The Secret to Building Real Trust in Business with Carl Walsh | RR323

Janice Porter: 00:00:02

Carl, Hello everyone, and welcome to this

Janice Porter: 00:00:04

week's episode of relationships rule. Today's guest brings an

Janice Porter: 00:00:09

unexpected blend of business savvy and stagecraft to the

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world of small business leadership. Carl Walsh, my guest

Janice Porter: 00:00:15

is an award winning actor, seasoned corporate director and

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small business coach who believes that the strongest

Janice Porter: 00:00:22

relationships and the greatest successes start from within. As

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co host of the oval table project, podcast, sorry podcast,

Janice Porter: 00:00:31

and co founder of alpha dogs business coaching, Carl works

Janice Porter: 00:00:34

with entrepreneurs and business leaders to foster open

Janice Porter: 00:00:38

communication, critical thinking and creativity. In this episode,

Janice Porter: 00:00:43

we're going to look at how lessons from the theater, like

Janice Porter: 00:00:46

presence, empathy and trust can shape thriving teams and help

Janice Porter: 00:00:49

businesses flourish from the inside out. It makes me think of

Janice Porter: 00:00:52

a a cartoon movie that I keep wanting to see called Inside

Janice Porter: 00:00:57

Out. This has got lots of lessons. Yeah. So welcome to the

Janice Porter: 00:01:01

show. Carl,

Carl Walsh: 00:01:03

well, thank you. And by by the way, oval table

Carl Walsh: 00:01:06

project, I kind of like that. They work on that. Feel free to

Carl Walsh: 00:01:10

use it.

Janice Porter: 00:01:10

Okay, yeah, slip of the tongue. Can you never

Janice Porter: 00:01:13

know what that can mean and bring Yeah. So where should we

Janice Porter: 00:01:18

start? I think I'd like to start with the fact that you've had

Janice Porter: 00:01:21

actually, and you and I when we first spoke, which I love to do

Janice Porter: 00:01:24

before I have guests on my podcast. I don't like going in

Janice Porter: 00:01:27

blind. I like to feel I'm starting to build a relationship

Janice Porter: 00:01:30

before we come onto the podcast. And when we did have our chat, I

Janice Porter: 00:01:35

was enamored with your years in the theater and in England and

Janice Porter: 00:01:40

Royal Dramatic School of Royal Academy of Dramatic Yeah, in

Janice Porter: 00:01:45

London. And, you know, shared with you some some of my stories

Janice Porter: 00:01:50

about theater and how I love it and don't get enough of it. So I

Janice Porter: 00:01:53

want to know from your unique journey, oh, I've got it written

Janice Porter: 00:01:59

down. See, I should have said it right from the Royal Academy of

Janice Porter: 00:02:01

Dramatic Arts in London to being an IT director and a podcast

Janice Porter: 00:02:06

host and a business coach. What's the through line that

Janice Porter: 00:02:10

connects all those roles for you?

Carl Walsh: 00:02:13

Oddly enough, it is relationships. Is when I went

Carl Walsh: 00:02:21

through acting, the relationships that you form with

Carl Walsh: 00:02:25

the people that you work with, you start working on the

Carl Walsh: 00:02:29

relationships between the characters. That's the glue that

Carl Walsh: 00:02:33

holds every play, every film, everything that that happens on

Carl Walsh: 00:02:39

stage or in front of a camera, is all about the relationships

Carl Walsh: 00:02:43

between the characters, even an Arnold Schwarzenegger action

Carl Walsh: 00:02:47

movie, it's all about the relationships between the

Carl Walsh: 00:02:51

characters. When I became a director on stage, again, it was

Carl Walsh: 00:03:00

their relationships that we're trying to find, and the

Carl Walsh: 00:03:04

relationships between the director and the cast. Because,

Carl Walsh: 00:03:08

remember, I have a vision as a director, and I'm trying to to

Carl Walsh: 00:03:13

get everybody on board with that vision. So I'm trying to work

Carl Walsh: 00:03:21

everybody towards that, and that needs relationships like crazy.

Carl Walsh: 00:03:27

It really does.

Janice Porter: 00:03:28

Yeah, I can see that. Can I stop you there for a

Janice Porter: 00:03:30

second? Sure makes me think. And I love this, this angle in that

Janice Porter: 00:03:34

I listen to a fair number of podcasts, but I listen to the

Janice Porter: 00:03:39

entertainment kind of podcast in particular, one called Smart

Janice Porter: 00:03:43

List, which is three crazy guys that interview people in the

Janice Porter: 00:03:47

film industry, in the entertainment industry, and

Janice Porter: 00:03:50

quite often they have directors on and celebrities and movie

Janice Porter: 00:03:55

stars and whatever. And something that you just said

Janice Porter: 00:03:59

kind of made me think from that experience as well, listening is

Janice Porter: 00:04:03

so you would have to, as an actor, you're going to bring,

Janice Porter: 00:04:08

the actors are going to bring to the role what they perceive they

Janice Porter: 00:04:13

should build the character to be. But now as the and then,

Janice Porter: 00:04:17

between their personal one and the person they're acting

Janice Porter: 00:04:20

opposite, those have to jive. And then your your position as

Janice Porter: 00:04:26

an director brings in, okay, wait a minute, guys, that's

Janice Porter: 00:04:29

great. But my vision is this, so, so you're like the

Carl Walsh: 00:04:34

and you can't do it like that. Yeah, cannot do it

Carl Walsh: 00:04:37

like like that. You Q, you cannot say, wait a minute,

Carl Walsh: 00:04:41

right? This is my vision, right? Yeah, you, you have to find what

Carl Walsh: 00:04:47

their vision is and then move it gently, yes, because, right,

Carl Walsh: 00:04:53

yeah, cuz you and you can't have 12 different visions up up

Carl Walsh: 00:04:57

there. You have to move everybody into a. Cohesive

Carl Walsh: 00:05:00

vision. Do you see where I'm going as far as business goes? I

Janice Porter: 00:05:04

was just going to say that absolutely yes, it

Janice Porter: 00:05:06

starts to influence the way you approach leadership and business

Carl Walsh: 00:05:09

community. I can, I can give you a perfect example

Carl Walsh: 00:05:13

of what happened on on stage to me once, and how it translates

Carl Walsh: 00:05:17

in into business and and I think people will recognize this if

Carl Walsh: 00:05:22

they've if they've had this. I My first Shakespearean lead in

Carl Walsh: 00:05:27

London, an American doing a Shakespearean. Yes, in London.

Carl Walsh: 00:05:31

Do you think I was nervous? And it was The Winter's Tale, which

Carl Walsh: 00:05:36

is a one of Shakespeare's, what they call a problem play,

Carl Walsh: 00:05:43

because it's a little strange. Okay,

Janice Porter: 00:05:45

I don't know that one. It must be not one of the

Janice Porter: 00:05:47

most popular, right? So,

Carl Walsh: 00:05:49

well, it's, it is in England, it is. It is done

Carl Walsh: 00:05:53

relatively frequently. But you know, it's not Hamlet or Romeo

Carl Walsh: 00:05:58

and Juliet. So I'm a 21 year old, 22 year old actor playing

Carl Walsh: 00:06:07

this middle aged King who is absolutely shot through with

Carl Walsh: 00:06:12

jealousy and hatred, and these are emotions I don't understand

Carl Walsh: 00:06:18

at that age. Well, our director, we would we were actually

Carl Walsh: 00:06:28

rehearsing upstairs at a pub in the afternoon, and that's not

Carl Walsh: 00:06:34

unusual, but he would sit in the back of the room, and he always

Carl Walsh: 00:06:39

had a pint of beer in his hand, and he would sit there and drink

Carl Walsh: 00:06:45

those pints. And we would rehearse a scene and look at him

Carl Walsh: 00:06:53

and wait for him to say something, and he would say,

Carl Walsh: 00:06:58

Yeah, fine, fine. Next scene, and we got no direction from

Carl Walsh: 00:07:03

him. What so ever? God, none. Yeah. And, you know, at first

Carl Walsh: 00:07:10

we're thinking, gosh, we must be pretty good, right? And all the

Carl Walsh: 00:07:16

rehearsals went like that. We got no direction whatsoever. And

Carl Walsh: 00:07:21

we're, we're struggling to get through this. And I finally

Carl Walsh: 00:07:26

developed an attitude of, why was I given this lead in this

Carl Walsh: 00:07:29

terrible play? I, you know, it's, it's just awful. We're

Carl Walsh: 00:07:33

awful. This is a disaster that we're heading towards. Ever feel

Carl Walsh: 00:07:38

that in business? And of course, opening night came, and you

Carl Walsh: 00:07:45

always hope it'll work out on opening night, just like they

Carl Walsh: 00:07:49

keep saying in Shakespeare and love, that's that. And of

Carl Walsh: 00:07:53

course, it was a disaster. Just, just awful, just Gosh. So I go

Carl Walsh: 00:07:59

to the canteen as a at the Academy, and I go up to the bar,

Carl Walsh: 00:08:03

and there he is, about three feet away from me, and he looks

Carl Walsh: 00:08:09

over at at me, and he says, Where do you suppose we went

Carl Walsh: 00:08:14

wrong?

Janice Porter: 00:08:16

Oh my gosh,

Carl Walsh: 00:08:18

it's a good thing murder is illegal, because one

Carl Walsh: 00:08:21

would have happened right then and there,

Janice Porter: 00:08:23

oh my goodness, and

Carl Walsh: 00:08:27

all, all the years since then, I've held a grudge

Carl Walsh: 00:08:31

against that play.

Janice Porter: 00:08:33

Yes, I'm sure was, were you a student then? Or

Janice Porter: 00:08:35

were you Yes? Yes, okay, yes, great. He didn't help so much,

Janice Porter: 00:08:39

okay, but in a way he did, yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:08:41

and then recently, I heard an audio version of Judi

Carl Walsh: 00:08:45

Dench, his book that that she recently wrote, and it just so

Carl Walsh: 00:08:50

happens that the Winter's Tale is one of her absolute favorite

Carl Walsh: 00:08:53

plays, and she describes what it's about and what the

Carl Walsh: 00:08:56

relationships between the characters are and what's

Carl Walsh: 00:09:01

driving this man and what's driving the other people. And I

Carl Walsh: 00:09:05

realize it really is one of Shakespeare's most beautiful

Carl Walsh: 00:09:08

plays,

Janice Porter: 00:09:09

interesting.

Carl Walsh: 00:09:11

And now, now I wish I could do the play,

Janice Porter: 00:09:14

yes, and what a disservice, in a way, that that

Janice Porter: 00:09:17

director did he get fired? Did you guys all

Carl Walsh: 00:09:22

Well, I did let the let the principal of the academy

Carl Walsh: 00:09:27

know. Don't ever let anybody work under him again. Oh my

Carl Walsh: 00:09:31

gosh. Don't do that to people,

Janice Porter: 00:09:33

yeah. But great lesson there, for sure, yeah.

Janice Porter: 00:09:36

So, so I'm just going to mention your podcast, the oval table,

Janice Porter: 00:09:44

and in it, I think you emphasize you interview groups of people

Janice Porter: 00:09:49

correct around a table.

Carl Walsh: 00:09:51

No, no, we the oval table is our concept on how to

Carl Walsh: 00:09:58

run a small business, or. Or a division of a large business,

Carl Walsh: 00:10:04

business. Our belief is, and I certainly saw it when I worked

Carl Walsh: 00:10:10

with Disney, you have a brain trust right there. In many ways,

Carl Walsh: 00:10:19

you don't need a consultant. You You don't need you have it right

Carl Walsh: 00:10:24

there, and it's often ignored. It's usually ignored. So in a

Carl Walsh: 00:10:29

small business, you have the guy at the loading dock. He's a

Carl Walsh: 00:10:36

thinking, sentient human being. He has ideas. Are you bringing

Carl Walsh: 00:10:42

him into the decision making process? You have people in the

Carl Walsh: 00:10:46

warehouse. Are you bringing them the receptionist, bringing them

Carl Walsh: 00:10:52

in because they have contact with your vendors, with the

Carl Walsh: 00:10:57

public. They're the first

Janice Porter: 00:10:59

line of contact for anybody who Right, yeah.

Carl Walsh: 00:11:02

And those people usually are not brought brought

Carl Walsh: 00:11:06

in. And if they aren't well, they're just swallowing their

Carl Walsh: 00:11:08

ideas, right? And, okay, first of all, you are wasting that

Carl Walsh: 00:11:18

brain power and that talent, yeah. Second of all, are you

Carl Walsh: 00:11:25

retaining them? Probably not. And how much does it cost to

Carl Walsh: 00:11:30

replace people?

Janice Porter: 00:11:34

Third, you're not wielding their their sense of

Janice Porter: 00:11:39

pride in what I do, and so on.

Carl Walsh: 00:11:41

So they don't have any skin in the game, right,

Carl Walsh: 00:11:45

right, right? And so are you getting commitment or are you

Carl Walsh: 00:11:52

getting compliance? And which one's better,

Janice Porter: 00:11:56

right? Yeah, my note says here that you

Janice Porter: 00:11:59

emphasize respectful disagreement and listening, and

Janice Porter: 00:12:02

I would say, probably active listening, right, right, and,

Janice Porter: 00:12:07

and so. So then your podcast and what brings in people, we

Carl Walsh: 00:12:13

bring in we bring in business experts and everything

Carl Walsh: 00:12:18

from authors to actual business professionals to talk about how

Carl Walsh: 00:12:26

they do it. Got it okay? And I, for instance, I brought in my VP

Carl Walsh: 00:12:34

that I worked for at Disney, who I thought was just, just one of

Carl Walsh: 00:12:39

the best people in the world that you could ever, ever work

Carl Walsh: 00:12:42

for. And we, we, we talked about how he did it. And it's that it,

Carl Walsh: 00:12:49

we have 49 episodes where we brought in people like like

Carl Walsh: 00:12:53

that, to talk about how, what is the correct way to run a

Carl Walsh: 00:13:00

business, and it was very interesting, because all of them

Carl Walsh: 00:13:03

had a through line that ended up at the oval table.

Janice Porter: 00:13:11

So you you've already mentioned Disney twice,

Janice Porter: 00:13:15

and I've had another gentleman on my podcast, Vance Morris, who

Janice Porter: 00:13:20

worked for Disney for many years in his early days. And you both,

Janice Porter: 00:13:25

I know, have spoken about the same thing. It really is the

Janice Porter: 00:13:29

best place on earth to work there too, right? Because they

Janice Porter: 00:13:33

have such great what leadership. They have great philosophies and

Janice Porter: 00:13:41

strategies, right? Teach you, and it's a great place to to get

Janice Porter: 00:13:45

great business experience. Do you want to talk about that for

Janice Porter: 00:13:49

a minute? Yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:13:50

sure, sure. I can give you examples of of what

Carl Walsh: 00:13:53

they did when I was there. I can't speak to the what the

Carl Walsh: 00:13:56

company is today, though they're doing pretty well.

Janice Porter: 00:14:00

Yeah? Yeah, I think so

Carl Walsh: 00:14:04

they're doing pretty well. I always say

Janice Porter: 00:14:07

there's only, like, five to six companies in

Janice Porter: 00:14:10

the world that own everything, and they're one of them. So

Carl Walsh: 00:14:12

yeah, right, right. So in the IT department there,

Carl Walsh: 00:14:18

what we did, we considered the and and I worked for the Disney

Carl Walsh: 00:14:25

Stores. Right when I stood, when I started there, there were 106

Carl Walsh: 00:14:31

65 stores. And I thought, when I walked in there, 165 Disney

Carl Walsh: 00:14:37

Stores. Jeez. How many does the world need? Yeah, when I left

Carl Walsh: 00:14:41

there, there were over 600 Wow. And we opened up all the

Carl Walsh: 00:14:46

countries that they eventually went, went into. I had a blast

Carl Walsh: 00:14:50

doing that. They sent me around the world. They sent me to work

Carl Walsh: 00:14:53

in England. They said, Let's send Carl. He speaks the

Carl Walsh: 00:14:56

language I. Um, but what we did is we considered everybody in

Carl Walsh: 00:15:03

that Corp, corporate headquarters and our stores,

Carl Walsh: 00:15:06

they're our customers, and we treated them as our customers.

Carl Walsh: 00:15:10

They were your customers. Absolutely they were Yeah. And

Carl Walsh: 00:15:13

every two weeks, we had a meeting with the heads, or at

Carl Walsh: 00:15:18

least the representatives, of every department in the

Carl Walsh: 00:15:23

corporate headquarters. And what we did is we sat down, and we

Carl Walsh: 00:15:28

always had had a list of the projects that they needed us to

Carl Walsh: 00:15:33

do, and we sat down and they got to decide what is the most

Carl Walsh: 00:15:40

important project for the corporation and some of their

Carl Walsh: 00:15:45

projects, yeah, some of their projects never rose to the top,

Carl Walsh: 00:15:49

but they made the decision, right? So if your project never

Carl Walsh: 00:15:54

made it to the top, you understood why, and you probably

Carl Walsh: 00:16:01

didn't vote for it to go to the top, okay? And because you

Carl Walsh: 00:16:06

understood, yeah. And this got us so much buy in that that it

Carl Walsh: 00:16:15

kept everybody so happy with what we were doing, and we could

Carl Walsh: 00:16:19

give them up updates on when they can expect completion. What

Carl Walsh: 00:16:26

stages were we in? We we gave them a complete update on the

Carl Walsh: 00:16:32

top projects and where they were. I didn't see that in any

Carl Walsh: 00:16:37

other company I ever worked for. It said, Well, this is

Carl Walsh: 00:16:41

important,

Janice Porter: 00:16:43

and yeah, that you send the list in and they've

Janice Porter: 00:16:47

got the list, and they decide

Carl Walsh: 00:16:49

Yeah, whereas we, we let them decide Yeah.

Janice Porter: 00:16:53

Or my experience once was it still is sometimes

Janice Porter: 00:16:57

is that you, you send your just with a company I'm associated

Janice Porter: 00:17:02

with. You send your your issues in, and they have a list. But

Janice Porter: 00:17:05

then the the CEO takes you, takes them sideways to do a

Janice Porter: 00:17:12

special project, which everything else now has to wait,

Carl Walsh: 00:17:16

right, right? And, and that's typical, yeah, at his

Carl Walsh: 00:17:21

window, right? So, yeah, that's, uh, typical, but let your

Carl Walsh: 00:17:24

customer decide what's important. Yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:17:27

yeah, and, and in your case, it's internal

Janice Porter: 00:17:29

customers. And it's funny, because I used to teach, back in

Janice Porter: 00:17:32

the day, I did corporate training for a telephone

Janice Porter: 00:17:35

company, and we so sold, you know, telephone equipment and

Janice Porter: 00:17:39

voicemail equipment to the big law firms and hydro and all the

Janice Porter: 00:17:44

big companies and small companies. But we also had kind

Janice Porter: 00:17:47

of a loss leader for those as part of the sale that they could

Janice Porter: 00:17:53

send their their receptionists or their their customer service

Janice Porter: 00:17:58

people to a soft skills seminar, webinar one day, not not webinar

Janice Porter: 00:18:04

seminar that I taught about telephone skills and in person

Janice Porter: 00:18:09

skills and dealing with difficult customers and all of

Janice Porter: 00:18:11

that stuff. But one of the things I remember saying is, if

Janice Porter: 00:18:14

you worked internally, who are your internal customers? They

Janice Porter: 00:18:19

are your customers. And one of the things that the managers

Janice Porter: 00:18:24

would say to me sometimes, because this was a big company,

Janice Porter: 00:18:27

but it was a, you know, lot of worker bees, and you know, the

Janice Porter: 00:18:32

back in the day, the telephone operators and things like that.

Janice Porter: 00:18:36

And so they come into the building and they looked like

Janice Porter: 00:18:39

they were dressed for the nightclub or the beach, not for

Janice Porter: 00:18:42

work, and they'd say, Would you please talk to them about dress?

Janice Porter: 00:18:46

And I said, well, it says it's a touchy subject, you know, you

Janice Porter: 00:18:48

can't really, you have to be careful. However, one of the

Janice Porter: 00:18:53

things I remember saying is, you never know who's going to be

Janice Porter: 00:18:57

walking through your department. Could be the, you know, head of

Janice Porter: 00:19:01

this, that, and the other thing, and you want to make sure that

Janice Porter: 00:19:04

you're dressed beyond what you are right now, so that you can

Janice Porter: 00:19:07

always look to be promoted, etc. But it was a, it was a

Janice Porter: 00:19:11

challenge. But they're internal, right? So they don't think about

Janice Porter: 00:19:14

it. That's just took me back there. That was,

Carl Walsh: 00:19:16

but you see, what, what, what we were doing at

Carl Walsh: 00:19:19

Disney was we were working the relationships, yes, and always

Carl Walsh: 00:19:24

putting that, that relationship first. And no other company that

Carl Walsh: 00:19:29

I worked for did that,

Janice Porter: 00:19:30

yeah, you said, you told me you had an

Janice Porter: 00:19:32

experience after you left Disney, that that definitely

Janice Porter: 00:19:35

resonated with how well you had been.

Carl Walsh: 00:19:39

Yes, yeah, that was a that was a company that was,

Carl Walsh: 00:19:43

it was a collection of silos. Every department was siloed and

Carl Walsh: 00:19:47

at war with all the other silos. And it was, it was a company

Carl Walsh: 00:19:55

that had a virtual i. A virtual lock on the state of California.

Carl Walsh: 00:20:04

It just they were they. I mean, how do you, how do you mess that

Carl Walsh: 00:20:09

up, right? And, and they did. They, they almost went bankrupt,

Carl Walsh: 00:20:15

and it was because they were at war within

Janice Porter: 00:20:19

and is that because of the leadership at the

Janice Porter: 00:20:22

top,

Carl Walsh: 00:20:23

no leadership at the top. You You had people in

Carl Walsh: 00:20:28

charge of departments that had been in charge of those

Carl Walsh: 00:20:30

departments for 3040, years. It was their domain. And don't you

Carl Walsh: 00:20:35

touch my domain. And it was, oh yeah, it was, it was, and had

Carl Walsh: 00:20:41

utter contempt for all the other domains. It was just the end.

Carl Walsh: 00:20:47

After a year, I parted ways with them, and I think they were

Carl Walsh: 00:20:53

quite, quite happy to part ways with me. It was not working at

Carl Walsh: 00:20:58

all.

Janice Porter: 00:20:58

So you're, you've you started, or CO started your

Janice Porter: 00:21:04

company many years ago, alpha dogs,

Carl Walsh: 00:21:07

yes, well, it's, it's, it's fairly recent

Carl Walsh: 00:21:11

business coaching, yeah, we started at six, six years ago.

Carl Walsh: 00:21:15

Okay, and it sort of evolved really. It's, it's, it was, when

Carl Walsh: 00:21:19

we did the podcast. We realized we're on to something here. Got

Carl Walsh: 00:21:25

it first when it when it came, when our ideas kept reflecting

Carl Walsh: 00:21:29

back to us by people who were really good at what they do. We

Carl Walsh: 00:21:34

said, Yeah, we, we, we have something here. And we

Carl Walsh: 00:21:39

identified seven different business personalities that you

Carl Walsh: 00:21:44

should have, right? That you should have sitting around the

Carl Walsh: 00:21:48

table if you can. I mean, some small businesses are too small.

Carl Walsh: 00:21:53

You can't have all and have all seven, but have as many as as

Carl Walsh: 00:21:56

you can, because one of the largest mistakes that small

Carl Walsh: 00:22:00

businesses make when they're hiring is someone walks through

Carl Walsh: 00:22:05

the door and wow, that person thinks just like me. I love that

Carl Walsh: 00:22:10

hire. That person. Big mistake, right? Huge mistake. You. Now, I

Carl Walsh: 00:22:16

know this is a dirty word in some quarters today, but you

Carl Walsh: 00:22:20

want diversity. You want diversity in thought. You want

Carl Walsh: 00:22:24

someone who can see it from a different angle, so that they

Carl Walsh: 00:22:28

contribute something a little bit different, to

Janice Porter: 00:22:31

see things differently. And they have and

Janice Porter: 00:22:33

they have expertise in different areas to right? Well, yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:22:38

right. And what I found at Disney is they took

Carl Walsh: 00:22:43

input from everywhere, and so everyone had input and felt like

Carl Walsh: 00:22:50

they had helped make the decision, even, even if they

Carl Walsh: 00:22:53

went in a different direction from what you put in, but you

Carl Walsh: 00:22:57

felt like you contributed. So when the So, when they said,

Carl Walsh: 00:23:01

student body left, student body went left. Yeah, and that's why

Carl Walsh: 00:23:07

it was so powerful, particularly in the 90s. When I was there,

Carl Walsh: 00:23:11

the company was so powerful because when they said that

Carl Walsh: 00:23:15

direction, everybody went that direction.

Janice Porter: 00:23:19

You know, it's funny, I went to the grocery

Janice Porter: 00:23:22

store the other day and I went to the fish department, and it

Janice Porter: 00:23:26

was a Sunday, and I knew the manager wasn't there, and there

Janice Porter: 00:23:28

were two young people there, one was in the supposed fish area,

Janice Porter: 00:23:33

and the other was in the meat area, and one was doing

Janice Porter: 00:23:37

something, the other one wasn't and he said, Can I help you? And

Janice Porter: 00:23:40

I said, Well, can you answer a fish question? Right? He said,

Janice Porter: 00:23:44

Well, I'm not sure. So as he came over, the girl said to me,

Janice Porter: 00:23:48

Oh, I can help you. So now they're both there, and I said

Janice Porter: 00:23:52

they had some filets of salmon that were this price, and then

Janice Porter: 00:23:57

they had these little sections of a full salmon that were

Janice Porter: 00:24:01

cheaper, right? And I they, you'd have to cut them open, get

Janice Porter: 00:24:05

the bone out, right? And so I said to the girl, could you fill

Janice Porter: 00:24:11

it? It For Me? Now it's cheaper, so I figured it's cheaper

Janice Porter: 00:24:14

because I would have to do it. But I thought there's no harm in

Janice Porter: 00:24:17

asking, because if I know the manager, she might have done it

Janice Porter: 00:24:20

for me, which I do, but she wasn't there. So they looked at

Janice Porter: 00:24:24

each other. First of all, they didn't know how to do it, and

Janice Porter: 00:24:28

second of all, they didn't know whether they should do it or

Janice Porter: 00:24:31

not. And it just made me laugh. And of course, I walked away

Janice Porter: 00:24:34

with nothing, and I said, it might be a good idea for you to

Janice Porter: 00:24:38

check with the manager to see what the options are. Yeah, it

Janice Porter: 00:24:43

was just, I'm constantly looking at customer service things. I

Janice Porter: 00:24:48

can't help myself. But anyway, I just throw that in because and

Carl Walsh: 00:24:52

and in any business, in any business, business, Hey,

Carl Walsh: 00:24:55

folks talk to each other. Yes, yes. I mean. It. It doesn't cost

Carl Walsh: 00:25:01

anything. Talk to

Janice Porter: 00:25:02

each other and What? What? What am I allowed to

Janice Porter: 00:25:09

do? When? What kind of decisions can I make on my own? Yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:25:12

because you look at each other like, Huh? You know, drives me

Janice Porter: 00:25:16

crazy. Anyway. Okay, so in your coaching through Alpha Dog. How

Janice Porter: 00:25:24

do you help business leaders and entrepreneurs and teams go from

Janice Porter: 00:25:29

conflict avoidant or hierarchical, hierarchical to

Janice Porter: 00:25:33

more open and collaborative, right?

Carl Walsh: 00:25:37

Well, the first thing that we feel we need to

Carl Walsh: 00:25:40

do, first of all is, take the temperature, get an idea. Is

Carl Walsh: 00:25:44

information flowing? How does information flow through,

Carl Walsh: 00:25:48

through this organization? How are decisions made? That's

Carl Walsh: 00:25:54

that's where we start. Yeah, so, but

Janice Porter: 00:25:57

wait, I have to stop you there. Sure. Are you

Janice Porter: 00:26:01

doing this individually, privately with each person?

Janice Porter: 00:26:04

Because if they have to, yes, I was going to say, they might not

Janice Porter: 00:26:07

say

Carl Walsh: 00:26:08

yeah, yes, you have to, right? Because if you, if

Carl Walsh: 00:26:12

you talk to people into individually, they're much more

Carl Walsh: 00:26:15

likely to talk Yeah, exactly right, and assure them this is

Carl Walsh: 00:26:21

confidential. We're not gonna Yeah, fair enough. And then then

Carl Walsh: 00:26:25

you find out how that information is flowing, and are

Carl Walsh: 00:26:29

there bottlenecks? Where are the bottlenecks? All right, so once

Carl Walsh: 00:26:33

you do do that, then you start introducing the idea of an oval

Carl Walsh: 00:26:39

table. Got it, and if the company's large enough, maybe

Carl Walsh: 00:26:46

you have a collection of oval tables. Maybe you have a team of

Carl Walsh: 00:26:50

teams. Yep, which is what the Army does and why information

Carl Walsh: 00:26:56

flows so well there. Now it didn't used to, but it does now.

Carl Walsh: 00:27:00

In the army, you have a team of teams, and then once you get

Carl Walsh: 00:27:07

that friction free or frictionless flow of information

Carl Walsh: 00:27:14

going, things start to happen. It's not easy at first. It

Carl Walsh: 00:27:21

really isn't, because it has to be a respectful flow of

Carl Walsh: 00:27:26

information. People have their guard up to start with, and then

Carl Walsh: 00:27:29

that's right and and so it takes a little time that that people

Carl Walsh: 00:27:33

feel it's safe, yes, and it has to be. Once you get that going,

Carl Walsh: 00:27:40

then we have some principles that we outline and we work on

Carl Walsh: 00:27:49

that, that what is a successful business? Business? How do you

Carl Walsh: 00:27:55

how do you know you're successful? And we, we have a

Carl Walsh: 00:28:01

graph I don't want to get, get get into that here, because,

Carl Walsh: 00:28:05

because then we're getting into the nuts and bolts of business.

Carl Walsh: 00:28:08

And really what we want to focus on here are the relationships.

Carl Walsh: 00:28:12

But, but once, once we have the information going and we get the

Carl Walsh: 00:28:17

relationships work, working correctly, then we we start folk

Carl Walsh: 00:28:22

focusing on these principles that that we have. Are you doing

Carl Walsh: 00:28:26

this? Yes, are you making a real profit, or are you doing this

Carl Walsh: 00:28:31

EBITDA stuff that is, is phony profit? Are you? Are you working

Carl Walsh: 00:28:41

with integrity in all things? Are, you know, on things like,

Carl Walsh: 00:28:46

like that. And we go down through them, one by one, by but

Carl Walsh: 00:28:51

by one. And once you once you can say, Yes, we do this, then

Carl Walsh: 00:28:56

we move on to the next one.

Janice Porter: 00:28:59

Okay, so, oh, sorry, I

Carl Walsh: 00:29:00

was just gonna say no, no, no, that's

Janice Porter: 00:29:02

it, yeah. So do you have say a group of people

Janice Porter: 00:29:07

come in and you start to see there's a lack of respect from

Janice Porter: 00:29:12

this person over here to this person over here. And how do you

Janice Porter: 00:29:15

deal with those kinds of things?

Carl Walsh: 00:29:18

Well, at that point, then we have to get management

Carl Walsh: 00:29:23

in involved, on, on that. I mean, I can't, you know, we're,

Carl Walsh: 00:29:27

we're, we're consultants. We,

Janice Porter: 00:29:29

we, yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:29:30

we can't discipline people, no, but, but then we, we

Carl Walsh: 00:29:35

have to get management involved and say, Hey, we noticing, yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:29:39

that there's a friction over here. Yeah, what do you think

Carl Walsh: 00:29:43

about that? What's, what's the history? Yeah, we can, we now.

Carl Walsh: 00:29:47

We can take those people individually and say, Hey, we we

Carl Walsh: 00:29:52

notice there's a little bit of friction between you two. Is

Carl Walsh: 00:29:55

there a history and and if we can. Unmediate, fine, we'll do

Carl Walsh: 00:30:02

it. But I think ultimately it's management that needs to handle

Carl Walsh: 00:30:07

that. They need to do their job.

Janice Porter: 00:30:08

Yeah, I know that makes sense. I've experienced

Janice Porter: 00:30:10

that myself, and I've did bring them in, yeah, but do you so

Janice Porter: 00:30:15

what's an average timeframe that you spend with the the

Carl Walsh: 00:30:18

overall, oh my gosh, that depends. Okay, that

Carl Walsh: 00:30:21

depends. It

Janice Porter: 00:30:22

could be months. It could be weeks, yeah,

Carl Walsh: 00:30:24

and sometimes we do our audit of the company, you

Carl Walsh: 00:30:28

know, our initial and we'll say we can't help you. You know, you

Carl Walsh: 00:30:37

know, sometimes you just can't, and we're not going to take

Carl Walsh: 00:30:41

their money and their valuable time, yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:30:44

can't help them. That's you working in integrity.

Janice Porter: 00:30:47

So I like that, right? Yeah, for sure. So go ahead.

Carl Walsh: 00:30:52

Yeah, I have seen some of these consulting

Carl Walsh: 00:30:56

companies. I i have seen it like some of the big names. They go

Carl Walsh: 00:31:02

in there and they gut a company, they take their money, and they

Carl Walsh: 00:31:06

don't help them, yeah, and I can't, you know, I hate that.

Carl Walsh: 00:31:12

You know, I'm in retirement age. I don't need, no, I don't need

Carl Walsh: 00:31:20

to pad my bank account. I do this because I love it and

Carl Walsh: 00:31:24

because I want to help people. And my partner's exactly the

Carl Walsh: 00:31:28

same.

Janice Porter: 00:31:28

It's wonderful because you get to give back

Janice Porter: 00:31:30

your wisdom as well as you're still learning. And I love that

Janice Porter: 00:31:33

Exactly, yeah, exactly. That's so it's like it the people that

Janice Porter: 00:31:38

appreciate that and understand that and can see the wisdom that

Janice Porter: 00:31:43

you can bring to help them. They're your clients, and you

Janice Porter: 00:31:45

can choose in this day and age, right? So that's wonderful.

Janice Porter: 00:31:53

Okay, just two more questions. What is if listeners today, if

Janice Porter: 00:31:56

my listeners want to start improving their internal

Janice Porter: 00:32:00

business relationships today. What's one simple habit that

Janice Porter: 00:32:04

they can build?

Carl Walsh: 00:32:08

It's getting people to talk. It's getting people to

Carl Walsh: 00:32:12

help with the decision making. Use that brain trust that you've

Carl Walsh: 00:32:16

got right there. You've got it already.

Janice Porter: 00:32:22

Use it, yeah. That makes sense. Totally, yeah.

Carl Walsh: 00:32:25

Bring the people in that that like, like I said in

Carl Walsh: 00:32:31

the beginning, that guy in the loading dock, that guy in the

Carl Walsh: 00:32:34

warehouse, the receptionist. The receptionist is a huge vault of

Carl Walsh: 00:32:39

information. Totally, yeah, yeah. Who knows who's her or,

Janice Porter: 00:32:44

well, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally okay. This is just

Janice Porter: 00:32:49

me and my I don't know my pop culture, artsy kind of side. Who

Janice Porter: 00:32:59

is the favorite person? Who is your favorite person, or persons

Janice Porter: 00:33:02

that you met in theater and in business, and why? If you want

Janice Porter: 00:33:07

to do okay in

Carl Walsh: 00:33:08

theater, I, I have to say it's Angela Lansbury. Oh,

Carl Walsh: 00:33:13

fantastic. A magnificent woman. God bless her. Yeah, I was, I

Carl Walsh: 00:33:19

was working at the National Theater in London, and she

Carl Walsh: 00:33:24

taught a lesson without trying to. I'll never forget. It was

Carl Walsh: 00:33:30

during the opening season of the National Theater of Great

Carl Walsh: 00:33:34

Britain, and they were doing Hamlet. Albert Finney was was

Carl Walsh: 00:33:40

playing Hamlet, a rather aging, oh, yeah, but this was in 1975

Carl Walsh: 00:33:47

so he wasn't that old yet, okay? And Angela Lansbury was playing

Carl Walsh: 00:33:54

his mother, Gertrude, and the critics were not kind to her.

Carl Walsh: 00:34:01

Now I thought she was just fine. But you know, critics gotta,

Carl Walsh: 00:34:06

gotta be critics. As soon as the reviews came came out the cast,

Carl Walsh: 00:34:12

a lot of young people getting their start, turned their backs

Carl Walsh: 00:34:17

on her. Many of them wouldn't even say hi in the hallway when

Carl Walsh: 00:34:23

they passed her. I mean, it was, it was like she became

Carl Walsh: 00:34:26

radioactive, and that just ticked me off. This is, this is

Carl Walsh: 00:34:32

a woman who had

Janice Porter: 00:34:33

a career, and they don't know her history,

Janice Porter: 00:34:35

probably these young bucks and, well, she's they should, I know,

Carl Walsh: 00:34:40

but she had had a history that they would love to

Carl Walsh: 00:34:45

have, and well, she she had to leave in the in the course of

Carl Walsh: 00:34:52

the run to she had a commitment on Broadway her last. Right

Carl Walsh: 00:35:00

there. She brought in cases. Had had them, brought in cases of

Carl Walsh: 00:35:05

some of the finest champagne, champagne that you could lay

Carl Walsh: 00:35:08

hands on, and had a whole spread catered for after, for after the

Carl Walsh: 00:35:13

show they she took over the scene, Doc, and had this all

Carl Walsh: 00:35:19

laid out for people, and did the most gracious speech on thanking

Carl Walsh: 00:35:27

everybody for their support. Oh, wow, yeah, and I'll never

Carl Walsh: 00:35:32

forget. Forget that classy. And just to show how wonderful fate

Carl Walsh: 00:35:37

is, yeah, that commitment on Broadway. Sweeney was Sweeney

Carl Walsh: 00:35:44

Todd.

Janice Porter: 00:35:45

I saw her in that

Carl Walsh: 00:35:46

which was, which to this day is one of the most

Carl Walsh: 00:35:50

legendary performances ever done on Broadway. And I'm so glad

Carl Walsh: 00:35:55

that Broadway treated her so much better than her compatriots

Carl Walsh: 00:36:01

in London did. That's a great and that taught me a huge lesson

Carl Walsh: 00:36:06

about how to be gracious, yes, when other people weren't

Carl Walsh: 00:36:10

gracious to you, and what an impact that can have

Janice Porter: 00:36:14

totally Do you want to mention anyone in

Janice Porter: 00:36:17

business? Does anyone come to mind?

Carl Walsh: 00:36:20

Well for for for me, it is there's two, two people

Carl Walsh: 00:36:25

that I worked for in my in my business career, they both hired

Carl Walsh: 00:36:31

me when they got new, new positions in in new companies.

Carl Walsh: 00:36:37

For them, they would hire me, which is, and these are people I

Carl Walsh: 00:36:43

respected tremendously, and when they would hire me, you know, no

Carl Walsh: 00:36:49

greater compliment could could be paid. And they are. They were

Carl Walsh: 00:36:52

Jesse Stan Caron, and who I worked for in several companies,

Carl Walsh: 00:36:59

Jesse Stan Coron is the one that got me into information

Carl Walsh: 00:37:02

technology. Okay, he's, he started my career in that and

Carl Walsh: 00:37:10

Bill McFarland, who was my boss at Disney, Disney, and got got

Carl Walsh: 00:37:19

me again to my my work at Smart and Final, which, which was my

Carl Walsh: 00:37:26

final job, and corporate world, and both of them are the best

Carl Walsh: 00:37:33

people you could ever ask for. That's wonderful to work, work

Carl Walsh: 00:37:38

with. It's I just look forward to going to work every morning.

Carl Walsh: 00:37:44

And I can't say that about every position I ever had, you know,

Carl Walsh: 00:37:49

but with them, with them, I look forward to the office every

Carl Walsh: 00:37:54

morning, and that is a wonderful feeling,

Janice Porter: 00:37:57

absolutely well, this has been delightful. I

Janice Porter: 00:38:00

thank you so much for sharing your stories and for sharing

Janice Porter: 00:38:03

your wisdom with my audience around the the gosh so much to

Janice Porter: 00:38:09

take in you show us that relationships in business aren't

Janice Porter: 00:38:13

just about client attraction. They begin with how we relate to

Janice Porter: 00:38:16

one another behind the scenes, whether it's a cast preparing

Janice Porter: 00:38:20

for a performance or a team preparing for a product launch.

Janice Porter: 00:38:23

The principles are the same. Listen well, value everybody's

Janice Porter: 00:38:27

voice, each person, and build a culture of trust. If we want to

Janice Porter: 00:38:31

grow strong customer relationships, we have to start

Janice Porter: 00:38:33

with our own people. That's the stage where real transformations

Janice Porter: 00:38:37

begin. And you have taught as well. Thank you, Carl. How can

Janice Porter: 00:38:41

people find you? I'll put it in the show notes. Of course,

Carl Walsh: 00:38:45

sure, of course. First of all, you can reach me

Carl Walsh: 00:38:47

personally, because I am a speaker as well as a podcast

Carl Walsh: 00:38:55

host and consultant. You can reach me at Carl Walsh speaks.

Carl Walsh: 00:39:03

And so that's Carl at Carl Walsh speaks.com or you can certainly

Carl Walsh: 00:39:11

reach me at the Alpha dogs group@gmail.com now, there. Now,

Carl Walsh: 00:39:22

some people turn turn their nose up@gmail.com Let me, let me tell

Carl Walsh: 00:39:28

you, if you use gmail.com you won't go into junk mail. Oh,

Carl Walsh: 00:39:34

that's Oh yes, yeah, my my own domain, Carl Walsh speaks.com

Carl Walsh: 00:39:43

frequently goes into junk mail, which irritates me highly. Yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:39:48

it's true, but we'll talk about LinkedIn after

Janice Porter: 00:39:50

and maybe yes, too. Thank you so much for for everything today,

Janice Porter: 00:39:56

and I appreciate it, and I hope my audience will check. Out your

Janice Porter: 00:40:00

work, because I think it's well worthwhile, and let us know what

Janice Porter: 00:40:03

you thought of the message today, thanks for being here,

Janice Porter: 00:40:07

and remember to stay connected and be remembered there.