The Quarterback DadCast
I’m Casey Jacox, the host of the Quarterback Dadcast. As fathers, we want to help prepare our kids—not only to enter the professional world but to thrive in each stage of their lives. Guests of this show include teachers, coaches, professional athletes, consultants, business owners, authors—and stay-at-home dads. Just like you! They share openly about failure, success, laughter, and even sadness so that we can all learn from each other—as we strive to become the best leaders of our homes! You will learn each week, and I am confident you will leave each episode with actionable tasks that you can apply to your life to become that ultimate Quarterback and leader of your household. Together, we will learn from the successes and failures of dads who are doing their best every day. So, sit back, relax and subscribe now to receive each episode weekly on The Quarterback Dadcast.
The Quarterback DadCast
When Tragedy Transforms: Finding Purpose Through Family Challenges with Charles Manning
What does it mean to be the quarterback of your family? Charles Manning, founder of Face the World and lacrosse enthusiast, takes us on a deeply personal journey through his experiences as a father, grandfather, and leader in business and sport.
Growing up in Australia as one of five siblings, Charles shares how a childhood tragedy transformed his family when his younger brother was hit by a car at age five. Rather than breaking his family apart, this challenge taught Charles profound lessons about empathy, service, and unconditional love that would shape his approach to fatherhood and leadership. "From tragedy quite often comes blessings," Charles reflects, explaining how this pivotal moment ultimately led him to meet his wife and create the life he now cherishes.
The conversation dives into the core values that guide Charles as a father – service, abundance, and patience. With remarkable candor, he explores his struggle to overcome what he calls the "Italian fire up" – a tendency toward emotional reactions that he's worked to temper throughout his life. "The higher the emotions get, the lower the level of intelligence is put on the table," he explains, offering a powerful insight for parents everywhere.
Perhaps most valuable is Charles's framework for understanding the "drama triangle" and why many parents fall into the trap of rescuing rather than teaching their children. "Our job as a parent is not to rescue, it's to teach," he emphasizes, challenging listeners to become facilitators who help their children develop problem-solving skills. He also introduces the concept of energy givers versus energy takers, providing a lens through which we can evaluate our impact on others.
Whether you're early in your parenting journey or reflecting on a lifetime of fatherhood, Charles's wisdom about cultivating curiosity, practicing patience, and leaving a meaningful legacy will inspire you to become not just a better parent, but a better human. Listen now and discover how to lead your family with both strength and heart.
Please don't forget to leave us a review wherever you consume your podcasts! Please help us get more dads to listen weekly and become the ultimate leader of their homes!
Hi, I'm Riley and I'm Ryder and this is my dad show. Hey, everybody, it's Casey Jaycox with the quarterback dad cast. Welcome to season six, and I could not be more excited to have you join me for another year of fantastic episodes and conversations really unscripted and raw and authentic conversations with dads. If you're new to this podcast, really it's simple. It's a podcast where we interview dads, we learn about how they were raised, we learn about the life lessons that were important to them, we learn about the values that are important to them and really we learn about how we can work hard to become a better quarterback or leader of our home. So let's sit back, relax and listen to today's episode on the Quarterback Dadcast. Well, hey, everybody, it's Casey Jaycox with the Quarterback Dadcast.
Speaker 2:We're in season six and we're going to the opposite side of the world, everybody. It's spring coming to summer and we're going to go talk to a gentleman. It's crisp fall, saturday morning and we're recording on a Friday which he's there Saturday, which always trips me out when this type of things happen. But, thanks to the wide world of the internet, we're going to have a conversation today and our next guest is Charles Manning. He's the founder of Face the World. We're going to learn all about that. More importantly, he's a dad, he's a grandpa, he's a fantastic lacrosse player and I only learned that because of a friend, a client, a former podcast guest. The one and only Mark Agostinelli said I got a guy you got to talk to and so we had a prep call. But I'm saving majority of my questions for now and we're going to let curiosity drive a fantastic conversation. But I'm excited to welcome to the quarterback podcast our next guest, mr Charles Manning.
Speaker 1:Casey, thank you, it's great to be on the show. I don't know the last time I've heard myself called mr charles manning, but sounds very formal. But yeah, yeah, well it just came to me just came to me.
Speaker 2:Um, all right. Well, we always start out each episode gratitude, so tell me, what are you most grateful for as a dad today or granddad today?
Speaker 1:Well, what I'm grateful for is tomorrow morning we get on a plane and fly up to Indonesia, to Bali, for 12 days, but my grandson's coming, so we're going up for a wedding in Bali and my daughter and her husband are coming up, so I get to have like 10 days of just spending all that time in the pool with my grandson. So I'm really grateful for the opportunity to do that, and Bali's beautiful too. Just can't wait to get there again. How long a flight is?
Speaker 2:that? How long a flight from Australia is that?
Speaker 1:yeah, it's from Adelaide, it's just over four and a bit hours. Yeah, it's, indonesia's our closest neighbour, new Zealand's our next closest neighbour, but Indonesia and part New Guinea are the two closest ones. Indonesia's an archipelago of thousands of islands and Bali's one of the Hindu ones, so it's got this beautiful, beautiful, peaceful culture and, yeah, and you go and hang out it's like Americans going to Mexico, I'm guessing or down to and hang out. It's like americans going to mexico, I'm guessing, or down to the caribbean, and it's very cheap, like um. At the moment we can probably fly return for about 300 american dollars for a return flight to bali, and accommodation and food's pretty cheap up there too.
Speaker 2:Wow, I'm, I'm jealous. That sounds amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that sounds amazing, but I'll say it in an American accent for you a bally.
Speaker 2:Okay, there we go. Nice Well, what I'm most grateful for today I get to watch my daughter play basketball this weekend, and I got my mom in town. She's going to come watch my daughter play hoop. We'll spend Mother's Day with both my mom in town. She's going to come watch my daughter play hoop. We'll spend Mother's Day with both my mom and my wife, which will be great, so we'll celebrate them together, and then I travel all next week, but I'm going to just enjoy the weekend, watch some hoop, play golf with my mom and enjoy the weekend ahead.
Speaker 1:Beautiful. I will share with you that in Australia, tomorrow is Mother's Day. I think we have it at a different time of the year. It's not Mother's Day there is it.
Speaker 2:It's tomorrow. Sorry, we're on Sunday. We're on Sunday.
Speaker 1:Okay, so Father's Day is different, so for us Father's Day is September.
Speaker 2:Okay we're. June for Father's Day.
Speaker 1:So we've got a Father's Day dinner tonight and our two local football teams in the National League and our two local football teams in the National League have got their game against each other tonight. So I normally have tickets to that game and we're staying home for Mother's Day dinner because we've got to get up at four in the morning to catch this plane. But it'll be beautiful, the family will be here tonight and we'll have a dinner and then go to bed and go to Bali.
Speaker 2:There we go. God, it sounds fantastic. Well, I can't wait to see pics. So please share a few when you get back. I'd love to see. I think once my I think my wife and I definitely have plans to travel more of the world once we get to that next stage, once we get kids into college or out of college. Well, bring me inside the Manning huddle. So for for the, the theme of this podcast is kind of like we we we treat dads like the quarterback, and so sometimes dad's going to be the one in charge, sometimes he's going to take a step back and let mom be in charge, and so quarterback isn't always the one. It's the biggest voice, it's the one with the biggest like influence and trying to bring positivity. So you have an opportunity to influence your kids, your grandkids. So I'd love to just learn a little bit about who's inside the Manning huddle right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, beautiful question. Well, I'm a father of two. My son is the youngest, kurt, he's 27. He's just got engaged. He actually did that up in Bali a couple of weeks ago, so we've got a connection with Bali there. And my daughter, eva, she's 30. And both of them played lacrosse as kids and spent a lot of time with Mark Gastinelli when he was here and, yeah, great connections there.
Speaker 1:But my daughter actually works in our business at the moment and was looking at becoming a consultant as well, doing the work that we do. But she's got in there and realized, you know, just, it's probably not the role for her because of a couple different reasons. But she is so skilled and gifted at it now clients love her and she could definitely make it a role. But, um, she's trying to balance the whole thing up of how do you make it work whilst being a mum and a wife and all those sort of things. But she's still happy playing the role she's playing for us in the business. My beautiful wife Janice, we met when we were 17. So I'm about to turn 60 next month, so we've been together for a very long time, but she's definitely the glue in our whole unit. I'm not sure what position she'd be playing in American football.
Speaker 2:We'll call the general manager.
Speaker 1:There you go, there you go. That is definitely what she's called here too. Yeah, and she's my best friend and we spend a lot of people go. I don't know how you two spend so much time working together, because we do a lot of assignments together. We both did the same master's degree at university, which was pretty much in behavioral science. But she doesn't want to be a consultant at the front of the room, but she sits back and, as you know, you pick up so much data from listening to conversations, watching behaviors, and she is just this river of information when we're on assignments with clients. But her role is quite often when we're running workshops in the back of the room and, um, riding shotgun with the venue and just making sure everything's ready for the next session, capturing all the stuff out of that session, watching for participants well-beings and just being, um, yeah, my, my right-hand guy really, but in the family you should know so much more than that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's really the inner circle and I'm one of five kids, I'm the middle of five, and my older brother is one of my. Really he's a really great mate. He's got a couple of adult children the same age and we're just really tight and, yeah, we don't always see each other for a couple of adult children the same age and we're just really tight. And, yeah, we don't always see each other for a couple of months and he only lives 40 minutes up the road, but we've just got a really beautiful connection. So I'd definitely put him in that inner circle and my nephew would be upset if I didn't mention him. I've got a nephew that's playing in the same lacrosse team with me today. He's 40. He's 20 years younger than me. He's in his 40s. I just gave him a couple of credit years. He's actually probably about 42, 43. Yeah, and he plays in the attack line and I play goalie.
Speaker 2:So yeah, that's the inner circle there and you have some grandkids too. Did I hear that? Yeah, just the one circle there and you have some grandkids too. Did I hear that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, just the one William. We just call him Will. He's three. Okay, he's gone around with a lacrosse stick now. So yeah, a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:There you go. Well, that's cool. Well, we'll dig into some lacrosse here in a little bit, but I want to go back in time and I want to learn about what was life like for Charles growing up and talk about the impact your mom and dad maybe siblings had on you now that you're a father and granddad.
Speaker 1:I'll try and help people with the geography a bit. I live in Adelaide, which is kind of where Texas is on the map for you guys, so down the bottom in the middle and I'd probably go, I think, corpus Christi or somewhere around that on the map. That's where Adelaide is in relation to Australia. But I was born in a city called Armidale, which is in New South Wales, a few hours from Sydney, so that's on the east coast. But my older brother and sister, my sister's the oldest, and they were born in Sydney. So that's on the East Coast, but my older brother and sister, my sister's the oldest and they were born in Sydney. My dad had served in the army and met my mum, who lived in Sydney, and then once he got out they moved back to Armidale and he went to the University of New England there, because we have a New England region as well, and the University of New England there, because we have a New England region as well, and the University of New England is where he ended up studying and working. And I was born in Armidale, which is kind of where his family were from and my two younger brothers were. And then most people have heard of the Tassie Devil from the old Disney series. So we moved down to Hobart in Tasmania when I was about four. We actually, you know again, if you're thinking about the map of the US, you think Florida right down the bottom, tasmania's down that bottom right-hand corner, but it's an island and it's pretty cold. Tasmania's, hobart's, right down the bottom, it's the capital. We lived there for seven years and Dad was working in the University of Tasmania at the time and yeah, we had, you know, after my primary school years. My elementary school years were there.
Speaker 1:But we had a tragedy in the family. My youngest brother was five and he got hit by a car right in front of me I'm out the front of our house when I was eight and he survived but he died three times that day and it was a real trauma for the family, as you can imagine, and as an eight-year-old I've only just processed it really with a counselor in the last couple of years carried a lot of guilt, thinking I should have been holding my brother's hand and we weren't even crossing the road. We were watching because our family dog had run across the road and my older brother had gone to get it and for some reason my younger brother just took off to go help out and that changed the whole family's world because he ended up in a coma for months with brain injury and they said he wouldn't be survived, he'd be a vegetable. But he actually, with lots of love and care, ended up being able to walk and talk. But he was definitely head injured and ended up in his mid-30s when he passed away. But he was a 12-year-old mind in a 35-year-old body at that time.
Speaker 1:But as a kid we had lots. Of it brought so many blessings to our lives, as tragedy quite often does, and that, yeah, helped us understand about living with, understanding disability and people with diversity and families bonding together. And there wasn't as many support programs in Tasmania and also the job prospects for the other kids weren't as strong. So my dad made the choice to take a job at University of Adelaide and we moved up here when I was in year six at school and so, yeah, it moves up here and that changed my life, because that's when we're at the school I was at, which lacrosse is our clubs 110 years old, but I'd never heard of the game and, yeah, they came out to our primary school and introduced the sport.
Speaker 1:But it was so if we hadn't had that tragedy, my parents probably wouldn't have moved. We would have grown up in Tasmania, um, I wouldn't have met the lady that is my beautiful wife and friend. I wouldn't have the life I have now if we hadn't had that tragedy. On, a whole lot of philosophy talks about from good comes bad and bad comes good, and and it's hard in that moment to hold that space and I know my parents it was my um, it really strengthened my dad's faith. We grew up as catholics and, um, yeah, I've moved away from that now as an adult, but definitely at the time that was a thing that really got our family through. Yeah, so probably talking too much, casey, no I appreciate you sharing.
Speaker 2:That's the goal is. I always kind of make the kind of sarcastic joke my job is to take my guests on a leash to the beach and then take the leash off and let you run. So thank you, I'm. I'm here for you guys, not me, so I have questions already. So tell me, what was dad's job for the university?
Speaker 1:He was in the finance department. So in the military he was in the intelligence corps and he came back. Actually, when he moved back to Armidale, we had had generations of bakers in our family. My grandfather owned a big bakery in that town and my dad went back there to take over the family business because his dad was ageing. But one thing led to another and the family ended up selling the business and my dad had to decide. He was meant to be a baker where he really only came back to help the family out and he thought it wasn't the best use of his intellect or providing for his family. So he went back to university and did a finance degree.
Speaker 1:So our education system works a bit different. In Australia people pretty much go from year 12 at high school. When you graduate high school, the next year you can be doing medicine, um. So you go and you might and you'll do six years to do a medical degree. But you can also be doing engineering or accounting or whatever it might be and you're straight into you know, um, the schools that you guys have talked about, where I watch college in america, and to me college is about helping people learn to be adults and prepare for life and if you're fortunate enough to do college in the States, it's part of your system.
Speaker 1:I know not everyone gets that luxury, but you do college and it teaches you to think and look at the world and then say you know what am I going to do? And then you might go off to medical school or business school In Australia. You're straight in, and so my dad. But as an adult he went back and went to business school and did accounting. So he comes out as a. He was qualified as an accountant but basically he ended up as the CFO of the equivalent of the university.
Speaker 2:Wow, did mom work or did she stay home?
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, she worked with five kids. They really needed that and so as well as doing that, she did a lot of time pretty much as a nurse and she was working in the hospitals down there and when we came to Adelaide she moved into aged care nursing. But she also had different things that she did all the time. She worked at a hotel on one stage doing housekeeping and she just took whatever jobs she needed to support the family. She ran a local corner store for a while which she bought and had interesting times running the store with the butcher next door and the drugstore on the other side, and that was right near our house where we grew up in Woodville in South Australia. So yeah, she just took the jobs she needed to support the family and definitely never had a career. She just did jobs to help provide for the family.
Speaker 1:You know, really I know my younger brother and my older sister both struggled around my handicapped brother because you know, we didn't go away on family vacations. I remember just that one time in Tasmania where our dad took my brothers and I camping and he was a real outdoors guy. That's what drew me to the military and kayaking and shooting and all that sort of stuff, and so he wanted to take us camping. But that was a really rare thing was to try and take five kids on a family vacation, particularly with a handicapped son. Um was tough. But so my younger brother and older sister. I think feel they they missed out in life because so much of my parents energy had to go to looking after that handicapped brother and my older brother and I feel we got blessed because I'm getting emotional.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we loved him and he was great fun and we learned to do that stuff. But it also meant, you know, you can fly under the radar a bit because our parents attention for me personally as a middle child. People talk about middle child syndrome and I go me personally as a middle child. People talk about middle child syndrome and I go, mate. I loved being the middle child because my older brother and sister had done all the hard work. You know, having parents worrying about their kids. By the time they get to the third kid and there's another two behind him, it's kind of like, yeah, do what you want to do. So I got so much freedom and also my parents having to give that care to my brother. You know that brought all different people into our home and our parents always, even before his accident, you know, we had Malaysian students that were at the university that my parents would bring into our home.
Speaker 1:And then after the Vietnam War, many Vietnamese families moved to Australia, a lot of them coming in as boat people. They had to escape Vietnam and just gave up everything and were in leaky boats coming as illegal immigrants into our country. Australia, took them in. My parents had Vietnamese families coming in and they just always opened the home up and my dad coached rugby, and so we'd have young rugby players at our house on a Sunday night sitting by the fire. I just have so many memories because of all the stuff my parents did to open their house up and care for others, and so my older brother and I go. You know, having that life, we were so privileged and we never went without for food or clothing or education or the sports we wanted. You know we didn't have brand new bikes or you know the latest, you know fashionable clothes or go on cool holidays to Fiji or Bali and it was great yeah.
Speaker 2:What are mom and dad still with us?
Speaker 1:my dad. Sadly we lost him a few years ago. That was hard and my mom's still with us. She's in her early 80s but that's a bit of a sad story too because you know, really I think she had lots of trauma in her childhood which she never processed and she's turned into into a bit of a grumpy old lady and really a lot of the family are estranged from her and you're probably familiar with Cartman's drama triangles.
Speaker 1:She's the queen of the drama triangle and everything's a drama and so people don't want to invite her to family events like weddings or engagements, because she turns them into a drama. And so she, yeah, a bit sad because she's a bit isolated. But my older brother and I although we see that and it's hard to have a relationship with her today and I've spent a lot of time managing her affairs and trying to help her out over the last decade but we just look back and remember everything she did for us as kids and the life she gave us and she was a strong, amazing woman. But I actually put it down to mental health for where she is right now and even though that's hard talking about. But I know most families have stuff like that going on, and how do you deal with mental health?
Speaker 1:if they were if she had arthritis and couldn't walk, everyone could go see that and deal with that.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I don't. I don't know if this is in australia, but like in on I I I actually was made aware of this through linkedin but mental health awareness month in may and I've seen people post on linked and my, my dad passed away December 29th 2021. Um, he had mental illness. He had a rap sheet of health stuff, um, and my wife and I really helped take care of him for close to 20 years, um, physically, mentally, emotionally, financially, um, so, um, I can, I can probably guess I know what you're going through with your mom and I've been there. So I'll be thinking about you guys and wish you wish the best. And I remember one time I got so like I don't know what the word is like just frustrated and sad and mad, and I literally typed in caregiver burnout and I was just like, and I didn't know, I for some reason, I just did, and it was there's 10 symptoms and I had nine of them.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Um, but the the blessing was like you kind of talked really good. The bad, like when he at the end of my dad's life, the last like six weeks, was like right in the middle of COVID, it was awesome, I mean, we could spend time with them. And it was actually from another guest I had on the show where his dad died of dementia and Alzheimer's and he just said he goes. He asked how how much do you see him? I go, not, not that much. And he did look at me, goes, he's still in there.
Speaker 2:And I was like, oh no, I was just like this guilt I felt so I was like all right and so I literally just changed my mindset and my attitude and I went and tried my best to go see him and you know the days were tough sometimes but at the end it was almost like before he passed away. The dementia like went away. It was really weird. And we had some peaceful days and I was with him when he took his last breath. I was holding his hand. So I'll always help with that. That's beautiful.
Speaker 1:That's a beautiful case and I know that my wife went through that. Her mother had dementia for over eight, nine years before it took her. But my father-in-law and my wife both spoke about how they lost her. Probably six or seven years before she died she was gone and the shell of her body was there. But Shirley was gone and you know, I know your colleague said they're still in there.
Speaker 1:In fact we were lucky enough to be in those last few hours with my mother-in-law. We saw moments where, you know, things just clicked and she'd say stuff or whatever, but then she faded out again and such a terrible disease and I think, um, sadly, we had to put down our family pet at labrador last saturday and there was so much grieving there and I just think it's so odd how labrador you know he would labradors will keep eating right up until their last breath and wagging their tail and giving love. But he was in pain and he was struggling and he may have been able to go on for another year, but he was in so much pain and so we're allowed to go and give them a peaceful exit from this world. Yet with humans we go. No, you got to stick around and go through some more shit. I know I don't get that. I don't think.
Speaker 2:I, I, we. Unfortunately we have that in common too, charles I. We put our dog, stella, down about two months ago and, uh, brutal. And so now we have, and we had, a puppy, harley. So she's, she's almost two, but Harley, like she was when she came into the world, she was like oh, I got this friend, this is awesome. I got this big piece of land to go run around and hang out with this dog and then all of a sudden, one day, stella's gone, harley's here. Harley's like hey, where the hell did Harley go? She's like I mean, where the hell did Stella go? I was joking, it's almost like we she's can't find her.
Speaker 1:I'm like you ain't gonna find her, but we're, we're gonna. We've got two dogs as well, and um gus is, uh, actually a little bit older. So he had ted come into his life but and we had gus kind of there when the vet was here helping us um send him on his way. But then at that last moment we got gus to go inside so he didn't see what the vet was doing. But then we let him come back out and we took him with us. When we saw Ted lifeless in front of him and he went up and sniffed him and looked at him and he came with us. When we buried he saw us burying and we made sure we buried him very deep just in case he didn't want to get his mate back. But he's buried just up the front of the vineyard. Here We've got a lovely steel-crafted Labrador dog cut out and we put that there to mark the spot.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm sorry for your loss, man. Oh, thank you. Losing a pet sucks.
Speaker 1:They bring so much joy too they do 100.
Speaker 2:Well, like harley. Yeah, she usually sits right back there and I take her for now. I mean she's I'm taking multiple walks a day and she sleeps on her bed.
Speaker 1:Now it's just like, uh, she's the best so I can see the beautiful view out your door behind you and you said you got some space and stuff that I'm sure Harley's living a great life.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's like, yeah, she's on vacation all the time. She eats and sleeps and takes walks and chases things and bunnies. She's living the jackpot life. So I was asking my guests about values that you learned that from your parents that were important to you. Just to the stories you told so far, I'm hearing empathy, like your mom taught you empathy. Your parents taught you empathy by opening your home to others. I don't know if I'm right or wrong, but tell me what other values were really important to you that you taught your kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my older brother and I both at our dad's memorial, um, yeah, the value he gave us. He gave us so many things, but big one was service. And you know you come into this world and you know we, we talk a lot about seeking our purpose. But even if you're lucky enough to be able to articulate what your life purpose is, um, much of it is about leaving legacy. But, um, you know, I didn't really understand until you know, my son introduced me to readings around stoicism.
Speaker 1:Um, that that's pretty much where my dad was coming from. He said everything you do is a service for others. He goes just most of your waking life will be about doing a service for others. And he said not 100%. Obviously, we also do stuff to serve ourselves, but at work, your outputs are someone else's inputs and thinking about who is it that I'm actually serving? And even for your children, our role is to serve them as a parent, by providing for them and guiding them with those teachings as you alluded to. Yeah, so Dad gave us a big one of service, and the other one was probably abundance and abundance is a huge one of service. And the other one was probably abundance and abundance is a huge one for me.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm not sure if you feel familiar with buckminster fuller, bucky, fuller's uh work back in the 70s and 80s. Um, american guy and a lot of books written by Buckminster Fuller, but he treated his life as a bit of an experiment where he said you know what and a lot of philosophers say this as well, and new age coaches might say this stuff but he said just focus on what it is that you're passionate and good at and do it well, and the money will sort itself out. But so much of our society is driven by the accumulation of wealth and people judging their success in life by their accumulation of wealth, and for men, particularly with toxic masculinity, their sexual conquests and their physical conquests around sport or whatever it might be. And those three things quite often distract us from what we're really meant to do with our life, which is to actually be on purpose and leave legacy. And the legacy isn't about being the richest man in the cemetery, but the sort of things people say at your memorial that they're so grateful that you left that as part of your legacy and what they're going to miss you for. And so that part of abundance is going.
Speaker 1:Don't worry about the money about my wife Janice being, as you call it, the general manager. At times I feel a bit guilty because when we started our business over 30 years ago and even as young newlyweds, I thought you know what I'm going to let her do all the finances. I hear all these guys talking about don't give your wife a credit card and all this sort of nonsense and the guys having to cut their spending, and I'm thinking I'm gonna let her run all the budget and she could tell me how much I can spend. I'm sure it's been. That's worked out pretty well I got.
Speaker 1:I got the same strategy, brother yeah, but she carries so much stress managing invoicing, chasing up, telling us when we've got to pick up the targets on the earnings and all that stuff and I go, I just love doing my work. Do we have to put an invoice in? Okay, I'll let you do that. And so that sense of abundance it's also as I've worked with other people over the years, sharing work, where you can win an assignment with a client and you could pretty much do all the work yourself and happy days with the money.
Speaker 1:but you know, you think about the old consulting dilemma of you know, that you can have this over a supply and just you know famine and feast, and so you're all so busy feasting you haven't set yourself up for down the track and so then you find yourself in time of famine when all this stuff runs out.
Speaker 1:And so that abundance part for me was so important to the success of our business because, by actually sharing work with other associates, it gave me space to go and have more clients seek other work and then just always have this pipeline.
Speaker 1:And even as I'm moving to 60 and thinking about what that next phase of work will be for me, you know, because of all that now I have a space where I don't have to go chase work, work comes to me, and that's all because of all those relationships you built which I might not have had time if I hadn't shared. It wasn't actually an intentional strategy, it was purely just wanting to go there's enough for everyone. We can make the pie bigger and there's enough pie for everyone versus people. That and you know this is when you go back to values. One of the values I found it hard to collaborate with was people that operate from scarcity and hide stuff and want to earn more than you and do all the work themselves and not share. So you know, probably the simplest word is sharing, so that abundance is about sharing and knowing you'll find more.
Speaker 3:Hi, I'm Leslie Vickery, the CEO and founder of ClearEdge, a company dedicated to transforming the business of talent. Through our three lines of business ClearEdge, marketing, recruiting and Rising that help organizations across the recruitment and HR tech sectors grow their brands and market share while building their teams with excellence and equity. I believe we were one of Casey's very first clients. He helped our sales and account teams really those people on the front lines of building and developing client relationships in so many ways. Here are a few. He helped us unlock the power of curiosity. For me it was a game changer. I was personally learning all about TED-based that's, tell, explain, describe, questioning, and that really resonated with me. We also learned about unlocking the power of humility and unlocking the power of vulnerability. Casey taught us to be a team player, to embrace change, to stay positive. He is one of the most positive people I know. He believes that optimism, resilience and a sense of humor can go a long way in helping people achieve their goals and overcome obstacles.
Speaker 3:And I agree Casey's book Win the Relationship, not the Deal. It is a must read. Listen. Whether you're looking for coaching and training or a powerful speaker or keynote, casey is one of the people I recommend when talking to companies. The end result for us, at least as one of Casey's clients our own clients would literally commend our approach over all other companies, from the way we were prepared in advance of a call to how we drove meetings, to how we follow up. It sounds really basic, I know, but let me tell you it is a standout approach that led to stronger relationships. I encourage you to learn more by going to CaseyJCoxcom. You have nothing to lose by having a conversation and a lot to gain. Now let's get back to Casey's podcast, the Quarterback Dadcast.
Speaker 2:How did your dad or mom teach you abundance? Is there a story that you can think of?
Speaker 1:Look, I think it's probably even when they were doing it tough financially, even when they were doing it tough financially, that they would always share meals with people and bring people in that and we had people come stay with us and stuff and look back at it. Sometimes we had some weird cats come through our house, but it was that. And I look at other families that would go, oh, we can't help those people out because we don't have enough. I think, wow, you got more than us, but our parents are still helping. So it was probably just that you know, and I'll share one story with you that actually is really a bit of a negative for me, but it was just really showed me so much about my dad. My older sister struggles a bit with mental health stuff too and she had a series of partners in her life and different people. But she had this one friend and he wasn't a partner. He was a really elderly man that really befriended my sister and her family. She was a single mum mostly man that really befriended my sister and her family. She was a single mum mostly and but they lived. She, she lived in back in adelaide and this guy lived in another town and we were trying to organize christmas and it was going to be my home this year and um, we were just going do we even invite my sister? Because she just uh, she liked my mum very much like my mum would A drama queen would make the day awful.
Speaker 1:There would always end up people yelling, doors being slammed, people taken off, all that stuff, and you think, geez, it's a day of loving and care, but it's always a drama. I'll tell you another story linked to Harry Potter about a good metaphor for that. But my sister was going, could she ask this guy to come to lunch? And we go no, it was just after my handicapped brother had died. He died in September and it was our first Christmas without him. And we said, no, can we just please keep it to the family, the inner family. We just want to have a lovely Christmas together.
Speaker 1:I can remember my dad being so angry with me and he goes Charles, haven't we taught you that Christmas is a time of loving and giving and opening your homes up and sharing. Why won't you let this guy join our Christmas lunch? But I also knew if I let that guy in, we had to let all these other people in. A couple of us were grieving and going. We just want to keep the doors closed and just huddle in as a family, and dad was still going open the doors up and share, and I didn't do it that year, which caused a drama, and my dad forgave me, but he was, you know, just even in those times, still wanted to go. Yeah, we're all grieving, but there's still plenty of food on the table and more people come to the table and it'll be even better.
Speaker 2:Wow, wow, yeah, that's powerful. Your dad was a. I almost knocked my microphone over buddy. Your dad was a giving dude. Any idea where that came from for him?
Speaker 1:I think it was his mother, yeah, his, with my dad's. A number of his siblings are still alive and a few of them are coming down next month to celebrate my 60th and a lot of them are in their 80s and they're all just beautiful people. But they talk about my dad's mum being that matriarch of the family. Yeah, and even during World War II, when my grandfather was away doing military service, she actually had this job of looking after a family of six and keeping things ticking over. But she also had this job of running the gates on the train line and a lot of women got these roles and there was many American troops on the east coast of Australia and to move them up into the pacific they would go from sydney or melbourne and our military camps on the east coast and take them up train lines up the east coast. But all the gates on those train lines were operated mentally and there would be my mother, my grandmother, out there two in the morning opening the gates so the troop trains could go through and and stuff like that. And you know she also had to train the family how to be ready to go and hide in these caves in the hills because they're all expecting japan to invade australia because they got right down into new guinea and australia and american troops really um stopped them in New Guinea from the invasion. But Australia had already drawn a line across the top of the country about what they were prepared to accept with the invasion during then. But so much of it was about women holding the because the men were off fighting the war and she had to train to take families and kids and old people up into the hills to hide in these caves for when the japanese invaded and just all these stories and all that stuff about service and generosity. That was her and she was just.
Speaker 1:My dad and his mom were really calm and you know Irish-German-English ancestry. Manning is an Irish name and I've been back to that part of Ireland from where we came from. But my mum's family were Italian and they'd come from the island of Salina, a mafioso country. But my grandfather, who'd migrated out to Australia after the war, my mum's dad, he was a pharmacist and he came out to Australia after the war. My mum's dad, he was a pharmacist and he came out to work for the Australian Navy and he said to his kids you're not going to speak Italian, you're going to learn to speak English and you integrate into the country, and he just wanted his kids to become Aussie kids. So we didn't have a lot of that cultural legacy of learning Italian, and I guess that's one of my connections with Mark as well with our Italian-Irish ancestry Catholic boys, all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 2:So one question I like to ask dads is mainly for younger dads if we can impart some wisdom. You got more wise years than me, but I got. I've been married now 26 years. I got a 19 year old and a 17 year old, so I got a few years under my belt, but I'm still learning every day, and selflessly. I get this podcast to get free therapy from gentlemen like yourself, which is great.
Speaker 2:But um, well, if you had to reflect back on your dad when you're raising your kids, um, what would be an area of your dad game that maybe wasn't always where you wanted it and you had to learn to kind of improve? Maybe you had to check your ego a few times. That might help another dad at home that might be struggling, that we can maybe speak to him, or speak to him through through your experience, or and I'll even maybe lead my witness, my my gap that I always work on, still to this day, is patience, not overreacting when I don't need to overreact, and so I've actually improved quite a bit. I think my wife's even said so.
Speaker 1:But tell me what comes to mind for you well, that bit about the harsh versus the Italian ancestry. I know it's a generalization around cultures, but it was more around temperament. My dad had this beautiful and so did my grandmother this beautiful temperament of calmness. And you know you talk about curiosity and the biggest learning for me as an adult and I loved you sharing in our pre-meeting around that curiosity, because that's one of the pieces I try to teach or share with all my clients. If you want to avoid ending up spiraling into a negative conflict and have healthy conflicting ideas, you need that curiosity. Conflicting ideas, you need that curiosity.
Speaker 1:Um, but from my mum's side they were what I call bulldozers and you know, in the advocacy with inquiry model, they were very high on advocate, advocating or competing and low on inquiry about other people. And that word curiosity is about being curious about or inquiring about what other people think. And my dad, even when he knew he was right, he would still be curious about why other people were thinking the way they did. Way before a whole lot of this stuff was being taught and, yeah, where I grew up very emotive and even as a lacrosse player, that was one of the biggest things I had to get under control was getting triggered and firing up, and that firing up would bring so much energy and aggression, which can be great in a contact sport, but, um, when the emotions are raised, the intellect lowers, you know, um, so the intelligence disappears. The higher the emotions get, the lower the level of intelligence is put on the table.
Speaker 1:And that was definitely the case for me of. You know that um italian fire up and everything in that was in a family of five. Any, any conflict that was being resolved always was sorted out very loudly and quite often aggressively, with four boys, and that was never my dad, I think. In my memory I can only remember probably two or three times in my whole life where he lost his cool. Yeah, yeah, I can remember about 3,000 times where I've lost mine.
Speaker 2:How did you improve and get better at that?
Speaker 1:It was when I was doing my master's. I definitely was on a path of wanting to grow and develop, but I was still in a path of arrogance. So another beautiful thing you said to me me and that's been a key lesson was around humility and just and I'll still battle with this all the time where you know your brain just runs and you think you've worked something out, you've got a position on it and I've just been always grown up with okay. You then go in and fight for that position and it comes from such a base of ego as well, being right. And it was at uni when they were taking us through this program of you know, learning about the jihari window and the fact that we've got these massive blind spots, and and then from your study group, getting feedback and opening up to feedback and people give me feedback about these things. That were my strengths, but they're also my weaknesses.
Speaker 1:It was the first time people had the courage to tell me in my face about you know, it kind of pisses people off when you do that and I remember coming home because I was going to uni in Melbourne and for one week blocks and coming back to adelaide and I'd always be so excited, heading off to a week of university for my master's degree.
Speaker 1:And then I'd get to university and I'd have this wake up moment that punches you in the face. And then I'd ring home to janice and go this is terrible, I just want to come home. I hate this shit. And then, as you process it and sit with it, ringing up and going this is amazing, this is what I needed to hear. And so, just having that other people around you, but committing to wanting to grow, and that first commitment to wanting to grow is, um, dropping the guard and being ready to hear stuff and not react to it. But it was this process that our professor took us through, which you know I now do with clients and on leadership programs, but, geez, I wish I got that when I was 19.
Speaker 2:but now you're going to give it away. And so it's amazing when you are really listening to learn versus listening to persuade. In life, and I've been very lucky with some great mentors, like my college football coach he remember told me, casey, if you ever have to tell me how good you are, you're not that good when you're great, I'll tell you. One of my first bosses out of school, he told me he asked me a question. He goes do you want to be right or do you want to get what you want?
Speaker 2:Most powerful piece of advice I got in my life, one of the most powerful Late in my corporate career, before this entrepreneurial journey found me a very, very successful software sales guy, sales evangelist, leader, trainer, extraordinaire. He told me it's okay not to know every answer. It's just not okay not to do anything about it. And so, when you can which then triggered my like, okay, my, these are my superpowers that I want to ignite for others is being humble, being curious, being vulnerable, like when those traits are present and I teach my kids all the time like you're never going to know everything, you can never learn it, you can't learn enough, and if you have a question, probably five of the people have the same question.
Speaker 2:So we're going to go first and be the one to go and ask our thing, and so I think we encourage people to like when those three traits humility, vulnerability and curiosity, I think, are present. In my experience not saying I'm right, just my experience I think it removes fear and we remove fear that it stops eroding families, it stops eroding cultures, it stops and and but.
Speaker 1:When fear is present, ego loves to be getting in the way and block all the good things that are about to happen so I want to hear about leaving that with the children and you know I'll look at both my children and um, my son has closer to my wife's personality and my daughter closer to mine. But both the my kids have definitely picked up that and we call it the LeCantro, which was my mum's maiden name. The LeCantro arrogance, and we just see. So arrogance is almost the compilation of all those three things you just spoke about going missing. And even my wife and I ran a leadership program during the day yesterday. And then we had to go to a board meeting last night and my wife and I are both on this board for this regional community leadership program we were running and one of the guys in the meeting was saying some stuff and I'm so lucky because my wife's sitting next to me and she could pick, read the body language and she just kicked me under the table and said don't say anything, because I so struggle to not go into that bulldozer arrogance mode because I just know the guy was so wrong and you know the don't say anything sometimes is a good strategy, but actually being curious and asking a question is quite often the right strategy, but in that moment, because we're where we were.
Speaker 1:It's also being strategic and seeing the long game, and you know that question you want to ask, or help the group ask, because sometimes it's not right now. You need to ask it. You know it'll be in two meetings time, and so that sense of patience can be important too, because I want to get everything sorted out today. I don't want to wait for two meetings time, but I know over those two, that time those people will discover some of those things themselves and they'll bring it back to the meeting and you won't be the one that has provided that insider lightning bolt moment for the group, which is about what your coach was talking about as well. You know. Park the ego. Why is it that you have to demonstrate your brilliance? Isn't it more exciting to see people discover stuff that maybe you wanted them to discover? And they might even bring other things that you didn't even see on the radar. So would park that arrogance no, love it, ma'am.
Speaker 2:Um, so the beautiful game of lacrosse. Um brought uh, my my new friend, who I get to meet actually. So when this episode comes out, I will finally have met mark in person. Um, I'm gonna be back in boston here in a couple weeks. Um, we're gonna play golf for the first time. Um, he doesn't know, he's gonna give me five strokes aside and uh, uh, joking buddy, but maybe you'll give me six.
Speaker 1:You better ask for it too, because the guy every sport he touches right, I'm sure he's a gun at golf. He's a good player.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't wait. Maybe he's going to. I'm hoping he signs a glove or signs a ball for me that I can bring it home. Just joking, okay, what he's already signed it for you, I'm sure. There we go. Tell me a good lacrosse story, because I think it's cool. He good, uh, a good lacrosse story, um, because I think it's cool. He came over to play professional with you. You guys played in the same team, were you like the coach player, or, if I have that right, or?
Speaker 1:yeah, that's right. Well, I wasn't coach, I was a club chairman and player. Yeah, so we had a very good coach that year, which is an interesting story in itself okay, but he come.
Speaker 2:but I think it's a cool story. He comes over and he was intrigued by the work you were doing, so he was probably learning through osmosis, watching you do what you do played lacrosse, but you guys still stay in touch. And then, next thing, you know, you guys are both guests on my podcast.
Speaker 1:Crazy, living in our house as well. So what would happen? And I played this role for a number of clubs going back to the days when Jesus walked the earth. I used to recruit. So I'd gone to America to play lacrosse in Texas on a tour in 1986, and I was such a lacrosse um junkie and I used to get lacrosse magazine delivered to me in australia and I realized, you know, we'd had a couple of canadians play for our club, our box players, and I thought they'd made a difference. That was when I was a kid and everyone just loved watching these box guys do around-the-back stuff and all that sort of thing. And I thought, and a couple of other clubs had had some really top-level players come out from Cornell and a place like that to play to their club and their clubs just dominated everyone because that player brought a level of professionalism and lifted everyone. So I wrote a letter to lacrosse magazine saying any young men that are graduating that are interested in adventure in australia for a season, um, here's the package right to me. And so it was all done with snail mail. And this is when I was working for army and running the Woodville lacrosse club from my desk with the army engineers.
Speaker 1:Um, I'd get letters from these guys asking to come out and play lacrosse and I'd read through them all and I'd try and do a bit of due diligence was, which was not easy. I'm trying to find out if they're legitimate players and we'd pick two. And so the first two I picked was those guys. One of them was out here for my daughter's wedding only two years ago and we visit them both and we played Masters together in Denver and around the world San Diego. And one guy was from William Mary, which I don't think has a men's program anymore. They dropped the men's program. And the other guy was from UVA and Tom Garland and Jack McDonald, and Jack was from Wilton, connecticut, and Tom was from Charlottesville down in Virginia and they have become like brothers to me. And from that year, every year I'd recruit two players. Another club started asking me to get players for them. They'd come out to Australia. They'd get hosted or billeted with a player or a family. We'd try and find them some work during the daytime, because we only had practice two or three times a week and played on Saturdays, so the rest of the week they would work, get some stuff on their resume for when they went home, money to pay to have adventure in the country and they'd coach our juniors. So it was great for developing our young players because they had other players getting the kids excited.
Speaker 1:And this just went on for years and when Mark was coming, by that time I was married, had children, been doing this for 20 years and it was now starting to happen with emails. And Mark wrote an email to me and it was now not me putting an ad out in lacrosse magazine. It was all word of mouth and Mark had heard from someone who had heard from someone and he wrote to me and said about coming out. And you know I went and checked his stats because now I could go and look online and see players' stats and see what their last four years had looked like and now even their high school career, and then maybe talk to people that could give him a reference that I knew. And Mark just looked amazing. But he said I've got three other guys that want to come and I'm thinking we only want two. And I said I can get the other two guys a spot with another club in our city. And he said, oh, we all want to stay at the one club and I said well, we have divisions, we have our state league league, division one and division two. Whoever doesn't get picked in that first team on a Saturday, then they pick a second 15 for the next division and everyone play up left over, plays in the third division and all the clubs kind of have players at that level. And he said I said they can play in our first division team. They don't make the state league. And he goes yep, they're in and they're. All.
Speaker 1:These four boys that had gone through St Mick's together all came out to Australia and I managed to get families to host them and it was just an amazing year and they had so much fun. But Mark had blown his. Just before Mark came out he'd blown his knee back in the States and he wrote to me and he was to tell me and we spoke on the phone. He was just devastated and didn't know whether he could come and I said you know what mate, you come out anyway and you can live with me and you can coach. And so he came out in 2007 and his three mates got to play while he was still doing rehab.
Speaker 1:He was doing his rehab here and he coached juniors and got to do lots of work in our business with me, and then he and his girlfriend tina came out, who's now his wife, and she lived with us. And then they got an apartment and they extended their visa and ended up staying for two years, and the next year he actually played and got to play some good lacrosse and have some fun. So he didn't get to get a championship game, though, so he came out and watched us win the inaugural Australian Club Championship and I was about 40 at that time game, though, so he came out and watched us win the inaugural Australian club championship. So and I was about 40 at that time and um come out of retirement to play goalkeeper in the state league team and we won the championship. And because of that we got to play in the club championships and first one ever and we beat a club from Victoria and I got to play in those games, and so did the other three boys from St Mike's, and Mark just had to watch it and he was so gracious about it.
Speaker 1:And then the next year he played his heart out, but we didn't win those games, but he left a huge legacy here. That's awesome, but he goes back, and even going back, everything he does, he serves. He had that same value of serving and just and also about our responsibility is one of his huge values around. Um, you know, being clear about what your responsibilities are and meeting those responsibilities. He just doesn't want to let people down, but he expects the same in return.
Speaker 1:I'll stop watching.
Speaker 2:No, this is great man. I appreciate the stories. It's been fun learning about you and your relationship with Mark. Okay, before we learn about Face the World, I want you to summarize, if you can, to your best, in succinct fashion. Try to think about three words or values that dads can take from our conversation today. They can kind of maybe do some self-reflection, say these are three things that I can think about, I can work on to become that ultimate or quarterback leader of my home. Charles, tell me what words come to mind.
Speaker 1:Well, the biggest one we haven't mentioned to me is about patience, and we all want the best for our children and we think we know those paths that they should probably choose to get their best. And you asked me the question earlier and I didn't get to it. With my dad you know I look back in early in my life I felt he didn't do enough of kind of pushing me or guiding me in the directions I should have taken some of the choices that I made, but he let me make my own choices and he never, ever judged me for not choosing the paths that I think he probably thought I should have took and it's taken me a long, long time he probably thought I should have took and it's taken me a long long time. Even with my own kids, I tried super hard to put the paths in front of them that would give them really good doorways to open and then just sit back and, if they didn't want to go through that door, just accepting that. My job was to love them, regardless of which doors they choose to go through, and when your kids are really not at their best, that's when you have to love them the most and probably the worst value that I inherited from my mother and my daughter really grapples with it as well is the one of judgment, and we so quickly judge other people in situations and actually just parking judgment, being conscious and aware of your judgment and putting it off to the side and just giving love. So, as a dad, understanding the responsibility to serve, be and withhold judgment and give love probably the three biggest things.
Speaker 1:I still struggle with it at times because with that Cartman-Drauman Triangles and I'm not sure if you're familiar with it, they talk about when people play the victim in their life that's one at the bottom of the triangle when they avoid responsibility and they want to blame other people for what's going on or how they're feeling. They want to avoid or deny that they have any part in it. You know what's your 50% of this? Because, as always, you have a part to take that responsibility. So they blame, they justify, they deny, but ultimately they're trying to avoid responsibility. And the way they do that is quite often by getting angry or whinging and complaining. But if they do enough whinging and complaining, they kick in the third, second player in the triangle, and this is the mistake we make as parents so often we rescue, we go in and we want to sort things out for our kids because we love them and we care for them. We want to resolve their problems, whereas sometimes we need to realize our job as a parent is not to rescue, it's to teach. Need to realize our job as parent is not to rescue, it's to teach. But every time you rescue them, they don't learn the lesson that they maybe need to learn. But in your becoming a rescuer, sometimes they see you as the third player, which is when they're playing the victim and they want to blame people.
Speaker 1:The third player is the persecutor or the bully, and that's the one that the child's or in that relationship is actually causing the pain for that person perceived pain and all of us have experienced as dads, when your kids are tired and grumpy and angry and they lose their shit and they're going. I hate you, dad, you're the worst dad in the world. All because you've told them they can't have another bowl of ice cream, it's time to go to bed, and they just lose their head and just are yelling at you because they're tired and grumpy. But a parent then gives in and goes okay, you can have another bowl of ice cream. It's not the best metaphor, but you've just rescued them and reinforced that if they actually throw a tantrum, then they'll get what they want and you're just creating someone that plays a victim.
Speaker 1:And I call that all the red triangle, because we need to stop doing that and that red triangle that was the harry potter reference I meant. You know, I call them the dementors because if you see someone that's a red triangle person that is either a bully or a victim or something, and you see them coming and they haven't seen you in the workplace, a lot of the time we go is it too late to hide in the closet because if that person sees me, they're going to corner me. And in the harry potter genre, the dementor traps you and sucks the life out of you in just two minutes. Person sees me, they're going to corner me. And in the Harry Potter genre, the Dementor traps you and sucks the life out of you in just two minutes. And some people have got the ability to do that. And that's kind of what I was saying before with my mum. You know she's a classic Dementor.
Speaker 1:If you go and spend time with her you've got to make sure your energy levels are high, because they just take the energy out of you.
Speaker 1:And that was one of the things Mark said for me. That he got from me was when he came out. I said to my kids there's energy givers, there's energy takers and there's people that sit on the fence and you know that if you go and spend time with someone like Mark, he's such an energy giver and you might only have five minutes with him but you walk away feeling pumped up and great, I love that time with that guy. And then there's other people that they're okay, they just hang there, they don't take your energy, they don't give you energy, but they're neutral. But then there's the energy takers, which are those victims, particularly, or even the bullies, and you spend time with them and it drains your battery and it's hard when they're people you, they're a family and you kind of love them. But even with work colleagues or clients or friends, you go. I just can't spend time with that person at the moment because I haven't got the energy for it, because you know all they do is take it and yeah, that's that red triangle.
Speaker 2:No, well said, I actually drew it myself and it makes complete sense. And you know, you're the victim of your own story, the hero, and I would say there's three sides, Like your triangle there's your side, my side, and the truth there's somewhere in the middle Sorry, can I just say.
Speaker 1:Say, because you use the language that a lot of people use either the victim or the hero. And the hero has courage, they accept responsibility to problem solve. And teams can fall into that space too. Dads can fall into that space, but definitely as individuals we all can.
Speaker 1:But if you see someone that's caught in that red triangle that you love and care about, there's only two roles. You've got a choice to play. And in the green triangle, which is where you go to to help people be the hero in their own story, you go, is my job. One of the other two roles, which is, rather than be rescuer, you're the teacher. Rather than being the bully, you become the facilitator to try and help that person. And again it's your questions around being curious. So you see someone struggling, you think you know what the answers are, so you want to go in and do it for them. That's rescuer. I need to help them learn this. That's the teacher.
Speaker 1:But sometimes you're not the right person to be the teacher or you don't have the skill, so that brings in the facilitator and the facilitator will introduce that person to the teacher or they encourage that behavior by asking the right questions, it could be saying things like I can see. This is really upsetting and really hard for you. What can you do to fix it? And just asking that one question and the person goes what do you mean me fix it? This person's causing the plane and they should nature and they'll go into the victim space ago yet, but they're probably not going to.
Speaker 1:So what can you do to make the situation better for you? And that's being the facilitator, when you're not actually telling the person, teaching them or rescuing them and it's such a great parenting tool because so many parents want to go in to rescue their kids. Dad, I love you for giving me that bowl of ice cream, but then later in life, when they put on all this weight, they go. It's your fault, dad, that I've put on too much weight because you gave me all that ice cream Sorry.
Speaker 2:How can people learn more about you and Face the World?
Speaker 1:Well, we've got a website, facetheworld, or one word lowercase com, but for Australia you have au at the end of it. So there's the story of Face the World. On there You'll see photos of Eva and Janice and some of our associates. It talks about the work we do. We only do three things or two things really. We facilitate thinking around business and strategy and we help people and teams get in good shape. So that plays out of really us playing the role as coach for many teams running leadership training and doing one-on-one executive coaching. So that's pretty much the three types of work we do and we've been doing it for 30 years and I love it.
Speaker 1:People ask me what are you going to do when you retire? I'm going to keep doing exactly what I'm doing now all the same stuff. I might just do a lot more for free for people in the community, community organisations and individuals that can't afford it, because that's my life purpose. I don't want to stop working when I retire. I say retirement is when you no longer need employment and we have employment to give us the money to finance our life. So retirement should be a time when you no longer need to earn money, but it's actually when you should get to choose the work you do and you should be choosing. Whereas most people think it's time to go play golf, and you know, stop working, I think no. It's time to go play golf and you know, stop working. I think no. It's the time to start doing the work you really couldn't do before, or the work you were doing that you loved the most. You know, keep serving because it gives a sense of purpose and autonomy and mastery. So there's Dan Pink.
Speaker 2:You're speaking the best way, speaking to my heart, brother. You're, uh, I'm, I'm early on this journey that you're on that.
Speaker 1:You've already been on for years, but I didn't mean to tell the difference in color with their beards out of beard.
Speaker 2:There we go well one's much wider than yours yeah, exactly, um, but it, I, I, it's a calling man. I enjoy it and so it's so important, this work. And when you talk about early early, about abundance and sharing, I love sharing customers with people and love. Actually, when I go out and see Mark he's a potential competitor of mine, I don't care, but he's a friend of mine. I had him on the podcast. His name's Chris Mader. He wrote a great book and he's a friend of mine. I had him on the podcast, his name's Chris Mader, he wrote a great book. We do kind of the same work, but obviously we're two different people, but he's going to go with us. It'll be great, and so I love that you have that same, because a mindset of abundance is a lot better than a mindset of scarcity. So I love that you're teaching this from across the world.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's now time time, as we wrap up, to go into the lightning round, where I ask you just random questions. I'm going to show you the hits have taken too many bong, I'm sorry, too many hits, not bong hits, but football hits in college when I played quarterback. That's an uncle Rico moment from Napoleon dynamite. Everybody, your job is to answer these questions as quickly as you can. My job is to try to make you laugh, tina come and eat some ham.
Speaker 1:Eat your food, Tina, Tina. Come and eat some ham.
Speaker 2:Eat your food, tina, okay, yeah. All right, are you ready? I'm ready. Okay, you hold an Australian lacrosse record for most scored by a goalie in a game. Not true, okay, true or false.
Speaker 1:Mark Agassinelli owns the Australian lacrosse record for most ejections in a game Probably very true?
Speaker 2:It's not true at all. Okay, what is?
Speaker 1:your favorite comedy movie of all time, the.
Speaker 2:Castle. Okay, last book you read, it's an Australian movie you want to understand Australian culture.
Speaker 1:It's an old movie, but the Castle, have a look.
Speaker 2:The Castle. Where can I find it?
Speaker 1:If you can't find it, email me and I'll help you find it. It will help people really understand Australian culture.
Speaker 2:Perfect. Last book you read was it was Yuval Harari's Sapiens. Okay, If you were to go on vacation right now, just you and Janice. Where are you going? Bali tomorrow morning, there you go. What would be one genre of music that might surprise your customers? That you work with, that you listen to?
Speaker 1:Bluegrass A bit of cherry pickers with bluegrass, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, if I was to come to your house to dinner. I'm flying the next flight out of Seattle to Australia. What would we have for dinner tonight?
Speaker 1:I'd cook you a lamb roast from some lambs from out the back.
Speaker 2:Okay, love, it Sounds good. If there was to be a book written about your life, tell me the title. He Left a Legacy. Okay, I love it. Well said, and now the Australian filmmakers and the American filmmakers are not going to. They're fighting over this, this manuscript, because because this, this movie he left a legacy, is going to be just an absolute thriller and killer, and, and and across the world. You are now the casting director. I need to know who's going to star Charles Manning in this great new film.
Speaker 1:Oh, you probably don't know the guy, but it'll be funny for most Australians. A guy called Mick Malloy.
Speaker 2:Okay, perfect. Now I'm going to look him up too.
Speaker 1:He's a beer drinking bum. He's just a.
Speaker 2:A beauty. I love him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, quite inappropriate as well.
Speaker 2:Okay, that sounds like right up my alley of humor, charles. So I love that. Okay, and then last question Tell me two words that would describe your wife Calm and smart. Great answers, lightning round's complete, as usual. I usually laugh more at my own jokes, so I get the loss, you get the win. Charles, congratulations, I'm grateful that you woke up early on a Saturday morning in Australia it's still Friday here and spent some time with me and shared your story, shared a ton of wisdom. I have a page full of notes now.
Speaker 2:I want to give huge gratitude to Mr Mark Agostinelli for making this introduction happen and for being a great customer and a great friend and a great former podcast guest himself, and I want to make sure that people go check out Face the World. I think what Charles and his wife and his team are doing is well, so important, and it's why he's been in business for, or they've been in business for, close to 30 years, because the EQ is never going to get in my mind, never going to get replaced by AI. How we treat people, how we connect with people, how we ask questions, how we give that Maya emblem on by, how do you make people feel when they leave the room is still a massive gift that we can give today. And I was joking with a customer yesterday. I said there's this dude named Voltaire back in the 1500s and he was teaching this thing called curiosity. I think he might've been a sexist, charles Cause he said a man, so it brought him to this day.
Speaker 2:I said a man or a woman is not judged by his or her answers but by his or her questions. So everybody, let's get a little bit more curious tomorrow. Have some grace for people. Listen to learn versus persuade, like we said, and I hope that once you listen to this episode, everybody take time to leave us a review or take time to share this episode with another dad that you think our conversation could could benefit them and their mindset where they're at. But, charles, I'm grateful for your time.
Speaker 1:Man, I'm grateful I passed across and I hope to have a chance to meet you in person soon thank you, and I really do want to honor you for the work you're doing, but the great learnings you gave me through this process too. I love that. The thing about advocacy with inquiry is mutual learning, and that's what we always aspire to is be mutual learners, and thank you for that gift.
Speaker 2:It's been a pleasure you bet, brother. Well, have a great rest of your weekend, enjoy Bali, and we'll hope our paths will cross again soon.
Speaker 1:Sampai jumpa lagi. Let's see you later, mate Balinese.
Speaker 2:Love. It All right, see you later.