Craig Anderson [00:00:00]:

On their last day, as we said goodbye, I was pretty upset about losing this employee. It turns out maybe I shouldn't have been. Welcome to Executive Evolution. I have over 25 years of leadership experience in corporate America. I learned a lot of lessons the hard way, and I created this podcast so that you won't have to. A lot of times we make hires that we think are good hires in this aspect. The person I had hired was really smart, really savvy, had a good resume, really won over the team. But there were warning signs that I didn't want to pay attention to.

Craig Anderson [00:00:37]:

And those warning signs really became apparent. A culture I was trying to build that was around openness and working together. This person wanted to be secretive and closed off, didn't want to share information, didn't really play well with others on the team at a deep level, did on a surface level. And I should have realized it sooner. And when I realized it, I should have acted on it and it turned out to be a big mistake. As I like to say, the only time we're really wrong about people decisions is when we take too long to make them. Today on Executive Evolution, we're going to talk to Jack MacKenzie. He's the president of CollegeAPP and he's going to tell a great story about his Executive Evolution.

Craig Anderson [00:01:16]:

Let's listen in. Jack, welcome to the Executive Evolution podcast. I am so glad you could be with me today.

Jack MacKenzie [00:01:26]:

It's my pleasure.

Craig Anderson [00:01:27]:

Yeah, I'm excited. As we go through, learn more about what you do, learn about your leadership journey and the great work that you are doing with your company. It's a pretty exciting world. As we were saying before we started recording.

Jack MacKenzie [00:01:40]:

Yeah. Things are in motion as they tend to be. So the key is knowing where that motion is headed.

Craig Anderson [00:01:47]:

That's right. That's right. As long as we can guess that with some accuracy, we're in good shape. Well, Jack, are you ready to jump into the lightning round as we get to know you a little bit better?

Jack MacKenzie [00:01:58]:

I am.

Craig Anderson [00:01:59]:

All right, let's go. First question. What is the best leadership book you have ever read?

Jack MacKenzie [00:02:05]:

Who Moved My Cheese?

Craig Anderson [00:02:07]:

Excellent. So that is one that has not come up yet. I am very familiar with it because I remember reading it. What stood out so much to you when you read that book?

Jack MacKenzie [00:02:18]:

Well, through the. Through the lens of leadership. What stuck with me about that was understanding that leadership has people you need to lead. Right. So not only is it. Was it a good lesson and in the way to think about change and embrace change and whatever it is you're doing, but also to have an appreciation, understanding for the people who you're leading, how they might not embrace change as much as you do. And that's okay. And your job as a leader is to bring them along with you to embrace that change rather than just expect it.

Craig Anderson [00:02:57]:

And, you know, it's so funny. I remember when that book came out, and reading that book when came out, I was like, oh, change is happening. The rate of change we have to deal with today as leaders is so much different than it was when that book came out. I don't remember when it was, but it was a good while ago.

Jack MacKenzie [00:03:12]:

It was a good while ago.

Craig Anderson [00:03:14]:

And now change happens so quickly. And you know, when I talk to clients sometimes about like the seven dynamics of change, how we take our teams through change, one of it is people just get exhausted. And as a leader, how do we keep people saying, I'm exhausted too, but we don't have any choice, we have to just keep going.

Jack MacKenzie [00:03:30]:

Yeah. It's one of the more exciting challenges, I think, of being in charge, if you will. And that is, I think, interpreting the importance of different kinds of change and the importance of reacting to it and prioritizing. There's nothing better, I think, to say to someone who you're or a group of people who you're about to ask to do something different, to say, this isn't a today issue. We need to solve this in the next month. But we don't need to solve it today. So think about it a little bit and let's get back together in a few days and really address it thoughtfully versus as a crisis.

Craig Anderson [00:04:16]:

Oh, yeah, yeah. Sometimes it's just enough to say, all right, we know that's coming, let's put that on the agenda, but let's focus on today. And that can kind of bring it in a little bit for people too, I think.

Jack MacKenzie [00:04:27]:

Yeah. And it gives people one. It's a smart thing for a leader to do, which is to let the people who are probably most affected, at least in their day to day jobs, to provide some thoughtful input. And along the way then, now you've also bought yourself some time for persuasion and positivity so that in the Humo region, we can get people to embrace whatever it is we have to change rather than just feel like it's been forced upon them.

Craig Anderson [00:04:59]:

That's right. Perfect. Question number two. Who is your leadership crush?

Jack MacKenzie [00:05:04]:

Because you use the word crush, that suggests that it's something kind of fresh and new, Right?

Craig Anderson [00:05:10]:

Sure.

Jack MacKenzie [00:05:11]:

So I actually have a new leadership crush. And it's a fictional character, and his name is Jamie Fraser, and he is the male lead on a show called Outlander, which my wife and I had just started watching about a month ago, but we're already into season four. And Jamie is kind of a ne'er do well heir to a significant clan in Scotland. Not a direct. He's an indirect descendant to the head of the. In truth be told, no relation. But it's the mackenzie clan. Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:05:47]:

This whole show is built around a family that has my name spelled the sanguine, the whole thing. But Jamie's brilliant, and he's brilliant at. He was consolidating both power and trust of the clan members so that when it was his turn, he was the obvious choice to take over. He did it with carrots, and he did it with sticks, and he did it with brilliance. By the way, this is mostly seasons one and two. He kind of goes off the rails in seasons three and four, but in one and two, he was brilliant. And a couple of times I said to my wife, I said, I have just learned a lesson from this guy. He is so good at getting people to do what he needs them to do to achieve his goals.

Jack MacKenzie [00:06:35]:

I was blown away.

Craig Anderson [00:06:37]:

I think there's so much. And when you think about leadership a lot, because I do, you start seeing all these amazing lessons in TV shows of good and bad leadership. Sometimes I think, you know, scripts written by people who probably never let anybody in their life and they just maybe read a book or something, Right. But, you know, one of my favorite kind of fictional leaders is Billy B. He's not fictional. He's real. In the. In the movie Moneyball, how Brad Pitt's care version of Billy Bean takes through.

Craig Anderson [00:07:03]:

And just, you know, one of the things I talked about, the seven dynamics of change that I talk about, one of them is, you know, if you take the pressure off, people revert back. And that's one of the things he had to do in that movie. Right. He's like, I've got to keep the pressure on because of the. If I'm going to achieve this change. Otherwise, everyone wanted to rubber band back the way it was. Right. And so I think there's a lot of great opportunities to find great leadership roles in fiction as much as in reality.

Craig Anderson [00:07:27]:

And in some ways, it's almost more intimate because you feel a little closer to them and you see the struggle that they go through, which I think a lot of leaders don't always show how much that burden can carry for you.

Jack MacKenzie [00:07:38]:

Yeah, I agree. Yeah. I mean, truth Be told now that we're two questions into the lightning round. I don't read books on leadership. I watch and observe people in leadership roles and learn that way, but I have not, I don't have the stack of the 11 best habits of success. I, I just don't do it.

Craig Anderson [00:07:59]:

Yeah, yeah. And there's lots of different ways we can pick up from it. Right. You can read all the books in the world. But you know, in my coaching practice, you know, a lot of times I say, do you want to read another book on leadership or do you want to walk through it? And that's what we can do, is we can walk through and start to improve. Right. There's, there's all different ways you can become a better leader, but a lot of times it's just having the self awareness that I could be better and continue to push.

Jack MacKenzie [00:08:22]:

Yes, absolutely. And there are, there are things that appear in front of you. They might be new, they might do just different. It might be a personnel issue, it might be a business opportunity and you can go back to someone in your life from 30 years ago and go, that's what I learned from that person. And you might not have needed that little lesson that you observed and took in and stored away, but you can call on it from a real life experience, from your own experience of observing it, maybe even participating in it as the non leader, but being someone who was being led at the time. And I have found that to be really helpful and in some cases soothing that I have a number of people in my past who I can call on their style, both good and bad, by the way that their style and the way that they did things. And I think about one of them almost every day.

Craig Anderson [00:09:24]:

Yeah. Oh, yeah. There's so many things when I write and when I talk about leadership that I think back to all the. And unfortunately, the bad leaderships always pop to your memory faster. So. All right, so last question, Jack, in the lightning round, how do you define leadership in as close to 10 words or less as you can get?

Jack MacKenzie [00:09:44]:

10 words or less. Okay, I actually have 10 words. Believing so strongly that others can't help but to believe equally.

Craig Anderson [00:09:53]:

Wow. Say that one more time for me. Believing so strongly that others can't help.

Jack MacKenzie [00:09:59]:

But to believe equally.

Craig Anderson [00:10:01]:

I love that because that's really so much of what we have to do as leaders is we cast this vision and then we've got to make it compelling and talk about it so that they want to come with us for the ride 100%. So what brings that kind of so strongly for you when you think about leadership?

Jack MacKenzie [00:10:19]:

Well, I think about different roles that I've been blessed to fill over the years that would be considered leadership roles. And it's a really quite diverse set of companies and different people, different kinds of people, different kinds of professions in each of them. But what is central to it is that we are managing people, right? And there's few things more powerful in either a person or in a group of people is when they believe in something. So the challenge is whether it's through just kind of emotional power of, like I said, positivity and some vision, not just words of a vision, but a real vision of what something could be in three months or six months or five years from now, or it's more tactical. Like, I understand what you do, I understand you as a person, what's important to you and in your job. And so to believe we have to reduce whatever barriers there are structurally to allow your belief to take over and not the naggy problems that might exist in your job. And everyone has needy problems, right? I mean, just name the many things that just get in the way of focusing on what you believe in. And so understanding all that and understanding how to help someone focus on the right thing is really rewarding when it, when, when it works.

Jack MacKenzie [00:11:55]:

It doesn't always work.

Craig Anderson [00:11:57]:

No. And it informs so many things, right? Is how you hire and how you lead and how you set priorities, right? You want to hire people who are going to come along who want to be part of that that you're trying to work towards, not somebody who just wants a job. And that's not always easy to find, you know, the people who are actually. Because not every, not every job is super inspiring, sexy, exciting, right? We make, you know, screwdrivers. But what's the reason? What's the mission? Why do we want people to focus on quality? Why? You know, we, when we compat, when we cast that compelling vision of whatever it is, probably whatever problem we're trying to solve in the world that helps people come along for the ride. And, you know, I don't want people to like, throw off their covers and, you know, Disney cartoon birds dance around and sing and there's a rock opera and they launch into the office because that's not realistic. But I at least hope that they're not laying there in misery thinking, oh, I don't even know why I go to this job every day. I'm out.

Craig Anderson [00:12:55]:

I want to. I want to quit, right? So we have to strike that balance as leaders. So I Love it. All right, well, let's go back. You talked about how this leadership definition for you evolved over time through leadership roles. And we always like to go back to kind of what you define as your first real leadership role. What was that role for you, Jack?

Jack MacKenzie [00:13:16]:

And I thought about this. I thought, do I go back to when I was nine and I started selling Night crawlers over the summer in Montana? And I thought, no, that probably wasn't really leadership. That was just more entrepreneurial than anything else. My memory of my own leadership, let's put it that way, and therefore, in somewhat formal job title, whatever was. I was an ambitious college student and ran for and was elected the student body president at the University of Missouri in Columbia. It's a big school. I mean, back in those days, and that was more years ago than I. Than.

Jack MacKenzie [00:13:57]:

I hope you won't make me say when that was. You know, there were 30,000 students, graduate students, professional students, undergrads in different kinds of areas, people who lived on in dorms, and students who lived off campus. So winning the election was like winning the election as like a small town mayor kind of thing. But, you know, for me, that was a big, A big deal. I had a budget, a couple million dollars to, you know, spend on student services, responsibility for a lot of policy, things that were kind of in play. This is the early 80s. I'm gonna say it because it might add some context to some of the things that were going on in higher education at the time. And volunteer students, dozens, if not maybe up to hundreds of them, who wanted to believe, right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:14:47]:

They were those. The student government types and wanted to believe in something and wanted to believe that all their volunteer work was going to mean something to themselves and all that stuff. So, yeah, I think I go back and I. And I do think about things that happened during that time, both good and bad, that I still call on today.

Craig Anderson [00:15:06]:

So I'm interested because that's a really. That's a really unique case, right, where you had to be elected to it. So you had to cast the vision before you even got the gig, right?

Jack MacKenzie [00:15:14]:

Yes.

Craig Anderson [00:15:15]:

So once you got the gig big and now, you know, all the student government kind of employees, the staff that you had, the volunteer staff, and then obviously the 30,000 students who you led as the student body president, what kind of struck you immediately to say, wow, I won. What was the first thing of leadership that kind of struck your mind when you started that role?

Jack MacKenzie [00:15:39]:

One that I still think about today was building a team. So the first thing was, is the president Has a cabinet. Right. So there were six to eight. I don't remember the exact number of jobs that I had to interview people for and select as part of the cabinet. One of them was, you know, the person who puts on concerts, and the other one was the person who liaisons to, you know, the food service operation and, you know, all that kind of stuff. And that was the first time I had been put in position, really, to select who I wanted to take this journey with. And then, you know, we had a campaign slogan, and so there are things that we talked about in the campaign that we were going to do, and most of it was centered around being good stewards of the students money.

Jack MacKenzie [00:16:27]:

How is your money going to be spent? And can we help you interface with the university system to make sure that they're charging you a reasonable fee and that you have access to all of the support systems that they offer? And so then setting up structures to, you know, just to begin to go down that list of priorities.

Craig Anderson [00:16:50]:

Let's talk about that. Building a leadership team, because there's a lot there, especially the first time you're doing it and you had the benefit of you didn't inherit a team, you built a team. What were some of your takeaways when you started building that team, good and bad? What did you learn from that experience?

Jack MacKenzie [00:17:07]:

Well, the most important lesson was that all the people who worked in my campaign couldn't have all those jobs.

Craig Anderson [00:17:19]:

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Jack MacKenzie [00:17:21]:

Right. And so the responsibility of having someone apply for a job who you were close to, who I was close to personally, and frankly, owed a debt to whatever that debt might be. It could just be emotional, but I couldn't pay off all the debts with titles.

Craig Anderson [00:17:40]:

Sure.

Jack MacKenzie [00:17:41]:

And in fact, it was a, as we're now used to, a contentious election that went to a runoff. And I made a pledge that there were people from the opponent's team that I would bring in. And so that ruffled feathers on our team. Right. Like why? Why would you go Take Larry from that group and Mary from that group, and instead of pick me, you know, I look back and some of it is kind of silly. I mean, honestly. But in the moment, it was really important. Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:18:14]:

It was, I thought, the most important thing in the world at the time. So I took it seriously. And that. And that was. I learned a lot about how to let people down, how to find other ways for people who wanted one thing, but find other avenues for them to feel like they were being appreciated and rewarded, but still keep the larger mission in view of any Sort of government, any sort of leadership isn't good if you don't have the support. Right. Of the people. So the goal was, at least in my mind, was to put together a team.

Jack MacKenzie [00:18:51]:

That that meant when I went to this, the senate meetings every two weeks, there weren't hecklers out there.

Craig Anderson [00:18:57]:

And when we think about the idea of, like, pulling together as the leader, that vision, and getting everybody to kind of come along, as you head in your definition, how did you do that with kind of the other faction, people that suddenly became part of the cabinet? Are there any stories from that that you remember of just like, how did I get everybody rolling in this? Because, like, yeah, it's one thing to invite that person on, but now you got to get them rowing in the same direction.

Jack MacKenzie [00:19:19]:

Yeah. So interesting, because I'm not sure I knew the answer to that until you asked it. Student government. Student government. Right. We were the serious candidates. Right. And our opponents were the, like a joke group.

Jack MacKenzie [00:19:33]:

They were good, smart people, but they thought student government was silly. And they were kind of running against the institution of a student government. But they were really smart people. In fact, the guy who was the head of the ticket and I later became college roommates, like, we later had an apartment together because he was just a great, really smart guy, but probably had a healthier view of student government. And I internalized how important it was. And he was like, come on, man, you're doing this for a year and then you're going to move on. You'll never remember you did this. So what I did is I wanted not necessarily to go.

Jack MacKenzie [00:20:13]:

It wasn't a policy thing, but it was an energy thing, which is I promised them that they could come in and do stuff and we wouldn't take ourselves too seriously. And that's all they really wanted to hear.

Craig Anderson [00:20:27]:

Perfect. Yeah. You found the button to push and.

Jack MacKenzie [00:20:30]:

Turns out we actually did something that showed we didn't take ourselves too seriously while trying to accomplish something that seemingly was really important, that they were very much a part of it. Like, it was an activity that they pretty much led and I let them lead it. Yeah.

Craig Anderson [00:20:46]:

Yeah. Great. So now let's accelerate X number of years to today. Without getting into full disclosure, you're the president of College App, a company you helped found, Right?

Jack MacKenzie [00:20:58]:

Correct.

Craig Anderson [00:20:59]:

You've been there for five years. What's your leadership style like today? How do you approach this every day?

Jack MacKenzie [00:21:06]:

Well, I'll go back to those 10 words. And I view my job is to feel so passionately about what we do, and turns out it's not hard to do because I do feel the pin.

Craig Anderson [00:21:19]:

Yeah.

Jack MacKenzie [00:21:21]:

That the other folks. We now have 15 employees. They can't help but share that equally. And I feel like right now it took five years, but I think right now I. When I look at ours, we do staff meetings. We're a virtual company. We do staff meetings on Zoom, and you'd get the parade of, you know, little squares of pictures, the Hollywood Squares thing. And right now, I look at that screen and say, we're in really good shape.

Craig Anderson [00:21:50]:

Yeah. What were the principles you kind of followed to build that team?

Jack MacKenzie [00:21:55]:

You had mentioned earlier that hiring is the most difficult thing. Right.

Craig Anderson [00:22:00]:

Yeah.

Jack MacKenzie [00:22:00]:

And for all of you who listen to this, I believe this. I have been very successful at hiring because I have a 50% success rate.

Craig Anderson [00:22:12]:

Nice.

Jack MacKenzie [00:22:13]:

So a year ago, I looked at that screen, and I didn't think that we were all there. Right. And if you can get it right half the time in hiring, then I think you're on a roll. You should play it for as long as you can.

Craig Anderson [00:22:30]:

Yeah. And it's tough because, you know, you interview people and you think you got the right one, and for a while, it is the right one. But then you realize, you know, we're not as in alignment as we thought. They kind of have this vision of what they want to do. This isn't set, whatever it is. So how do you start to make that assessment over these hires as a leader, to say, okay, here's where we're at. How do. How do you start building those assessments in.

Jack MacKenzie [00:22:58]:

Yeah. And I think part of this does change from type of organization. Type organization. But what I've learned, because now I'm in position actually to help other people run a job opening and interview people and hire them. Right. So now my job is to train them or share my experiences with them so that they can be successful. And over the course of several jobs in which I've been in position to hire a team is the mistake that is made when you're one of the half that don't make it. Right.

Craig Anderson [00:23:36]:

Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:23:37]:

Is you make excuses in the interview process. You cover up things. You go, yeah, But. And I think red flags are red flags. I think a yellow flag is a red flag. Right. That it's worth the extra time that there are no. Yeah.

Jack MacKenzie [00:23:59]:

I hope that works out. Part of them, especially in a small organization. You know, it might be different if you have 10,000 employees when you have 15. I talk to each of them every single day at some point. Right. And it's not Two weeks in, and you're like, oh, that's that red flag that I. That's that thing I thought maybe wasn't as bad as it might have appeared to be during the interview process. And now I can see it.

Craig Anderson [00:24:26]:

I still have a friend, but we used to debate this all the time, that I really think gut is a real thing. And he would scoff, we have to do data. Data, data, whatever. Data matters, too. But the gut, to me, is your subconscious telling you something your conscious mind isn't seeing yet. And I think we see that in the interview. And it's like you said, the yellow flag. It's kind of like the idea, hell, it's either hell yes or hell no.

Craig Anderson [00:24:48]:

And so that yellow flag may as well be a red flag, but sometimes you can't pinpoint it, and so you don't want to pull the trigger on it. So you're like, no, this is just. But it's like if your gut's there telling you as a leader, you really need to pay attention to that gut because it's telling you something that you're just not seeing right now.

Jack MacKenzie [00:25:03]:

Yeah, I agree 100%. And part of the discussion internally with people who are relatively new to hiring is a lot of people, I think, make the mistake of taking the side of the applicant. And this is going to sound terrible. Right. But they tend to want to represent what the applicant says or whatever and not consult their own sensibilities about that. And it's more traumatic for a person to take a job and have it not work than it is for the company to hire someone. And so I think it's our job to make sure that we're protecting the potential employee by not necessarily believing that they say. Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:25:58]:

And using your instincts about what you know about your company, what you know about the job, what you know about the responsibilities and going, you know, it's just not a good fit. Because not being a good fit is a terrible thing for someone who you offer a job to.

Craig Anderson [00:26:12]:

Right? Yeah. And I think a lot of times I've seen, you know, when you sit down and have that conversation, they know it. And either for some reason they didn't want to pull the trigger yet, or they were already working on it and I didn't know it.

Jack MacKenzie [00:26:23]:

I can tell you, in a long history of having to both hire and also let people go, it's never a surprise. I mean, no one's like, oh, my God, I love it here.

Craig Anderson [00:26:36]:

Right?

Jack MacKenzie [00:26:37]:

How could you do this to me? Now, relationships, employer employee relationships are usually Pretty even. And if you're uneasy about it, you can pretty much bet that the employee is ending about it 100%.

Craig Anderson [00:26:49]:

100%. So one last question on this and then we'll go to the close. But you said kind of now you look at that screen and you've got the team. What's different about daily performance? Execution, achieving that kind of everybody going together. Do you see when you get the whole team assembled in the right way, what's the difference?

Jack MacKenzie [00:27:12]:

It is magic when it's all working and when I know everyone on that screen not only believes in what we're doing, but they believe in each other to help each other and our performance. Since that group's been together, it's probably now like as it sits right now, probably about three or four months, which is actually a long time in the life of a five year company. We're rocking right now.

Craig Anderson [00:27:46]:

Yeah.

Jack MacKenzie [00:27:46]:

And it's because there is very little if any friction in the inner workings. It's just all working right now. I'll claim some credit but also claim this is a lucky moment in any manager's life and I'm going to, I'm going to exploit it for as long as I can.

Craig Anderson [00:28:06]:

Absolutely. And enjoy it because it never lasts. It never lasts. Well. So, Jack, final question. If you could go back in time, pick your time machine, go back in time to that first leadership role, what's the one piece of advice you would give that younger version of you that would be most helpful yet?

Jack MacKenzie [00:28:27]:

Don't take yourself so seriously.

Craig Anderson [00:28:29]:

Oh, beautiful. The greatest compliment I ever received from an employee was, I like that you take the business seriously but you don't take yourself seriously. We are not gods. We have a title and that's cool. And it's a lot harder than it looks from the outside. But you just can't take it that you can't take yourself so seriously that you're somehow immune from criticism or questioning. Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:28:55]:

Or just being human. We've achieved a level that we can get on the phone with someone and either person, me or someone else who know, boy, I'm having a crappy morning.

Craig Anderson [00:29:05]:

Yeah.

Jack MacKenzie [00:29:06]:

Right. And it could be that a windstorm and you know, a tree branch fell down in my yard. It could be I just got off a terrible call with a prospect that it didn't go well. But be human. Right? That's what we're all. That's the magic of this Right. And that's where the belief comes in. Right.

Jack MacKenzie [00:29:23]:

You believe when you're. But robots don't believe, they just do. And if you can, as a leader, share some level of vulnerability, humor, self deprecation, but never suggesting that the vision is ever in question, then you forge a bond that then strengthens the belief.

Craig Anderson [00:29:44]:

Love it. Beautiful. Well, Jack, thank you so much for sharing the story of your Executive Evolution today. I loved your insights. If people want to know more about you, follow you. What's the best ways for them to find you online?

Jack MacKenzie [00:29:57]:

Well, I have been accused of being a little overactive on LinkedIn, but it is a small company. We didn't have a PR budget or anything like that. So we kind of established our. When we think we established our personality on LinkedIn. So whether it's me, Jack MacKenzie, Mac of the Klan, MacKenzie from Outlander, and by the way, I will say, just because you're very kind, my legal name, like, I was born Jamie MacKenzie. So literally that character has my name.

Craig Anderson [00:30:34]:

It's a past you.

Jack MacKenzie [00:30:36]:

Yeah. Which probably made it a little bit more powerful. Like, oh, maybe that stuff's in me too. And Our website is YourCollegeApp.com we're proud of what we do. We're really excited about the role we play and can play in society. And whether you're in education or not, I'd love to connect with any of your followers and listeners and there's anything I can do to help. I'd be honored to be asked to.

Craig Anderson [00:31:00]:

Excellent. A lot of people have questions about your part of the world in that space, so I'm sure they love to follow you. We'll drop links to all those in the show notes so people can find you. Jack, thank you so much and we look forward to speaking to you again.

Jack MacKenzie [00:31:14]:

Thanks, Craig. Happy holidays and happy New Year.

Craig Anderson [00:31:17]:

Take care. I really appreciated the time I spent with Jack. He was introduced to me by a mutual friend and really had a great story to tell about his Executive Evolution and how he's grown in his leadership career. As always, I like to break down the lessons that I see from the interview and the key areas of confidence, confidence and calm. In the area of confidence, I liked how we talked about not being afraid to admit when you're wrong. That takes a lot of confidence and it takes a lot of self awareness and not every leader is good at that. And it takes a lot of confidence to stand up in front of your team and admit that you were wrong in the area of competence. He talks so much about building the right team.

Craig Anderson [00:32:01]:

He said that, you know, he was about 50% right on his hires. And when he got all those hires right, the company moved forward so much more quickly and so much more confidently. And it's that competence of really dialing in and knowing that you're getting the right people. And if they're wrong hires, taking care of those hires quickly. And then finally, I really appreciate, just from a sense of calm, and this may be a stretch, but from calm, saying, you know what? I'm not a big reader on leadership books. That's not where I get my leadership information from. I think there's something there about knowing yourself and knowing how you learn, that you don't force yourself into ways that people may tell you is the best way, but you can calmly move in to say, no, you know what? This is how I best learn. So, Jack, thank you for being on the podcast this week.

Craig Anderson [00:32:45]:

Thank you for all the great lessons that you shared. As always, you can go from being an accidental leader to the greatest leader of all time. All it takes is developing your confidence, confidence and calm. See you next time on Executive Evolution.