112: The Power of Positivity with Jon Gordon

1. It’s OK to admit when something is wrong or challenging. Positivity is not about ignoring a problem, but rather navigating it with optimism and courage. 

2. You shouldn’t lead with tough love unless your team knows you love them tough. When your team trusts that you care about them, you can earn the right to challenge them. 

3. True positive leaders address negativity. It’s only when you’ve addressed the problem that you can transform, neutralize, or remove it.

The Power of Positive Leadership

The Positive Leadership Challenge

Positive University Podcast

BELAY Accounting Service

(1:32) Jon tells us about his favorite hobbies and activities

(3:37) What does positivity really mean?

(6:51) Positivity doesn’t ignore challenges, it helps you better navigate them

(9:12) Jon shares how positive leadership transformed Snapchat and the L.A. Rams

(15:44) How to become a more positive leader

(18:41) Why do so many leaders struggle with positive leadership?

(21:48) This week’s one next step: Hear more from Jon and Tricia on Jon’s podcast, “Positive University.”

Jon Gordon:

We’re not positive because life is easy. We’re positive because life is hard. And one thing I know is being positive doesn’t just make you better; it makes everyone around you better. So as you become a more positive person, as you feed yourself, you’re then able to feed others. And if you don’t have it, you can’t share it. So it’s essential that you feed yourself each day to be able to feed others.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Welcome to One Next Step, the most practical business podcast in the world. You’re now one simple tip, practical tool and small step away from growing your business. One Next Step is brought to you by BELAY, the incredible 100% remote organization revolutionizing productivity with virtual assistance, bookkeepers and social media managers. Accomplish more, juggle less. Modern staffing from BELAY. And now to your hosts.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Welcome to One Next Step, the practical business podcast that helps you run your business, so it stops running you. I’m Ryan, and today, we’ve got a very exciting guest interview for you. You see, our CEO here at BELAY, Tricia Sciortino, is sitting down with author and speaker Jon Gordon about the power of positive leadership. As a leader, you may struggle to balance positivity with seeing things as they actually are, but Jon argues that positive leadership is the key to transforming both your organization and the world around you. The conversation is so full of value for any leader, regardless of your position or the number of people you lead. You’re definitely going to want a notebook handy to take lots of notes. Let’s not waste any more time. Let’s jump right into it.

Tricia Sciortino:

Hey, Jon. It’s so good to spend this time with you today. Welcome to the podcast.

Jon Gordon:

Tricia, great to be with you.

Tricia Sciortino:

Yes, yes, yes. Before we get started talking about all things positivity, and actually, I can’t wait for this conversation, I wanted to ask you. You’ve written, gosh, 25 books. Is that right?

Jon Gordon:

26 now, because the sale came out just recently.

Tricia Sciortino:

Oh, okay. 26 books. And you’re very well known for all the things we’re going to talk about here in a minute. But what I wanted to ask you before we get started is what do you do for fun? What are your hobbies? What is your favorite hobby when you’re not being Jon Gordon?

Jon Gordon:

Yeah. That’s a great question. I do love to walk every day. I don’t know if walking is a hobby, but I do walk every morning, and while I’m walking, I practice gratitude. I’ll also just talk on the phone, call friends, reach out to them. So I pretty much do that every day. I love to play pickleball, which I’ve been doing a lot more lately.

Tricia Sciortino:

That’s the newest sport. That’s the thing, is pickleball.

Jon Gordon:

Big time. And I’m from Long Island, from New York. I was an athlete. So very competitive. So I find friends that I could play with, and some of them are other business leaders, other speakers, other people that are doing this kind of work. Others are just friends back from Florida where I play, or I’ll play in California with friends. So I’m big in pickleball. Also, I love tennis and I love basketball. So I would say anything sports are definitely my hobbies. Or also, I love to read and movies. I love movies.

Tricia Sciortino:

Oh, yeah. I’m a movie buff. I love a good movie. I am a book-or-movie person. I’m a movie girl.

Jon Gordon:

What do you like better, the movie or the book? When you watch a movie, do you like the book better?

Tricia Sciortino:

Yeah. No, I like the movie. I’m such a movie girl. Yes.

Jon Gordon:

That’s awesome.

Tricia Sciortino:

Yes. I’m such a movie girl. Yeah. There’s something about I get lost in a movie. I really get lost in a movie. I’m like blinders on. My husband tries to talk to me mid movie. He’s one of those guys who’s talking at me in the movie, and I’m like, “No, don’t talk. I’m very focused on what’s happening in the scene.” But yeah, I love a great movie.

Tricia Sciortino:

Well, I could tell already by all the things you said you love to do as hobbies that it makes perfect sense that we would sit here today and then talk about what it means to be optimistic and positive in life and how leaders can really leverage that as a tool at work. So I’d love it if you would just start us off and talk to us a little bit about what really the definition is for you and what positivity actually means from your perspective.

Jon Gordon:

That’s such a great question because people often assume it’s Pollyanna positive. It’s about seeing the world through rose-colored glasses, but it’s more about having the power to overcome the thorns. It’s not about ignoring reality. It’s about maintaining optimism, belief and faith in order to create a better reality. And it’s definitely not about sugarcoating the situation. It’s okay to say, “This stinks, this isn’t good. We’re going through a tough time right now.” But how will we overcome? We’re not going to allow negativity to sour our situation. We’re going to find a way forward. We’re going to be optimistic. We’re going to believe the best is yet to come. And through that resilience and that grit and that belief, we’re going to find a solution instead of complaining. We’re going to find an opportunity in the midst of the challenge, and we’re going to look for ways to grow and get better.

Jon Gordon:

So when you go into a challenge, what can we learn from this? How can we grow from this? How can we get better because of this? When you go into a challenge in your life or major adversity, you have to find that belief and that optimism to keep going, because sometimes you want to give up. We get discouraged. But the answer to the discouragement is encouragement, and the word encourage means to put courage into. I would say, when you encourage yourself, you put encourage into yourself. And when you encourage others, you’re put encourage into them. So encouragement for yourself and for others is essential in terms of how you do things in life.

Jon Gordon:

So people think, again, it’s someone who ignores problems. You can look at the problem and say, “This is a problem. I’m not going to ignore it, but I’m going to find a way to deal with it and get better.” So when we talk in terms of leadership, in terms of teams, in terms of being great, you need optimism, you need belief, you need positivity to be your best as a leader and to be your best as a team, because positive leaders bring out the best in their teams, and they believe in their teams more than they believe in themselves.

Jon Gordon:

And I work with the Rams, for instance. Sean McVay is a positive leader. Worked with Clemson Football. Dabo Swinney is a positive leader. Cori Close, UCLA, she is a positive leader. Donna Orender turned around the WNBA years ago. Her positive leadership did that. I can give you countless examples of positive leaders. They’re the ones who transform their teams, organizations and ultimately change the world.

Tricia Sciortino:

Yeah. Wow. I love that. It is truly… And I like how you talk a little bit about the fact that we’re not ignoring that life is hard. Life is hard. Leadership is really hard. Leading people is really hard. The world we live in these days is hard. So it’s not about not aligning or ignoring the fact that those things are true, but looking for the opportunities to turn those challenges into next-level problem-solving. And so it’s great that you’re out there talking to leaders and people about the reality that life is hard, but how you handle life, picking yourself up, dusting yourself off and continuing to move forward is really the encouragement you give. So I love it.

Jon Gordon:

Yeah. I often say that we’re not positive because life is easy. We’re positive because life is hard. And one thing I know is being positive doesn’t just make you better; it makes everyone around you better. So as you become a more positive person, as you feed yourself, you’re then able to feed others. And if you don’t have it, you can’t share it. So it’s essential that you feed yourself each day to be able to feed others.

Jon Gordon:

So you wake up in the morning, like I do, I take that walk. I practice gratitude. The research shows you can’t be stressed and thankful at the same time. So if you’re feeling grateful, you won’t feel stressed. So I do that. I come back. I have flooded my body and brain with positive emotions that uplift me rather than the stress hormones that solely drain me, and I create a fertile mind that is ready for great things to happen. Do that day in and day out, and then over time, you become someone who’s resilient. You have more grip, and then you’re better able to take on the challenges to lead your team, to feed them, to encourage them, to develop a relationship with them, to help them be their best.

Jon Gordon:

I always say, how can you lead someone if you don’t know them? How can you motivate someone if you don’t know what motivates them? So part of leadership is also getting to know your team, and the more positive you are, you want to get to know your team and invest in them and pour into them and guide them. So positive leadership is not just a state of mind that makes you feel better. It’s a state of action that makes people around you better.

Tricia Sciortino:

Right. There’s a quote out there, and I’m totally going to butcher this, that goes something along the lines of unexpressed gratitude is ingratitude.

Jon Gordon:

That’s good.

Tricia Sciortino:

Something along those same lines. If it’s not said or shown or expressed, it doesn’t exist. And so really putting it out into the world is what’s going to make it work truly. And who wants to hang out with negative Nancy [inaudible 00:08:59] man or lady? Nobody, right? I mean, getting behind a leader who is looking ahead versus wallowing in what we’re sitting in or what’s behind us is, I mean, I know that’s where I want to be. So I love that.

Jon Gordon:

Yep.

Tricia Sciortino:

You must have a lot of stories of organizations who have been very successful at this and maybe some who maybe you’ve seen failure here. Would you have a story that you could share maybe of an organization or a leader that you’ve seen really use positivity to support or maybe implement great change?

Jon Gordon:

Well, just a great example of that is Snapchat, Evan Spiegel. Evan reached out to me after he read my book, Power of Positive Leadership, and it’d just come out, and I went up to go speak to his leadership team. On my way there, I’m like, okay, these are some of the smartest people on the planet. What can I say to them that they haven’t heard before? I said, “Evan, should I talk about the cost-benefits analysis of positivity? Should I share the latest research and data that shows that positive leaders are able to go under the support of their team and move them in the right direction and all the latest research and benefits of positive leadership?” He said, “Jon, Instagram is coming after our business. Wall Street is beating us down. The marketplace is just destroying us right now.” He said, “Pessimism is seeping into our pores. Just help us stay positive.”

Jon Gordon:

And I knew right then and there, okay, I had to share their framework. I told stories. I shared the research and really made the case for positive leadership. I left. And then fast forward a few months ago, I was visiting his 150 global leaders to speak again. That was 2018. Here we are now, and I’m speaking to them, and all these new global leaders, he wanted them to embrace positive leadership, came to see me in the green room and said, “Jon, you came at such a crucial time. Our stock price was $4 a share. We were really struggling. Many were wondering if we were going to make it. We embraced positive leadership as a company, as a leadership team. It was a game changer for us. It changed everything. And we really focused on our business. We stopped worrying about the negativity. We stopped looking at the outside.” I always talk about leading from the inside out. “We focus on what we can control. We focus on belief and optimism for what we were creating, leading with positivity, no more pessimism.” He said it was a game changer.

Jon Gordon:

And if you watch them over the last number of years, I mean, they skyrocketed. About a year ago or less, they were $80 a share recently with the crash in the market. Everyone’s gone down, so they’ve gone down, but it was amazing the success they had over the pandemic. So it really turned things around. So that’s a great success story.

Jon Gordon:

Also, the Rams are a great story. When Sean McVey became the head coach of the LA Rams, I met with him and he was 30 years old, and he had just gotten the job. And there we were in the Fairmont Hotel in Santa Monica, and we talked for six hours on leadership. We talked about culture. We talked about the values and principles that he wanted to share and create and build off of and what what he wanted his culture and team to be. And he created a pyramid, like John Wooden’s pyramid, and in the middle of that pyramid was “We, not me. We, not me.”

Jon Gordon:

So I spoke to the team in the next few years, would talk to Sean often and watched him just lead in incredible ways. And he grew and grew and grew and really embraced positive leadership. Fast forward to the Super Bowl, right before that, they’re playing the 49ers in a playoff game, and there is Odell Beckham Jr. on the sidelines, a camera captured. This is a great video clip, and he is shouting “We, not me. We, not me. We not me.”

Tricia Sciortino:

I remember that.

Jon Gordon:

And I’m watching that, and I go, “That’s it.” I said, “The things we talked about five years ago was now being implemented and ingrained in a player that had just joined the team in week 10 of the season.” And Odell Beckham Jr., OBJ was not known as a We guy with the Browns and the Giants.

Tricia Sciortino:

Sure, for sure.

Jon Gordon:

So I saw the culture now come to life. I saw positive leadership come to life first hand, and seeing that was so powerful. I said, they’re going to win a super bowl because I knew that they were ingraining the principles and the culture that Sean had talked about five years ago, and he did a masterful job, an incredible job of demonstrating positive leadership and reinforcing the culture and the values.

Jon Gordon:

And so often, we don’t reinforce it. I work with In-N-Out Burger. One of the things I love that I get to do is I work with some of the greatest companies and leaders on the planet. So I learn so much from them. You go to In-N-Out Burger and you see a company that’s relentlessly focused on their culture, and they will not even let you make a hamburger unless you’ve been there for a year. They only hire from within. So you have to work there for several years before you can become a manager, and they are focused on positive leadership. Now, ingraining that book into their culture, in an organization in a big way. I’ve got a number of events with them.And so it’s cool to watch these organizations lead in a positive way, embrace it, then to see the culture come to life, and then you see the success and the results.

Jon Gordon:

Clemson Football, been working with them for the last 10 years. Dabo Swinney is the most positive leader I’ve ever seen actually. And winning two national championships, that program was built on belief. I mean so many stories I can tell you just with Clemson of that journey with them. I was on the sidelines when they won the national championship, one of the greatest moments of my life to see this team overcome all their adversity, obstacles. Alabama scores with two minutes left. Clemson comes out and wins the game with four seconds left. Pure optimism, pure belief, pure positivity, changing the game.

Tricia Sciortino:

I’m used to doing the bookkeeping and the scheduling and client calls and the actual deliverables, and to hand that over was kind of nerve-wracking because my name’s on all of this, and it felt a little bit like a leap of faith. I just trusted the process, and I proved me right, that he’s worthy of my complete trust, and he has made my business so much better and working like clockwork and just, I feel like my clients are taken better care of now that we have more than just one person on the line.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Their story can be your story too, and all it takes is one next step to get started. You shouldn’t have to do everything, and with a BELAY virtual assistant, you don’t have to. Visit belaysolutions.com today to start accomplishing more and juggling less.

Tricia Sciortino:

So if there’s somebody who’s listening right now and saying, “I need some of that in my leadership, in my organization,” would you offer any practical next steps, right? Somebody’s recognized that maybe there’s a shift that needs to happen for them and their leadership or their organization. Are there a few key things they can do to get started?

Jon Gordon:

Yeah. I mean, one, we have a positive leadership challenge. So you can actually take that challenge. It’s a free challenge, and it’s a seven-day challenge. Do one thing a day to be a more positive leader. So positiveleadershipchallenge.com. You can go to that website and just do that challenge.

Jon Gordon:

You can also start by, I would recommend… I’m not trying to be self-promotional, but read The Power of Positive Leadership. That’s why I wrote it because you’re going to be able to get ideas and principles and practices. This is not just about Sean’s story or Dabo story or Donna’s story. This is not your story. How can you be a more positive leader? What are the tips and strategies?

Jon Gordon:

So start every day on a practice to feed yourself each day. Do one thing each day that starts to feed others in a positive way where you can start to do that practice. It’s amazing what happens when we see leaders do that, when I give keynotes, when we do our trainings. We have a full-day training program that we do and leaders come. The keynote, obviously, I’m there to encourage, inspire, tell great stories, but then I want you to take away a few things you’re going to do immediately to be a more positive leader. So that’s key. So reading the book is key.

Jon Gordon:

And then one thing I love is, on a scale of 1 to 10, how positive of a leader are you? On a scale of one to 10? Just evaluate yourself. And then what would make it a 10? What are some things you can do to improve? Communication with your team, to better communicate, which is a key part of positive leadership. Ask your team on a scale of one to 10, how well do I communicate with you? And then what would make it a 10. They’re going to give you great ideas, great feedback on what you could do better-

Tricia Sciortino:

Oh, that’s good.

Jon Gordon:

… to be a better… We do this in our training. I’m giving some tips and some things from our training, but it’s so much fun when people do this in their training and evaluate themselves. Then they ask their teams to evaluate them. And then the key is the “What would make it a 10?” That’s where the gem is. It’s not, “All right. You’re seven or an eight.” The difference between a seven or eight or a 10 is what you could do better, and everybody always gets good ideas of what they can do to be a better leader. I did this with my kids, my wife. They gave me a million ideas of what I could do better, and that’s okay, right? It’s okay. We’re all here to improve. I am not perfect by no means, even though I write these books, right? I’m from Long Island, New York.

Tricia Sciortino:

You’re not a 10? Come on, Jon.

Jon Gordon:

Long Island, New York. I can get fired up sometimes.1 I got to be careful. And so I’ve had to learn again. I’ve had to learn a key part of leadership – love tough. Not tough love. I used to lead tough love. Now, I lead love tough. If your team knows you love them, you earn the right to challenge them, to help them be great.

Tricia Sciortino:

Oh, that is good. I’m writing down some mental notes myself from this one. Okay. So final question. Where do you see most leaders struggle? Where are leaders getting this wrong? Is there just this one place where you see over and over again-

Jon Gordon:

There’s-

Tricia Sciortino:

… a miss?

Jon Gordon:

… several, several ways. One, they don’t believe in positive leadership. They think it’s rah-rah. They think it’s motivational. They think it’s soft, and they don’t realize how it produces incredible results. So one, they discount the power of positive leadership because they think it’s just motivational leadership technique. They don’t understand what it really is. So I’ve written a lot on that recently in my free newsletter I send out every week, and I’ve been driving that because I’m tired of people discounting positive leadership, trying to say it’s toxic positivity or Pollyanna positive, or we’re really not about results, not because you believe the best is yet to come. You have this optimism and belief in the future. You’re going to give your best and build the best team to create the best outcome.

Jon Gordon:

You don’t have to choose between positivity and winning. Positivity leads to winning, and being positive doesn’t mean you ignore the problem. Though most leaders, that’s the big challenge, they ignore the problems. They ignore the negativity. Positive leaders address the negativity on a team, in an organization. As part of our framework, you address it. The goal is to transform it, neutralize it, or remove it. And if you’re sabotaged in the team and culture, we will give you a chance to succeed and to rise up and to be a better leader. We’re going to care about you, invest in you and coach you, but if you’re not willing to change and you’re hurting the team, you have to go. You have to get off the bus. And that’s reality, and that is real leadership.

Jon Gordon:

So I think the biggest mistake leaders make is that, and they also don’t address the negativity that exists in their organizations and teams, that’s a big challenge, and they don’t focus on the culture. Most leaders think the culture’s just going to happen, but you have to intentionally focus on it, build it and live it. And if you think about it, right, this culture that you’re trying to create, it’s like the fruit and the root. Focus on the fruit of the tree. Focus on the outcome, the numbers, the stock price, the wins and the losses. Ignore the root, the tree dies, and so with culture. Invest in the root. Make it your number one priority. You’ll get a great supplier fruit.

Tricia Sciortino:

The fruit will come. Yes. Amen. I mean, we are practicers and believers in great culture. Great culture equals great results. It flows downstream. So Jon, this has been amazing. I would love it if you wouldn’t mind sticking around for one more bonus question. I want to talk to you and ask you a question about inspiring positivity in your team. Sound good? You mind?

Jon Gordon:

Love it.

Tricia Sciortino:

All right, guys. Awesome. Great. Well, guys, you don’t want to miss this. To hear that clip, subscribe to our email list, and we will send you a link to our bonus content, or you can visit onenextsteppodcast.com where you can find a link in our show notes.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Wow. What a great conversation. We are so grateful Jon took the time to join us. Tricia and Jon realized they are both from Long Island originally. So I think they probably could have talked for a few hours if we let them.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Each week, we offer One Next Step for our listeners, and today, you can hear more from Jon and Tricia by checking out her interview on Jon’s podcast, Positive University. You can find that at positiveuniversity.com/episode.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Well, thank you so much for tuning in for this week’s One Next Step. To make sure you never miss an episode, subscribe on Apple Podcasts or follow us on Spotify. And if you’re ready to start accomplishing more and juggling less, go to belaysolutions.com. For more episodes, show notes and helpful resources, visit onenextsteppodcast.com.

Ryan Fitzgerald:

Join us next week for my conversation with Brian Dodd, Director of New Ministry Relationships at Injoy Stewardship Solutions. He’ll chat with us about all things leadership – from how to measure effective leadership, building winning cultures, questions we should be asking our teams, and a whole lot more. Here’s a quick preview.

Brian Dodd:

If we’re not consistent as leaders, we cause the people we lead to have schizophrenia, because they never know who’s walking in that door. They never know if that decision’s the correct decision. They never know how somebody’s going to be treated or if a good decision today is a bad decision tomorrow. The best thing you can do to create winning cultures and develop people who will be high performers is create a culture and a climate of consistency.