The Transformational Power of Coaching Influence with Anthony Bonifazio

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To the Athletics of Business, a podcast about how the traits and behaviors of elite athletes and remarkable business leaders frequently intersect. The real stories and hard lessons to help you level up your leadership and performance. Now your host, Ed Molotour.

Welcome back to another episode of the Athletics of Business podcast. I am your host and CEO of the Molotor Group, Ed Molotor. Now I know I get excited about each and every special guest that we have here on the podcast, but I've got to tell you today's special guest, Anthony Bonifazio. If you were to look up the Athletics of Business and Wikipedia, it is very feasible to say that his picture should be front and center. Because Anthony oozes everything about the Athletics of Business mindset, the seven Pillars of Victory as well as the five fundamentals of coaching. Before I jump into his professional career, let me connect you back to his incredibly elite athletic career.

He went to the University of Arizona as a two sport athlete, football and baseball, and at one point he had to make a decision which one it was going to be. Now to be a one sport athlete at that level is mind blowing. To be able to navigate the waters whether it's for one year, two year, three years or four years as a two sport athlete physically, mentally and emotionally is incredible. And let's not forget the academic part of his world. Not to get ahead of myself, but we're going to talk a lot about the coaches that impacted him throughout his playing career, how they influenced his coaching style in the business world. Now back to Anthony as a professional. He is the Vice President of Market Development in Reimbursement at Iveric Bio and a Stella company.

Now iveric is a biopharma organization focused on the discovery and development of novel treatment options for retinal diseases with significant unmet medical needs. Now here's what's really just another thing that's phenomenal about Anthony is his journey. He has such a rich background in the biotech and pharma industries. He his extensive expertise in launch execution, leadership and team building. And before joining iveric Bio, Anthony's journey included executive roles in Novartis, Santon and Genentech where he worked for nearly 20 years, starting as a Senior Manager of commercial training and development and growing to the role of Director of Oncology field. Why do I tell you all this?

Because I want you to be able to connect the stories that he is going to tell inside of this conversation and see how he has shaped his leadership style, his beliefs, his North Star if you will, his purpose and how he operates not just with his athletic coaches, but the leaders that have mentored him throughout his professional career as well. Anthony absolutely excels in assembling innovative teams for market access and patient services, particularly in complex environments. His dedication lies in driving success and growth and adaptly maneuvering through the industries challenges. And we talk a lot about embracing change. Right. And the significance of self awareness, incremental self awareness, a great part of the conversation. And vulnerability. We talk about the importance of setting clear expectations and encouraging accountability to promote team success.

How to craft coaching strategies for improvement through observation and reflection and the impact of innovative ideas and adapting to unexpected situations. Of course, we'll jump into how those sports coaches again influence his leadership style in the business world. And we spend time on what times of adversity, discomfort and high pressure reveal about your people and how that empowers you to coach them to execute at the highest level possible. Now, I'm going to get out of the way and let you enjoy this conversation with Anthony Bonifazio. Anthony, thank you so much for joining us today on the Athletics of Business podcast. Man, I can't thank you for your persistence, your resilience, your patience. It is great to be here and.

To connect today and humbled to have to be on here with you. I've heard about you through other guests you've had over many years and I was just wondering when it was going to be my time. I appreciate it.

Well, see, I don't want to say this, but, you know, because I'll hear about it. But we're saving the best for last, right? That crew. Yeah. No, it is great. You know, I, I look back on your journey and there's so many different things that I want touch on. But I think a great point and obviously I filled the listener in on your career, professionally, athletically. But football and baseball at the University of Arizona, I don't know that folks understand. Like, it sounds really cool. It sounds really neat. Oh, you must be an amazing athlete. But there's so much more that goes into it, right? How were you able to do that? And in what stage of the game in your life did you realize, hey, you know what? I think I have a shot at doing this? Yeah.

You know, I, I was very fortunate to grow up exposed to a lot of different sports, team sports, individual sports. I mean, tennis, golf, soccer, football, baseball, basketball. And that was the time at you and I talked about this before where that was really encouraged, you know, to play multiple sports and, you know, one sport would help another. So I Was very. I was exposed to that at a young age. My parents gave me a ton of opportunities. And, you know, as I advanced in age and through middle school and high school, I really narrowed it down to tattoo sports, football and in baseball. The inspiration, however, really came from an athlete you and I are very familiar with. Vincent Bo Jackson or Bo Vincent Jackson. And I just admired the heck out of this guy. Number one. Just physically, right.

This guy was a specimen. And I would argue he's the best athlete of our time. Right.

Athlete, well rounded.

Right. So he's just someone I admired. And that inspired me that, you know, really encouraged me to say, hey, you can play more than what. Why only one sport? Why do I have to just pick one or choose one for college if I have the opportunity to play? Both, go ahead and do that. So I took that mentality on, I took that mindset on. And through the recruiting process, you know, when I was talking to colleges, one of the priority things I was looking at from the school was, would you be open to having me play both sports? And at that time, at Most of the PAC 12, it was PAC 12. At that time, most of the PAC 12 schools were very open to that. And there were some schools that weren't at all.

So that helped me narrow down my decision, you know, to which schools to go to and which allowed that were both, you know, both programs were something I was looking to get out of. And, and that's really what guided my direction to get there and play both sports as, you know, very difficult to do. I wasn't anticipating how hard it would be going to the Division 1 level. You know, at that level, I'm not.

Just talking, but yeah, right. High, high major.

Right, right, absolutely. You know, because, you know, at that time, you're 17, you're in high school and you're thinking, yeah, you know, I can be both sports. I've done things my whole life playing multiple sports. Why not doing it at the next level? What you don't have knowledge about is the commitment each sport demands, you know, from each athlete, the academic rigor that you need to keep up. And then the social, the adjustments to the social life.

Right.

Of being on your own now to add a big time school, you know, those are things I learned some really good lessons from. Right.

As well. Well, and that's the thing that's really amazing about it. I gotta think back to being a one sport athlete. In Creighton, we had zero time to ourselves during the season. Preseason, you got a little bit, you Know, postseason, when the coaches wanted to give you a break. But I mean, you have football, you wind down a little bit during. Whenever you start. I mean, baseball's going. By the time you get done with football, how did you find it to balance everything? And balances is coming. Overused word. But physically, right. Totally different muscle groups. Yeah. The whole mindset of each sport, cerebral, you know, the time in between each action. But the physical, the mental and the emotional side.

And how are you able to just balance all of that and yet still develop a personal life and still feel like you had somewhat of a social life and you had the time management, you had the academics, you had, I mean, all the different aspects. How did that come together for you?

Yeah, that's a great question that I. I think I realized a couple things really early on when I chose that path. Number one, I'll start with the social aspect, like yourself. For anyone who's played at that level, your time is not yours. Right. It's owned by the program, the team. I remember I had this, you know, I had this epiphany. I was riding my bike at. For my dorms to the practice field, and I was riding by a couple fraternities and these dudes are out in their front lawn, they're having a good time, they're, you know, tossing the ball around, whatever they're doing. Right. I thought to myself, I will never get to be able to do anything like that. I'm not going home for Thanksgiving. I'm not going to have spring break. Those things just don't exist because of the commitment I chose.

Right. The path I chose, I had to get my mind right around. That was hard to do as a 17, 18 year old, as a younger freshman, incoming freshman. So I think, number one, I just came to that realization pretty early on, and I just had to get my mind right around that. And there was a struggle around that as well. On the physical fitness side. Ed Duray, Such different requirements from each sport. Football, you know, started out with football. I'm missing fall baseball. I start baseball in the spring. I'm missing spring football, and I'm missing all the workouts right. On both ends of the spectrum. And that caused anxiety in me, I have to admit.

Right.

Is as good as an athlete I thought I was, and as in good a shape I thought I was coming out of the football season. For baseball, there was still a big physical adjustment for me. Part of that was went to a bowl game my freshman year, so that season extended. Football Season extended longer. Right. I had no time to prepare for baseball. So then when I started preparing for baseball, I was thinking to myself, I'm going to be ready to go. I'm going to be in shape. And that wasn't true. I struggled.

Right.

There's more endurance type of requirements, just different activities. Right. Different physical requirements. Your point? Going from football, which is more linear, right. To a rotational sport, I mean, all these things I didn't realize at that time that I look back now and I've learned from. But it's very difficult to transition from.

And I don't mean to interrupt you, but I'm curious. You have somewhat of a mental hangover from football. And I mean that in a very, like it's natural, like that whole decompression. Like, did you get an opportunity to really heal mentally and physically, to really decompress before you launched into baseball?

Yeah. Another great point. I'd like the mental side of it, right. This, I say the stress for that long of a season and just everything being new to me. Right. Orientation wise and. And just being in a new environment, playing at a different level, different speeds, all the variables. Right. That you encounter. I didn't have a time to decompress. I really didn't. That played a pretty major role in how I struggled transitioning from one to the other. I never did it before. There was no playbook for me to really go to. And I struggled through that transition. I really did because of that.

Well, and the level of athletes that you're competing with, right. All of a sudden in high school, you are the elite. Like you are the standard. You are the elite. Now you come here, football, you got 90 other ones, right. I mean, you're not going to have 90 year position, but you get my point. Baseball, I mean, these guys been swinging the bat, they've been playing catch, they've been, you know, fielding, they've been doing whatever it is. And now you've got to completely transition into that. But I have to think over the long haul, that's helped your adaptability and your flexibility and your agility. So what happened after that freshman year with baseball? What, what was in your, like, what was going on with your mind, in your heart in terms of two sports?

I came to, you know, two paths. Conversation.

Right.

For myself and with my father, who was, I'm very still very close with and you know, who was my confidant at the time. And I said, you know, I think from what I've just experienced, to play both sports and then Try to manage everything else in my life is just not going to be sustainable. I think it's time to just go with one. And what a fortunate position that I was in. Right. Hey, I get to choose football or baseball to play the D1 level. Right. I mean, it's. It's amazing. But it was a really difficult decision to get to that point. But I. I realized, pick one, dedicate yourself to one, and give everything you have, you know, to that. And baseball, you know, baseball. Over some pondering. Right.

And some time and talking to people that I trusted and respected, and that was the path I chose.

What did your dad say to you as a parent? I'm curious. Right. We can all only be so blessed to have that conversation with our child. But you mentioned earlier, like, we live in this world now. Like, you got soccer coaches saying, with basketball, you got baseball coaches saying, why are you playing? What was the advice or what were the questions that your dad asked you that got you to make the decision you made?

Yeah, I think a couple things from my dad being a parent and a baseball fan. Right. He was happy of my decision. Right. To go with baseball. Right. That's one. And obviously for my health and well being. Right. That good for you. Right. You're not doing both. And I'm glad you're going one. I think on the other part, just him trying to be objective for me and him not being through any of this, you know, before is make sure you're making the decision for yourself, not for me, not for your buddies or whoever. I just try your best to make the decision that's best for you and what you want to pursue. And I always appreciated that. Again, it's that perspective that he gave.

Me that takes a lot for him not to nudge you towards baseball, being a baseball guy. Right. Like that he was.

He was trying for sure. Right. It was. That was definitely.

I was just giving him props. Don't steal that thunder from your dad. All right, let's go back. Let's go back to the social thing, because I think this is something that shows up in business a lot. I was just speaking to, with this amazing group, a client of ours, and I was at their event in Nashville a couple weeks ago, and we're talking about shifting the core, moving the middle, and we're talking about some of the reasons why they struggle. The middle does. Right. But I think you go back to. You hit on something with that social piece. And I remember experiencing this, a similar situation. I woke up for our first practice at Creighton. And I was walking out of my dorm on a Saturday morning at 4:45 in the morning and my guys on my floor were just coming in, right?

And I'm sitting there like, man, but there's this. There's this thing because we all have our hearts broken in sports at some time, just like we do in business. But we worry about is the price that we're paying going to be too high? Are we missing out on too many things? Because we focus on the sacrifice, not on the endurance. And then the other piece that puzzles like art. Is a reward going to be not is going to be enough, or is it going to be too low? Is it reward? And that's something as an athlete you fight through every day. But I see it show up with my clients too.

Like, when you're trying to take that next step and you're trying to push yourself into that complexity of discomfort and really be able to create order out of it and live outside your comfort zone, it's like, is this something I really want to do? So how did you lock in and how do you get folks to lock into, like, you know what? I absolutely believe in this. Yeah, that seems great. And there are no guarantees, but this is the path I'm going to choose and completely commit to it and operate with conviction.

You know, number one, when you're in the moment, right at that point in time, it's hard to lift your head up and see the bigger picture, right? You're locked in to your sport, you're locked into your goals. You may not be thinking of, right. All the sacrifices it's going to take, perhaps, right? Or is this, you know, what is it, right? What is it that I'm trying to accomplish here? You know, a lot of the guys I played with, they had the right mindset and I learned from the older guys, you know, and their mindset was, listen, I'm not going to be in the NFL. I know that I'm going to have the best college experience I can. I'm here on scholarship. I'm going to take advantage of what the university has to offer me and I'm going to get my education.

I'm getting my degree. I was really fortunate to be around a couple teammates like that, Ed. I think that really adjusted my mindset as far as creating the right or setting the right expectations for myself. But I never said to myself, I'm going to be a major league baseball player, I'm going to be in the NFL. I was more of like what they helped Me do is help myself set expectations. How am I going to get better each day, each year so that I'm more prepared and it's all for myself. Right. That I. When I look back, I know that I've left it on the table and I've developed more as an athlete.

Right.

Intellectually and physically. I think that's really helped me. And setting those expectations and learning from those perspectives and now having your own perspectives, transferring over to business, that very similar mindset, I think has really helped me be successful. I say successful for myself. Right. I'm happy what I've accomplished in business, and I think it absolutely transferred over to the business side. So percept perspective, not perception, perspective. And setting those expectations for yourself that age.

Like, so if I heard you right, you were 17 when you first enrolled in college. So I mean, that's a. That is a tough thing to do. I tell you this. I had to spend the summer going into my freshman year, our entire team did in Omaha. If I was 17 years old, I don't know how things would have went. I mean, there's a level of maturation that you had to have to be able to do that. Okay. Yeah, but you're at that age. You're young, you're impressionable. There's always a little bit of being naive at that age. Right. How was it that, though, you were able to be vulnerable a little bit, to listen to the older guys, to understand the lessons, that they're like that whole piece of the just get better today.

Like, it's hard to talk to these kids today about that with the nil and with the transfer portal and all of that. But how did you buy into the fact, like. No, you know what? That's it. I absolutely get it. I just need to. To focus on getting better and locking into every piece to my puzzle, to the academic side of social side, the athletic side in both football and baseball. How did that happen?

Number one, there's a lot of humbling that happened for myself. Right. You mentioned this earlier. I went from. This is a humble brag, you know, as Gatorade player of the year for football.

Right.

In the state of Nevada, going to university Arizona, chest puffed out a little bit. Right?

As it should be.

Yeah. I mean, listen, you got to have. You got to have a little bit of edge and swagger. You got. Got to have that right going in. But there's. There's a. There's a fine line you need to walk. Right. And you don't know that at that time Right. So I got my butt kicked. Just plain and simple, you know, I'm going against. I was a wide receiver. I'm going against DBs that are bigger, faster, stronger, two, three years older. I just got my butt kicked. The game speed was at such a high level, and I wasn't prepared for that conditioning wise. And I was struggling. And I remember this is preseason. This is my point. How did you get to that point? The offensive coordinator looked at me because he saw that I was just absolutely struggling.

And he said, stop feeling sorry for yourself. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. And that really resonated with me. That was like the butt kicking from the coaching side that I really needed. Right. Again, change my perspective on things. That's one example of many. I have many examples of that, Ed. Right. As many successes I had, I got my butt kicked even more. And those times really helped me get to me understanding towards the end of my freshman year, like, the perspectives that really matter and the maturation that's needed to get to that next level. If you want it, that's what it comes down to as well.

Right.

What do you want? This is a worth it, right? Your questions before is a reward, worth the sacrifices. And you go through that whole process. And again, I went through. I went through a journey that freshman year, very emotional journey. What am I doing here? Do I belong here? You know, you question yourself, you question your abilities. It's quite the journey you go through. Right. To get to that point. But I was very fortunate. Again, I was surrounded by good people. I had good mentors at, good teammates that were willing to share their perspective. Right. Older ones that have gone through that and parents that were very supportive.

Right.

As well. But it was definitely a journey to get to that point. So it wasn't. I hope I didn't create the impression. I showed up and I was at, you know, such a mature state.

I wasn't at all.

Quite the. Quite the contrary. Right. It just took those experiences to get me to that point, you know, where I was able to look forward with those different perspectives that I needed.

And you did not create that illusion at all. And matter of fact, I'm going somewhere with this, the fact that the coach knew to say to you, because my guess is that's how you'd like to be coached. My guess is that's what you responded to. And he knew to say to you as young as you were, stop feeling sorry for yourself. And there had to be something in the delivery. There had to be something. Eye contact, there had to be something in his body language. There had to be something in the timing and the set. Now you play all these sports, growing incredibly high level your freshman year. Play these two sports. You had all sorts of different coaches who were the ones that resonated with you the most, connected with you the most. And how have those.

Those coaches influenced the way you lead today?

Yeah, great. I love the question. And there's very. There's a few that really stand out to me. So to your point, how do I like to be coached? Just tell me what you're thinking. Don't make me guess. I don't want to play mental games if I'm not meeting expectations. Just tell me what I need to do right, to get better. And don't sugarcoat it. Just be very direct. So that's number one, what I really appreciated from that offensive coordinator at that time. And from that point, it became very close with him. No surprise. And we developed a really good relationship. I had a very similar experience in baseball. Again, struggling a little bit. And I was an outfielder. It was my outfielder coach at University of Arizona. And, you know, one of the things he did is like, here's what you're doing really well.

Here's where you need to tighten things up, but don't try to overcorrect things. He didn't say it exactly like that, but I think what he tried to do is like, don't now over rotate where you're spending all your time on these two to three things I'm telling you to get a little bit better at. And I think the last thing with him that really stood out to me is he believed in me. He believed him. He said, keep doing what you're doing, keep being consistent. Right. Things are going to work out for you. And why he was saying that is because I wasn't starting consistently. I was kind of platooning at the time. I was in and out, and I didn't really know where I stood right in the lineup. And he. He just kept encouraging me in that regard. And that.

That, to me, just really helped me get through that freshman year and stay focused.

How hard was that for you, platooning, not starting all the time from what you were used to? Like, I've got to think that you were a player regardless of the sport that you were in, had to be dragged off the field.

Yeah, I never wanted to come out of the game if I wasn't in the game. I was, you know, itching to get back. I couldn't stand not being part right of the action.

Right.

Of contributing. That's really what it was when I started platooning, not being a starter. Right. I was more of a situational player. Extremely difficult at. Very difficult to do. I respect anybody who's had to do that because mentally you have to be ready to go at any time. That could be towards the end of the game with two minutes left, Sitting on the bench the whole time in a big situation, in a pressure situation.

Yeah.

Which did happen to me, by the way.

Oh, wait, you can't just blow. You can't blow past that, man.

Yeah, I'll give you. I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example. This was my second year in college. Didn't start the game. Were playing against byu. It was a regional tournament. I believe it was the seventh inning. Coach calls me and says, you're going to go up to hit. Pinch inning, you're in, right? So here I am. I'm cold, right. I'm on the bench for seven innings. Now I'm going in a tie game. Situation was tight game. We had two men on base, no outs. I'm going in a pinch hit. This guy throwing at. He's throwing like 98 miles an hour, right. He's just bringing serious heat, right?

Yeah.

He was actually another two sport guy. He played quarterback on the team. So number one, I knew this guy was just going to try to blow fastballs by me. So I'm like, I just got to catch up to the ball, right? Just break this down and make it simple. First two pitches, he just blows by me. I got two strikes on me, two guys on base, high game, third pitch, little high outside. I just made the adjustment, roped a ball to right center, off the wall, drove two runs in. We ended up winning. The game was awesome. You know, one of the highlights of my college career. But the point is, right, it's again, just being mentally ready at any time, right. To adapt to any situation. Extremely, extremely difficult to do.

And again, I respect anybody who's had to do, you know, how to come into those situations at any level, you know, in sports. But it was a huge adjustment for me because I never had to do that before. So again, it was a process for me to learn just to be mentally ready and be engaged. I had to say to myself, I am going in the game at some point today or tonight and stay in that mindset as long as I could, you know, through the duration of the game.

How did all of that transfer, and we hear it all the time you know, not just the podcast guests, but the great people that I work with and work alongside. The fact that a coach had a belief in you, right, and understood what you're struggling, the way they communicated with you, what they said to you when they said it, like I mentioned before, but how some did that translate into the way that you led in the business world and connecting with different business leaders early in your career? I mean, you've had an amazing journey. Did you start to develop that mindset early in your business career where you realize, like, it's really the same thing? Not physically, but it's really like mentally and coaching wise, they're one and the same?

Yeah, Ed, you're right. Human performance and psychology, right. It's very transferable. Business to sports to business. And I think after about five years into my biotech career, you know, as a sales professional, I really had this urge to go into leadership because I started realizing, gosh, there's a lot of similarities here. Gosh, everything I've learned and experienced in sports at that level, I think will benefit me being a leader, right. In the business world. So it took a couple of years to get to that point. And what I realized very quickly was the similarities, right? Your belief in people, they deserve to be coached as a leader, you owe that to that person to be honest and forthright.

Right?

Why would I tell somebody they're a.400 hitter? If they're.250 hitter, what good is that going to do? Because I saw that on the other end and that only takes that person so far. Tell them where they're at. Tell them where they need to get to that high level performance. Believe in them, help them get there. Now the caveat is the other. The person has to be willing to put in the effort. Right. Like those two things have to converge. And once that, once those things happened, right. You could get, you could get people really believing in themselves, believing in their skills and abilities if they put the work in. So like the culmination of those experience I had in sports really helped me as a young leader start coaching people that way and had very good results.

Not saying I had 100% hit rate, but for the most part people responded really well to that.

Did you find yourself ever worrying early in your leadership career? Right. Ever worrying about how the things that you, the things you were going to say, how they were going to land and. Because they're, and I'm trying to say this the right way, like there's this mental edge that high level athletes have, especially when they perform at the level that you perform in. Right. And you have the ability to take things a certain way. And sometimes we live inside these worlds where some things are dictated by compliance, some things are dictated by hr and it's. I get it, like I understand it. Did you ever find yourself trying to lead in a way that wasn't you, that wasn't authentic, that wasn't true and therefore you weren't as effective? How did you handle that?

You know, I'll give you a, an inverse view of this first and then I'll go to your question if you don't mind, Ed. So competitive edge, you know how you're spoken to in an athletic competitive environment. Right. At that level, how you receive information, how you communicate information with your coaches, with your teammates. Right. How you deal with competition. It is very different in the corporate world. Right. How you do it. So I found myself early on in my leadership career thinking I'm going to get the same response from people I'm leading if I did it in the same way, if I deliver the information in the same way, it's the how. And what came back to me was, hey Anthony, we appreciate what you're trying to do and Right. This was a very polite way at it that I got this feedback.

But not all of us played sports. It's, it's coming across a little bit in overdrive. A little bit. Right. And I'm like totally get it because. And not everybody is wired that way. And I respect that. Right. How you're talking to people in the business world shouldn't be how I'm delivering, you know, a motivational pregame speech at a championship level. We have to change the house. So I got really good feedback early and I was appreciative that people felt comfortable enough to come. I had to temper that down because I led sales teams and I led non sales teams. Now on the sales side, you could up that game a little bit right around that. How you do the delivery on the teams that I led that were not revenue generating more support, that didn't land well. Right. At all.

So in that space I had to really experiment with the type of leader and how I delivered the messages were. And I found myself at times, to your point, not being who I really was.

Right.

I over indexed going the other way and that was a very uncomfortable space for me and very ineffective.

Right.

And how I was leading these teams as well. Because that wasn't authentic.

No. And that's Just it. Right. Like deep down inside you're being authentic because you're in a struggle. You're trying to figure it out. How did you do that? What was your strategy is not the right word, but kind of your methodology to find the different types of teams you led. How did you find your voice? How did you find your body language? How did you find your style? I mean, is this something that you journaled on? Is it something that you studied? Is it something that you found? Mentors who led similar teams and you respected their style? Like, how did you go about that?

Yeah. Thinking about the. How I help myself, number one, just knowing I needed to be vulnerable.

Right.

Knowing that I'm going to be uncomfortable. And that's okay. Just get in that mindset, be okay. Going to people and saying, I need some help, asking for help, because I know that's. That's uncomfortable for people. Like, some people look at that as a sign of weakness, as a sign of unintelligence, whatever it is. Right. And I was like, this is. This is crazy. You have really good people around you. Like I did with coaching, ask people for help. And for the most part, when you ask for that help and you get it. So mentors, I really leaned on mentors.

I had a tight group of mentors, my father as well, and I really leaned on them to just run these scenarios by them and say, hey, if you are on the other end receiving this message from me, whether it's in a group setting or one one, how is this, how is this resonating? How's this landing? Is it hitting the mark? Is it not? So a lot of experimentation during that time. Right.

As well. I have to think that people really appreciated the fact that you did that.

Yeah, I think, Ed, you know, if I were to look back and say, what am I most proud of? Right. In my accomplishments as a leader, I feel like one of them is people felt very comfortable giving me that feedback both ways. This is what you do really well, Anthony. And here's some things that, you know, you could do a little bit differently or do differently altogether. Right. It's not hitting the mark.

Was that. I don't want to say, was it hard to hear things from others because, I mean, we watch game film, right. And we know that the film doesn't lie. But were you anxious to get the feedback as you were trying to find yourself in the leadership role? Were you hesitant to receive the feedback? Were you defensive? Like, how did you get. You had this unbelievable amount of humility with all the amazing accomplishments you've had. And I just. I have to know because, hey, we know what we're supposed to do, but that doesn't mean that's always what we do.

Yeah. And all the above, like, to this day. Am I nervous getting feedback? Absolutely. Abs. Is it uncomfortable for me? Yes. It's still uncomfortable for me. Watching film on myself cringe, Always cringed. I hated it. I hated watching myself.

Especially if things weren't going well too.

I'm like, man, I'm really moving here. And I was like, man, you are stupid. You need to pick it up, man. Right. Like many of those moments. So, you know, it's interesting to this day, I had an executive leadership analysis right over my, you know, leadership style. You know, one of those. And it was really good, by the way. I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna name it by name, but I got a very good, like, 360 feedback on behaviors and leadership and where I'm showing up well, where I can do things differently. And that was super uncomfortable.

Right.

For me. And why. Why do I feel that way? I think for me, number one, I don't want to let others down in my. And that would always go through my head. And this is on. This is self imposed. Right? This is on me. Like, am I. Gosh, man, I'm not doing well here. Am I letting others down? And I have such a high expectation of performance for myself, and I always have. This is just how I was wired that if I didn't believe I was hitting that, it would be. I would be disappointing myself. Right? It was letting myself down. So, yes, there's humility, Ed. But is it uncomfortable? Absolutely. Does it make me nervous? 100% it does. Right? But I know that now. Right. Doesn't make it easier, but I just prepare myself a little bit better, right.

To receive this feedback and to your point, not get defensive. Don't get defensive. Don't make excuses. Take it. Just take it and learn it. Take it as a learning opportunity. Right.

You said something that I ask every former athlete that's in a leadership position, every former coach, athletic coach that joins the business world goes into a leadership position. You said I had very high expectations or I have very high expectations of myself. How do you handle and navigate the waters when you have a team member that might not recognize what they're capable of and might kind of. They're on the fence of whether or not they're willing to do what it takes to get to that point. So in other words, they don't have those expectations of themselves.

You know, I know when I got out of coaching for the first time in 1998, after our head coach was let go of Texas A and M and I went into the mortgage business, I mean, I, after a week in the office, I'm like, you know, no culture. There's a handful of guys with work ethics and with work ethic and ironically, those are the biggest producers. There are some things missing and I'm sure that I didn't handle it the best way at the age of 28. But how is it now? Like after these years of experience, you can find a way to cultivate these individuals even if they don't set the standards for themselves that you model as a leader?

Yeah, I think a couple things, you know, that I try to just do fundamentally well, like process wise is if they have a certain perception of themselves, why is that? Like what's that journey they've been on to get to that point?

Right.

Is someone beat them down in the past, Ed. Or someone just didn't believe in them? Right. All these things were talking about, you can't do this, you know, you're not good enough. Right. Those types of things where they have this constant self doubt talk in their minds. Right. As one example, like if I can understand that better from that person and what their perception is of how things are going or where they believe they can get to, then it helps me on my journey with them kind of unpack what their potential is. Right. And set the right. Really, it's setting the right expectation for them as well. It's like not everyone's going to be as superstar. That's okay. But what is good enough for you? Where do you want to get to?

Are you willing to put the extra work in to get to that point? It's a lot of discovery conversations.

Here's the gold right here that you're about to give us. Right. Because this is a question I get a lot from our coaching clients is okay, Ed, I get that, like I need to understand what their journey has done to them. I, I need to understand what their circumstances, how their past experiences has shaped them. But how do It and how do It in a way that they don't get defensive, that they don't try to spin it, that they don't put a wall up. So how is it that you're able to connect with folks and find those things out that have influenced and impacted them along the way and shape them into the person that they are.

Now, bear with me when I share the story with you because it's relevant to how I'm going to answer this question. I'm going to fast forward. After college, I was playing in the Florida Marlins organization. This is a ball, Ed, right? This is a ball trying to get to that next level. I get. I'll. I'll fast forward this conversation. I get called up to the next level, which was great. Get on a plane, fly to another city, put the new uni on. You're in the game. There's no transition time. Now, fortunately, I knew a lot of the guys, right? These are teammates of mine from spring training, which was cool. So you had that first at bat talk about flow state and, like, everything was just slow moving, which was amazing.

And this first at bat, I had this pitcher through a changeup, and I. I could see this thing come out of his hand, slow mo. And. And I just. I could still feel the bat going through the. The zone as it did on that night. And I hit. I. This thing probably went 450ft. I just crushed the ball. So get back to the dugout. High fives for my teammates. Some of the coaches, manager, you know, giving me high five. But I noticed the hitting coach, who I didn't know well, didn't even look at me, didn't even make a gesture, nothing. And I noticed that at the end of the game, he came up to me and he said, I don't even know how you hit that ball out of the ballpark. Your fundamentals are so bad. I didn't know Ed if he was joking.

I'm like, is he messing with me? Like, is he just trying to jack with me? Like, what's going on? He said, your. Your fundamentals are really bad because. So if you want to get better, I'll be at the park tomorrow at this time. It's about two and a half hours before we started the game, and I'll be in the cages if you want to show up. That was it. That was the end of the conversation. That did mess with me that night, though. I was like, oh, my gosh. I've never. I've never gotten feedback quite that way.

It was actually kind of a moment either. Yeah, yeah.

It was like he was laughing at how bad, you know, my fundamentals were, you know, swinging the baseball bat. What did I do? Of course I showed up. You know, for me, I'm like, yeah, I'm going to take this opportunity. This person, I'm not going to name him by Name. He was the hitting coach for one of the top college programs in the country. Taught Barry Bonds out ahead. I'll just leave it at that. I'm like, of course I'm going to take advantage of this opportunity and put the work in. We spent about two good hours that next day, but that's not where it ended. Right. It took me through the season and even in the off season were getting together. Here's my point to your question. How do you get people along that journey? He went through the pain like with me.

I felt that like the struggle and the grind. It wasn't just, I'm going to tell you what to do and do this and I'm good as your coach. And Anthony, you just go through this on your own. He actually went. I felt that he went through this grind and struggle with me because I had to undo everything I learned that I thought was right.

I went pretty well for everything I.

Thought I was doing well at. He's like, get that out of your head, man.

Yeah.

And that is a hard process to unwind and then start over. Because when you start that process over, I had a lot of failure and I had to trust him. Right. That was the other thing, this trust and bond that I formed with him because I knew he was in this for the long haul with me to go through that struggle, I just, I stuck with it.

Right.

To be, to keep simple. And I think with people moving forward and who I lead and who I believe in, who want to put the effort in, I want them to know the struggle or whatever you want to call it, the failures.

You.

I'm going to be there with you along the way. And I found that not only meaningful, but people will give more knowing that they have a co pilot or wingman or whatever you want to call it, wing woman along the way. And I've seen that work really well.

He observed, he delivered the brutal truth to you in a certain style, certain way. But as you're leading people and you lead folks in high pressure environment, I mean, there's a lot going on. There's a lot going on. And not only is there a lot going on business wise, there's a lot going on in everybody's world. How are you intentional about observing the way people are responding to adversity, responding to success, responding to challenges? How do you observe that and then what do you do with that information?

I believe, Ed, the way you understand what people are made of and who they are times of adversity. And Stress and discomfort, right. When things are going well, everybody's in a good mood, right. Everybody's smiling, everybody's high fiving that's not who people are. Get people out of their comfort zone in a high pressure situation, a situation where there's duress, right. Where they're expected to perform and it's an executive level, you know, they're in front of. Right. Or customers that are at a level where they're making decision where you win or lose, right. A formulary decision. That's when you know what people are made of and who they are. So I would say, number one, you have to observe your people in action in those situations to really understand who they are. You have to.

If you don't, you're doing yourself and them a huge disservice. When you observe them in those situations and really learn, like watch, observe and listen at how they react, how they handle tough questions, you know, what their critical thinking is in the moment where they have to make a decision or give a response. That has really helped me craft how I coach them, you know, moving forward. Now the other part of it is letting them know I'm going to be observing them, you know, before. But it's to help, right? It's to help and support and to help us get better. Right. Moving forward.

Right.

As a performer or to get to that high level performance, you want to be an A player. Here's the things we need to agree on. Here's the situations I want to observe you in. And then after that, we'll do a proper, you know, debrief and see what we need to do now moving forward.

The information you're going to get, and I think this is so significant, the information you're going to get, you are going to use that as a tool to help them level up. Whereas some folks, and there's some leaders out there that like, okay, I'm going to observe you, I'm going to watch you, I'm going to ride with you, and dang it, if you don't do it right, I'm using it as a weapon. Like you aren't doing things the right way. When, when you use this information that you get as a tool, do you find that the folks that you lead open up? Do you find that they're, they're more willing, they're more coachable, they're more vulnerable. How does that go?

Yeah. And you know, at times it's individually based, right. I think some people receive it better than others. Again, based on their experiences and perspectives that have been shared with them. Right. So I've had many people that know intentions are good here. If you're telling me you want to be an a performer and you truly want to get better, you know, at certain things. Right. I want to, I want to get to a different level in the organization. I want to have more agility, whatever that is. Great. Tell me what you want and I'm going to help you get there. I'm not going to have all the answers. Right. This is a two way relationship. Right. As well. But I'm going to help you the best I can. From what I'm observing from you, it's not to beat you down.

This is not to say, aha, I got you. That's not the purpose for this, you know, for these coaching opportunities. It's to help you understand why I'm telling you what I'm telling you. The perception, right. It gives off to others. I had someone recently, high level presentation, high level engagement with customers that were one of our biggest accounts throughout the country. And the expectations on the customer end was not met. A lot of that came from preparation and planning and it was a miscommunication. Right. Between the two entities. So simply, I'll just wrap this up really quick, you know, quickly is did you put the proper planning in place before? Did you think of the assumptions that the other side may have and run those scenarios, you know, run those plays out as an example? And the answer was no.

I had my agenda, I stuck to it. I wasn't able to get out of that mode.

Fair.

Right. I've been there, you've been there. We've all been in that, you know, a lot of us have been in that mode.

Right.

But just being able to set that expectation up front and then get to the coaching piece of it.

Right.

To get them to really understand why it came across the way it did on the other end. That's where I see people really opening up because they understand I'm there to help their performance. Right. I'm there to help them understand how it came across on the other side. And even those that are listening within our organization, how that comes across, tough conversations. Right. But definitely more open to that than me just going, here, let me. Here's five things you didn't do well.

Right?

Right. Which can happen easily. Right. It's, it's time on my end to invest with them. Right. Again, going through that, going through the grind, going through those failures with them and they Know, I'm with them along the way.

You know, one of the things we talked a lot about, like how we handle things in a one one situation, which is so critical and so key. And one of the things I have so much admiration for you for and you know, all the folks I talk to in your orbit and the connections that we share is your amazing ability to build innovative teams. And one of the things we focus on here with our leaders that we work with is the intangibles, the little things. What is it about you? What is it that puts you at this level, creating an innovative team? And for you, what does it mean to be an innovative team?

Yeah, sometimes I, I feel a little uncomfortable at talking about myself, but I think for me, what I really look for, you know, when I put a team together, there's two things that I really look for in people. Number one, do they do the fundamental things that need to be done every day? The mundane things, do they do those things really well? Right? The blocking and tackling, as a lot of people like to refer to it as. They're not fancy, they're not as sexy, they're not these big projects that they're undertaking, but the fundamental skills and effort you put in every day, do you do those really well and continue to practice your craft? You put the time in to do it, right? The effort. So that's one thing I really look for.

The second thing you and I, you know, we hear these buzzwords a lot is mental toughness or mental strength. It's not a gift, right? You have to work at that thing, right? So what I try to get to with people is when you're in this emotional state of self doubt or whatever you want to call it, or you're struggling, how long does it take you to get out of that? We're all human. If anyone says non existent, for me, they're lying, I don't believe them. Right? Red flag, red flag right away, right? The championship level, right performers, the alo, everybody goes to this mental strength, struggle. The difference is how quickly can you get yourself out of that struggling state. Does that make sense? I hope that makes sense.

Makes total sense. There's no such thing as absence of fear, absence of anxiety, craziness, self doubt. We all have it.

Absolutely.

What do you do with it?

What do you do? So can you get. Yeah, you're in it. Recognize it. How do you get yourself out of it? How do you deal with the things you and I were talking about, right? Adversity? You don't have control of most things in our lives as much as we'd like to trick ourselves and think we do. How do you handle what those situations are, those changing variables? Give it a quick example. I think you and I talk about skiing. Downhill skiing.

Yeah.

Love skiing, grew up skiing. One of the things I really love about it is the challenge of skiing because the variables are changing all the time. You could literally ski the same run all day long. It's going to be different every single time you ski down that run. Why? Weather lighting the person before you. Right. I mean, you can name 20 things that are different or more. I love that challenge. I love when people embrace that Right. As well. Because that in business, right, we call it that agility, right. To deal with the uncontrollable, deal with adversity is so applicable to what they do every day and ultimately leads to their performance and outcomes. Right. In the end.

It's funny how you can just connect it to scheme, but that's just it. The different conditions, the different circumstances, the different challenges. How do you feel? Where's your fatigue factor at? Where's your physical mental fatigue factor at? And how can you channel all that and just. And continue to just get better if you put an innovative team together, it is an art to be able to do that. And I know that you are uncomfortable or very similar, don't like talking about ourselves, but you're so servant minded, you're so selfless. So you're actually really helping someone else here by doing this. What is it that happens when all of a sudden starts to click and you see the team getting to where you want them to get.

Yeah.

Where they need to get going back.

To the innovative teams.

Right.

You know, those are two, you know, core things I look for. Right. And then there's. There's many other things too, Ed. Right? It's. People take their collective, right, their collective experiences, right? How they deal with adversity and ultimately. Right. How do they produce, right, ultimate results? How do they get high performance out of themselves? So essential, right, to building these innovative teams? Because those people, I believe from my experiences are more open to taking risks, to being in an environment that all the plays aren't run out. Here's your playbook, Anthony, and here's. This is what you're going to do for the year. And if you do those things, everything's going to be great. They don't want that playbook. Bring it on. I'm up for the challenge. I'm up for the weather changing on Me, the variables changing, it doesn't matter.

I'm very comfortable being in an uncomfortable environment. So that's number one, I think number two with these innovative, they have to understand what being in a team based environment means accountability from themselves and what they look for from their teammates. Right. Others as well. So when you introduce innovative ideas or more so non traditional ideas or things that aren't going the way as we expected them to go in a launch, they're more prepared for to flex, to change direction without this major disruption to themselves. It doesn't get them off their game is my point. Hey, I'm going in a different direction now. Awesome. Where do we need to go? I will figure it out in my local area. Right. They're taking things on as an owner. So when you talk about innovation, it's not like these things that are, you know, life changing. Right.

Life changing experiences. It's the little things that get them to think about how to do things a little bit differently because they're able to.

And does that go back to having the ability to challenge the status quo? So in other words, here's the constraints that we're operating inside of. But we need to find a way to reframe the situation or reframe the circumstances, reframe the opportunity. How significant is that into an individual significantly contributing to the innovation of a collective unit?

Yeah, it's both ways, Ed. Right. It's like, hey, here's what we have to work with. Don't ask for anything more. Figure it out with what we have and watch people respond to that. Most people, and I tell them this too, a lot of, you know, one ones, you know more than you think you do approach the situation and challenge like that.

Right.

Where you're at, everyone's like, I've only done this role. I've been in this role for three years. Yeah, but you've been in this organization for 10 years. Right. You've seen other functions around, you've seen other how other parts of the business work. You know how these things work. Yeah, maybe you haven't done the job in another part of the business. You're, you're touching, but you have experience in it. Apply that to your every day. And most people are like, it's a great point. I didn't really think of it like that because we don't write a lot of these companies that we have people very siloed in what they do until you get to certain levels of the organization. Right. You got to look around, you get people to understand that. And realize that you know more than you think.

You do perform your job, approach your work that way in problem solving.

Right.

With these constraints. Right. That get thrown upon them at times.

And this is a great segue, by the way. And I know you didn't do that intentionally. You're just a natural at this. Because as we. And I have to apologize because I could talk forever. We've been at this for an hour already, and there's so many more questions I have. But as we wrap this up, I want to get to the personal side a little bit. Okay. We both love to ski. We talk about looking around. We both love to ski, try new things, see new places. Give me your top mountain that you love to get after.

Oh, man. So I've skied so many great mountains. Right. So, no disrespect to. To those that love these other mountains, but Deer Valley is my go to. And I would say it gets a lot of, you know, it gets a lot of trash talk like, there's only skiers there. There's no snowboarders, which we do like, by the way. But the terrain is very underestimated.

Unbelievable.

The terrain is underestimated. I'll give you a fact here. This is cool. And you've skied there?

Yeah, a few times.

Boots off of Empire are the steepest pitch shoots in North America. They're at Fort. What are they at? They're at 40. They're about 15 degrees steeper than most other shoots and pitches around the country. More so than Colorado.

Right.

Even up in Alberta and those types of things. And people don't realize that I'm like, yeah, super challenging terrain there. So, yeah, I get. It's got the reputation.

It's. She, she.

And yeah, it is. Right. There's some great things about. But the terrain, once you get into it, is amazing.

Yeah, there's some great tree runs. There's. I mean, and what I. What I love about it's. And I made this mistake, and we talked about this, I think, before is like, that's the first place out west. I brought the kids. So they think that's how everything's supposed to be now. Right. Like, it's always going to be groomed and everything's gonna be perfect and catered. But I mean, the experience there, that's what it's all about. It's like the whole complete package, the. The skiing experience. So that leads me to my next question. Okay, that's one personal thing. What leadership book has impacted you the most? If you were. For instance, I have, in my backpack, no matter where I travel to, I have the book Legacy about the New Zealand All Blacks.

I think it's one of the best leadership books written, or at least for me, it's really resonated with me. For you, what would that be?

This is in my top and here's why I mentioned this one right now. My oldest son, again, another humble brag, proud of him, graduated, I think, you know, I talked about this. He's a West Point graduated last year, last May in Ranger school right now. So I've become really wanting to up my game around, you know, not only military history, but why does the military build exceptional organizations, right? Chain of command leadership, right. Things like that. So common name. I think a lot of, maybe a lot of your listeners know Jocko Willink. He wrote Extreme Ownership, right? And I love that book. It's nothing again, it's nothing fancy. It's not like, oh my gosh, this is so enlightening. But what it does is just really, he really breaks down again the fundamentals of leadership such as being decisive. It's not this huge organizational decision.

It's the day to day, minute to minute decisions that you have to make. And what you and I talked about, times of duress, stress, where you have to be decisive or else your squad can die, right. As an example. And what he talks about is the little decisions that he made that have a huge impact but at that time they seem little but be decisive about them, right? That's an example of how he breaks things down in that book. And I really appreciate that. I think it's so applicable obviously to business and our day to day work.

We're going to put that link to that book for our listeners. We'll put that in show notes. To me, it's a great book and I love the fact that they can access it and think like you think. And then my last thing is, you know, we live in this world. Unfortunately. Some folks think like this, the majority of folks think like working hard and finding joy in what you do are mutually exclusive. The great leaders know that's not true. What is it about being a high impact coaching leader for you that brings you the greatest joy?

You know, when I see people make incremental advances or wins, add whatever you want to call that, right? Progress in what they're striving for and there's a smile on their face, right? There's a story they can share with me on how it Impacted not only the business side, but maybe periphery. Right. Beyond. Beyond just business. Watching people and seeing people accomplish what they want to accomplish. It's the little things give me tremendous joy. That really is what drove me into. Into leadership.

Right.

As well. Nothing fancy or enlightening, I'm sure, for your listeners, but I think for me, being able to, if I'm getting that out of the people that I'm able to lead, I'm doing a little bit right for them. And that keeps me going and gives me a lot of energy every day.

But at the end of the day, isn't what it's all about. It's like the genuine substance of why we do what we do. And that's it. There is nothing flashy about it. Right? Right. There's nothing glamorous, there's nothing sexy about it. You know, from my point of reference, basketball, it's not always game day. It's not always cutting down nets. It's seeing the growth. And you couldn't say any better. The incremental advances in the small wins.

Yeah, for sure.

Anthony, I can't thank you enough, man. I mean, that hour flew, at least for me. It did for your mind forever. But for me, that flew by. Hey, man, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Yeah, Ed, thank you for the opportunity. This was awesome. Love the questions. Love being able to reminisce about good times and. And most importantly, hopefully giving your listeners some new things to think about or not. Not just new things, maybe some things just to remind them of. Right. That I'm sure they're doing really well. So love being here. Thank you for the opportunity.

Thank you, Anthony. And we'll put the link to your. Your LinkedIn profile, all things social media. We'll put the link to Jocko's book. But any chance I have, I mean, I. I'm better for this last hour. Like, I'm a better person, I'm a better leader, I'll be a better dad. And that's another thing. I would love to bring you back again and do a segment on how you parented your son. Okay. And by the way, please, for all of us, thank him for his service. Unbelievable. I'm making the ultimate commitment and how that was a result of your father, the coach in your life. I think that'd be just an awesome conversation.

Yeah, let's do it.

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