Resonance Episode: Season 2-Strategy vs Tactics

In this conversation, Steve, Mike and Randy delve into the critical distinction between strategy and tactics, exploring how these concepts apply not only in business but also in the music industry. They discuss the evolution of music production, the challenges artists face in a rapidly changing landscape, and the importance of being prepared for success. The conversation emphasizes the need for flexibility in strategic planning and the role of optionality in creating robust strategies that can adapt to unforeseen circumstances. In this conversation, the speakers delve into the nuances of strategy and tactics, emphasizing the importance of feedback, adaptation, and the need for a solid baseline in measuring success. They draw parallels between sports and business, illustrating how effective strategies can amplify strengths while dampening weaknesses. The discussion also highlights the significance of empowering decision-making at all levels within organizations, ensuring that teams can act effectively without unnecessary oversight. Ultimately, the conversation underscores the dynamic nature of strategy in both business and personal endeavors, encouraging continuous learning and adaptation.

 Takeaways

Strategy and tactics are often confused in business.

The music industry has evolved with new production methods.

Preparedness is crucial for success in music careers.

Talent shows can create stars, but many are unprepared.

A good strategy opens up new opportunities.

Flexibility in strategy is essential for adapting to change.

Understanding the 'why' behind actions helps clarify strategy.

Short-term planning can help manage long-term goals.

The chaos of the current world requires adaptable strategies.

Optionality is a key characteristic of effective strategy. Strategy requires intention and feedback.

Amplifying successful strategies is crucial.

Dampening ineffective strategies allows for adjustment.

KPIs can be both helpful and misleading.

Establishing a baseline is essential for measurement.

Sports analogies illustrate strategic adaptability.

Empowering teams enhances decision-making.

Understanding the difference between strategy and tactics is vital.

Long-term strategic thinking is necessary for success.

Continuous learning and adaptation are key in any field.

Chapters

00:00 Understanding Strategy vs. Tactics

02:59 The Evolution of Music Production

05:57 Navigating the Music Industry's Challenges

08:51 The Importance of Preparedness in Music Careers

12:09 Defining Strategy and Tactics in Business

15:03 The Role of Flexibility in Strategic Planning

17:53 The Impact of Talent Shows on Music Careers

21:00 The Importance of Optionality in Strategy

24:26 Strategic Feedback and Adaptation

29:15 The Importance of Baselines in Strategy

32:13 Sports Analogies: Strategy in Action

36:30 Understanding Strategy vs. Tactics

43:39 Empowering Decision-Making in Organizations

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

This is Resonance, the podcast for leaders that unpacks the power of song, silence, and strategy.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

We believe the great leadership begins with deep listening, not just to others, but to the still small voice within.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

It's not just about being a successful leader, it's about being soulfully aligned as well.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

In a world moving fast, resonance invites you to pause and reconnect with purpose, people, and possibilities.

SPEAKER_02 0:33

We'll dive into some cool stories, celebrate with friends, and dig deep into the music too. Cause song has a way of saying what words cannot alone.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

So whether you're leading a business, a team, or just trying to lead your own life with more meaning, this is Resonance. Resonance.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

We're already off to the races. Yes, indeed. Welcome to Resonance, a podcast about really thinking more deeply about business topics, about really bringing the soul into the world in a way that it is something that uh is important in business. So this is about going deeper than maybe uh just talking about platitudes and bumper stickers. And one of the most important topics that we're gonna be covering is the distinction between strategy and tactics. And that's what we're gonna be talking about with Mike, the monk guy, Ferrell, and Steve. Yes, I'm a country star and an amazing human being, Azar. That's your your middle name, your tagline in the middle there.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

Okay, I've got it.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

My name is Randy Harrington, and I'm just a slacker. But what we're gonna be talking about is strategy and tactics. Doctor, man, you're the doctor. And so what that really gets to is almost everything that you do as a business is can be understood in the buckets of either strategy or tactics. But what happens as normal human beings is just like any organizational thing, I was looking at my spice drawer last night. I have one of these pull-out spice drawers that was really neat and tidy a year ago. And now it's just like it's like there's a riot going on in that. Things haven't even been put back right.

SPEAKER_02 2:13

And there's they're all mixed together only actually.

SPEAKER_00 2:15

Everything is mixed together. I had a strategy, right? But but the tactics and the strategy didn't go together. And so that's what happens is you have strategy and tactics, but oftentimes these things just kind of end up being mixed together and people lose their way. They forget what I am actually doing here. Is this a strategic thing or is it a tactical thing? So we're gonna unpack that and we're gonna unpack some of the most important issues in strategic planning and strategic thinking, no matter how big your business or your household is. Strategy and tactics also work in parenting, for example. So this is gonna be something for everybody, and we're just gonna dive right in. Okay, Azar, here we go. So I'm gonna postulate that when you are writing a song, you are thinking about a whole bunch of things at one time. And so you begin with the inspiration of the music and the artistic constraints of the music and what you can do and what you're feeling and all of that stuff. And now you have this song. You this thing has suddenly appeared in the universe, and now you have to decide what you're gonna do with it. And at that moment, you engage the wheel of strategy. So now you start thinking about how do I what do I do with this song? How do I get it out there so people can listen to it? Now, back in the day, you had a very specific thing you needed to do. You needed to get with a producer and you needed to get with a label, and the label needed to do a thing, and then you had to go talk to the DJs all over the country, and then eventually, after these 37 steps are done, people can hear that song. Now, your strategy think about the difference from back in the day to how you think about taking a song to the people now. It's a completely different strategic trajectory. Am I correct?

SPEAKER_02 3:49

Well, yes, it is totally different because anybody can put anything out at any time, but it's more than just putting things out. I mean, you have to be prepared for success. So there's a bunch of points here. One is the songs that you have, they forever have an opportunity to find a home. Uh, this year alone, I probably had three songs, either one of them re-recorded and two, one documentary, or three, three documentaries, one one film that some songs are in that have never been in movies before or documentaries before. So they've just seen the light of day. The interesting thing was I was reached out to for other songs that they wanted, and they didn't fit the scenes, or it didn't fit to be the end credit, or it didn't fit they thought that it was gonna be perfect for the movie, but they said to you, we really want you to have something on it, which was really nice because we got to know each other, and they were going like let me just send you some other stuff. And it's really interesting. The stuff that one of them made all the sense in the world, and I said, if they don't get it, how can they not get this? And they got it, but that doesn't always happen, okay? But it it usually doesn't happen. So I let how'd I get I got that right? But the there was another song that was so far off the wall off my Kingsman record called Wake Me From the Dead. And it is the furthest thing I thought that would work. The movie's called The Gardener that's coming out this spring. And somehow they were able to make it work, and they just used the track about a minute and 40 seconds during a scene. And I was so curious because they wanted sunshine, but sunshine didn't work. And I was going like, Well, the gardener with the story and the heartfelt this and the when people are gonna love this story, it's really beautiful about a business leader that's kicking tail and and realizes she's sick, and then she's trying to live those, you know what I mean, those days, not not in the hustle and bustle and everything. But uh anyway, they decided when I saw the trailer, well, they sent me the scene and I said, Hi, that makes sense. I can't believe it. Well, I'm not singing, it's just a track. And they then they reach out and they go, Hey, would you mind us? Can we make this a feature? It's called a feature track in the end credits. So once the movie goes, it's over, so they're gonna run the version with me singing the whole thing at the end. And so I thought, well, that's cool. So it's interesting how that took place. Uh the lady Dabney, she's wonderful. She is her film. She was hunting me down, she's from Mississippi, but she's lived in Los Angeles, been very successful. And this is her first real baby out of the roles that she played in the film industry. And she's so excited about it. But we had these conversations via email or text or on the phone where we just got, we became friends so fast, I believe that she just felt like I want something to work for Steve because sunshine's not going to work, which is what we thought. And that's why they reached out to me. You know, I'm constantly learning about it wasn't like I was trying to build a relationship. She's just so wonderful and easy to love, you know, and talk to. And so through that became another opportunity that worked. Uh those things I look back at them and I'm going, like, you know, she could have taken the time to go heck with you, Steve. I could have gone on busy. But instead, we were engaged in this Mississippi conversation and folks that she knew that I grew up around, that we just didn't know each other. And uh it was amazing, you know. So uh you're always wanting to farm these songs. So getting back to that for me, it can be the songs can be 25, 30 years old, but if you feel like they hold up today, uh you never know where that home is gonna, it's where it's gonna be. The song in a Mississippi Minute, you guys have been on my radio show and podcast. It's been, I mean, my ninth year, that song was a song, and we named the show after it, uh, which made all the sense in the world on Super Talk Mississippi and every market in Mississippi and all that. But the bottom line is it made sense because of sort of the idea of what's a Mississippi Minute like? You know, it's actually an hour show, and I was explaining, but they loved that idea, but it finally gave that song a home because it never had a home except for sitting on an album somewhere hidden in the back of it, you know. So interesting how that all comes. Of course, now, you know, you're making records. People, we did we had our first AI number one uh before the end of the calendar year last year, from start to finish, which is scary, shocking, like what the heck? But um, you know, we're gonna have to figure out how that's gonna work for us. There, there's just so much going on. So you can imagine how easy it is now to produce something. You, Randy, you and Mike can get off the phone and go, I want to write a song about now. Listen, I'm a purist. It ain't gonna happen, okay? I'm a purist, I'm gonna fight for my words and all that. But you guys could get off right now and go, you know what? I want to write a song about tender love and care, or I want to write a song about climbing this mountain, or da-da-da-da-da, and do it. And there, all of a sudden, one minute later, you got a lyric. Now, will you please? I would like some cellos, I'd like to take me back to the 70s with the guitars and bass players. You can be descriptive about what you want. And all of a sudden, two minutes later, you've got a record that sounds incredible, like incredible. So that is scary for musician folks like us. So when you're talking about strategy and tactics, it's the Wild West all over again. And you're getting a lot of artists who are getting signed from TikTok who are building followers who 99% of them can't hold a crowd. But at the same time, they got all these followers, and labels are just not what they're doing is okay, we're gonna give this a shot. And they're doing single deals again. Yeah, where the song will work and all that. So it's it's the Wild West. There's so many avenues and so many opportunities for people to make music now. When I was a kid, if I wanted to go make one song and record it professionally with my band or wherever, it's$3,500 out or$1,000. Yeah. You know, so to make an album that was worth a dang at all, you had to spend$30,$40,000. And now those those times are gone.

SPEAKER_01 9:31

Steve, that's right. I hate to break the news to you, but Randy and I have already recorded a song, and it's called Steve Azar's Waffle House.

SPEAKER_02 9:39

So well, that's a smash. You know what? You got exactly how I like my hash browns. So unless you know that, young enough. That's not going to be honest. Wow. Well, that's where we are now.

SPEAKER_00 9:53

When we go back in history, what we find is that the term strategy actually, the word was basically defined in the Greek by it's what generals do. So strategy was absolutely the word comes from a military thought. It's about how am I going to do this? So strategy is what the general is going to do. And the tactics also are a military term. And that is about what, how are we going to do this? And I think that's a it's a good way to think about tactics and strategy as we go into this. And one is the the why, and the other is the how. And one is the ends, one is the means. And so when you start getting those two things kind of in your mind, you start beginning to see how that works. Now, Mike, I know you are, you know, counseling business leaders all the time. And do you ever see a business leader get confused between strategy and tactics?

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Oh, yeah, all the time. In fact, I just was in Tucson for the last five days working with about 30 different entrepreneurs on that very specific issue. And and so I spent, you know, one-on-one sessions with them, helping them create strategic plans and that kind of thing. One of the ways that I approach it, you know, when we talk about the why, you know, why why do you have this business? Why are you doing what you're going to do? Those kinds of things. I like to tie it back, and we've talked about this on the show before, this idea of a higher purpose vision. What is it? Why do you exist? And why do you exist beyond, especially with entrepreneurs? Why do you exist and why do you exist for something beyond yourself? That's that's the first step is is what is it you want to do that goes beyond yourself? It goes beyond making a bunch of money, it goes beyond having market share, it beg goes beyond launching a new service or product, whatever. What is the higher level there? And so when we start getting into strategies and tactics, the way, you know, and I get asked this question all the time: is it a strategy? Is it a tactic? My best way that I can answer that to them is ask the question, is there a why? Okay. So for instance, and and this question came up multiple times over the over the weekend, some of these, some of these folks are are online entrepreneurs, and so they're trying to generate leads and that kind of thing through a variety of different tactics. And so they would say, okay, well, if we want to do a quiz funnel, is that a strategy? And so then I would ask them, well, you tell me. I said, what's the quiz funnel designed to do? Why are you going to do it? Well, the the obvious reason is why is because we need to generate leads. Okay, then it's not a it's not a strategy, it's a tactic. Generating the leads is the strategy, you know. So I think when when we do strategic planning, if you can ask that question, why are you going to do something? If it ties directly back, so if if if lead generation ties exact directly back to your higher purpose vision and your goals, well then it's a strategy. But if it ties back to something other than that, then it's a tactic. And so understanding the difference. And I think one of the things we were talking offline before we started, you know, how crazy things are in the world right now. And I had somebody ask me the other day in one of these sessions, how can we plan for five years or 10 years from now? And I looked at him and I said, you can't. I said, it's virtually impossible. I said, the world is changing too fast. You know, we did a whole show on this Bonnie idea, this brittle, anxious, you know, nonlinear, incomprehensible model from navigating the age of chaos. And I said, because of the world today, there is it, it is virtually impossible to try and do any planning out beyond more than a year or two. You know, you might have a vision, but a vision is different than a plan. And so I think the challenge is how do we do this and stay focused on that? And, you know, one of the things that I've always talked about and of course wrote my first book about was breaking it down into chunks, um, whether it's a quarter, whether it's six months, but breaking it down into chunks where number one, it's easy to keep focused. Number two, it's easy to pivot because we know things are gonna have things are gonna change, things are gonna happen. If I'm not so locked into a plan that's a two-year plan or a five-year plan or whatever, and things change, well, it's not gonna upset the Apple cart if I make a quick pivot because of what's going on outside of my control, external forces and all those kinds of things. So I think that's as I talk about strategy, that's really what I try and help these folks do is understand that let's break it up into small enough pieces so that you can stay focused on what you can control and quit worrying about whatever what everything else is going on that you can't control. Focus on what you can control and then understand that a strategy is a bigger picture. So, you know, back to your idea on, you know, the the strategy and tactics when it came to warfare and the ancient Greeks and the Romans and and all of those, you know, the strategy was to, you know, take a, you know, take a battlefield or take a overcome a civilization or whatever it is. The tactics were how are we gonna do it? Are we gonna use cavalry? Are we gonna use infantry? Are we gonna use artillery? Are we gonna go by land? Are we gonna go by sea? All of those things are the tactics.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

That's right.

SPEAKER_02 15:12

I'm gonna jump to the music side again, real quick. So you talk about strategy and tactics. So you've got all these uh talent shows now that are on, right? You've got, you know, the voice, title, of course, for many years, uh, Who Wants to be a star. I I don't know, all the X Fac X Facts, whatever they are. There's a zillion of them, right? So this is where it drives me a little crazy. First of all, the voice itself. I don't know if there's ever been a star created from that show that's real less lasted. Uh maybe there has. I know the talent's absurd, good, but what happens after. Now American Idol's had a ton of. Right. You know, they they've done really at some point it gets a little saturated. So what's the strategy of someone that gets sort of toward the quarterfinals and there's only like six people standing? They've had all this television uh, you know, their Instagram's gone crazy, all of this stuff is happening in front of them, and then they're off the show and they're not obligated to the show. Right, right? How prepared are you to have something out yesterday? What happens is they're not prepared. And the ones that aren't prepared, the ones that are not, and that are not obligated to continue doing tours for the show and all that, are stuck there feeling they're all excited, and everybody's patting them on the back, look what you did, and da-da-da-da. But you've got no product. You know, like I'm going, you should have been prepared for this moment. And if you wait six months, it's too late. Because the audiences out there, you're not on tour, and you're not having built this grassroots people that have watched you out in the rain, who've driven miles and miles and spent all this money to come see you back in the day, they're not the the fans that have become your fans from the show are not invested enough. And they move on to the next because they're watching the TV show. So if without any strategy and without the tactics to put in place, as sterile as that sounds in my industry, you will fail. Now, now, TikTok, with everything they're doing right now with TikTok, you can go viral, right? And things can blow up. But I promise you this Justin Bieber back in the day when he blew up on YouTube, Justin Bieber was prepared because he was making music. And as things started to happen, he was one step ahead of everybody. When Taylor Swift wasn't getting country radio play like she needed to get, and she had the best radio team, arguably, pushing her stuck, because she didn't quite fit the format of country music at the time. And she still doesn't at the time. She's a pop star, she's a rock star, you know. The bottom line is she figured out she had a strategy and her tactics were they were in sync because she became the one that that broke online and became built those fan that fan base that got so big and invested in her that those grassroots turned into miles and miles of golden highway. And when it happened, country radio and everybody else had to play her because and so that demographic changed. She changed the demographic for country radio. Guess what? The mothers that were the demographic and the kids that were loving Taylor, the mothers ended up falling in love with Taylor because it was a bond between them and their kids. Yes. Yes. And not only the mothers and the kids, the dads who would go to concerts and watch their kids scream and cry when they saw Taylor. Taylor had it all figured out. Her and her family. Brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant. So they they had the one-two punch of we have the strategy, we've got the tactic, tactics, we can implement all of this somehow. And they had the money behind it. They had a great record team that hadn't broke anything yet because they were on big labels before that had done it, but they hadn't been proven yet on a new label, and the rest is history. So these these TV shows and all this stuff, how prepared can you be when you're not on it anymore? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:53

So you're speaking to one of the one of the characteristics of great strategy is that if the strategy blossoms, you discover optionality. So optionality is simply means that as your strategy unfolds, if it's a good strategy, if it's truly a robust strategy, as it unfolds, it will it will then highlight new opportunities for you, new options that are ready to go. And so that's what if you're if you're thinking correctly, you'll go, okay, my my strategy should get me to the place where now I can then go do these other three things. And I am ready to go do these other three things. And that gets back to your person who won the talent show, but then it all fizzles because they didn't they didn't have that sense of readiness around the optionality that was that was there. So they weren't thinking three, four moves ahead. And that's ultimately what strategy is about. It's not about that one chess move, it's not about the the the immediate response. It's about thinking, okay, if I do this, then they're gonna do that, then I need to do this, and then I can do that. So that's where your head needs to be is in this cause and effect, multiple step, longer term kind of thing. And at the end of that, if it that strategy paints you in a corner, and I've seen this with leaders where their strategy's working perfectly and it's destroying them.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:14

Because, you know, a good example is in the financial services market. Yeah, we're gonna become a lending machine. We're just we're gonna all we're gonna do is lend, lend, lend. We're gonna become, we're lending like crazy. Well, that's great, but it turns out you know what you need to do. Yeah, you got to have some money in to do it. So you have these people, their whole organization is turned into a lending machine. And then when the interest rates went way up, 500 basis points in a year, these are the industries that got killed because all of a sudden they had no way to attract deposits. That was not who they were. And so their strategy was effectively killing them, right? It happens like you see it with athletes all the time, too, where they've decided that, you know, whatever, you know, development approach, you're gonna, or I'm just gonna be a passing quarterback, or whatever it is. But to the degree that a strategy closes you down versus opening you up, that to me is super important. And the ultimate goal of strategy is to manage the ambiguity of the reality that you're in. So strategy is a template that you're putting over chaos and you're looking at it and going, holy crap, what am I gonna do with all of this? Strategy is a way for you to kind of get through that. It's it's just a rough map that will take you along the way there. But it's nothing.

SPEAKER_01 21:22

And it gives you clarity. It gives you clarity on what it is, what it is you're trying to do. And I think the the key to, and and one of the reasons why I talk so much about short-term versus long-term is that strategies are gonna change. Sometimes they're gonna change every 90 days. You know, I mean I've got a lot of clients right now that I work with that we look at those strategies every 90 days and say, okay, is it something that we still need to be focused on? Is it something that maybe we've already done? We don't need to focus on it anymore. Maybe we need to come up too new.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

Two words I want to put into your noggins, if for the listeners and whatnot, and that is when you have strategy, you begin to get feedback from the strategy. To put it another way, the minute you have any uh strategy needs to have an intention behind it. And we talked about the fact that as soon as you have intention, you have resistance. You create the resistance. Oh, I want to go do this. Oh, well, I can't do that because these other six things are in the way. Strategy does need to change, but here are the two words. The first word is when the strategy feedback starts working, it's like, oh wow, that actually worked. Okay, I'm putting my stuff out on TikTok and all of a sudden I've got 9,000 viewers of this thing. Okay, that will work. So Azar's question is is that artist ready to amplify that effect? Can they double down, triple down on what they just did, or do they only have that one song? So the first word is amplify. What do I amplify? What do I turn the volume up on? And then the second word is damp it. Notice I'm not saying kill it, cut it, stop it. I'm saying, oh, that didn't work so well. So I'm gonna dampen this a little bit until I figure it out and then try to come back. So it's about dampening and amplifying. It's about opening it up or or muting it, pulling it back a little bit until you can kind of get it right. I use those two terms in my head all the time when I'm working with clients. And I'll I'll just sit there and listen to them for a little bit. And to me, just those two words help because I'll go, well, those things that aren't working very well, let's just dampen those.

SPEAKER_02 23:21

Put them over there, and let's amplify the softening the blow for for what's not working. I love that. Yeah, yeah. I love how you're saying that. And that still gives that opportunity in another way without shutting it all the way down. You guys, y'all both deal with actual facts. So you're dealing with windows of 90 days you're talking about, and you're dealing with things are either working or they're not, right? Or they're or they or why isn't that working that has a shot at working, but you're dealing with hardcore facts all the time, correct? I mean, like you guys have to, you know, it's either it's either working or not, right? Within reason or no.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Yeah, I think yeah, I think to a certain extent, although, you know, I would argue that that, you know, I work with a lot of entrepreneurs that are relatively new startups or or you know, shortly into their businesses, and there isn't a lot of certainty there. There isn't maybe a lot of the the factual stuff that you'd like to have to help them build out strategy. There's no history there.

SPEAKER_00 24:19

So sometimes, yes, you know, there is, but we're gonna say like our KPI key performance indicator. So if I might we're gonna have KPIs, my God, we're gonna have KPIs and KPIs, and what's what's the measure, my God? We're gonna And it's like so a lot of times, so let's go back to that financial institution that was a lending machine. Well, they were they were crushing it. They were, they were lending, lending, lending, but that was killing them at the end of the day. So it's the KPI was like, yes, our our loan to share is huge, you know, but it's killing us. So so the measured measures can be as much of a problem as they can be a solution. And that's why when you said, well, you guys are dealing with facts, and both Mike and I go, Well, you know, you know, there it is. It's like, well, you know, it's it's sort of like when you when you get your health measured, and uh you've I don't know if you've ever had that experience where you go to the doctor and you feel terrible, and they say, Well, there's nothing wrong with you. But you feel terrible. So there's some there's this disconnect between the measures and what the experience it it's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

They had a one of the slides over this past weekend that you know they were kind of presenting, had one of my quotes on it, and the quote was you can't measure your business without a baseline. And, you know, it kind of like your health. I mean, we we kind of know what the baselines should be. You know, how much should we weigh? What should our cholesterol be? What should all this kind of stuff? Well, without some sort of a baseline, a measurement is worthless. And so I think the challenge is can you get your business at a point where you can start measuring it and start establishing that biz that baseline? Because that's the only real really way that you know are you succeeding or not succeeding is by exceeding what your baseline is.

SPEAKER_02 26:00

Let's talk football right now. Football sports. I want to just make this known. This is how I feel. I grew up watching Archie Manning. We're talking manning's right. And I watched him run around like a wild child. It was the most amazing thing we'd ever seen. Broken arm, whatever, it didn't matter. He was flying all over the field creating opportunity for himself. And when he did, he could zip it, right? His son, what he didn't want was Peyton and Eli to become that because he was so broken up in the NFL. He was battered, right? And so he, I think they figured out, first of all, you guys are gonna be tall, you're 6'4, 6'4, whatever. You're gonna be these you're gonna be these quarterbacks like Tom Brady that's just gonna throw, handoff, get rid of the ball, change. You're gonna be so smart that you're gonna know every single defense that's coming when they're setting up, when they're moving. Uh, you got it, because they were studied. Well, here comes Arch Manning. And Arch had a tough start this year, but what Arch is, unfortunately, is Archie. Yes. And and he's Peyton and Eli. So he's the son of Cooper, who was a wide receiver who was so athletic, it was crazy. And Cooper's wife is crazy athletic as well. All of them amazing athletes. But I'd have a feeling that Archie and the uncles at Cooper probably are going like, we want him to last in the NFL, like like Eli and and uh Peyton did, not like the dad, not like their dad Archie, who didn't like, he was beat up, you know, played a long time, but you know, he's suffering from all that still to this day. Classiest family in the world, they are the class of football. Yeah. And not only football, but with and great personalities. But Arch started to their strategy and their tactics started to change later in the season when they started to let him run again. Yeah. And he was creating all of this noise out there in the defense, and all of a sudden he's dangerous for two or three reasons now rather than just one. And when he played Ohio State at the beginning of the year, they were having him drop back. He wasn't that creative guy. Right. They weren't letting him, I'm telling you. So their strategy was wrong. They're trying to protect him. But the bottom line is with Arch Manning, is he's a superstar with his legs and his arms. You got to keep both in the game. Otherwise, the glass is half full, and it won't be fair to him to be as great as his uncle's. So I'm just calling that. And I know I'm not a football coach, and I know I may not know what I'm talking about, but I have a feeling that this guy's going to be amazing if he uses his wills as well to open up all these other opportunities. It's going to drive defenses crazy. And late in the year they started to do it. Yeah. And he started to light them up. So it'd be interesting to see if this year they change their strategy and tactics. Texas does that, and they allow him to be what he truly is and has been born to be.

SPEAKER_00 28:44

Well, and it's a good example of the uh amplify and dampen thing. Right.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

I mean, that's exactly what they're doing. And let's face it, how many quarters? How many quarterbacks can we talk about in the NFL where you can say if they'd have just been in the right system, they would have, you know, they would have excelled, you know. I mean, and the system is the strategy, you know, and that's the thing. And and I love R too. And and I would argue that Archie played on such horrible teams that that's why he got beat up.

SPEAKER_02 29:14

Well, no, no, no, it's true, it's true, but running we're dealing with running quarterbacks that have this, that have the ability to do both, and it's hard for them to stay healthy their entire career. Not even a season. So we're dealing with that. And then you're also dealing with uh what happens if Tom Brady went to the Cleveland Browns. Right. What happens? Yeah. You don't know. You don't know what happens. He went to the New England Patriots when Belichick was at his best and they had everything at the perfect time, the perfect place for Tom Brady to become absolutely incredible. Yeah. He had the opportunity. But you got to go to the right organizations to because you got barely have a shot. Right. I mean, Cleveland had the best quarterback in Baker Mayfield. Not only was he great on the field, but he was a heck of a commodity with commercials. Living in the Cleveland stadium, all these funny videos and the commercials they would do, it was it was drawing you to Cleveland and being a Browns fan, and all of a sudden they get rid of him and he's gone and be successful in Tampa. But they that was the best quarterback they've had in forever, and they got rid of him. Right. So you got leaders, you look at the Baltimore Ravens, which used to be the Cleveland Browns, that owners are there, and they always had a competitive team. Pittsburgh Steelers, always competitive. You look at these franchises that are always in the mix, or their the conversations there because of at the top.

SPEAKER_01 30:38

Well, that things are they got Yeah, it's interesting too. I mean, I my Vikings right now, you know, there's there's all kinds of rumors going around about what they're gonna do at quarterback. And, you know, one of the guys they're supposedly looking at is Kyler Murray from the from the Cardinals, uh who they just released. But Kyler Murray is a very different quarterback than O'Connell's off-screen system. Um, and so again, the strategy's gonna have to change because his tactics start with his legs, not his arm, you know.

SPEAKER_02 31:09

Yeah, you can't put him in the perfect system that he that coach is used to. He's gonna have to use what that yeah with what collar is, which is not what now look, you had Sam Darnold, right? Didn't you have Sam Darnold? Yeah, oh yeah, yeah. He just goes off in Seattle and wins a Super Bowl. Right. So you got rid of a quarter that was capable of winning a Super Bowl.

SPEAKER_01 31:29

Well, I mean, like And he excelled and that's it. I mean, look at the Sam Darnold with the Jets or I mean 49ers. I mean Yeah, I mean he was awful, you know. He comes to the Vikings, it's the right system, he flourishes and then rides off into the sunset with a new contract for$35 million a year, you know.

SPEAKER_02 31:45

The last quarterback to me that's been great with the Jets was Brett Farr when he moved over from uh Absolutely when he moved to play for him. I mean, they they're a mess as well. So I mean, it's interesting how leadership affects everybody, and then you're drafted into a situation with certain types of GMs, certain types of coaches, and if it doesn't fit, man, you can just get stuck in in nowhere land like forever and ruin your entire career because you weren't in the right place.

SPEAKER_01 32:14

Well, and I think that's it's really important that that and that's we make a yeah, we're talking football here, but we make a good distinction. So many times business owners and leaders make decisions on strategy before they even look at the pieces that they have, the strengths that they have in their organizations. And Randy, I know you can talk about this as well. Yeah, you know, you decide you're gonna do something, but you don't have the the people with the strengths that they need in order to make that strategy successful.

SPEAKER_00 32:43

So I've spent the last uh 20 years or so. The number one thing I do the most is work with boards of directors. And so a board of directors is a particularly interesting animal. They are usually somewhere between the smallest I've ever seen is five, and the biggest I've ever seen was like 79. So uh that was for was it uh Procter and Gamble, I guess. One of one of those. So they can get very big, but most of the time I'm working with boards, hospitals, or or financial institutions. You're talking about nine to eleven, thirteen people or so. And they forever struggle with the difference between strategy and tactics because the board is the CEO's boss, right? So that CEO is going to answer to this board of directors. So you'll hear the CEO usually in a complaining kind of way say, Yeah, I've got 11 bosses, and they're not wrong. So now you've got 11 people, and the goal of those 11 people is to speak with one voice. Guess what? That's hard to do in any situation. But the critical thing that they have to understand is the lane that they need to be in. So the classic thing that happens with a board of directors is the board will come in and say, Well, I really think that we need to put branches over on this side of town because that's where my son goes to school, and I think that that place is really hopping. So I'm so they're they're getting into the weeds of where to put a branch. Sure. Or, well, I think the branch should look like this, we should paint it blue, or the parking lot should be this way or that way. And it's just like, oh my God. So now the boss has got 11 voices telling him all these other things to do, or her, all these things to do. And it's like, oh my goodness. So the difference between strategy and tactics is crucial for a board. And so the question I always ask is, why is it so tempting to drift into this? And I think it's because tactics are touchable, yeah. They're knowable, doable. And there's a certain comfort level with that. Oh, I understand where that traffic is going, and so I can weigh in. Everybody's got an opinion about I hated that application or this was really good, or that was no good. But it's very difficult to do strategy. So the first thing I would like to say about boards of directors is understanding a strategic direction is not easy. And it requires everybody to kind of lift themselves up and have a discipline about not getting into the tactics. And that is really difficult for boards of directors because it only takes one person to drag them into that. And so what you end up with role confusion becomes a big part of this. Whose job is really what? What's the job of this or what's the job of that? So one of the things that I'm seeing going on right now is I'm trying to say, let's develop strategic awareness and at least your middle management, preferably all the way through the whole organization. But your middle management has got to be able to articulate that strategy. And they should be able to say it verbatim. It should roll off their tongue. They should have memorized it. So if there's strategic awareness at the middle level, then your senior leadership, they should be operating at an exclusively strategic level. And so the way I'd measure that is if all of you guys get hit by a bus, will the institution be able to run fine? Will the day-to-day tactical reality of the institution be able to be okay? And that's what you're looking for is if the tactical reality can't manage itself, you got a problem. Yeah. Because the leaders are now able to look forward, forward, forward. And then the board sits on top of that, and the board should be looking way. They should be looking up that third horizon, you know. And I love it when you hear a board do like a long-term strategy. There's a book by a guy named Watts Wacker. He's passed, but he was an interesting dude. He's a Canadian hockey player, and uh, he wrote a book called The 500-year advantage or something to that effect. And he would run strategic planning sessions for multinational corporations for 500 years. He'd say, our window is 500 years, and it would blow their minds and be like, oh my gosh, how do we have a 500-year plan? That's impossible. But then what he what he found out was, you know, for Proctor and Gamble, it was like, well, in 500 years we'll still have teeth. Our dental, all our dental stuff is still gonna be there. So yes, we can begin to think, but what he would do is do 500 years in the morning and then he'd come back in the afternoon and say, okay, we're not gonna do that anymore. We're gonna do 30 years. Everybody would go, oh, that's easy. Oh, yeah, okay, I got you. Right. So he stretched their brains way out, didn't really care what they came up with with it, but just blew away all of the time constraints and then came back with 30 years, which is still an absurd amount of time. And they were able to get their minds around that. So that was what he did with the boards. Now, the board should be able to have conversations about that long-term. Where do we want to be in 30 years? They should be able to answer that. Yeah, yeah. And that's different than the leadership team, which is just working on the immediate strategies. They would be like the general managers of the football team.

SPEAKER_01 37:33

I'm gonna I'm gonna throw a word on us. We haven't had a word for a couple sessions now, so I'm gonna throw a word on us. It's called subsidiarity. And subsidiarity is when we have that strategic awareness in all levels of the organization, and we let those people that are that at that particular level execute the tactics and make the decisions that they are directly impacted for without somebody over the top of them making them second guess their decisions. And so subsidiary is it's actually a it's actually a term that comes out of Catholic social teaching, uh, and it really talks about giving people at the lowest possible level the ability to make decisions and to be able to do the things that they need to do without having to send things up the ladder to find out who gets who who should be doing what. So it's a great way to think about it from a standpoint of stri strategy and strategic planning is that making sure that you're allowing your people to execute on that strategy and to execute the tactics that are gonna that are gonna take. You know, it's kind of like when we go back to that military example, you know, it's kind of like uh a general not letting anybody shoot a cannon off until that general goes down and lights the fuse. So again, subsidiarity is allowing people at that level to be able to do what they need to do. So all right. Love that word. Let's bring us home.

SPEAKER_02 38:58

I'm gonna let uh I'm gonna, you know, pass this one on to Randy Harris. Hey, we can bring you home, but go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

Yeah, so I think when we talk about strategy and tactics, what we what we begin to understand is that they're both terms that require constant redefinition. And so you're not crazy if you struggle with the idea of what strategy is. Because you might know what it is written in a dictionary, but when you try to apply it to your life or to the world, then it becomes more difficult. And strategy and tactics do come together. They do mix, they do need to be connected. And that was what Mike Farrell was talking about when he talked about, you know, having the purpose, the why in mind, as well as the how. So ultimately, what you want to be sure about, though, is that, and I think, Mike, I think you nailed it. The most important thing you can do is drive agency, drive the ability to act as far through the organization as you possibly can, up to and including completely empowering your customers, which is what's happened with things like Uber and where you you travel when you want to travel, the way you want to travel, and so forth. So all of these things come together. But so I guess I the number one thing I would say about this is read it, study it, learn about strategy because it will help you. Absolutely. I love it. Hire us. We can help.

SPEAKER_02 40:12

That's yeah, you guys, I'm saying we can do it quick.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

You know, we can diagnose that stuff pretty fast. And Azar, just because it's music doesn't mean that you're free. You still gotta pay the part of you are, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 40:27

Well, I really enjoyed doing these pods with you guys, and it's been an enlightening for me for sure. And I've been using a lot of this in new record stuff that I'm working on with other projects and and just implementing. I hate the word implementing for an artist, but man, music people gotta be on both use both sides of the brain. And if you don't have it, you better go figure out what to do. Do something to light that side up because it's so important now to be to know it all to know how to do everything. Enough of it, enough of it until you get to the point where you can rely on people around you so you can focus on your art. I've been in both places in my life, you know, uh been able just to focus on art. But I gotta tell you, I enjoy focusing on the art and doing the business part as well, and trying to see if you can sort of crack the code because the code keeps moving and keeps changing. You know, it's somebody changing a combination of this lock. And it's kind of exciting, I gotta tell you. Always exciting. It keeps you on your toes, it keeps you being creative, and it keeps you loving what the why I get the purpose of what I do is that's to make music, man. And what you get to do with that afterwards is just the most beautiful thing in the world. So I'm grateful for that. But yeah, yeah, the world needs us, especially today.

SPEAKER_00 41:38

All right, friends, we'll see you next time on Resonance and find us everywhere. You like your podcasts, and we'll look forward to hearing from you soon.

SPEAKER_01 41:46

Check us out on resonanceleader.com. Also, you can have us come in live. We uh do resonance live. We'd love to do that. If it's something that you're interested in, if you go to residenceleader.com, there is a contact button there. Just hit the contact button, send us off a message, and we will get back to you just as quickly as we possibly can. And uh, we look forward to seeing you, hearing you, or you hearing us on the uh next episode of Resonance. Thanks, guys. Later on. All right, boys.

SPEAKER_02 42:15

That's what I'm doing.com.