Scared People Can't Think: The Neuroscience of Psychological Safety with Patricio Cuesta

[0:00] you're paying for their prefrontal cortex

Patricio Cuesta: You're paying for their prefrontal cortex, not for their body. It's 100 % available. So what else do you want? If you pay for somebody that went to Stanford and then the guy has been working 30 years in whatever, in &A, and the guy is all the time scared and he's not producing, create the conditions to keep him working hard, challenged, but that he's not thinking about survival so he can offer you that brain that he developed for so many years and you're paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for it.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Pretty simple.

Dan Korus: Okay, well welcome. today's

Patricio Cuesta: Thank you.

Dan Korus: all about you. where where are you from? Where'd you grow up? Tell us about yourself.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm from Argentina. I was born in Argentina

Dan Korus: Okay. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: already 56 years ago in a middle-class neighborhood. And I know how much you know Argentina. It's a very beautiful country where, I mean, you have all the climates, you have all the kind of geographies you can imagine. The way we like to engage with people is super warm. Friendship is... It's a very important value, but we have politicians and we have a lot of crisis there. So my lovely country is beautiful, but we have

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: a hyperinflationary few years. We have a lot of poverty. So that's my beautiful country, my beloved Argentina.

Dan Korus: Okay, cool. have you been back recently? Do you ever go back? Do you still have family there? Okay. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I travel every year, minimum once, because I have my parents there, have my friends from high school that we still are very close, my sisters. And also I like to connect with the country and the food and feeling the pain of living in Argentina so I can feel connected to my culture and to my past. So every year there I am.

Dan Korus: I get it. sometimes when I go home I feel like who I am now is a slightly different person than who my family knows me as. Right? Do you feel like going back every single year that when you go back who who you are kind of changes or do you feel like you're more integrated?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, it changes because I think that the environment where you live, maybe what you're trying to describe is bringing you to certain places. And when I go back, it's not worse or best. It's different. And I see when I have conversations with my friends, when we talk about whatever we talk, we start to, every day, be more apart in certain discussions or certain topics or certain perspective. And you start to get disconnected. I don't know how frequently you travel to your homeland, but in my case, traveling once, twice a year, after 12 years, you start to disconnect with the time and you start to think different.

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: mean, living in this country is amazing because you have so much innovation, so much energy towards entrepreneurship. And my country is the opposite of that. So when you get used to that and you think with that environment in your day to day, When you go back, you start to feel that you are moving every day a little more apart from whatever is being talked, discussed, done there. So, unfortunately.

Dan Korus: Mm. I get it. When we were when we were first meeting and we were talking about ideas of what we wanted to talk about for the show, your dad seemed like a big influence on you. What did your dad do? Or what does he do?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, my dad is engineer

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: and he had a big influence because the way he lives, he's very responsible and he's about doing the right thing and he's a great provider. So that was a good example for me, but he's extremely good provider, extremely responsible, extremely professional in what he does. And he taught me not to go to that extreme, to not, work extra hours, to look for having a balance.

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: And also he is an engineer. when I was thinking what to do when I was 17, I started to discard a lot of things I didn't want to study. And then he helped me to figure out that maybe engineering could be something that I could like. And he was right.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: So, you know, those are the two influences I had from him that helped me a lot.

Dan Korus: You know, and sometimes our parents will have us pursue something that is also their dream. Do you think that he helped you find your own dream in engineering? Or do you think he was helping you find

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah

Dan Korus: his dream in engineering? What what

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, it's true. Some parents, I think that they want their kids to do whatever they could not accomplish or to do

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: what they do because in that way they get validation.

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: My parents were great because they never told me, start engineering. When he saw me that I was lost, he said, hey, maybe engineering could be a good balance in between all the things you like. By the way, after many years, I discovered that engineering was not the right career for me, but maybe I'm going to be

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: talking about that by diversity. I think that he allowed me to have that space to decide what I wanted to do and not what he wanted me to do.

Dan Korus: I get it. When you first found engineering and you said, Okay, this is something that I could pursue for a little while, what was it about entren engineering that sparked your interest?

Patricio Cuesta: I love that it gives you a methodology to solve problems. It

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: gives you a framing. And then I realized that no matter if you're dealing with human resources issues or day-to-day issues, it structures your mind in way that allows you to attack any issue and find the right path, the right system to start with the crisis or with the issue and end with a solution that is the best possible one, maybe. And I need structure. That is part also of the way my brain was built with neurodiversity. I need a path

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: to be followed. And I think that engineering had that input, black box output approach that helped me during my whole life to solve any problem that wasn't a problem.

Dan Korus: At what point did you find out you're neurodivergent? This is a recent is this recent? 50. Okay. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: I was 50. Yeah, I'm 57. And I was 50 and was thanks to my kids. So my whole life,

Dan Korus: wow.

Patricio Cuesta: I live a life where I was thinking, there's something wrong with me. Let's hope nobody discovers that I'm weird or I'm failed or I'm not as good as it looks like because I was successful with my profession. But then I realized that certain things. were very difficult for me and for other people were super easy, super straightforward. But then one day when I turned 50, I was taking sabbatical year and my kids were going through some challenges with school and we started to test them. They found out that they are neurodiverse. And then when the person that was doing all the testing shared with me the results and the approach that they take for the test. And the kind of, what does it mean to be neurodiverse? For some in this case with this calculator, this is a neurodiversity related to math. I said, man, that's me. That's me. So, so you're talking about me. It's not my kid. It's me. No, no, this is, these are your kids.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And, suddenly, by the way, a few days ago, I, I shared with a group of people about my neurodiversity journey. And I was sharing with them that for three decades, I thought I'm weird and failed. And suddenly. I started to understand, this explains a lot of things. It's not about

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: you. It's about you being in the wrong places or being measured with the wrong ruler. And it was such a relief. On the other side, helped me to rethink my life in a different way. So it was a very intense experience. On one side, you think, my kids. They got my genes and

Dan Korus: Uh-huh.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm screwing their life. No, so it's my fault.

Dan Korus: No, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: No, and then I think

Dan Korus: It's a gift. It's a gift. I think it's a gift.

Patricio Cuesta: it's a gift depends on the conditions and how you deal with that. But at that moment I felt guilty. But then I started to say, remember a certain situation happened in my life and it was so clear now that I was wired differently. It was not about me not being capable enough. So that was a relief, but also open new doors.

[7:40] what neurodiversity actually looked like for me

Dan Korus: Yeah. And we don't have to go into too big a specifics because some of this is medical information. It might be helpful though for someone who's listening, what sort of symptoms were you experiencing that suddenly clicked as soon as you knew, I'm neurodiverse?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, well, I have a combination of neurodiversities as

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm sure you know that you never have one. It's not that you

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: have black or green. You have a combination because the non-true brains are alike. And it's about you use the neurodiversity explanation to try to understand certain patterns. In my case, the driver is dyscalculia that is basically, in my case, short-term memory, I'm horrible. then formulas and numbers doesn't mean for me the same time for you. I have challenges understanding typical formulas. You can understand when you're studying math. And my brain looks things in a different way. And then I have a big issue with names. So in my job, I have to have a lot of meetings, parties, international meetings with people I was meeting for first time and remembering their name was so painful. So painful. You say, hey, I'm done. And then in one minute, I'm like, who are you? Or I go to

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: a hotel. I mean, when I travel, my room was 500 free C in my hotel. But when I came back from the office, I had to go to my room. I was, what's my room number? And everyone could find their room, but I couldn't do it. So a lot of small things that were, when

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: they happened in my life, I felt man, there is something wrong with me. And then when they describe you, what does it mean to be this calculate? That was me. That was me. Also, I have some level of ADHD that

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm sure you know is about rabbit holes. I'm a

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: person that I see all the time ideas. I want to this and that. And being an engineer and working a lot around systems helped me to keep my life under control because otherwise I couldn't achieve anything. I was all the time. ideas and things I love. I like to move fast. So

Dan Korus: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: there are small things you find out. And today with AI is easier to help you to understand yourself and understand what are the elements that could define if you are new to the verse that

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: helped me to not just think, man, I'm different is okay. What are the conditions under which I can excel and I can add more value to who worries with me to myself. And I realized that when I was young, even I didn't have any diagnosis because when I was young, I mean, that was many years ago, it was not so common as today to get to have resources to test yourself. it

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: was not, you know, it was not the mainstream issue, but I was without knowing the diagnosis, I was living my life in a way where I look for the best possible way for me to add value to myself and others, understanding my limitations. And I think that that was my achievement, that I found my way through the craziness of being studying engineering and

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: not being, I didn't have the brain for that. So it was the worst possible career and I was there.

Dan Korus: Yeah, you know, for for the audience. and I didn't give you a great introduction. I'm sorry. that that's on me, but I kinda like to discover my guests. But what do you why don't you tell us a little bit about where you are now? So that way people can contextualize it. 'Cause where you are now is actually quite impressive. and if people know a little bit about that, then we can go back and talk a little bit more about the journey.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, that's a great point. Well, let me go back to my, that, that year when I turned 50 and I score, I was in the diverse. I

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: scored that I love sharing. I love helping people to find out things that are good for them. I love, I love teaching. I love learning and sharing. And

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

Patricio Cuesta: that's the moment where I changed my career. Our

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: arm from being a corporate guy started to adjust. my direction, started to study neuroscience, applying to management and how to coach people. And

Dan Korus: Okay. Got it.

Patricio Cuesta: I ended today helping executives to create systems, to work with their teams in a way they are more productive. They can create more with less. They can achieve more, taking care of their people and assuring that they move forward and they grow.

Dan Korus: Awesome.

Patricio Cuesta: Also, I teach in University of Central Florida. I work with post-graduate students of engineering and we help with my colleagues to them to be more ready for today's world, today's AI world, especially when it comes to how to start an initiative from scratch and launching that project, being an entrepreneur or working in a corporation. I love to mentor students. I love to share about how to connect the AI era to the students and also executives because many executives don't know how to deal with this new crazy reality we facing.

Dan Korus: That's a really good point. okay, we have a lot to talk about. and I love all of this.

Patricio Cuesta: yeah.

Dan Korus: this is really fun already. So engineering, right? And when you first started engineering, what was appealing is that there were systems all of a sudden that you could utilize. And it was about f solving problems and being able to have frameworks to be able to think. think through problems and be able to come up with solutions. And that helped you organize your thoughts in a way that started to make sense. So what would did you have a job as an engineer? Did when did you study formal engineering? Did you did you have what were you up to there?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, let me, let me show you, this is crazy part of my life connected with the engineer. yeah. So

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay, good. I'm ready. I'm ready.

Patricio Cuesta: I was an engineer in the best college you can find in Latin America for engineering. It took me a lot of work,

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: a hard work to be able to enter and be accepted. I think I lost most of my hair in the process of studying with

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: my friends. And I was able to enter to be accepted together with eight friends. that we did together intermediate and high school. So we were my best friends, my buddies. And

Dan Korus: Okay. Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: suddenly we were studying every day like crazy and they

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: were passing all the subjects and I was not.

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: And again and again, first semester, second semester. So I was approving certain ones that were not so dense in math, but other ones

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I was not. So I was, man, what's wrong with me? And same friends, same professors, we are coming from the same very high school. And why

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm failing after one year and half, I couldn't continue anymore because

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: they were progressing. was not progressing. I got the job. I abandoned college. I got a job in a multinational company. It was

Dan Korus: Yep. Okay. What was the job? Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: a German company. They exported agricultural equipment and I was customer experience representative and I was helping customers from different countries. And I realized I was very good working with people from different cultures,

Dan Korus: Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: solving issues. it was the first time I said, man, I'm good at something because I was not good playing

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: soccer. I was not good with math. I

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: had to abandon college. And suddenly then there was a sign that, okay, maybe I can survive in this world.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And when I was working in this company, they offered me an internship in Germany. I was 21 years old. I was excited about that. did that. I reconfirm again that I was very good doing working with people in different cultures. I already spoke three languages, Spanish, English, and German. And when I was ready to come back and say, okay, I'm going to insist again with my career or a different career, I said, no, I want to do some crazy stuff. And I traveled to Italy and I got a job as windsurf instructor in Lake Garda. And I stayed there for six months, again, working with people from different countries. And it was so good. It was fun. It was a dream job, but also I said, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[15:20] going to Germany and selling windsurf lessons in Italy

Dan Korus: Okay. Hold on. Hang on. Hang on. So I totally get it. You you have this cohort of friends. And I was similar. I think out of my cohort of friends, I probably had the worst grades. I think if if you doubled my GPA, it's nowhere near to what theirs were. But and and and having a cohort of friends can be immensely valuable, but how hard not to compare. Right. When you feel like the circumstances are the same, then you feel like the difference is the people. Right? Like it's us. And yeah, that sounds like a really hard situation to go through. And then you made the decision to go work at a company. and it sound and and that went really well because now you're in front of people. And in it sounds like in the span of two years, you learned German.

Patricio Cuesta: I learned in high school. Sorry, in school. I started when I was four. So I went to a German school.

Dan Korus: You knew okay. So you you had already known you were taking you went to a how did you know German? wow.

Patricio Cuesta: bilingual school. I had to learn Spanish, English, and German at school. So it was pretty intense. But you know, in Latin America, but

Dan Korus: So you grew up learning learning three languages? Well that's pretty impressive. I don't I don't I barely know one.

Patricio Cuesta: think about this, when you are in the US,

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: you speak already English, and that's the language of business and whatever. When

Dan Korus: Sure.

Patricio Cuesta: you're in South America and you want to be successful and have a career, you have to be the best. You have to be the

Dan Korus: Yeah. Got it.

Patricio Cuesta: best so you can... My parents said, hey, let's go to this amazing school where I was using computer when I was already eight years old. We are

Dan Korus: Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: talking about almost five decades ago. We were using lasers.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Well.

Patricio Cuesta: I have to thank you, my parents, because at that time I hate them because I had to work very

Dan Korus: Yeah. huh. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: hard to pass German and I had German professors that were very demanding, but that

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: really put the bar at the right level for me because... Yeah, you know how it is when you have the bar

Dan Korus: Yeah. I get it.

Patricio Cuesta: at a certain level, you know, you never go backwards.

Dan Korus: What do you what do you why do you think you're good at so you go work with this German company, they say, Hey, come do an internship in Germany, that takes you over to Europe. Is that your first time in Europe? Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: It was in Cologne, Germany.

Dan Korus: Why do you think you were so good at what made you good at dealing with people from different cultures?

Patricio Cuesta: I think that I connect very well with people when it comes to my energy. I

Dan Korus: Uh-huh.

Patricio Cuesta: love what I do. And I think that I conveyed that to, I work with people in every continent. And I think that they, even the worst moments of whatever we are working together, they know that what I, that I really love what I do and that

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm committed to make the best of our relationship. And

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I think that people felt that since they won. I truly, I'm not the guy that is thinking I'm going to. create a good connection with them because I need this. I

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: love connections. I'm not a super social party guy. I'm somebody that

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: values a lot, having a productive good connection where the other person gets what they deserve and what they're treated with respect and

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: that I'm honest. And I think that when you have that energy and you honestly are like that, that... helps you to create more value with people, no matter the culture. And when you have different cultures where you have that friction of, do you think differently? You act differently. That energy helps you to eliminate that friction or minimize that friction. That's my thinking.

Dan Korus: Yeah, it sounds very genuine and very sincere and that even though there are cultural differences between the people, you were able to bridge that gap with passion and just caring about the people and the the team objective. Sounds very wholesome to me. Would you add anything to that? Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, think that, yeah, and I think that it has to be something that has to come from, I don't think that I'm superior than because of that. I think that that's my,

Dan Korus: No, yeah, of course.

Patricio Cuesta: that's my, what I can bring to the table because I have

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: partners working that they work great at this and that. I'm good at that. And let me give you an example. Brazil, one of the companies I was working, Brazil was in the middle of a crisis, the business. And they say, okay, go and solve it. And

Dan Korus: Yes. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I traveled the whole country. talking with every distributor in the top 10 cities of Brazil, I spoke Portuguese so I could really go deep in talking to them because I learned Portuguese for that purpose. And people, when they felt me traveling to Manaus, Recife, the deep Brazil, eating their food, chatting about whatever they want to chat in their language and spending time with them just to learn about what is your issue? What can I do to help you? Tell me what you think we can do better. You just get a lot of great information, but also you create trust and you create psychological safety.

Dan Korus: Meeting people where they're at and asking what's your problem and what can I do to help?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, just grabbing a plane, grabbing a car, going there, eating their food, enjoying, suffering their pain. Especially when you have clients, distributors going to the, I used to go to the points of sale to the supermarket where we have our products, the warehouse, talking with people, hey, this warehouse is too hot. Okay, let me feel it. And when people see that and you do it just because you want to feel their pain, I mean, nothing stops you after that because it's honest. and his empathy and his caring.

Dan Korus: Yeah, I mean you're quite literally putting yourself in their in their shoes. You know, you're you're walking, you're falling yeah, you're there. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, I mean, and that's leadership. I mean, you want to a team, you have to really feel their pain. How can you ask people to do something if you never did what they did and you don't know in which conditions they have to do whatever you're asking them to do? So I truly believe that super important is empathy, connection and feeling people pain being, you said it very well, is wear their shoes. Really wear them, not just for a few seconds for a nice picture.

Dan Korus: Go hang out in the warehouse.

Patricio Cuesta: No, absolutely. And I remember it's evenings where we have crisis with the operation where we had dinner sandwich dinner with the warehouse team that they were trying to close the month. And I was there with them and say, what are you going to do? I mean, no, go boss, go. No, no, I want to do with you guys. But because I like them, I appreciate what they do. People feel that.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. that's gonna make one hell of a soundbite, I can tell you right now. I'm gonna ruin it. Let's go back to when you were windsurfing in Italy. How'd you get that job? Why wh why'd you end up in Italy? really? Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: that was fun, By the way, I had hair, long hair. I can show you a picture that I had long hair. Well, it was difficult then because I was talking with this, I would this with a group of people a few days ago. I

[23:00] how to study for a brain that isn't built for it

Dan Korus: Yeah. huh.

Patricio Cuesta: had an event with a few business people and I was sharing how the question they had is how you got a job in 1990 in Europe that no internet, no apps. It was a newspaper Sunday. Yeah.

Dan Korus: How did you get a job? Yeah. Newspapers? Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: So was in Cologne in Germany and said, I don't want to go back to Argentina. I'm not ready anymore. Adventure. I don't

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: know what to do. My parents expecting me to go back. I said, I don't want to go back. And then I started to read newspapers. know, Lake Garda, we need an instructor for windsurfing. Okay, here I am. Phone, you call, you have an interview, you grab a train, you go there and you don't have certainty they're going to hire you. But life was like that at a time of, mean, life was more, less certain. less everything was less reliable because you you you be trying to say I don't hire you don't look well And you you're out of money. So It was fun. No whatsapp.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: No, no messaging. No emails. Nothing letters yeah, yeah, I was I was

Dan Korus: Yeah, just flying by the seat of your pants. Have you did you had you ever windsurf before? Okay, cool.

Patricio Cuesta: a avid windsurfer I for me was a dream job because you know girls in italy and windsurfing and

Dan Korus: Got it. Right. Sure. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: the lake, it was a pizza, what else can I ask? Is that or going back to study engineering?

Dan Korus: Yeah, y that not much. That's right. So why are you why aren't you in Italy windsurfing now? What what why'd you leave?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, well, I enjoyed the experience. It was amazing. But then I realized that I love, I love progressing. I love to, whatever I do, I'm not saying that being a Windsor instructor is not great. It's great. But what's next? What's next? What's next? I'm, I have an issue. I think that I need to maybe a therapist for that. That is, I want to always learn something new and progress. I need more. And then

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: after six months, I was like, okay, what else?

Dan Korus: Yeah, right. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: And what else? Nothing. else? It's this wind, boats, and that's it.

Dan Korus: Yeah. I get it. okay, so where where'd you go? Like the this is an interesting part in the story because it seems like you're before this you're discovering your passion for working with people, right? And your ability to connect with people. And it seems like and windsurfing sounds like the first part in the story of you know, of you where you get to teach people and you've rediscovered your love of teaching recently. So but then there's this in between where you're a cor a corporate man doing corporate man stuff. so where do we go from windsurfing to corporate? And I know it's not a straight line, I'm not trying to put that on you. I'm just I'm curious about the story here.

Patricio Cuesta: Well, it's a straight line because I already free samples that

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: prove that I can create value when I'm around people of different cultures, connect them, energizing them, getting things done, achieving a goal. And I said,

Dan Korus: Yes. Okay. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: okay, there is something I can do in life. I'm good at something. And

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I traveled back to Argentina. I got a job and also I came back to school, but I came back to engineering. maybe. Your question is, are you dumb? You are failing already. But

Dan Korus: No. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: my thinking was there has to be a different way of learning what I have to learn. Instead of learning in the traditional way, I have to find a different way of studying whatever is related to math. And it worked pretty well. In every subject...

Dan Korus: What'd you do differently?

Patricio Cuesta: Second?

Dan Korus: What'd you do differently? How'd you teach yourself how to learn differently? Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: Well, there are two groups. Everything related to math is quantum physics, mechanics, whatever was math intensive. started to, instead of focus too much on the theory, I was focused very much on the practical aspects. And

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: that helped me a lot because I was too focused on trying to understand the concepts and the formulas. I was more about when I see a problem, how I can create a system so I can understand the problem so well that then the math is going to go with the problem.

Dan Korus: Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: so be more practical and very practical. And right now in the way I do business is very practical. And then I focus a lot on the non math subjects, economics, whatever I had to study. And I got straight A's and that gave me the trust to progressing and putting extra effort. In some cases I have to repeat again certain subjects while I was working. and having good results. When I was 28,

Dan Korus: Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: I was already managing director for a business operation without a title. And when I turned 29 with my first kid, I got my degree. It took me a lot of effort, a lot. But that made me, I mean, that was all grit. Because

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: the level of grit I developed after so many years, saying something my brain was not built for, made me, I think unstoppable because then nothing looks complex.

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: You know this ability of insisting, looking for a way, and you know what's your long-term goal, you are passionate about it, and then you don't let anything stop you. I think that that made me, yeah.

Dan Korus: That is so impressive. That's really impressive. so most people I think probably would have maybe I'm one of those people, most people probably would have said, Okay, I found what I'm good at. Let's go all in on this. And you went back and you said, No, I'm gonna figure this out. And instead of succumbing to the same systems, you built your own in order to make it make sense. And you put in even extra effort to really contextualize everything. And I think for a lot of neurodiverse brains that tend on the ADHD spectrum, myself included, and I'll tell a little bit about my own story here.

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: I did not have good grades in any of my science or chemistry or math classes until I started doing hands on research. So until I could touch it, until I knew why it was important. And until it wasn't a theory, but it was something that I needed to use, then it started to make a lot of sense. And so I I didn't have to do that and a full time job at the same time. So I I'm not sure if I I developed your levels of grit. However, I I do understand what it's like for theories to just go in one ear and write out the other and to not really stick and then to be able to contextualize something through a practical system.

Patricio Cuesta: You said something very important then that is when you understand how it works. Yesterday I had an event where we talk about the brain. We have a manual for our brain. We get the brain. It's one of the most complex things we'll have to manage in our life. You buy a microwave, you get the manual, you buy a car, you get an owner's guide and you

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: get the brain and nobody explains you in high school, intermediate

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: college, how to use it. But you said something very important. You figured out the way it works by yourself. You found the literature, whatever you found. And to me, that's a key in life in general. When you find what's the instruction manual for whatever model of brain you have, you have a Samsung, you have an iPhone, whatever is the brand, you have different ways of using it. So what's your operating guide? You learn it, you experiment. And no matter how different is your brain, how you're wired, it's going to be fine. So I think that what you did is super wise, but many people are not as lucky as you were. You decide to do that. And they are more about, man, I'm different, I'm weird, and my life is going to be horrible. Let's look for some ways of surviving to the system. Instead of looking for that edge where you can do things that other people cannot do. And I think this is, if somebody's listening to this thinking, what can I do to have a better life is when you see something that is difficult, it's good to experiment like I did with, went to Germany and this and that, but also it's good to try to understand what I'm learning outside of my core occupation, whatever I'm trying to accomplish that can help me to find a way to solve this.

[30:40] finding the instruction manual for your own brain

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I feel you did that in a certain way.

Dan Korus: And it sounds like you did too. And it sounds like the first time, you know, we were and and I I think where I wanna guide this conversation is I eventually want to talk about our systems. Because I think

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: there's a dialogue in here to be had about what we could do to the educational system or what we could tell students in the future in order to Be able to be more successful because you learned how to adapt your own environment to thrive in a system that wasn't actually built for you. And I just want to ask one question because it's burning inside me really quick. Were you just windsurfing one day and you were like, I want to go back to Argentina and finish that engineering degree? What motivated that change? Did someone send you a letter? Like, did a girl say, Man, you would be much prettier if you had an engineering degree or something like that? Like, what happened, you know?

Patricio Cuesta: That's a great question. I met, there was a family that were my clients in this hotel where we offer services to our clients. And one of them was

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: learning windsurfing and sailing. There was a family

Dan Korus: Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: of two, I mean, the parents and the kids that were from Germany. And he was an engineer that was leading a project to help at that time, German, the democratic Germany. got together with the other Germany and they had to rebuild the whole country. It was a mess. And that guy was in charge of a very big project. And he invited me to travel with him to Switzerland and Germany, and then to visit all those projects he was managing. He had such an amazing company, such a smart guy. was having

Dan Korus: Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: such an amazing impact in rebuilding that former communist Germany that was

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: in pieces. That's it, man. This is amazing. I mean, how you can really transform a country, people. And I said, I want to do something big. I mean, this is fun. It's great, but it was so inspirational to see this guy. He was an engineer one day and then now he had 70 people working with him and he was one of the key. So that was enough for me. I said, I have to go back. I need to have an impact. mean, you cannot just live your life teaching windsurfing. I want that as a hobby, but I want to... I would do something big for others. And there I was traveling back to Argentina.

Dan Korus: Why did he take you?

Patricio Cuesta: I don't know, mean, they like me and they saw, mean, I was the same age that their kid and,

Dan Korus: come on. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: hey, you want to come with us? Okay, we went to Switzerland to a cabin they have there. I don't know, I feel that they felt comfortable with me. They saw me as another son.

Dan Korus: Okay. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: You know, those things, as we were talking about you, those things that

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: you say, how did it happen? I don't know, but I'm sure I something for that to happen in

Dan Korus: Sure.

Patricio Cuesta: your case the same.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay. Dude, that's that's a good story. I really like dude,

Patricio Cuesta: it was...

Dan Korus: this is such a good story. Okay, so you go back and Yes. Yes. Really?

Patricio Cuesta: By the way, let me tell you something. I never shared this story. I mean, I'm even on a podcast. I haven't talked about this with anyone because it's old times. But now that I'm sharing this with you, yeah, but I'm

Dan Korus: what this is such a good story dude are you joking me? This is so good

Patricio Cuesta: not very good at telling stories. So I'm running with you.

Dan Korus: I think this is an awesome story. It's a story of worldliness and self discovery and coming of age and learning what it means to have grit and you know, learning how to have self confidence in a world where you think that something's wrong with you and so many people are going through that right now. You know, maybe not at the same level,

Patricio Cuesta: But you know, Dan...

Dan Korus: but it's a good it's such a this is a really good story. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: But then also it's a survival story because now

Dan Korus: It's true.

Patricio Cuesta: let me share with you the ugly part is when you live in Argentina and you don't have a good job,

Dan Korus: Let's do it. Mm-hmm. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: the US has a better economy and more opportunities. So

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I had to get this going, because otherwise

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: there was no future for me. I wanted to work in a big company. At the time, working in a big company was a dream. When

Dan Korus: Yeah. This is post graduation. Sorry, this is post graduation.

Patricio Cuesta: I was in Italy, in Lake Garda, beautiful women and fun and wind.

Dan Korus: Okay. Yes, yes, yep.

Patricio Cuesta: I had long hair long ago. You think

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: about, Hey, I mean, I want to have a good life. want to create value. I want to be relevant and

Dan Korus: Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: to, in a country like Argentina, to be able to achieve that level of success where you can have impact in many people, you have to be very good. And so I want to study more. want to become better. It was survival because otherwise you get the

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: second level job and you don't have an impact. So that pressure. of you have to survive, Patricia, you have to stay relevant was there, was there. needed to find a way out. When I was in college and I couldn't get my grades, I was not thinking, I want to be the best. I was thinking, man, I'm going to fail. I'm going to be a supermarket with all respect employee with no possibility of having doing something big. I wanted to do something big. So it was a

Dan Korus: Yeah, you hit the fire.

Patricio Cuesta: lot of pressure of, you have to do it or you are done, man.

Dan Korus: Okay. Why is Argentina like that? Why is it why is there so much pressure to succeed? And why why when you have those dreams of you want to do something big, why is it What's the b what's the barrier there?

Patricio Cuesta: think it's not about Argentina. I think that in

Dan Korus: No.

Patricio Cuesta: life in general, if you want to progress, you have to have something to offer in the US, in any country, especially in the US is super competitive. But

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: in the case of Argentina, it's not like the US. You have one big city that is Buenos Aires and all the industries and big companies are there. The rest of the

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: country is beautiful, but you don't have much business or much happening. it's

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: not just about income. If you really want to do something fun, from the professional view, point of view, this not happening there is you have to look for something. My dream was I want to work with people of different cultures. So being a regional guy working in a multinational company was the way to go for working with that combination of cultures and geographies. For that, you have to be very well qualified because American companies

Dan Korus: Right, right, right, right. Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: or European companies, they look to the best talent. So that was my pressure. It was... My pressure was not the country pressure, it was myself putting pressure on myself.

Dan Korus: Got it. You wanted to do big things. You're competing on the global scale and in order

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: to be in Argentina and and get those global jobs, you you had to

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: push. You really had to push. And you were working full time and getting your engineering degree. And so when you came out of that and you started to, you know, in engage in the corporate world, were you working just as hard as you did then, or did you feel like you were so good at working that you kinda, you know, didn't have to work as hard or did

[38:20] moving to the US and running a bigger operation

Patricio Cuesta: I worked hard and I think also then it was a different time. And when I was young, I remember I had

Dan Korus: Yeah, okay. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: an interview with Unilever to work with them. And the first question was, are you open to work 14 to 16 hours a day and maybe weekends? And you say no, they say, okay, thank you, bye.

Dan Korus: Yep. Okay. Yeah. Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: Now, I mean, which company

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: will make a question like that today? Our company. It was different.

Dan Korus: Yeah. No, they w and they won't openly say it even if they expect that, right? So yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: get the degree, work many hours, and maybe you can get something in your career. It was so different. Not saying it was better,

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm saying it was different.

Dan Korus: Right. So at some point you come over to the States. When does that happen?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, I got my degree. I continue growing my career. I did great. I had great results. I built great teams and whatever

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I started to manage, we did great. And it was not because of me. It was because I created an environment where psychological safety allowed people to take risk. Elon Musk talks a lot about allowing people to take risks and to make mistakes. I was good at that, assuring that

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: then we had results. And then they said to me, hey, why don't you manage Southern corn in Latin America? Okay. I manage Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay. Hey, this is great. Why don't you manage Brazil? Okay. Hey, why don't you manage Latin America? That was like five to seven years where I grew, I grew, grew. The results

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: were great. And then one day I was in London with my family having vacations and my boss from LA calls me and said, hey, we need you in a home office. We want you to do for the rest of the world. the same things you're doing for Latin America. was, when he said that, maybe you think, but this was so exciting. He said, yes. I said to my wife, you know, no freaking way. I'm having a great life in Argentina. I'm doing what I like to

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: do. I have a great team in Latin America. I love the culture. I mean, in Argentina, when you have a good income, you live like a king. And

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I said, no. And she said to me, yeah, but you know, maybe the kids could benefit from this. I have free kids. They were already 11, nine, and nine, 11 and 13 years old. And

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: maybe they could be exposed to new things. could be an adventure. Otherwise, I would have stayed in Argentina and doing the job I was doing. And we said, yes, we move. That was 2014. Yeah, that was 2014. Yeah. yeah. And we went to California. I said adventure because. When you move to a new country, you the kids, the school, even my work, even though I knew at the time very well the American culture, you are an American employee learning how things work here, health insurance and the banks and the kids and the school. So it was a lot of stress. We moved in November. That also is a bad time for California because it rains a lot and

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: it's, but it wasn't amazing. It was great. It was great.

Dan Korus: Sure.

Patricio Cuesta: thanks to my wife.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And yeah, that's how everything, this American journey started.

Dan Korus: Yeah. When you first showed up in the US, right? And you're working in in the US office in California,

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: what was the first thing that you were like, this is different? Was it the traffic or?

Patricio Cuesta: No, it's working hours. In the US, people work more relaxed. I mean, you have less holidays, but

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: at 5, 5.30, everyone was gone. And

Dan Korus: People are gone. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: in South America, not because we are hard, I mean, we are harder workers in South America, because everything, the systems are not well, and people are very unproductive because the friction and the... complexity of the country. So you have to work from eight to eight sometimes. And there it was maybe eight, 39 to four, five. And people were moving very slow and relaxed

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: because also in South America, you don't have critical mass for having strong teams and having resources. The U.S. have it that. So you can accomplish more. You have more resources. You have specialists. in Latin America, you have more, let's say, generalists that do a little of everything. So it was less time work, but more things were accomplished. And that really blew my mind.

Dan Korus: More complex environment in Argentina. Therefore people are working longer hours to try and get a similar amount of work done. There's not as many resources or as many specialists just because the economy's slightly smaller and therefore getting similar tasks just takes longer. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: And it's even worse in, there are countries like Ecuador, Peru, in Asia, a lot of small countries, Vietnam, where they don't have the scale to have the resources you have in the US, specialists and experts. So this

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: is, we'll say, an issue that most of the world faces in general in business.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay. I feel like I'm learning a lot about the world. And I'm feeling

Patricio Cuesta: You

Dan Korus: like there's a theme here, in your story is all about systems. Right? So you move to the US and then all of a sudden you're in a system that is a little bit more relaxed but very productive and is resource rich and is your work is properly leveraged or is able to be leveraged, not properly, but Yeah, I feel like that could add a negative connotation. I don't want that to be there. I think just leveraged in a different way where your out your your same amount of hours can take you further. Is was that the case?

Patricio Cuesta: Exactly right.

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, that's correct. And one thing I would like to add is because

Dan Korus: Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: I don't have many resources in Latin America and the business was running very well. They said, hey, here in the US and globally, we have so much money, so much. I mean, we have everything and we are not being accomplished, not even close to what they are accomplishing. So get all this and produce more. And it was exciting for me because the impact was huge for the company. So that was really fun. That

Dan Korus: Yeah, I bet.

Patricio Cuesta: was really fun.

Dan Korus: So this is where you learned. So now you know how you said now you're teaching executives how to do less with more? That's where you learned it. That's where the skills came from. Okay, it's all coming together.

Patricio Cuesta: It came from my life in Latin America, basically. Yeah.

Dan Korus: It's all coming together. Okay, cool. So your kids six years ago is twenty twenty. That's like COVID time. You're in California. Are you California then? Or are you in Florida?

Patricio Cuesta: California, well yeah, we moved from California in 2020 to Florida.

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: Now we're in Florida.

Dan Korus: Okay. And and your kid and and at some point the kids get tested for neurodiversity. And so does dad by proxy by osmosis. not about your kids, this is about you. you know, and and a are you still at the same company, new companies? Like what are you doing like what's going on in twenty twenty for you? It was COVID times, right? Those are

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, 2020, I

Dan Korus: That was a weird time to be it's a weird year.

Patricio Cuesta: was in California. I already had my business working for myself. I said, I love to do this.

Dan Korus: Nice. You built the business.

Patricio Cuesta: yeah, yeah, I said, want to, my business myself offering services to my clients. I started coaching, but then I realized that

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay. Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: I love mentoring. And now

Dan Korus: Got it.

Patricio Cuesta: what I do is another level that is... helping a group of people to incorporate systems where they were more productive.

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: But at the time I was doing that and then I got a call from the CEO of company called Taprower that was about to go Chapter 11 and the pandemic combined.

[46:00] 99 percent of business problems are human problems

Dan Korus: Tupper the Tupperware CEO?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dan Korus: I thought w wouldn't pe if people are at home cooking, wouldn't we need more Tupperware? But they're filing for bankruptcy?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, that was a great time for the company. But in March 2020, they were coming

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: from the business was being affected by the change of trends and by the commoditization of the container business globally and China and so on and so on.

Dan Korus: Got it. Okay. Yep.

Patricio Cuesta: And they were about to go Chapter 11 in Q2 2020. So they needed to change the management. said, OK, I need you to help me for two or three years. to see how we can change direction of this boat. I was like, I don't know, I'm having fun with the life. I love California. You have to move to Florida, the pandemic. And

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: finally I said yes, because it was a great opportunity for me to test all the things I've been learning for already maybe two years about how you can use neuroscience applied to management to

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: improve the way. teams work, I said, okay, now I can test, I can learn more. And also I love challenge. mean, this was some of very difficult challenge. I love the idea of helping a brand that was iconic at that moment. So we moved with the family in October, 2020 to Florida. to move the kids and everything. So it was a very interesting time of my life. And I spent

Dan Korus: Okay, okay. Wow. Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: there two years and a half helping them. knowing that I was going back to my company, the company I have now is the same I had before that corporate time. And I confirmed

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: that corporate is not that I didn't like it anymore. It was a great step in my career. But

Dan Korus: Got it. Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: in order to teach and to share everything I want to share and to research, I had to be outside of the corporations. And

Dan Korus: I get it. I get it.

Patricio Cuesta: I think that was the right choice because I have the time now to to really do that, that is for the love.

Dan Korus: Okay. How'd the tu how'd the Tupperware CEO know that you were the guy to reach out to?

Patricio Cuesta: We worked together before, so he knows, he knew me. He

Dan Korus: Okay. He knew you.

Patricio Cuesta: knew that I was the guy to fix, I the fixer. They will know us as the fixer. Whenever something was broken, I was the one fixing it through systems.

Dan Korus: Yeah. You know, when police chief commissioner Gordon and Batman shines the Batlight into the sky and the Batman appears, you know, like that's you. Like you're you're Batman for the for the

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember when I got assigned Brazil, for example, they were not doing well. I fixed

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: it, but then I'm not the best guy. When things are, when I fix a country, maybe two, three years, I'm not the kind of guy that brings up energy of innovation or what, no, I fix. It works well. build strong teams, but then I need to fix something else. Yeah.

Dan Korus: Got it. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I get bored. Otherwise I'm not good at keeping things stable and maybe. making small adjustments. So I need that.

Dan Korus: yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I need Gordon to call me. Yeah, I agree with you. That's my dopamine. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Dan Korus: Yeah. You need a Gordon. You need a Gordon. Yeah, I get it. Okay, good. Good. What was the what was the end of the story with the Tupperware CEO? Like did you did you guys win? Did you get a win? was it was it kinda no, not a win? Okay. Got it. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Now the company went to chapter 11 a few years after I left. I was able to do is to give some stability to the business, but it's difficult to change the channel and the product. They

Dan Korus: To buy him some time. I don't know.

Patricio Cuesta: needed a big change that was a lot of work. So I

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: know that after I left and after a few years,

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: now the company is divided in pieces.

Dan Korus: Got it. I was just curious. it sounds like you were able to buy some time though. It sounds like they were originally considering bankruptcy and then they got more runway out of that. That's that's a win. That's good, right? So okay.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, I think so. And for me, I learned a lot. It was a very humbling experience.

Dan Korus: Yeah. you probably learn a ton from each of the different companies that you work with, getting to have all that exposure as the fixer, right, in your own personal business.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, I learned a lot from the companies, but also from the countries because I was lucky to operate with every almost 57 countries I work with. So

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I love learning from different cultures and the way they work from Japan to Malaysia, Indonesia, China, to any countries of Africa. That was such an amazing experience. By the way, you made me think that I never talk about that whenever I write. about my experience. I never talk about the international element and how humbling, but also how fun is to learn from our cultures and to realize how different we human

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: beings are and what drives us.

Dan Korus: Yeah. I would be interested in reading about that. for those who don't

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: know, we both have Substacks. Patricio's is very good. I read it, it's nice.

Patricio Cuesta: Thank you.

Dan Korus: it will be linked So anyone can go reach out to Patricio through Substack in the future and read his stuff. I and highly encourage you subscribe. especially if this content's coming out. That sounds pretty good. I think that having spent time in startups myself, nowhere near as as as much as you, it it I do know that whenever we have breadth in different fields and we know some tips and tricks from different fields, then when we go find a new problem, we have a larger tool belt and a bigger arsenal of things that we can bring to that problem. And so getting to do that for years over years, you probably feel, especially internationally, you probably have a lot of different perspectives about how you can solve problems. And your tool your toolbox, so to speak, is probably quite large. Do you feel that way or?

Patricio Cuesta: I feel that way, but in a certain way, it was disappointing because I ended learning that you have to go to the basics. Or you're talking about systems,

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: we're talking about psychological safety. We didn't talk about this, but it's very important how you find goals, how you

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: find what is important or not, and how you keep things moving forward. The basics, the pilars of what I learned. was always around that and was about human behavior. Because we are very complex, we don't have the manual of instruction of our reign. We don't know what's happening there. And what I learned is that 99 % of the business issues are related to human beings not being able to work with themselves and others. That's it.

Dan Korus: Ninety nine percent.

Patricio Cuesta: In my experience, yes, because you can have strategic issues, operational issues, but who... There's always one person, two or three that are not solving the issue or creating the issue because they don't get along with each other. They don't have good communication. They are not prioritizing

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: the right things. So I like to always look to what's a human factor in the issue. Because when you fix it, things get better pretty fast. They can figure out the strategy. They can figure out the technical issue that has to be solved and on and so on.

Dan Korus: So you're going to these companies to solve problems, and there's these system issues. And what you're saying is 99% of some of these problems, and I might be overgeneralizing here, and I just need you to steer me straight. But

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: a lot of these problems are They they boil down to just a few people that aren't able to work well together and there's some sort of blocker there. Tell us tell me more like how'd you figure this out? How set me straight there.

[53:40] be the defensive line for your team

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah. When I say 99 % is to make the case, but in general,

Dan Korus: Yeah, sure. A majority.

Patricio Cuesta: any organization, even entrepreneurs, I work with entrepreneurs, it's about what are the things we have to do that really matter? And then who's going to be doing those things for when and how, and assuring that then that's the lever and things happen and execution takes place. And if you need to adjust the plan, we do it timely. And that everyone is comfortable with those priorities and they have the resources. And in my experience, not just my personal experience, but reading, researching, talking with college professors, talking with my clients is in general, we don't do a good job in that loop. That is

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: what you are going to be doing then and what I'm going to be doing so certain goal is accomplished. How we keep us accountable, how we... Create the conditions for us to be successful how we create psychological safety. So we we don't just think about surviving Because in that case the prefrontal cortex is going to be not operating at the fullest how we can assure that I'm so comfortable taking risk measure our reason and Smart risk so we can accomplish those goals and how we are sure that the everyday friction doesn't stop me to me that that's the majority of the issues or non-issues we face in organizations.

Dan Korus: Yeah. When you're when you're working with people on these systems, it sounds like it's just a you know, you you say basics, right? And when I think when you say basics, you're meaning, okay, what what's our goal? What are we getting there? And how do we delegate the sub process of these goals to people so that's that we're all working within the system well? Is that what you're talking about when you say basics? Okay. How do you do it right?

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, so simple.

Dan Korus: What what does that good look like there?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, everything starts with the owner of the business unit, the CEO, whoever. It's typical that they talk to the whole team saying, okay, for next year, these are the priorities. They're defined by himself. There are no discussions with the team about how feasible it is to accomplish that. Maybe in some cases they are willing to accomplish too many things. So you have too

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: much multitasking. And now everyone, you have to cascade down. And I want everyone in the organization focus on these priorities. But then they're not thinking about the day-to-day operations that have to keep moving forward. They didn't check, do we have the resources for that? And

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: when I mean resources, in general, the conversational resources are, hey, can you do this, Dan? Yeah, I can do it. Okay, do it. Instead of, how many hours do you estimate we need to accomplish certain tasks? What do you need? You need consulting, you need this or that. Those discussions are handled in a very qualitative... And I will say not deep enough way. So the CEO says something, then we say yes, because we are scared about the boss being upset with us. And cognitive biases are pushing us to, you know, offer the bias. Okay, Dan says we have to do this, let's do it because otherwise he's going to fire us. And then to the team, Dan says we have to do this. I know that we cannot do it, but let's pretend we are doing this. Or we have to do it because the boss is upset, so stop doing the basic customer service. And then you have the cascade, the crisis cascade where somebody pushing hard for something he wants to do is before working with the team and actually that is something is feasible to be done. Then you have everyone doing too many things and nothing moves forward fast enough. And during that process, you kill the business, but also you kill people's happiness because at the end of the day, I truly believe that, and I said that to everyone working with me, my job is that you guys help the company and the shareholders to achieve their goal. But also that when you go back home and you get together with your family, they don't see a guy that is like, man, this was a horrible day and this company saw whatever. No, that you have energy and you have what you need to have a happy life with your family. To me, that's a duty of any

Dan Korus: Motivated, inspired.

Patricio Cuesta: leader. Not just talking about that. Have your people going back home in good shape. That's your

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: job.

Dan Korus: That's great. All ten fingers and ten toes. And happy. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And for that, you need to assure that as a boss saying, was, you know, I had a typical way of operating when I visited the country that was, I arrived to Malaysia and said, okay, guys, let's visit points of sale. Let's visit the stores. want to see what's happening out there. will talk with clients and customers and the distributors. That gave me information firsthand. And then

Dan Korus: Yes.

Patricio Cuesta: let's start the business meeting with what are your priorities, but not just. yeah, I have to work on an article. No, how many hours and what's the impact and when it's going to impact the business. And we reviewed that. And in general, I was a guy saying, Hey guys, those parties that you have in the bottom of the spreadsheet, cancel them right now. No, we have to do it. No, cancel. I was the guy that killed initiatives because I wanted them to move forward with the ones that we identify that could really move the needle. I prefer you move forward with that one that can have impact in Q next quarter and not that one that is going to have impact next year.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: How you balance your CAPEX, your OPEX, the impact on the business, people demand, how you manage the politics, how you manage the shareholders, depending on what you're focusing on. And I was a no guy, not the yes guy. I was not the guy saying, then this is not enough, do more. I was the guy saying, do faster or what really matter. and kill those initiatives. And we put that in your goal document and that's going to pay your bonus. And we're going to be talking about this every freaking week.

Dan Korus: Wow.

Patricio Cuesta: So in that way, you create a system, a loop where you say something, they start to work on that every week. You help them to solve the friction and you see progress and you have a loop. And during that loop, when that loop takes place, you also looking for what's stopping them because the leadership role is to help them. Use your power to help them. When you have that working consistently every week, and you also add to that half an hour one-on-one meeting or whatever your system, some feedback, Hey, Dan, great job with this. By the way, next time do that here. You agree? Okay. Incorporate that. You have people 1 % better every week. You have the business progressing what really matters. And you're all the time, you know, like in American football that the defenses are taking care of the quarterback. My job was, I was like the defense, the defense for my team, how I can take away, politics or things that are coming to them. So they, they can say focus, so they can do the quarterback job. can throw the ball to the running back at the right moment. And some people think that leading is that I'm the quarterback, clean everything for me. No, I think that I have to clean. I'm not saying tactical things. I'm thinking about how I can assure that nothing else that doesn't matter. affects my team.

Dan Korus: Nice. That's really good. When you go back

Patricio Cuesta: Simple,

Dan Korus: to the when you go back to the example of the company that did it wrong and you say, Okay, the CEO comes out in the year and says, These are our objectives. And then the objectives that they have and the goals that they have for the year are completely ignorant to the day-to-day going-ons of the people. And there's some sort of divorcing there between the ideas that we have for the year and the actual resources that we have and what people are actually working on. And that's the first break. But people say yes here because That's what we do when you know, leadership tells us that's what we're conditioned to do. and then And then no one is looking at their priority list and saying, no, this really moves the needle versus this isn't. And so your system is really saying, okay, here's the direction the company needs to go. I'm going to take everything off of your plate that isn't what you want to be that you could be working on that's going to be moving the needle. And in addition to that, I'm going to be a blocker and I'm going to stop anything for else from coming on your plate. And when you have problems, I'm going to help fix them and I'm going to be there for you to support you. And by the way, As you're working on this, I'm also gonna be investing a lot of my time into you to help you become incrementally better over time and make sure that you have the resources and the support you need in order to succeed. Is that what we're saying? Awesome. All right, cool.

[61:20] what psychological safety really is

Patricio Cuesta: By the way, then that's a vision. I love John Maxwell, his vision of being a multiplier. And I think that when you learn to do that, it's difficult because you can start to be involved in a lot of tactical things. So you have to be smart how to do it, but you can

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: help people to transform from producers to multipliers. And I think that that's our job is to, if you help your people to become 1 % better a week and that they do their job, but you... help them to do that job, then you are a multiplier. And then nothing stops you. Nothing stops you.

Dan Korus: You know, and and that's something that people feel a lot of shame about, I think, when they first get into their leadership role is maybe they got there because they were good technically or they had a lot of knowledge, but they didn't realize that the role of the manager and the leader is to be able to get everyone else around them to produce, to be able to produce at their best. And when they can do that, it's not about them getting work done. It's about them allowing other people to get work done. And if you look at how far the running back runs, you say, wow, they're covering a lot of distance. They're doing all these things. But the defensive line, you you know, like you're you're stagnant. You're almost in one spot. So I think, you know, people feel the shame of like, I'm not getting all these amazing things done that I used to be doing. I feel like I'm stagnant and it's a total mindset shift to be focused on what other people can produce. Have you ever dealt with that, like that, that blocker or Has it always kind of made sense to you that your job is to enable the best in others?

Patricio Cuesta: I think that that's what I learned when I was in Europe and when I was

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: young, trying to figure out what to do in life. I figured out that that

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: was the way to go. And it was all psychological safety. I'm a total fan of psychological safety. think many people

Dan Korus: Let's talk about that.

Patricio Cuesta: see, yeah, because I know that you're passionate about this topic too. And I think many people understand that this loop I was talking about helps you to create psychological safety. Because if I'm... I'm reporting to my boss and I see that every week I learn 1 % more, I'm becoming 1 % more. And what I said, if you're going to be doing, you're consistent, you measure me using that frame of reference that we discussed a few weeks ago. And when priorities change, you are fair with me. And we don't just talk about what priorities we can deliver, but also we are very specific about how many hours, how many resources. So everything adds up. Then I feel that... This is challenging, this is going to be difficult, but the right conditions are there for me to succeed. And then, I mean, your brain says, okay, Patricio, everything's fine. Move forward, work hard, because yeah, we can fail, but the best conditions you can have to be successful are here with this guy leading the team in this company in this moment. And then people unleash all their power and the prefrontal cortex of those people. You're paying for their prefrontal cortex, not for their body. It's 100 % available. So what else do you want? If you pay for somebody that went to Stanford and then the guy has been working 30 years in whatever, in &A, and the guy is all the time scared and he's not producing, create the conditions to keep him working hard, challenged, but that he's not thinking about survival so he can offer you that brain that he developed for so many years and you're paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for it.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Pretty simple.

Dan Korus: So you've studied neuroscience and you spent a lot of time in this field and thinking about it yourself. And from an early age you've been thinking about systems and how we are able to create environments in which we're able to be successful. You know, so for psychological safety gets a bad rap, and sometimes you'll say it around people with technical backgrounds and they'll kinda like Like you know, we're not we don't you know what I mean? And some some CEOs even

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: think it's a myth, right? Like a lot of management doesn't believe in it. So what is psychological safety and why is it so important?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, to me, if I have to define it very simple is creating the right ecosystem and conditions so every person can maximize the ability to contribute with their experience and their expertise. And you create that by firmness, transparency, just the fact that you're clear about what has to be done or not, that you're assuring that people have the right environment so they can have a chance of being successful. companies people are condemned not to be successful and to be slaves of a system where they cannot never accomplish something meaningful. I think that it's a combination of elements also is how open you are in a meeting, for example, you those bosses that they say, okay, we have to do this and I'm sure you guys are with me. I mean, there are many people that they think that being a boss is that and the boss is, hey, Guys, I think that we need to work more in how well the exhibition of our products in point of sale. But help me with your input and let's see some indicators. I mean, many companies don't have those discussions or discussions where we are open for feedback or discussions where you are clear with the rules and you keep them or have so many situations where when I was working in direct sales, we have issues with venues or events where people were supposed to, people that did a great job selling products, they got a cruise or they got hotels or travel and we made mistakes and we didn't have enough cabins or whatever. And my first reaction when there was a mistake there and my team failed was, okay guys, I'm with you. I'm not going to crash you because there was a mistake. Now let's think about how to solve this. And in that

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: way you could get the best of people. But some guys are, Dan. You made mistake. This is horrible. I'm going to think I'm going to fire you or not after this. Now find a solution. What can you expect

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: from that? And maybe here sounds like

Dan Korus: Much

Patricio Cuesta: obvious, Patricio, but companies continue doing the same. It's threatening people and

Dan Korus: Yeah, I get it.

Patricio Cuesta: it's simple.

Dan Korus: I mean, a lot of people frame psychological safety as this nebulous thing that cannot be touched and it's kind of, you know, har hard to measure and a definition that it's a very ethereal thing that's very pop science, right? And not grounded in what I would call traditional Machiavellian leadership styles. And in in that way, I think people don't want to confront it. And I would define psychological safety slightly differently. And I really like your definition. I'm going to come back to it in just a second. I would define it as an environment where people are okay making mistakes or okay delivering bad news. And that's probably, you know, a good sub definition of yours because you define it very sis simply. It's an ecosystem for success. It's success focused. You're defining it toward to CEOs

Patricio Cuesta: Peace.

Dan Korus: and C that that puts it in the language of business, baby, you know, of being able to make money and being able to solve the problem and being able to move the ball. an ecosystem for success. And I like that. I really like that definition.

[69:00] dependability, clarity, and meaning from the Aristotle project

Patricio Cuesta: And you know, I like, there is a project that is a Aristotle project in Google. I don't know if you read about it, that it's an old project. It's from 15 years ago. And they were trying to figure out what are the conditions under which their teams in Google did best. It was about education. It was about budget. And they had like 150 teams, something like that. They were working in similar conditions and they figured out. very common sense what they figured out, but the most important elements for creating that performance were related to psychological safety and included dependability. So if I'm working in a team where I know that I'm working with Dan and Dan is capable, is a hard worker and is reliable, that is the common situation in the whole team, then you are in a good place to be a very successful team. Clarity of structure. So you then, you're my boss, I report to you, and then there is somebody that is my peer, and we all know who does what and who is responsible for what. But many companies doesn't work because they are all job descriptions, they are not realistic, and people don't do what they have to do. So clarity of structure and responsibilities, having a clear meaning, what's for why? What we're doing, what we're doing? Because we talk about this, but some people, you know, and... When you have those elements are pretty, I mean, and clarity of goals, according to them, that's still learning. When you have those elements together, you have the best performing teams you can have in Google. Isn't it simple and straightforward? No complex science, no neuroscience. It's just, man, who works with whom? That they know what the

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: hell they're doing, what they have to do, and that is something that is valuable and meaningful.

Dan Korus: I like that. Dependability, clarity of structure and goals, and meaning. The why.

Patricio Cuesta: so simple. And then I realized when I was reading about this project a few years ago, I think it was five years ago, I realized this is what I was doing, not because I'm super smart, because it was common sense and it worked very well for me. I was so obsessive with the goals on my teams and having my one-on-ones. And I was obsessive with providing feedback. And in some cases I was thinking, maybe I'm too intense. But then I realized that the people working for me, they were moving forward faster. They were promoted faster. And then one day when I this project, said, man, this is so, I mean, we don't need a go to Harvard. This is available on the internet and it's just doing this. It's org charts, job descriptions and goals that are make sense, just, you know, in typical companies that job descriptions are from 20 years ago and they say things

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: that people never do.

Dan Korus: Right. Right. I get the feedback that I'm too intense sometimes. People will tell me that, because I tend to care a lot. And when I care a lot, I'll invest a lot and I'll work really hard. And then sometimes I'll fall into the trap of measuring other people based off of my output. And a lot of people I think find it hard to have my level of output. And so then my automatic assumption is, they don't care as much as me. You know, they don't they don't care as much. it's not as important to them. D have you ever gotten that?

Patricio Cuesta: Yes. And obviously I'm 57, so I have more years of experience than you. And I evolved. Yeah. I think that,

Dan Korus: You've seen the other side, hopefully. Yeah. Good. How'd you evolve there?

Patricio Cuesta: well, pain, because

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: I started to realize that people were not happy. I mean, not all being intense. think it's great to be intense, but

Dan Korus: Sure. I get it, yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: two brains are not alike and every person

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: has a different background and different experiences.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I used to expect people to work as hard and having the same approach and same commitment to me. And also

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: my brain is different because I have a combination of different neurodiversities. So I have a pair of glasses in my brain that is very different than yours and others. So

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: it's not better or good or worse. It's different. So I wanted them to see things as I saw them. For example, I'm very good for pattern recognition, but they couldn't.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: I was expecting people to be like me and I'm not better or worse, I'm different and I needed them to be how they are. So

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: I can combine with them, do the best. So I learned to rely more on that diversity and letting people be how they are and adjust my methodology to what works better for every person. But it took me many years, I have to confess and people hate

Dan Korus: Okay. No, yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: me a lot. I can tell you for many years.

Dan Korus: No, it's good. I bet. Well, I mean that's I really appreciate you being open with that. And I I think that you have worked on this and leadership's a journey, not a destination. We're always working on it. And we'll always be working on it. And that's okay. That's that's part of it. And I think that for someone like myself, if you were gonna give advice to me about this problem, you know, what would you tell me to do? How how could I start working on it? Knowing that it might take a few years.

Patricio Cuesta: There's a concept I love that is having because you know, you know, I love the instruction manual concept for the brain. And I think that every person needs a different instruction manual in

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: the same way, different phones and different computers and different, micro voice at different instruction model. And I always, when I work with my clients, we prepare when they have, we have this conversation because this is a very typical conversation. This is not your issue or my issue.

Dan Korus: Yeah, right. Yep.

Patricio Cuesta: say, Hey, what, And they start with their boss. He's, no, because my boss, he's my boss. Okay. Do you know how your boss thinks? Yeah, yeah. He's, no, no, in detail and how he expects problems to be solved and how he brain works and what are his issues and what, what, what, what, what are the issues that are really putting pressure on him? You know that? Okay. Write everything down. And we'll start to write everything down. We talk after two weeks and they say to me, now I understand. Now understand that my boss is in a different place. He thinks in a different way. And I'm complaining about him all the time that he's not doing this or that, but he has a different job, but also he's a different person. And whatever is a weakness for him, my boss is very hard with numbers. Okay, I'm great with numbers. Then instead of saying, my boss is bad boss because he has no numbers, do the numbers for him and you're going to progress faster. changing the approach, having your instruction manual for whoever you're working with, looking for what are the areas of synergy and what are the areas where he's going to do better and you're learning from him in that area and compensating him in the weak areas, accelerates your career and your life and makes you happier.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Do you think that

Patricio Cuesta: And the same with the people reporting to you, by the way.

Dan Korus: Yes. Yes. Do you think and and and I think my question is as if if you're a leader listening to this, should we be writing our own instruction manuals for people? Or should we is that something

Patricio Cuesta: yeah.

Dan Korus: that has to be defined by someone else? Should we get the project started and be like, Hi, I'm your I'm your new boss. Here's my instruction manual. Here's everything I'm bad at. Here's what I'm good at. Here's how I like to solve problems. Here you go.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, I don't think...

Dan Korus: Do you have one on file? Do you have like an instruction manual on file for yourself?

Patricio Cuesta: I have, but don't share it with anyone because I think the

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: idea is not to have people putting together and sharing it because it could be some basis, a little uncomfortable,

[76:40] write the instruction manual for your boss

Dan Korus: Sure.

Patricio Cuesta: but if you have it for you, by the way, it doesn't have to be a 20 pages PDF. It has to be one

Dan Korus: Yeah. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: paragraph, but you know how it is that whatever you have in your brain, you have the brain fog and you have the biases and I forget about what I mean, selective memory. So this is a way of. confronting you with the reality. This is how your boss works, what are his strengths, et cetera, et And when you see that, and also when you write down, you know that you have a process in your brain that's going to help you to really go deep on that concept. And when you write it down, you're going to confront it and you're going to do something like that. You don't need to share that with anyone. It's going to allow you to look to your team, what you're, you're talking about your team and, people you're with you that they are different. Okay. It's good. You're going to realize, Patricia is so good at patterns. Why don't focus on working with him in patterns? And whenever we talk about numbers, he's a mess with numbers, I mean, don't criticize him. Just don't look for Patricia for collaboration in number-related issues. Just with those small adjustments and the way you look to people, because this is the energy you have when you, when I look to Dan, what I'm expecting from you. I'm expecting things that you cannot do. Why? Why

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I'm complaining about Dan not being great at whatever if I know that he's not great at that, but he's amazing at that.

Dan Korus: Sure. Yeah. Knowing you're knowing the team's strengths and weaknesses. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And avoiding the emotions of trying to blame people, to be frustrated. Put emotions away and what are the facts? What are the things Dan is great at? Where I can create synergy with him? And there

Dan Korus: This is good.

Patricio Cuesta: you can eliminate the subjectivity, the emotional part, the animal part, the amygdala doing the bad job in keeping you away from having your brain present and leveraging on Dan, not looking for what's wrong with Dan.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Earlier you said that when you started working with leaders you were help they were they were trying to find ways to escape from friction. And it seems like this process of self examination is very self confrontational, like you said. It's really taking a step inside and looking at who you are, and that that is in and of itself friction, because it's very easy to not do that, and it's very difficult to be able to admit I have problems, I'm bad at certain things, and here's how I need to work in the world. Would you agree?

Patricio Cuesta: I agree and I think that when you enter in this loop of working in a certain way,

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: at the beginning it's heavy. It demands a lot of energy, it's painful. I for

Dan Korus: Why?

Patricio Cuesta: me, when I realized, because suddenly I realized, hey, I'm expecting from Dan, he to be amazing with

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: connecting with people and he's not, I'm wasting energy there. Why not?

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I mean, first realizing that you are wrong.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: You're wrong. Focus on what you can control. I can control myself. Let's talk with them. And that's painful

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: because this is, hey, it's your fault. You're wasting your time. And

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: then establishing this way of working, when we were talking about psychological safety, we were talking about loops, priorities. At the beginning, creating the habits, you know, how much work it takes to build a habit. It's super dense, a lot of energy

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: in your brain. But when you have this going, the friction, because you have something going that... work in a certain way, the friction starts to disappear. So, it's a lot of investment at the beginning, personally and with your people. But I work 100 days with my clients and then the first month is painful for them. They're like, man, no. And then when it starts to go insane, I'm having my one-on-ones every week, half an hour. They never pay more attention more than half an hour a month. And now I see that things are flowing and... I like this. And they get excited and dopamine and this and that because the friction starts to go lower and lower. So a lot of energy at beginning, a lot of friction, lot of frustration, a lot of pain, seeing, it was my fault. And then you still see how accumulates and improves and improves. And then nobody can stop you. It's amazing.

Dan Korus: I like this. So I'm writing a lot of notes. It helps me digest what you're saying and then I can go back and ask questions. So you're working with CEOs now, and you studied brain science for a stint.

Patricio Cuesta: I studied six months neuroscience applied to management. It's like a certification for being a coach based on neuroscience. Basic

Dan Korus: Okay. Sure. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: and practical. So I'm not a science guy at all, but enough to understand

Dan Korus: No, that's fine. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: that we don't have a manual for our brain.

Dan Korus: Okay. And Now you're working with executives.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: What's that like? What do you what do they normally call you for? They shine the bat light and they say, Patricio, help me out. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, well, in general, in general, I was working with an executive from Europe. We finished last week from a big company and

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: her boss thought that the issue was that she was not good at presentations. She was always nervous and this and that. And we started to work together. She realized that the issue was that she was not, she didn't knew who she was. what she wanted to be in her career. So questions like, okay, now you are a VP or whatever. So what you want to do? No, maybe one day I want to be a senior VP. No, no. Tell me like a story of how you see your day in three years, the kind of things you do, what you enjoy, what

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: things you like of what you do in your job every day. What are the things you know that you do great? I see a lot of executives that they come in to, looking for help, but they are not. They don't cover the basics of this, who you are, what you want to do, what are the things

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: that you know that you're good at and the ones you are not. So every time I engage with the executive, we end, we start talking about that immediately because they realize that, man, this is not presentations. This is not leading people. This is me. And because I'm not in a good connection and in peace with me, knowing what I want, what I don't want, what the things I do great, what then... When I'm with people, I'm in limbic mode and this is not working and I'm not living, I'm surviving. I want to realize that and to learn how to self-regulate. They know that they can be using the frontal cortex 100 % of the day and they start to produce more and more and more and more. They start to look to people like computers and how to optimize them. Not saying that they don't care about them as people, but

Dan Korus: Yeah, right.

Patricio Cuesta: you need your paying salaries. and you need to leverage on them and don't waste any energy and any processing power because you are emotional. And when they realize that, then the magic unleashes. No matter

Dan Korus: Got it.

Patricio Cuesta: if the issue is this or whatever is the issue they had, they solve it very fast.

Dan Korus: Yeah. So She employs your services to work on her presentation skills. Or she gets sent to you to work on her presentation skills.

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: And then you later diagnose the issue as well, this isn't about presentation, this is about direction.

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: If she really wanted to be Can can you can you know, without disclosing you know, identifying characteristics, what what did she want to be?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, first let me tell you that she was not good with presentations because when she was presenting, she was thinking about she failing and she not surviving. she was, yeah. So it's yeah,

Dan Korus: there's a fear there's fear, fear blocker? Yeah.

[84:20] why your presenter is scared, not bad at slides

Patricio Cuesta: it's like here I'm talking with you and thinking, man, when people see this podcast, they're going to think that my hair doesn't look good. I don't have any hair

Dan Korus: Ha ha ha.

Patricio Cuesta: and this and that. And what they're going to be thinking,

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: this guy. I don't care. I don't care.

Dan Korus: Okay. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: But if you care, you're going to be, okay, I'm looking good. I'm like, listen to this and that. And then you're not thinking about your question. So that's typical. I'm sure you observe this a lot because of your experience. And I know how passionate you are about human beings in the workplace.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Many people don't do the best possible job because they are thinking of themselves instead of if we're here in this podcast with you, it is not about you and me. It is about whoever is going to listen to it and maybe is going to have a better life.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: So the purpose, the purpose and helping us. So in the first case, she realized that she was selfish and she was not thinking about the result that is helping somebody with her presentation. When she realized

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: that, she realized that she was doing that because she doesn't know exactly what she wants to do in her life. So her limbic system is saying, hey, emergency, this woman doesn't know what the hell she wants to do with her life. So we're going to die. We're going to die. And then you are shut down. Also, she doesn't know what are the things she's great at. Because sometimes we tend to think that we are horrible at everything and we are not good at, I mean, we are not thinking about the good things we do. We are thinking about the bad things we do. And

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: I invite her to look for performance reviews, talk with people. What are the proofs that show that you're good at something? And what are the things you love to do? Not saying, you have fun. I mean, I love to teach. I'm not saying I'm the best. I love to teach. I'm out there stitching, I don't know, I can improve on that. When you have that inventory of what you love to do, what you're good at, and what people need from you, and then you define goals that have some consensus with that, then it's easier to work on your presentation skills. It's easier to work in your leadership skills. It's easier to deal with your boss. How many

Dan Korus: Right.

Patricio Cuesta: of my clients, are like, my boss is such a whatever and he's not good. There's one guy that... He was saying to me all the time, I hire you because my boss is terrible. I want to look for a job. And while I look for a job, I want to prepare myself to be able. And then he realized that his boss was great in certain things, but he was just thinking about all the bad things he was, was not good at. And he didn't respect him for that. And he understood that it was about focusing on what you can control. And then suddenly one day he was promoted by his boss and he was the head of the most important business unit of the company. That was a few months ago. you know, focus on what you can control, understand who you are and what you do well, but really, really not just, I think I'm good at, no, no, no, bring the proofs. We look for validation for concrete things you created. And then it's

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: like, know, there's a TV program that they go to Ken, no, to Alaska and they drop people in an island and they have to choose 20 things you want to bring with you like, I don't know,

Dan Korus: Alone. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: alone. Yeah.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And some people are, they win because they choose the right things that they have fit with their abilities. Some people not because he's the same is know what are the things you have to bring to Alaska, how to use them and what are the things that are more efficient for that mission. And you're going to win.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Don't build a boat.

Patricio Cuesta: I mean, what are the things you choose to go to that

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: process of having to survive? I remember one of the guy won because he had a great, he had like a cover for his mini house where he was not getting wet and he could handle lower temperatures.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: What you said is sometimes one guy was not very good at hunting and he broke a lot of hunting gear, but he was cold. So what's the point? And I think that it's

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: the same in corporate world and even in entrepreneurship, because some people tend to think that corporates and entrepreneurs are so different. At end of the day, are people and I work with many entrepreneurial leaders that they don't know very well themselves. They have less systems around them to... regulate the organization and they make the same mistakes. And the most important mistake is you pay for prefrontal context bandwidth that you don't use. That's meet the definition of how you can waste money in your P &L is you pay for a lot of smart people and they cannot think because they're all afraid, scared or whatever. That's leadership, man.

Dan Korus: Got it. Dang. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Trust. Building the trust, building the clarity of the of the systems and the goals. Dependability. What else was on our list for making s psychological safety? We had dependability, clarity of structure and goals, meaning. Start there, leaders.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah. If you cover those three,

Dan Korus: Pretty good.

Patricio Cuesta: for that you have to be confident about yourself. To be honest with you, when I work in corporate world, I was lucky to have companies that pay me well, that gave me long-term incentive bonus. But believe me, this is true. And I wasn't all the time thinking, I'm going to make the bonus or not. I want my clients to be so happy with me, with my organization, my contact center be the best, my products that... And that was my fun. That was my why. Because I knew that the money was going to come by itself. And too many people are just so focused on the money that then they are afraid of losing money or whatever. Just do the best job you can do. And then people are going to love you. Customers are going to be happy. They're going to buy more products. I know that this sounds like, yeah, Patricio, I know what you're saying, but then life is hard. Man. I've seen everything. I work in 55 countries, 30 years. I finished as an EVP and president. I have seen everything. And believe me, it works. When you focus on the customer, when you travel the country, you go to point of sale, you know so well your customer, you listen to them and then you're going to see psychological safety. And then you kick hard for them to accomplish things that are amazing and super challenging. Yeah, there are going to be challenges, but there are going to be nice surprises, Nice surprises.

Dan Korus: You'll make it. Yeah. No one can get in your way. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And it's fun. It's fun. And there are mistakes and issues and sometimes you don't make it happen as you wish. And from that point of view, I love a lot the philosophy of Elon Musk where he says, allow people to make mistakes, don't waste time if you don't need, simplify. He's very about systems. And I think there are many executives. Bezos also is like that. He's very focused on the system philosophy. That's why... I love what they are doing there and customer centricity. It's not just about talking with the customer. It's having such a tremendous passion on your customer.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: This is why I started my business to every country with points of sale business. And if any of my former teammates listen to this podcast, I want to say, it's true. I went first, I arrived to Malaysia and the first thing is let's go to Distributor. And we went to Distributor in the middle of nowhere in Malaysia. But I learned

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: so much from my students, from my clients, from the customers, from using their products local from this country, went to manufacturing facility. And then you can talk about business. Because at

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: end of the day, we are here to serve customers in any company

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: you work.

Dan Korus: Yeah, I mean, and you said that multiple times, right? As soon as you start with someone, you go to the point of sale. Can I ask you like a philosophical question? So these leaders like Elon Musk I think he's got some really great lines about I'll give him that. I think I I interviewed some people who'd worked for him. And they said, he's one of the only guys who would come down on the floor, even if it was three AM and he'd walk the floor and there would be a welder, a welding station or something in the welding. he he would go sit where the welder was doing it, and he would try and make the weld that the welder was supposed to be doing. And he like, Yeah, no wonder this sucks. Like this is such a all awful position. We need to fix this. Right. And so that that's an example of someone who's willing to get in the trenches and kind of observe. you know, so so there's good points and like like you're saying, his his ability to think about these systems and innovate. But, you know, they're all they're also problematic leaders. How do you hold that? You know, maybe you don't think so, but there's a dichotomy there, right?

[92:00] build a menu, not a one-true-way of leading

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah. Well, I think I share with you that I like to focus on what kind of control and also I want to focus on the positive. And I like to look to every leader out there and look to whatever I can learn from them and take out. And ideally

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: combine like a Frankenstein, combine all the best things each one does. And that's, that's my model. And I agree with you. I read Elon's book. I know people that work with him. Yeah.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: He's not the best potential leader I would like to have in my team, even though he accomplished amazing things. But certain approaches he has, for example, simplification, the way he

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: looks to the Raptor engine and how he has been looking for less parts, less moving parts, more reliability. That kind of thinking to me is genius. Or the way he thinks about meetings, interactions, people allowing team members to lead meetings that they are not...

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: useful in those meetings. So I like to take whatever I like from him, from Jess Bezos, customer centricity from each leader out there, and then combine it. Because, I mean,

Dan Korus: Got it.

Patricio Cuesta: to me, there is no perfect leader. Because also the leaders are human beings with a specific range, specific experience for a specific organization.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And I love the concept of having a menu with the best things you can do in business. Obviously the

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: combination is going to give you the perfect leader because it's more situational, the leader. But I

Dan Korus: Right. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: love the menu approach. I love the instruction manual approach where I can see all the things you can do to create

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: a strong leadership. And then I can choose or I can help my clients to choose. it gives you pressure, know, to see all the, it's like going to an ice cream store and to see there's a one ice cream store. think it's in. in Italy, I went once where they have, no, it was in France, where they have like 200 flavors. You don't need 200 flavors, but it's, I can see all the things I can choose. I love that sensation. Yeah, yeah. It was in Nice. It was not in Italy. It was in Nice.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah, you have the options. Yeah, it's nice. cool. I yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And it's fun. It's good. It opens your mind and you can see all the possibilities.

Dan Korus: Yeah, absolutely. And please don't take this as me pushing back against you. I think part of the reason why I've started my company and why Kestreles exists is because I think that there are a lot of examples out there of leadership, good and bad. And there's also a lot of ways that we can teach leadership. There's also a lot of ways that leadership could be self-taught. And I don't think all of them are equally effective. And I don't think all of it is something that we should be spending time on. And there's also a lot of people out there who want to commodify leadership teaching. And, you know, I'm saying this on a podcast with two people who are both consultants for leaders to teach leadership elements, right? And so I I understand the irony of me sitting here saying this, but I I don't think that e everything else that everyone else has out there is is good. It's not focused on psychological safety. It's not focused on the emotional intelligence of being able to put your people first and making sure that they go home happy. It's not focused on let me make your job as simple as possible and solve and get out ev all the other bullshit around it, you know, and solve all of your problems. Be your defensive line. And make it extremely easy for you to use your advanced knowledge to deliver. And so i i you know, in in that way I am Maybe maybe I'm a little bit more grumpy than you about it, but you know,

Patricio Cuesta: Hahaha

Dan Korus: I I I admire your perspective, you know, so and I I like to think that's why we're here.

Patricio Cuesta: Well, but also I think in my case, I don't want to change the world. I don't want to

Dan Korus: Yeah. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: write a book that's going to be a bestseller and it's going to change management forever.

Dan Korus: Sure. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: To me is, is again, you have a hundred ice cream flavors and if somebody likes a banana with salt, okay, I have it.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And, that's it. I don't believe that there is a one way of doing things. I know people that have consultancy business or they write books and they think that, if everyone does this, the world's going to be better. I

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: don't think that I'm that guy too. I think

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: that we need to have the flavors and we need to be situational. And I think especially with the AI world coming,

Dan Korus: Uh-huh.

Patricio Cuesta: what I think we need, we need to do is to help people to become better at finding what's the competitive advantage we can offer in the economy of the future and how relevant the human skills that we are discussing here are in that world, how we can help the students to be ready for that and how we can help the business leaders that today they are concerned about their future understand that there is a big, big, big, big chance that if they don't pay attention to all these things we are talking about this podcast, not our philosophy is working on those topics and becoming very good in those skills, they are going to be absolutely 100 % irrelevant.

Dan Korus: You think?

Patricio Cuesta: I think so. think that whatever

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: is cognitive, a lot of the work we do in companies today is operational coordination, avoiding friction and cognition

Dan Korus: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: and all that is, I use all the AI's today and use them too and man, but I think that all the things we are discussing here, creating psychological safety, all these elements, and art is complex and even though Maybe one day we'll have all Elon's robots doing everything for us and AI from

Dan Korus: Ha ha ha ha.

Patricio Cuesta: some album doing everything. We will chatting with you here because we don't have anything to

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: do. And we have to find a way of dealing with each other in the best possible way. And the reality then I'm saying this as

Dan Korus: I would love that. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: an older guy than you and much older is that we human beings, we do a horrible job at being humans and working each other, communicating, coordinating, connecting. So why

Dan Korus: You think? Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: not?

Dan Korus: Yeah. You know, I I think I share your perspective. I think the more that AI automates, the more the human work becomes important.

Patricio Cuesta: Important or what is, let's be pragmatic is, okay, everything is done by AI, everything is cognitive and coordination, project management and coordination. What else can we do? Communicating, influencing, evaluating, motivating. Those are the things that AI, the research is showing cannot do yet and maybe one day it's going to be doing, but still at that time, I think... that in the same way you like to have a human chef preparing your food, you would like a human whatever helping you with this element. So, I mean, it's a hope more than a certainty. I cannot, I'm not an expert or I don't see the future, but

[99:40] first day of work, get expectations and a feedback loop

Dan Korus: Okay. Sure. Yeah, I get it. There's a lot of uncertainty around it, yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: yeah, but we can focus on this, what we can control that is you or me, we can work on that in ourselves and with high chance that we're going to be in a better place than some people that they don't care about this. You can control it. It's not very expensive, especially with AI. I mean, being a better speaker, being a better leader, leading people and agents and robots together, how to do that. Starting to think about those elements of leadership, communication, coordination, combining different disciplines. You can do that. You can control that. Why not doing that? I see many executives that are like, man, I'm so scared that I don't do anything. No, do it.

Dan Korus: Ha ha

Patricio Cuesta: Do it! Do something! No?

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah, I get it. I get it. I get it. Okay. I have I have three more questions for you. Are you ready? Okay, let's do this. All right. Someone's first day of work is tomorrow. Their very first job. Have your kids started their first job yet? Okay. congratulations.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, they're all working. Yeah. Thank you.

Dan Korus: first first day of work tomorrow at their first job. What's your advice?

Patricio Cuesta: The first conversation is talking with your boss, what do you need from me? What do you expect? How do you measure success? And then asking, hey, I need as much feedback as you can share with me. You know, the first hundred days in a new job that is fundamental to have some quick wins, for that you need to know exactly what your boss wants. And some cases, the bosses are horrible at telling people what to do. So start with that. What you know? you have to do this. Okay, but for when, how? How we can measure success, how we can track this. Can we talk every week? No, every two, okay, no problem. And every week you your progress and you keep focused on the things that he told you that he needed you to do. And if he brings more things to you, he hey, boss, listen, you added more priorities. The hours doesn't count. Help me to decide, should I focus on this or that? That gymnastic of dealing with priorities and assuring that you have that quick win the first hundred days. by how you deal with your boss, how you negotiate with your boss, how you understand how he works and communicates and ensure that his weaknesses doesn't destroy you in your first hundred days, to me it's the most important thing.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Okay. Get the expectations. Figure out how they're gonna be measured. Create a feedback

Patricio Cuesta: and then.

Dan Korus: loop. Create a feedback loop for feedback. And iterate.

Patricio Cuesta: Measure, measure, we are progressing. And sometimes you need to remind your boss that you're doing a great job because I remember I wrote an article a few weeks ago about one person I know that he called me saying, I was fired and I wasn't expecting this. And I said, hey, but did you have one on one? No, I didn't have one on one with my boss. Did you track your progress? Sometimes bosses, we forget about what people are doing and how well they are doing. We are so busy.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: And people tend to think, my boss is going to take care of me and he's going to be following. No, sometimes you are so busy. are so much pressure, so many issues. do some marketing about what you're accomplishing, not in a functional way where you're helping your boss, not just, I'm great, I'm great.

Dan Korus: Well, yeah, and that's just a smart practice in general because then you can look at, well, where did I get progress this year versus not? So it's good to have that data for your own records.

Patricio Cuesta: It's fundamental.

Dan Korus: It's good just in case something happens to be able to advocate yourself in the future and say, Here's all the things I'm doing. You can if you just have an objective list of the things you do, it's useful for a lot of things, right? So yeah, I totally get it.

Patricio Cuesta: Exactly.

Dan Korus: For someone who's in the middle of their career, perhaps they're in middle management or they're a senior team lead, what's your advice for them?

Patricio Cuesta: My question to them or advice is have

Dan Korus: Advice. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: your own development plan because I hear a

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: lot mid-career leaders saying, have to wait for my company to invest in my development. I have to go to a business school and they have to invest in my training. And then I say, what's your plan? No, no, my company has to invest in me and they have to tell me what they want me to improve. No, no, have your own plan, man.

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: So who you want to be, what skills you need to become, you are a director, you want to be a senior VP. What does it mean to be senior VP? What does it mean to move from a producer to multiplier? What are the skills

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: you need? And then prepare your plan. No, but no investment. Okay, invest yourself. Why

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: an entrepreneur has to invest in their own business? A guy has a store, has to invest in the store and you don't invest in yourself. You have a corporate career, you are working in a company, even in a startup. is do something to improve your skills. So have your own lead developing program that you track every

Dan Korus: I like that.

Patricio Cuesta: week and you put in your calendar. Half an hour a week to track and to learn something new. Half an hour. No, I don't have time. Half an hour, man. You don't have an hour

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: for yourself.

Dan Korus: You don't have half an hour? That's yeah, you got you you can't make a half hour, that's pretty tough.

Patricio Cuesta: putting the calendar has to be there. 9.30 Friday to 10, I'm going to learn a new skill. This week is about how to prepare the manual to deal with my boss.

Dan Korus: Adds up. Adds up.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, and you do it. In the same way you go to a meeting with your boss, you go to a meeting with yourself to work in a skill you want to develop. That's it. Discipline. 1 % better every week. 1 %

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. That's up. Yeah. A lot yeah. Right.

Patricio Cuesta: better every week. How much money costs that? Zero. Where you can get the information? AI, books,

Dan Korus: Zero for free.

Patricio Cuesta: whatever, YouTube for free. In my time, it was impossible. Today you can do it. So what excuse can you have, man?

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: weekends have to be my family. This is part of your work to develop yourself. It's your job as an employee of any company. They expect you to do that. They don't tell you that, but they expect you to do that.

Dan Korus: You know, one of my favorite ways to solve a problem with AI is to have it teach me how to solve the problem. And it's hard to do that because

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, I agree with you, yeah.

Dan Korus: you gotta have the you gotta have the time for that, right? And that's one of the problems with using AI in education, is because you'll get the problem, but you won't actually learn the skill and how to do it. But I think Gemini or ChatGPT both have features where you can have them teach you how to find the problem and kind of work with you through it. And that, like if you can find a prompt for that, that's a really fun way to go through things because then you

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: You know what good is, you can look at what good is, and you kinda need to be able to know what good is for yourself in order to properly leverage AI so that way you know what the outputs are. You don't have to trust it.

Patricio Cuesta: Fully agree. And the other thing you can do then

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: is to use AI as a consultant or as a board of advisors where you can put together a group of five great coaches that you know. I mean, Tony Robbins, and then, guys, you create an agent or you create a project and then you share updates and progress and help me coach me, put together a plan for free.

[107:20] use AI as your free board of advisors

Dan Korus: Yeah. It's democratizing a lot of the a lot of the coaching resources that used to cost lots of money. So it's good.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah. In fact, in fact, people pay me for working with them, but then I teach them how to use AI so they

Dan Korus: Mm. Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: can in between sessions. I have a session every two weeks, so they have time to build habits. Use AI, for example, the presentation one is how you can use AI to provide feedback to your presentation. Why not? mean, it's not

Dan Korus: Good. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: competition for me. What I do is I handhold to make it happen. I give you my experience, but the operational aspect. I want AI to help me. don't want AI to stop competition for me.

Dan Korus: Yeah. It's good. Plus your goal as a coach is to not be needed, right? You want to empower them to have

Patricio Cuesta: Exactly.

Dan Korus: the skills that way you're not needed anymore.

Patricio Cuesta: Exactly. also the involving AI in the conversation as a partner prepares people for the future. And this is what our clients are. If you are client-centric, customer-centric, you have to do that. You cannot

Dan Korus: Yeah. You have to.

Patricio Cuesta: have a conversation with a client that is an executive and not talking about how do you say AI to prepare themselves for the future. It's your duty.

Dan Korus: Right. You don't want to be the McDonald's McFlurry machine where you're just always you're a broken coach and you know, you stay there forever and you stagnate and you

Patricio Cuesta: 100%. Yes.

Dan Korus: know. Okay, so senior executives, and this is kind of your territory right now, so I'm excited to see what

Patricio Cuesta: Mm-hmm.

Dan Korus: you say, but what's your advice for, you know, people at the top?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, my advice is if you want to be able to lead at that level and to dedicate time to the strategic issues of the company and what you have to do, you need to create an organization where everyone are multipliers. So they can build people reporting to them that by themselves, they can solve complex problems and they can develop a team. for that, you need to create that system, that work system, but also a lot of feedback. a lot of feedback because the only way I run to accelerate development in people at that level, I'm if that report to you and their directors, senior director VP, senior VP is that you help them to have that habit of learning of themselves and what they're doing through what they do every day. So the goals you define for them, not just the business goals, but the goals for the self-developments are going to want to put, they're going to be pushing them to the next level. And if they move faster, you move faster. A lot of time dedicated to observing your people, to make comments, to... Some people tend to think about feedback as something you do every quarter, every semester, every year, to miss every week. It has to be intentional, has to be strategic, has to be tied to an action, has to be tied to creating a new behavior that is form of habit. that you follow up, follow up, follow up. So they become multipliers and you can become... somebody that is looking beyond just things happening and developing people. You thinking about the destiny of your organization.

Dan Korus: Create multipliers. To do that, you have your systems and your feedback and constant observation of feedback. Intentional towards building the people and supporting them. I have that right.

Patricio Cuesta: Yes sir, a symbol

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: of that. The devil is in the details and execution, but yeah, because I made so many mistakes in my years, so many scars.

Dan Korus: If you I bet. Yeah, I know I bet. Yeah. you got the practice. Yeah. yeah. Well, that's why people go to your for help. That's why you're there. That's why, you know, when they shine the bad light, they want you to show up. When you who who are you

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah. The execution friction.

Dan Korus: coaching right now? Like if someone was listening to this and they were like, dang, I wanna I wanna get coached by Patricio, you know, like who who are you coaching? Who is that person?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, more than coaching, I mentor because remember coaching

Dan Korus: No quote.

Patricio Cuesta: is helping people with questions. I'm in general, I work with people that are, they have 15 years of career minimum because otherwise they cannot really leverage on what I do on my experience. 15, 20 years of career. there are 40, 45 years old and,

Dan Korus: Okay. All right. Yep.

Patricio Cuesta: they are, I never get the client from a company because I work with executives, but sometimes companies hire me. where, I have this activity, it's doing a horrible job and we don't know what to do with this guy. Because I want the person to be willing to be working with me. Tomorrow, Monday, I have a meeting with a boss of somebody that they want me to make him a chief commercial officer because he wants to be a chief commercial officer and the boss is going

Dan Korus: Okay.

Patricio Cuesta: to invest in, not because the guy is a problem and we don't know what to do with this guy. So for me, person wants, person wants to grow. And they don't just want to discover who they are or what they want to do. They want to incorporate management practices so the results of company can improve in the short term. And they want to build habits. Building habits, as you know, very well, it's a lot of work because you have to rewire your brain and that requires hard work. So, whoever wants to work with me, I expect in between sessions that they practice in their day to day with their bosses, the teams or whoever the things will learn. So it's very active. It's, it's execution.

Dan Korus: Yeah, they gotta work hard. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah, no pain, no gain. It's like that. I have to try and I can help them when they try and they make a mistake or maybe, no, my boss didn't react well. Okay, let's find a different way. That's what I can add value to. The rest you can

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: find in AI or in the book.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Okay, that's excellent. And how can people get in touch with you?

Patricio Cuesta: Well, I have my LinkedIn account where I have all my information, my services, the subsac account too. So yeah, yeah. LinkedIn, LinkedIn. yeah.

Dan Korus: Alright, we'll link that. Sure, we'll link those. Which one's good? LinkedIn, Substack, where you want to send people? Okay. Yeah. Great.

Patricio Cuesta: But you did a great job. And also

Dan Korus: Thanks.

Patricio Cuesta: that's part of my mission is sharing, not because I'm an example of, whatever I experienced that can help, especially people that think differently or they think I'm not good enough. We all are good enough if you. put yourself, if you measure yourself with the right ruler. And that's your ability, the ability of finding what's a ruler and going for it. And especially in the AI era, I think that the AI era

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: make us as messy human that we are, more

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: better chance than ever to stay relevant. I'm very positive about the future. Let's see how it goes.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Good. Well, you're my guest, so I see you kinda as my boss. so what feedback do you have for me?

Patricio Cuesta: I mean, you didn't cry that I, you know, for me, this

Dan Korus: Good.

Patricio Cuesta: was having fun to this Saturday. So the fact

Dan Korus: Good. Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: that we, mean, to me, this was like having a conversation with, with a friend or colleague and, that that's amazing. That's a skill you have, man. You're very good

Dan Korus: Good. Good. Good.

Patricio Cuesta: at creating an environment where I'm open to share things and also enjoying because it's Saturday. So

Dan Korus: Awesome.

Patricio Cuesta: I was sure that we could do this in Saturday was going to be like a a nice conversation, but

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I love the way you structured the whole process and that

Dan Korus: Awesome.

Patricio Cuesta: you tried to bring some order to my chaos. So thanks for that. It was really great. And I appreciate

Dan Korus: no. It was very fun. It was very fun.

Patricio Cuesta: that you disagree with me. That also is very important. I love disagreement. I love that people speak up.

Dan Korus: good. Yeah. I didn't disagree with you that much.

Patricio Cuesta: No, but in certain moments, especially when I talk about examples, you had your...

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: I think it's super valuable because we need that. We need this agreement. We don't need to agree.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we agree on a lot there and I think that I always admire people who are able to see the best in people because there's so much darkness in the world right now that it's really good

Patricio Cuesta: Yeah.

Dan Korus: to be able to focus on what's inside your control and the good in people, you know, of all people. And that's a valuable skill to have. And n we don't do that that much right now. And media wants us to not do it. Great. Nice.

Patricio Cuesta: And I think that when you look on focusing what you can control,

Dan Korus: Mm-hmm.

Patricio Cuesta: it makes your life easier because when you read the newspapers and you see the news and the social media about politicians

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: in many countries in the world, not just the US, you always disagree. You don't like it, but what's the point? Focus on

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: voting, focus on in companies, focus on what you can do with your boss. Focusing while you control is good for, I mean, neuroscience, tell us is good. It's not me. If you focus when you can control, then

Dan Korus: Yeah.

Patricio Cuesta: you have an Olympic system that is not nervous, and then you can think. That's it. Pure neuroscience.

Dan Korus: Yeah. Absolutely.