Juggling Dreams and Duties: Alan Lazaros Shares His Insights

00:03 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Welcome to Voices in Leadership, where leaders who connect, inspire and grow come to share their stories. Live. I'm your host, dr Angela J Buckley. Join us as we explore authentic leadership, gratitude and the power of connection through powerful conversations with inspiring voices. Let's inspire, uplift and elevate leadership that truly makes a difference together. Well, hello, and welcome back to another episode of Voices in Leadership. I have with me in the studio today Alan Lazaros from Next Level University, and I am so excited to have him bring his expertise on how he's helping leaders develop themselves and the people around them. So welcome, alan.

00:51 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me, First and foremost. Gratitude first and ownership. Number one I was late. That's on me, not on you, Angela, and I want to take ownership because I think that's leading by example. And number two is I am very grateful to be here. You obviously take your platform very seriously, which I respect and admire, and I will not waste a second of anyone's time.

01:12 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Well, thank you very much. We all know that our listeners, our CEOs, are incredibly busy people, so we can be fast and furious today.

01:23 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Let's do it.

01:24 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Let's do it so quickly. I would like to introduce a little bit about you and read a little bit about your background, so this is the part where you get to smile for the camera. Alan was very successful already, but he experienced a near fatal accident at the age of 26. And this was after already having lost his father at the age of 26, and this was after already having lost his father at the age of two. So, putting all of these things together, he found that he was looking for personal development and not finding what he was looking for at the time.

01:58
He has built an organization of 18 team members for, as part of the Next Level University. It's a global top 100 podcast focused leadership team and very unique on this version of success. He's now had well over a million listeners in 175 countries as he coaches individuals to also be successful with their podcasting. So I am very excited to learn a lot more about the systems that you are using to bring people along and how do you get them into your flow, how do you move them forward and how does your personal story reflect how you built that system?

02:45 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Well, the first thing and I know a lot of your listeners will realize that this is a book that's probably very common amongst your listeners, which is the Flywheel by Jim Collins good to great. And that concept is the concept that I use, but I have my own unique flavor of it. So it's essentially a business model in this space of five layers. So the top is the highest volume for the lowest value and the bottom is the lowest volume for the highest value.

03:16
So, the top is social media. Then you bring people to your podcast or your YouTube channel or whatever scalable value you have. Then you have a private group of some kind, then you have some sort of a meetup. So for me, I do a monthly masterclass. I've done them every month for 46 months, so the 46th month will be in October.

03:37 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
And it's virtual or in person.

03:39 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Virtual, yeah. So it's on Zoom and it's register and invite only and they're private, they're not recorded, so it's kind of that thing. And then I have one-on-one coaching.

03:49 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Okay.

03:49 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
So the way we say that our company is level up yourself, level up your podcast, level up your business. Some people want to just have more success, so they listen to the podcast. Some people want to have more success and then build a podcast and build their own community and then Some people need to generate revenue, and so we basically have something for everybody in that but that five layer business model is essentially what I recommend for anyone who is starting an online business you have to have at least one of each of those layers and in this.

04:19
So my business model at one point was 24 departments and a charity with 20 14 members and we kind of overextended I think I talked to you about that on the when we were off recording, because you and I chatted before we hit record and basically I have an 18 person team now. So we overextended. We were growing 154% year over year on average for four years and then it was 18% and then 11%. So we spent more than we had and then we over extended and then we didn't grow as much. So I came to Kev, I sat him down and I said, brother, we need to can some of this stuff. What are the departments that we would go out of business without? And we only came up with eight.

04:56
So now I say this I say successful online businesses CEOs, business owners you do not get successful by doing 10,000 things. You get successful by doing five things 10,000 times and getting really good at them. So those are the five things. You have to be really good at social media. You have to be really good at some sort of adding value on a podcast or a YouTube channel of some kind, something scalable. You have to have a group and an actual community that you build private, private, we have some sub communities too. You have to have some sort of a meet up, something I have a book club I've been doing. I also do the master classes so some sort of a meet up where you actually meet these people virtually or in person Ideally virtually in the 21st century. And then you have to have some sort of services or products that are actually profitable. And if you do the first four things, well, then you get permission to do the last one, and that's the one that feeds the business with actual money.

05:50 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
So if you were going through some of the development parts of that, um, what did it feel like? Let's, let me back up. Sorry, I'll jump a question. When you were looking at the departments that you were no longer going to keep around, how did you one identify? So in the engineering world we would call that waste right. If you're not turning things in, and we talk about Tim Woods, we talk about those are like that's the acronym for the different wastes that we look for, and so my question is what did you do? How did you handle that reduction?

06:34 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
We looked at what was profitable and what was indirectly contributing to that. So I treated it like and again, this is a metaphor, but the salmon downstream and then the salmon upstream, and what are the? So what are the things that are necessary to happen upstream in order to get the profitability downstream, and what is the core of our business? I think we we got a little bit. A good example of this would be when in Good to Great jim collins, he talks about how circuit city bought carmax yeah and I always joke and I say you know, tesla should not sell energy drinks and red bull should not sell cars.

07:13
And I think that we got a lot of success. You know, after covet at 2020, so 2020 to 2021, 2021 to 2022, 2022 to 2023, and then those those years were big. We more than doubled our company every year and we hired too much and we overextended this whole thing. But really what we were looking for is the three things. So there's not profitable activities, there's profitable activities and then there's indirectly profitable activities. So we were looking at for those two. So anything that wasn't profitable we got rid of. We actually had an app. It was called optimal but it wasn't profitable yet. It wasn't even indirectly profitable yet it was costing us a lot of money. So it was just a cost value analysis, essentially of like listen and the core of our business to.

07:56
We produce 66 podcasts as of right now. I have a business coaching practice where I help CEOs and business owners all over the world. Those are the two most profitable things that we do. And then we have a group coaching program. That's super successful too. We have we just graduated our 19th group on Tuesday of this week. But those three things.

08:13
Thank you, thank you. So those three things are very profitable. The rest of what we do was kind of wasting time and effort, honestly, except for book club. So we kept eight departments Right. And so social media, other media which is going on, other podcasts, meeting people like you, and then we have book club, we have the monthly master classes, that kind of stuff, and then we have some other. We also have a dreamliner as well, and this isn't a sales pitch, this is just products that we do. But ultimately, the point that I'm making is what are the things that are making money right? What are the things that are directly, indirectly, leading to making that money? And then how do we get rid of everything else? Because, quite frankly, when you get successful, you get shiny object syndrome and all of a sudden everything seems like a good idea and the fish are jumping in the boat. So why not? And and that's I always say if when things are going well you have to stay humble, when things are going poorly you have to stay optimistic.

09:09 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Oh, that's actually a really great mindset. Yeah, I like that. So it's interesting because, to put some of the words that you've just used kind of into some of the engineering words that you would hear for process improvement, we would talk about value add, non-value add and the one that's sort of in between is indirect, right, so we have direct and indirect, and then we have those partials that are really difficult to work through. But then you also talk about exactly what you were saying how are you putting the people in place to identify that? But the next step for us is how do we optimize Some work is always less value add, that indirect part, but you still have to do some of it in order to do the next part. And how do you speed up those back end systems? Partially, it's a skill because, to your point, you said 10,000 reps, right, in the beginning it takes you longer, but as you get better and as you understand the technology, you're also able to reduce that waste and have those reps be even faster, correct.

10:31 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Absolutely. And then the tools improve the tools improve too.

10:35 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Tools improve.

10:36 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
And then you train your team so they improve Skills, improve, skills, improve. Yep, absolutely. We use something called DRI directly responsible individual. This is something Steve Jobs used to do at Apple, and so every department has a DRI, has a specific directly responsible individual. So think of it as eight business units all rolling up under one business and they all feed each other, and then we have something I call a P3 target. I have it written on my whiteboard over here and it, every single person, has three priorities, yep, and so we use a metaphor at my company where we're all juggling, we're all jugglers. So, number one take care of the juggler, because if the juggler falls, we all fall, or all the balls fall. Rather, we're all juggling. Nine balls, okay. Three of them are glass Good, one of the nice one of my favorite.

11:28
Go so good. So one is gold, one is silver and one is bronze. So number one do not drop any of the glass balls. The rubber ones you can drop, they bounce, you can pick them back up later. So everyone has their glass balls and we have a motto at our company never drop the golden glass ball. So if I was going to drop a ball, it would be the bronze one or the silver one before the gold one.

11:51
So my golden glass ball is one-on-one coaching.

11:53
So one of the reasons why I took ownership at the beginning, I've had a long day of one-on-one coaching and, quite frankly, I'm going away next week and our podcast we've never missed an episode for 2200 episodes. So one of the reasons I was late today is because I'm overwhelmed and I apologize for that again, but at the end of the day, it's this concept of I have to focus on the golden glass ball above the silver or the bronze one and unfortunately and this is really hard for me, unfortunately sometimes you disappoint people because you can't be at the barbecue or you end up late to a podcast or whatever it is, and I think that's my least favorite part of being successful or trying to be successful, I should say is you basically have to disappoint people outside of your priorities and that hurts the most emotionally. And so you and I worked through that and I appreciate you know how we worked through that. But at the end of the day I do think that's the hardest part of success for me is just letting relationships down.

12:51 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
It is a struggle and it's interesting because that is one of the things that we specifically discuss within our Vistage cohorts is actually, how do we minimize that One? Two, what systems can we put in place so that we have the support structure that we need? And three, when it does happen and let's be honest, it does what does the conversation look like? How do we have that open, honest conversation that includes accountability and apologies. That includes accountability and apologies and, as my dad always used to say, sorry isn't good enough if you're not going to change something so it doesn't happen again. It doesn't mean it won't happen again, but you've put something in place to try to minimize it. Going forward Just like a quick sorry, isn't really the answer right?

13:48 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Well, I already have in my mind. I'm going to talk to my executive admin, laura, and talk about letting me know in advance if there is something on the calendar that doesn't line up with the hour-long blocks, because you and I had talked about how this was going to start 10 minutes prior and I only do hour-to-hour to keep those spots available for clients. So I already have my process improvement based on that failing forward moment that we've already done.

14:12 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
I learned a couple of years ago that Google will allow you to set up your systems so that it will end meetings at 5 till. You can actually change it which whatever your preference is. But if everybody in the company and this is easier when you have an organization the organization can follow a standard all meetings and five till. It is harder when you're forward, facing, customer facing, and those standards aren't in place or aren't clearly communicated.

14:44
It happens right 100%. So it is easier internally than it is to work through some of those differences externally.

14:54 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
I actually have done this, so I have 21 clients and all of my clients. I know I have a five minute buffer because I do back to backs all day and sometimes I have to go to the bathroom or whatever, it's too much.

15:04
So I have a five minute buffer and you know people say well, why do you overwhelm yourself? And it's like well, if you study Pareto principle and Parkinson's law, you realize that being overwhelmed actually gets more done in less time, and so I want to fill my whole day with as much coaching as possible and as much profitable, passionate activity as I can. Yes, and so sometimes that that does obviously come back to bite you, but that doesn't mean so. But you're absolutely right when it comes to the front-facing stuff, like other podcasts and stuff, all my clients know, all my team members know, but the front-facing I can do a better job, for sure, with emails or something so it's just interesting to see how people work through it and the the tools that are available to work through it as well, right?

15:44 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
so yeah, um, and I think also probably a little bit of culture at play, right? So so much of the work that I do is German facing and therefore punctual.

15:57 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah Well. I wouldn't do as well there. Well, I did tell you you you I've been on a lot of podcasts and I mean that. You know humbly, but you hold a certain standard that is not common in this space in particular. I mean, there's been 5 million podcasts produced ever.

16:18 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Yeah.

16:19 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
And of those 5 million, only 400 and something thousand are still in production and even a smaller percentage ever got past 100 episodes. So there's something crazy like only 50,000 podcasts that have ever gotten past 100 episodes. I mean it's it's very small percentage of podcasters stick around.

16:35 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
The other statistic following up on that is how many books get written that don't actually ever get read, yep. I mean, yeah, I was like my first, my first book sold well enough that it was profitable. Right, nice and um. That's when I started looking at statistics and I was. I was shocked at how many books get published and I just are not profitable.

17:04 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah, it's wild. And so that's the 20% of 20%, of 20% of 20%. Conversation of Pareto, right, so? So if you want to talk about that, I'm happy to Love to, okay. Well, so everyone, everyone in your space, knows Pareto. Yes, 20% of effort produces 80% of results, and I love the engineering talk we got going on right now. By the way, I don't usually get to do this on podcasts because a lot, of, a lot of podcast listeners are not process and theory oriented.

17:33
Um six segment, all that, but so I try to do 20 of 20, which is four percent and then 20 of four percent is 0.8 percent yep 20 of 0.8 is 0.16 and 20 of that is 0.04. It's 0.03 if you round out, so 0.03, but I'm always trying to find the 0.03% leverage point that makes the biggest difference and then eliminate, automate, procrastinate or delegate everything around that. Yep, and when it comes to the books thing, there's a very small percentage of books that do the large majority of sales.

18:18
true, I was definitely not in the large but at least I knew I was profitable and you definitely were at the bottom experience. Definitely weren't the bottom. Yeah, you definitely weren't the bottom.

18:28 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Yeah, I definitely wasn't the bottom, and that's when I started learning some of the numbers. But it's interesting to hear and see also, just even in the podcast world, who is handling it, who's handling it successfully, who's taking it private right. There's a lot of subscription-based ones now. Yeah definitely, and some of the quality ones. They're truly private, so you won't see them out in the public.

18:57 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah, there's a lot of different monetization models and if you want to go down that rabbit hole, I'm happy to.

19:06 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Maybe not today, maybe sometime in the future Sounds good. Maybe not today, maybe sometime in the future Sounds good. But so one of the questions I'd asked you when we got started and we probably have maybe five minutes for this topic is when someone hires, they're soon to be replacement, right? So, hi, I am the leader of my organization and I am preparing either to sell, step out, but I have fond feelings for the organization. I want to be prepared when I leave. What's my legacy? I want to have the next person trained up. What are the steps that you would recommend to get that person ready to be prepared for those next steps?

19:44 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Well, so it's exactly what I take all my clients through, and the first step is obviously lead by example. So, assuming you're already leading by example and letting them see you and shadow you, then this is the steps that I would take, and you can use Excel for this, you can use Google Sheets for this, you can use whatever metrics tracker you want to do I use Google Sheets personally but so this is the system that I take people through and I'll keep it under five minutes, as you mentioned. So I do, and I'm gonna give you all of them and then I'll go through each one. So I start top to bottom, a macroscopic thinker. So I do. I do the top first. Okay, so reverse engineering dreams, goals, priorities, metrics, habits, skills and identity, and they all roll up okay so dreams is first, a dream statement is one sentence.

20:30
So, assuming that I'm trying to replace myself, I'm going to coach this person, so I'm going to be this person's mentor or coach, whatever you want to call it Mentor, coach, trainer I think coach is probably the best label. So what I would say is we need one dream statement, one sentence that encapsulates the true north of what you are trying to achieve through my coaching. This can be anywhere from as specific as to build the most positively impactful personal development company in history which I have written, or it could be to help me get my finances in order and to become the CEO of Nexel University. It's a pie-in-the-sky North Star. I wear this North Star around my neck right here to remind me of my sort of true North. It's the compass that guides you. Nice. Now the key here with dream statement. Last piece on dream statement it has to be specific enough to be meaningful, but broad enough to encapsulate the next decade. Okay, even if it's not a full decade, yep.

21:28 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
That's fine.

21:29 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Cool, it's just your true north Pie in the sky. Next is goals. I do quarterly. I read a book called the 25-Week Year.

21:40 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Maybe you've heard of it. Awesome, the 12-Week. Wait, I was thinking the 12-Week Year, I'm sorry. The 12-Week?

21:45 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah, you're absolutely right. I combined two things in my head 25 years is 100 quarters, yes. So I combined two things in my head 25 years is 100 quarters, yes. So I combined two frameworks in my head right there the 12-week year combined with something called the 25-year framework, where 25 years equates to 100 quarters. What could you accomplish with 100 quarters? That's sort of the mentality my coaching is based on.

22:05
Okay, so we do goals, which is quarterly, just three. I always say one is too few, five is too many. That's the right answer. Nice, love it.

22:13
So if you do that, though, you need them based on your priorities. So remember the P3 target, the glass balls. The goals need to be predicated on those. So this is what I say to each client. I say if you can only water three plants with intentional effort and time this quarter so Q4 is starting in five days. So in Q4, we're going to set three goals underneath your three priorities. Your three priorities are the plants that you can water in Q4. It doesn't mean you still have to take out the trash, you still have to do the laundry. I get it, but I mean these are the ones that are going to get your intentionality Okay mean you still have to take out the trash, you still have to do the laundry. I get it, but I mean these are the ones that are going to get your intentionality Okay once you have those.

22:54
For me it's coaching, training and podcasting. Coaching is one-to-one, training is one-to-several, podcasting is one-to-scale and they all feed each other. Those are the three priorities. Okay, good, now I need a goal under each you can work All right. So for me, coaching, training, podcasting certain number of clients, training certain number of attendees at my masterclasses and then podcasting a certain number of listens and views on YouTube. Okay, so my current goals are 25 clients I'm going for. I'm at 21 now Attendees I think I'm shooting for 25 average attendees at my master classes and right now my 1.3 million is what we're almost hit for listens and views between our podcasts. Okay, so that boom. So the goals roll up from the priorities. So now you have dreams, goals, priorities, metrics. Okay, the metric means you obviously have to track the listens and views every day. You obviously have to track the number of clients. Why day you obviously have to track the number of clients? Why do I know I have 21 clients? Because when I wake up in the morning I open my dashboard and I update everything.

23:57 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Yes.

23:57 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
You've got to know your numbers. So there's metrics. So there's one metric, at least one under each priority, that rolls up to each goal, that rolls up to your dream. Then you have habits Difference between a metric and a habit. A metric is your weight, so I weigh 203 pounds right now. A habit is exercise, so I exercise an hour a day minimum and my weight is a metric. The habit of exercising an hour a day is a habit.

24:28 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
This is my rule and again, it's only mine, I mean it's kind of like the difference between kais and kpis, right like, the performance index is your metric, but what? What influences it? Kai, your activity index similar to that.

24:41 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yes, it's just like objectives and key results, same sort of idea. Okay. So for me, a habit is you do it daily, brush your teeth daily, that kind of thing. I don't consider it a habit unless it's daily. I'm also big on the daily thing. I also work weekends. I know not everyone wants to do that.

24:56
So dreams, goals, priorities, metrics, habits, skills now this is the piece where you have one most important skill. I call your mis, and my most important skill is effective communication. I have something called the 25 impact points of effective communication that I do green, yellow or red on every single week for myself Tonality, compelling, storytelling, all this different stuff. But basically, everyone has a bottleneck in skills, and so I was on with a client earlier. He's a videographer, he has a YouTube channel. Videography is his most important skill. Videography is not my most important skill. Right, I have video editors who edit our stuff. That's not my most important skill, but I have to be effective in communication, all right.

25:35
So then the last one is identity, and identity is what is the identity that you have to hold For me? I have the identity of a CEO. What does it mean to be a CEO? I have the identity of a business owner. What does it mean to be a business owner Our company, next Level University. What does it mean to be a business owner I, our company, next level University. What does it mean to be a next level er or a next level community member identity of? I'm a podcaster, I'm a coach, I'm a trainer. So what are the identities that you must hold in order to roll up to your habits the most important skill, the metric, the priorities, the goals and the dreams, and they all, if they're all in alignment, people really do start to flourish. Flourish, and I think success is a process, not a destination, but you have to choose the destination in advance in order to get the process.

26:18 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Also all of those things put together, defining what success looks like for you A hundred percent. Not everybody says I want to run a hundred million dollar company this year. Some people say I want to be a solo printer and do my videoing from the beach, and maybe it's only working six hours a day, but it's enough to pay all my bills and my family is secure like. The definition of success also defines what the entire process looks like absolutely, it's positive.

26:48 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
I was on with someone yesterday named Gabe who said you scare me, I'm not interested in all that. We do 240 a year, me and my wife. We have 90% profit margins and I'm not interested in it. It all depends, to your point, on what you want, and what I would say is don't shoot for a goal or a dream that requires a process that you hate. Dream, yep, that requires a process that you hate. Also true, a very, very good point the lifestyle you want needs to be a byproduct of the goals and dreams you set and the process necessary to achieve it. Because people used to come to me and say I want Brene Brown level impact and I would say, okay, perfect, and then I'd show them what to do, and then they'd be like I hate my life. So it's Brene, grinded for 25 years, like you're not going to get that level of impact without work, and so, at the end of the day, we all have to define it for ourselves.

27:35 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Every endurance athlete and every musician will tell you the same thing, right Like there's. Those are years and years and years of development, before anybody even knows your name 100%.

27:47 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
And that is the process that I'm currently in.

27:54 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Good for you. Thank you, um, I need to turn the conversation to our gratitude section here and thank you for all of the insights that you have provided so far. But my next question is who would you like to recognize who has helped you along your journey to get to where you are right now? And the questions that I'm going to ask you are based on the SPIRIT framework. That stands for specific, personal, impactful, so metrics, relevant, talking about those values, or how are they relating back to what your dream is inclusive? We're doing this by default by making it public, and timely doesn't particularly apply here, because normally you would want to do it as close to when an event happened, but this is a little more of a retrospective. So that's the quick overview of the spirit framework. So who and what specifically did?

28:56 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
they do to help you. Okay, it's my beautiful girlfriend and future wife, emilia. She is the. I met her coming up on six years ago, in October Our six year anniversary is in October, next month, nice and we live together and she and I have a business together and she is the greatest gift of my life. So what has she done for me? Yes, she helped me. I think the better question is what has she not done for me? She loved all of me, okay, in a way that I had never experienced before, and she helped me understand every blind spot I've ever had, and she's helped me. So a lot, of, a lot of people say you know, things like my woman is always right. I'm telling you right now this woman has never not been right. Everything she's ever said and everything her intuition has ever shared with me has always come out right Eventually, and that has just been. She's been a tremendous guide said, and everything her intuition has ever shared with me has always come out right eventually.

29:52 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
And that has just been. She's been a tremendous guide. This will be a very interesting conversation, okay, so what has that cost her or how does that reflect on her character? So this is the personal element of the personal cost, or the personal gift that they provide in giving you the guidance that she's given you.

30:16 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah, the gift is that she's brilliant and, more importantly, she's been studying the inner game. So when I first met her, I said I'm gonna teach you the external world, you're gonna teach me the internal world. I just said so. When I first met her, I said I'm going to teach you the external world, you're going to teach me the internal world. I just said that intuitively, I just met her.

30:30
I was the STEM Biff science, technology, engineering, mathematics, business and finance guy external driven man and she had been studying internal family systems and cognitive behavioral therapy and all the inner modalities, the inner work. She's been. She's had a therapist since she was 12. She is a clinician, so her gift is the inner game understanding yourself, understanding your parts, understanding your trauma, understanding how that all works, understanding how you process information, the whole nine got it.

31:01 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
And then, how has that impacted your business?

31:06 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
It got me to see that I was a coward in terms of leadership, so I wasn't the CEO back then.

31:13 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
That's okay.

31:14 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Yeah, and my business partner, Kevin, was the CFO. Now I am CEO slash CFO, and he's like brother. I told you I shouldn't have been CFO. So Kevin is one of the hardest working, best men I know, but he is not super educated, At least he wasn't. He is now self-educated but not college educated and basically I didn't want to be the leader. I think internally I was too cowardly to like lead from the front and I was hiding from my own greatness for lack of better phrasing and we had the non-numbers guy doing the numbers. So that was a huge mistake and Emilia is the one who called that out and helped me lean into my leadership.

31:57 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Okay, that's fantastic. And then the next one is relevance. How is the support that she's provided, the intuition that she's provided, how has that been relevant to the mission vision goals? Courage, in particularly, is my a big focus and it never was before.

32:28 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
And number two is I have a diagram right over here of people with high coachability and high work ethic are my absolutely people.

32:36
And people with low work ethic and low coachability are my absolutely not people, because I'm just going to be a pain in the butt and she's really the one who helped me see that I was trying to help people that not only don't like me, but then I try to help them even more to try to make up for the fact that they don't like me, and I know a lot of entrepreneurs resonate with that.

32:54 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
So I had to grow up and it's a little guilty Guilty as charged over the.

32:57 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Trojan horse into the castle and then wonder why it all went astray. So I don't do that anymore. And now I? If you don't have high work ethic and high humility, I'm not interested at all.

33:07 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
If you're not, a hell yes, then why are you here?

33:09 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
A hundred percent.

33:10 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Okay, do you mind if I try to reword that into a couple sentences?

33:15 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Not at all.

33:16 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Thank you for sharing openly and vulnerably and um am I correct in understanding that you have grown significantly in the six years since she started coaching you?

33:29 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Tremendously, okay, yeah, more so than any other human. She has had a bigger positive impact on my growth than any other person by far.

33:39 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
I'm also referring to Next Level University.

33:42 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
The success of the company. Yes, absolutely. Oh yeah, yeah for sure.

33:50 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
We're only eight years old, so of course right, she showed up at a good time yeah so um. I'm sorry, did you give me her name?

34:00 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
uh, alan, alan.

34:01 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
oh, her name no emilia, emilia you did say it quickly at the beginning, yeah, Okay. So thank you, Emilia, for the support and the inner growth light that you have provided for Alan in these last six years. You helped him lean into leadership and the leadership role that was waiting for him but maybe was a little bit fearful to take. This reflects on your commitment towards helping others helping others grow and it reflects on the outcome of the company, as each person has found the role that fits for them. Each person has found the role that fits for them, allowing the company to truly grow tremendously in the last six years. So thank you for your time, Thank you for helping them find their focus and then truly accelerate.

35:00 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
Thank you, angela, for having me. This has been great and I would say everything at NLU, nexel University, has benefited since I met Emilia, for sure.

35:10 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
That's fantastic, Alan. Before we hang up, where can people find you?

35:16 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
So it's called Next Level University Podcast, it's on YouTube, it's on all the podcast platforms. We say 0.1% improvement in your pocket, from anywhere on the planet, completely free. We are the male role models that we never had because we both grew up without fathers, kevin and I, and it's success and personal development in your pocket, for free, every single day okay in a website next level universe, dot-com. The person who has Next Level University is charging way too much.

35:50 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
I have lived that also, so I will make sure to get that correctly in the show notes and also in the blog when it comes out. So, ellen, it has been a pleasure speaking with you. Thank you very much for joining us today and until next time. Thank you, angela. Thank you very much for joining us today.

36:06 - Alan Lazaros (Guest)
And until next time. Thank you, Angela.

36:08 - Dr. Angela J. Buckley (Host)
Thank you. Thank you for joining us on Voices in Leadership, where leaders who connect, inspire and grow share their stories. I look forward to welcoming you back to our next conversation. In the meantime, visit wwwvoicesinleadershiplive to access show notes, links and to subscribe and stay connected, and in the spirit of gratitude, let's remember to thank one person near you Until next time. This is Dr Angela J Buckley. Signing off.