IDL60 Season 2: Brilliant Ideas: Three Questions to Ask Yourself, with John Houston

How does healthy leadership create sustainable organizations? How should you handle good ideas to achieve them while encouraging teamwork throughout the company? Why must leaders strive to ask hard questions and be willing to receive the truth?

Today we’re talking about how to build healthier leaders with John Houston, owner, and founder of John Houston Homes. His company has built over 700 homes, and they run multiple other affiliated organizations. In this episode, John and Tyler discuss how leaders can approach mentorship and hardship, as well as the three key elements of ideation.

Meet John Houston

After facing many hardships when he was young, John Houston has become a respected and successful business owner who views his companies as a platform to reach people for Christ.

He is the Founder and CEO of John Houston Custom Homes, a homebuilding company he began in 2004. Since then, he has started five additional companies which make up the JH Family of Companies; including a mortgage company, a land-development company, a title company, an insurance company, and an environmental erosion company.

During his journey of building these businesses, John has stayed true to his core belief of putting God first, family second and work third. This has created a company culture and brand that is excelling at the highest level.

Visit John Houston’s website and connect with him on Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, and LinkedIn.

IN THIS EPISODE WE DISCUSS:

• Be an incubator, not an incinerator (12:50)

• The power of a great mentor (18:59)

• Three questions you need to ask yourself (24:22)

• Do not be afraid to ask (36:25)

Be an incubator, not an incinerator

In your organization, it is your responsibility as the leader to lead your staff and employees in a sustainable and uplifting way.

If you have to drive them with force and threats, then you know that something needs to change.

Healthy leadership creates a space where employees can develop into their truest, most successful, and authentic selves while working in your company, and not become burned out.

Sustainable and successful work environments are created by healthy leadership.

The power of a great mentor

Learning from and working closely with a mentor can elevate your leadership skills and life skills to a much higher level.

Surround yourself with a mentor, a small team, or a fellow leader with whom you can learn and journey with because you will both grow that much faster.

Three questions you need to ask yourself

When you have a new project you would like to work on or a new idea to test out, ask yourself these questions:

1 – Is this idea for me to do?

2 – Is this an idea for me to partner with somebody to do?

3 – Is this idea for me to hand off to somebody else to do?

When you use these questions, you realize that you do not have to own everything and you do not have to do everything.

An idea can become a question that you ask someone that it may relate to more.

Do not be afraid to ask

Leaders can often struggle with asking for honest feedback from those that follow them. Implement open, honest, and real conversations with your staff about how you can better lead and serve them.

If you want to make a genuine impact in your company, be sure to sit with the people who work with you and ask them to tell you how you can help them better.

Resources, books, and links mentioned in this episode:

BOOK | John Houston – Finding My Way Home: A Journey to Discover Hope and a Life of Purpose

BOOK | Donald Miller – Hero on a Mission: A Path to a Meaningful Life

Visit John Houston’s website and connect with him on Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, and LinkedIn

Join the Impact Driven Leader Community
Connect with Tyler on Instagram and LinkedIn

Email Tyler: tyler@tylerdickerhoof.com

About the Impact Driven Leader Podcast

The Impact Driven Leader Podcast, hosted by Tyler Dickerhoof, is for Xillennial leaders who have felt alone and ill-equipped to lead in today's world. Through inspiring interviews with authors from around the world, Tyler uncovers how unique leadership strengths can empower others to achieve so much more, with real impact.

Rate, review and subscribe here on Apple Podcasts or subscribe on Stitcher and Spotify.

I like interacting with people that don’t think and act just like I do because even though I am trying to add value to their lives, they always add value to mine.

John Houston

Podcast Transcription

[TYLER DICKERHOOF] All right, welcome back to the Impact Driven Leader podcast. This is your host, Tyler Dickerhoof. So glad you're here. If it's your first time, that's okay. Welcome back. Glad to have you here. Would love for you to subscribe, would love for you to, at the same point after you get done, listen to this episode, give me a rating, a review, let me know how I did. My desire, my purpose here is to help other leaders get healthy too. It's a process that I had to go through. I'll talk out about that today with my guest, John Houston owner, founder of John Houston Home located in greater Dallas. They are a company that builds over 700 homes. They also have multiple other organizations all tied into real estate. He and I got to know each other several years ago, playing golf, Pebble Beach with the John Maxwell leadership foundation, Equip. It's a relationship that he has poured so much into me over the years. I'm thankful, glad to be able to have this conversation with him. In this episode we're going to talk a lot about leadership. We're going to talk about mentorship. We're going to talk about hardships. We're going to share three elements. He shares this. I'm going to share it with you now, as I look down at my notes and it's whenever you're thinking of an idea, if you have an idea to share, you have an idea that you're bringing forward, think about it in this way. Is this idea for me? Is it for me to partner with someone or is it this idea to hand off? As I leave that with you before going to the interview, to me, that's the epitome of leadership. You'll hear me talk about that in this episode, but I'm walking away with that from this episode, this conversation with those three items, those three items that to me, I want to share with everyone that is around me, because I believe if we focus on that, man, how much better can our leadership get? How much healthier can we be? So again, listen in, take notes, enjoy this conversation with John Houston. [TYLER] John, so thankful to be here, chat with you, man. Like you said, as we were chatting beforehand, we only see each other at Maxwell events. So it's good to hang out here and chat. I was so fortunate to get to know you a couple years ago. We were an event, we got to spend a day golfing together at Pebble Beach, but then have just continued to see each other and thankful for the example that you've been in my life. I know so many others. So thankful to have the conversation with you to talk about leadership. I mean, that's how we know each other. That's what this podcast is about. So I just want to kick off and again, say thank you for the time to join me and look forward to the time we have today to chat. [JOHN HOUSTON] Yes, man. Tyler, same to you, man. Thank you for having me. Man, what a blessing it's been to, you say we played golf together. I say you played golf and I went. I'm not the greatest golfer, but yes, thank you for having me. [TYLER] Well, here's the thing John, is I've been to enough of those events. You've been to those events. They usually put people that shoot the same level, I have about the same handicapped together. So I can't say that I'm any better golfer than you. That would be unfair to anyone. [JOHN] That is true. You do bring up a good point. Yes, tell John and his team, sometimes they need a double handicap. Like if it's 20 over, I try to get there, but I just don't have time. But I do enjoy it. [TYLER] One of the guys that joined us that day, one of your friends from Texas he's gone on to now, like spent a lot of time golfing. Chris Parvin, he's gone next level. He's like, I'm not going to be with those John and Tyler's anymore. It's like, okay, Chris, you got to go do that. That's fine. [JOHN] That's right. That's right. We'll keep playing together. We'll keep having our leadership talks and see what's up. [TYLER] Totally. Well, I'm excited to talk to you about leadership. I'm excited to just talk to you about your life and your experiences and all the wisdom that you've gained. I want to kick off with this and I want you to just hear this quote. It's something that I wrote in my early twenties and I happened to think about it just about 30 minutes ago and I wanted to kick off with this. I wrote the rewards of childhood are not seen by the child, but rather the adult that grows from the child. [JOHN] Wow, that's good. [TYLER] So as I thought about your story and where you are now, how does that quote hit you in just that thought? [JOHN] You know, I think when we're young, we don't actually even know, we don't really don't fully understand the overall perspective. I think that's the thing that is so different in my, I just turned 50 last year. I think that's the thing that sticks out to me the most is my perspective of the way that I grew up versus my perspective today. I saw a lot of those challenges and struggles as just that and now I see, I wouldn't be who God's called me to be today without that. So it's early on, I was blessed to actually have a mentor that actually owned a plumbing company. Man, just the way he lived his life and walked it out, he was beginning to take me down this path of understanding a different perspective, but looking back even today, I mean, you know this with what's going on in the world today, we've got real challenges going on right now that we have to lead through. So we actually just had this conversation with some of our leaders yesterday. There's so much of it is instead of looking at the problem, look at the solution that can actually come out of it and the win that we can turn it into. That's the way I take that in the back end of my, at 50 today, I look back at when I was 11, 12, 13 into my twenties and thirties and even forties and praise God I had somebody that actually taught me that don't focus on the problem. Focus on the solution and what good can come out of it. What can we learn from it? [TYLER] So is the listeners that have opened with an opening and kind of little bit your bio, John Houston Homes, you guys have now several companies that are impacting a ton of people in the greater Dallas area. All of that though came through a lot of hardships. You mentioned being 11. Part of why I say that quote is the impact of what happened as a child in your life, and now why you're doing the things that you're doing. So for a guy who at 11 lived with his older brother who was 15 and that was then you're entering adulthood, as I read your book and know you man, to know those things about John and it's not to set you apart, but man, how much does that set you into a place of appreciating the people that work in your business and what they're going through? [JOHN] Yes, I think it gives me a whole different perspective because, and here's what I want to say. All your viewers and listeners, we all have challenges. We all have trials and tribulations. So when I just share my heart with humility that this is just my story, but I know every viewer and every person has a story and that's why I believe God wants me to just share the hope that's within me sometimes because when I was 11 and my brother was 15, that's when our parents left us and moved to two different cities and left us there. That's when we actually had to start our first business and started a landscaping company and it's through those, and that's how we provided for ourselves. So what's interesting to me about it is through that journey, that chaotic life that we were living, my brother would, we would get up, we'd mow yards till school started. He would drop me off at school. We would go to school during the day, he would pick me back up after school and we'd mow till dark. That became our normal way of life. So this chaotic life that I was living, I didn't actually know I was living. I didn't actually know that until I started dating my, who's now my wife of almost 30 years and I saw her family and I'm like, oh, wait, this is actually what family's supposed to look like. It actually took me a few years of processing that to even be able to go, wait, what I've been living's not normal? This is normal? I think about that even with your viewers and your listeners now, I think that's the power of I'm 50 years old, CEO of seven different companies, but man who do I learn from, I learn from our other leaders. I learn from people like you, people like Maxwell, people like our AP Girl. Not in a disrespectful way, but one of the lowest paid jobs in our organization, I can still learn from them. That's what I love about leadership. It's simply influence. So these people at every level are influencing me. But if I wouldn't have had to mow yards, then later we started a janitorial company to make extra money and I wouldn't have had to clean toilets I don't think I would have the same value. I tell our staff all the time, whether you are the person that cleans the toilets here, or whether you're the CEO, guess what both of them are just as important. The reason why they're just as important is because I could be the best CEO with a dirty building and dirty restrooms and places people can't work and it means nothing. If I lead terribly, then it affects the person that's doing the janitorial work. So it's just always a humbling reminder for me to go none of us are any better than the next person. It's just, this happens to be the gift and the influence God has given me today. I've got to continue to steward that well and realize that the people are the thing I have to steward the most. That's huge for me. [TYLER] Is that a responsibility born over time or born out of the experience of, oh man, I got to figure out how to really my brother and I blink arms together and get through this life? [JOHN] I think it's, it was a mind shift for me. So when we started that by the time I was 19, I had either been living with my brother or by myself for about eight years. 1990, I was making roughly $90,000 a year, which is equivalent to about 200,000 today. It just wasn't doing anything for me. So I was making a lot of money, but what good was it? I don't know where your listeners are. For me, I'm a Christ follower, but I'm not trying to preach to anybody. That's just part of my life. What happened to me was I went down this journey of losing everything I had, ended up having to file bankruptcy thinking that was one of the worst times of my life other than when my mom committed suicide going where is all this going? How do I get myself out of this? So I took on all this role and this pressure in these terrible times and I was trying to figure out how do I pull my boots up? How do I strap them Up? How do I do these things to get through this? Nothing was working. Literally what was happening was I was having to learn to die to myself, that my ways aren't the best and I need the Lord. I need wisdom. I need other people that I can run this race with. So it's completely changed my perspective. So for me, it shifted when, there's a passage in scripture, it's Psalms 24:1 that says the earth and everything in it, including its people are gods. That was the big shift for me when I realized, wait, I'm not, even if I, as a Christ follower, I'm not even my own. As a leader, these people aren't here to serve me. I'm here to serve them. You know what's crazy about that as a leader and I know you know this Tyler, but I get excited about it is. When I try to pour into every level of leadership that I have influence over and you see them rise up and now they're taking my job, I love that. I get more motivated about that than I do the amount of money we make because they light up. It's just exciting. [TYLER] That excites me too and I know, to me, it's the difference between being an incubator and an incinerator. If people come through your organizations and you burn them out and they go somewhere else and leave, because they're burned out, that's an incinerator. I know from your heart and I'd love to hear these stories about being an incubator and why that hits me as you were sharing that is right before this, so now we're 17 minutes into the time we start recording and 19 minutes ago I got off the phone with a former employee of ours. She's gone on to launch her own business and doing her own thing. It's been several years and she's done really well and excited making a huge impact. She goes, "Tyler, I'm calling you because I'm asking for help but at the same point, I also want to say that I yielded from what the experience I had with you guys to do this." I explained to her, "I'm proud of you because to see you go and do something else is so amazing." So I'd love to hear from your perspective, those people that have taken your job or gone on to do other things kind of that proud parent that I know that you have, how has that really put legs to your legacy? [JOHN] It's interesting that you're even asking this question right now because literally one of the number one questions I'm getting asked from other leaders right now is how do you recruit because it's so hard for us to find employees right now? I say this kind of humbly, but very rarely do we have to recruit. I really believe it's because not because I'm the greatest person, but I believe it's because our organization has purpose. It's bigger than just coming to work. We want to add value to people's lives. Our brand vision and mission is to help people find their way home by being joyful, hope-filled, loving God. Well, that's huge to us because every business we have is real estate. So all of our employees can relate to that and it gives them a purpose. But what I love, I'm going to share one quick story with you, there's a guy named Justin Bright that actually interned with us because we do internships. He interned with us when he was at A&M. So he did for three summers and then we were like, dude, we want you to come to work for us full time. So he came to work for us and worked for us 10 plus years, was knocking it out the park. In all honesty, I literally saw him as I think that guy could be the next CEO. I really believed it. Now I knew it was going to take him 20 plus years to get there but we were pouring into him and pouring into others as if we want them to be next level C-level leaders and if not in one of our companies in another one. I love that because he came he texted me one day and he said, hey, and this was, at this point, he was still about two levels down, two levels below me. But I have such a relationship with a lot of our employees that he text me and said, "Hey, can I meet with you for 15 minutes?" Well, you know what that means. It either means they're leaving or something major's going on. So I was discerning, he's probably going to tell me he's leaving. So I meet with him and he says, "Hey, you remember that story that you tell all the time about how, when you were leaving the investment company that you'd been at seven and a half years, you had two babies and you felt like God said, dude, it's time to get out of the boat and experience the miraculous step out in faith? He's like, God asked me to do the same thing. I've been wrestling with it because I love being here. I love your leadership, but that's what I got to do." I was like, "Dude, first of all, my flesh does not want you to leave, but I'm telling you're making the right choice." Then the next thing I said though, was, I said, "Justin, this is how much I believe in you. I want to invest in this business." You know what he said to me? He said, "John, I appreciate that but the Lord told me I need to trust Him and not trust anybody else," in other words, not take money from me. I mean, that's been probably three years ago and the dude's killing it. I mean, he's just doing so good. It's like just seeing one of your little kids grow up and now he's got three kids of his own. He's been married for, going on 15 years and it's just so powerful. So that's what motivates me. I love to see our leaders grow and raise up here, but I also know I don't own them. So I still have to help them raise their lids and be prepared to go to whatever place it is God wants them to go to, [TYLER] To me, that's a leadership aspect that takes a lot of maturity. It takes a lot of humility and as if you shared, grown over time. There's one of the things that stuck out that you shared in your book that I never picked up being around you, but because I think you grew past it, but it's something that I had to work through, is how much our hardships make the relationships around us challenging, meaning for me, it is kind of that intensity. I know there's this amount, I've played golf with you enough to know there's an intensity that I want to do well, but I like I can do what I can do. But when that intensity from that hardships of, I don't know how to get through other than push through creates those barriers and relationships, as you mentioned that about being an incubator well, that comes after some probably tough times and maybe it wasn't like that. [JOHN] Yes. I think for me, it came from me really trying to silo myself and and so in all honesty, I'd been hurt by a lot of different people, some of them financially, some of them mentally, some of them spiritually and relationally. So I basically had to come to this place of, I can either be mad at those people and hold a grudge or I can learn from those people. So I had a mentor when I was probably my upper twenties and he said, here's what I want you to do. Incredible leader. He was also my boss at the time, but he said, "I want you to start making a list of all the great leadership qualities you want to have and in the same notebook, I want you to keep a list of all the terrible leadership qualities you don't want to have." Man, I probably kept that journal for 10 years, 12 years consistently looking back on that to go, okay, that's what I don't want to do. So when I would catch myself in a tendency of heading down a path, I would go look at that and say, okay, this is what I don't want to do. What's the opposite of that? That's how I'm going to respond. So it takes a lot of taking those thoughts captive, not responding to them, processing it and then actually responding. [TYLER] I think as I relate to that and again this conversation about leadership and this world we live in now that the best way to grow an organization is to grow everyone in that organization. If they grow out of it, then that's great, because everyone's still growing. I think about that from this time we're in and everyone wants to hold on tight. They want to hold on tight because they're afraid and not willing to let go knowing that until they let go, it's not going to grow. You're an example of that. Your career is an example of that, of going through both sides of that and having the quality of mentors and leaders around you, people to speak into you, but also speak into you with, I guess partnership. One of the guys that I usually spend a lot of time with is Scott Wilson, who has made an impact on my life as well. I know that as he's approached me as as a mentor, but also it's like a partnership. How important are those relationships, the partnerships, the people sitting at your table as it is those mentors that are 10, 15 years down the road? [JOHN] I mean, for me, it's huge. Scott has been, so Scott and I met 25 plus years, actually 30 years ago. Now, we've been best friends for years and he's my neighbor for almost 20 years. So every time we move, we move together and its' --- [TYLER] It's kind of like a bad thing going, he just follows you. [JOHN] It is man. No, we say, okay, here's where we're moving. You guys come with us. It's awesome. Yes, but the power of it comes from when he's learning I get to learn too, when I'm learning, he gets to learn too because we're processing it together. So neither one of us are condemning each other. Neither one of us are judging each other, but we're going okay, if I can process this with you, as I'm learning it, then you're going to actually learn it too. You don't have to go through it. I've seen that happen over and over again. So I love that about Scott, but man, I'm incredibly blessed too. That's how my executive team is. Our executive team, which is overall the family of companies with the seven companies, we're just all real and transparent. We will literally, at the beginning of almost every year, one of the things that we do is we talk about what our weaknesses are because I need, they need to know what I'm struggling with right now. I need to know what they're struggling with so we can help each other through that but then we also talk about what areas are you excelling in and what areas do you feel like you need to grow in? Then we'll literally change things up sometimes so that each one of us can grow in our areas of leadership and responsibility at times to get better. I just love that, because it's that whole iron sharpen iron thing and none of us take ownership of any area we have, but we say, what is best for where God's taken us and what is best for the organization and the people in the organization. So how can we add value to that? [TYLER] That is a model of learning that has been impressed upon me from probably the same source that for you is, it's layered learning. John Maxwell talks a lot about that. I love sitting at the table with him and with anyone else. I think with that mentality, we're going to sit here, I'm going to bring an idea, but I know everyone else has a different perspective and value and they're going to make it better. There's not this turf war struggle of, I have to own that idea. It comes out of it we're all going to have a better idea when we leave here. I think from a leadership perspective, if you've never been in that experience, it's hard to understand how genuine it really is. Then you're in it and you're like, I don't want to be in a different place. Like this is the only place to go about life and business when there's this freedom. I'm like, I'm going to take your idea and I'm going to put my spin on it and we're all going to make it better and not like we'll get afraid of a different perspective on an idea. [JOHN] Yes. I'm going to actually throw you one other one too there that I actually had got taught a couple years ago that's been a game changer for me. I don't know if you've ever heard of Rob Hoskins. Rob, actually I was processing some stuff with him because he's a great mentor of mine too. I was processing this idea with him and I was like, man, I really want to go do this. He was like, well, John, you got to ask yourself three questions. Is this idea for me to do? Is this idea for me to partner with somebody to do, or is this idea for me to hand off to somebody else to do? Well, I've brought that back into not just as a visionary as an entrepreneur, but all the way down into our leadership and our teams that I'm like, it doesn't matter if you're in AP or if you're in it or what you, if you were having these ideas, that's a question. So it may be, if you ask that question, it may be, you just want to go talk to marketing and say, "Hey, have you ever thought about this? Here's an idea. You guys might want to run with that." What that's done for me though too, is it's made me really realize I don't have to own everything and I don't have to control everything. Sometimes I'm simply just handing it off. What's really cool about that though, is I actually saw Rob model that and an idea that God had given me and I was like, this is so much bigger than me. I can't do this. Literally man, they took that idea and ran with it and they took it so much further than what I would've ever thought or imagined. I'm like, praise God, they did something with it because it's way better than what I could have done with it. That's exciting to me too. [TYLER] I think that, let me go back through those three points because that gave me a tremendous amount of value as I thought about it. If you go into that, is it for me? Is it for me to partner with someone? Or is it me to hand off? From an leadership perspective, but from a cultural point of view, when you can apply that to every position you are actively creating every single position as a leadership position. [JOHN] For sure, because that you value them. [TYLER] Yes, totally. [JOHN] Yes. So what --- [TYLER] Go ahead. [JOHN] I was just going to say the other thing that it really does is when you begin to share that with people and they begin to open up and you begin to speak that over at me, I think you're going to do better with this idea than I could've. All of a sudden man, their lid and their capacity immediately just rose because I said it could and that's just mind boggling to me. But then even with my story, I look back on the plumber who spoke that same stuff over me when I was in my low twenties. It wasn't until I was in my thirties and forties, that I even began to understand what he was saying. So he saw something in me that I didn't see in myself. We can use those questions sometimes to hand that idea off to somebody else and they get the win. [TYLER] There's a piece of your book that you talk about in this idea of identity, who you are, what you do. I think of those, that last point again and how imperative it is. If you can go into that, it's like maybe my identity is, I'm just the idea guy. I don't have to hold onto what I do in my job. Maybe my job gives me the perspective to have a lot of ideas, to be a catalyst for others. I think when you again, apply that is this for me, is this for me to partner, is this for me to hand off, if that's your lifelong identity, man, it's pretty free. [JOHN] Oh man, when you understand what your gift is it literally, I'll tell you right now, I'm not a CFO. Do I understand some finance principles? Yes. But I'm not a chief strategy officer. Do I understand some strategy? I don't understand IT, but I know people that do. Let them go run in their lanes and running it fast. That frees me up to actually be able to think more creatively, have more vision. I don't have to wear, I don't have to carry the weight and the pressure of figuring all these things out. So I was blessed that somebody actually taught me that early. Then, even when I was growing the business, in case some of your viewers are growing businesses, you don't always have to have the money to hire somebody full time to do that. I quickly learned what I needed to do is hire a CPA that could also help me learn some of those financial principles that I needed to learn, but it's not breaking the bank. I was spending $500 a month instead of thousands a month. I was learning as I go. It was helping her. So together, it really helps us all grow. [TYLER] Let's talk about the value of mentors. We've touched on it a little bit, the different mentors, the partners you have. How much do you see where you're at in life, the experiences you've gone through. I know you talked about the interns. I know some of the mentees that you've had in your organization, how much of that is just a heartfelt desire to be a shepherd to lost sheep, and guys and girls that maybe are going through some of the same struggles that you had through life that maybe don't have the clear path? How much of that is a just a joyous responsibility? [JOHN] Oh man, honestly, I get up in the mornings and sometimes I just tell my wife, I'm so, I mean, one, I've got an amazing wife that I don't even know why she loves me like she does. But I'm just blessed. I've got a wonderful son, a wonderful daughter. I look at that and I'm like how many people have poured into their lives that had a desire to pour into them and help mold them and shape them in who God wants them to be. Now it's up to all of us to choose what path we want to take but if I have a young adult that wants, that is asking for that and they're seeking it I say, "Hey, you guys pray about it or you pray about it. I'm going to pray about it. Then if so, we're going to move forward with it." So I have a young man that actually interns with me now. He'll spend a year, so we spend a year with him and he'll work for me for a year, but he goes everywhere with me, trips, family trips, everywhere. But it's because I want him to experience some of those things, some of those relationships that he never thought he could have. What's interesting is, I was even having a conversation with him last week and what he was saying was a lot of times, it's those little conversations that he actually gets the most out of. So the ones sometimes we think we're going to grasp all this. Well, the reality is what I think I'm starting to understand after doing this for a while, as a CEO, I want them to get this really high level stuff. And the reality is it's actually the stuff that I consider very basic and general in my life. That's just part of who I am. Those are the things they really grasp hold of. But what I also know is those things that we're teaching them now, there's going to come a day where he's going to be like, oh, I remember when John said this 20 years ago, now I get it. I get excited about those days because I think it changes the trajectory of their life. If I didn't have people do that for me, I literally know I wouldn't be where I'm at. That's huge for me and I love it because I would almost rather do that than have businesses, but I know the business is the tool and the vehicle God is using so I can do that. [TYLER] Yes. I mean, it's having got to know a few of the people that you've spent time with, and at the same point, you allowing me the opportunity to be a mentor in their lives. It's fun to me, from a perspective of being able to add value where you can speak into people from your experience. It doesn't mean it has to be somebody that's in your life right now. It could be through that proximity of others. To me, that is true leadership. It's being able to impart that and help others and serve others through the value you have and not look at it and say, "Hey, how can I get the most out of them?" [JOHN] Yes. Well, what's really cool about that is that I think the last time we were together was at Pebble Beach, if I remember right with Maxwell, is that right? [TYLER] Hawaii. [JOHN] Hawaii? Yes, in Hawaii. Well, that night we had dinner. You actually ate with one of those guys, one of the young guys that that's working with me this year. Well, what you probably don't even know is when we left, one of the things that stuck out to him was you said something in that conversation about his relationship with his dad, that you may not even remember, that massively impact him. There were probably three different people, you being, one of them and two others that just said little things to him that gave him a whole different perspective about life, about what it means to be a man, what it means to be a father and a husband. My guess is you probably didn't even realize that, but that's because of the consistency of the way you live your life every day, how you lead as a husband, how you lead as a father, how you lead as a leader. It just comes out of you and you didn't even realize that you impacted his life that much. So you're modeling it, is in other words, what I'm saying but I want to encourage all of our all your viewers to realize that's really where I think most people are impacted is when we less realize it, or least realize it is probably when they got impacted the most. [TYLER] Yes, well --- [JOHN] Thanks for sharing that by the way. [TYLER] Yes, no, again, I didn't realize that. But it's cool. At the same point, I didn't necessarily sit down and have dinner with them to do that. It was just to visit and learn about a guy and I think that is putting a bow on this portion of it. The joy of mentorship is just learning about somebody else. It's learning about someone else sharing a little bit about you. To me, that's, if you take that same quality, as you expressed earlier, how you try to go through your organization and lead, it's doing the same thing, man, that's when people are like, I want to be here or they say, I have an opportunity to go do something else and what I want to do, I want to take those pieces and that experience that I took from such great experience that I had and go share it with others, maybe outside of the arena or umbrella that you could. To me, that's that idea of incubation that if someone can take the ideas that we're working through here today and go apply it in a completely different industry and positively affect it, well, then that's for the good of all people. That's what excites me about doing this podcast and having a podcast and talking to people like you is how can I help other leaders get healthy too? Because I had to get healthy. I had to get healthy in my relationships and all the different ways and only through the process of getting healthy, was I able to make an impact? It is through that we all kind of put our layer in that together to where I can use the experiences you've had together and use the experiences with Christian that night to be able to say, oh yes what that does positively, in fact might impact myself and others. [JOHN] Yes. One of the things that I love about what you're saying, Tyler is that there were probably a lot of years, if you're like me, you didn't realize you weren't healthy. [TYLER] Oh yes. [JOHN] And I think that's where for me, seeking wise counsel and seeking people that you know care about you and people that have been around that are going to speak the truth to you, if you ask. The hard part is sometimes as leaders, which I'm not talking about title, I'm talking about influential leaders, sometimes that's the hardest part for us is to go ask. So I actually, that's something I've implemented over the last five or so years, is I'll just sit down with random staff at every level and ask them what can I do different? How can I lead different? Because there's five generations, I think in our company, multiple different races, I need to make sure I'm impacting everybody's life, not just the ones I'm the most like. So I like interacting with people that don't think and act just like I do, because even though I'm trying to add value to their lives, they always add value to mine. I was actually with Dan Kathy and what was interesting about it was I was so excited about going to meet him. So I was like, "Hey, do you care if my daughter comes?" I took my daughter with me and you know what's crazy that guy poured into her for the whole day and a half we were with him. I mean, he spoke so much great leadership and wisdom, but one of the most impactful things that he did was here, I'm the CEO, I've got these, a couple other high level leaders that I brought, and he was still loving on us and respecting us. But man, he was point blank asking her questions about, tell me about your life. Tell me about what's going on with you. Tell me about how I can help you. I was just blown away by that because I was like, I mean, I had just never seen that modeled before that way. Man, she left so motivated and encouraged that it really challenged me to actually, I need to spend more time with the next generation. He actually made an incredible statement that I think was a great leadership lesson. He said, one of the reasons why they operate like they do is because they actually invite the next generations all the way down to the table. They actually invite them to the table and say, what ideas do you guys have because you probably have better ideas than we do? So a lot of the things that have been implemented in Chick-fil-A, they didn't come up with these young, next generation leaders that don't even have a title in their organization are getting these ideas that have transformed Chick-fil-A and that's what he'll say. That was just really encouraging to me. So it doesn't matter what level you're at is what I'm saying. You're all influencers, you're all impacting people and you can still all grow. But I agree with you, Tyler, we've got to be healthy but we also, in order to be healthy, we have to be vulnerable because we have to be open and willing to ask the hard questions and actually receive the real truth of what areas are we not doing that good in what areas are we not healthy in? That's probably one of my favorite things about my relationship with Scott and my relationship with my executive team is I can ask that question and I know they love being cared about me and enough that they're going to tell me the truth. Even if I don't like it. [TYLER] Do you remember when, as you share that and I appreciate we're talking about this idea of healthy leadership, I can remember the point to where I was able to start to see it and there was people being willing to engage with me and flip that switch. It was a very distinct timeframe. It was actually getting involved with the very first step into the Maxwell organization and kind of you inside, outside that was that catalyst for me. Was there a point in time for you or was there an evolution towards that growing in your health as a leader? [JOHN] Yes, I would, I actually do think there was that moment for me. It was a leader that I had named Mike McWilliams at this investment company that I worked with and he gave me this two year long project that was a massive project. I had never led a project like that. What was interesting is when I got to the first meeting, I realized every person in that meeting was at least two levels higher than I was. First day out of that meeting I went back to his office and I was like, "Dude, this ain't going to work. I'm supposed to lead all these people and I'm two levels below them? They're not going to do anything I say." He said, "Exactly, you have to gain influence by showing up, being prepared, answering their questions, serving them and I promise you if you do that, they will come in alignment with what you're asking them to do." He walked me through the process for two years and we actually saw that happen. I mean, and that probably is the moment where it changed the most because he saw something in me that I didn't even see in myself. Then he put me in a place where I had to actually start doing it. That was the scary part. I was like, dude, you're the one I was thinking, you're the one taking the risk man, because at the end of the day, you're the big boss. But I look back at that and it was actually one of the defining moments in my leadership. [TYLER] Do you find yourself now doing that for others? [JOHN] Oh yes. I'm a very hands off leader. But they always know I'm here. So any of my leaders that report to me, they literally could call me twenty four seven and I'll answer the phone. So they always have access to me, but also tell them just like any leader probably does bring me the problem, but have the solution because I want them to process it, have to think through ahead of time. Now we're in a place in our organization that we're taking our strategy and every company we have we've passed on the strategy to now two and three levels down. They're actually having to come up with the strategies over the last three or four years. What's really powerful about that is they buy into it. It's their strategy. Man, they're knocking it out of the park. So all I'm there to do is give them the wisdom when they need it. They ask me questions when they need it. Sometimes they make the decision, the right one and sometimes it's the wrong one but to me that's the cost of leadership. I'm okay with that even if it costs us because it's going to make them a better leader, it's going to make them a better man and woman that will actually more effectively lead us So yes, I love it. I get excited about it because you know that's, I'm a huge fan of succession planning, but I think that's all the way through the organization. You need to do that from top to bottom and sometimes we'll focus just on that with the top level leaders and and I really think it ought to be all the way through. [TYLER] That makes sense. There's something that you shared towards the end of your book and I want to take the last few moments to focus on that. You talked about the importance of every single interaction of all, if a home sells within John Houston Homes, how many different points of contact and how many different people are impacted by that one single transaction? I go ahead. [JOHN] I was just going to say that for me, that's what so much of business is about, is are we actually meeting people where they are? Are we making a positive impact in their life at those interactions? So for us, earlier I said that I think what employees are looking for and I really do believe this. I think they're looking for purpose. So many times we have people that are coming here that come to work for one of our companies and they'll literally tell us I could make more money somewhere else, but I don't feel fulfilled. Now I understand. Here's what I can tell you. We pay fair market value, but we're going to steward the money just like we're going to steward the people. Both of those are just, I've got to do, I've got to create them equal or if I just start throwing money at people, I'm telling them that their value is how much I can pay them when in reality, the value is what they bring to the organization and what we can actually help them with in their lives. So for me, the 60 touch points for every one house we build is just a reminder. Earlier I said, not trying to preach to anybody, but for me, we know, my wife and I know God told us to start our very first business and all seven of them for two reasons, to reach people from Christ and give to the kingdom. That's it. So the Lord always said, I never told you to sell a house. I never told you to make a ton of money. I told you to reach people and give to the kingdom. So for us, we break it down like this. So on average, for every, now, not in a market like today, but in a normal housing market for every 10 prospects you have you contract one house. So that engages the salesperson. So now all of a sudden the sales manager, the sales assistant, they know these are the 10 focal points I have. The prospect is just as important as the person that contracts, because they're all children of God. Then you go to the builder and there's approximately keeping it really simple, because that's what we try to do. There's 42 subs and suppliers. So that's one framer, one plumber. If you've ever seen a job site you know there's more than one framer out there, at least you hope. There's 42 there. Then it takes about eight to close a house. That's a title company, surveyor, different people like that. Total that gives us 60 touch points but what that also does is it engages every level of our organization. Every level is bought into the process because they play a part and they know what role they play. Now here's the crazy part. So if we build 700 houses this year, which is about what we're projecting, that's 42,000 touch points we have. That's crazy. So for me as a believer, if I can just love people there and it impacts their life enough that maybe they want to follow Christ or they want to start utilizing those touch points in their own life, if we only impacted 10%, that's 4,200 people. Then it's just a domino effect of, so we focus on that with every company we have one so that the customer feels valued whether that's a trade internal or external customer, but two that our employees see where they play a part in the purpose that we're driving. [TYLER] I think what's cool there is you start off this way that it's not just the person that buys the house. It's the customer, it's the prospects, it's everyone. Then as you shared that last piece, it's the internal and external customers, meaning everyone inside of John Houston Homes is a customer that you're serving. And I think when you have that perspective, man, from a leadership and a business point of view, people don't get missed. When people don't get missed, they tie into the purpose. It doesn't matter what purpose of you shared your purpose and your mission, every listener, every person that's viewing this, you have a purpose. For your organization, if you looked at every person that's inside, outside as a customer and treating them that way, how can I serve you, man that's how we make an impact. [JOHN] Yes. And what's crazy is as a leader, it takes all the pressure off because if I'm a leader and I'm just telling you what to do, you're only doing it because you have to. But man, if I say Tyler, dude, how can I come alongside and serve you? What can I do for you today that will help your life be better today and you actually fulfill what you have today? Then all of a sudden I do that over a year and I just keep adding value to you. What do you want to do? You want to do anything I ask you to do? So it's this backwards effect that we think in America really around the world, probably that this title leadership of telling people what to do is actually going to make a difference and they're going to want to follow you and they don't want to follow you that way. But it's when you're actually raising them up as leaders and you're saying, no, Tyler, I see something in you and I want to help you get there. How can I do that? Then you just start raising them up all of a sudden, who's your biggest fan? Your biggest fan is the leader that helped you accomplish where you are today. So it's huge. [TYLER] John, thanks so much for your time. Thanks for being here, sharing all your wisdom everything that you shared with me and I appreciate your friendship. I appreciate the impact you have on my life. Hopefully, I see you again real soon. [JOHN] We will, man. Thanks for having me buddy. [TYLER] One of the great things that I love about having a podcast with a conversations like guys like John, John and I know each other, we've known each other. Obviously, this podcast gave us a reason to talk to each other and share that conversation with others. My hope is you got tremendous value out of that. I got a lot of notes and I got a lot of good thoughts. I shared this in the opening, what I'm walking away from this conversation and it's the three questions, but I also know this and John shared it, I believe in it wholly and absolutely, is this concept of layered learning. I shared about it. I'm going to share more now. It's bringing this healthy idea and knowing that you don't have to fully own it. It's like maybe it's something to partner with or pass off or be that incubator for others. That's what my hope in developing the Impact Driven Leader community is about, is knowing that as leaders, we go through times where we don't know how to play the game. I was going to share this in the interview, but it didn't find its way in, but I'm going to share it. Now I had this conversation yesterday at lunch. Sometimes as a leader, you find yourself in such a place that you've lost sight of the chessboard. You know the chessboard is there, you know it has the black and the white squares, you know that all the pieces are there, the black pieces, the white pieces, or maybe it's the red or whatever that color is. You know it's classically black and white, the chess pieces, the king, the queen, the rocks, the ponds so forth and so on. As a leader you know all those pieces are there the board's there, but you can't see it. You physically can't see the board. I know from talking about this at lunch and John bring up because he experienced it too. There's probably a lot of leaders that find themselves in that place that they're trying to play the chess game of life in front of them and they're really right now pretending because they can't see the pieces. One of the things that I believe John shared and I believe too, is it's when people come alongside us, you know he talked about his relationship with Scott. He talked about Rob, a future guest actually here on the podcast, being those guides to help them open up the light. It ties into this month's book, Hero on a mission that Donald Miller talks about this element of a guide. I think one of the great opportunities we have as leaders and friends and put our arms around people and link arms with others is to help clear the picture of that chessboard and help people move those pieces and understanding if you move one piece, all of a sudden, now everything opens up just a little bit more. To me, that's life, that's leadership, that's the great opportunity we have, which maybe it's through the interactions or relationships we have, or the mentorships. To me, that's, what's exciting about leadership, but also knowing that if we can look at life with that type of mentality, I won't know it all. There's going to be days where it's foggy, but there's people out there for me to rely on and link arms with that are going to help me, that care about me. I believe as a leader to do that within an organization is like super exciting, but I also believe a leader needs to seek out those relationships. John has done that. He's someone that I know I could go to at any point and ask to help clear the fog. You have someone like that. If you don't, man, I'd love to be that for you. I'd love to invite you into the impact Driven Leader community where that's my goal. Like I said earlier, is to help other leaders get healthy too, because I had to get healthy. John talked about that. I hope you got tremendous value out of the episode today. I hope you subscribe to this wherever you listen to podcasts. You watch it on YouTube. You can watch the live recording there. I also hope that you leave us a review, a rating. Let me know how I did. What can I do better? As John talked about that I have that same goal of mentality, because I just want to get better. I don't know it all. I'm not perfect. I just want to get better. I hope you as a leader want to do that as well. Thanks for listening in. I hope you got value out of today and I hope you listen to another episode when it comes out. Thanks for being here.