Have you had encounters with leaders or leadership teams where there are big emotions and had to kind of tamp those down somehow? Yeah.

Yeah.

So, you know, I think probably more often than not, I have worked for leaders who have yelled, who have screamed, who have been, you know, and even sometimes justifiable.

Like what, you know, what we didn't hit our quarterly numbers.

We didn't, we're way behind.

The leader told us to do things and we all chose not to do.

Um, those, you know, those things, but the, um, but I mean, it's, it's really, I can count on one hand, the number of leaders that I can remember that will really, really kind in a situation.

And I think that there's some really powerful thing there that you've got that you can share with us.

What are some clues when you begin to interact and start to prepare to either deliver a keynote or do other work with organizations that you can begin to smell whether it's a team that's built to navigate changes and move through the noise and the swirl and still be as effective as they can, or ones that are stressed, kind of locked up, disjointed and disconnected? Are there clues that show that?

Yeah, I think the number one clue I see is this.

And it's really interesting is when will they let you talk to other people in the organization? And are they willing to let you talk to the frontline personnel? One of the favorite things I like to do whenever I'm doing an event is I want to talk to the people who are going to be in the audience.

It's great to get the perspective of the meeting planner.

It's great to get the perspective of leadership.

But Are the people in the audience going to, you know, can they get on the phone? Can they talk with you? Can they give you some of their thoughts and their ideas? The other is the level, the amount of time it takes to make a decision.

You know, making a decision, taking a long time to make a decision means that the opportunity is going to pass you by.

What say you about that? I know you just kind of said that, but let's take it a little bit further.

Oh.

And that's why the neck of that funnel is so incredibly important, 'cause if I can get you to trust me, you're gonna slip into that base of the funnel, and you, you're not only a customer for life, I'm gonna hard sell you other stuff, and I'm gonna get you to refer customers to me.

And you're gonna wanna do it because I went through the steps.

So you need to understand that the first sales call, that first part, is about building trust.

And we build trust by listening, really, really listening, and then saying, "Donald, what I heard you say was this.

Here's a couple of ideas I've got that I think I can help you with." But what that does is it validates that I was not there to sell a product, that I completely, I understand you.

I could care less if you understand me.

Go deeper on that part.

How do we prepare for this change?

Yeah, so I've really, you know, I've, Mark, I've been researching this since 2016, right? I've been obsessed with why some companies grow during the Great Depression, others disappear.

I just told you that 45% of Fortune 500s are expected not to be here.

I wanna know why some won't be here and others will.

Like, what are they really doing differently? And I've really nailed it down to just three steps, just three little things that you need to do, and number one is you need to adapt your perspective.

You just need to make the decision that change leads to opportunity.

Now, that sounds really simple, and it is simple.

What are your thoughts?