Jason Taylor 0:00

Welcome to this episode of the People's Playbook. I get the opportunity to interview and chat with a variety of guests from different businesses, from VPs, from presidents to entrepreneurs and whatnot. And if you want to talk about somebody who likes to build something, Vladlin Stark is the guy. So Vladlin is the CFO at Ramuta Building and founder and chairman of Luxera. He's reimagining the way we do this stuff in luxury real estate through innovation and co-ownership. He's a CPA, uh corporate director, an entrepreneur, and he's skilled real estate portfolios more than tenfold while leading organizations through growth, governance, and AI-driven transformation. Vlad, welcome to the show today. Thanks so much, Jason. Great to be here. Yeah, I appreciate you coming. So let's get right into it. You know, myself and Matt, our producer, have had a few chats and just super impressive what you've been able to build. Let's talk about that for a second. So you've led uh billion-dollar financial decisions, right? If we're being just frank and right out there, from buildups or from scratch. How does your leadership style change between a mature business that's already around and has has got that reputation or an entrepreneurial one where you're starting it up?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 1:14

Can be contradictory and say it doesn't. Absolutely. Um and let me elaborate on that. I mean, I I believe in this idea of authentic self and having a consistent presentation of that authentic self across every playing field you're you're playing at, whether that's a sport or life or business. But I think what does change pretty dramatically is the tools and the strategies that you're using as a leader when you're in different organizations. And having had the vantage point of both, you know, a large established corporate organization and then some a startup with an employee of one, and I've had a few startups at this stage, the difference is quite dramatic. And I think in those bigger organizations, you're playing a role more of a steward. You're really just guiding your teams within the frameworks that they're established, you're giving them context, you're giving them guardrails, you're empowering them to make decisions and to shift around and really just keeping them accountable to the outcomes. Whereas in in a smaller organization, you really have to be in the trenches. There's really no two ways about it. And your tools are really more about the teaching, you know, being vulnerable with your teams, growing and learning and trying to build something from nothing. So, like I said, while the overall core values and the style might not be different, the tools that they do have to adjust for the environment for sure.

Jason Taylor 2:34

Yeah. When you do something like a startup, do you like getting your hands dirty like that? Or do you do you try to scale it as quickly as possible so you can just be on the business thought in that business?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 2:43

The look, sorry, right now uh I really am enjoying being in the weeds a little bit more. It is nice change of pace and it's quite interesting, but it's a lot easier when there's people around and when there is a little bit of scale.

Jason Taylor 2:55

Yeah.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 2:55

So I'm certainly looking forward to uh to having a few more people share the love.

Jason Taylor 3:00

I love that when I talk to entrepreneurs like yourself, or I I and I've experienced I'm an entrepreneur as well. And all of a sudden I've worked for big corporations as well. And you're like, wait a second, what do you what do you mean they don't oh that's me? I have to do that? Oh, okay. It's just it's it's a little bit of a mind shift where you're like, wait a second, that's me? Oh, wait a second, everything's kind of me right now, right? So, Vladlin, you've uh you've led, you you've said, sorry, durable businesses are built with strong governance. Okay. So structure, process. What leadership habit creates trust before a company is even tested or ever tested?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 3:36

Yeah, I you know, my philosophy is that trust is a strict prerequisite for success. And if you look at high-performing teams, they're always high trust. I don't think I've ever seen a high performing team that's a low trust team. So trust is probably one of the most important things that I focus on right at the very get-go when I hire somebody or when I start a new thing. And it always is, you know, the the little things, I find. And you can't build trust in a moment of crisis. So, you know, you're asking an insightful question. I mean, sometimes crisis can forge a little bit of trust if people do come through for you, but ultimately you have to start well before the crisis hits. And really, I think it's about creating an environment where people feel safe and people feel authentic with you and people feel that they can voice their opinions. I think Simon Senec calls it the circle of safety, the circle of trust, right? So having that environment, I think, really empowers people to start building rapport with you and start building trust. And one thing that's an actual habit that is surprisingly simple, it's been, you know, hammered it to me when I was doing my directorship course, but it's uh always speaking last. And it surprises me how many people don't have the patience to do that in a in a meeting, in a in a leadership position, right? And by simply speaking last, you just allow the people around you to get their piece out, to feel safe about expressing their opinions without your own bias, right? So that's something that I preach, that's something that I practice it. It's super simple. Uh, you just have to be very mindful about it to actually execute on it.

Jason Taylor 5:14

I love that. I um I often say it's amazing how many people don't actually pause when they're speaking. They feel like that that silence has to be, you know, stopped. And the pause is so powerful when you're speaking with somebody because it actually allows them to digest what you're saying and you can digest what they're saying as well. I love what you said about trust there. So I I run on a theory that your trust is like your bank account. There's trust deposits and there's trust trust withdrawals, right? So in any relationship, I'm hoping there's a there's a balance there of trust that, you know, even if maybe I made a mistake or I didn't do something right and whatnot, and there's a withdrawal there, I still have enough balance in my trust bank account that, you know, you still want to do business with me or you still wanna, you still want to continue the relationship, right? Because you've hit something there that I'm very passionate about. It's trust and communication that actually run companies, right? And if we don't get those two things right, trust and communication, the two pillars, we really don't have a company. Because when I speak to leaders around the world when they're building and scaling their companies and they're trying to get their leadership teams engaged, it's amazing how they don't have a communication cadence or some kind of point throughout the day where they make sure that they have that people interaction and that kind of touch, you know what I mean, with the with the people. So love where you're going with that. So let's go on to, you know, your career and whatnot and what you've done. But you've worn many hats, right? From a CFO to a founder to a board director. How do you avoid becoming the bottleneck as your organizations grow? How do you get out of the way?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 6:52

I'll be contradictory again. I'll say sometimes you've got to be a bottleneck as you do than that. And, you know, as a CFO specifically, and just being in that finance function, I think it it kind of comes with the territory to be the gatekeeper for a lot of the things. And you do have to think about materiality or, in other words, the magnitude of the decision at hand. And uh we can certainly talk about delegation as well. But I think the question is is super important and super insightful because having had to switch those hats, I've really recognized just how dramatic of a difference it is, especially for somebody like myself who's more sort of technically trained in accounting, right? Yeah. And then having to switch from that into entrepreneurship, where in the accounting and in the finance space, you often have a lot of information, you have time to make decisions, you have processes and systems and people to do things, right? But in the entrepreneurial world, more often than not, you have no information whatsoever. You have to make decisions. And I mean, sometimes you got to go in your gut feel, right? So that's been something that was a huge moment of growth for me and challenging myself all the time to really kind of step out of my comfort zone to switch that thinking because you can't run a startup as a CFO. You just cannot. Those things do not match up, or a corporate director for that matter. But to answer your actual question, I think fundamentally to not to be a bottleneck, we have to get out of the way. Yeah. Very simple. And to get out of the way, I think you have to switch your mindset from I'm the decision maker to I'm the context provider, where you're giving all the information, all the context, all the strategy to your team and empowering them to actually go and make those decisions. And one framework that I really like is um, it's actually from Amazon. They have this idea of one-way doors and two-way doors.

unknown 8:49

Okay.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 8:50

And basically the idea is that the one-way door is a decision that is very significant, largely irreversible, takes a lot of time and efforts and money to execute on, and it's a high-stakes decision. And then the two-way doors are decisions that are lower risk, lower stakes, and their teams are able to execute on them, to try things out, fail if if needed, and learn from it. And there's this great book called Um The Bezos Letters that talks about the Amazon story, and they talk about other things in addition to this, and really they come to the conclusion that Amazon has become the master of risk because they're able to, you know, rapidly prototype, let their teams try things, fail, try again, and keep on innovating all the time. Right. So yeah, at the end of the day, empower you teams, give them all the right tools, and they will they will move you out of the way.

Jason Taylor 9:45

Yeah. Vladin, I uh I uh do a lot with human analytics and I I can't wait to get your assessment because I'm gonna send it to you. I'm just so interested in to see what your profile is all about. But you've done so much and you're you're very it feels like you're very proactive in what you do and you're very independent in kind of the way your decisions are made and whatnot. So as you've expanded throughout the years, what's the one leadership lesson that you had to learn the hard way about delegation? Because I find that a lot of entrepreneurs, founders see they have, they say, Oh, I'm getting inundated, it's crazy right now. But then, okay, well, give that to somebody else. And they're just like, oh, no, no, no, no. I don't want to give that to somebody else. That's I I need that. So how how are you with how hard are you with delegation? And uh, what was the hardest part of actually learning that?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 10:33

I think you nailed it. I mean, a lot of business leaders, I think that's probably the biggest hurdle that they face, especially the founders of organizations that are still running their businesses. That's probably the thing that I see people struggle with the most. And in my experience, and again, I was fortunate that my career started at uh PwC as an auditor. And there you're working on these big engagement teams and things are delegated and you've really learned delegation. But what it is at that level is this distinction between delegating execution and delegating accountability, right? And the simplest way I can think about it is if you delegate execution, you simply say, Hey, Jason, here's 10 things I would like for you to do. Come back and they're done. Right. And you come back with those 10, I looked them over and we move on, right? But if I'm delegating accountability, I give you those 10 things, and then you come back with 15 things that are done. And you say, hey, you know, I recognize that those 10 things didn't actually achieve what we were trying to do here. So I found this one, two, three, four, five, and I actually went and did those things. And now this piece of work that I was responsible for is actually done, right? And you don't have to think about it again.

Jason Taylor 11:43

Yeah.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 11:44

Now, to make that leap, I think it's a lot of the things we've already talked about in the last few minutes is you know, you have to have highly aligned, highly trusting teams that you can actually delegate the full accountability over something to. It's something that you grow into. I don't think you can delegate accountability on day one with somebody, you have to teach them, you train them and build out foreign trust. But at the end of the day, making that false assumption that you could just leave somebody with an accountability on day one, I think that was the biggest lesson for me.

Jason Taylor 12:16

Love it. You've been in many different industries, and those industries from finance, technology, manufacturing, real estate, what's the one leadership principle that has stayed true no matter what industry that you're you're currently in? Alignment precedes performance.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 12:34

That's I think a fundamental truth. And I think if you simplify the businesses, you know, not thinking about industries, right? I mean, the business is taking a strategy within a market context and executing on that strategy, no matter what industry you're in. Hopefully you have some great people to execute on it, but at the end of the day, you have a strategy, you have some actions that you take. So you have to make absolutely certain that everybody in your team is aligned in where you're going and why you're going there. There's certainly a lot of books out there on, you know, explaining the why, understanding the why. And I think that's that's something that I take very closely to heart. And if your teams and your people understand the why of you as an individual, of you as an organization, of why are we doing this, why are we taking these initiatives, I think that creates a lot of alignment and that that allows for people to then row in that same direction, right? And I think that creates that compounding effect that you need that is absolutely fundamental. Because if people are rowing in different directions, you're never going to get there. Right. So you have to have them aligned. And it all starts with what we talked about, you know, building trust and building transparency with your teams and making sure that they understand where the business and you as a leader are coming from.

Jason Taylor 13:53

I love that thought. I actually, um, when I was working with a very big organization, I once said, I said to a speaker that was chatting with us, and he and I said, you know, I wish I could have a little stick, like a meter almost like a thermometer, and I could stick it in somebody's gut and know kind of what passion they have, and I would know, you know, is that person going to work out of my company? And he said to me, he said, I don't understand what you mean. And he was a professional athlete, by the way. And he said, I don't know what you mean. And I said, you know, sometimes you get somebody and you're thinking, oh man, I wish they had more and I knew that and whatnot. And he said, he just said it like this. He said, that's your problem. That's that's your fault. And it was so direct, Vlad, I was just like, What do you mean it's my fault? And he said, Because you're the coach. You're the coach of that team. And he said, It's your job to create belief, which you're talking about, the why, right? And he goes, belief fuels passion, and passion rarely fails. And it changed my whole leadership philosophy. He said, Listen, you got to create the belief or explain the why, like you said. That will fuel the passion, and passion rarely fails. It was so profound, and I've taken that in my entire career. He was such an inspirational speaker and just the way he led his life. And I was just like, wow. And when you said that, it just brought me back there because you're right, you have to explain the why. And you said something key there. There's so many times when there's not clarity, and when there's not clarity, you're right. We're rolling in all different directions and we're spinning. And if we're spinning, we're not going to get to our results. And when I work with companies, I always say, every problem you have in your business, every problem is a people problem. Every problem. If you actually, if you're drilling down and you're thinking, you know, in your bed at night, why am I not sleeping right now? And your mind's racing, it's a person. Something's, if you keep drilling down, it'll come down to an actual person or a relationship or kind of what's going on. So I often say every problem is a people problem. Great discussion.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 15:48

Yeah. And if I can just add something, I mean, I really love the passion comment. And I've been challenged on this before because, again, I'm a believer in that. And I mean, I wasn't, I didn't have it in my mind as eloquently as you put it. So I really love that. But it is hard to be passionate about manufacturing floor panels or building buildings, right? But I have this one quick story just from Bermuda. It was a couple of months ago. We have this customer who saved up for 30 years to build this big, beautiful barn on his farm.

unknown 16:20

Okay.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 16:20

And he came to us and he chose us to build this building for him. And sharing that story with the guys who then went to deliver the materials to build the building, you could see the level of excitement, the level of commitment, the level of passion that they were describing. Because all of a sudden, they're like, oh my God, we're actually building somebody's dream here. The stakes are so much higher than just us getting a paycheck. This is incredible. And the metrics on the job were absolutely phenomenal from safety to efficiency to everything else. And it was just this beautiful thing where they just got rallied around the site, this passion that they were building somebody's dream, right? So I think it's super powerful.

Jason Taylor 16:59

I love that. And you're right. When you when you see somebody with passion, like when I deal with a salesperson that has that's passionate about their product or passionate about their service, that oozes out of them, right? That that oozes out of them. That you you said a couple of times in this in this chat today, you've said off authenticity and you said authentic. I don't think you can fake passion. I think people will see right through that. I think that if if I or you try to fake passion, they'll be like, eh, I don't know about this guy, right? But when you are authentic and you are absolutely passionate about something, it oozes out of your pores, and people understand, wow, this person takes this very seriously. Right. So I I absolutely love that story. And I could just imagine going to that barn and going to that lake and just seeing it kind of all come to fruition and seeing the conversations, right? Let's talk about AI. Have you heard about AI? I'm just joking, obviously. I mean, it's it's a conversation that we have daily, right? So where um do you think leaders are relying on technology too much, okay, instead of building stronger people?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 18:08

Yeah, so I have heard of it. I I've maxed out my Cloud Pro Max four times this week and it's only Thursday.

Jason Taylor 18:16

The tokens are just flying out the window right now, right?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 18:19

Yeah. Token anxiety is real. But I think I'm very open that you know, a business like Wixara, first of all, would not even exist without AI. And even though it's not an AI company, but simply the AI enabled its its existence and its growth. And I'm an absolute believer in it, but I think we are getting to a pretty dangerous inflection point as humans and as leaders, in that we're starting to substitute AI for human judgment and for strategic thinking. Does that scare you? It does because I think in misinformation and disinformation aside, you're really robbing yourself and your teams of the opportunity to learn, to challenge the assumptions, to think creatively. Because if you really think about what an LLM is, it's giving you the most probable answer given the parameters that you've put in there based on the training data that it has, right? So it spits out something that somebody has done before in these circumstances, and it very rarely builds outside of that, if ever. So, you know, with that in mind, you're completely robbing yourself of creativity. And, you know, the counterpoint to this is well, you know, you can still learn a lot of things from these suggestions that that are coming out of the systems, sure. Right. And I'm the first one to admit that, you know, I'm a lifelong learner. I read management books and leadership books all the time, and I learn new things all the time. But there's a very big difference between using AI to summarize information to provide new insights and actually delegating that judgment to the system. So, one of the most important skills right now, I think, as leaders and the skills that I look at in my teams is this idea about professional skepticism. I'm a CPA. I started my career as an auditor, and it's something that's really hammered into you when you go through your training. But basically, it's the idea that you just have to challenge all the assumptions. You have to corroborate the facts, you have to inquire, you have to challenge what you're seeing, right?

Jason Taylor 20:18

Yeah.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 20:19

And that has to be the same mindset with all this AI stuff. And I've I wish that we were training that skill kind of broader than just my profession. I'm sure other professions have it as well. But it's a very important skill, and it's something that I think we need to continue focusing on because yeah, I think we're at a pretty dangerous spot and we need to be careful here.

Jason Taylor 20:40

Do you think that we're too trusting as human beings as a whole? Because you talked about skepticism and challenging and whatnot. But I agree with you in in totality. There, everybody is just like, hey, if AI says it, that is true, right? And I I was on, I was on YouTube the other day, and this this one guy said he said it so confidently too. I forget his name, but they were talking about him being an author, and he was, they said, Are you nervous about AI? And he says, he said, no, because I write better than AI. And he said it with just like such he wasn't being honestly, he wasn't being like cocky or anything like that. He was he was just he was just said it was and it when you said that it reminded me that he he challenged, he basically said, Yeah, no, I think I'm better, right? And whatnot. So do you think that as you know, as a whole, we're putting too much trust in this and we need to dial it back a bit?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 21:28

I think we do. I really think we do. And I think people maybe just need to understand a little bit more about how these things work. So maybe just some general education about what is the backbone of these models and you know, in very simple terms, what I described earlier, and and that it's simply historical out outputs based on the circumstances. And yeah, and and again, I think we're at a moment in time where there is a lot of misinformation and disinformation that is only amplified by AI, and it is. So important to have that critical thought and to corroborate and have multiple sources that you're looking at and really trust the experts.

Jason Taylor 22:09

Yeah, absolutely. You built some outstanding companies, and obviously those companies all have a culture. So, what's one leadership habit your team sees from you every single week that helps build that culture?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 22:23

Yeah, I think you know, culture and trust, uh, then both those again go hand in hand. And, you know, for us, we always start with the why. We try to explain our why at the very beginning when we hire somebody who's very protective about who we bring into the culture, make sure that there's a line that's sort of on day one with what we stand for, why we do the things that we do. The habit itself that you know I exercise weekly is this idea of feedback Fridays. It's something that I borrowed from my time at PVC many years ago. And it's basically this idea of having an informal window of time on, in this case, Fridays, where people are encouraged to come to you and to talk to you about their week. I do have a slightly more formal framework. You know, we have our executive meetings usually on Mondays, and then I have my one-on-ones with my team on Friday and kind of have them back to back on Friday. But beyond the one-on-ones and them reporting on their progress for whatever initiatives that they're working on, I always, always ask them to give me feedback about the roadblocks that they've had. And if I never hear my name, I know there's a problem. So I always challenge them to say, okay, what is your roadblock? What is the bottleneck? Is it me? What am I not doing? What do you need me to do for you? Right. And I think that really helps the teams to feel again a lot more comfortable, really understand me as a human being and have that more informal dialogue. And I don't even schedule the feedback Fridays bits, like the one on the ones that was scheduled and have, you know, time flux and whatever, but that other bit is purely informal and it's an open door. And it extends beyond my immediate direct reports because you know, now that the organization's a bit larger, you know, I tend to deal with slightly the with the managers and slightly more senior people directors. But I encourage anybody who's who's working at the company to come in and give me their feedback.

Jason Taylor 24:14

Feedback's, it's a gift. And I find that sometimes, uh, and I've you know experienced this with many leaders, they have troubles getting it because they don't, it's almost like they say, I want your feedback. And then somebody will say, actually, you know what, Vladin, I I think that you did this decision wrong. And you're like, I'm using that as an example, but you're like, wait a second, my back gets up now, right? I'm just so it it's it's a fine line where you know, you have to explain to a lot of leaders, hey, it is an absolute gift. And they they're not going to agree with every decision you say or every road you've taken, and that's okay, right? As long as you're comfortable in the why and why uh you took that that road or that path and you can explain that clearly, it's a perfect thing then.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 24:58

Yeah, absolutely. And you know, you do point out a very important challenge here is that, you know, in the context of that I just gave, right? That, you know, my my direct reports, again, they're a little bit more senior. So, you know, they've established themselves and they have the confidence to actually provide me with that feedback. But, you know, somebody who started three weeks ago probably is not going to walk into an executive office and say, hey, listen, I don't agree with you on this, right? So you really got to build that culture where that is welcome and show people that there is never a consequence of that action that is negative, that it's always a learning opportunity for everybody to get involved. And, you know, we actually value that, right? And and it takes time to build that rapport with people, but it is certainly something that that I value very highly.

Jason Taylor 25:44

I love it. You have a young family and you're raising that young family right now. How has becoming a father changed the way you leave people at work? Yeah. They're all your kids.

Vladlen Xavier Stark 25:58

I I wasn't going to say that, but uh pretty close. Pretty close. You know, I think parenthood is the most wonderful and the most terrifying thing that you can do as a human being. And for me, it was this realization that I should have had much sooner that there's this total and utter and complete destruction of any illusion that you have any control about what's going on around you. It's absolute chaos at all times, especially with your little kids, and you have to understand that chaos. You have to strive in it. And what I've taken from that is you have to switch your mindset from being a director where you're sort of directing people to do things and direct them to an outcome. And you have to change that to more of like an architect where you're actually creating an environment where people can succeed. Right. And I think it's true with kids. I think it's true with in business, where if you set people up for success, they will strive within the parameters and their own, their own selves, right? So I now focus a lot more on that idea of creating an environment rather than giving specific direction, recognizing that everybody's different. Everybody works within different parameters. And we've talked about psychological assessments. We recently did ours at Bermuda. We used Colby framework on the entire senior leadership team. And that was very insightful, right? Just understanding that there is pretty significant differences in how people operate. And it's going back to again, creating that environment that works for that specific individual to then work with you and come to the same conclusion at the end or the same outcome at the end that you're all striving towards based on your strategy and your business goals.

Jason Taylor 27:45

Phenomenal. Two questions. I know you're busy. I got two more questions for you. Then I'm going to let you get back to your crazy day, probably. So, what is the one leadership principle that's non-negotiable for you? So, no matter where you go to or whatever you're doing, what is one leadership principle that you say, no, that doesn't align with my values and it is an absolute non-negotiable, even if it's going to cost you some money or you know, you're going to have to make a different decision based on that, what would you, what would you say that would be, Flatlin?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 28:14

I'll probably go back to this idea of the authentic self. I will never compromise my values, no matter what. I mean, if I have to compromise my values and my beliefs, that's not the right business for me. That's not the right relationship for me. So that's probably the one thing I'll say is is super important to me as just staying true to yourself and holding your beliefs if you feel strongly about them, and not sacrificing them for a quick win uh in a business context or in a life context.

Jason Taylor 28:44

Yeah, great answer. I actually asked that um to a gentleman, gentleman by the name of Steven Emerson. He owns uh Emerson Packaging, his family does. And his answer was we make sure we do the right thing, even if it's going to cost us. Right. So that's that's a value with him. Like, hey, if if we've made a mistake or something's gone wrong, and you know, we look at it and say, oh, that's on us. We will make it right, even if it costs us. And I thought, wow, that is, you know, putting, you know, what you say in, and you just basically said the exact same thing, like be real, be yourself, and it's amazing what what things can happen. Last question before I let you go, and and you've been very generous with your time today. If someone that you has worked with you or on your team for five years, and then they decided to leave, what would you hope that they say they learned from your leadership beyond finance and business?

Vladlen Xavier Stark 29:41

Two of my very fundamental core principles, and and that's something that I hope I impart on others, is this idea of relentless perseverance and always paying it forward. Okay. These are exceptionally important to me and they hold they hold a lot of meaning to me that we won't get into here. I speak about it quite a bit on my own podcast. And what that translates to in a business setting, I think, is when people look at at businesses or at careers and they see this success, they always assume that it's some big grand thing that happened that got them there. But in reality, and in my view, you know, the business and career and life is a journey of a thousand steps. And you don't just build your resilience in the times of crisis that we talked about earlier. I think it you build that resilience in consistently showing up day after day, building the thing, brick after brick, and never giving up, right? And the other bit about you know paying it forward, I think earlier in my career, I didn't have a ton of support professionally speaking. And as I started growing in my career, I actually started seeking it out and asking for mentorship and asking for guidance. And I I've built some wonderful relationships and I think that really catapulted my career in many different ways. And that's something that I now really strive towards myself as well is you know, always paying it forward, always setting people up around me to grow and to succeed. And if I'm measured on anything in career or in life, I think I would like for that to be by how much I've improved their lives of anybody around.

Jason Taylor 31:26

Wow, phenomenal answer. I'm a big believer, and I and I you can actually Google this. They they say that people come in in there's three categories. There's matchers, which means, okay, I did something for you, now you got to do something for me, right? And then you're always worried about the math. You're always worried about am I ahead or you ahead, right? Then there's takers. We want to avoid the takers. They just take and they're kind of doing something just for them. But they say, you know what, if you actually meet givers, you'd be amazed on how successful they become and the people around them become just based on learning that pay it forward. And one of my philosophies is very much like like you just talked about there. I like to leave more on the table than I take. And it's so freeing when you just do something just to be a good person and help somebody out. And if it comes back to you, great. If it doesn't, that's okay. That's okay. You you made a difference in somebody's life. And as a leader, we have two choices be a good leader or be a bad leader. And people remember the best leaders they've ever had. And when I teach courses to people on leadership and and just culture and engagement, when you ask, does everybody remember their worst leader? A thousand hands go up. Like they're just and and the the the conversation is just like, you know, and and she did this and he did this and and and whatnot. And they have everything that, you know, in their mind ready to go. When you ask them who the best leader was, their hands go up as well, but they're a little quieter. And I I always ask them, I say, did you call that leader up in the last month and say, hey, thanks? Have you actually gone and said, hey, I just want to let you know, Vladlin, you made a big difference in my life. And based on our, you know, our relationship and and you mentoring me, I'm the president of a company now. You know what I mean? It's just, it's so important to actually thank good leaders and great leaders because I think it's it's a world right now that needs a lot more great leaders along the way. It's not just, you know, this is what it is. Now we're at a stage right now in humanity, I'll say, where we are craving better leaders and better people like yourself that have your kind of philosophies. So with that, Vladin, I will, I I want to thank you. Thanks for being a great leader. Thanks for sharing. You put a lot on the table today with our listeners. They I I get texts all the time. Hey, heard this, love this. And uh I appreciate your time today. Thanks so much. Thanks so much for having me. It's fun. If you love that session and that conversation as much as I did, would love to have you join our People Playbook community in the link below.