The Kindness Matters Podcast
So. Much. Division. Let's talk about how to change that. Re-engage as neighbors, friends, co-workers and family. Let's set out to change the world. Strike that. Change A World. One person at a time, make someone's life a little better and then do it again tomorrow and the day after that, through kindness.
Kindness is a Super-Power that each of us has within us. It is so powerful it has the potential to change not only your life but those around you, too. Let's talk about kindness.
The Kindness Matters Podcast
Can Kindness Be Your Most Powerful Marketing Tool?
What if your biggest business mistakes could become your greatest marketing opportunities? What if teenagers could successfully run million-dollar operations? Dr. Mark Leonard, human performance expert and certified high-performance coach, challenges conventional wisdom about leadership, success, and the younger generation.
Having studied human psychology for over two decades, Dr. Leonard shares the fascinating insights that led him to develop a leadership approach based on coaching rather than dictating. He draws a powerful parallel between how we encourage toddlers learning to walk and how we should approach failures in business and life. "We're meant to struggle," he explains, "but what if you could be successful and happy? What if you could be successful and giving? What if, at the end of the day, you weren't exhausted but fulfilled?"
The conversation takes an unexpected turn when Dr. Leonard reveals how he and his wife entrust teenagers to operate their Jeremiah's Italian Ice franchise locations. Rather than subscribing to negative stereotypes about younger workers, he's created a culture where these "toddlers in the workplace" flourish as leaders. His secret? Teaching them to ask questions, make decisions, and transform mistakes into opportunities.
Perhaps most revolutionary is his approach to errors: "I love when my employees make mistakes. I can make money off of mistakes." By encouraging employees to create "the prettiest mistake they've ever made," these imperfect products become donations to schools, food banks, and local businesses—building community relationships while simultaneously serving as innovative marketing.
Whether you're a business owner, manager, parent, or simply someone interested in human potential, this episode offers practical wisdom for creating environments where people thrive. Learn how kindness and empathy aren't just nice values—they're powerful tools for building successful businesses and meaningful relationships.
Connect with Dr. Leonard at thehappinessbreakthrough.com and discover how his coaching can transform your approach to leadership, success, and fulfillment.
This podcast is a proud member of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance or have a podcast and are looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetwork.com.
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Hello everyone and welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. On this podcast, we promote positivity, empathy and compassion because we believe that kindness is alive and well, and there are people and organizations that you may not have heard of in the world, making their communities a better place for everyone, and we want you to hear their stories. On this podcast, we talk about matters of kindness because kindness matters. Hey everybody, thanks for joining us today. I am so happy that you made the conscious effort to take 30-ish minutes of your time and join me today with my amazing guest. It just shows kindness, I guess. I'm grateful for every single one of you that tunes in and listens every single week. So thank you from the bottom of my heart. Don't forget to subscribe wherever you're listening to this podcast on, whether it's YouTube or Spotify or Apple or any of the other platforms out there. And speaking of subscribe, I now have a newsletter that will be going out every month with great stories stories about kindness, about hope, about inspiration.
Speaker 1:August is about a pizza shop owner that found out he had people eating out of his dumpster and what he did to rectify that situation. It's a great story, so go ahead and sign up. There'll be a link in the show notes, but it's thekindnessmatterspodcastcom backslash contacts. And now we get to talk about something really cool. My guest today is Dr Mark Leonard. He's a human performance expert, industry-leading certified high-performance coach. That's a mouthful thought leader, psychological capital expert and public speaker. And he's also an entrepreneur, because he apparently had spare time in his life, I don't know. Welcome to the show, mark. Thank you so much for being here.
Speaker 2:I appreciate it. Thank you, looking forward to being here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. So what exactly is a human performance expert? Are we talking physical performance or mental performance?
Speaker 2:I love that question. I am a mental performance expert. Just if you think about all of the professional sports right now, they have lots of different types of coaches. I am a mindset coach, but I focus instead of athletes. I'm business owners and entrepreneurs.
Speaker 1:Oh, fantastic, okay. So, and how does one gravitate to?
Speaker 2:that particular skill set slash career choice. If you have ever failed and you try to figure out why that happened, you might become a coach in the future. If you have ever had difficulties in trying to figure out, wow, why is it that everyone else around me seems to be so successful and I continue to struggle, and you're looking for the answer. Once you find it, you might become a high-performance coach. That's probably the easiest, quickest way to say it, but I've been studying human psychology for over two decades now. I'm fascinated by this whole concept and idea of why people are successful and why others continue to struggle, and I want to help people have that breakthrough, because I believe that this is a world of abundance. I believe that there's so much out there. I would just love to see more people be successful. That's why I do what I do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's amazing. I'm also fascinated about why people make the choices they do. And then you know, because every day we wake up, we're faced with a multitude of choices and we make them right, and some are good and some are bad, and and yeah, but I've always, I've always wondered, especially for myself, because you were talking about you know why, when I fail, did I ever ask why did I fail? And the answer is yes, sometimes I came up with the answer, sometimes I didn't. It was that stupid, so-and-so.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, the blame game. Yes, Well, it's easy.
Speaker 1:It's an easy way out, isn't it it really?
Speaker 2:is. It really is an easy way out. By the way, I've never failed in business. I have only learned. I have a belief backed by science, but I have a belief that we are meant to struggle, we're meant to grapple, we're meant to try to understand, and I think one of the big difference makers in people that are happier and people that are really making a difference in their life, they're the ones that they look at this failure as nothing more than a learning opportunity. What did I learn in this instance? What could I have done differently? And when we begin to dissect and really look at internally, what were our decisions, how could we have done it differently? All that is telling us is there are lots of ways to succeed. Let me give a quick example. Yeah, have you ever?
Speaker 2:If you have children, when your child is young, or your grandchild, they are beginning to walk? When they trip and fall, do you berate them? Do you yell at them? Do you spank them? Do you make them feel stupid for all of the things that they did because they tripped? No, of course not. We pick them back up and we allow them to try again. So then, why is it that people, when we make mistakes. As adults, we berate ourselves, we beat ourselves up, we begin to believe that we're stupid, when the reality is no, you're learning.
Speaker 1:Right, right, that's a great example, though, because, yeah, he wouldn't berate a child because they tripped and fell. Now I will say, when my kids were teenagers and they would do silly stuff, stuff that maybe wasn't quite, and they got hurt, I think my answer was what was my answer? Oh, I think my answer to that was did you learn anything?
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, so there it is. What did you learn? You know, I made the mistake once of asking one of my teenage boys, you know, I found out that he was wrestling a 12-foot alligator without training. Sure, and yeah. And I decided not to ask him what did he learn? Because his response would have been oh, I learned that I can wrestle an alligator and live. Maybe not the best approach, so I could definitely see the loopholes in that question, but we could begin to ask ourselves all right, so you don't have training in this? Yeah, what did you learn about the alligator that could have been dangerous for you? He goes oh, that tail. Yeah, that tail, when it whips around, is designed to trip you. Yeah, so that the alligator can then attack and get you. So, all right, what if it didn't go? Well, well, it did, dad, it did. I know, I know you're superman, you're a teenage boy, but what if it didn't? Let's, so then we begin to practice the idea of what happens when things go wrong and how can we be successful in that?
Speaker 1:yeah, wow how does one go about wrestling a 12-foot alligator I? That's the first question in my head.
Speaker 2:That's probably not the right question, but that's the first one that came into my head um, I think I think my, my dad, you know, my inner teenage boy was like oh, that's so cool. What was that like and what was the conversation that led to that? And he laughs.
Speaker 1:So many questions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so many questions, but let's have a conversation about what could you do differently? All right, so you want to wrestle? Do you want to get training in that? We lived in Central Florida, would you like? Some training so you can do that without putting yourself in as much danger. You know it's ways to phrase it. Start looking at it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And that was going to be my next question was because I know now you're in Arizona, I'm like, do they have a lot of alligators in Arizona? So that answered that question. So, and so this whole, this curiosity about the human mind and performance, mental performance that led you into the happiness, the happiness breakthrough.
Speaker 2:It did. It did. So. It started with my studies for my doctorate, okay, and I was looking at sales teams and I was trying to understand, if you take a very large national organization that has regional sales teams, why was one so successful and one was not? I was one so successful and one was not, and it was part of that study that I fell upon coaching and leaders that coach, as opposed to leaders that tell or dictate or leaders that are hands-off, tend to have sales teams that perform better.
Speaker 2:Now here's one of the funny things we sometimes put on our junior high hat and we remembered what it was like in junior high and the coach or the PE teacher would yell and say no, we don't do that. Blah, blah, blah. That's not leading and that's not coaching. Coaching is an exploratory practice wherein we understand where is their current capability, we measure that, what would they like their capability to be? We begin to forecast and put that into the future and then we look at what are the skill sets that someone needs in order to achieve that. So coaching practice looks right back at, ironically enough, my master's degree, which was the psychological study of how to create learning environments. So we do the same type of mental modeling of where is someone, where do they want to be? Let's measure it, let's understand the habits that are going to drive someone to that successful point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, perfect yeah, and we talk about coaches and coaching, and you mentioned sports, and all I can think of is there's no earthly way Bobby Knight should have been as successful as he was with his style of coaching, right?
Speaker 2:You know, but aren't there CEOs that are irate and mean and angry and successful?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I guess. Well, there are. I can't think of any off the top of my head, but who?
Speaker 2:well, uh, steve jobs was not, oh my god, yes, I forgot a leader who was a listener. He was a teller and a dictator. Yep, yeah, so he, but he still created products that ubiquitous. Almost everyone uses some form of an Apple product, yep, so was he successful? Can you be successful doing it that way? Yes, but what if you could be successful and happy? What if you could be successful and giving? What if, at the end of the day, you weren't exhausted but you were fulfilled? What would your life look like if you could do those things? That's the real goal, isn't it? Well, it is. It is for me and it is for most of my clients.
Speaker 2:In fact, honestly, I don't accept everyone as a client Most of my clients, in fact. Honestly, I don't accept everyone as a client. I only accept those who have a goal that they're working towards, that they're struggling with, but they want to be good humans in the process. They want to grow in the process, they want to go through difficulties, and it's okay to have difficulties. Yeah, and I'm not sure if I asked permission, so I guess I'll. I'll say it, and if you don't like it, you can edit this part out, but go for it. Okay, the apostle Paul. He talks about having joy in your tribulations. Whoa, that's mind-blowing. Over 2,000 years ago, we had someone who was saying life can be tough, life is hard, you're going to have difficulty. What if you had joy in that process? What if you felt fulfilled? What if you felt love in that process? What if you felt fulfilled? What if you felt love in that process of difficulty? Yeah, my clients align with that belief.
Speaker 1:And that's a fantastic belief. I really think that the world would be a better place if a lot more people subscribed to that theory and practiced that every day. And this is kind of going into the kindness thing. But besides your coaching, you're also an entrepreneur, you and your wife, right? Yes, absolutely.
Speaker 2:It's a joint thing. So it is. Yeah, we own a couple of franchise locations of a dessert shop called Jeremiah's Italian Ice, and I love that. In the introduction you said, oh, because Mark didn't have enough to do, he decided to own more. But that's the funny thing about being high performing is when you have it all figured out, you could do all those things that derive and bring a lot of joy, that bring a lot of happiness, that give a lot of opportunity, and you're doing it without feeling overwhelmed or stressed. Now, do I have difficult days? Of course who doesn't? But I bounce back very quickly from those difficulties that a lot of people express. Yeah, so we do. We have 35 teenage employees who are running million dollar stores. That's crazy. Notice what I said they are running million dollar stores. Yeah, I am not on site every single day. I trust teenagers to be successful leaders. I coach them how to do that.
Speaker 1:You coached them how to do that. Oh, absolutely Okay, Okay, Okay, yeah. And you know, because it's very, it's kind of an in thing these days, probably since the pandemic, to kind of blast what are those? Gen Alpha no, what generation was that?
Speaker 1:I don't remember Gen Alpha. No, what generation was that? I don't remember as being lazy or not willing to work, and that seems to be a. Anytime I see a story about a business going out of business or closing its doors, you go to the comments and it's all well, that's. They couldn't find workers, they couldn't find this, that the other thing, or the workers they had were teenagers and they didn't want to work, and I don't think that's the case at all.
Speaker 2:No, the lies that people tell themselves about that generation. Yeah, no, the lies that people tell themselves about that generation, which is ironic, because let me go back to that toddler learning to walk you don't berate them. And then, when someone graduates college, you don't berate them. You don't berate the older generation. I don't sit here and berate my father who you know he's 84 years old and stumbles. I don't berate him. But for some reason in our culture we believe it's okay to say a teenager, that's the exception. They're no longer human at this point. So let's berate them because they're lazy. How about? How about the owners take some responsibility and say that's the culture I was creating, that's the culture that I allowed. Were they lazy? No, you were lazy as a leader. You allowed that to happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and yeah, that's true, and it's so funny because there are dozens and dozens, literally, of examples of owners who fostered what you're talking about and trusted the kids, and the kids came through for them.
Speaker 2:They absolutely do. See, kids, teenagers, they're toddlers in the workplace. They're toddlers in the workplace. If they're a toddler in the workplace and they make a mistake, they may not know. I remember one of my employees. We said, okay, here we're going to go to the back of house for here's the recipe to make our Italian ice. And said here's the measuring spoons, here's the measuring cups, here's all the ingredients. And she turned and she said what's a tablespoon? Oh, oh, oh. That was a real eye opener for me. Yeah, that I she exposed a weakness in our hiring practice. We didn't qualify that. Yeah. The other thing is well then, what's the choice? Well, okay, I could fire her. Great, you're firing someone because they didn't know something. Yeah, that sounds like a lazy leadership. Or you coach them? Awesome, let's pull these things out. Little T, big T, right, yeah, but they want to be led, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, and kudos to her for even asking, because I think there are some people that probably if she had been a little bit older I don't know if you said it was a she, it doesn't matter. If they had been a little bit older, you know they may have said that's a stupid question. I'm not going to ask that question, I don't want to look stupid in front of my boss, but kudos to her for for doing that, because that gave you an opportunity to then teach her so.
Speaker 2:So I coached that, though in the interview process. Pardon me no worries. In the interview process, we ask them to ask me a question, and so, if they don't know how to ask a question which again they're toddlers in the workplace we again we rephrase it and say hey, you have a business owner who I have six kids, I have 13 grandchildren. We own multiple businesses. What question would you ask someone Based on what you know right now in high school? What question would you ask someone based on what you know right now in high school? What question would you ask someone that was successful in business? And it starts them thinking yeah, I get them right at the interview process ask a question, ask a question. Ask a question day one. I present something and they say, okay, now ask me a question about this. I'm teaching them to have critical thinking skills.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic.
Speaker 2:That way, when there is an issue, they don't. They don't clam up and they're not sheepish. They already have asked many, many questions. They know how to ask the question. Now I have someone that's moldable absolutely absolutely that is what sets them up for college. That's what sets them up for the next phase in life. Whatever that is learning to ask those questions, coaching them through the process yeah, that's fantastic, that's so cool.
Speaker 1:I was just thinking about learning to ask those questions, coaching them through the process. Yeah, that's fantastic, that's so cool. And I was just thinking about I don't want to go into that story, but an example I saw recently of a bunch of teenagers that kind of took over a restaurant when the owners had to be out, and they actually trained each other how to do different aspects of that job. Whether and you know, I'm like so not only were they, because when they first started, when we all first start right, we're, we're new and we're we're trainees, but then they stepped up and trained the newer people. Those kids that work for you are going to be the leaders of tomorrow, and that gives me hope.
Speaker 2:I've got to tell you, those kids are amazing and I would put my young teenagers, my young ones, these toddlers, in the workplace. I would put them up against any age workforce. They work hard and they lead each other. One of my favorite questions I asked them is you know when they present a problem? Hey, we've got this issue over here and they're describing it and I stop and I say, okay, if you were boss for the day, what would you do? See, again, I'm not dictating, I'm coaching. What would you do? Oh, I would do this. Okay, Do that, Do that, and then let me know, let's talk about it. That gives them confidence. The other thing is, I love when my employees make mistakes.
Speaker 2:I can make money off of mistakes. Yes, it's because I'm a great business person. But let me tell you why. One I let these teenagers know I need you to make mistakes. And they look at me because they're in high school. Well, we're not supposed to make mistakes. I said, oh, I'm so glad you're perfect, but let's pretend you're not and you're going to make mistakes. And I need you to make mistakes because, one, you're going to learn the right way in a wrong way, and that's great and that's valuable too. You'll never make a mistake that will cause me to go out of business. I have insurance. If something happens, we'll figure it out. If something happens, we'll figure it out. Number three if you make a mistake, I want you to make it the prettiest mistake you've ever made. You put it in the freezer and we're going to go donate that. We're going to go give that to somebody. Oh, oh, now there's tangible value in their mistakes. Yeah, a donation, a gift, a service.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure we take them down to the food bank, their quote-unquote mistakes. A mistake could be someone wanted vanilla instead of chocolate, so you have to remake it. Okay, great, finish making it wrong. Make it the best beautiful wrong you've ever made. Someone will love it. Yeah, absolutely yeah. We take big piles of these mistakes and quote unquote mistakes and we bring them to other businesses. It's a hot day today. Today is nice and cool. Here in Arizona it is currently a hundred, so we are in a cold snap right now. But for us, we could take these bag of all of these mistakes and bring it to an office or to a school or to a church and we donate it to them and it opens up a conversation. See, I've built seven figure businesses off of mistakes that give.
Speaker 1:I absolutely love that, and this is kind of what you and I had talked about offline before the show about marketing using kindness, and that kind of goes into what you're talking about, isn't it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. We are always willing to donate and to give so a mistake, as long as it's salvageable, as long as it looks good.
Speaker 1:It's not going to poison anybody food poisoning or anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and we donate that to another business, we use it for marketing. We'll call up a school and we'll say, hey, do you have a teacher in-service day coming up? How many teachers do you have? I have 30 treats. Can I just bring those to you and I give it to them and I say you know, we're your neighbors and we love partnering with schools.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:What else do you need? Do you have a reading program for your kids? I would love to give them coupons for a free item. That's so cool. So what's happening here? I'm creating trust. I'm creating a relationship where I'm giving and through that giving process, it lowers those barriers that people have. When someone feels like they've been served, when they feel like they've received something, the barrier lowers and they're going to be more open. Now I can have a conversation. We would love to donate 20% of our sales to you. Is there an organization in your school that could use some money?
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course there is. Are you guys back in school yet?
Speaker 2:yeah, of course there is. Are you guys back in school yet? Oh, yeah, yeah, we start in mid july. Oh, wow, we have. We have a modified year round because it is so hot. Yeah, uh, it's better for them to be in school, but then in the fall and in the spring we have two weeks at each. We have extra breaks throughout the year. We have a longer Christmas break. I don't know.
Speaker 1:It was great. But yeah, when you're talking, I was going to say we're getting ready to go back. We go back the day after Labor Day. I think, but I know there are other school districts that are already back in and, yeah, that's just a fantastic idea. But I know there are other school districts that are already back in and, yeah, that's just a fantastic idea Because I'm sure the teachers could use all the help and school supplies, that donation to go.
Speaker 2:It goes so far, yeah, but my favorites are the reading programs or maybe the school and this goes back to my doctorate and looking at creating cultures that thrive. And if you want to see one aspect of the culture continue to grow, you reward that, you give accolades to that, you make it very well known. Well, I'll walk into the school and I'll bring in two 300 coupons for a free item at our store and I'll bring it to them and say, hey, it says caught you doing something cool. Are there behaviors you would like to see replicated and done over and over and over again? Hand this out to them, just give it to them and then let the teachers make a big deal about it. And then, when they come into the store, my teenage employees go oh that's so cool, what did you do to deserve that?
Speaker 1:That's so great. Yeah, I can see that. That's so great. Yeah, I, I can see that one of those coupons and you, maybe jimmy, saw tommy eating lunch alone and decided to go sit down and talk to him and eat with him and that's something cool and rewarding that kind of behavior sets that too it does, and the adults now are being tuned to see it.
Speaker 2:Oh, now they're seeing positive behaviors instead of negative behaviors, right?
Speaker 1:yeah, for sure, that's so cool. So, so, so, so cool. Um, I'm just looking over yep, this is. I love what you do, mark. I just I absolutely love that and I love your giving nature and I should schedule a one on one.
Speaker 2:I would love that, and I would love anyone in your audience to do that as well. I am going to have the link to your website, would?
Speaker 1:love that and I would love anyone in your audience to do that as well. I am gonna have, I'll have the link to your website. It's again. It's the happiness breakthroughcom I moved away from my microphone.
Speaker 1:I hope that doesn't have screwed up the happiness breakthroughcom. And if you would like to work with mark um, we could all be better, right, no matter how good we think we are, we could all improve and I think Dr Leonard has the key to that. So if you want to move up in your career and take it to the next level, I would highly suggest clicking on the link in the show notes for that.
Speaker 2:I would love that they could follow me online on all the social media. The Happiness Breakthrough Perfect.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for your time today, mark. I do do do appreciate it. Do do do it's better than do do Appreciate it. Do do do it's better than do do Appreciate it, and this is really something to think about and something we can all learn from.
Speaker 2:Thank you, mike. I appreciate you just doing the good work out there. Keep spreading kindness, keep spreading love.
Speaker 1:Will do, sir. Take care and we'll talk soon. Bye, I want to thank you for taking the time to listen to this episode with my guest, dr Mark Leonard. I hope you were able to take something positive from the time that you spent with us today. Maybe you'll be inspired, maybe you'll be motivated, maybe you'll be moved. If you experienced any of those positive feelings, please consider sharing this podcast with your friends and family. I'm always striving to offer you a better podcast, so give me some feedback. Let me know how you think I'm doing. You can email me, mike, at thekindnessmatterspodcastcom, or leave a message on any of the platforms that you're listening to this podcast on, or on our social media pages like Facebook, instagram, linkedin, tiktok you name it. Youtube I forgot about that one. You can leave a message there too. Just let me know how you think I'm doing. Let me know if there's something you'd like to see or hear on the podcast. And yeah, let's stay in touch, let's engage, shall we?
Speaker 1:This podcast is part of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and you need some technical or production assistance, or you already have a podcast and you're looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetworkcom and check out the many different shows they have, like Afrocentric Spoil, my Movie Generation Mixtape In a Pickle Radio Show, wake Up and Dream with D'Anthony Palin, stacks of Packs and the amazing Time Pals or actually the name of the show is the Time Pals. They are amazing, but that's not part of the name. We'll be back again next week with a brand new episode and we would be honored if you would join us for that. You've been listening to the Kindness Matters Podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. Have a fantastic week.
