thing out of this podcast, what would it be? What's yours?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Dang, we said it so many times. It's what I'm wearing on my shirt here, man. Just live and give life in the Glad to be here mindset. Be grateful, be generous, be kind, all these things, enjoy your dang life.

Now, what's the tactic I would give you? Debrief. Learn how to do a Glad to be here debrief both in your team and personally. That's the tool that allows you to continually be in this state of bliss.

Nikki Miller:

I love that. And if people want to connect with you, where should they find you?

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Best way is website, johnfoleyinc.com. I think there's a signup thing you can put in there. I send a weekly newsletter out. More importantly, hey, I got something cool for everybody who has kids, anyone who's got youth. I'm doing a special thing, December 20th, a webinar - it's free - for youth on how to reach their hopes and dreams. So, maybe we'll tell that story, Chris, about a 12 year old boy looking up and seeing the jets. But the key is that, I want to get this message out, not just to the corporate world. I mean, we speak over a hundred times a year to all kinds of great corporations. I'm working with P&G right now to develop how did the best get better, their innovation. So, we do all that, but I want to empower youth.

So, anyhow, just connect. LinkedIn is really good too, by the way. I got a whole team that supports me in whatever we can do to share this information. And you guys keep it up too, man. The ONE Thing is a powerful message and I think you're helping a lot of people, so thank you.

Chris Dixon:

Thank you.

Nikki Miller:

Thank you so much for being here today.

John 'Gucci' Foley:

Glad to be here.

Chris Dixon:

All right. Bye everybody.

Outro:

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