Winning At Work And Home With Randy Gravitt

Join us in this insightful episode of "The Anatomy of Leadership" as we explore the challenge of winning at work and family life with Randy Gravitt, CEO of Lead Every Day. 

When was the last time you examined the connection between your leadership at work and your life at home? In this eye-opening conversation, Randy Gravitt, CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer) of Lead Every Day, reveals that our greatest superpower isn't talent or expertise—it's our ability to choose.

The conversation explores the fundamentals of creating an integrated life where leadership principles seamlessly flow between professional and personal domains. Gravitt introduces his "love first, live last" philosophy alongside practical guidance for creating a family blueprint—a strategic vision similar to what effective organizations use. "If you win at work and lose at home," he cautions, "I think you still lose."

Discover how authentic leadership starts at home and learn practical strategies to achieve harmony in both personal and professional spheres. 

Join us, this is a great listen.

Guest: 
Randy Gravitt, CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer) of Lead Every Day 

Host:
Chris Comeaux, President / CEO of Teleios

https://www.teleioscn.org/anatomy-of-leadership/winning-at-work-and-home-with-randy-gravitt

The Anatomy of Leadership podcast explores the art and science of leadership through candid, insightful conversations with thought leaders, innovators, and change-makers from a variety of industries. Hosted by Chris Comeaux, each episode dives into the mindsets, habits, and strategies that empower leaders to thrive in complex, fast-changing environments. With topics ranging from organizational culture and emotional intelligence to navigating disruption and inspiring teams, the show blends real-world stories with practical takeaways. The goal is simple yet ambitious: to equip leaders at every level with the tools, perspectives, and inspiration they need to lead with vision, empathy, and impact.

https://www.teleioscn.org/anatomy-of-leadership

Chapters

• 0:00 The Superpower of Choice
• 9:15 Leadership Through Caring
• 18:40 Love First, Live Last
• 27:32 Building Your Family Blueprint
• 39:25 Creating a Leadership Operating System
• 51:59 Guard Your Heart Above All Else

Transcript

Randy Gravitt: 0:00

I think my superpower I think it's all of our superpowers, I would say is our ability to choose. I ran across a quote years ago from Henry Cloud, who's an author, and he said you are ridiculously in charge, and I love that reminder that we all have the opportunity to make choices, our current habits choices. If we use the word choice, they're perfectly designed to give us our current results. So, really, if we do want word choice, they're perfectly designed to give us our current results. So, really, if we do want something different, it's going to require a choice.

Chris Comeaux: 0:30

Covey Seven Habits for Highly Effective Families. He would have this ritual of I'm about ready to go do the most important work of my day, that's so good. Yeah, that is really so good because you know you're spent, because you've just been sucked everything because of all the insta-all the fist fight, as you would say, all day and like wait a minute, no, this is not time to go veg out or just to pick up more work. It's really the time to do the most important work of your day.

Randy Gravitt: 0:57

Every good coach will tell you. You mentioned Nick Saban, I promise you he would say if you can't block the other team, you can't beat the other team. It's blocking and tackling right. We know those fundamentals. You know there's rhythm and timing and chords and scales, but nobody ever talks about what are the fundamentals at home. If you win at work and you lose at home, I think you still lose. I think it's really hard because we live in a world of more distractions than we've ever had, and so I think this is a fistfight that we're all in.

Jeff Haffner: 1:25

And now our host, Chris Comeaux.

Chris Comeaux: 1:34

Hello and welcome to the Anatomy of Leadership. I'm excited. Today is a show that's been a while in the making and so I am so excited. Today Randy Gravitt is with us with Everyday Leadership. Randy. Hey, Randy.

Randy Gravitt: 1:41

Hey thanks, Good to be here, Chris.

Chris Comeaux: 1:43

It is very good to have you, man. It really is, I said, long time coming. A mutual friend, Chad Tidd, with his work with Chick-fil-A, and I gave a keynote speech and he's like. You got to meet Randy and so it took us a while to connect and, after connecting, getting today's show scheduled, and so I'm excited because you've got a book last year and a new book coming out. I think it's going to make a great discussion. So, if it's OK, let me read from your bio and then I got a question for you. So Randy Gravitt is the CEO I love this.

Chris Comeaux: 2:13

The Chief Encouragement Officer of Lead Every Day and sought after speaker Author and Executive Coach who empowers leaders to reach their full potential, both professionally and personally. This is what I love about Randy. With expertise in leadership development, team building and organizational effectiveness, Randy delivers transformational keynotes and workshops and here's the key it drives real results in the workplace and beyond. His impressive client roster includes Fortune 500 companies such as Chick-fil-A, Kroger, Grand Hyatt, alongside prestigious organizations like the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and Windshake Foundation. His coaching expertise extends to professional sports. He served as a leadership coach for the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Buffalo Bills organizations. Love both of those. My LSU Alumni, Paul Skeens, is at the Pirates now, yeah there you go, and Randy's a prolific author.

Chris Comeaux: 3:08

He's written four books, including his solo work, winning Begins at Home and his latest collaboration, lead Every Day, and I'm really excited once we get to that Just a lot of synergy in what he's writing about and the work that we get to do. So. In that book, it outlines three disciplines of their proven leadership operating system. He's also co-authored Finding your Way and Unstuck with Dan Webster, and Randy hosts two of his podcasts the Lead Everyday Show with bestselling author Mark Miller, and Winning Begins at Home podcast, where he passionately demonstrates that true leadership starts with winning beyond work. So, Randy, it is so good to have you, and my opening question to you is what's your superpower?

Randy Gravitt: 3:48

That's great. I think my superpower, I think it's all of our superpowers, I would say, is our ability to choose. I ran across a quote years ago from Henry Cloud, who's an author, and he said you are ridiculously in charge and I, I love that reminder that we all have, uh, the opportunity to, to make choices, and when we do, it actually leads to, um, really what, what the life that we want, and so, um, most of us, when we don't like what we have, we really need to look in the mirror and and understand that we do have the, the, we have agency, and we, we have the power to choose, power to choose. So, you know, to me, that's that's what it, that's where it starts.

Chris Comeaux: 4:29

That's so cool. You said that it's interesting. We have a one-year leadership certification course at Tilly Ash University. My mentor was a guy named Dr Lee Thayer. Many people don't know who he is, but he was Stephen Covey's mentor, and so, which is really kind of fascinating, was Stephen Covey's mentor and so which is really kind of fascinating. But one of his core principles is everything in life is done by choice, and in that Tilly Ash University yesterday we really talked a lot about that in class, of exactly what that means, because it is actually incredibly empowering, but it's also a little bit maybe for some personality types, depending on where you're at in your journey a little bit of stullifying as well. Like, everything is based upon your choice, and sometimes not making a choice is a choice itself, and so I've never had someone say that that was actually their superpower. That's really interesting.

Randy Gravitt: 5:17

Well, I think, when I look at life, for all the leaders we work with as well, and I start talking to them, it's amazing how, for all the leaders we work with as well, and I start talking to them, you know it's it's amazing how, for all of us, our, our current habits, choices if we use the word choice, they're perfectly designed to give us our current results. So, really, if we, if we do want something different, it's going to require a choice to make a change. And, um, you know, the cool thing is we can. We can start making progress immediately if we'll just choose, and so it starts there. So, yeah, that's awesome.

Randy Gravitt: 5:51

When I saw your question I was like that's kind of what came to mind.

Chris Comeaux: 5:55

Now my kids would be very disappointed if I didn't ask you this you worked with Chick-fil-A. Talk a little bit about what you did with Chick-fil-A, because they love Chick-fil-A.

Randy Gravitt: 6:03

Our family goes on these once a week. Yeah, Chad's a Rock Star. You mentioned him a moment ago. He's a great operator. We've had an opportunity through the years last I don't know, 12 years or so to do a lot of coaching and training and we've worked with people at their support center, probably done over 200 events for their owner operators around the country over the last decade and it's just been a joy to help create leadership content for them and and help them uh think about stuff.

Randy Gravitt: 6:35

I've had a great uh connection to Mark Miller. You mentioned Mark and I haven't the book coming out together. Mark is now has joined our team. He left Chick-fil-A after I don't know 40-plus years on the corporate staff. He started in the mailroom, really working in the warehouse I think he was the 16th corporate employee and then, 44 years later, ends up. Overall leadership development. I worked alongside their team and helped them with a lot of their leadership content and now Mark is as partner with me at Lead Every Day and we're having a lot of fun serving leaders all around the world.

Chris Comeaux: 7:14

That is so cool. I was actually talking to somebody yesterday about I can't remember the exact context, but fast food they're. So I mean, if you look at the best franchises and of course Chick-fil-A I think has been the top for I don't know how many years in a row and we were talking about French fries is the gist of the conversation like really thoughtful franchises put so much thought into their French fry because it is your emotional connection to their product. And we were trying to draw the core layer into healthcare. Like what's that first impression in healthcare?

Chris Comeaux: 7:44

But to think about successful franchises like that put so much thought, like one of the ones I got exposed to, like they knew the name of the potato farmer in Idaho that made the potatoes that their actual french fries were made out of. But yet in healthcare we might not even pay attention to, like the first person that the customer, the patients, can interact with. And we got to go well, what's the corollary between fast food? Well, if they put that much thought into their product and we don't in healthcare, what does that tell us about healthcare? So I think we've had a lot to learn and I've always been a huge fan of Chick-fil-A.

Randy Gravitt: 8:16

Yeah, I'll mention one thing a little under the hood. Look, they have changed, really, their vision statement. I mean they, they now are not talking to them. I mean they're they. It has nothing to do with chicken. They're talking about trying to be the most caring company in the world and, uh, to your point, they, they, they pay so much attention to, uh, what it, what it means to come into their restaurant, how you feel they want to make sure you get through the line quickly.

Randy Gravitt: 8:38

It's amazing, when you pull up to the, to the Chick-fil-A, uh, to the Chick-fil-A, to me, a lot of times there are cars out in the highway and you're going. Do I really want to wait in this line? And somehow, magically, almost four minutes later, I've got my spicy sandwich and I'm good to go. So they're, they're giving a lot of thought to all that stuff you're talking about, and I and I think, yeah, in healthcare, um, really even more so in some ways, don't we want to? Don't, don't we want our healthcare providers and the people you're working with as well, we want to make sure that they are giving the best care possible, because they're taking care of us, they're taking care of our moms and dads and our kids and all kinds. I mean it's amazing, and so, yeah, I love the idea of them being thoughtful for sure.

Chris Comeaux: 9:21

I don't know, Randy, if you ever bumped into Powell's in Eastern Tennessee. It's a fast food place. They have actually won the Malcolm Baldrige Award.

Randy Gravitt: 9:29

I've heard of it. I've not I've not been there, but I have heard about them.

Chris Comeaux: 9:33

Yeah. So actually they have a center of excellence and a friend of mine in hospice called and said look, I know you're going to think I'm crazy, but you need to go. I'm like it's a fast food restaurant. He said, trust me, you need to go. And I did. It was fascinating. There's so many things that I pulled from. I think it was like a three-day workshop.

Chris Comeaux: 9:47

But one of the things that hit me between the eyes was these kids. They were 16, 17, 15 years old, typically fast food, high turnover, very different, very similar to the culture of Chick-fil-A. But they knew the mission statement cold. And they knew the mission statement cold. And I went back to my hospice and started asking about it. In fact, later we made a video because it was hilarious.

Chris Comeaux: 10:08

People look at me like can I phone a friend? And it just hit me like you know, here's this great organization, a fast food restaurant. It doesn't even make sense to me. They won the Malcolm Baldrige Award but their commitment to excellence was off the charts and then that inspired us and actually started a renaissance in our own organization at the time where we did our mission statement, et cetera. So again, I love that we're doing this because a lot of leaders may go. What can I learn from fast food and obviously your portfolio is much bigger than that, but I've always been a big fan of great organizations and Chick-fil-A has been one on my radar screen, and again this Powell pals in Tennessee.

Randy Gravitt: 10:44

That's great.

Chris Comeaux: 10:45

Well, let's segue then. So in my book, the Anatomy of Leadership, what I tried to do is kind of a frame, a meta framework, like a table of contents of what is leadership, because it's such a vast kind of subject, right, and you get different consultants. So I love that you and I hit it off because I felt, quickly, we have a very common ground, a common lexicon and a common bond. But one thing that maybe I've been less intentional about, maybe a little bit more than the typical consultant, but we say, look, these principles we teach not only will make a great hospice palliative care program or whatever, but also a spillover at home. But you've taken that to a whole different level. I mean, you wrote this book Winning Begins at Home. So why do you believe that this message is maybe important, relevant, or maybe even a high priority, given the time that we are now?

Randy Gravitt: 11:33

Yeah, that's a fantastic question and it's something that just kept coming up over and over. As I said, our organization, we get to work with high-performance leaders, or leaders that are chasing high performance I guess that's a better way to say it. We're working on culture and engagement and execution and really all the stuff that we work with Chick-fil-A on and helping them chase this high performance. And what we started noticing was all these leaders are making progress. They're great results, fantastic, but there still was something missing for so many leaders I kept talking to and I'm I'm personally really passionate about family. It's been a great joy of my life. I'm I'm 60 now, so I'm an old guy, but you know, my wife and I've been married nearly four decades and we've got four daughters that now have kids, nine little grandkids. We have just one born yesterday, which was really cool, and so I'm just I'm passionate about what happens outside of work and I kept talking to these executives and really it actually started with I was, you mentioned, working with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Randy Gravitt: 12:42

We also did some work with the Buffalo Bills, as we talked about, and I was talking to an assistant coach and he had two little girls at home and he asked me a question. He said do you think you can win the Super Bowl and not lose your family? And we're in a little coaching session and I'm like why do you ask me that you know? I said what's behind this question. And it turns out he had actually won a Super Bowl with another team when he was playing. And now he's a coach. And he said I remember when we won the Super Bowl it was great. I mean obviously the confetti is coming down and you just, I mean it's the ultimate in the game. But he said I'm looking around and all of our coaches and a bunch of our players, their families, are just, it's just a mess. He said we've paid such a high price to get there. And he said I'm thinking, if we're going to win a Super Bowl here in this organization, which they're trying to do, obviously the bills are close and they're, you know, every year. He said but I don't want to blow up my family and lose my you know, my two little girls and all this kind of stuff. And and I and at that moment I told him here's what I said I said I don't know if you can, I think you can, I really do, but if you can't do both, why do you want to win a Super Bowl? And he looked at me and he said I really don't. If I'm going to lose all this to win one. And I think in that moment I came up with this little statement. I told him. I said if you win at work and you lose at home, I think you still lose.

Randy Gravitt: 14:06

And I've said that to so many executives and leaders through the years. They're just like that is exactly right and and uh. So I there's no content out there for leaders. I mean, there's content on how to have a family and all that stuff, but there's nothing for leaders. And I thought I'm going to write this little parable and we put a blueprint in the back of it. You saw, there's like a little 70-page blueprint on how to build a great family.

Randy Gravitt: 14:31

And I think again, we spend all our time trying to help people win from nine to five. But I think we both would agree that what happens from five to nine is just as, if not more, important for most of us. And even in the places that you're serving with your leadership stuff, those people come to work. I mean, I've heard leaders say before we tell our people to check their heart at the door. Well, that doesn't work. I mean, people are going to bring with them their family. We had a conflict last night, or my kid got angry with me on the way to school this morning and they're affected by that. And so if we don't pay any attention to that and try to help them win outside of work, I think the best companies really are trying to help their employees win outside of work and actually what we've noticed is the more they do that, the more they invest in them outside of work, the better they are at work.

Randy Gravitt: 15:20

I think there's this holistic thing I'm real passionate about. I would say the superpower for everybody should be integrity. I mean, it is our ability to choose, but it really should be integrity. And when I say integrity, I mean it in the true sense of the word. You know our math word, integer. It's this integrated life where who we are at work matches who we are at home, who we are in public matches who we are in private, versus this disintegrated life which is just blown apart, and I've met so many leaders there. They seem to be winning in one place, but it's not so good at home, and I don't think that's the life we want. So I thought I'm just going to write something, try to help some people, and it's been. It's been, it's been a hit. A lot of people really enjoyed it.

Chris Comeaux: 16:01

That's awesome, Randy. I don't know if you know this and so, but that integrity thing really hit me hard just now. First off, that's huge. That's one of our core values in our company, but one of which I've always said. If there's anything I hope they put on my gravestone one day is he was a man of integrity. And when I say that I always wince a little bit like, okay, that's my work in progress here. But my wife, my wife gave I'm a bit of a geek my wife one of the coolest Christmas presents is she gave me a first edition Daniel Webster dictionary. So very beginning of our country, do you know the definition of integrity? The beginning of our country was much closer to what you just described. It was like this, almost like the Hebrew word of Shalom, like whole at peace, fully integrated, fully. Well, all of those different words, and so that was actually the first word I looked up in that dictionary. So you were like right on point with that.

Dragonfly Health : 16:55

Thank you to our Anatomy of Leadership sponsor, Dragonfly Health. Dragonfly Health is also the title sponsor for Leadership Immersion Courses. Dragonfly Health is also the title sponsor for Leadership Immersion Courses. Dragonfly Health is a leading care-at-home data technology and service platform With a 20-year history. Dragonfly Health uses advanced technology and robust analytics to manage durable medical equipment and pharmaceutical services as part of a single, efficient solution for caregivers, patients and their families. The company serves millions of patients annually across all 50 states. Thank you, Dragonfly Health, for all the great work that you do.

Chris Comeaux: 17:42

Yeah, the interesting thing is. So we had Daniel Pink in our podcast talking about his book A Whole New Mind, because, you know, artificial intelligence can't be in any conversation these days without artificial intelligence coming up, right? Well, you think about what you just said about. That is the typical paradigm. Right, check your heart at the door, which means I pretty much just want your left brain. Well, guess what AI is going to pretty much be able to do that, but what AI cannot do is what we would call wholehearted leadership, like your full self involved. So I really feel like you have provided this great resource at an incredibly opportune time, or maybe a much needed time. So maybe this is a good segue question. So how do you define success? Given this, what is your definition of success? I'd just love to hear you answer that.

Randy Gravitt: 18:33

Yeah, well, I think it would go right back to what we just talked about. It's living a life of integrity and that sounds great. But what does it look like? And I'll just unpack just a couple of things. So when I go to work, let's, let's cause you're, you're a leadership guy and you're talking to people who have these, you know, companies and stuff, and that's great. When I go to work, am I going with passion? Am I? Am I in my sweet spot? Am I doing my best work or am I just getting by?

Randy Gravitt: 18:55

We hear, we, you know, we've heard for the last several years, quiet, quitting and the great resignation, all that. That's not an engagement problem. As much as it is, it is an engagement problem. I mean, we do have an engagement problem. Don't let me just blow by that. I mean, I think Gallup's last numbers 70% of people are disengaged at work. But I wouldn't argue that that's a leadership problem as much as it is an engagement problem.

Randy Gravitt: 19:21

We've not created an environment or held people accountable or created clarity or put them in the right role and all of a sudden, our people are, are leaned out, and and I've heard, I've always heard that people don't leave organizations, they leave leaders, and I think that's true. But I also think sometimes they they leave us and they don't tell us they actually stay, and now they're still on the payroll. They're killing our morale, they're sucking up resources and that's not good. So we don't want that. So let's make sure that we're leading and we're leaned in. People always watch the leader right, so we need to be leaned in. When we're there, we're creating that great environment and so integrity.

Randy Gravitt: 20:00

When I say integrity, it's like am I showing up every day and bringing the full weight of my leadership to my opportunity and trying to do my very best? But let's go back home for a second. What happens? And this is executive after executive told me I go home and I find myself there, but I'm actually not there. I mean, I'm there, but I'm thinking about tomorrow's meeting or I'm thinking about the project and I think there needs to be an opportunity for us to. But you pick the place, but maybe it's a red light or it's a stop sign in your neighborhood, or maybe it's your driveway, but you're not always still on the phone when you pull in the driveway. You know you. Once you go past this place, you're like I am work will be there when I get back. And let's be honest, have you ever finished a work day and thought all the work's done, there's nothing else left to do? That's never going to happen. So if we're not, if we're not careful, we'll we'll not separate the two. And and now even more, so we're working. A lot of us are working at home. I mean you, you know. So there can be a door jam in the place where you're.

Randy Gravitt: 21:02

Literally, when I go past this, I'm going to be with them. I see this happen all the time. We go out to you know a restaurant and you'll look, and around a table there's, there's four, you know, maybe a mom and dad and a couple of kids and their own screens and they're scrolling social media and checking texts and emails, whatever. And I'm like they're, they're together, but they're really not together, and I've been reminded through the years that that that proximity does not equal intimacy, and and so just because we're in the same car, I'm driving that 13 year old to school, doesn't mean we're connected.

Randy Gravitt: 21:33

And so I think if I'm going to have a life of that's integrated I really want to pay attention to, to is is there a wholeness in the way I approach that relationship. So, for me, I can't control what everybody else does, but I can, I can. What we say in the book is I want to live my life in such a way that the people who know me the best actually love me the most. And I know so many leaders, the people who know them the best, they respect them the least, because they're one, they're duplicitous, right, they're one way over here and they're another way over there, and I think that that's that, that's that disintegration. And so for me that I know it's a long answer, but back to your end of it. It's back to that life of integrity, being where we are and leaned in, and I think it's really hard because we live in a world of more distractions than we've ever had, and so I think this is a fistfight that we're all in.

Chris Comeaux: 22:29

That is such a good one. I think this is a fistfight that we're all in. That is such a good one, in fact, one of the. It's funny, I've gotten a reputation that I don't like stickies because we actually teach this great organization system, but I actually do have stickies on my big TV. That's my big screen where we do our meetings all day. But it's for things I really need to focus on right now, and one is that, nick Saban quote is be where your feet are, because, man, you're so right. It is a fistfight. I mean, there's so much coming at us every moment, every bell, whistle, technology, insta, insta, this Insta, that and to be where your feet are is just so hard. And I love you've reminded me um the Covey seven habits for highly effective families Effective Families. He would have this ritual of I'm about ready to go do the most important work of my day.

Randy Gravitt: 23:14

That's so good.

Chris Comeaux: 23:16

Yeah, that is really so good because you know you're spent because you've just been sucked everything because of all the insta-all the fist fight, as you would say, all day and like wait a minute, no, this is not time to go veg out or just to pick up more work. It's really the time to do the most important work of your day and I love you take it to integrity because you're so right, because when you have that disintegrated, it does affect you at work and it does affect you at home. So in some respects you're losing it both places because you're not your full, best potential self if you're at work and bad stuff's happening at home or bad stuff's happening at work and you take that at home. You know quite often we do that. So I love this. Well, you, you used a parable, and so about businessman john williams, can you just talk about the parable a little bit and what is the story kind of offered to the readers, without giving it all away, because I want him to get your book?

Randy Gravitt: 24:08

yeah, he's a businessman. He's a businessman who is kind of neck deep and he's running a consulting firm. I mean it's like you know, and uh, he's got three little kids, a couple of twins and a. You know, and uh, uh and and then a little baby and basically he's his. He's he's struggling at work and things are not so great at home. All of a sudden he's struggling at work and things are not so great at home. All of a sudden he's just trying to juggle all these plates and he can't get it done. And I won't give the story away. But his next-door neighbor is an old guy who used to be his little league baseball coach. I mean, they happen to live next door to each other, but 30 years ago this guy was his little league coach and the old guy is still volunteering in the community as a little league coach. And he comes down with an issue he can't coach and so John gets roped into coaching and he's got little girls, so he's not a baseball coach. And so he goes to the field and he meets this guy who becomes sort of the guide for him and helps him navigate everything and basically he learns.

Randy Gravitt: 25:16

In the book we teach the two fundamentals of family life, and there's some best practices there, just some things that are pretty simple stuff. But I find so many times people are not really focused on the fundamentals. And you know, we've got football season coming up here. Every good coach will tell you you mentioned Nick Saban, I promise you. He would say if you can't block the other team, you can't beat the other team. It's blocking and tackling, right. We know those fundamentals. We know in healthcare what the fundamentals are. We know in music, you know there's rhythm and timing and chords and scales, but nobody ever talks about what are the fundamentals at home, and so we identified a couple of them and I think they really do help us win where it matters most. And so, yeah, I hope people will get the book, not just for themselves, maybe for the people that choose to follow them too. I think we can create some great conversations around this if we choose to.

Chris Comeaux: 26:18

What's one of those fundamentals, Randy?

Randy Gravitt: 26:21

I'll give you both of them. The first one is to love first. I think sometimes we get the fundamentals mixed up. The second one is to live last. So let's start with the first one here for just a second.

Randy Gravitt: 26:35

Love first is about no matter what you give somebody the benefit of the doubt, you start and you really are trying. When I say love, love, I believe, is demonstrated. It's great to say I love you, but you show, you know you don't. Love is not, it's not really a noun as much as it is a verb. You show somebody you love them by the way you, you, uh, you, you act toward them, and so it can be anything from, let's say I'm a, I'm a dad who's got a kid, I think, or maybe even a mom or dad who's you know you're married and you and you think saying it louder is going to make you more. My wife is like don't saying it louder Doesn't make you more, right. So it's your tone of voice, it's, it's, it's how harsh you are. You know, there's an old phrase that says you're never persuasive when you're abrasive, and I think sometimes we think I'll just say it with more vigor, or I'll say it louder, or I'll shame the other person and that's going to motivate them to change, and that just doesn't work. We know that, and so we lay out several things there that help people understand some ways to love first, and then the live last thing really is about. I'll go back to the football again here for a second. It's almost that offensive lineman mindset. If anybody's listening who loves football or hates football and I ask you to name a football player you're probably going to come up with a quarterback or somebody who scores a lot. I think the people who are the unsung hero is the person who moves somebody else out of the way so somebody else can score, and in a family that's a mom or a dad or it can be a brother or sister.

Randy Gravitt: 28:09

When you show up every day with your presence and really try to help the people around you win, I would say that's what makes you a winner. It's like when you can lie down at night and think I helped somebody win today, I think you won. And so if I'm just here and I'm trying to get everybody to help me win like let's go to work even for a second and if I'm just constantly thinking, how can I extract value from my, from my people. Well, first of all, they're not my people, their people. And if I'll show up every day and really try to add value to them, I think that's going to make you much more valued as a boss, much more valuable as a boss, and, and, honestly, those people are choosing to work for you and so they could go somewhere else.

Randy Gravitt: 28:51

It's a privilege to lead them, and so I think that mindset of being, I know, a servant leader that word kind of has a bad rap but I think that really is the way that we help people the most is we show up and we're willing to serve, and that doesn't mean we're a doormat.

Randy Gravitt: 29:06

We are willing to hold them accountable, we're willing to have hard conversations, but we're also willing to admit when we're wrong, and and you know that we're we need to grow as well, and I mean there's all kinds of stuff there.

Randy Gravitt: 29:17

But uh, yeah, and I and I don't think very, I mean I didn't when we got married, nobody said, hey, you're going to sit through a class and we're going to stop this. We've got to give people some tools here to help them build a great family, and it's been amazing to talk to so many people who have gone through and created that blueprint and the blueprint that we created in the back. They've taken that and created a blueprint for their own family, helped guide them through that, and it's just so fun to hear people making progress because because at the end of the day, if your family life is not right and I know so many people who are in hard families, I mean every family's hard right, but I know so many people who are their family's a mess and they'll just tell you because of that it has affected every other area of their life.

Randy Gravitt: 30:05

And so I'm I'm on a little bit of a crusade here to try to help as many people grow up in a great family, as we can I mean, obviously we love the leadership stuff and that's what we do with our day job but I think we need to be talking about this way more than we do.

Chris Comeaux: 30:20

I totally agree with you, Randy. So you do some much cool coaching leadership we were talking about in the green room. Before we start about some of the engagements you're on, how do you bring this into the work you're doing Like has it been solely just for this or has it been a broader thing, and then you slip this thing in.

Randy Gravitt: 30:36

Yeah well, I would say maybe a little bit of both, but I would say, typically when we're doing coaching, when our coaches are working with people, that we will help them create a blueprint. I mean, let's think about it If we were going to build a home and in fact when we built our home it's been 20 plus years ago now my wife is like we need a house. And I'm like we have a house. And she's like no, we need another house. I'm like why do we need two houses? And so, anyway, she's like we only need one house. We're selling this when we're getting more house. And I'm like are you sure? And she's like and here's the deal. We had four daughters and we had one bathroom for the four of them. And she's like long-term, that's not going to work. They're little at the time, so it's no big deal. But she said this is not going to work long-term. And so she's.

Randy Gravitt: 31:21

She lays in front of me, she's gone to Staples or wherever and bought the graph paper and she's got every little square foot drawn. This is what we're going to build. And so in her mind and her heart she had a vision. Now we needed an architect to help us put some elevations on it, but literally we're still in this house a couple of decades later and it looks exactly like it did on that paper, almost, I mean. I mean, the square footage is the same and so she had this plan. It would have been foolish for me to say, okay, I'm going to go to Home Depot or I'll get down to Lowe's and get some lumber and try to. You know, we didn't do that. We needed somebody to help us build it. And so there are people who need a coach to help them build what they're building. But I think it starts with that, that blueprint Like what are we, what are we trying to do here?

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Randy Gravitt: 32:44

And I think so many times people don't really have a way to think about what they're trying to do they do at work. Sometimes we have goals and all that stuff. I don't think we we think enough about what we want to do outside of work. So when we do our blueprint with with anybody that we're coaching an executive, we will start with work. That's typically what's paying for it and but. But there's so many areas of our life that we need to think through as that. We need to think through as well that we want to have a blueprint for, like, what are we trying to do with your fitness and your finances? But your family life always comes up. They're always wanting to have a target there. And you mentioned Stephen Covey. This is sort of what got me thinking about this. I sat through a Seven Habits conference. You know when was this? In the 90s.

Chris Comeaux: 33:27

This has been a long time ago Early 90s and when was this?

Randy Gravitt: 33:31

In the 90s. This has been a long time ago. You and I come from the 1900s. I know you've got people listening here, young people, which is great Way back. He's talking about this, one of the things he said.

Randy Gravitt: 33:41

I want you to envision your eulogy. Let's say you're 80 and you die, and you've got people come to your funeral. Your spouse is there, your kids are there, your co there. You know, what would you want them to say at your funeral? Well, I, that sounds great, but I've I've changed it a little bit. I want it. I want it to be my 80th birthday party, cause I want to be there. I want to be at the party.

Randy Gravitt: 34:04

And how amazing would it be when you think about the people that you want there. They come from all these different parts of your life. What would you really want them to say? And if you, you know again, let's just pick an area. If you want them to say you're generous, I'll use that.

Randy Gravitt: 34:17

I had a guy we coached years ago. He said I want people to think I'm the most generous person they've ever known, and so that's great. That's kind of his North Star. So, along the way, you better be generous every day, if you're going, if people are going to be able to say that down the road. I love the way Covey just gives us a like picture the end, begin with the end in mind. Right, that was his thing. And and and then take steps toward that every day. And so that blueprint that we create with any leader that we coach, it's going to include some of that outside of work stuff, cause that, I mean, that's really. That's probably two-thirds of our life. I know a third of it we're asleep, but a third of your life waking hours you're out. More than that You're outside of work, and I think if that part is not right, that's where we end up struggling. And so it's, you know it's so important.

Chris Comeaux: 35:08

That's so good, Randy, you're actually right and I think it actually was Covey that inspired me. In fact, jeff, our executive producer, actually did it for me. We've got a it's in it's still in my closet. Our kids are three boys and are engaged but already get married. So we're a little bit further and there's a picture of us as a family and they're all still little, but I've got our mission, vision and values as a family and then we teach pillars and the work that we do in healthcare.

Chris Comeaux: 35:32

You probably have encountered that. It's just a more holistic way to look at your business people, service, quality, growth, finance. So I kind of created a corollary in our home life and you actually hit those in your actual blueprint and I still have that and I still see it every morning whenever I get ready and it's interesting. You go well, did that piece of paper make you do it? I don't know. It's almost like I think it's your. I love your architect analogy. It is almost like we got that little graph paper as a family and you know, I can't remember if I did the first draft or my wife and we had a family meeting and looked at it, but I was. It just hit me just about two weeks ago. I was in the closet and looked over Like that intention feels like it's come to fruition.

Chris Comeaux: 36:13

We're still very much a work in progress. We've got this whole new frontier as a family marriage. You're in the grandkid phase. I'm looking forward to that, but those principles I think have come alive at some level. Again still got a lot of work to do. You're convicting me even now, but there is something about putting that intention out there. So I don't know if you've I know you have your blueprint in the back of the book, but we're going to include links of anything that you want in this show, anything that will help people along these lines.

Randy Gravitt: 36:41

Well, I'll just say this I think there's so much power in what you just said having a target. It is so powerful. One of target, it is so powerful. We one of the things we we talk to leaders about in in the workplace is we will, we will draw and we use an archery target. You know just draw, you know the circles. You can kind of picture the old I when I think about archery.

Randy Gravitt: 37:01

One of the guys on my team, his daughter, was a high school. Uh, she was in high school archery and I'm like I didn't, I didn't even know they had that it's Kentucky. So they're shooting bow and arrows up in Kentucky and and I'm picturing the hay bale and the you know the rubber target thing around it and you got all the different colors and and here's the reality, most of us want to have a great family and we know kind of what to do and we sort of do it and we kind of you know our own track and and so say that like if you put rings around it, you get some points for hitting the outside ring, you do, and then you get more points if you hit the one inside, that and more points. But the bullseye, that is the place where you get a whole lot of points right. That's the force multiplier and I think most of us who are living, we kind of do, we sort of do we're going to, we do get some points for that intention. But when we have a target and we are focused and we become more strategic, you know, pushing toward something, rather than sporadic, we get points, for sporadic there's nothing. You know, it's not terrible when we're sporadic, but I think when we look at it and I love your, we've got this in our closet, and I just think, I do think there's some maybe it's osmosis, I don't know but when you walk by it and you know this is what we should be doing and this is what we aspire to and this is our target, it is so powerful to keep us focused Because, again I mentioned earlier, so many distractions these days and and, by the way, there's an old, uh, I actually, uh, like to read the Bible. Uh, you know, I don't.

Randy Gravitt: 38:39

You have probably people listening here who read the Bible or don't read the Bible, but I'm telling you, every single person listening has heard of the word sin. So sin is a Bible word, right, we think, but it actually is not, it's actually an archery word. It means we would think of it in the Bible. It's like a person's sin they didn't do what they were supposed to do or they did something they shouldn't do. Sin actually is an archery. It just means to miss the mark.

Randy Gravitt: 39:00

Wow, and I think it's family sin or it's leadership sin to miss the mark because we didn't even have a mark, we didn't have a target. And I think when even have a mark, we didn't have a target, and I think when we have a target we actually do. It's amazing what we can accomplish when we have a focus, we have a target, something to point toward, and let's do that. And I mean, so many great things have been accomplished in the world because somebody had a target. Records have been broken because there was a number, and so again, I don't want to be a slave to all that, but I do want to. I don't want to just wing it with my family and hope they turn. You know we always say hope is not a strategy. I love hope, but if I hope my family or maybe they'll turn out okay, and I don't give any thought to this and any focus to it, I'm playing with fire, I believe, so I don't know if that's helpful or not.

Chris Comeaux: 39:49

That's very helpful. In fact, we could go on hours just on this one topic, but I do want to get to your other book. That was all solid gold, thank you. Let's talk about Lead Every Day. I'm super excited You've got this new book coming out. Can you talk about it a little bit?

Randy Gravitt: 40:04

I got a copy right here. It's coming. I say early because it's coming out September the 2nd, so we're three or four weeks away. I don't know when the episode will drop.

Chris Comeaux: 40:13

Actually, we're going to drop this pretty close to your release date. You're going to drop it out?

Randy Gravitt: 40:15

Okay, so people can. Yeah, it'll be available then. That's great, it's available now for pre-order. But yeah, so Mark and I have been working together I say working together. I've been helping do some stuff for Chick-fil-A we talked about earlier. For the last decade plus, mark and I have actually been creating content together. For that decade he's written several books for their organization and then he and I have written all kinds of resources around that and tried to help leaders. And then what happened? Not only was I working with Chick-fil-A, our team, the team that I was leading, lead every day. It has now given us an opportunity to work with all these hundreds of companies outside of Chick-fil-A, which has been fun. And so Mark and I, this last year and a half, have thought, okay, how do we take all this stuff that we've done and put it into one way to think about it? And we've tweaked it through the years, but we thought the correct language was to create a leadership operating system.

Randy Gravitt: 41:28

A lot of people are familiar with Traction. You may be familiar with Traction, the EOS kind of mindset, and a lot of companies use that and it's fantastic. Well, the publisher for that is actually our publisher. Gino's publisher is our publisher and he's like you guys need to do the leadership operating system, because he just thought that'd be great and we already had it. I mean so, if you think about an operating system, we have them in our phones like what is an operating system? They create speed and efficiency and really the ability to process all the apps and all this stuff.

Randy Gravitt: 42:04

I think, as leaders, we have so much stuff coming at us. Uh, we need a way to think about that, and so we created this operating system based built around three disciplines. The first one is to become a better leader. I think the the truth is, the hardest person any of us listening are going to lead is is is ourselves. I mean, if we can lead ourselves and we can keep getting better every day, and we've got so much good stuff to help leaders do that, to escape what we call the leadership quicksand. So many leaders are drowning right now and they're, you know, they're buried in emails and details and all kinds of stuff and they can't seem to get their head above water and that's exhausting. And so we we we talk about and teach how to get through that, and then we teach the five fundamentals of leadership, which is the same content that was developed for Chick-fil-A 25 years ago, and so it's been really fun to help leaders get better. I mean that really, at the end of the day, that's the starting place. If you don't do anything else, just start there and you're going to be. You're on the right track.

Randy Gravitt: 43:08

The second discipline is to improve team performance. We find so many leaders have a vision bigger than what they can do on their own. They need a team, and yet I've met so many teams or been around so many teams. I've been on teams since I think I was five years old. I started on my first little T-ball team, you know as a kid, and now, 55 years later, I'm still a part of a team. I don't think there's ever been a time I hadn't been a part of a team. We're all part of teams, we know what, and yet how many teams have we been on that are just awful? There are teams that flourish, but there's more teams that just flounder. They're just not locked in, they have bad meetings, they don't solve problems together like they should, they don't have role clarity, all that stuff. And so we've identified best practices to build a high-performance team, again the same ones we've taught at Chick-fil-A for years. And our second discipline is built around that, about talent and making sure that we get the right people, retaining our talent, all that stuff. And then discipline number three is to strengthen our organization, because most of us are a part of something bigger than just our team. I mean it's like there's a big deal going on and so there we write about culture and engagement and execution. At the end of the day, culture is great, but it's an enabler to execute. I mean, at the end of the day, we should have results. That's why we have an organization, we're working together, and so it's been a lot of fun to create this leadership operating system, all kinds of resources around that. We've got a 75-day challenge that's being launched here in the next couple of weeks and I mean all kinds of fun stuff around that just to help leaders have a way to think about it.

Randy Gravitt: 44:57

And if I could take just one more minute here, I would say I'm an old school teacher. I was a. I was a teacher for about a decade, a hundred years ago. It feels like now, but when I started out I wasn't actually qualified to be a teacher. I got hired, uh, because the, the, the principal, was desperate. They knew it was long story short.

Randy Gravitt: 45:19

Middle of the school year, day before Christmas break, and I had this chance encounter and the biology teacher had resigned that morning and my interview. I was calling about a coaching position in the fall and the principal said do you teach? And I'm like no. And she said do you teach, do you teach biology? And I'm like I don't teach. And she says have you taken biology? And I'm like I don't teach. And she says have you taken biology? And I knew she was really desperate and so I get hired. It was crazy and I stay a day ahead of the ninth graders for the first. You know what would have been the spring quarter semester, whatever it was. But in the summer they call me in and like that was great, you survived. But now we're going to, we need to let you know there are. There are these things called lesson plans and there's a scope and sequence and all that and I'm like I have no idea what they're talking about. And so, anyway, I learned about, you know, this whole process.

Randy Gravitt: 46:16

You don't just wing it as a teacher. They're really trying to educate people and if you think about it, you know you have these. You have these kids that are going to school here right now. They're brand new kids in school. Your kids are older, mine are older, but all the first graders they're not going to go to the first day of school and get trigonometry books. That ain't happening. They're getting some numbers, they're going to learn to count and they'll you know, add and subtract and they'll get where they can do some fractions. And then I never made it to trig, but some of them probably will along the way. But they don't start there. They can get there, they don't start there.

Randy Gravitt: 46:50

Well, in leadership, I think, so many times we just like wing it and somebody writes a book on this and somebody writes a book on that.

Randy Gravitt: 46:59

And I love that. I read all that stuff, it's great, but if I'm not careful, if I'm building a company, it'll just be random acts of training that I'm bringing in. There's really no scope and sequence to how do we develop a leader. And so Mark and I said let's make sure that we lay out this complete operating system on how do you build a leader, how do you build teams and how do you build a great organization, and so, again, that's a lot, but that's sort of the heart behind it and we believe leader development should be intentional, the way we say it is. You can build it by design or you can build it by default If you don't design what you want. And again, we've tried to create this resource to help people design the leadership culture of their dreams and not just like hope it turns out and see what happens and there's so many wasted resources. Engagement again is all time low. All kind of stuff happens when we just wing it. So we're trying to be a little more thoughtful and strategic here in how we help leaders.

Chris Comeaux: 48:01

This is. I feel like we're brothers from another mother. We were just so on the same page on this, although, mark, I'll be transparent and I've always been a voracious leader and a voracious learner. Very transformational moment of my career. I had just got back from a national presentation conference, had pulled our team together Monday morning the whole staff, because it was a smaller hospice at the time and literally one of the nurses said out loud great, what is he bringing now? And I just remember that and she said it out loud, loud enough for me to hear and going oh man, so that's not a good thing being an eclectic a little bit here, who moved my cheese and a little bit there. And now we're going to do the seven habits thing and unfortunately there is so many, so many resources out there.

Chris Comeaux: 48:47

And again, Dr Lee Thayer was my mentor. He was Stephen Covey's mentor and he was very of that same mindset. Like, you have to have a lesson plan, otherwise you're going to just turn your people up out every which way and you're not really going to make an impact. So I love that you've done this. We use a similar lexicon about a leadership system and I think that is absolutely brilliant and your timing is so good because of just the pace of things right now. You know technology, I'm so afraid the tail is wagging the dog and, like you know, what are we actually here to do? And there's so many parts of our community have kind of, you know, disintegrated, and one of the last places a community is kind of the workplace and it is a place to make a great difference in other people's lives. And so just for me to you just know, I think your timing is just impeccable on this.

Randy Gravitt: 49:39

Well, thank you, I can't wait for you to get a copy, and I'm looking forward to your feedback this.

Chris Comeaux: 49:43

Well, thank you, I can't wait for you to get a copy and I'm looking forward to your feedback. That'll be great. Absolutely Well, Randy. I just want to give you the last word.

Randy Gravitt: 49:49

Any just last thoughts to our listeners that you want to share. Yeah, I think I would say there's an old saying that it says above all else, guard your heart. That's where your life comes from, and it's an old proverb. I think that's good. We use a picture in our leadership, when we talk about it, of the iceberg, and I think all of us kind of we've probably seen the picture right. There's 80% of it is below the waterline, 20% above, maybe 90, 10, some people say, and I think that's a good picture of our leadership. There's a skill side that people see.

Randy Gravitt: 50:22

Let's go back to that integrity conversation we had. We've got to be integrated though. We can have all the skills in the world. We're great at vision, we can develop people and lead meetings and build teams, solve problems, all that that's fantastic. But if our character is not there, our leadership character, there's not an integration between who we are. Are we teachable character? There's not an integration between who we are. Are we teachable? Are we positive? You know I always say it's hard to go to a positive place with negative people. Well, when the leader's negative, it's just, you have no shot and you know, are we? Do we accept responsibility for our actions. I mean all these things that would be good. Are we servant leaders? I mean all that stuff.

Randy Gravitt: 51:00

The truth is, if your heart's not right, nobody cares about your skills, and so I think it starts with that, and I think we live in a world now where I'm not sure we're giving enough attention to that, and so I just would encourage leaders make sure that you are leading you correctly, you are getting it right outside of work. Be proud of that and try to get better every day, and know that it's going to be a struggle. Perfection is not I mean, it's mythical, right but you can make progress if you'll take steps, and I think if your character is in check, you're going to be a leader that others are going to want to follow, not that they have to follow. How fun would it be if you go to work every day and your people? Again, they're not your people, but the people that show up. They really want to be there and they want to do great work with you. It's amazing what can be accomplished. So I think that iceberg is a good metaphor for our leadership.

Randy Gravitt: 51:53

The skill stuff matters and, by the way, you have to have both. You do have to have the skill side, I know a bunch of people have great character. They couldn't lead us out of the room if it caught on fire, you know. And so you got to have both. But I think let's make sure that we start with the heart. So I love that old proverb above all else, guard your heart.

Chris Comeaux: 52:12

That's where your life and I would say that's where your leadership impact comes from. That's so good, so good, randy, thank you. I totally understand now why Chad Tidd, at the end of my presentation, came up to me and said you got to meet, randy. I could so see why You're doing such incredible work. That's amazing.

Chris Comeaux: 52:26

He is an amazing guy and the mountain area community is blessed to have him and his Chick-fil-A organization there. But again, I could so see why he wanted to connect us. I'm so glad he did, because you've just given all of our listeners an incredible gift. Thank you for writing Winning at Home. Thank you for writing Lead Every Day.

Randy Gravitt: 52:48

I'm looking forward. We'll include whatever links you want to include, Randy, and just want to just thank you again. I hope everybody listening gonna get a copy uh of both. I think they'll help you, uh at work and I think they'll help you actually win outside of work. So that's great thanks for letting us be here with you. Anything we can do to serve you, just let us know and and uh, we're grateful yep, absolutely, absolutely.

Chris Comeaux: 53:02

We're grateful for you as well. We're also going to include a link to your own podcast as well. So, to our listeners, at the end of each episode, we will share a quote, a visual. The idea is to create a Brain Bookmark, like a thought prodder, almost like a brain tattoo, and there's going to be. This is going to be a really fun one to do, because there's just so many pearls that Randy's given us today. Please subscribe to our channel, the Anatomy of Leadership. We also want you to subscribe to Randy's podcast as well. Again, we'll have a link for that. We don't want you to miss an episode. Tell your friends and families about Randy's books, also the Anatomy of Leadership book. So thanks for listening to the Anatomy of Leadership, and here's our Brain Bookmark to close today's show.

Brain Bookmark / Jeff Haffner : 53:42

Above all else, guard your heart. That's where your life comes from. Paraphrased from Proverbs 4.23.