Order of Man - The Power of Strategic Leadership

00:00:00.000 Whether you're running a fortune 500 company or working to lead more effectively in your home,

00:00:04.380 your ability to rally the troops, inspire them to take action, creating the systems and processes

00:00:09.860 to allow your team or family to thrive is crucial. That's why I'm extremely excited to introduce you

00:00:15.500 to my guest today, Bruce Pettit, president and CEO of Leupold Optics. Today, we talk about the

00:00:20.700 challenges of running a 700 employees, strong fifth generation family owned company. We cover

00:00:26.100 strategic planning, working through differences of opinion, getting a team to buy into your vision,

00:00:31.920 making tough calls and ultimately the power of strategic leadership. You're a man of action.

00:00:36.280 You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears and boldly charge your own path. When life knocks

00:00:41.640 you down, you get back up one more time. Every time you are not easily deterred, defeated, rugged,

00:00:48.600 resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become at the end of

00:00:55.340 the day. And after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on

00:01:01.560 today? My name is Ryan Mickler and I am the host and the founder of this podcast and the movement

00:01:05.940 that is Order of Man. You might notice that my voice is a little deeper, a little sexier today.

00:01:12.840 That's because I'm recovering from a cold or a flu or a bug. I was down in SHOT Show in Las Vegas last

00:01:19.160 week and apparently a lot of guys caught this bug, whatever's going around. So I'm fighting through it.

00:01:25.000 I want to make sure I get you these conversations. We've got a very powerful one. In fact, the

00:01:29.980 gentleman I'm going to introduce you to here in just a minute is somebody who I met with down at

00:01:34.340 SHOT Show. So we're going to get to that here in just a second. I do want to make a very quick

00:01:39.020 mention before we get into that of my friends over at Origin, Maine. I had a lot of people ask me

00:01:45.680 about Origin while I was at SHOT Show in Vegas, their boots, their denim, all the other supplies

00:01:49.900 they're doing. I want to congratulate Origin and also Jocko for, I think it was last week or maybe

00:01:55.680 the week before they had all of their nutritional supplements, the milk, the discipline, all the

00:02:01.260 things they're doing. Now they're in vitamin shops throughout the U S. So I want to congratulate them

00:02:05.820 for doing that. And it's very cool to see their growth and what they're doing. And to be, I don't

00:02:10.720 know, 10, 15 minutes away from their facilities and factories is pretty cool. Cause I can see what

00:02:15.940 they're up to guys. If you're looking for nutritional supplements, I would definitely

00:02:20.520 recommend origin labs. Or if you're looking for geese rash guards for jujitsu or boots, denim,

00:02:26.320 any of that stuff, then check it out. Go to origin, Maine is in the state, Maine origin,

00:02:30.500 Maine.com. And then if you end up picking anything up, make sure you use the code order

00:02:34.440 O R D E R at checkout for your discount there again, origin, Maine, and use the code order at

00:02:40.180 checkout. All right, guys, let me introduce you to Bruce Pettit. As I said before, he is the

00:02:45.500 president and CEO of Leupold optics, which is, I'm sure a lot of you guys are familiar,

00:02:49.560 probably using their optics. They're one of the premier optic companies in the world.

00:02:53.580 They're a hundred percent made in America out of Beaverton, Oregon, if I remember correctly.

00:02:58.520 But Bruce has been named one of marketing 100 sporting goods business named him and an industry

00:03:03.900 pace setter. But in addition to his involvement in, of course, Leupold and that organization,

00:03:08.780 he's a member of the Safari club, international Rocky mountain elk foundation, national rifle

00:03:13.720 association. And his goal is to share a loop holds collective values of conservation and response,

00:03:20.640 responsible hunting practices. So I hope you enjoy this conversation. Forgive the background noise.

00:03:25.720 It was very busy at shot show, but I think you're going to get a lot from what Bruce and I talk about

00:03:30.160 today. Enjoy. Bruce, what an honor to talk with you, man. I've been looking forward to this.

00:03:35.740 Yeah. I'm a, as you know, I'm a big fan of, uh, of your podcast and I didn't know that, but, uh,

00:03:40.200 up until a couple of days ago. Yeah. So I, uh, I appreciate you spending some time with us.

00:03:45.120 Yeah, no, it's nice to be able to be here, to be in this booth. It's funny three, what, three or four

00:03:50.540 years ago was the first time I came to shot show and, you know, I'd see Leupold and I'd see other

00:03:53.840 organizations, you know, these big organizations that I, that I was excited about that do,

00:03:57.480 that we're doing cool things as, as a, as a casual observer, but now to be like in the mix a little

00:04:02.480 bit, it feels good. Yeah. Awesome. It's been really good. You know, it's, uh, I'm always impressed

00:04:08.760 with, with the support that this industry has for, you know, shot show and what it does. Um,

00:04:14.760 a lot of folks don't know, but the shot shows, uh, a part of the national shooting sports foundation,

00:04:19.320 which is essentially the trade organization for the firearms industry. Yeah. And so the money that we

00:04:25.920 spend on exhibiting here and talking to customers and, and doing various media things that we do

00:04:31.340 here, um, that all goes to, to really protect our second amendment rights. Yeah. That, uh, the,

00:04:37.480 the national shooting sports foundation is, uh, I'm on the board of directors and they do a really,

00:04:41.620 really good job of supporting the industry and fighting for our rights, um, to make sure that we

00:04:48.000 can hunt and shoot and do the things that we love to do. So. Yeah. I mean, it's a really interesting

00:04:52.460 time, you know, you think about, uh, everything that's going on in, in Virginia, for example,

00:04:56.300 even this week with the protests and everything with the second amendment infringement, I would

00:04:59.660 call it, but, uh, it's a really interesting time in the, the firearms industry and community,

00:05:05.640 um, that, that, uh, I don't know if I, maybe that's the right word of salt on, on our, our rights is,

00:05:12.280 uh, it's a dangerous precedent. Yeah. And I think that is the right word. Yeah. And I think it's our

00:05:17.700 job to make sure that, you know, we are, um, really not only fighting to protect that, but

00:05:24.060 really talking about the things that, that we do as an industry positively, um, project child safe

00:05:30.360 about making sure that you're, you know, handling and taking care of your firearms and locking them

00:05:34.640 up and do it, you know, being a responsible gun owner. That's another thing that this industry does

00:05:38.740 and the NSSF does that, you know, really is, has, we've gotten a lot of accolades for that. And I'm not

00:05:43.760 sure we, you know, we try to talk about it, but a lot of the mainstream media doesn't

00:05:47.580 really want to cover that. Right. That's the problem. You know, you, you have this,

00:05:50.680 you have this narrative in the media that, and they're great at storytelling. I mean,

00:05:54.860 that's their job. Right. And I think this industry could do a better job of, I wouldn't say necessarily

00:06:00.760 being more inclusive. I think it is inclusive to those who want to be involved, but just doing

00:06:04.300 a better job, sharing the entirety of the story rather than, Hey, we're just going to go out and

00:06:08.020 shoot guns in the backwoods and kill things. Right. And I think that's the gap that a lot of people

00:06:12.300 who haven't been exposed to firearms, haven't been, uh, hunting as, as they were growing up,

00:06:17.440 you know, I didn't hunt as I was growing up and I had a completely different perspective about this

00:06:22.220 industry and this way of life 20 years ago than I do now, even over the past three or four years

00:06:29.420 as I've immersed myself even more fully. Right. It's, um, anytime that I have an opportunity to

00:06:35.520 talk to some, cause most people, you know, you've got some people that are way over here and there's

00:06:41.040 probably not anything we'll ever do to convince them. Right. Any different, uh, as it relates to,

00:06:45.640 you know, hunting and the shooting sports and, and, and what we, what we do, but there's a whole

00:06:50.160 group of people, a really large group of people that are agnostic. They don't really, you know,

00:06:54.880 they don't do it. They just haven't been exposed to it. They don't really know they haven't been

00:06:56.800 exposed. And so when I've had a chance to, we have friends that way, my, both my wife and I hunt,

00:07:00.780 um, which is awesome. Yeah. That's a good, that's a good hobby to do together. Oh, it's fantastic.

00:07:04.720 Is she better than you or are you a better hunter than her? You should ask her that. Um, you know,

00:07:08.480 the thing is, I'll tell you one thing about women hunters. They're intense.

00:07:11.580 They are intense. There's no doubt. And their ability to focus, you know, they've got this

00:07:16.300 special thing. She can shoot like none other. I don't, I just don't think women put the same

00:07:22.220 pressure on themselves to perform as men do. I think you're right. Cause I know when I get up

00:07:26.280 there, I get trigger happy and I don't, I don't hunt with a rifle a whole lot. I'm more of a bow

00:07:30.140 hunter. I would say bow stalker. I wouldn't say bow hunter too much yet. Cause I've only been doing

00:07:34.640 it for a couple of years and I get plenty of stocks per animal down, but, uh, yeah, I get,

00:07:41.240 I get excited. I get anxious and my wife, she hunts as well. She, she doesn't, I mean,

00:07:45.120 she's excited, but it doesn't freak her out cause she's not under this pressure to perform for

00:07:49.480 anybody else. Yeah. It's, uh, anyway, she's, she's an awesome hunter. She does a great job.

00:07:54.440 Yeah. Did you grow up hunting? I did. Okay. Yeah, I did. I, uh, my grandfather took me hunting

00:07:58.940 for the first time. I think I was probably eight years old and, uh, it, it, it kind of hooked me

00:08:05.160 forever, you know? And it's just, I think it's just something that's, uh, in certain folks,

00:08:09.800 you know, DNA, I think it's in, uh, it's down there latent in all men's DNA, but some of us had

00:08:17.800 the opportunity to kind of get exposed early. And I just, I grew up doing that and, and I love every

00:08:22.120 aspect of hunting. I don't, it's not just one piece of it. I like hunting. You know, I have a gun dog,

00:08:26.460 I have two gun dogs right now and I, I love hunting with them and get out in the field and

00:08:30.100 do that. I'm a big game hunter. That's primarily what I do. Sure. Yeah. Um, so, and with, with my

00:08:35.580 job, um, I do get a lot of opportunities. That is part of the job of what you do. Well, why don't

00:08:40.620 you tell us what you do? And, and that way these guys can connect the dots and, uh, understand a

00:08:44.940 little bit about where you're coming from. Yeah. So I'm the, I'm the president and CEO of Leupold

00:08:48.820 and Stevens. We're a fifth generation family owned business, um, based in Beaverton, Oregon. Uh, we've got

00:08:54.600 about 700 employees. Uh, we make rifle scopes in our factory seven days a week. Yeah. Uh,

00:08:59.860 which is, which is pretty cool. Interesting place to do it. How many, uh, how many scopes

00:09:03.580 would you say on average would you crank out a day? Uh, we keep that pretty confidential,

00:09:08.240 but it's lots. A lot. It's lots. Significant. Yeah. Um, the beauty of being privately held is we,

00:09:13.720 uh, you know, we try to keep that kind of, uh, you know, put it this way. We make hundreds

00:09:19.520 of thousands of scopes in a year. Is that right? Yes. Yeah. And any optic that you're going to

00:09:25.020 mount on any kind of a firearm. So whether you're putting on a handgun, whether you're putting on a

00:09:29.320 bolt action, rifle, rifle, and AR has to come out of our factory in Beaverton. And as opposed to what,

00:09:36.100 as opposed to our competitors that source them. I get you generally from Asia. Sure. Right.

00:09:40.800 Overseas. Yeah. So it's got to be made in our factory. Um, because I think that's that moment of

00:09:45.140 truth. You know, you, you, you're looking through, you're getting ready to pull the trigger. That's the

00:09:48.780 moment of truth in a hunting or shooting situation. Um, it's got to work. And so we

00:09:54.280 guarantee our product for life. Even if you hand it down to your son, we're going to guarantee it for

00:09:59.420 him. It's powerful. That's good. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's a, it's a big deal to us to make sure that,

00:10:03.600 you know, we talk about, you know, guaranteeing performance and, uh, there's a lot of warranties

00:10:08.560 out there, but you know, if you've drawn a tag and you're in the back country, um, and you've waited

00:10:12.780 10 years for this tag and your optic doesn't work, guess what? There's no FedEx. Right. That's it.

00:10:17.060 And your hunt is over. That's right. I've got a friend who just drew a special tag on a, uh, on a,

00:10:23.320 on a mule deer that he's, he's wanted to get for, I think, 25 years for this tag and, uh, big Chino

00:10:29.920 outfitters, in fact. Oh yeah. Yeah. We know, you know them as well. And, uh, yeah, you need that

00:10:34.140 stuff to perform, but you know, and it's, it's not only about performance. I think that's a given,

00:10:37.220 right? But I don't, I don't want to understate that it is about performance, but I also think

00:10:41.100 it's, it's a uniquely American hunting isn't uniquely American, but I think firearms in general

00:10:48.920 is uniquely American. Our ability to own firearms, our ability to go out and hunt, uh, uh, public land,

00:10:55.620 our ability to, uh, support what it is in our way of life. And I think the fact that you are making

00:11:01.580 everything in America is part of not just the story, but part of the experience and a critical

00:11:08.680 component of it as well. That's right. That's right. And so we do, we do import some items

00:11:13.800 in our line. Uh, again, none of our, none of our optics that you mount on any kind of a,

00:11:17.880 a weapon, but, um, some of the things we do in observation, we make some of our spotting

00:11:22.280 scopes in our factory, uh, all of our mounting systems, uh, predominantly are made in our factory.

00:11:27.580 We might have some machine shops throughout the U S that'll help us on some pieces like that,

00:11:31.740 but, um, there are certain things we import. So I want to be clear on that, but, but, you know,

00:11:37.260 the biggest piece of our business is our rifle scope business. And we do things with our military.

00:11:42.080 We do a lot with some of our, with our allies and, um, just really proud of that because,

00:11:46.900 you know, we talk about creating epic moments. That's our, you know, that's our reason for being,

00:11:52.520 uh, and our core purpose as an organization. And, and I get, you know, pretty excited. And every

00:11:59.000 single one of our employees gets excited about creating that epic moment for a father and daughter

00:12:03.280 in the field or father and son in the field and those, those things. But more importantly,

00:12:07.160 when, when, you know, I've gotten feedback from our war fighters that says, Hey, you know what?

00:12:10.980 I was in a tough spot and this is what happened. And my optic performed flawlessly. Uh, it gives

00:12:16.040 me chills talking about it right now. Oh, no doubt. And, um, that's literally a life and death

00:12:19.460 situation. I mean, there's no, there's no, Oh, I hope this works or let me fix this or let me correct

00:12:24.100 this. Like you have split seconds to be able to make that decision or, or use that piece of

00:12:27.680 equipment that will save yours and other people's lives. That's your brothers. Yeah. And, uh,

00:12:32.520 it's a little important. We take that and correct. That's, that's an epic moment. Right. That's what

00:12:35.940 our team gets, you know, we have with, with 700 employees, not every single one of our, our team

00:12:40.580 members hunts and shoots. Most of them do if they're in, you know, product marketing, if they're

00:12:45.700 in sales, if they're in, you know, engineering. Um, I mean, it'd be almost disingenuous if those

00:12:51.620 guys did not. Almost all of them do. Yeah. Um, like how are you going to sell that stuff if you don't

00:12:55.920 even use it? That's right. But the, but the rest of the, the rest of our team, you know, they,

00:13:00.560 they get inspired by that, by quality and by the ability of making sure that they're going to

00:13:06.120 deliver on that, that epic moment when they walk into that factory. So anyway, it's good stuff.

00:13:11.280 Like how big is your, your facility? Cause I think about 700 people. I've got a friend that we were

00:13:15.620 talking about Pete with Pete Roberts with origin and, you know, I know his facilities. I've been there

00:13:20.600 and, and, and, and helped them move some stuff around and he's got, I think roughly 50, 60 employees.

00:13:24.740 And I think about 10 times the size of that. Like I can't imagine what it's like to, to oversee

00:13:30.620 that sort of operation. That just seems overwhelming and daunting to me, frankly. Yeah. I can't even

00:13:36.940 like lead my, myself and my son, like shipping, you know, five to 10 orders a day sometimes,

00:13:42.100 let alone get 700 things done or 700 people managed. Yeah. You've got to, uh, you know, when you get to

00:13:48.440 the, the size and the, and the other thing with our product is it's complex. You know, if you take,

00:13:52.440 you know, one of these rifle scopes is sitting out here on the higher end, like a Mark five,

00:13:56.480 for example, you know, it's over 200 parts, right? Yeah. And it's gotta, it's gotta all come

00:14:01.320 together. The tolerances are so tight because A, it's gotta be waterproof. Yep. B, we got to guarantee

00:14:07.220 it forever. C, it's gotta be optically perfect. It's gotta work in any temperature. Right. And so

00:14:12.140 when you pull all that together and you think about that, your, your ability to get a, you know,

00:14:17.820 an architecture in place in the organization to allow that to happen, you know, on a big scale,

00:14:22.800 um, every single day and guarantee it and go through that is a, is, is a huge undertaking.

00:14:29.480 Um, and so you've gotta, you know, you've really gotta have the right processes in place and more

00:14:36.440 importantly, the right leadership team and the right team members that are passionate about getting that

00:14:43.020 done every day and, and, and, and following that. And, and it takes that complexity out of the

00:14:47.820 business somewhat. I think that's where a lot of guys get hung up, whether they're trying to lead

00:14:52.300 their family or a small team at work or lead an organization or they're on a team or coaching so

00:14:58.420 many different capacities where they feel as if they need to do it all. And I can't imagine with the

00:15:05.220 kind of schedule and operation that you're running here that you can even do, you know, a small

00:15:10.540 percentage of the things that need to get done, your oversight. Right. Right. Um, but I think

00:15:15.100 that's where a lot of guys get hung up is like, well, I need to do it all. If I don't do it all,

00:15:18.280 then it won't get done right. Or it won't get done on time or correctly. And, and I think men have a

00:15:23.100 real hard time letting go of some of the, not quality necessarily, but just letting go some of

00:15:28.980 the reins so that other people can step up into those roles. And I imagine you've had to do that very

00:15:32.480 well. Yeah. I, I mean, I learned early in my career, I was fortunate. You know, my first, I got my first

00:15:37.980 CEO job when I was 33 years old. Um, I had no idea what I was doing. Yeah. And so I made a ton of

00:15:43.240 mistakes and I learned a lot at that time. You know, I was, uh, I was in that mode, to be honest,

00:15:49.500 I was, uh, kind of had had a lot of success early on and, and worked real hard and felt like, you know

00:15:55.300 what, I can, I can kind of make anything happen if I just work hard enough. Sure. And what I, what I

00:16:00.400 found was actually you can do a lot, but it is limiting. And, and what, what I learned was a

00:16:07.880 really, really simple thing. Hire people smarter than you and let them roll. Let me ask you this,

00:16:14.580 because I think, I think people know that instinctively, but it's harder, it's hard to

00:16:19.160 do, right? Cause you got to find the right people and then you got to let go of the reins. But at the

00:16:22.660 same time, why would somebody who, for example, is smarter than you want to come work with an

00:16:27.660 organization as opposed to like, you go, go do their own thing. Well, look, you gotta,

00:16:33.080 you gotta find people that are experts in that area. So if you think about a leadership team,

00:16:37.920 right? And building a leadership team for a consumer products company, well, just ours is an

00:16:41.960 easy one to kind of use. The reality is I have to have an expert as it relates to, to product,

00:16:47.980 right? A product leader. No doubt. So they've got to have a better understanding of engineering than

00:16:53.440 what I do. You know, um, they've got to have a better understanding of kind of, you know,

00:16:59.860 product uses and things like that than what I do. So they may not know more than me about the

00:17:03.920 finance side of the business or the brand side of the business or whatever, but you've got to build

00:17:08.520 that team of experts in each one of those areas as you get to a larger organization. So you can't have,

00:17:14.980 um, a bunch of kind of, I know everything's right. You, you really. And so, you know,

00:17:21.060 my leader here of product, you know, I hired a guy and a young guy gave him an opportunity,

00:17:25.480 our VP of product, Tim Lesser, who, you know, he was a guide for a part of his career.

00:17:30.560 Super smart. Spent a lot of time at Leupold and left the company. And he was actually my first hire

00:17:36.060 when I, when I, uh, came to Leupold and Stevens. And I just looked at it. I said, this guy has

00:17:41.140 incredible field knowledge. He's got an engineering bent into him. And he's going to be a guy that's

00:17:45.660 going to really be able to provide authenticity or a product line and do that. If you look at my sales

00:17:49.600 leader, he is an incredibly strategic sales professional, right? So that's his expertise.

00:17:57.180 So every one of the areas, my, my human resources leader and what she brings to the team in terms of

00:18:01.560 understanding people and putting people systems in place and things like that. Even if you're in a

00:18:05.760 small organization, you know, look at, you know, it's almost like, you know, having a quarterbacking

00:18:11.900 a football team, you know, you've got to look and say, okay, I don't need seven tight ends, right?

00:18:18.800 I need one really good one, right? But then I need this small fast receiver over here, right? And so

00:18:23.900 you've got to build and find those skill sets. And you want, you put that team together and you're

00:18:27.780 going to know what you're, you're good at. So, you know, I tend to spend more time on the, on the,

00:18:32.720 the marketing and product and branding side of our business. That's kind of my background for the,

00:18:37.060 you know, generally, although I understand all aspects of it. Um, and so I build my team in those

00:18:42.800 other areas, really strong manufacturing, you know, team leaders that I have. So I want those

00:18:48.120 companies. Yep. What, I think the challenge that a lot of guys might run into as well is that

00:18:54.960 how do you know that somebody you have in, in the place, let's say marketing or, or development or

00:19:01.120 engineering, whatever it may be, like, how do you know that that individual where you might be

00:19:05.220 deficient in that area is performing at the highest level? Like how does, what are the checks and

00:19:10.560 balances and systems in place to ensure that that person that you may not be an expert at is,

00:19:15.800 is doing their job well? Like, how do you know that? Well, let's be clear. You have to be really,

00:19:21.200 really good. Sure. At, at, you can't know nothing. You can't know nothing. Right. That just doesn't

00:19:25.840 work. Generally, you don't get to, to the level, um, of running an organization like ours, you know,

00:19:30.980 if, if you don't have, uh, competency in all those areas. But what I do want, and so, you know,

00:19:38.380 the first thing I would say is, you know, you hire, uh, folks, you get folks in your team with

00:19:43.060 a proven track record. Um, most importantly, they've got to align with your core values as

00:19:48.680 an organization. And, and that's a really critical, critical piece of it. And we have a set of core

00:19:54.680 values in our organization that, you know, I tell, I do every, uh, new, new team member orientation.

00:20:02.640 I want to make sure that when they come into the company. You do it personally. Yeah. Wow. Okay.

00:20:05.840 I do it with my, my, my head of HR. Right. Yeah. And I do it for a reason because I want to make

00:20:11.100 sure they're really clear on what we're about, what we stand for. And I tell them, and I remember

00:20:16.360 the first time that I did it is my VP of human resources kind of went, I don't know if this is

00:20:21.100 a good idea to do this. You know, she was kind of like going, what was her hesitation? Well, what I,

00:20:25.120 the hesitation was what I'm about to say was I tell every new team member, I say, listen,

00:20:28.880 here's our core values. I take them through them. Right. I said, these are pretty easy to get along

00:20:33.420 with, but they're, they're critical, but they're non-negotiable. Hmm. This, this is what we are.

00:20:39.200 This is what we're about. This is, this is non-negotiable. So guess what? It's a great job

00:20:43.380 market out there. And if this doesn't fit for you, you should go and find a place that you can fit and

00:20:50.340 you can be aligned with the values of that organization. Right. Sure. Don't spend your time here. Yeah. I

00:20:54.400 encourage you. I think that's good. You have to give them an out because if you don't, then they

00:20:58.400 feel hamstringed into moving forward, even though they may not align. And so you get these people who

00:21:02.260 faked their way through aligning with your core values. And then you find out a year or two or

00:21:07.240 five years down the road that this person did not align at all. Yeah. They just lied the entire time.

00:21:12.160 That's, that's exactly right. You have to give them that path to go out. That's exactly right. And I think

00:21:15.400 too, is genuinely care that they succeed. Right. Right. Like I think there's a lot of people who,

00:21:19.860 you know, are, are, are vengeful or, or, or, or just out of spite, like don't want these people

00:21:24.600 to succeed. I've had companies that I work with and know, um, very well who, you know, they, if they

00:21:30.420 have to let an employee go, like they genuinely still care about that person and they want that

00:21:34.700 person to thrive. There's no sort of revenge or anything about it or spite in, in, in, in that at

00:21:40.540 all. Right. Right. It's, um, it's, it's, it's definitely that. And I think here's the other

00:21:45.260 thing you, you have to be as a leader mindful of. And I honestly, I think everything that,

00:21:49.640 that we're talking about, you know, I, yeah, I have a fairly large organization, but this works

00:21:55.000 even if you've got 20 people in your organization or 10, and it may even be more important to have

00:21:59.520 those values established and, and, and where, where you're at are certainly as important because

00:22:04.340 what happens is if, if you have, you know, I, I always kind of look at the, you know, three types

00:22:11.380 of team members. And I tell my leaders this, um, you've got folks on your team that are competent

00:22:18.500 in, in what they're supposed to do. And they're aligned with your values and their stars continue

00:22:23.100 to give them what they need to be successful. You've got team members that are, um, maybe not

00:22:30.400 as competent as they need to be. Maybe they're growing in their career or, or they've got a job,

00:22:33.880 you know, they've got to learn, continue to learn, but they're aligned with your core values and you've

00:22:37.580 got to invest in them. That's where you've got to really look at them. You've got to sit down and you

00:22:41.380 got to have conversations about, Hey, this is directionally where I want you to go. And we're

00:22:44.340 going to invest in, in you, you know, we want to invest in you and get you there. The third is

00:22:50.600 someone who's actually competent, but not aligned with the core values of the organization. And what

00:22:57.660 I tell my team is fire them today. Right. And it sounds harsh, but it's true because what happens

00:23:04.600 is, is they can create, they create cancers in the organization and that spreads. And so, you know,

00:23:11.020 I have not found yet, I'm 55 years old. So I've been doing this a while and I have yet to find,

00:23:17.480 and I've tried a time where someone that wasn't aligned with the values of the organization made

00:23:23.640 it. Yeah. Well, not only made it, but actually helped, they undermined everything you do.

00:23:28.820 Right. And, but the trap is they're producing. That's the trap. That's the trap is like,

00:23:34.640 you have this high performer who, you know, brings in revenue or speeds up times or whatever,

00:23:39.800 whatever it is they bring to the organization. That's exactly right. And so you overlook

00:23:43.400 their cancerous type toxic behavior because they happen to be producing. But what you don't see is

00:23:50.140 how much more productive things could be if that person wasn't around, that you don't get to see

00:23:55.060 that side of things. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. You nailed it. And it is. Yeah. And

00:24:00.080 it's hard for a lot of leaders. I mean, a lot of really experienced folks, you know, we tend to,

00:24:05.400 you know, all of us that, you know, do the things we do and, you know, we tend to be kind of type A

00:24:10.620 and we want to, we want to make things better. And if you've got a positive outlook, you always like,

00:24:14.240 well, if they just did this, they would make it and it'd be great. Yeah. You want people to win.

00:24:17.480 You want them to be successful, right? And what you find is it just doesn't work. And so spend your

00:24:25.320 time investing in folks that are aligned with your core values and have the ability to either get

00:24:30.540 competent or are competent in what they're supposed to be doing. And it works.

00:24:33.640 What is the authority that you give your, I'm assuming it's your department leaders who are

00:24:39.720 hiring, firing, coaching, et cetera, et cetera. How do you delegate that authority and ensure that

00:24:45.560 they're making the best hiring decisions and firing decisions as well? Well, you know, it starts,

00:24:50.680 it starts with me, right? So I have to build a team that AI trust, I respect, and that works together

00:24:56.320 as a team. And, you know, I've been at Leupold and Steven six years. Okay. And it's taken me,

00:25:03.380 you know, it took me four years to really get the team in place that I wanted because you can't

00:25:07.540 go work on everything immediately. Right. And we've had a great organization, a lot of success,

00:25:13.260 but I changed out almost every senior leader, you know, over a period of time. And so you have to

00:25:21.020 be really, really trusting and you've got to make sure that you have the right people to be able to

00:25:28.160 then make that next step. Cause I expect them to be able to do the same thing with their leadership

00:25:32.160 teams that they built. So teach them to build strong leaders and, and, and, and build the

00:25:37.980 organization. And so if once you get everybody in sync doing that and your values are in place,

00:25:42.000 right, you've got a really clear strategic direction or architecture for the organization

00:25:45.540 and where it's going, it works. It all happens. It's not easy. It's not easy. That's why you see

00:25:51.160 a lot of organizations fail. Um, but if you do that, um, that's how you make it for the long run.

00:25:57.160 And I'm, I'm just incredibly blessed because we're a fifth generation family on business

00:26:00.780 that is, you know, our shareholders, uh, their, their family, literally, you know,

00:26:07.000 and I've got 60 some family shareholders cause we're 112 years old.

00:26:10.540 Which has got to be an interesting thing because you're not family.

00:26:13.540 That's right.

00:26:14.040 Right. So what is the dynamic there?

00:26:16.040 Well, the first thing I would say is...

00:26:17.440 You're not blood. Maybe I should say it that way.

00:26:18.680 Yeah. They, they treat me like family.

00:26:20.080 Right. I bet. I bet.

00:26:21.000 And, you know, we just, that's the, that's the first thing. And that was one of the things that

00:26:25.420 I was so excited about when I, when I made the decision to, to, to come to loophole, you know,

00:26:32.080 I was meeting with one of the shareholders and they said, listen, you know, we care, um,

00:26:37.400 about numbers and we care about performance and, and all, you know, profitability and all that.

00:26:42.260 Of course they do.

00:26:42.840 Of course.

00:26:43.120 And, you know, but what we really want is we want to build generational value. We want to make

00:26:50.700 sure that the next generation, the sixth and seventh generation has this incredible company

00:26:55.720 that we've, that we have today and that we've had in the past. Right.

00:26:59.160 That's been built. And I, I, I went, wow, that's, that's what I want to do. I want to build that

00:27:04.860 long-term value. I want to really look at building a long-term strategy. And, you know, I'd worked mainly

00:27:10.720 for private equity previously in my career. And so I didn't have that kind of an opportunity

00:27:15.100 because there's always kind of a set period of time.

00:27:17.460 Sure. Well, and then the, and then it's, it's, it's primarily profit driven, right? So it's like

00:27:21.260 now, now, now, now.

00:27:22.260 Yeah. Particularly if you're trying to eventually sell something.

00:27:24.280 Exactly. If you have that extra strategy.

00:27:25.240 That's what they do, the investments. Yeah.

00:27:26.220 Right.

00:27:26.480 Right. Yeah. So we're here, you know, they don't even, the word sell never even comes up. It's not even

00:27:31.200 like in our vocabulary about ever, you know, thinking about that with this business. And so it's a,

00:27:35.820 it's been a really a liberating thing, honestly, um, because of that mindset of,

00:27:40.500 okay, let's make sure. Now I wake up every morning. I look at numbers because I'm just

00:27:44.340 programmed that way. Right. That's just what I do.

00:27:46.100 Yeah. Your numbers. Yeah.

00:27:46.800 Well, I'm not, I actually, it's just, I think in my job, that's part of what you guys,

00:27:50.100 you got to look at how are we performing? Cause numbers tell you a lot.

00:27:52.780 Sure. Right. How'd you do what's going on? So I, I do look at that, but the reality of knowing

00:27:57.960 that I can make these decisions that sometimes may not pay off for three, four, five years,

00:28:03.460 six years, maybe, you know, those kinds of investments. Um, it's a huge competitive advantage

00:28:09.000 for us over any of our competitors. I mean, it's, it's a, it's a big advantage. So how

00:28:13.200 do you, how do you judge these decisions that are not going to, you know, quote unquote pay

00:28:19.700 off for the next four or five years and, and evaluate whether that's a good decision, whether

00:28:24.660 you're still on track, even though it may not be producing the profits or whatever it

00:28:28.340 is you're ultimately after. Um, that's a great question. The, the, I think you have to start

00:28:33.840 with, uh, you know, having, I call it a strategic architecture, right? So what I mean by that

00:28:40.260 is you've, you've got to really have, if you think about building a house, you've got to

00:28:44.280 have this, this plan. Um, and you've got to have a foundation, but as you go along and

00:28:49.780 you've, you, you take these steps and you, you know, you can't do everything. That's the

00:28:53.020 first thing you've got to know. Sure. You've got to really go through a rigorous process

00:28:56.020 of saying, what should we not be doing? Cause if you try to do everything, generally that

00:29:01.260 doesn't work in my experience. So what, at least not to the degree that it could, not

00:29:05.420 the degree it could. So you've got to say, what's the most important things that you want

00:29:08.700 to invest in and you want to commit people's time to, and then you, you've got to put that

00:29:14.060 on that, that, that, that map, right? You've got to get it on that architecture and begin

00:29:17.920 implementing the initiatives and so forth that it takes to get those done. Um, and then

00:29:23.780 you just like in building your house, all of a sudden you realize, you know what, my garage

00:29:27.440 isn't big enough. I need to, this is where, or I didn't think about this the right way

00:29:31.840 and I've got to make a change here. And so you've got to, you've got to constantly be

00:29:36.340 looking, you know, thoughtfully at what are the things we're doing? Is it working? Is

00:29:41.160 there tweaks to it? Is it working perfectly? Let's keep going. Right. Do we need to invest

00:29:44.500 more? Right. You know? And so I think you just, that's, that's really the key. And I would,

00:29:48.380 I would encourage any business person out there, whether you're an entrepreneur and that's

00:29:52.560 what you're doing and you've got just a company of one or whatever, but take the time to really

00:29:58.640 sit down and think through your strategy. What are you trying to do? You know, the, the,

00:30:03.860 the cubby begin with the end in mind. It's a really smart thing. Yeah. And, and so, you

00:30:08.060 know, you know, look at those things and any, you know, treat, treat your company like, like

00:30:13.200 you are huge and where you want to go and set that architecture in place and then evaluate

00:30:18.400 it, look at it and say, is this working? Do I need to stop doing that? Do I need to

00:30:22.160 make a change here? That's going to help it, propel it faster. That's the key. And, and

00:30:26.780 you just, people, a lot of times I've seen leaders and business leaders and even boards

00:30:31.180 that, that govern over organizations, they want a strategy and they want it in place and

00:30:35.680 okay, leave it, let's go. Right. And then they get over here doing these other things. Right.

00:30:38.680 They get all distracted and everything else. Stay focused on it. I like that you're talking

00:30:42.360 about, cause I think these actually are dichotomies. They, they kind of end up sometimes on the

00:30:46.780 opposite end of the spectrum. There's over planning, right? There's over action. Yep. So you're just

00:30:51.100 acting without a plan or not acting with a solid plan. Right. And so you're talking about

00:30:55.200 finding, finding the balance, right? Have a plan, realize that it's, it's not going to

00:30:59.920 be perfect. There's going to be tweaks and adjustments that you need to make along the

00:31:03.260 way, but the action is kind of important if you want to grow the organization or the family

00:31:07.980 or whatever it is you're trying to grow. That's right. Yeah. That's, that's it. That's right.

00:31:11.000 And, and, you know, get, get those smart people around you. Um, sometimes if, you know, if it's

00:31:16.680 not hiring someone, it's, it's having, um, I encourage, you know, I have a lot of friends

00:31:20.820 here that run smaller companies than we are and we're really lucky cause we're this independent

00:31:25.220 company and we have these incredible relationships with, you know, like, you know, Butch Whiting

00:31:28.880 at Cryptex, a good friend of mine. And so we, you know, we'll talk business stuff and, and,

00:31:33.000 and, you know, I always encourage them, you know, make sure you've got at the very least

00:31:38.920 a small group of advisors that you can, that can tell you the truth. Right. And can tell you,

00:31:44.220 you know what? That's, that's really stupid. I wouldn't do that. These are business advisors

00:31:47.780 that you're talking about, other CEOs, business owners, you know, get them, surround yourself

00:31:51.900 with them, get, get them in there. And, and, uh, you know, it may cost you a dinner or two,

00:31:56.380 but I'll tell you, it's worth, um, having people give you advice and, and listening to them and

00:32:01.260 getting their perspective as you're, as you're continuing to, to not only build out your plan,

00:32:06.020 but, but execute on it. How do you get these guys to give you real feedback? Cause I think

00:32:10.980 what a lot of people will do, especially when you're talking about upper level management,

00:32:14.340 I think there's probably a lot of arrogance and ego and pride and maybe some, some,

00:32:18.160 some earned pride in what they're doing, but sometimes it's taken to the extreme and they don't

00:32:23.820 let others around them tell them the truth about what's, what's not working, what, what's a stupid

00:32:30.180 idea where they're misstepping. Like, how do you encourage these advisors to actually tell you

00:32:36.360 the truth? You know, you, you've just, you got to put your ego aside. I don't know how else to say

00:32:43.260 you've got to be humble and you've, you've got to understand that you don't know everything.

00:32:46.820 I haven't met that person yet that knows everything. And so, um, you, you really have to,

00:32:52.460 um, make sure that, you know, you, you approach it, you know, think about what you,

00:32:58.860 what you want out of it in terms of, of, uh, the relationship and, and you, you gotta be humble

00:33:05.000 and you gotta listen. And sometimes let me tell you things you don't want to hear. Yeah. And guess

00:33:10.960 what? It's part of life, man. Let me hit the pause button real quick. I know I've been talking about

00:33:16.560 it for the last couple of months, but, uh, if you're a father of a boy between the ages of eight

00:33:21.300 to 15, I want to invite you to our third legacy event, uh, on my property here in Maine, that's

00:33:27.740 June 11th, uh, through the 14th, 2020. Uh, the whole goal of the legacy experience is to create,

00:33:33.140 uh, write a passage of sorts and equip you as your son's father with the tools, resources,

00:33:38.760 uh, the conversations he needs to thrive as a boy, becoming a man. Uh, it's no secret that the world is

00:33:44.160 increasingly dismissive of men and masculinity. And it's my goal along with our cadre there to help

00:33:49.600 inoculate and prepare your son for what this world has to offer. Uh, I invite you to head over to

00:33:54.480 order of man.com slash legacy to watch a quick video and learn more about what this event entails

00:33:59.540 and how it may be an integral part of ushering your son into manhood. Again, you can check it out

00:34:05.940 at order of man.com slash legacy to learn more and to lock in one of the seven remaining spots.

00:34:11.460 Hope to see you there. Uh, do that after the show for now, I'll get back to my conversation with Bruce.

00:34:15.500 Well, it's a, it's a, it's a critical part. If you want to grow, it's a critical part. If you want

00:34:21.000 to, cause if you don't, if you want to hear everything that you want to hear, or you only

00:34:24.000 accept what you want to hear, I mean, that feels good, but it doesn't produce much. It doesn't

00:34:28.740 produce much. And, uh, and you know, that's one of the things, one of our core values is, uh, we talk

00:34:35.060 about, you know, uh, making sure that, uh, we have, we have, you know, this communication,

00:34:40.660 this collaboration that is, uh, open and honest and straightforward. And, and so we call it respect

00:34:47.480 and candor. And so, you know, you, as long as you and I are disagreeing respectfully and I'm being

00:34:55.240 candid and truthful, I'm not politicking you, um, things move forward. Yeah. You know, we can be honest

00:35:01.000 with each other. And as long as we're doing respectfully now, you know, I, I, another thing I

00:35:04.820 tell in my initial, you know, uh, meeting with employees, I said, listen, the one thing I won't ever,

00:35:09.900 ever put up with this, this organization's politics. If, if I see, or I hear of an email

00:35:14.800 that you're sending about someone else and you're doing this roundabout, what happens in organizations,

00:35:19.260 this, this backbiting and backstabbing, you won't make it right. Because if you have an issue with

00:35:25.300 one of your teammates, guess what? Don't talk to someone else about it. Get up, go to your teammate,

00:35:31.280 get up, go face to face, let's have a conversation and do it with respect and candor and you will move

00:35:36.140 the ball forward. And it, it is amazing what it does to an organization. And again, I don't care

00:35:40.520 if you have 10 people or you have 700, it is a huge deal when you get everybody working in that

00:35:45.940 kind of a environment. And I would say for a CEO, it's the same thing that you've got to do when

00:35:51.140 people, when you have advisors and you have friends and, and folks who want to help is respect and

00:35:56.480 candor. Yeah. Listen to them. I mean, this obviously it applies to the context of business,

00:36:01.160 but it also applies to the context of it's just, if it's just you and your wife. Oh yeah. Respect

00:36:05.900 and candor. You need to be able to talk to each other. I know so many relationships, my, my relationship

00:36:09.960 included, especially in the early years where my wife and I would have an issue with each other

00:36:13.960 and we, we would have respect for each other, but we wouldn't talk about it. Right. Because we didn't

00:36:19.680 want to rock the boat or whatever. And then when we finally did talk about it, it was only because we

00:36:24.000 blew up and it had to be addressed as opposed to being assertive and addressing it early as it comes up.

00:36:29.860 Right. Yeah. A hundred percent. You know, I, I, uh, you know, we all know, you know, when you're,

00:36:36.080 when you're have the role that I have and then switching it off sometimes, you know,

00:36:40.440 cause I can't have a CEO relationship with my wife. Right. I am the CEO of the family. There's

00:36:45.780 no question about that. Yeah. But, but the reality of it is, is that, you know, she's my partner and,

00:36:50.260 and I have to, you know, the, the respect and candor thing has to, has to work there too,

00:36:55.340 just like you said. And, and so, uh, sometimes I have to like go, okay, you're, you're not running

00:36:59.900 the company right now. This is a different thing and you got to, you got to do this differently,

00:37:03.600 but I'm lucky because I have a, I have a wonderful wife and she's, um, puts up with a lot of my kind

00:37:09.480 of crazy stuff that goes on in this crazy life that I live. And, and, uh, we just make the most

00:37:14.800 of every minute we're together and it works. So. Yeah, that's good. I think a lot of ambitious guys deal

00:37:19.520 with that. I know I do because I, you know, I don't want to say the business stuff comes easy,

00:37:23.840 but it's more objective. It's easier to quantify. You can look at the numbers you were talking about

00:37:29.260 that, but in the relationship, it's not like you can, okay, how many hours did I put in my,

00:37:33.600 with my wife and how many, you know, you can't talk about profits. Like there's no profit, right?

00:37:37.560 So it's like, no. So in a lot of ways, the business stuff, I think comes a little bit easier

00:37:42.340 and more natural to a lot of men. And the relational stuff is a challenge because you can't really

00:37:46.620 quantify it all that well. Like you can't see the increase in profits or, or the decrease

00:37:51.860 in, in overhead. You know, you can't see those things in a relationship. Yeah. You're, you're

00:37:56.040 talking about me right now. So that's everybody's listening is probably to that to some degree.

00:38:00.420 It's a, that's, that's exactly right. And so, um, I want to talk about your role as a, a salesman,

00:38:07.220 I guess you'd say is because I imagine you have ideas and vision for the organization and you've

00:38:12.460 got a board that you've got to present these ideas to. I assume is what is how that works.

00:38:16.620 Yeah. And you also have to get your department heads on board with these things too. And I

00:38:20.640 imagine there's some situations where it is in always a hundred percent agreement. And so what

00:38:26.820 is that process like for you? Let's talk about it, uh, approaching the board and the family,

00:38:31.740 you know, who, who created this, this, this company and this organization? Yeah. Um, well,

00:38:38.340 you know, I think that, um, I think the first thing is, you know, you've got to, um, if you're new

00:38:43.760 to an organization, um, you know, I think that stage, particularly the first year, um, you've

00:38:49.660 got to do a whole heck of a lot, you know, you should always be a good listener. You should

00:38:54.860 always listen, but you've got to do a lot more listening and testing and, and, and really

00:38:59.580 understanding what's going on. What do you mean by testing? Um, the things have been kind

00:39:04.200 of the way things are being done just because we've done it. You think about it when you walk

00:39:08.360 into a company that's over a hundred years old, like ours, how many things that are being done

00:39:12.360 in an organization like that? You know what? Yeah, I know we did that 25 years ago that way.

00:39:16.560 Right. It's probably not the way to do it now. So how do you convince them to, to see that?

00:39:20.380 Cause those might be their two, three, four decade old ideas that they just love for whatever reason.

00:39:25.640 It's not easy. Um, but what you do is you've got to, you've got to first listen, understand,

00:39:32.020 build that trust out, uh, that, that you can with, with your, your board or, and your,

00:39:38.100 your shareholders. Um, and frankly, your team as are more important. And then what you've got to do

00:39:44.100 is you've got to put that plan in place. You've got it. And I don't care if, you know, some people

00:39:49.440 get this, the whole strategy thing's an interesting thing to me. I love it. That's like, to me, that's

00:39:54.200 what I'm most passionate about in terms of the businesses laying out that plan to go win.

00:39:58.520 You know what? I want to win every day. I look at all of our competitors and I, I seriously

00:40:03.220 want to put them out of business. That's how I look at it. I think that attitude is something

00:40:07.360 a whole lot of people don't talk about, but I think that's a healthy attitude and something

00:40:11.600 we probably ought to talk a little bit more about. Cause that's what drives men to excel.

00:40:14.840 Yeah. That level of competition. Yeah. That's it. And so what, what, what happens is as soon

00:40:19.980 as you get that plan in place, that architecture I talked about earlier, and of course there's a

00:40:23.700 lot more to it, but, but the, then you can begin to say, okay, this thing we were doing, does this

00:40:30.380 fit? Does this work still? It might, it might be still the best way. And we have many things in our

00:40:35.640 organization from an engineering perspective, a product perspective that absolutely are still,

00:40:41.440 we've been doing for a long time and they're still the best way, but there's going to be things

00:40:45.960 that you're going to find that aren't. And you've got to adjust that and you've got to make that.

00:40:49.280 And so that's how you get them. You can't, you know, it's not just trust me. I'll, I'll handle

00:40:54.380 this. Right. You know, um, it's, it's really trust me. Here's the plan. Here's how we're going

00:41:01.300 to do this. Here's the details behind it. And this is what this is going to mean. And it may take us

00:41:05.500 five years. It may take us eight years or whatever, but that's, that's what you have to do. That's the

00:41:10.020 critical thing is, is putting those together. And that's when you start to hit that sweet spot. Now,

00:41:15.180 you know, going back to your question a little bit, what happens, there are times where

00:41:18.420 you know, there's disagreements and you're not going to get off that. And your job as a CEO is

00:41:27.540 eventually you got to make the call. Cause it's rare that everybody agrees with you. Um, I feel

00:41:34.100 pretty lucky right now. Cause, cause I feel like with my team, it's, it's a, it's such a strong team

00:41:39.000 now that, that they do, but in general, you know, ultimately you've got to make that call and you've

00:41:44.680 got to said, you know what, no, this is, this is what we're going to do. Here's why. And let's go.

00:41:49.620 Well, and I imagine too, it has a lot to do with the way that you run your organization and a lot

00:41:53.900 with the culture. You know, you get these guys in guys and gals, you get them in on board quickly

00:41:58.980 and you get them on board with the culture. And then there's that expectation that's upfront

00:42:04.120 and there's no mistake about that. And then they also probably see the wins, right? So they see,

00:42:08.920 okay, well, Bruce has let us down this. I didn't agree with that. And yet we went forward in that

00:42:13.240 direction and we won. It worked. That's exactly right. And so they see that victory and they're

00:42:16.520 like, all right, well, I got a little bit more faith in this next time that I'm maybe don't agree

00:42:20.540 with them again. Yeah, that's exactly right. And, and you gotta have, you gotta have wins along the

00:42:24.600 way. You know, we've got a, uh, I don't mind sharing this. We have a, uh, our shareholders were

00:42:28.360 incredibly, incredibly smart years and years ago. They put a plan in place that every single employee

00:42:33.780 that we have at Leupold and Stevens, um, is a part of our profit sharing plan.

00:42:37.800 And so we get a victory every year and sometimes it's bigger and sometimes it's smaller, but there's

00:42:43.080 a victory every year for every single employee, whether you, whether you work at the reception

00:42:47.640 desk or whether you're the CEO of the company, you, you, you get to share in the profits and it's,

00:42:53.640 it, it, there's no cap on ours, which is really foreign to most. In other words, the better we,

00:42:59.480 the better that the shareholders in the company do, the better the entire team does. Yeah.

00:43:03.640 And so those are, that's a way to show, look, we've built this plan. We've put it in place. We're

00:43:07.160 increasing what we do in terms of profitability because that, you know, that's, that's the,

00:43:10.920 the real critical thing in any organization. Yeah. I want growth, but ultimately I want

00:43:15.640 profitability. That's what fuels us. It allows us to invest. It allows us to make this

00:43:19.400 incredibly performance product to hire a bunch of people to get people on board on their family's

00:43:23.720 table. Exactly. Yeah. And so, so, so having, you know, having those wins along the way,

00:43:28.760 like you mentioned, or just that's, that's an absolutely critical, critical piece of it.

00:43:33.880 How do you guys maintain the culture? You know, you bring them on board, you get them

00:43:38.200 familiar with the culture and there's some expectations that are laid out there. You

00:43:40.920 give them an opportunity to back out if it's not a fit. Now you've got an employee who's been around

00:43:45.720 for two, three, four or five years. They've maybe become familiar and comfortable, complacent,

00:43:51.080 maybe even to a degree. How do you ensure that that culture of excellence continues

00:43:56.360 as you have employees that stick with you for longer and longer and maybe drift a little bit

00:43:59.960 along the way? Yeah. I think, you know, engagement has, you know, so many, you know, aspects to it.

00:44:08.040 It's, it's more than just money. We all know that. I mean, there's a whole bunch of other motivators

00:44:12.920 that people, you know, get inspired by. I think, I think, you know, you, you've got to have a vision,

00:44:17.400 you know, our, our vision is to be the dominant performance optics company in the world.

00:44:20.600 Mm-hmm. It's really straightforward. How do you, how do you, well, I'll get to that. Okay,

00:44:23.880 keep going. I'll get to that question. And so, but I want to make sure that every

00:44:26.360 one of our team members is inspired by that. Like I take that as a really important piece

00:44:30.280 of my job is when they come into that factory every day that they are excited about what we do

00:44:35.240 and what we deliver to our customers. Right. And so I think you have to have that. I think you have to

00:44:40.840 have the appropriate ways to compensate. You have to have, you know, the, the right benefits and stuff

00:44:46.040 in place that people, you know, they get it. I think things like the profit share and,

00:44:49.800 you know, the, the right plans. Those are all really, really important. But, but most importantly,

00:44:54.680 you got to engage your team members. They've got to be a part of the business. It's not just,

00:44:58.440 hey, go do this, but hey, here's what we're doing. The last, uh, all company meeting that I had,

00:45:04.200 you know, I did a whole different format. I just said, you know what? I, you, I know I get up here,

00:45:09.000 I'll tell you how we're doing and all these things, but here's what we're going to do this time.

00:45:11.400 You're just going to ask questions and there's no bad questions. Let's just go.

00:45:15.080 And I stood up for our team and they asked, and it was awesome. I mean, it was an hour and 20

00:45:19.560 minutes of questions. And, and, and, and so I think making sure that they, they feel like they

00:45:25.800 can make a difference, right? And they can, and giving them the opportunity to make a difference,

00:45:29.960 right? Those are the kinds of things that keep people passionate about your business and about

00:45:35.160 where you're going. Yeah, that makes sense. I found that too with, you know, we, so we've got our

00:45:39.480 iron council, which is a digital brotherhood is typically what I say. But, you know, even in that,

00:45:44.360 ultimately, I have to make the decisions about the path, but I try to involve as many of our

00:45:47.560 team leaders as possible. When we have new ideas and directives that are coming down,

00:45:52.200 I try to involve the members of the iron council. When, when I have a question, or maybe there's

00:45:58.520 some things that I want to do, I try to involve them and listen to their feedback. And then also,

00:46:02.520 this is important, show that I actually listened to their feedback, right? I didn't just solicit it.

00:46:06.680 I acted upon the feedback I received and man, that's gone a long way, but that isn't something I've

00:46:11.160 always done. It's, I used to have this mentality of like, well, it's my, it's my thing. It's my

00:46:15.960 organization. Like I'll do whatever I want for whatever reason I want. And although that may

00:46:20.920 be true to some degree, like you're not going to get much buy-in if that's the kind of attitude you

00:46:25.000 have. No, not at all. You have to, you nailed it. You've got to, I think it's okay to say,

00:46:31.880 you know what? I appreciate what you're saying and I understand that, but here's why we're not going to

00:46:36.520 do that. Right. Here's why we're not going to go that direction, you know? Yeah. You don't need

00:46:40.920 to take it so far that just because you're giving the authority for an employee to speak that, that

00:46:45.400 you, that you feel obligated or compelled to move that direction. Right. They don't see the full

00:46:50.040 picture either. That's right. Like you do. That's right. But there are times when I've had suggestions

00:46:54.840 that are dead on and I'm like, you know what? That makes a lot of sense and we'll figure it out.

00:47:01.080 We'll get back to you and we'll, we'll get going on that. Or let's get you involved and let's,

00:47:04.680 let's figure out how to, how to make this happen. So it's, it's, you know, if that's,

00:47:10.760 that's what you do every day. Right. Just part of the process. Yeah. What we do. What do you enjoy

00:47:14.440 most about leading the organization? I like the people. I mean, I just love having, you know,

00:47:21.240 seeing people, you know, love to come to work and, and, and work in an environment where it feels like

00:47:26.840 a family. I mean, we've got a lot of times, it's not just family owned, but you can, you know,

00:47:30.840 you can come into our parking lot and you'll see, you know, for one of our shifts and you'll see two or

00:47:34.440 three people get out of a car and come in. Is that right? Yeah. You know, a lot of organizations

00:47:37.640 frown on that. I'm like, no, get your brother in here, get your sister in here, get them all.

00:47:40.760 If you've got good people and you know, it's a family environment, the way, the way we kind

00:47:44.040 of look at it. Yeah. Um, it's just, it's a, it's a great, great, uh, asset for us. I tell people

00:47:50.440 all the time, I said, look, if, if, if we can, can be insanely competitive, okay. As an organization

00:47:58.600 and focused on making sure that we become the dominant performance optics company, that that's what we're

00:48:03.080 doing. And we, and you, and we lay the plan out to do that. And at the same time, treat each other's

00:48:07.320 family. We're unstoppable. Sure. Our competitors won't be able to deal with us. Do you think there's

00:48:12.440 situations that you've had where you are too familiar or too close, uh, employees or executives

00:48:19.520 with employees that you've had to consider as you've grown the organization? I think your values take care

00:48:25.140 of that. I mean, I think if your values are clear, if you have that foundation of values that are clear

00:48:29.040 and understood, um, we, we've had, we've had situations where we've had to let a family member

00:48:35.060 go of, you know, someone else in the organization because it just wasn't working. Right. And as long

00:48:40.780 as everybody's clear on those values, right. Um, then you can make those decisions and you can justify

00:48:47.760 those decisions to the extent that you have to, to say, look, here's what this, here's what it is.

00:48:52.140 This is what was going on. Um, we don't do a lot of that, but I'm saying it's happened. Yeah.

00:48:56.080 It's happened for sure. And you just, you know, you ultimately my job is to look out for the

00:49:01.720 collective group, right. For all of us, my shareholders first, that's always, always the

00:49:06.700 CEO's job. They have, you know, you act on their behalf. That's right. Yep. And then ultimately I've

00:49:14.000 got to look out for the team as a whole and, and where we're going to go and what we're going to do.

00:49:17.560 And so I, I, I look at that and, uh, and, and take that into account and make sure that all the,

00:49:22.800 all of our team members are, are thought of not just, Oh, this is a situation.

00:49:26.740 Right. Yeah. I've run into situations like that. I just go back to iron council where I've had to

00:49:31.600 let people go of the iron council because, and they were liked, you know, they were well liked

00:49:35.860 people, but there was just some things going on in the background or politics like you were talking

00:49:39.260 about earlier. And you know, where I've fallen into the trap of thinking, okay, I really want to

00:49:43.580 make sure this person is taken care of. I don't want to ostracize this person or make them feel

00:49:46.960 whatever. And then I realized, okay, my priority isn't to this one individual. My

00:49:52.680 priority is to the mission. And this one individual is jeopardizing the mission,

00:49:56.920 which jeopardizes the other 500 plus people that I'm working with trying to lead and trying to

00:50:02.920 propel in their life moving forward. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. I mean,

00:50:07.100 I listen a lot. I think you give out, give some tremendous advice to, to, you know, your listeners

00:50:13.000 as it relates to, you know, you don't maybe call it this, but, you know, kind of having the values

00:50:18.560 and making sure that you're, you're, you know, not only personally living that way,

00:50:22.000 but if you're running an organization, you know, it's, it's a living being, man. It's a,

00:50:26.500 this thing is this living thing and all these people and these people are going to make it

00:50:29.960 successful. And, and you gotta be really clear, really clear.

00:50:33.240 The interesting thing about it being a living thing is that I've thought a lot about this,

00:50:38.680 that if I died or decided, you know, I, I didn't want to do this anymore. I don't know if I could

00:50:44.280 stop the movement if I wanted to, which is cool. That's a great position to be in, but it also

00:50:49.380 brings a lot of burden of responsibility in that this thing, if I don't lead and manage it correctly,

00:50:56.700 could quickly become a monster of its own. And so that's a big priority and a big responsibility.

00:51:02.180 I feel like I have to steer it in the right direction. Sometimes I feel like I'm just along

00:51:06.820 for the ride and other times I feel like maybe I'm in a little bit of control. That's a, that's a

00:51:10.620 balancing act as well.

00:51:12.200 You know, when you get to that place where, where sometimes as a leader, you feel like you're

00:51:16.260 along for the ride, I think that's one of the best things that can happen to you because it's

00:51:20.640 just, it knows, it means that you've done the foundational work. You've, you've put the plans

00:51:24.600 in place and, and it's working.

00:51:26.200 Yeah, true.

00:51:26.880 You know, and I just think it's such a, I, I don't, I, you know, when I was younger, I probably,

00:51:31.720 you know, I would want to, you know, control things more. And I've learned, man, when you,

00:51:37.100 that's a great feeling when you, when you've got an organization that can, can, can see the vision

00:51:41.960 and continue to move toward it every single day, even when you're not completely out there

00:51:47.020 in front, you know, driving the bus. Hard not to do that. I feel like, but it's just, it's a cool

00:51:52.380 thing. So, well, I think it's a little bit foreign, not only to me, but a lot of guys,

00:51:55.400 because they're so used to grinding, like quite literally like grinding through and you're trying

00:52:00.360 to move this beast and it won't move and it won't do what you want it to. And then it does. And you're

00:52:05.040 like, wait a second, something's off here because I'm so used to having to grind through everything or put

00:52:09.680 out fires or do whatever it is I have to do. Yeah, that's right. No, I want to go back to

00:52:14.300 what you had said earlier. I, I almost interrupted you. You were talking about becoming the dominant

00:52:18.920 performance optic company on the market. I mean, obviously you can look at gross revenue. You

00:52:24.220 can look at the numbers. Is it more than that? Like, how do you define when you've achieved that

00:52:29.280 objective? Uh, you know, defining dominance is, it's, it's, it's, it's really a cool thing for us

00:52:36.520 because I don't look at it as, um, strictly like market share. Right. Um, that's one of

00:52:41.080 the things we look at. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. And, uh, I, I, I, that's why I chose that word dominant

00:52:46.820 instead of leader, be the leading because dominant to me means you're never satisfied. If I have two

00:52:54.300 points more market share than my next competitor, I want four. Right. And when I've got four, I want eight.

00:52:58.720 And when it's eight, it needs to go to 10. Right. I mean, it's, it's that kind of mindset. And,

00:53:05.640 and I wanted to, to make sure that, you know, we have set a market share levels that we want to be

00:53:12.040 in every category that we participate in. Okay. And, and that's, there's some levels on there that I've

00:53:17.320 got, you know, detailed out that says, this is dominant when you get to here, this is dominant when

00:53:22.160 you get to here. And so that's how we look at it overall to kind of define dominance. And then we've

00:53:27.580 got the other metrics of the business we look at, which is profitability and revenues and all that

00:53:30.980 thing. But it's really about market share, uh, for us and how we define that. Right. Um, and it's market

00:53:36.120 share in performance optics, not optics, optics, because we're not going to play the game of, you know,

00:53:43.220 going over to Asia, throwing a, throwing a logo on a rifle scope and bring it over. Right. Slapping

00:53:47.780 something on there, making it cheap and sending it out. I mean, there's companies all throughout here that

00:53:51.780 do that. That's just not us. It's not what we're going to do. You know. And it's fine if that's your

00:53:56.080 thing. I like that you've defined it and you've clearly defined what it is, not just some random

00:54:00.760 general objective you're after. That's right. And so, um, and then what we do is actually in our,

00:54:08.780 in that, that, that planning that I talked about, right? That architecture, those, you know, I talked

00:54:14.000 about those initiatives that we ended up coming up with and the things that you do want to do.

00:54:17.480 Mm-hmm. We, we talk about those in, in respect to what does dominant look like in that, right?

00:54:25.440 So if, if you say, you know, we want to have the, the strongest sales force, I'll use an example.

00:54:30.980 Sure. If, if this is what we want to do, what does a dominant sales force look like? Mm-hmm.

00:54:34.540 What does that look like? Mm-hmm. What's, what's, what's a vision for that? What is that,

00:54:37.220 what does that smell like? What is a, what is dominant quality? What's, what's less than one

00:54:42.100 half a 1% return rate? What is it, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah, right. You got to define it.

00:54:45.080 It's just like, so you can get down and you can keep that thing going. I think a lot of people,

00:54:48.640 they lose sight of being able to drive it down into things that folks understand. Because if

00:54:53.600 you're on my manufacturing team and I, and we, we define what dominant quality is, they get it.

00:54:59.180 Right. Yeah. And. Because you've talked about it.

00:55:01.120 So do you want to be dominant or not? Yeah, I, I want to, I'll, I want to be dominant. Who doesn't?

00:55:06.560 You know what I mean? And I, when I mean that, I mean, it's just in respect to the company and what it is. So

00:55:10.780 that's how we do it. We, we drive that all we do. So I, I see this, uh, this competitive

00:55:16.120 killer type mentality in you. Do you think that that, and in fact, I like that. I think more men

00:55:22.580 need that. Do you think that attitude is frowned upon generally in society? Do you think it's

00:55:28.400 embraced? What are your thoughts on that? Do you feel that you have that mentality? I guess to lead

00:55:33.080 off with that. Uh, yeah. Because you've said a couple of things where I'm like, man, he wants to crush.

00:55:37.420 And I love that. Yeah. Most people don't talk about it that way. No, I think,

00:55:40.780 that if you talk to my family, my wife, my sons, my daughter, you know, anybody that's, that's

00:55:46.520 around me and certainly my, my teammates, they, they know that, that I am kind of probably uber

00:55:50.960 competitive. Yeah. Um, I have to actually, um, make sure I, I keep that in the proper. Sure.

00:56:00.200 There's a place for it. There's a place for it. And I, and so I got to be thoughtful about how I,

00:56:03.580 how I do that. But yeah, I, it, it, it drives me. Um, and I think it's important in a leader. I just do.

00:56:10.280 I think it's hard to be a leader if you don't want to go out and win, you know, and understand

00:56:16.000 what it takes to win. I just think we're in this overly soft society that says, Oh, well,

00:56:21.940 if you want to win, then somebody else has to lose. And what if they feel bad? You know what

00:56:25.640 they need to do? They need to listen to order of man podcast. I agree. And because, you know,

00:56:29.640 and I, I, I, I've told both my boys, I've said, look, listen to this. Here's a podcast. I want you to

00:56:34.220 listen to this. This is good stuff here. Um, and, and, and I think that, um, what you're doing

00:56:41.180 is incredibly needed, you know, as it relates to what's it's, it's okay to be competitive.

00:56:48.380 It's okay to want to win. In fact, it's really important. Yes. And, and you know, now it's also

00:56:55.960 okay to lose. That's right. Like losing there's value. Some people say, well, I don't want them to,

00:57:00.020 I don't want to lose. Cause then it'll damage their self-esteem. No, no. The idea of losing

00:57:03.900 is that you figure out where you failed and then you fix it. So you don't lose next time.

00:57:08.480 That's right. And yeah. And, and it's a really, really important thing. That's the beauty of

00:57:13.380 hunting, man. And that's why I love the sport so much is, you know, you can, it's just, you know,

00:57:20.140 when you fail, it is like, it nails you to the bone, man. Yeah. Yeah. Just to your core.

00:57:26.640 Yeah. And, and the feedback is valuable. Yeah. And I usually take, you know, if I've had a hunt

00:57:31.220 where I've, you know, either something's gone wrong or I've made a mistake or whatever it is,

00:57:35.580 you know, I can, I can think about it for a while. And then all of a sudden I can feel the passion

00:57:41.080 start rolling, you know, and I'm like, okay, I know what I did. I know what I need to do next

00:57:44.860 time. It's a, it's a cool thing. So I do the same thing. I, I, when I was in Arizona several weeks

00:57:50.140 ago, I blew a stock and, you know, you feel bad for yourself. And I'm walking back to the truck with my

00:57:54.180 head down and thinking, you know, this sucks and feeling bad for myself. And I get back about

00:57:58.740 halfway, you know, a mile and I'm like, all right, this is where I screwed up. Let's get back on

00:58:04.000 another deer. Cause I can do it next time. That's right. You know? So yeah, I think that,

00:58:07.480 I think that feedback's important. Well, Hey, I want to be respectful of your time. I know we're

00:58:10.660 here at SHOT Show and you've got a lot of people you need to meet, but I do want to ask you a question

00:58:14.380 and I didn't prepare you for it, but you said that you listen to the podcast. So you've probably

00:58:17.160 heard me ask this before. The question is, what does it mean to be a man? You know, I think, you

00:58:24.680 know, for me, it's just, you know, being able to, to, to, to have respect for, for others and, and,

00:58:34.680 and really being honest with them and straightforward with others is, is probably one of the biggest

00:58:41.880 things about being a man. I think just the integrity to do that. And, and I tell my boys,

00:58:48.380 do what you say you're going to do, do what you say you're going to do. And that is a big piece of

00:58:54.920 being a man. So we all make mistakes. We all have times where we've said something and not followed

00:59:03.360 through, not done it, not made it happen. Whether it is in a personal relationship with your, with your

00:59:09.360 spouse or whether it's, you know, your family or whether it's your business. And the deal with

00:59:14.720 that is don't let it happen again. Don't let it happen again. So to me, I think that's the key

00:59:20.880 aspect of it. Do what you say you're going to do. It's powerful. Respectfully, honestly, with candor.

00:59:27.440 Excellent. Well, this has been a great conversation. I appreciate you taking some time. I know you're a

00:59:30.820 busy man. Obviously you've got a lot going on. So to be able to sit down with you is a real honor.

00:59:35.020 Thanks for doing it. And I'm happy you're here and, and you're welcome to use the

00:59:38.680 loophole booth as your, as your home. Yes. And, uh, doing your stuff. Yeah. We're going to do a lot

00:59:43.540 more interviews, uh, over the next couple of days. So I'm sure we'll be back, but really appreciate

00:59:47.400 you. Thanks. Thanks brother. Gentlemen, there you go. My conversation with Bruce Pettit. I hope you

00:59:52.600 enjoyed that one. Like I said, I know there was a little bit of background noise, but, uh, the

00:59:56.740 conversation was still good. I'm sure you got a lot of it and, uh, man, this idea of strategic planning

01:00:01.300 and making sure that you have the right systems and processes in place. Again, whether it's running an

01:00:05.980 organization that has 700 employees that you have to manage or, uh, leading your wife and your

01:00:10.960 children. Well, a lot of this stuff is very, very applicable. So make sure you connect with us on

01:00:15.780 social media. I'm most active on Instagram at Ryan Mickler, also Twitter again, at Ryan Mickler.

01:00:22.880 Uh, make sure you check out the legacy event. I'm trying to keep this one fairly short because my,

01:00:27.100 my voice is gone. You can hear that. Uh, but I really appreciate you being in this battle with me,

01:00:31.640 guys. It's a, it's an honor to stand shoulder to shoulder with you in the battle to reclaim and

01:00:35.480 restore masculinity. And every day I'm getting messages and links to articles and videos and

01:00:42.080 everything else as to the trends of society, which are disturbing to say the least. So my goal is to

01:00:49.180 help reverse some of those trends and really step into and help us all step into who we are meant to

01:00:54.700 be as men. So guys, we'll be back tomorrow for the ask me anything series with Kip Sorensen.

01:01:00.580 Uh, so hopefully you'll tune back in. Then, uh, make sure you're sharing this show,

01:01:04.680 make sure you subscribed. And, uh, I don't want you to miss any of this and make sure you're engaged

01:01:09.020 with us. Appreciate you being in the battle. All right, guys, we'll see you tomorrow. Until then,

01:01:13.100 go out there, take action, become a man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of

01:01:17.700 man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be.

01:01:22.760 We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.

Order of Man - January 28, 2020

The Power of Strategic Leadership ｜ BRUCE PETTET

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