Episode 946: Develop Your Influence - Interview with Serial Entrepreneur and Coach James Pyle - Part 3

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining us on episode 946 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:06] James Pyle: I'm James Pyle. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent and your treasures to live out your call. Having the ability to master self awareness and transcend your limits are keys.

[00:00:30] And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Knight.

[00:00:40] those people's lives are going to be impacted that those partners' lives will be impacted. Their vendors lives will be impacted, and that they're going to be that positive role model of price, like living where other people are going to say, wow, I really liked the way that person lives their life and that's business.

[00:00:55] And I want a piece of that.

[00:00:56] Scott Maderer: Welcome and thank you for joining us on the [00:01:00] inspired stewardship. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast, you will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:23] In today's interview with James, I asked James to share with you his definition of leadership. James also shares with you his calling and how he's found his mission in life. And I also asked James to talk with you about how an entrepreneur can develop their innocence. as well. One reason I like to bring you great interviews.

[00:01:44] Like the one you're going to hear today is because of the power in learning from others. Another great way to learn from others is through reading books. But if you're like most people today, you find it hard to find the time to sit down and read. And that's [00:02:00] why today's podcast is brought to you by audible.

[00:02:03] Go to inspired stewardship.com/audible to sign up and you can get a 30 day free trial. There's over 180,000 titles to choose from. And instead of reading, you can listen your way to learn from some of the greatest minds out there. That's inspired stewardship.com/audible to get your free trial and listen to great books the same way you're listening to this podcast.

[00:02:30] James pile is a dynamic and energetic serial entrepreneur. He specializes in lean startups, transformational turnarounds, and rapidly scaled exits. James has a tenacious work ethic and a track record of being a self-motivated top 1% producer and leader in any environment he's considered uncommon among the uncommon, because he's been able to break through barriers that others cannot surpass no matter what it takes.

[00:02:59] [00:03:00] James is an accomplished speaker, coach, executive leadership and management professional start-ups specialist, business development and sales guru, strategic planner, and ex executer extraordinary. Now James can be found incubating startups, speaking, coaching high performance entrepreneurs investing in real estate and volunteering his time.

[00:03:21] Performing service work with community outreach organizations. Welcome to the show, Jay.

[00:03:27] James Pyle: Awesome. Thanks for having me, Scott,

[00:03:30] Scott Maderer: we're looking forward to hearing all the great stuff that you have to share with the listeners.

[00:03:35] So one of the questions that I like to ask all of my guests is around that word of leadership. So again, we talked a few weeks ago that as we're recording this, you'd just gotten back from a conference. What would you say is your definition of leadership?

[00:03:51] James Pyle: Yeah, this is an excellent question. I love to talk about leadership.

[00:03:54] And in fact last week we had talked about, servant leadership being one of the identifiers of [00:04:00] what is a kingdom entrepreneur. And so leadership first and foremost to me is service is being of service to others to help build others and to actually elevate them to a higher level than I.

[00:04:12] I had also mentioned, and then the past couple of weeks that one of my greatest joys in life is actually building up others raising up and equipping others to see them grow up and thrive. And so leadership to me is actually serving others and serving the world. And I actually believe that the very best pathway to leadership is leading by example.

[00:04:32] There is absolutely nothing in this world that as inspiring as just being out there and doing it and other people seeing you do it. And that actually inspires you to actually raise up your level and to try to match the level of the leader. And I think also a lot of times we encounter people who they're worried about.

[00:04:49] If somebody smarter than them comes around, or if they're not the king, always in their circle, then I love to encourage people to get outside your comfort zone. It is our belief that we really want to encourage entrepreneurs [00:05:00] as they're building a team and as they're building their venture and as they are being a leader, To actually get out there and find other people to raise up and be stronger leaders than we are.

[00:05:08] Because when we build a team of leaders who are better leaders than us, those are the people that are going to be leading the enterprises and leading the ventures to be able to scale and create this lasting impact in the world. So really I view leadership as service and the best way to do that is leading by example and the way that we live our lives on a day-to-day basis so that other people can see that and match and exceed that standard.

[00:05:31] Scott Maderer: We've talked a about, your past journey as an entrepreneur and kind of what you're called to do now around coaching others. So I wanted to ask you a question if I had to pin you down and I said, okay, James, what is your actual calling in life? What would you say that is? And then thinking back on the journey to get here, how do you think that's played out at different points in your life?

[00:05:58] James Pyle: Yeah, this is an excellent question. [00:06:00] So what I see as my calling in life, really at its core and most fundamental level is to bring people to Christ. And part of that calling in my life is to actually encourage people who are entrepreneurs in that journey. And the way that we see this playing out in the way that I've seen it playing out over my life is that I had the ability to raise up and equip people in different businesses that I've built.

[00:06:25] And when I was younger, I didn't realize that the reason why I was in that position and the reason why I had a lot of the leadership skills that I had and entrepreneurial skills I had was to be able to create this impact in people's lives. And then they would come to a place where they would want.

[00:06:40] Hey, what is it like? You're kinda different, man. I'm like, I see you, you do stuff a little different than people. What is it about you that makes you so different? And that's actually the opportunity to open up and to share my testimony and to minister, to other people. And really where I see that playing out now is I have this really audacious goal that the Lord gave me.

[00:06:58] And that is that I want to [00:07:00] see that the way that the world does business change. I really believe that business can be conducted in a Christ-like manner. I believe that biblical business principles are the absolute best way to build and sustain businesses to create the legacy, not for my name and not for any human's name, but for the name of our savior, Jesus Christ.

[00:07:20] And that's really what my goal is in life and what my calling is. And also as part of that if your listeners are familiar at all with the seven mountains of influence, it's my understanding. I received another revelation earlier this year from the Lord that the mountain of business is the domino mountain.

[00:07:37] It is the mountain through which finances flow, and that is the mountain that actually leads into government and family. And entertainment and every other mountain of influence on this earth. And so my calling in life is to be able to encourage entrepreneurs, to be kingdom entrepreneurs, to have their faith and their spirituality as the cornerstone of not just their life, but their business.

[00:07:58] And to be that example [00:08:00] that when they're hiring people that may have different faith beliefs or different religious beliefs than they. That those people's lives are gonna be impacted that those the partners' lives will be impacted. Their vendors lives will be impacted, and that they're going to be that positive role model of Christ, like living where other people are going to say, wow, I really liked the way that person lives their life and conducts business.

[00:08:19] And I want a piece of that. And my final thought in here is that, the reason why I'm here. Excited and passionate about my faith is because that's where I was. I was in a place where my life was dismal. And fortunately I had the experience of being introduced to my faith at an early age, and then going away from it for awhile and vacillating at different points of my life.

[00:08:37] But I would see these people, Scott, and they would be like, they just their mom just found out two weeks ago or they found out their mom two weeks ago had stage four terminal cancer. And the mom just died two days ago. And this person is smiling from ear to ear. Just happy on life. Living the fruit of the spirit.

[00:08:53] And I would see people like this who are going through terrible tragedies and hardships and challenges in life. And they always just had so much peace [00:09:00] and joy. And I just, I was like, man, whatever, these people are on I want to live life like that. And, that's where I really pressed into my Christ following faith and I pressed into scripture and that's where I really developed it.

[00:09:11] And so that's what I see as my calling and how that's impacted my life and where I'm at.

[00:09:16] Scott Maderer: So we talked last week, some about, building a team and you talked about lifting folks up and helping to develop the people around you. One of the things that I like to talk about is, influencing other people and to be clear on defining influence, not manipulation.

[00:09:33] You talked also about we've only got three in the warehouse, so when you've really got 50. That to me is manipulation, which is when I get you to do something because it's in my best interest or to me influence is helping people to do what they need to do. That's in their best interest, as opposed to me focused.

[00:09:51] So what are some of the things that entrepreneurs can focus on to help them develop their influence, whether that's what their team with their [00:10:00] customers and in any of those sorts of companies?

[00:10:03] James Pyle: Yeah. Excellent question here, Scott. So first and foremost, it has to do with mindset and internal alignment with what a person is wanting to achieve.

[00:10:11] And if this is something a person wants to achieve, one of the best things that we can do is to study persuasion and to study actually coaching techniques. At the heart of, without going too much into this, the Father of life coaching. If you will, Tony Stoltzfus, he talks about the coaching method and the fact that, when you're leadership coaching and you're coaching people who are believers and in general, anybody, everybody knows the answer to their own questions and they know what to do.

[00:10:37] It's actually being good at being able to help ask good questions that people can come to their own conclusions because whose ideas, the best idea. Yours is everybody's own ideas, their best idea. And so one of the ways to develop influences the study coaching techniques, especially as a leader also to study persuasion, you talk about manipulation versus [00:11:00] inspiration.

[00:11:01] Versus influence. I'm sorry. And that's the way that I see it too. Manipulation is a one-sided deal. It's where I'm winning and you're losing and I'm going to do whatever it takes to get that done. And that's actually not the way that I believe conducting business in sales, specifically as best. I believe it's persuaded.

[00:11:16] And I believe it's influenced so people can study. There's a really good book by Dr. Robert Cialdini, psychology, the influence of persuasion I'm sorry, the science of persuasion and influence. He did a follow-up to that book in the last couple of years. There's a lot of books out there where people can study influence and also study some of the great leaders.

[00:11:35] We talked about a couple of weeks ago. I was at a conference with John Mack. This guy, you guys are familiar with all this stuff. This is one of the best people that talks about influence and leadership. And the other great way to influence people is, and we've talked about this in the last couple of weeks is to just be that positive role model to be that example of the ways that you live and other people will see that.

[00:11:57] And then they will actually be influenced by it, [00:12:00] especially in this era of social media and quote unquote influencers. So many people are interested in being an influencer one. In fact, when we look at the people who are some of the strongest influencers, they're the people who have been living their life a certain way at certain standards for several decades.

[00:12:14] And then they go on social media and no wonder they have a huge following and people. Because they're not pretending to be something they're not, they're just doing what they do each and every day with their daily habits, daily rituals and these sorts of things. Yeah.

[00:12:28] Scott Maderer: Yeah. Yeah. Kiana Reeves.

[00:12:31] Popular, not just because he's counter Reeves, but because of the way he lives his life, th that every people that have run into him we'll talk about how he's that nice. John is the same way. I've had the pleasure of being in a room, very small room and having personal conversations with John Maxwell.

[00:12:46] And the funny thing is he's the same guy on stage as he is off stage. And that makes. More, much more influential because he's not a totally different character on stage. And then you talk to him off stage and it's completely different. If that makes [00:13:00] sense. Yeah,

[00:13:00] James Pyle: totally. And for me, a couple of people I've president who is Jocko Willink, he's the retired seal and David Goggins, these are guys who have, they have been living their life at a certain standard Jocko.

[00:13:09] He posted a picture of him getting up at four 30 every day. Cause he'd been doing it for 30 years. It's not a big deal to him to wake up and take a picture of his phone for something he's already been doing for several decades. But to other people they think, oh, I want to get some of that. It's tough.

[00:13:21] You've got to go to work on yourself and do that for a lot of years. Yeah.

[00:13:25] Scott Maderer: But you can get there. Totally. So as someone who's done some public speaking yourself and had the opportunity to do various events and that kind of thing, how do you think people can use speaking as one of those tools to develop their influence?

[00:13:41] James Pyle: Yeah speaking is one of the best tools for influence, communication across the board. We believe that business will rise and fall based on communication alone. And so one of the ways to use speaking as an influence is actually going into the, a little bit of the answer to the last question is actually just being that.

[00:13:58] When we are that person and you [00:14:00] talked about John Maxwell, when you are that person and you live that life, it's really easy to get up on stage and just tell your story and tell the truth. And in fact, the truth is always the best story to tell, because it's the easiest to remember because it's actually what happened, right?

[00:14:15] And so the ways that we've seen people being influential and speaking is just first and foremost, living it in their lives and setting that standard for themselves. And then actually using the platform of speaking, to be able to encourage that message in others, one of the best leaders of history and in our experience, it was Jesus.

[00:14:34] This was a guy who did what he said, and he said what he did. And he lived a good life. He loved everyone. And in fact that was his instruction to us was just to love everyone. And this was in fact, one of the things that they had mentioned that, that kingdom business summit that I was out of.

[00:14:49] Wow. Was that, you're not, you don't have to lead everyone that you come into contact with, but you are supposed to love. And so the ways that we've seen people being influential in the speaking realm was [00:15:00] just by loving people with their message, by having that heart for service for others and wanting others to experience life at the level they have, I had shared previously about one of the reasons why I'm so passionate about my faith and it's actually just.

[00:15:13] I want everybody else to be able to feel what I feel and by getting up on stage and speaking to others and other people can just see, they can see the energy and the aura radiate from you, from your frequency. And people are like, Hey, I want a piece of that. I can't tell you how many times that I'm out places, whether it's at a speaking event or anywhere else.

[00:15:32] And people just come up to me. Man. I was just drawn to you. Like I just, your presence is powerful. I just had to come and meet you. What is your name? This and that. And the other thing. And it's just by living our lives at a certain standard. And, in terms of the speaking realm, the tie, this one up, it has to do with a lot of practice too.

[00:15:47] If you're getting into the speaking realm and you want to influence. Be versed in communication, be burst in persuasion, potentially even do some research and study some NLP tactics and those sorts of things that you can know what is out there and not [00:16:00] use them to manipulate as so many people do, but use them to influence and persuade others for their own best interest.

[00:16:06] As you talked about previously,

[00:16:07] Scott Maderer: You can follow James on Twitter as James F pile or find him on his website@awarenesselevation.com. He's also on LinkedIn is James F pile and on Instagram, under awareness underscore elevation, of course I'll have links to all of this over in the show notes as well. James, is there anything else that you'd like to share with us?

[00:16:28] James Pyle: Yeah, just encourage people to come follow us on social media. I'm most active on LinkedIn and Instagram. We're constantly putting out content in that regard and we're also developing our YouTube channels currently. And I also just encourage people to come and connect with us on the website. We're developing a lot of resources to be able to offer for free to people that come on to understand more of what kingdom entrepreneurship is and to be equipped with that.

[00:16:51] So that's awareness, elevation.com. And I just wanted to thank you, Scott, for having me on the show here and giving me the opportunity to speak with you and your [00:17:00] audience and just share this awesome

[00:17:01] Scott Maderer: message. Absolutely. Thank you so much for coming on. It's been great to have you a lot of great stuff today, and I look forward to hearing more about your journey as we go.

[00:17:12] thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast as a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoy this episode. Please do us a favor. Go over to inspired stewardship.com/itunes rate.

[00:17:39] All one word iTunes rate. It'll take you through how to leave a rating and review and how to make sure you're subscribed to the podcast so that you can get every episode as it comes out. Until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures. [00:18:00] Develop your influence and impact the world.