Executive Podcast #303: Leading For-Profit and Nonprofit Teams with Jason Bilotti

Perry Holley:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast, where our goal is to help you increase your reputation as a leader, increase your ability to influence others, and increase your ability to fully engage your team to deliver remarkable results. Hi, I’m Perry Holley, a Maxwell leadership facilitator and coach.

Chris Goede:
And I’m Chris Goede, executive vice president with Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining, man. We are excited that you joined us today because we have a special surprise for you today. I think Perry got so tired of coming up with content that we all of a sudden decided to go and some of the guys and gals that we’re partnering with in our publishing arm and gave us the privilege to publish a book. We are going to unpack some leadership around this book. But first, before we go there, I want to remind you, just go to maxwellleadership.com/podcast. There you can fill out a form, you can download the learner guide that we’re going to work through today, or even if you just have a question or a future topic for Perry, put that in that form, go to this. Go to this podcast, submit the form there.

Chris Goede:
And we would love to see that.

Perry Holley:
By the way, I did work on this one. I mean, I.

Chris Goede:
You did work on it. We just gave you a launching pad. Usually we don’t even tell you to go figure something out. Yeah, that’s right.

Perry Holley:
It was helpful. Thank you.

Chris Goede:
So, as I mentioned, we have a special guest today, and Jason Blotty is joining us, and I. And we held up this book right here, and we were talking about this, and we’re going to talk about this in just a little bit. But, man, what an amazing story from, from business leadership to leading your family to leading in ministry. And we’re going to get in and talk about all of what that looks like and your experience as a chick fil a operator, as being in the mission field and what you’re doing there. And this book. Right? Sink or sit. One couple’s journey of answering God’s call to step out of the boat. So we’re going to get into some serious stuff.

Chris Goede:
Before that, though, Perry brought it to my attention. He’s like, hey, we’ve got to kick off this podcast, and we’ve got to let him tell a story about how you connected with John. I know John’s had a big influence on your life from a leadership standpoint, but, man, the first time and the connection, you got to share that story.

Jason Bilotti:
Sure.

Chris Goede:
I have not even heard it yet. Perry’s heard it, so I cannot wait to hear this.

Jason Bilotti:
It’s great. Thanks for having me, guys. Absolutely excited to be here. Exactly. I started with Chick fil a when I was 15. I’m now 53, but I’ve been an operator for 29 years. And years ago I was in a group where we did written goals in five areas of our lives. And one of the things we did, and it was an exercise, I did 150 lifetime written goals and one of those was to meet and or have.

Jason Bilotti:
It was really to have a beverage, coffee or a dinner with John Maxwell. And 1520 years go by and I really never had the opportunity. And then two and a half years ago, I learned that he was going to be speaking at our annual chick play seminar. And so I reached out to JT Robinson, a friend within Chick fil A, and just said, hey, is there any way I could just meet him? I’ll change my goal to meet versus spend time with him. That’s awesome. And he said, absolutely. Let me see what I can do.

Perry Holley:
This was Nashville.

Jason Bilotti:
It was in Nashville.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, we were there. Yeah. I was putting that together. I was like, wait a minute. Yeah, we were there.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah. And so they connected me with the guy that was going to host him and he called and said, why don’t you and your wife come and host John for the day? And I was just like, oh my gosh. You know, got goosebumps. And so we show up that morning, we’re no ten steps into the walk to the room with John and he’s got his arm around me. My wife takes an amazing photo from behind and he’s asking me what I can teach him. And he says, hey, I heard you’ve developed a lot of leaders within Chick fil A. Tell me about that. And so, started off really well.

Jason Bilotti:
We had breakfast with him and then they said, hey, would you be willing to introduce him this afternoon? He’s gonna do a big speech this morning to the 10,000 group and then this afternoon he’s gonna go in front of a breakout session of about 2500 people. And would you be willing to introduce him on stage?

Perry Holley:
So you went from wanting to have a beverage to being on stage?

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
Okay. That’s what I love about that.

Chris Goede:
Keep going. Yeah.

Jason Bilotti:
And so then, so then he asks us to sit down front. He does his main speech, mentions me, says, I just spent time with one of your fellow operators, Jason Blotti, this morning, points at me and then he does his big speech. We walk with him and then have lunch with him. So now I’ve had two meals with him. Check the box, right?

Chris Goede:
Yeah, that’s amazing.

Jason Bilotti:
And then we go and we’re putting on our microphones for that afternoon session and I’m going to get to introduce him and he says, listen, I’ve got an idea. I’m going to do it’s 45 minutes session. I’m going to do 30 minutes and then I’m going to call you back on stage and I’m going to interview you for the last 15 because the content is for operators. And I’m like, absolutely. And you know, chick fil a people are like, are you nervous? Are you prepared? I said, man, I’ve been reading this stuff all my life. You know, I’m ready. And so I love John Maxwell stuff. And so jumped up there and he invited me back up and then as we were done with that session, he goes, I’ve got another one in an hour.

Jason Bilotti:
Don’t take that mic off.

Chris Goede:
That’s awesome.

Jason Bilotti:
So I got to do the second one. And so we were together for eight or 9 hours. He was incredible. Everything you hear about John is true. It’s just genuine and caring and wanted to know our story and spend time with us.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, it’s the charisma. I was talking to somebody about this just yesterday about he is who you see and, and it’s just the connection. It’s the care for people. It’s the charisma that separates them. Before we, we jump into this next thing, I want to stay here for just 1 second. We’re sitting here and you and I are looking at each other and we’re like, wait a minute. This was just a written goal that turned into something greater than he could have ever thought about. Now let’s unpack this for just a minute for leaders, okay.

Chris Goede:
The purpose of going back and being intentional about saying this is a goal of mine and beginning to write it down, beginning to track it, what happened is as I’m listening to your story, I’m going, oh, people caught wind of it. They were aware of it. They made this opportunity happen. And just by having the intentionality to write that down as a leader, as you went through those goals of year after year after year, you had the opportunity to experience something where you’re sitting on stage going, why am I answering leadership questions from John Maxwell?

Jason Bilotti:
Unbelievable.

Chris Goede:
In front of Chick fil A? And so I want to encourage the leaders out there and I don’t even do a good enough job of this because especially with technology and I struggle with even journaling, you know, that is like, man, how intentional are we about sitting down and thinking about what is it that we want to be a part of? What are those things we want to learn from? It’s not like you were like you were trying to achieve something. You just wanted to be in proximity to ask questions, to learn and to absorb. And with that right mindset, I mean, look what happened. And so, yeah.

Jason Bilotti:
And really just to say appreciation for what he had written and all that I’ve gotten from it. Another really cool part of that story, I’m glad you’re standing there for a second, is when I went to check the box back on that list of goals, really close to that one that I had forgotten I’d written was one day speak before 1000 people.

Chris Goede:
This is amazing.

Jason Bilotti:
And there was 2500 people at that breakout.

Chris Goede:
That’s amazing.

Jason Bilotti:
So I got to check two boxes unintentionally on that.

Chris Goede:
Okay, forget this book. Let’s just stay right here on this whole lesson to say no.

Perry Holley:
But I love your goals. Amazing. I love it is a great reminder because we kind of skip by that sometimes. So Jason and his wife Hailey wrote the book. If you’re on YouTube, I’m showing you the book sink or sit. As Chris said, it’s a couple’s journey about answering God’s call to step out of the boat, which is a story of your. And you’re already a chick fil a operator of two stores, which is a full time job.

Jason Bilotti:
It is.

Perry Holley:
But you felt called into a ministry in Niger, in Africa?

Jason Bilotti:
Yes.

Perry Holley:
Tell us about the book, the title and about Niger. Just get sure.

Jason Bilotti:
So where we got the title really the book is about what are you called to do and are you going to take a chance to step out of the boat and answer God’s call? And where we got the title is if you think about when Peter is in the boat with the other disciples and the storm comes and they’re all scared and they call for Jesus, he comes to them walking on water and what does he say? He says, peter, come join me. And so Peter steps out of the boat and starts walking on water. And he answered that call to step out. And yes, pretty soon after that he loses a little bit of faith, a little bit of trust, gets a little fear and starts to sing. But as we’ve explored, and I think you guys would agree, we only know two people ever in history to walk on water. It was Jesus and Peter. So you’ve got to think the disciples were a little bit envious as they sat in the boat and they’re like, he’s sinking. Oh, wait a minute.

Jason Bilotti:
He still walked on water.

Perry Holley:
I’m sitting.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah. And so we think it’s better to take a chance to get out of the boat to possibly sink than it is to sit there in complacency. And so when God calls us to something, we need to say yes. And the cool thing about that we talk about in this book is that Matthew 20 819 already calls all of us to missions. It’s just you finding what that calling is and answering it. And, you know, Andy Stanley did messages years ago about, you never know what lies in the balance of one yes. And that’s what this book is about for us. One yes to me to go to Niger.

Jason Bilotti:
You asked how I got. One operator from Chick fil A was already going. He was building a classroom. He invited me to go with him, went alongside him. We ended up building classroom after classroom, working with 18 different christian schools in a muslim nation and affecting 8000 students on a daily basis. And so that one yes, led us to an adoption. There’s a whole chapter in here about that. He’s now 26.

Jason Bilotti:
He was 14 when we got him. These are all things we just said yes to that God was asking us to do.

Perry Holley:
And what I loved about it as reading the book is the leadership lessons. Whether you’re a chick fil a operator or leading a team in a foreign country, serving a village, serving your family, the lessons, that’s what we want to kind of dig into today is the principles. Whether you’re at the chick fil A or in Niger, they’re all, they’re relevant and they’re real. So that’s what I really took away.

Chris Goede:
Yeah. And leading self to be able to get to that point where, for our example here today, take that step. There are a lot of leaders out there, right. That have to have that self development to take this step. And decisions they got to make, changes they got to make or wherever they’re going to be able to do that. Now, let’s talk a little bit about, from a business, from leading teams, leading organizations. That’s those that listen and watch with us. They are leading people.

Chris Goede:
They’re in organizations. You had the opportunity, which not a lot of people do, right, is to have the opportunity to lead multiple stores, multiple things. That causes, I’m sure, all kinds of leadership challenges and opportunities. What was that journey like for you? And you told us a lot of years at Chick fil A, but you get that first store, you figure that thing out. You’re learning how to lead, I’m sure, making. And then you got that second one. What were the leadership challenges, and talk about that journey that you went through in order to be able to successfully lead two different business units?

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah, that’s a great question. And I think for me, when I had the one, it was when I very. When I took my very first long vacation, I did a moose hunt in Alaska, and I was gone for, like, ten days. And I had. That was back before cell phones. And when I came back, I was shocked. The restaurant was still standing. And so I learned, and life went on, right?

Chris Goede:
Like, oh, my gosh, they made it without me.

Jason Bilotti:
But that was a really good learning moment for me as well. But what I also noticed at that point when I came back is there were things, like, one of the things I shared with you the other day is that one of the things I always did was organize stock. I’m a neat freak. And when I came back, I noticed the store wasn’t organized. So there was a learning there of saying, okay, you guys missed this, but why did they miss it? Because I was the only one doing it and I hadn’t delegated. And so I learned that even something that small, that that’s what was happening if I weren’t there. You jump to two restaurants, and I learned very quickly that you can’t be in two places at once. And so what do you do? Well, you learn to be at neither.

Jason Bilotti:
And so for me, it was like, hey, if I can’t be at both, how do I be at neither? And through that was this amplified existence of a leadership program we already had and just really pouring into development of young leaders that are hungry, that have a desire. And for us, my calling within Chick fil a now is develop young men and women that want to be operators, and we’ve had a great success with that. But I really hedged my bets on leadership and poured into a lot of John Maxwell stuff and other podcasts and things where I said, hey, leadership’s going to take us to the next level and get me out of the restaurants so that they can perform at a high level when I’m not there.

Chris Goede:
Can I? So a lot of people talk about having different teams, different places, different physical locations. We have many clients that come to us and say, hey, the culture here feels this way. And when I go to this store, the culture feels this way. In essence, what you’re saying is that you hedged down on developing. The people pouring into the leadership consistently across both gave you, what I would say, a similar culture in both stores. Would you say that’s correct? Would you say that’s the root of what drove the similarities between you.

Jason Bilotti:
This is going to sound like so much. I’m just slobbering all or, you know, drooling Oliver Maxwell here.

Perry Holley:
Right.

Jason Bilotti:
But everything does rise and fall in leadership. And I believe that. And I saw it and we lived it out. And so, yeah, we took two restaurants, put incredibly hungry leaders in there. I would venture to guess a lot of restaurants you’re talking about, or other businesses, they have what they think are leaders, but they’re really just managers. And so, finding the difference in that and pouring into this young talent, the jobs we do in a restaurant can be very monotonous. So how do you keep them engaged? How do you keep that book that’s out there about grit and that hunger? How do you do that? And I think it’s providing opportunity for leadership growth.

Chris Goede:
It’s good.

Perry Holley:
We miss the restaurant humor that you have. Really hungry leaders.

Chris Goede:
Got you. Yes.

Perry Holley:
Good. Maybe it’s just me. Sorry, but I don’t know you nor.

Chris Goede:
I have ever missed a meal. So we are very.

Perry Holley:
So this idea of going from one restaurant to a second restaurant and then having the audacity, not a moose hunt, but taking on a village and a people in Niger, on another continent caused me to think, and I was sharing with you when we. When we talked earlier about, I’m so interested in how leaders. We have two types of leaders in the world. Those that want to see things work because of them. You need me. I’m very important here. And those that are okay seeing things work without them. And you were just describing a little bit of what you did.

Perry Holley:
But I wonder if this encouraging our listeners on if you want to be the leader that can step away not to go necessarily to another continent, but to maybe think about your business instead of being in the business, working on the business. Some leaders can’t do that. They’re so in the business. What are the coaching aspects of being a leader that sees it work without you? You did that? You were.

Jason Bilotti:
I did. And I’m going to be really vulnerable with the audience today and tell you that when I came back the first time after having two restaurants and I came back from a long time away, it was probably Niger. I don’t remember that. But I remember getting back and there was no fires to put out. Everything was clicking, everything was running well. And, guys, I went, depression’s way too strong. But for about ten days, I got this little funk of like, they don’t need me. Where am I going to plug back in? And I had to get my big boy pants on and pull up those boots and say, where do I add value? And that’s where.

Jason Bilotti:
So I went backwards and said, hey, listen, this is where I add value. It’s developing. It’s coaching. It’s shepherding. It’s also having that peripheral vision, the bigger picture of what’s in the future for us, and then providing those leaders with the proper tools. Proper tools also mean people. And we’ve got to give the authority to be able to hire more people and wear and spend the money on that and having the right equipment and having things fixed and then clean. Somebody said to me a long time ago, especially in the restaurant industry, you might be the cleanest of place.

Jason Bilotti:
A lot of your employees come all day, and their best meal they get all day. And that was humbling to me. And so we want to hold those high standards to where people are excited to be at work because they know it’s with excellence.

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Chris Goede:
So, as we learn more about your journey and those that get this book and read through that, one of the things they’re gonna learn is the courageous that you have as a leader and how you need to have that as a leader. We all need courage, and I want to unpack this just a little bit before I’m going to set this up, before I get your thoughts on this in regards to leadership. So, as you go through your chick fil a journey, I read that there was a store, right, that needed to be turned around, needed some U turn leadership, as John calls it. Right? Like, let’s turn that around. People probably doubted you. You may have doubted yourself through that process. I know that there’s this phrase that oftentimes we use with leaders as they inherit a team, which I’m sure you did in the moment where you inherit the team that you get right. But over time, you get the team that you deserve.

Chris Goede:
And so as you kind of work through that, the process you went through, that took courage to understand that in the beginning and the work through that now, on the side that we’re talking about, right, where you guys had this faith moment, where you stepped out with Nyser, where you’re at, you guys also had the courage where I know that Haley went off over there, your kids went off over there. Right. And so you guys had to make some of those tough decisions. What would you say to leaders? How do you get through that? The fear and the anxiety of having to be courageous. And when I say courageous, we’re talking about from a leadership standpoint, we’re not. You know, it’s not. We’re coming over the top. We’re talking about, man, sitting in solace and going, I gotta make this decision.

Chris Goede:
I gotta do this. Hey, this team, I gotta turn this around. They’re not buying into me. That’s not a good team. How do I begin to implement? Walk us through your years of development and training as a leader in response to that.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah, it’s a great question. I’ll start with a spiritual point here and then get to the business part of what you’re asking me. So I think when we invited people to go with us on missions trips, we would get what we call the three f’s in response. We would either get friends and family don’t want me to go, I don’t have the finances, or I’m fearful. And that’s what we’re talking about here. And so we would counter that with the other f word, which is faith. And we would say, you’ve got to have faith in that. The Lord’s called you to that, and that you’re going to go and you’re going to be safe.

Jason Bilotti:
And we have to do the right things, too, to be safe. Right. But now, take that to the business side. I think it’s having faith, not necessarily in a higher calling, but it’s having faith in what you’ve done up until then is going to stick. And so, back to what you said for us, even when we went to that mall in Cleveland, honestly, we got there, it had been through seven inter managers in three years, and Chick fil A could not understand why it wasn’t performing well. But when we got in there, it was. We just went back to the basics. Now, luckily, I had my wife, Hailey.

Jason Bilotti:
What a blessing that was to have four eyes instead of two and two, four hands instead of two. But we literally just made it a chick fil a. Chick fil A is a great product. Chick fil A is a great foundational company around their basic products and cleanliness and everything they expect. And so we just took it back to the basics, and then we got the right people on board with that vision and started from there. So I think you go back to what got you where you were. You start with basics. You build that foundation strong, and then you come out of that, and it’s.

Jason Bilotti:
I like to say what I do is not that difficult. We’re selling chicken, and we’re making people happy. Now it’s people. Right. And so all of those things can be difficult. But when you’re leading, remembering how you got there and what you learned and have faith in that foundation and then go from there, did you do anything.

Perry Holley:
Specific or intentional to. I mean, I’m thinking about. I’m very close to the chick fil a family, and I know that there’s a lot of preparation that goes into serving. And so your team is well trained how to use the equipment, how to interface with the customers. But going to a mission in another country, use a little prep for that as well. And so think about it in our terms. We would say equipping or empowering people to be. Be able to go and do this work.

Perry Holley:
Is there a. What’s your formula for when you look at a team? Is it intentionally equipping and empowering? Or how do you.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah. The organization we went with was, we were very planful. So just like you’re thinking through a business, we were very planful. We actually had a rise and shine leader. We had devotion leaders. We had breakfast leaders. I mean, we had leaders, and we call them leaders.

Perry Holley:
We didn’t say we’re missing on our team. We do not have a rise and shine.

Chris Goede:
We do not. Not many people that rise and shine. Maybe you and I might be the.

Perry Holley:
Only one show up.

Jason Bilotti:
You’re the one that makes the call. Coffee and wakes everybody up. But we were very intentional with not only checklists, but we would have three pre meetings. This is what you can expect. This is the medication you might want to take for malaria and on and on and very organized and buttoned up so that when we got in the field, the people could focus on what they were there for. And they felt like everything else around them, from a cook to somebody who did their clothes, place to sleep. And so it allowed the workers, if you will, to go into the field, do what they’re gonna do. And then when they get back to the rest place to be able to enjoy that mission and stay focused.

Perry Holley:
Was it the rooftop meeting? Did you have rooftop meetings?

Jason Bilotti:
We did.

Perry Holley:
Was that like a debrief? How did you.

Jason Bilotti:
Every night we would go up there and do highs and lows from the day.

Chris Goede:
Oh, I love that.

Jason Bilotti:
And then we would fire up a speaker and do three, four songs, and everybody would wander around and look at stars. And, you know, anytime you’ve gone anywhere in the world, the really cool part is you’re reminded really quick how small the world is. We would look up and see stars, and one of the travelers said he experienced seeing the moon, and then 24 hours later, he’s standing in his driveway in Stockbridge and saw the same moon.

Chris Goede:
Right. Like, how does that work?

Jason Bilotti:
And he’s like, wow, this is incredible. And how great it is.

Chris Goede:
You mentioned earlier, I’m going to come back to this for just a minute. You talked about what you’re still doing at chick fil a and developing future. Those that desire. It’s a big process. We were just talking about that. You two are very well aware what that process is like as a parenthood, the passion for that. Right. I know where it comes from and your stores and all kind of stuff.

Chris Goede:
Why do you keep doing it? Like, what? You’re now in a different season of life. Why does it mean so much to you to still stay very involved? I would say in that we’ll call it the chick fil a organization. We’ll call it the operator development. To me, it’s just adding value to people. You are really passionate about that. What drives that as a leader? That you’ve, you’ve made your run, you’ve led teams, you’ve led organizations, you’ve led trips, and now you are intentionally leading people.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah. I think one of the greatest challenges some operators could face and do face, and any businessman that’s been doing this long is complacency. So the answer I give you might actually surprise you. One of the main reasons I do it, beyond the fact that I’m very proud of them and it excites me to go to work every day, is that iron, sharpen ironization. The fact that, you know, if you’ve ever, like my wife and I used to do mentoring for young couples at church, right. And these are couples that are going to eventually get married, is premarital mentoring. And when you have to do that workbook yourself, and then, you know, in a few nights, you’re going to say, hey, buddy, you got to act this way to your wife, and you’re not doing it yourself, it’s going to hold you accountable. So now take that to the business world.

Jason Bilotti:
Same thing when I’m teaching John stuff, or. Or we’re talking about what’s going to happen tomorrow in the restaurant. If I’m not living that out myself, if I’m not giving it my all and paying attention to cleanliness and food safety and those things, then they’re not either. So the whole idea of developing young leaders, a, I’m looking for people that are hungry, desiring to be better, but it really keeps me sharp, and it excites me to go in every day and pour into them.

Chris Goede:
I love that.

Jason Bilotti:
And, you know, and again, y’all remember the Dunkin donuts commercial? The guy would say, it’s time to make over and over? Well, the restaurant industry is monotonous. And so our employees, if not challenged in a way that’s. That’s gonna drive them forward to grow. It can be very monotonous. And so I don’t know how you develop or keep managers. I know how to develop leaders.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Jason Bilotti:
And that’s been the difference for us.

Perry Holley:
I’m dying to know, because, like I said, I’m in the chick fil a family, and I know that I go to a lot of chick fil a’s. There’s a lot of young people.

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
A lot of what we would call Gen Z and maybe the older, younger Gen Y’s, millennials and Gen Zs have you. And I know you’re running a high performance team. What’s your lesson about leading young people? And we’re very into this. One of our colleagues has written a book on this generational diversity, and we teach on it quite a bit. It’s one of the number one challenges we’re hearing from leaders is, I got these young people, and they. You’re a Gen X, probably. He’s a very old Gen X, but I’m kidding. Okay.

Perry Holley:
I’m a baby boomer.

Chris Goede:
Yeah. I was gonna say, but I lead.

Perry Holley:
One way and they need another. But what’s your learning about multi generational leadership?

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah, I think, you know, one thing we’ve preached that things carried on for years, even into any of those, is work hard and build relationships. And it seems so easy, but it’s really hard for a lot of people to do both. And we have a lot of people that work hard, and then nobody likes them. And we have a lot of people that everybody loves, but they’re lazy. And so when they can do those two, that and we’ve seen any generation be able to do that, but I think the biggest thing, too, is pouring into them. I’m a big believer in the law of attraction, which, again, is from John Maxwell. And when you find the right people, I think generally, any of these generations want to do well, and maybe they either haven’t been taught it or they haven’t been challenged, but chick fil a gives them that environment that then when they’re with somebody, even from a whole different high school, and they’re doing the same work, and they’re challenged by each other, and when we hold the expectations high, that what we’ve seen is they fall in line, we get the question all the time, how do y’all find such great teenagers? And I think there’s probably great teenagers in a lot of different brands. They don’t have great leadership above them.

Chris Goede:
That’s great.

Jason Bilotti:
And they haven’t set the expectations that is.

Perry Holley:
I mean, you walk in the restaurants on either side of you, the same. Same talent pool you’re pulling from, but yours are higher. I think you have a standard, but you also have leadership, and you communicate and you care. And I tell people you’re not in the chicken business. You’re in the people relationship, community business, and you do it through chicken. Yeah, it’s. It’s a great story.

Chris Goede:
So, yeah, I love the conversation around multi generational teams. Right. And so we do get this a ton. So if you’re listening and you’re like, man, Jason, that’s exactly what I got going on. And my team, whatever industry, doesn’t matter, I want you to go back this podcast, click on the podcast, fill out the form, and just say, I need more information on that. Because Perry, along with Tim Elmore, we put together a full day training around that, and it has been received extremely well, and it’s helping a lot of teams, you know, put things in place to where they understand each other. They can connect. They’re having those conversations.

Chris Goede:
And then with the right accountability and the right structure, they’re getting things done. Now, as we wrap up, I’m gonna throw. I’ll throw it to you after he’s done answering this question, because Perry also developed a course that is called ascend to servant leadership. And again, if that is something you’re interested in, just let us know, and we’ll get in touch with you. But I want to talk about server leadership for a minute, because I. You know, from what I’ve heard from John, I met true at one time, I’ve had the chance to meet some of the other catholic families, but listening to stories, and he was a great leader. I think he was a great leader of people in the way that he served people. And Perry, you know this, you get people like serve in leadership.

Chris Goede:
That’s, well, that’s really soft. Right. I’m not going to come in with.

Perry Holley:
Can we call it something else?

Chris Goede:
Can we call it something else? And what do you say? It’s, we’re like, we’re not teaching subservient. Right. What does this really look like? And what, they just don’t understand that that’s a covering, that’s a title for developing people. The best meal, they’re going to get it a day, the most clean, all those things. We’re serving people. So it’s not a you, but you grew up through an organization that made this a priority. Why, from your perspective as a leader, is that so important for leaders, no matter where they’re at in the industry, to really focus on servant leadership?

Jason Bilotti:
Yeah, it’s a great question. You know, I would say that what do we hear all the time? Treat others as you want to be treated. I think servant leadership’s the same way in the sense of model the behavior you want modeled. And so if you’re a leader, don’t we all love to be served? I mean, we’d much rather go to a fine dining restaurant to be served. Right. And so if you think about the service aspect of serving one another, you know, the greatest person ever walked this earth was Jesus Christ, and he came to our world to serve, not to be served. And, and here we are 2000 plus years later, still talking about it.

Chris Goede:
Still talking about it. Yeah.

Jason Bilotti:
And so if he, if it was good enough for him, it should be good enough for us. But I think if we, if we really want to see that in others, we model it ourselves and it can mean the littlest things, you know, and it could be maybe to your executive assistant, you get her coffee today, or, you know, Dan, Cathy picks up trash everywhere he goes. And so he’s modeling that behavior of, I’m not above this. And I think that’s the missing piece is people think they’ve grown up to this level. They’ve arrived and, oh, no, people want to follow people that they would want to be treated.

Chris Goede:
Leaders go first.

Jason Bilotti:
That’s right.

Chris Goede:
Just go first.

Perry Holley:
Fantastic. Well, Jason, this has been terrific. Thank you so much for making the investment to come be with us today. I totally enjoyed the conversation. I’ve enjoyed the book quite a bit. As a reminder, it’s sink or sit about his journey. It’s written, I love the way you wrote it. It had both Jason and Haley write, but also the kids as they came of age and began to serve in the village in Niger.

Perry Holley:
They also write in there, as well as Rashid, who they adopted from the village in Niger. He has written in there as well. I think you’ll enjoy the lessons of leadership that are there, both as a ministry and as a chick fil A operator. As always, if you want more information about the book, about our offerings, about our podcast family of offerings, you can do all that at Maxwell leadership. You can also leave us a comment or a question there. We love hearing from you and very grateful that you spend this time with us today. That’s all from the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast.

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