The Promise of a “C-Suite” Education and its RX for Humanity

0:00 The topics and opinions express in the following show are solely those of the hosts and their guests, and not those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services, or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability, explicit or implied shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio or its employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W FOURCY Radio. What's Working on Purpose? Anyway? Each week we ponder the answer to this question. People ache for meaning and purpose at work, to contribute their talents passionately and know their lives really matter. They crave being part of an organization that inspires them and helps them grow into realizing their highest potential. Business can be such a force for good in the world, elevating humanity. In our program, we provide guidance and inspiration to help usher in this world we all want Working on Purpose. Now here's your host, Doctor Release Cortez. Welcome back to the Working on Purpose Program. Thanks for ning this week. Great to have you. This show has been brought to you with passion and pride since February of twenty fifteen. I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes. If we have not met before and you don't know me, I'm an organizational psychologist and local therapist, speaker and author. My team and I at gusto Now help companies to enliven and fortify their operations by building a culture and leadership activated by meaning and purpose. Our mission is to help our clients create a destination workplace where people flock to join, are intrinsically motivated to

1:32 perform at their best, can grow to the fuller potential, and are committed to stay and an end deliver in the company's mission, which all translates to higher profits for you. You can learn more about us now. We can work together at gustodashnow dot com or my personal site, Atliscortes dot com. Now getting in today's program we have with us today. James W. Keys a global business leader, philanthropist, educator, artist, musician, commercial rated pilot, and modern renaissance man. He is the former CEO of two inter nationally recognized Fortune five hundred companies, seven eleven and Blockbuster. He's had a lifelong commitment to education, serving as a founding director of the Dallas Education Foundation and is the founder of the Education Is Freedom Foundation. He's the author of Education Is Freedom The Future Is in Your Hands, which will be talking about today. He joins you today from my city, our city, Dallas.

2:21 Jim, welcome to Working on Purpose. Thank you for the opportunity to be here. So it is a mild understatement to say that I loved your book. Thank you every single last word of it. And I do read my guest's books cover to cover. Yours was just so inspiring and encouraging. Really really appreciate being able to share it with my listeners and viewers and champion your message. Jim, Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it. I am as my first journalistic adventures, so it means a lot to me to wow, really, that's your first one out of the gate. Okay, let's say I'm hanging up now, that's it. I'm to invested. Yeah. I've had some good coaches and some very good mentors along this journey, but yeah, very first one. Clearly, Well, I love what you state is. The objective is to inspire us all to learn and to keep learning because wisdom, which is a higher degree of knowledge, you say, is the lifebloit of a civil society and the oxygen that fuels our personal enlightenment. And I love that you're really championing a unit of effort among all of us. I just find that so hopeful and as a course of action, I definitely want to be part of that. So I'm in Jim, you got one. Thank you. I appreciate it. You know, I'll share a quick story with you. When I first wrote the book, the publisher, of course, is working on the title, and I knew the title was going to be I'll share that story with you down the road.

3:44 But the hardest part was the subtitle. I understand, Yes, it's really hard. And so they kept asking me what I wanted, and I said, well, I really wanted to say that this book is a self help guide for humanity, and they said, who do you think you are? You know you can't say that. I mean, it's it's like that's way too overreaching. But it's so true in so many ways that what it comes down to is knowledge and wisdom to take away fear and anger and hatred and all that stuff. And truly it is something that we can all do if we if we believe in it. Mm hmm, yeah. I really really subscribe to this whole notion you said. You know, therefore, our collective desire for the greater good becomes the bright light that will take away our fear.

4:34 As you said, we can replace ignorance with knowledge. We can replace to spear with hope, we can replace fear with understanding, and we can replace aggression with peace. That sounds really good right about now, Jim Bolly, doesn't it. And you know, when I wrote the book were we were in a time of polarization, and I, as I began to research book and knowledge and problems throughout history, I struggled with this issue of how do I, and especially how do really intelligent people, really intelligent societies put themselves in a situation where they're in this cycle of fear and hatred. Sense, you would think that the more knowledgeable a society becomes, the more peace you would have, one would think, And interestingly I stumbled on this thing that I put in the book called militant ignorance. Oh yeah, definitely, I'd never heard that before util I read it in your book. Yeah, it was fascinating because I was really struggling with how do I explain this?

5:35 How do I explain the irrational behaviors? And M Scott Pack in a book called The Road Less Traveled, uh about this? Yeah, I talked about this idea of militant ignorance. And basically what it is is that, you know, it's that natural human, almost tribal behavior that you know, after all, we are human and we do fall back into what I call later in the book, our cavemen brain kicks in and we are become convinced by those around us that something is true or something is correct, even if it goes against all of our values, all of our knowledge, and we literally choose not to continue learning in that environment. We shut it down and say I'm going to go with the group. I'm going to go with the tribe.

6:28 And that leads that that idea of militant ignorance, like, no, I'm not going to learn, I'm not going to get the facts because this is what I believe, and this is what I want to believe. All my friends believe the same thing. It can lead to some pretty frightening outcomes. Yeah, And I you know, I appreciate that you want, you know, because I'm a researcher at heart. I have about twenty eight pages of typewritten notes from your book because that's what I do, and that one of the things that I stribe when you were talking about military ignorance was many of the challenges society faces today can be traced to our individual and collective refusal to learn. Yes, yes, I mean think about think about some of these issues that have plagued just our country. And if you put a group of intelligent people in a room, many of these issues could get solved, and yet they don't. And yet not only could they get solved, but we turn them into we almost weaponize these issues and get people so worked up and so angry about them that people choose not to seek knowledge and truth about these issues. They're so hunkered down on the idea that we're right and they're wrong that it leads to basically an impasse. There is. It's a self fulfilling prophecy that there will be no solution. Yeah. Yeah, I was just listening to the news this morning and they were just talking about how,

8:01 you know, anger sells, you know, and it was sort of not just sort of, it was very disheartening to hear that you know, peace and you know, encouragement and compassion and love don't actually sell, but but anger does. And I'm like, oh, oh in the wrong business. Sadly, it's a motivator. But you know, interestingly, if you look through history again, I've learned a lot in the course of writing this book, and if you look through history and you think about our leaders, the leaders that have historically, Now there have been exceptions to this, but most of the leaders who have prevailed in national political presidential elections, most of them have been purveyors of hope, yes, and those who are stoking fear generally don't prevail in the long term because hope, I do. I do think that hope ultimately prevails over fear. But fear is easier. It's the lowest.

9:00 I'm a the nominator, yep. And so you know, if you're going to pull out your deck of tools to how to motivate people to take action, you pull out that fear tool, and it's a lot easier than the hope tool. In the short term. I agree, I'm aligned with you. Let's restire we can do better than that. But speaking of history, Jim, I want to talk a little bit about yours, because I have to say, when I was reading your book and I started reading about the story you say at the beginning, which was pretty compelling and interesting, and then you and then come to find with that stories about you, I was like, Wow, no, wonder this. So it's important that our listeners and viewers know a little bit more about your history like I do now, because if they understand that, they will understand even more deeply the power of your message and what you've written in the book. So will you just kind of give us a sketch of your earlier life? Sure? I was really you know, I set it up that way in the third person because I was really reluctant. I didn't want this book to be about me.

9:52 I didn't want it to be a memoir because I'm certainly I'm not old enough for a mena. Let's start with that. Yeah, yeah, let's start there now. I really wanted the audience to be engaged, the reader to be engaged in a story about an individual that could have been any kid growing up anywhere in the world. Because my story is unique. My story has played out over and over again all over the world. Too many kids in the family, too little money, problems, marrital issues. You know, my mom left at five, my father passed away when I was twelve, We had no running water, the house was condemned. I mean, I didn't go on and on with the list of all these adversities that I faced.

10:41 And yet I'm not alone. The whole world is full of people with those kinds of challenges. In fact, we all have adversity of some sort. So my objective in the book was to share my adversity and to be able to show how I turned adversity into opportunity and to say, look, you don't have to I don't want that for anybody, but take your own adversary, because everybody has one, everybody has an issue. Take that and turn it into a positive. Learn from it and make it your strength, make it your superpower. And that was my objective in telling my own story in that fashion, and then coming up with the reveal that yes, this was me, which was delightful by the way, I thank you for that.

11:24 I was delighted by that. And then, you know, I do really want to celebrate you, Jim. I mean, you really are a living billboard of having achieved and still achieving the American dream. I mean, you have been a well known CEO of two remarkable organizations, You're a philanthropist, you're a pilot, an artist, and musician, among many other notable achievements. And so it's what I love about that too, as a fellow person who believes very much in lifelong learning, you wouldn't be doing all of those things if you hadn't embraced this notion of lifelong learning. That's exactly right. You know, I've dedicated a whole chapter in the book to curiosity. As you know, Oh, I love it. We're going to talk about that. It's the root, it's the root of all of of all knowledge.

12:11 And to me, there's really no difference from me than anybody else. I'm not any smarter, I'm not any more blah blah blah. I just never lost that curiosity that I had as a kid, and I've nurtured it. I intentionally tried to stay curious, and that curiosity still drives me today. I just I just want to keep learning. I'm fascinated by Like right now, we're doing social media, you know, and I knew nothing about social media. I've never been on a podcast, yeah, months ago, and now I've learned and I'm fascinated by it and I'm using this now, this tool to reach people where especially young people, where they live, which is in social media world, and it's it's a beautiful thing. So it's yeah, it's it's all about just lifelong learning is lifelong living, you know.

13:09 It's it's about the more you learn, the more richer life can be. Completely agree, which is which is why you still find me nine and a half years still hosting this podcast, because that's it's a learning platform for me that a few people happen to listen to as well. It's kind of fun. Okay, well, let's let's dive in. I want to. I love what you've created and especially from your vantage point of what you've done in your life of you call it the C Suite of learning here and this is how your book is organized so beautifully. To Jim, it just all hangs together so beautifully. But listeners and viewers, these the c suite of learning for our purposes, what Jim has created, we're going to we're going to talk about change, confidence, clarity, critical thinking, curiosity, creativity, collaboration, cultural literacy, and character. They're all part of us and they are essential to enhance our democratic process. As Jim said, So if please start with the first one, the change here, and you are a master at change. I loved your stories of how you navigated the change through your career and you know, as life sort things up to you, and I also love that for you you noticed, as you said it before, change equals opportunity. In other words, you can be the CEO of your life through change exactly. And I didn't, of course, as a kid, I didn't realize I was doing this. I didn't know early in my career how important my ability to embrace change was as a point of differentiation versus other employees. And then one day I woke up and said, you know,

14:39 all of these things we've been through that I've been through personally contributed, I think to my ability in a company setting to deal with change because I always recognize that. I came to recognize this is what I'm trying to share in my book, that it has nothing to do with the change itself. It seems like a horrible crisis at this moment, and it could be the best opportunity of your life. You just don't know it at the time, right right, So that's why I say, you know, in any change can be opportunity, but it's not the change that matters, it's our response to the change right well. As a logo therapist too, has been very steeped in doctor Victor Frankel's work. Of course, one of the things that he used to champion is in between stimulus and response, there is a space, and in that space we have the choice of how we're going to respond, which is empowering. And I love how you go on to say that your own freedom was created from within. You were free from the inside out.

15:37 You're free in your mind. And that sense of freedom turned into a life of learning, and the life of learning turned into a life of adventure and the foundation for this book. It's very true and I am growing up, I didn't have an understanding of wealth because I didn't have any wealth, of course, but I and my father used to tell me that he wanted more from me, but he didn't want me to be rich. He never said, I want you to go out and make money, which so many of us get caught up in that hamster wheel you know of to make money, that's what success is all about. And I realized for my dad, he used to tell me stories. He was in World War Two and he was in Burma. He was a truck driver on the Burma road, and he used to tell me stories about the Burmese people and how wonderful that culture was, and how much he learned from the people there, and how he longed for that experience, and now that he was back in the United States and out of the war, how he wished he had a job that would allow him to travel the world and continue to basically have the freedom to be with whoever he wanted to be with wherever he wanted to be. And I sort of internalized that, and as I progressed through my life and my career, kind of woke up one day and said, you know, it really isn't about accumulation of wealth. That's an enabler, it's a tool, but it's really about freedom. Think about how many wildly successful or wildly wealthy friends

17:12 we have that are miserable. Yeah, yeah, you probably deal with a few of them in your practice. Indeed, indeed, indeed, Oh okay, so on, then let's grab our first break and let our listeners of viewers do a little bit on what you've just served up here. As an opening. I'm your host, doctor Earles Cortes. We'll go on the air with Jim Keyes. He's a global business leader, philanthropist, educator, artist, musician, commercial rated pilot, and modern renaissance man. He's the former CEO of two internationally recognized Fortune five hundred companies, seven to eleven and Blockbuster. We've been talking a bit about where his book came from, and we're just getting started into unraveling the c suit of learning. See what this will be right back. Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at elisecortes dot com.

18:27 Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to Elise A. L Se at Elisecortes dot com. Now back to Working on Purpose. Thanks for stating with us, and welcome back to Working on Purpose. I'm your home doctor, Elist Cortes, as I am dedicated to helping create a world where people realize their potential at work and are led by inspirational leaders that help them find and contribute their greatness, and we do business that betters the world. I continue to research and write my own books. So the last one came out in March of twenty twenty three. It's called The Great Revitalization. How activating a meaning and purpose can radically in live in your business. And I wrote it to help leaders understand the nature of today's workforce, what do they want from you to stay and thrive? And then I offer twenty two best processes to help you create that culture to provide it for them. You can learn about my books at leastcoretes dot com or find them on Amazon if you are just now joining me. My guest is Jim Keyes. He's the author of Education Is Freedom The Future Is in your Hands, which which is what we've been talking about today. So before the break, we served up that we are going to be covering as many as we can of the c suite of learning, which again is change, confidence, clarity, critical thinking, curiosity, creativity, collaboration, cultural literacy, and character. We've covered change, so

19:59 now let's talk about confidence. Yeah, that was a challenge to write the chapter on confidence here. It is so critical and it is such an important part of my success because I was fearless, and everybody says, well, how did you How did you move from you know, from a regular employee in the organization to all these different ranks and CFO and chief operating officer. It was it was about not being afraid at the part of it. For example, I was originally I entered seven to eleven the South in corporation via the sort of the financial side of the business, let's say, the planning side, because I came in to help them with an oil company that they had acquired. And then I moved into an operating role. And then after a while I raised my hand and said I'd like to go back and work on this strategic piece again because I can help. And what I did is I kept moving from area to area throughout my career where I didn't have the experience. It was a stretch, but it was also an opportunity to learn.

21:15 Now, how many of us get stuck in that trap? They say, well, no, no, I can't do that. I might have to take less money for that new job, even if you're gonna learn a lot more. So I yes, for some reason, I had the courage. And here's the analogy I like to use. When you're a little kid, you're in school, teacher, teacher, I know what happens. You get a spitball in the back of the head. That's right. You get all these people that are criticizing you. Why are you doing that? You're making us look bad? You know you this and that, and they call you names. I was able to tune that out as a kid for some reason, because and I didn't recognize it. Took me many years to realize it was never about me. It was about that. That's right, they're in securities, that's right being projected on me. And took many years.

22:08 I wish I knew that then. But that same behavior happens in the in the boardroom, that happens in the workplace all the time. And so confidence is critically important so that you can say I'm not gonna let the pack and they're in securities try to hold me back in my career. It's not good for me, and it's not good for the company. The company needs me out there taking chances and so yeah. So it was confidence really that propelled me in so many ways throughout my career. Well, one of the things that I got from your confidence section, there's two pieces I wanted to talk about. One is this next piece, and then one's on humility. But I really think this is this is this is actionable for our listeners and viewers, because confidence is hard for a lot of people. And so I love that you go on and you say, you know, we all know about the golden rule, which is to treat others the way that we wish to be treated ourselves. Then you say, but in addition to the golden rule, we should consider it establish a platinum role. And you say, in other words, if you treat yourself the way you want to be treated by others, then you will indelibly hold yourself to a higher standard. This will manifest in a higher self confidence that will in turn encourage others to believe in you. That is really really powerful. If we can hold ourselves to that same treat ourselves in the way that we want other people to treat us.

23:30 That is a game changer, Jim. It's brilliant. It's just so true. We all struggle with the imposter syndrome. We're human again. It's that stupid part of our cave man brain that kids him, Oh, I'm not good enough, you know, I'm not strong enough, blah blah blah, and it's just all noise. So I tried to figure out a way to put it into terms of people could embrace, and it was like, well, wait a minute, why am I treating myself in a way that I would not want to to treat me. I'm harder on myself than they are out there, and they're hot enough already, you know. So yeah, I tried to put it in those terms. The Platinum Rule I called it.

24:11 Yeah, why not? I love it? No, I think it's so powerful because what I think about, Jim, and part of what I'm trying to do in the world is one I'm always about helping to activate people to understand their meaning and their purpose and then inspired their make a contribution worthy of their one precious life by doing so. Imagine if we could live society just five percent by allowing people to take more ownership of that confidence and that they could then serve from that the world would be a vastly different place, vastly different place. Yeah, but you know there's a trap, because this is what trips up a lot of people. When a confident person expresses their confidence. There is a risk there that others will again try to take their legs out because they're jealous or whatever reason. But there's also an e I've been guilty of this. I've been guilty or certainly called arrogant because I am so confident I do believe so much in myself and my ability that others sometimes perceive that as arrogance. So I tried to struggle that. I struggled with that in the book, and I said, I need to help my readers understand the difference between confidence and arrogance and where that line is. Yes, I went back to Norman Vincent Peelee. Interestingly, you know, if you think about confidence, Donald Trump kind of comes to mind. Well, his dad used to take him to hear Norman Vincent Peel the power of positive thinking.

25:37 Well, Norman Vincent Peelee was a preacher, and yes he preached positive thinking, he preached confidence. But what I discovered, and this was new learning for me. I discovered this and reading about Norman Vincent Peelee that in equal doses he preached humility, but it was an important unique form of humility. Wasn't humility in the sense of oh I'm not that good, blah blah blah. No, it was not self deprecating humility. It was humility in the sense that I know I am smart enough to know that I don't know everything that I have something I can learn from every human being that I interact with. Could be the janitor, it could be the waiter, it could be the CEO in the boardroom. I can learn something from them. So as long as I hold that true in my heart, then I can be as confident as I want, and I will never project that over the line kind of arrogance because I'll be listening to them, waiting for what I can learn from them. Yes, not so beautiful. I'm so aligned with that, Jim. It's just so beautiful. So that's how we can temper arrogance with humility, so that we have that good balance. So let's go on to Clearity News because I want to get through his means we possibly can't for our listenership. So much meat to them. So clarity, you know, gosh, that sounds really simple. We just have to be clear and what we what we want people to do, and what we say. Right,

27:08 that's all sounds simple. However there's more. Oh yeah, Everyone from da Vinci to Einstein said it's the hardest thing that a human can do is to simplify that. We have a tendency as humans to over complicate everything. And Einstein said it well. He said, if you can't explain something well enough that the six year old can understand it, you probably don't understand it well enough yourself. Oh and it's so true, really, And I can't tell you how many times clarity simplicity kept me out of trouble. I was CFO in the Enron era of a public company. Wow, Sarbanes Oxley. The very same people that we're calling on Enron with offshore special purpose entity tax shelters, right, we're calling on me as the chief financial officer of a twelve billion dollar public company, saying I can help your performance, your company's performance with this accounting scheme. And I recall vividly the reason that I didn't recommend that is I would say to them if I can't explain this to my board, and I couldn't. I just did not understand it well enough to explain it to my board. Then I have no business doing it. You know what their answer was, Well, you're not supposed to understand it. We're the experts, we're the tax experts. Oh wow, to do it?

28:37 Accept it and that element of simplicity, that rule that I have probably kept me out of jail or kept the company out of a serious financial crisis. But it works, and it's so just to elaborate a little bit, it's not just simplification, it's clarity of both inbound communications, so listening and being able to understand what we're being told. That means breaking it down into simple terms, right, and then outbound clarity because at the end of the day, if you're leading an organization, you can't lead if they can't follow, if they can't understand what your what your plan is, what your strategy is.

29:23 And the reality is we all we all find ourselves in situations where our organization is saying, oh, yeah, sure, I get it, I get it, not a clue, I'm here, you said, or they're afraid they're afraid to challenge it. And step up and say, really didn't understand that. M Yeah, which is part of my work too, is helping to make that safe. That psychological safety is so so important. So the clarity piece too. And then as you go on to say, being able to carefully curate the message and deliver it into the intended audience in a way that they understand but also inspires them to want to be around it and part of the action. So that's a champion that too. Okay, So what we've been talking about then is those three were really about what to learn.

30:04 Those three pieces. Now we're going to move on to three pieces of how to learn. So the first one there is critical thinking. Please could we have more of that in the world? Please? Would you make that happen like yesterday? I know, wouldn't it be nice? Would you know? And I'll share with you that we all learned critical thinking. For those who don't really know what we're talking about with critical thinking, think of the Socratic method that we all learned in grammar school. Who was Socrates? Well, he was the guy that asked why about everything? Why? Why? Why? Why? And he got persecuted for it. Blah blah blah. He was probing. He was delving. It was he wanted to understand, and he would challenge assumptions all the time. So we all knew that, but then we don't like to ask why. In fact, we're probably probably lose the why as little kids when mom says stop asking, right, yes, we drive our parents crazy. And then we we sort of learned not to ask why. But it wasn't until I got to seven eleven. And here's when I really embraced critical thinking. My Japanese licensees were wildly successful.

31:14 They're selling fresh sushi in seven eleven in Japan restaurant, We're having a hard time selling a fresh hot dog, Like, how does this work? How do they do so well? And I became a student of their success and what I discovered was amazing that they took and it was actually inspired by Deming. By Edward Deming, one of our Americans that went over their post World War two to help reconstruction of Japan, and he taught them the basic scientific method as it applies to business, and it just basically start with a hypothesis.

31:56 From the hypothesis, taken action after the action, measure the results, and then redo your hypothesis. Very simple they had in Japanese basically simplified it to plan see do or plan do ce plan do see And basically it's it's the idea of having an idea to start with, having a plan, but most importantly, putting that action in place. And this is the part we all forget hearly as Americans because we're all so busy measuring the results, and then when we measure the results, a lot of times we measure measure, measure, measure, measure, and we won't do anything about it. How do we take that result and then re and then change our hypothesis. Now, if you put that into political terms, it means, Okay, we're going to try something. We're going to put a policy in place. Let's step back and see if it worked. Oh, it didn't work as well as we thought. Let's let's take a different position. And now that may seem like we're flip flopping or changing our minds. Well not. If we make that change based on data, based on and sometimes that change is really great. You know, I've come to view things totally differently than I did before I did that investigative research or critical thinking, Thank goodness, right exactly exactly and It's kind of comes full cycle back to change equals opportunity, because

33:30 even if I had the right hypothesis, the right program, the plan, it may have worked today, but it may not work tomorrow. It's something changed in the environment. I got to Blockbuster to take it to digital. I was down that path on a streaming video company, ready to have wild success. We doubled ebitdah our cash flow and dramatically improved earnings, and then all of a sudden the financial crisis hit. Yeah, well I had to pivot now from transforming the company to saving the company, to try to restructuring the balance restructure the balance sheet, and and people from the outside looking in said, oh, well, what's he doing. He changed his strategy, or he didn't know what he was doing whatever, No, it was it was responding to change with information, with new information that you have at any given time. And you also had all kinds of people too that were part of this, that that were weighing in on the decisions and things, including your board, et cetera. So anyway, that's a I read all of that too, very very fascinating. Perhaps in another conversation we could talk more about your Blockbuster days. Because I think a lot of people really want to better understand that. But for now, let's take our next break. I'm your host, doctor at least Cortez. We've been on the air with Jim Keyes, who has had a lifelong commitment to education, serving as a founding director of the Dallas Education Foundation and is the founder of Education His Freedom Foundation.

34:58 We've been talking about his of learning. After the break, we're going to cover next on curiosity. We'll be right back. Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at Elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to a lease a lisee at at least coortes dot com. Now back to Working on Purpose. Thanks for staying with us, and welcome back to Working on Purpose. I am your host doctor at least Cortes. I mentioned in the last break that my latest book came out in March of twenty three.

36:19 It's called The Great Revitalization. What I did for you is I created a very simple three page assessment for you, and it will give you a roadmap to elevating your own organizational culture to meet to the discerning needs of today's workforce. And it will tell you really how you're doing with regard to what today's workforce wants. You can find it at gustodeshnow dot com if you are just now joining us. My guest is Jim Keyes. He's the author of Education, News, Freedom The Future Is in Your Hands, which we're talking about today. So one of my favorite parts of the book, of course, which we started we sort of hinted at before, is part of your c suite is curiosity. I love giving myself over wildly to my curiosity. It's gotten me into all kinds of wonderful mischief over over time. It's fun.

37:01 It is fun, and that's that's at the heart of it. It's it's it's getting back to the fun of learning, and that that's so often missing in in our both our academic equation and and just life. Absolutely, think about how many times have we traveled. You and I both travel a lot to foreign countries. Even a little bit of understanding of the language just makes that trip so much more interesting and enriching, Yes, and enriching. Yeah. And the response from people and not my French is terrible. But when I'm there, when I do try and make the effort, it could be a waiter, it could be a taxi driver, it could be someone and I'm doing business with. They they just they're grateful, absolutely extra effort.

37:53 You're reaching for them, right, You're making an effort for them. That's why I love how you distinguish the cure versus the complacent. Yeah, exactly, And you know it's I'll give you an example. One of the things that we're hearing today is, well, what's wrong with this generation Generation zem. I'm doing a lot of interviews about gen Z and why aren't they a mess and blah blah blah, And I say, you know, no, actually not, They're just different. And what they're doing is they are actually quite curious because social media has lit them up. Now they may be spending some time looking at cat you know cat videos on TikTok. But I have a video out there talking about the what of learning, the change confidence, clarity. It's got forty million views. And these are young people, so you know, anything they're learning, they're curious how did the CEO of seven to eleven? And Blockbuster? How do you get there? And they're learning from these things, So that curiosity is alive and well, and I think we just need to celebrate it other than you know, critical of people in invoking that curiosity. Well, I'm taking a one step further, Jim.

39:07 I've created a course that actually enhances curiosity by actually teaching people to get better in touch with their transcendent emotions. So I am totally with you. I love how you also describe curiosity as intelligence at play, and also it's the lust of the mind. Completely embrace that. Imagine if we could, we could turn on the curiosity inside organizations. Imagine the innovation, the problem solving, the way that they go about delighting customers in a different way. That's what I am out to help companies do as well. Oh my gosh, you know you're right, I'll give you. I'll give you a great example of that. I mean, I can't tell you how many companies I dealt with at seven eleven. I was always looking for new products, right, So I was curious about what are things? What are products in Hong Kong that could be transformed and brought here to the United States or in Spain, or in in China or anywhere. How can I find those things that we could bring back to the US. You know, I was told by so many consumer products companies, by the CEOs of these companies, like Jim, what do you It's not your job, you don't You don't do that.

40:17 You know, you're CEO. You just first of all, we the consumer product companies do that. And by the way, as a CEO of a consumer products company, I would never do that. That's my people that do the creative people, those are the ones that develop us. Well. That curiosity helps you find new products your customer better. Yeah. So one of my favorite examples, you know that little aluminum model you see for beer. That's how I love this story in your book. Yes, tell it. Oh yeah, it's it's it's fabulous. So I'm having trouble competing with Walmart at seven eleven because they're selling beer below my costs, you know, as Walmart, that's what they do, using it as a loss leader and try to bring people in the store. And that's hard when you're trying to compete with that. You know, it's like wait a minute, they're they're they're selling it at retail, blow my cost. I could send people out and buy it at Walmart cheaper than I can buy it from my Miller distributor whatever.

41:10 So I was trying to find how can I innovate beer. You know, that's pretty hard. It's been around for a long time, right, Well, my customers like cold beer. And so I was in Japan one time and I opened the mini bar and here I pulled out this thing at probably three in the morning, you know, jet lag, and it was so cold. I couldn't hold it. And I turned on the light, which I didn't want to do, but I had to see what this was. It was grapefruit juice in an aluminum bottle. I had never seen that package, certainly not in the United States. Yeah. I brought it back and I shared it with Budwise or with Miller. I said, can I get beer in this package, and I got the you know, kind of the eye roll. Yeah sure, sure, yeah, of course, and you know what they're thinking, that's not your job, that's not even more.

41:57 And it took two years, but I finally got it done and now that package is everywhere, and it's fabulous package for water, for beer, for soft drinks. It's great, it's wonderful, it's so so, so delightful, and just really quick because I think you'll find this delightful. Why I know a little bit more about seven eleven is from ninety one to ninety three my boyfriend, that's how I ended up going to Madrid. And then Rio de Genio worked for Arco. His job was to add the AMPM convenience storeline to the gas station. So that's what we were doing all over Western Europe and South America. And talk about creativity. Everybody said, that's never going to work, ever going to want those stores. But as you say in your book, you realized what you were doing at seven eleven is you were selling convenience exactly exactly. He was my nemesis, by the way, I well, sorry, so I just thought i'd just come clean on that.

42:49 Yeah, AMPM, they were tough competitors. Arco. They had North Slope crewed from California out in California, all the way from Alaskan North Slope, and they would bring it down to California and sell it again. They were selling gasoline and ten cents cheaper than my cost. It was. Boy, it was tough to compete with that. Yeah, I just thought I'd better just tell you that, so in case you found out on your own, you know, up tell right, we got to start this relationship, right, Jim. So all right, well let's move on. Now we were talking about curiosity. Now we got to go on to the next one. That's creativity. And that's another thing that I sew and so you know, talk about I'm being compelled by this, this curiosity to create this, this this course for organizations, and so creativity here enabling our inner child.

43:36 You say, this is this is intelligence at play to enable that exactly. And it's it's another one of those things that is innate to humans, that we are creative individuals and that as we grow up again, is that fear thing? You know? At one point we may have had a piano teacher and she banged our our knuckles and said that's not good, or we try to saying and somebody said, oh gosh, that's terrible, and and and and our fear kicked in and we stopped doing it, and I, for some reason, I was blessed with again that fearlessness. I was like, I don't care if they like the way I sound. I'm gonna do it anyway. And I don't care if they like my painting. And my my favorite example is I take I like to take people to MOMO, to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and I go, okay, look, you don't think you're an artist. Here's a box of rocks. Now what do you think you know? It's somebody said a box of rocks is beautiful, and this box of rocks is now in the Museum of Modern Art.

44:40 Or or there's one of my favorite exhibits, there's a whole bunch of jars with hair in them. And it's like, now, that is art. It is it is inspired by someone who had a point of view and they wanted to express themselves in a box of rocks. So what makes someone think that my expression, whether it's a painting or whether it's a sculpture, or my terrible sinking thinging singing, Why is that good or bad? So if you can get beyond that judgment, yes, have confidence to go forward. There's so much richness that can come from your pleasure in exercising that right side of your brain and just letting it loose and being creative. It truly is intelligence having fun well, and I love how you distinguish that. You say curiosity is what makes us wonder. Then creativity is what helps us execute.

45:35 And don't we want to do more of that also, you know, within through our organizations. And I also appreciate how you went on to say, without the creative minds of our ancestors, we would still reside in the stone age waiting for a creative mind to invent fire exactly. And you know what happened when some guy in a cave the flint and rock together and all of a sudden pts on fire. His wife probably said, you're going to burn the hut down. You knuckle ahead, don't ever again. You know, but creativity is often not encouraged and and and if we can overcome that fear and recognize the power of creativity, anybody can do it. Don't delegate it off to your marketing department. No, I wanted. I wanted to cross the whole organization exactly exactly. It's uh, it really is a beautiful thing. Well, and you know you you describe so many benefits. It builds confidence and improves well being, inspires others, awakens and expands senses, balances an unbalanced world. And you will also go on to say, and I completely agree, it's an essential job skill for the future. It really is. And you know I'll give you I'll give you another example. And I bring these examples in from my own experience in the book. And I got to Columbia Business School and I'm gonna I had never taken an accounting class.

46:55 I was a Polyscia undergraduate. I was like, I didn't accounting. And now I'm in Cora County. I'm looking around. There's KPMG on one side, a guy from Chrice Waterhouse on the other in Deloitte, and I'm going, oh, I'm in such trouble. But then they had this thing called case studies. And my first response to a case study is, you know, in the high school, you're an individual performer, and in college you're an individual performer. I mean, my grade's going to depend on these knuckleheads. I don't want that. I want my own control of my own grade. And then I realized, well, wait a minute, one of the guys in my case study is a CPA. Maybe that can help. Well, then the imposter syndrome started to kick ken, and I thought, I'm going to drag this group down. I'm embarrassed because I don't know accounting.

47:38 How can I help them? Well, here's what happened. In the middle of that case study. We were balancing, we were comparing companies and not knowing accounting principles. I knew nothing and how to spell gap. I literally came up with this idea to compare balance sheets basically factoring, put them both at one hundred percent with them in percentages. Now we can compare a company to company B on a rational basis. And the accountants were like, Their original reaction was, well, you can't do that, that's not proper, and then we ended up doing it. We got an A in the class, and the lesson there was that it's that coming together of different skill sets that really makes us successful and having the courage to be a little creative sometimes even even if you're technically in a technical area, you're not arguably paid to be creative, you can still be creative. Absolutely. I love that story. And here we are. We're out of time already. Dim.

48:42 I wanted to talk about your orgs for humanity, but we'll do something else with that some other time. I want to give you a chance just to say, like, in fifteen seconds, how would you like to close the show? Well, what I hope we can do. I hope we can do this again. Yeah, come back for around two Yeah. Absolutely. And I hope people will find that this is a book if they buy Education is Freedom, that this is a book that they can learn from. I hope it helps individuals in their career. But I also hope anyone that buys this book will give it. It's intended to be a gift book. Give it to somebody who needs that spark, that inspiration, and hopefully you'll be doing them a favor too. That's why I wrote it, and I hope everyone is able to benefit from me sharing my gift with you. I know I'm already much better for it. Jim, I thank you so much for doing all the hard work to write it and to get it out into the world, and I'll talk about it more to come on that for sure.

49:37 Very glad to know you and have your life. Hang with me for just a second. Let me close the show. Listeners and viewers. If you want to learn more about Jim Keyes, the various initiatives he pours itself into, or his book Education is Freedom, you can visit a couple places. One his personal website is James W. Keys dot com. Let me spell that for you, James J. A. M. E. S W K E y E s dot com, James W. Keys dot com. And then his book website is Education is freedombook dot com. One more time, Education is freedombook dot com. Last week, if you missed the live show, you can always catch it be a recorded podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. You're on air with Finnian Kelly talking about his book Intentionality, a groundbreaking guide to breath consciousness and radical self transformation. He taught us his blueprint to develop intentionality as a way of life, how to understand our human operating system, how to discover how our belief loops code impressions in our lives, and then to recode those impressions for a better outcome. Next week, we'll be on the air with Pam August talking about her book Potential, How to connect what's already there for exponential impacts so you can elevate your mattering in ways that are most important to you. See you there, and remember that work is one of the best adventures and means of realizing our potential and making the impact we crave. So let's work on Purpose. We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to tune into Working on Purpose featuring your host, doctor Elise Cortes, each week on W four CY. Together we'll create a world where business operates conscientiously. Leadership inspires and passion performance and employees are

51:09 fulfilled in work that provides the meaning and purpose they crave. See you there, Let's work on Purpose.