Figure It Out Mindset

What happens when your perfect plan collides with real-world pressure? We unpack the FIO—Figure It Out—mindset and how it transforms chaos into clarity. We discuss the distinction between obstacles and barriers, the discipline of “be quick, don’t hurry,” and how asking sharper questions can transform uncertainty into action. You’ll leave with a toolkit you can use today. 

Episode Guest:  Derrick Girard
Website: https://derrickgirard.com/
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/derrickgirard/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/author.derrickgirard/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/derrickgirardauthor/#

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Transcript

Tracy-Ann Palmer 0:01

You have to walk the talk.

Speaker 1 0:03

You have to be authentic as a leader if you're not doing it. They see that.

Speaker 2 0:07

It is entirely universal. There's other people who are going through this.

Speaker 1 0:11

For me, a great leader needs to be able to marry three things: vision, systems, and people.

Speaker 2 0:20

Welcome to Leadership Moments. If this is your first time, and if you are returning, thank you for your support.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 0:26

This show is about leaders from all walks of life, leadership tips, and maybe even a little of what you wouldn't expect to help you in leadership.

Speaker 2 0:35

We would appreciate it if you tell someone else about our podcast as we strive to support all leaders that want to just be better.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 0:41

Let's get on with the show. Hey Derek, it's fantastic to have you on Each of Moments Podcast today. And I'm so excited that I am the host. I get to uh spend some time with you.

Derrick Girard 0:54

Yeah, you and me both. I'm I'm very much looking forward to this discussion. So thank you for having me.

Defining Test: Lawsuits As Catalyst

Tracy-Ann Palmer 1:00

Yeah, no, it's great. It's wonderful. So I'm gonna just, you know, jump right in. Uh I've I've been looking at a lot of your stuff that's already out there, and I know that you're gonna bring incredible value to our audience. Your book title challenges all of us that when life demands more, will we make excuses or figure it out? So my question to you is what was your most defining put to the test moment? And how did it shape your view of leadership?

Derrick Girard 1:34

You know, it's a it's it's such an interesting question because I think uh as I as I look back to the book and my experiences, I use sort of the biggest put to the test moment as the catalyst for the book, and it's what I start off with in the book, you know, starting this company from the ground up, this tech company, and then getting hit with three lawsuits, um, you know, right as we were, I feel like we were right as we were hitting our stride. So that was certainly probably the most distinctive and the biggest. Um, but the reality is, I think in most people's cases, just like me, it's been a lifetime of tests. And so everything built up to that moment and what I was going to do in that moment. But it was an entire lifetime of, you know, I grew up an Army Brat. I was all over the world. I moved all the time. It was constant change, constant tests. So I think all of that led to how I handled the most significant moment in my life when I got when I got served with all those lawsuits, and I found myself in that very, uh, very difficult situation.

Obstacles vs Excuses

Tracy-Ann Palmer 2:35

Yeah. Yeah, I could see that. Now, you know, excuses, there's always a conversation in leadership, and you know where I'm going because there's always a conversation in leadership, but you know, just you know, don't make excuses, you know. Uh you don't you can't make excuses. Now, however, we know that there are sometimes circumstances where people are trying to justify the circumstance, let's call it, versus, you know, trying to make an excuse. But excuses can often sound reasonable, let's say. So, how do leaders distinguish between you know a valid obstacle and an excuse that's really masked by fear or complacency or avoidance or you know, someone else is gonna take the buck, right?

Derrick Girard 3:25

Well, I think you already said it. Honestly, you you said the word obstacle, and I think that's probably the most important word, right? It's amazing how many times you'll hear somebody complain about something, and they view it as sort of like not an obstacle, but as a barrier. Like it's impossible to get past this. So in sales, maybe my sales quotas get changed, or a deadline gets changed, or the project scope gets changed, or a personal relationship goes through a difficult patch. It none of those things are barriers, none of those things are a brick wall that you can't get past. That doesn't mean they're not obstacles. And so for me, the easiest way to look at it is what's the solution? And I always use the example, again, I'm a military guy, so I always use the example of imagine you're in battle and you put this perfect plan together, and then you go out on the battlefield, and everything you put together in a plan goes right out the window, right? Shots fired. Sitting around saying this isn't what we planned doesn't help you save your own life or anybody else's life, right? So, yes, it's not perfect, yes, it's not ideal, yes, it's not what you planned, but what are you gonna do now? And that's the only thing that matters. I say to my kids all the time, so what, now what? I get it, it's not perfect, it's not ideal, it's not what you asked for, now what? And so I think that's the difference between excuses and a solutions-oriented person. And a lot of times you talked about fear or avoidance. It's amazing how many people are afraid of being wrong or afraid of maybe not looking like they don't know the answers, especially leaders where they're afraid of not admitting they don't know it. It's just amazing. Start asking questions. I say it to people all the time: your your answers are in your questions, not your statements. Just ask more questions, and you'd be amazed at how easy the answer presents itself.

Be Quick, Don’t Hurry

Tracy-Ann Palmer 5:16

Yeah, I love that. I love that whole situation around discussion of questions, questions, questions, because we do not as a society ask enough questions. And I had a very dear friend on a few months ago, and he said, I always I I keep asking the question until I get root cause. So I love that. I really love that. Now, you know, in a high-stakes situation, right, we're often forced to choose between reacting emotionally or rising intentionally. And I do believe that how you react has an impact on the way, you know, people see you as a leader, right? Because no one's gonna follow the guy that's, you know, reacting to the fire. He's gonna follow the guy that's calm under the pressure of the fire, right? So, what tools or mindsets have really helped you consistently choose the ladder?

Modeling Accountability Without Blame

Derrick Girard 6:13

Well, it's it's one of those things that I would tell you I'm not perfect at. In fact, it's it's a difficult thing because the answer to me to this sort of question is taking your time. Right? There's uh an old quote, there's a famous basketball coach named John Wooden, coached at UCLA, and one of his players said he used to always say, be quick, but don't hurry. And when you don't understand that, that quote, you think those two words mean the same thing, but they don't. And so I think the best way to understand how to not react emotionally or how to how to be intentional with how you choose to move forward is to slow it down a little bit. That doesn't mean you stop progressing, but it means you give yourself the opportunity to rationally think, analyze a situation, and make the most tactical approach moving forward. And so I think the best way to do it is be quick, but don't hurry. Slow it down. Try to remove some of those quick emotional responses. There's an old quote that that said the quick response sacrifices accuracy for speed, right? You you respond really quick. It's amazing how many times you stop and you go, man, I wish I would have done something different or I would have said that different. And the more times you find yourself in those situations, hopefully the better you get at just responding slowly. And it's one of the things that I learned, you know, an interesting way, or that I was I had to experience it a very interesting way when I went to court. You know, sitting in federal court, you know, you if you've ever watched any courtroom drama or anything on TV, you don't see a lot of facial expressions from the witnesses or from the people sitting there, the defendants or whatnot. And that's what I was told by my attorneys. Keep your emotions exactly the same. Keep them very still. Don't have big emotional responses. If you disagree with something, if you know they're lying, just keep it together. Don't worry about it. And and so that was an interesting test as well, being put in that situation of don't allow yourself to have those big emotional spikes. But to me, I think the best answer is slow it down, give yourself a little bit more time to respond and think and be methodical and be intentional, and that makes those situations a lot easier to manage.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 8:22

Yeah. Boy, that's that's really that's a gold nugget right there. You know, I I literally had to get a pen and paper because I had to write that down. Be quick, but don't hurry. So someone who I uh is a mentor, I admire, is Don Jaeger, and he was actually mentored by uh John Wooden. And and I tell you, uh, you know, there's so many things you can learn from these incredible coaches.

Derrick Girard 8:47

Yeah, it is, it's amazing.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 8:49

Yeah, but but I really love your thought process around that because I'm an emotional creature. So what you just said really spoke to me personally, because I know I've got to be like, you know, poker face, you know, but uh it's not easy to do, hey. It's hard.

Derrick Girard 9:06

I'm the same way. I mean, my staff over the years, my kids, my wife, they all say the same thing. You they know what dad's thinking. You can tell what dad's thinking. And so when you get into these situations, it's it's sometimes you have to remind yourself that how easy you might be to read. And you have to be aware of that. Self-awareness is really, really important.

unknown 9:25

Yeah.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 9:25

It's the first thing that you know, um, you learn in EQ, self-awareness before anything else. And you gotta know what your triggers are. And that's that's your point, right? Is really being able to just sit back and not react, but rather to assess the situation. I love that. That's really good. So now you talk about personal responsibility as a core leadership trade. I love this, by the way. I absolutely I 100% believe in this. So, how can leaders model accountability without creating a culture of blame or fear?

Coaching, Questions, And Root Cause

Derrick Girard 10:03

Gosh, what a great question. Um, I think a lot of it starts with what what I've talked about even in the book is understanding the difference between self-awareness and self-confidence. And to me, one of the biggest um dangers of self-awareness, one of the biggest things that stand in the way is self-confidence. I had that, right? There was a point in my life where you couldn't have convinced me I could have, you know, I couldn't do something. And so for me, that personal responsibility, uh that to me is I think one of the greatest teachers in failure. And so there's a lot of opportunities, there's so many different, you know, experienced athletes and successful people that talk about the power of failure. To me, that I think that's a massive thing to learn from a lot of people is to really understand the difference between self-awareness and self-confidence. And again, how detrimental sometimes self-confidence can actually be. But I think the to the other part of your question is modeling accountability without creating a culture of blame and fear. Again, it's are you looking for solutions or are you just pointing out problems? It it doesn't take a good leader to point out a problem. That's easy to do. Yes. Again, changing deadlines, changing quotas, changing parameters, job descriptions, that's easy to do to point out what's wrong with this situation. But it's a very unique person who can say, well, given the new requirements or given the new constraints, here's what I think we need to do moving forward. And so, in order to do that, like I've already said before, in order to say, here's what we need to do, are you willing to ask questions? Are you willing to raise your hand and say, I don't know everything, but I'm going to ask a lot of really smart questions to a lot of really smart people. For me, I had to do that when I decided to build my tech company. There isn't a solution. How do I find the solution so I can solve the problem? And then I ran into the same thing when I got sued. I don't understand this world. I don't understand how to handle lawsuits. I certainly don't understand how to handle three, but I've got a whole team of people that are relying on me. What do I do now? I just start asking really good questions to really smart people, and that helps me guide what I'm going to do, and I start moving forward methodically and appropriately. So I think that's the best way to do it. Again, I could sit back and go, this is ridiculous that I'm being sued. This isn't fair. This isn't right. What does that solve? It solves nothing.

Coasting, Coachability, And Self-Awareness

Tracy-Ann Palmer 12:29

Yeah. Yeah. No, I I I really, you know, I really respect that and I really appreciate that. One of the things that, you know, I'd always say to my team is, what would you do if I wasn't here? It's not to say that you're expecting them to come up with answers, but you want them to what what you're talking about is really the critical thinking skills, which is their learned ability, right? If you never, you know, it's something everybody can learn. So to your point, if you're not asking the questions, you know, what is the current state? What's the gap between current state and where we want to be? Just, you know, the basic question, what got us here? What shouldn't we do going forward? I I think your point is just is so, so valid because that is definitely an area where as leaders, you want your team to be able to come to you with options, recommendations. They may not be perfect, you're not asking for perfection. You're just asking them to really figure out what's really going on. Uh and and again, ask around the smart people, the experts, you know. Um, so I think that's great.

Derrick Girard 13:38

I was doing some consulting for this organization recently, and they're having these challenges, like a lot of organizations do. And this woman asked me, Derek, how can you help us? How can you help us, you know, get to where we're going? And I think she was looking for me to give her an answer. And what I said to her was, Well, I can't, I can't even begin to suggest what I might be able to do to help until I understand what's really getting in the way. And she stopped and looked at me and I went, It's amazing when you stop and focus on the actual problem instead of just admitting there's a problem, instead of just saying there's a problem, what is the problem? And then you start backing that problem down. So the problem is we can't hit our sales goals. Why can't we hit our sales goals? Because the salespeople aren't doing enough. Why aren't they doing enough? Right. You start asking that question, you start backing it down and realize I don't have to have the answer. I just got you to think about this slightly different. The answer presents itself almost every single time. And so for me, that's the best part of consulting, and a lot of really good consultants will agree to that. You just get a different vantage point to ask questions that most people know they should be asking, but they're just not self-aware enough at that point in time to ask it.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 14:47

Or maybe just scared to.

Derrick Girard 14:49

Yeah. And I say it to them all the time. I'm gonna ask you a lot of questions. I'm not challenging you, I'm not being disrespectful. I really want to know what the answer is. So let me ask you a bunch of questions and let's see what comes out of this.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 15:00

Yeah, that's excellent, excellent feedback, excellent advice. So now many people sort of wait until they're in you know, crisis to change. You know, you know what I'm talking about. What would you say to leaders who are hosting, you know, who haven't been put to the test yet, but we know they will be.

Derrick Girard 15:23

Gosh, this is, I have to tell you, this is probably one of the greatest questions I've ever been asked. And the reason it's one of the greatest questions I've ever been asked because the answer is, does it matter? And let me let me explain that to you. Like I mentioned before already, there was a point in my career where I was my self-confidence was so high, my self-awareness was just gone. So the question really is if I have that person who waits till crisis to change, maybe they're coasting or maybe they don't think they need to change, does it matter what I would say to them? Because would they listen to me anyway? Right?

Tracy-Ann Palmer 15:57

It's brilliant.

Resilience Without Burnout

Derrick Girard 15:58

You know, I've got a I've got a I've got a 12-year-old daughter. Is she ever gonna listen to mom talk about, you know, what it means to have heartbreak until she experiences it? Right? So it's one of those things that how many times do we get the advice we're supposed to get from a colleague, from an expert, from our parents, right? And we just brush it off as if they have no idea until we get to that point where we go, you know what, I should have listened. But I had to fail, or I had to trip over this landmine, or I had to have my heart broken before I finally woke up and listened. So it's such a great question, but the real question is, is somebody even willing to listen to it? If I gave them the most perfect answer in the world, would they even listen?

Tracy-Ann Palmer 16:42

I think that is absolutely brilliant because you're spot on. You know, in in executive coaching, we're taught if someone's not coachable, fire them because they're not coachable. It doesn't mean how much you coach them, they're not coachable. Okay. It's the same situation that you're talking about. You know, there's something about the power of failure in school of hard knocks. And until you've been through it, I mean, I don't know about you, but I know when I turned 30, you know, I looked at my mom and said, All you told your son is were right. You know, I told you so, yeah. I told you so. But I would I wasn't gonna listen.

Derrick Girard 17:22

Yep.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 17:23

Had to I had to feel.

Derrick Girard 17:25

And the problem, as I I've my kids have heard me say a million times, I write about this in the book. The problem with people that don't have self-awareness is they don't know it. That's the point. And so I could tell you all day long. I mean, again, if you have kids, you know this. Don't touch that, it's hot. And then finally you go, you know what? Touch it. I'm just I'm tired of telling you, go ahead and touch it. You know, don't eat all that candy, you're gonna get a stomachache. You know what? Go ahead. I'm not gonna keep telling you. And so it's just one of those things where it's personal or professional, it's it's sort of the same question. Are they even open-minded enough to listen?

Lived Experience Beats Classroom

Tracy-Ann Palmer 18:00

No, I think that's and and I think that is something that every leader should think about for themselves is where are you relative to your self-awareness, your self-confidence? Derek, I really think that point you raised, because we should never ever feel overconfident to the point that we give up on our self-awareness, right? So it's just brilliant. Now, as entrepreneurs, there's a constant pill between resilience and burnout. I mean, I know that I worked for an incredible entrepreneur, 35 years old, and I remember driving in the car one day and he said to me, I'm tired. And it was the first acknowledgement of the sacrifices that he had made to get to where he was. And just shortly after that, he gave up his CEO role and handed it over to someone who felt who would be more appropriate for the role for the company at that point in time in terms of the growth and that. So, how do you figure it out without sacrificing your well-being? You've been through this. I mean, boy, if anyone knows this feeling, it's you because of everything you went through with the with the business, right?

Ego: The Hidden Divider

Derrick Girard 19:06

Yep. Well, there's there's a couple of different things that I think matter, right? So for most entrepreneurs that that push themselves to exhaustion or burnout, a lot of times it's it's because of lack of trust. And I can tell that for myself. It's it's a fear that if I'm not here, if I'm not doing it, I can't trust anybody else to do it. My first time I ever built this organization on my own years and years ago, I've I had somebody had to bring that to my attention and say, everybody here relies on you. And that's when it hit me that I'm doing a terrible job of sort of teaching everybody what they need to know. That's why they all need me here every day. And so when I was doing this the second time when I built my tech company, I had to find a way to empower people that I could trust. I had to find a way to empower these people so that if I was gone, it didn't break, it didn't stop. Now, that doesn't happen right away, right? That takes time. You have to build those people, you have to build that trust, that camaraderie. But there was a point when I just worked myself to the bone and I ended up in the hospital for six days. And it was amazing, nothing broke. And that was like this aha moment of okay, I can actually be out of the office for a little while, and it's fine. The team knows what they're doing. And so a lot of it has to do with surrounding yourself with people you can trust, finding those people that you know can pick up the slack or can do what they need to do, and you can trust them to do it. You don't have to watch over them. That does take time, and you know, the reality is you might get it wrong a few times before you get it right. The second thing is something I do talk about on the book because it's really important. Surround yourself with the right people. So the one thing that I did, I just did a very poor job of, is I took this professional network that I had. And when things really got rough for me in the tech company, I shut them out. I didn't want to be a burden to them. I didn't want to dump my challenges and issues on them. So I just shut them out. And I dealt with this on my own for three and a half years of legal battles. I just, I kept it all inside. And that is a I say it takes a really, really strong and stupid person to do that because that is really, really hard to do, and I don't recommend it. So find a way to surround yourself with people that can help, people that you can confide in, people that actually want really good things for you. Find out who those people are and don't be afraid to lean on them when you need to.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 21:35

Yeah, I think that's excellent advice. I I because also the other part of that is you don't know when you're having those conversations, who in their network can also help in certain situations. And even just getting it out for me is always that emotional release. It it helps to stop the burn, to be honest. You know, it helps create, you know, um, you know, they they always say emotions make you sick. I I I actually firmly believe that. And I think when you keep all of whatever's going on in, you're not able to rationalize it in the same way because you're not thinking you know, you're not thinking out loud, basically.

Derrick Girard 22:13

Well, and it's a domino effect, right? So for me, you take all this stuff internally, you stop working out, you stop sleeping, which means everything about you changes. It just it it just eats you away inside out. And you might say, oh, that'll never happen to me. It doesn't happen overnight, it takes a while and just slowly chip away at yourself, and it's it's it can be devastating.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 22:35

Boy, I tell you, I I just want to say to our audience, what a valuable time. I'm so thoroughly enjoying this. Uh, we're gonna keep going here, but I just wanted to stop for a second and just tell you that, Derek, because this is this conversation is amazing. It's wonderful. So I'm gonna move on now to just some, just your perspective on leadership, right? What are the leadership qualities that most often emerge from people who've been tested in real life, not just trained in a classroom?

Realistic Entrepreneurship: Beyond Highlights

Derrick Girard 23:07

Well, I honestly we've talked about already. I think self-awareness is a big point, right? How many people think they're invincible until somebody has to hit them over the head and make them realize they're not? Right? It's it there's just so many different examples of that professionally and personally, where we have to learn these lessons. And so when you've been tested in real life, when you've had a breakup personally, or you've been fired from a job, or you've again missed a deadline or something, perspective is really, really powerful. Perspective is one of the most powerful things in the world if you understand how to leverage it, right? What have I been through? What have I seen? How did that impact me? What did I learn? All that stuff. And so I think that's probably the most powerful leadership quality is that self-awareness, gaining that from the perspective and from what you've been through. Um, it's amazing to me. I think that is probably the most powerful thing when it comes to what you learn and you take away that you can't get in a classroom. I'm sorry, you just can't. I I speak a lot of times on college campuses to entrepreneurship students, and I tell them all the time, I can't believe they teach this because they teach you all the cool things about being an entrepreneur and being your own boss. They don't, they can't prepare you for what you're gonna go through. They cannot prepare, yeah, they cannot prepare you mentally for the hurdles and and roadblocks that you're gonna run into. And that's really what matters when it comes to ultimately your success as an entrepreneur is can you handle that stuff? Not do you know the difference between an S-corp and a C Corp.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 24:38

Yeah, totally. I'm so with you. Yeah, totally. Now, uh, what do you think when you think about the people that you have seen as leaders that you have seen be successful and not? What makes those people different? I mean, we've spoken about self-awareness. Is there anything else that you think that really stands out in your mind about what makes a successful leader not a successful leader?

Derrick Girard 25:02

Honestly, I think in my experience, I've seen it. The the one word I would say is probably ego.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 25:09

Interesting.

Finding Mentors Who’ve Done It

Derrick Girard 25:10

So it's it's so easy to see in in people. And I think sometimes they don't think it's that easy to see, but it's so easy to see when somebody is is is constantly acting with their ego. And so for me, like I can't tell you how many times I've told people, I don't care what you call me. If you wanted me to join a meeting with you, I can be the owner of the company, I can be a colleague, or I can be a brand new person that just joined the office. I don't care. I'm here to help you. It's not about me. And so there's companies that I've consulted with, they say we want to tell people we're working with you. You don't have to at all. They don't have to know I have anything to do with this. It's not about me. And there's too many people out there, I think, that want to make it all about them. And so ego is, I think, and for a lot of leaders, is is the enemy.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 25:59

You know, it's so funny you say that because I think about social media and just what's happening in our world around social media and and and with and with our children. You know, no one talks about the bad stuff in social media, they only talk about all the good stuff, right? And the challenge is we both know, uh, to your point, is when you're an entrepreneur, most of the time it really sucks. It's actually really hard. It when you get to the end and you've been successful, it's rewarding. But to get there, most entrepreneurs don't ever get there, Derek. They don't actually take it.

The FIO Mindset Explained

Derrick Girard 26:34

Yeah, I've I'm two simple examples. When I started the tech company, my my business partner said we should go get funding. You know, all these startup companies get funding because he reads the headlines. You know, this company just received $40 million of funding. Well, when you start going down that path, you realize like one company published it. It was like 20,000 applicants to fund one. That was it. So all of those people got told no, but you thought it was easy because you saw the headline. And the same thing I've told my son, who's a basketball player, if all you watch are the highlights, you would think some of these best basketball players out there never miss. They never airball it, right? They never make mistakes. But if you watch the whole game and you see the summary of it, you realize, no, they do make mistakes. But if all you ever watch is the highlight, you never understand that.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 27:27

Yeah. No, that's an excellent point. So, what advice would you give to a young entrepreneur or, you know, someone who's an emerging leader who's really in the thick of it right now, they're facing doubt, they're facing delay, setbacks, maybe they've got some challenges. You know, we're in a very volatile economy, let's call it. Tell me just what kind of advice makes sense.

Derrick Girard 27:49

Yeah. My my favorite advice to give people is find somebody else who's done it. And what I mean by that is if if I'm starting a company from the ground up and I meet somebody who's running a company, I have to understand if that is the person who built it from the ground up. It's not to say they're they're not a good leader. It's not to say they can't manage and run the company, but the type of person it takes to start it from nothing is very different oftentimes than the person who can run it later on. And so depending on where you are, find someone who's done it. Find someone who's been there or is there with you, right? Doing the same thing, right? Maybe even a different field. So you have someone who you can talk to who can actually relate. I use the example in the book of, you know, when I chose to go to college, most of my family didn't go to college. I couldn't lean on them for the challenge that I was walking into. I they just they couldn't relate to having finals. It just they never did that, right? And so I had to find other people that when when things got hard, I could talk to about it because they experienced it as well. And so find those people that are going through or have gone through something similar. Because really, only those types of people or those people are the ones that are going to be able to help you through it.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 29:05

Yeah, that's just excellent, excellent feedback. And, you know, surround yourself with that network of people who can really help you, right? That's really the key. So if there's one message you want every listener to take away from your book and apply that to their leadership or their entrepreneurial journey, what is it?

Derrick Girard 29:25

Well, what I call the book, what I reference all the time is the FIO mindset, the figure it out.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 29:30

You better go there, you beat me to it. Okay.

Adversity As A Leadership Gym

Derrick Girard 29:32

It's it's a mindset and it's not a checklist, right? So a lot of times people will want to read the book and say, well, just tell me what step one and step two is. I don't break it down that way because it's all depends on what you're struggling with, right? What part of this mindset is getting in your way? And then how do you deal with that mindset? Is it setting goals? Is it your attitude? Is it self awareness? Is it motivation? What is it? So understand the mindset first and also really understand. Everybody has it. So if you're listening to this or reading the book thinking, I don't have it, yeah, you do. It just hasn't really been activated or tested yet. I promise you, you do. And the second thing, and probably most important thing, excuses don't solve problems. I don't care what it is. I don't care how big or how small. There is never a point in your life where you're going to come across an excuse or a problem where an excuse is the solution. You will never encounter a problem where an excuse solves it. And so whatever you need to do, figure it out, attack it head on, be intentional, be methodical, and overcome it.

unknown 30:36

Yeah.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 30:37

And if you want to just let people know what does F-I-O mindset stand for.

Derrick Girard 30:43

Yep. It's figure it out.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 30:45

Exactly.

Derrick Girard 30:47

And the important thing there is like I say, I say all the time, a lot of times people use the phrase figure it out as a as a creative way of saying not my problem. Like you figure it out, right? The whole point of this mindset is what do you do when it is? What do you do when there isn't anybody else who's going to solve this problem for you? That's when you have to apply the mindset.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 31:06

And really, I I don't care if this is for leaders or entrepreneurs. This is a, to me, that is a life lesson. It's it's a life mindset because adversity comes in all shapes and sizes in our life. Obstacles and challenges, figure it out, to me, is, you know, I think a life lesson for all of us. That's the mindset that we that we have to have. So I just love that. What a what an absolute gold nugget. Now you do talk about something else that I it was one of your key takeaways, which is this using adversity as a leadership gym. I loved this. Like just quickly, you know, just tell me how how you think about that.

Rapid-Fire Personal Questions

Derrick Girard 31:51

You know, challenges aren't something I think we should avoid. I think challenges are something that are are such unbelievable builders in character and knowledge and everything else. So for me, I'm I'm hit with three lawsuits. What did I do? I became a law student. Like I literally studied the law like my life depended on it, because it kind of did. And so if it wasn't for that, would I have ever done that? No, probably not. My knowledge of you know the legal system would have been what I see on TV. But for me, that adversity is what helped me learn. It was like I say, the gym. Like it was the mental gym of just like, all right, here's the challenge. What do I do? How am I going to attack this? How am I going to absolutely make sure I never run into the same problem again and find myself in the same position again? And so to me, I think that's that, you know, that's that mentality of like, I'm not going to back down. An excuse isn't going to solve this. I'm going to attack this thing. And whatever it takes, I'm going to win. That's just how it works. And I think there's a lot of people that think that's different and that's unique. And I heard people say that, like, well, Derek, you have that, but not everybody does. No, they do. They, I promise you they do. It just are they using it? Or are they surrounding themselves with people that let them use excuses? So if I surround myself with people that let me fail and let me use excuses, then it'd be easy for me to say I don't have it. It's because I've never been forced to use it. It's there. I promise you it is.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 33:19

That's excellent. So now I've got a couple of fun questions before we uh we finish up here. Would you rather want to be a master chef or have a master chef in your home?

Derrick Girard 33:33

Oh, that's an easy one for me. I love to cook. I love to cook. My kids say all the time, Dad, you should go on cooking shows. I love to cook. Really? I don't need someone cooking for me. I would love to do it. That's that's me. I'm the chef. I'm the chef.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 33:49

Oh, that's amazing. And would you rather, in terms of communication, would you rather use instruments to do it, or would you rather sing communication?

Derrick Girard 34:00

Oh my goodness. I I would never sing ever. I mean, I can't play an instrument. I could play maybe hot cross buns on the recorder, but I promise you you'd get more out of that than if I if I had to sing.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 34:11

Oh, that's funny. And last question, would you rather telepod or have no 10 languages?

Derrick Girard 34:20

Say that one more time. What I what?

Tracy-Ann Palmer 34:21

Would you rather have a telepod, like where you can, you know, teleport places or learn 10 languages?

Derrick Girard 34:28

Oh man, 10 languages. I how great would that be to be able to communicate with so many different types of people? I can go there and see it. If I don't know how to communicate with somebody, am I going to appreciate it? Probably not. So I I want to be able to chat with different people.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 34:43

Yeah.

Derrick Girard 34:43

For sure.

Closing And Listener Invitation

Tracy-Ann Palmer 34:44

I wish I'd taken up more languages when I was younger. Yeah. It's great to have all that. All right. Well, we've come to the end of the show. Unfortunately, because this has been such a fantastic conversation. Derek, thank you for being with us today. Uh, it's really been valuable. Yeah, it's been fantastic. And uh we'll certainly uh have you have you back again for sure. So uh to everyone out there, thanks for being with us. Thanks for joining us. It's LeadershipMoments Podcast.com. Please give us your feedback. We want to hear from you. We want to know what what you care about, what who you want to hear from, what you want to hear about. And remember, together as leaders, we make a difference. Thanks everyone. If you enjoyed the show, please go to LeadershipMoments Podcast.com to subscribe to the podcast or on your favorite player, as well as follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Speaker 2 35:39

You can also send us a message on what you like and don't like or what guest you want us to have on the show.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 35:44

So until next time.

Speaker 2 35:45

This is Stacy Castor, and what does it challenge you won't change you.

Tracy-Ann Palmer 35:49

And I'm Tracy Ann Palmer. Be the change you wish to see in the world.