SHOW TRANSCRIPT

Mike_Schnitzer_V297q2s.mp3

Mike_Schnitzer_V297q2s.mp3

Speaker 1 [00:00:03] Hey, Michael Schnitzer was just in the studio, we had a great conversation, he shared today with us his passion for history. We’re usually talking all Stanley, Martin, Stanley, Martin, Stanley, Martin, but not today. You get another side of Michael Schnitzer. Enjoy. All right. So welcome. Michael got Michael Schnitzer here sitting down with us today. And we’re going to chat about something totally different. We’re normally talking about Stanley Martin, custom home stocks when we get together. But today we want to learn more about you. So welcome, Michael. Thanks, John. Yes. So. So why don’t you start out and give us a little tell us a little bit about your family history and how you grew up and things like that. And let’s learn a little more about you.

Speaker 2 [00:00:53] Gotcha. Yes. So I think I was thinking about this, John, because I know you and I had spoken before.

Speaker 3 [00:01:00] You said, come over, let’s talk and whatever.

Speaker 2 [00:01:02] It’s like, you know, kind of what would I want my kids to

Speaker 3 [00:01:06] know perhaps when I’m not here? Right.

Speaker 2 [00:01:09] And just trying to give a little bit of family history, I thought may be kind of interesting.

Speaker 3 [00:01:14] So, you know, kind of reflecting on

Speaker 2 [00:01:17] this,

Speaker 3 [00:01:19] my grandfather came over to this country, I think he

Speaker 2 [00:01:22] was

Speaker 3 [00:01:22] 13, 14 years old.

Speaker 2 [00:01:24] Parents put them on a boat. Wow. From Europe by himself. Wow. And came this country. Amazing. So, you know, I think myself, like now this was late 80s, 90s. Right. You know, could you do it in this day and age? I wouldn’t put my kids on a boat by themselves and see you later.

Speaker 3 [00:01:43] Right.

Speaker 2 [00:01:44] It’s is crazy, right? So he comes to this country and, you know, he has to start making a living and

Speaker 3 [00:01:52] starts to sell scrap metal.

Speaker 2 [00:01:55] Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 [00:01:56] And was selling scrap metal.

Speaker 2 [00:01:59] Then he became

Speaker 3 [00:02:01] friendly

Speaker 2 [00:02:02] with this family. So.

Speaker 3 [00:02:04] So I grew up in Baltimore. Mm hmm. Baltimore County.

Speaker 1 [00:02:07] So how did your grandfather come into Baltimore? Is that where he came?

Speaker 2 [00:02:10] You know,

Speaker 3 [00:02:11] interestingly, I don’t really know.

Speaker 2 [00:02:13] OK, but I know he came here. Yeah, I know so. But he he became friendly with the this family called the Bloustein and and they were relatively wealthy.

Speaker 3 [00:02:28] They owned the Baltimore Orioles.

Speaker 2 [00:02:31] Wow. At one time they you used to be this old gas station, a gas station, but

Speaker 3 [00:02:38] Crown Oil Company. Right. This crown, which used to be everywhere in Crown Oil,

Speaker 2 [00:02:43] and they helped

Speaker 3 [00:02:45] my grandfather out and

Speaker 2 [00:02:46] he started to then sell scrap

Speaker 3 [00:02:48] metal from the back of a horse and buggy. Right. So, yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:02:53] So that’s the way they did it in the late

Speaker 3 [00:02:56] eighteen hundreds, early 1990s. And he started selling used tires.

Speaker 2 [00:03:00] Right then eventually he

Speaker 3 [00:03:04] bought or opened

Speaker 2 [00:03:05] up a

Speaker 3 [00:03:07] tire business in Baltimore. Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:03:09] Then he eventually started manufacturing tires. Wow. Then he eventually

Speaker 3 [00:03:17] owned. I remember as a child I used to go to work with my father because we became a family

Speaker 2 [00:03:22] business was like six or seven city

Speaker 3 [00:03:25] blocks that my grandfather owned.

Speaker 2 [00:03:28] And at the same

Speaker 3 [00:03:28] time, he’s bringing family members over from Europe.

Speaker 2 [00:03:32] So he is, you know, which you truly defined as a self made man. And that’s really the struggle that he

Speaker 3 [00:03:40] had to go through. Yeah. However, the perhaps the opposite was he knew of the struggles that he had left in Europe. And so perhaps from his perspective, this was, yes, a struggle, but not anywhere near what he would have had to have gone through. Right.

Speaker 1 [00:03:55] So he probably would have never owned six or seven blocks in anywhere in Europe. Right?

Speaker 2 [00:04:00] Well, not only

Speaker 3 [00:04:00] that, he would have been persecuted. It would

Speaker 2 [00:04:02] just be a whole

Speaker 3 [00:04:03] a whole another can of worms. So I remember the the family story. So in to what does any immigrant want to do.

Speaker 2 [00:04:11] Right. Sign up

Speaker 3 [00:04:13] and enlist. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:04:14] Goes down multiple

Speaker 3 [00:04:16] times to try to enlist because he wants to fight for his new country. And every time he’s turned down because of course he has

Speaker 2 [00:04:24] this

Speaker 3 [00:04:25] manufacturing facility making tires mobile. And they the government said he was in the central business.

Speaker 2 [00:04:31] So he was I don’t know if he was pissed, but I know he was disappointed. Yeah. And he started

Speaker 3 [00:04:37] looking for other things

Speaker 2 [00:04:39] to do. And back in the day and what I’m going to say now, it’s

Speaker 3 [00:04:43] it’s not really prevalent anymore. But there

Speaker 2 [00:04:45] used to be this Masonic

Speaker 3 [00:04:46] Lodge. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:04:48] And people used

Speaker 3 [00:04:49] to know the Freemasons.

Speaker 2 [00:04:50] And I guess back in the day it was huge.

Speaker 3 [00:04:53] And my grandfather

Speaker 2 [00:04:55] joined. He wanted to figure out ways to give back. So he started

Speaker 3 [00:05:01] feeding the poor in Baltimore every week,

Speaker 2 [00:05:05] he eventually and again, I don’t

Speaker 3 [00:05:07] have a good reference point for this, but evidently in the Freemasons

Speaker 2 [00:05:10] Society, the highest

Speaker 3 [00:05:12] levels, just like third degree rights, are like presidents, the United

Speaker 2 [00:05:15] States, and it takes something special to get to that

Speaker 3 [00:05:20] level. My grandfather did,

Speaker 2 [00:05:22] and I don’t know if it was because he couldn’t give back to his

Speaker 3 [00:05:25] country in the war. So he gave back in a different way.

Speaker 2 [00:05:31] But, you know, I just look at it. I’m thinking to myself, ma’am, what?

Speaker 3 [00:05:36] That is truly a self-made man, right?

Speaker 2 [00:05:39] Nothing came from nothing and

Speaker 3 [00:05:42] was very successful. Then I kind of flash forward my my father and my

Speaker 2 [00:05:47] uncle took over the business. You know, one time I think they had maybe

Speaker 3 [00:05:50] 12 or 15 stores around the Baltimore County suburbs plus the headquarters downtown. And I nice to go with my father to work probably twice a month. You go downtown and just do stuff, right.

Speaker 1 [00:06:04] So how old were you when you did that, do you think?

Speaker 2 [00:06:06] I may have been six or seven and maybe I’d go down once every couple months and then my teens, I’d go down and do stuff.

Speaker 3 [00:06:14] And, you know, my father worked sunup to sundown,

Speaker 2 [00:06:18] so I knew what it took

Speaker 3 [00:06:20] to be successful. Right. Perseverance, hard work, determination.

Speaker 2 [00:06:25] I mean, I saw it. I lived it

Speaker 3 [00:06:28] every day, not as an owner of a business, but as the son of an owner

Speaker 2 [00:06:32] of a business. And it was it was interesting. My my you know, my father downtown had a lot of

Speaker 3 [00:06:37] people that this huge warehouse

Speaker 2 [00:06:39] there was this one gentleman, his name was

Speaker 3 [00:06:41] Reverend

Speaker 2 [00:06:43] Tommy Jenkins.

Speaker 3 [00:06:44] And Reverend Jenkins

Speaker 2 [00:06:45] was, among other

Speaker 3 [00:06:47] things, the foreman. And everybody respected them,

Speaker 2 [00:06:50] you know, nicest guy. But, you know, even as a kid, I knew, like,

Speaker 3 [00:06:54] you walk around the whether it was the retail store or back in the manufacturing facility, just a lot of respect. And I remember

Speaker 2 [00:07:03] now. So I must have been, I don’t know, seven, six,

Speaker 3 [00:07:06] whatever,

Speaker 2 [00:07:07] when tragically MLK was killed and

Speaker 3 [00:07:11] all the inner cities lit up. Right. There was fires. There was riots. And my father, my grandfather had really been kind to Reverend Jenkins

Speaker 2 [00:07:24] and they helped him

Speaker 3 [00:07:26] build a new church. And in terms of giving money and whatever. And during the riots, Reverend Jenkins, his entire church, kind of surrounded the family business in Baltimore to make sure it wasn’t destroyed. Right. So it’s interesting how,

Speaker 2 [00:07:43] you know, you you almost you get what you give, right. It’s so kind of what

Speaker 3 [00:07:52] comes around goes around in a good

Speaker 2 [00:07:54] way. Right. And so, yeah, I always looked at that and said, you know, it’s you know,

Speaker 3 [00:07:59] again, perseverance,

Speaker 2 [00:08:01] be kind, do good things. Things will happen to people who do good things. And, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:08:09] it just it really had an

Speaker 2 [00:08:11] effect on me, you know, I

Speaker 3 [00:08:15] remember, you know, and it really

Speaker 2 [00:08:18] gets into. Peoples seems like the human condition and just it’s that visceral thing that you

Speaker 3 [00:08:30] can’t really

Speaker 2 [00:08:31] quantify. You know, I look at my wife’s side of the family, so

Speaker 3 [00:08:37] my father in law remembers

Speaker 2 [00:08:39] in WW two A. Postman, my mailman,

Speaker 3 [00:08:46] coming to the door, delivering a

Speaker 2 [00:08:50] death notice to

Speaker 3 [00:08:53] his mother. So my my my wife’s grandfather died when his third mission over the Pacific in the Battle of the Rabaul. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:09:05] And, you know, just like think about it today,

Speaker 3 [00:09:09] like a mailman bringing you a death

Speaker 2 [00:09:10] certificate. Right. You know, that had a huge impact on my

Speaker 3 [00:09:16] father in law when

Speaker 2 [00:09:17] he was a little kid was against human condition. What’s what’s in your DNA? Kind of how are you made up? What do you think in which your passion? He said, I want to go into the Navy.

Speaker 3 [00:09:29] Right.

Speaker 2 [00:09:29] So he he goes to the Naval Academy

Speaker 3 [00:09:34] a year early,

Speaker 2 [00:09:37] eventually becomes, I think, either the youngest or one of the youngest

Speaker 3 [00:09:43] people to ever make admiral

Speaker 2 [00:09:46] eventually becoming I mean, I could spend, you know, probably 10 shows talking about what my father did. So I’m not going to get into the. Yeah, all the details eventually gets, you

Speaker 3 [00:09:56] know, four star admiral had the

Speaker 2 [00:09:59] position that and I’m a

Speaker 3 [00:10:01] big history fan

Speaker 2 [00:10:02] that that

Speaker 3 [00:10:03] Chester Nimitz, who was Admiral

Speaker 2 [00:10:05] Nimitz, who in WW two was Nimitz

Speaker 3 [00:10:08] and MacArthur in the Pacific. Same position.

Speaker 2 [00:10:12] I remember visiting my father in law in on the island of Oahu, and he sat in the same desk that was Nimitz there. So it’s just just history just so it’s just so cool. Right. So it’s just, you know, so I was thinking about just how

Speaker 3 [00:10:30] people react to either adversity or

Speaker 2 [00:10:34] just people today

Speaker 3 [00:10:37] really can

Speaker 2 [00:10:38] under you almost have to live in that time. Yeah. To be able to even truly understand what people think. Right. Right. It’s just it’s it’s it’s almost impossible.

Speaker 1 [00:10:50] It is.

Speaker 2 [00:10:51] Yeah. I just anyway so and I don’t know what it is or what it was and this was well

Speaker 3 [00:10:58] before I ever met my wife. But my and this is really odd to

Speaker 2 [00:11:02] my passion was I

Speaker 3 [00:11:04] loved history.

Speaker 2 [00:11:06] And I most think that even

Speaker 3 [00:11:09] more than loving history was loving to read about major influential historical figures and kind

Speaker 2 [00:11:16] of what made them tick. Right. You know, and it’s just. Yeah. And how blending

Speaker 3 [00:11:23] these two together. But I remember let me

Speaker 2 [00:11:27] let me give you a so people are talented. Mm hmm. And people will

Speaker 3 [00:11:37] persevere and work hard. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:11:38] So, you know, kind of at a high level, you need a little bit of both. Right. And sometimes if you have a little less

Speaker 3 [00:11:46] talent, you may have to work harder. Mm hmm. Right. That’s me. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:11:51] You know, I think it’s it’s

Speaker 3 [00:11:52] everybody it’s in their nature, if they’re successful,

Speaker 2 [00:11:57] to sometimes have to compensate. But you have to be God. You got to have some God given talent. Right. To be able to utilize

Speaker 3 [00:12:05] that to propel yourself forward. So I remember as a kid,

Speaker 2 [00:12:11] I loved math. Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 [00:12:13] Hated to read. You know, I remember having fights with my parents. I want to read and

Speaker 2 [00:12:18] Mahmoud and sit down and do math. And I also and in an odd way, I always wanted to be outside and love the

Speaker 3 [00:12:28] game of lacrosse. And I carried to stick with me probably for 17 or 18 years and literally slept with the thing. I was like my passion.

Speaker 2 [00:12:38] But like, if I if I was home and I was just kind

Speaker 3 [00:12:40] of puts it around, my mother was an artist and this has no

Speaker 2 [00:12:44] so I must have had some inclination. But I used to like sketch and sketch house like weird.

Speaker 3 [00:12:51] And I was

Speaker 2 [00:12:52] like, why am I even doing this? It’s like I had no idea.

Speaker 3 [00:12:55] Right.

Speaker 2 [00:12:55] But it’s just something that I

Speaker 3 [00:12:57] was drawn to. I know I my mother’s talent. Right. She would just

Speaker 2 [00:13:01] paint sketch people like I just didn’t have that talent. But I always thought of myself as a little bit of a paradox.

Speaker 3 [00:13:09] Right.

Speaker 2 [00:13:10] Like, why would you be this, you know, someone who kind of likes

Speaker 3 [00:13:13] math and likes to surround sketches, but really all he wants to do

Speaker 2 [00:13:16] is be outside

Speaker 3 [00:13:17] and play lacrosse.

Speaker 2 [00:13:19] So there’s a lot going on. Hated to read. And yet

Speaker 3 [00:13:24] probably

Speaker 2 [00:13:25] when I was maybe 15 or

Speaker 3 [00:13:28] 16 started to read, that was not a great reader. And the first book I read that I truly remember

Speaker 2 [00:13:37] was a book by a gentleman, by the name of

Speaker 3 [00:13:43] Scheurer. Wrote this book called The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich writes, I was like maybe 1000 pages, right? And I work through that

Speaker 2 [00:13:50] book and I just loved it. And I loved

Speaker 3 [00:13:53] the the personal drama

Speaker 2 [00:13:55] and the conflict.

Speaker 3 [00:13:56] And sure at the time

Speaker 2 [00:13:59] was

Speaker 3 [00:14:00] reporter. And he was there in Germany. Hmm. Pre during the rise of the Nazi regime and even once Hitler had taken power whenever. So it’s just

Speaker 2 [00:14:10] a fascinating book. And that started me with my lifelong quest to

Speaker 3 [00:14:19] read and write. I remember not a great reader, but I probably in the last 25 years have read every night

Speaker 1 [00:14:34] John Jorgenson here. And if you’re considering building a new home in Northern Virginia or Montgomery County, Maryland, reach out to us through our website. We build on your lot dotcom, that’s we build on your lot dotcom. We have pricing and floor plans online, lots of great process information and contact us through the website so we can get you started on the path to your very own Stanley Martin custom home.

Speaker 3 [00:15:11] Every night of my life and I only read history

Speaker 2 [00:15:14] and I

Speaker 3 [00:15:16] love to read most,

Speaker 2 [00:15:18] most especially about people and what makes people tick,

Speaker 3 [00:15:24] not just the average person, just great

Speaker 2 [00:15:27] leaders. Yeah. What is it about them and the human condition and how fallible people are? Absolutely. So it was you know, so I’ve

Speaker 3 [00:15:39] kind of run the gamut in terms of the Roman Empire. This is author and this was it was a crazy read, this author Gibbon’s who wrote about

Speaker 2 [00:15:51] the the the

Speaker 3 [00:15:52] the basically the fall of the Roman Empire

Speaker 2 [00:15:55] to

Speaker 3 [00:15:56] my favorite person of all

Speaker 2 [00:15:58] time happens to be

Speaker 3 [00:16:00] Winston Churchill.

Speaker 2 [00:16:02] And way back

Speaker 3 [00:16:03] in the day there was this three volume

Speaker 2 [00:16:05] set by William

Speaker 3 [00:16:09] Manchester called The Last Lion. And I read that those three books and

Speaker 2 [00:16:14] that hooked me into

Speaker 3 [00:16:17] Churchill. And I

Speaker 2 [00:16:18] always thought, you know, and this is from the

Speaker 3 [00:16:20] perspective of my grandfather and struggle.

Speaker 2 [00:16:23] And and if you

Speaker 3 [00:16:25] read through Churchill, having the

Speaker 2 [00:16:26] guy was

Speaker 3 [00:16:29] I mean, when he was first born and in his childhood, I mean, everybody wrote him off. Right. He was kind of

Speaker 2 [00:16:34] a you know, he wasn’t athletic. He was a little feeble.

Speaker 3 [00:16:39] His father wanted

Speaker 2 [00:16:40] nothing to do with them.

Speaker 3 [00:16:43] And like all Brits, he goes to boarding school. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:16:47] He that read

Speaker 3 [00:16:48] through his letters and he’d be writing to his parents, by the way, his mother was

Speaker 2 [00:16:54] an American, I think

Speaker 3 [00:16:55] was named Jean Jerome, who married his father, Lord Randolph Churchill, who was in parliament. But his father absolutely had nothing to do with Churchill.

Speaker 2 [00:17:10] And like he begged his father to come

Speaker 3 [00:17:12] visit his father, like literally gave a speech across from where Churchill was at boarding school, wouldn’t even walk across the street to see him.

Speaker 2 [00:17:21] I was just kind of that that’s awful. You know, just kind of like so and you look at this guy and and you look and not the boy with the details, but you look at what he did in

Speaker 3 [00:17:36] in Great Britain.

Speaker 2 [00:17:38] I mean, it’s just it’s amazing. I mean, in my mind, he single handedly held back the Germans. Right, because at the time, FDR

Speaker 3 [00:17:52] was fighting

Speaker 2 [00:17:53] isolationism. Right. So the U.S. wasn’t coming in

Speaker 3 [00:17:56] because if you can’t bring your country with

Speaker 2 [00:17:58] you, right. He went, you’re not going anywhere. Right. And so not to get too much into history, but I just find it so fascinating to talk about. Yeah, so so. So Chamberlain is

Speaker 3 [00:18:15] removed from parliament.

Speaker 2 [00:18:17] Churchill assumes the

Speaker 3 [00:18:20] position. And there’s all kinds of stories I can tell you about that.

Speaker 2 [00:18:23] But it’s you know, I used to just even as

Speaker 3 [00:18:27] a kid, I remember. And maybe

Speaker 2 [00:18:29] just because, you know, my father was grew up

Speaker 3 [00:18:32] as a child in World War Two. And so, you know, I was a product of,

Speaker 2 [00:18:37] you know, the end of

Speaker 3 [00:18:39] the World War two and the beginning of, you know, the Cold War.

Speaker 2 [00:18:43] But what is

Speaker 3 [00:18:45] in a person like Churchill’s

Speaker 2 [00:18:47] DNA and his ability

Speaker 3 [00:18:50] to write the most inspiring words? Right.

Speaker 2 [00:18:54] So like he takes office and, you know, within a couple of days he goes on the Nagase was the BBC back then. He goes, All I

Speaker 3 [00:19:04] have to offer is blood, tears

Speaker 2 [00:19:08] and sweat, something like that. Right. It’s like, yeah, he’s not sugarcoating it. He’s telling me exactly how it is. Right. Were those those famous lines where he said, you know, if

Speaker 3 [00:19:21] the British Empire shall last for a thousand years, people will say, this is our finest hour? Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:19:27] Right. I mean, it’s just I don’t know, just some of his

Speaker 3 [00:19:31] words are so powerful and just think

Speaker 2 [00:19:34] how they had to

Speaker 3 [00:19:35] take a country who in World War One lost about nine hundred some thousand people. Right. The U.S.

Speaker 2 [00:19:41] doesn’t even

Speaker 3 [00:19:42] understand World War One

Speaker 2 [00:19:44] because

Speaker 3 [00:19:45] we only really fought more one for about six

Speaker 2 [00:19:47] months. Right. And we lost maybe 100000 people. Right. I mean, it’s a lot of

Speaker 3 [00:19:50] people in a short time. But the U.S. has no monuments of World War One. We don’t really get it.

Speaker 2 [00:19:56] We didn’t lose that, those kind of numbers.

Speaker 3 [00:19:59] And so he had to bring the country with them. And and there was a lot of people who were.

Speaker 2 [00:20:08] AKAM passivist, but they didn’t have an appetite to to

Speaker 3 [00:20:13] fight another war, right?

Speaker 2 [00:20:15] So it’s and Churchill knew he couldn’t win it. He was just biding time,

Speaker 3 [00:20:22] waiting for the Americans to enter. Mm hmm. Which as terrible as it was or is

Speaker 2 [00:20:30] at the time, Japanese

Speaker 3 [00:20:32] bombed Pearl Harbor, Hitler within

Speaker 2 [00:20:34] two days

Speaker 3 [00:20:36] in a reactionary moment says declares war on the United States Bembe. Yeah, Churchill gets his wish, right? I mean,

Speaker 2 [00:20:44] it’s like it’s just unbelievable. It is. So but you think can you imagine that guy just sitting home and, you know, take yourself and say, OK, do I have that kind of DNA to be able to withstand

Speaker 3 [00:21:02] that kind of pressure? Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:21:06] It’s just it’s it’s mind numbing. Right.

Speaker 1 [00:21:10] So what do you think? So what do all of these characters that you’ve studied, what do you think the common thread is? Or is there a group of common threads that make them exceptional?

Speaker 2 [00:21:19] Yeah, I think

Speaker 3 [00:21:22] to a person, they’ve come from

Speaker 2 [00:21:27] some kind of family.

Speaker 3 [00:21:31] We’ll call it trauma,

Speaker 2 [00:21:32] but some kind of event that shaped them,

Speaker 3 [00:21:36] right?

Speaker 2 [00:21:38] And so maybe that was the

Speaker 3 [00:21:39] spark and they had it in their core to be able to rise because, you know, I know myself, I couldn’t rise to a level of taking an entire country and moving it forward in the perils that must have

Speaker 2 [00:21:55] gone on. Right. I mean, John, look at look at yourself.

Speaker 3 [00:21:58] So you married a French woman, right? Right.

Speaker 2 [00:22:00] So think about

Speaker 3 [00:22:03] France.

Speaker 2 [00:22:04] Yes. So the U.S. who who

Speaker 3 [00:22:08] we have really no perspective of. If you look at World War One and World War two, which really World War two was war were one. Part two. Right. It was really not

Speaker 2 [00:22:19] part of World

Speaker 1 [00:22:20] War Part one and two.

Speaker 2 [00:22:22] Yeah. Really.

Speaker 3 [00:22:23] So, so so France

Speaker 2 [00:22:25] loses 2x

Speaker 3 [00:22:27] the number of people in Great Britain. So let’s say

Speaker 2 [00:22:30] they lose two million people. Right. And those are the two million fighting men who were, you know, at the time, it was mostly a man’s

Speaker 3 [00:22:38] type of war in terms of being in the trenches and

Speaker 2 [00:22:41] fighting. And what are the Americans thinking of that?

Speaker 3 [00:22:46] The French, they can’t fight battles.

Speaker 2 [00:22:49] They’re kind of wimps. And if you look back on it, France, in terms of the European continent, was the most dominant

Speaker 3 [00:22:59] power in Europe, right through Napoleon and whatever.

Speaker 2 [00:23:04] And yet, you know, they lose, let’s say, two million people.

Speaker 3 [00:23:09] And granted, Hitler comes in with the blitz just

Speaker 2 [00:23:12] absolutely decimates

Speaker 3 [00:23:14] right there. France is fighting last last year’s war with the Maginot Line. Whatever the Germans just come right in

Speaker 2 [00:23:22] France just didn’t have it in them. Right.

Speaker 3 [00:23:25] They didn’t have the horsepower

Speaker 2 [00:23:27] to and the public sentiment to to withstand that that that at that time, the Nazi

Speaker 3 [00:23:35] aggression. So it was

Speaker 2 [00:23:36] just it’s crazy. And then and you look at. In terms of just the human condition, how

Speaker 3 [00:23:47] fallible people are right now,

Speaker 2 [00:23:49] and it seems if you go to that

Speaker 3 [00:23:51] leadership level, right, so

Speaker 2 [00:23:55] the the English have what’s called

Speaker 3 [00:23:57] the Battle of Britain, the blitz. Right. And Hitler through his wonderful

Speaker 2 [00:24:04] and I’m saying this tongue in cheek

Speaker 3 [00:24:06] advice of Hermann Goering says, oh, we can knock the Brits

Speaker 2 [00:24:10] out, we’ll just bomb them.

Speaker 3 [00:24:12] Just I’m using the word because it wasn’t used back then. Carpet bomb. Right. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:24:17] Just bomb

Speaker 3 [00:24:18] the crap

Speaker 2 [00:24:18] out of London

Speaker 3 [00:24:20] and in all their facilities and armaments and whatever, they were stronger. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:24:28] You look at the allies and what they did to and,

Speaker 3 [00:24:34] you know, perhaps rightly so. They leveled the the city of Dresden. Right. I mean, completely rubble. Didn’t really change the Germans. Mm hmm. No.

Speaker 2 [00:24:45] Look at what the U.S. did in Japan. Right. So there was a guy by

Speaker 3 [00:24:51] name of Curtis LeMay back in the Times. No Air Force or was the Army Air Corps Lamay. I mean, there’s all kinds of things in

Speaker 2 [00:24:58] terms of altitude bombing and low altitude. But we use napalm back then and we just

Speaker 3 [00:25:06] firebomb

Speaker 2 [00:25:08] Japan. I mean, the amount of people that the Japanese loss based on, quote

Speaker 3 [00:25:14] unquote, traditional bombing, forget atomic bombs. Right. Because that’s a game changer. And even if the world exists. Right. At least in our concept, if that really happens to,

Speaker 2 [00:25:25] you know, in today’s society. But none of that bombing had any effect on the people.

Speaker 3 [00:25:32] In fact, it probably strengthened their resolve. Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:25:35] Right. And then so you look at the just the fallibility of leaders. What is just so I guess what I’m getting at is so you have

Speaker 3 [00:25:46] this is the backdrop. And then I remember growing up, the fear

Speaker 2 [00:25:51] was communism and communist expansion. Right. And that was it. In fact, there was

Speaker 3 [00:25:58] a famous person, probably my famous person, who coined the phrase the Iron Curtain. Churchill did a

Speaker 2 [00:26:05] speech in

Speaker 3 [00:26:07] in Missouri, and that’s where he coined the term the Iron Curtain has descended upon us. Right. But the U.S. was worried in French

Speaker 2 [00:26:18] Indochina about what they called back then, the domino

Speaker 3 [00:26:22] effect, like where do we draw the line, right? Mm hmm. And stop the spread of communism. Mm hmm. And so there was multiple presidents on both

Speaker 2 [00:26:32] sides of the aisle.

Speaker 3 [00:26:33] Had certainly Nixon did this in a big way,

Speaker 2 [00:26:37] but so did

Speaker 3 [00:26:38] Johnson. Whatever. What did they start doing? This is like

Speaker 2 [00:26:42] the the fallibility and the the the.

Speaker 3 [00:26:50] Inability for leaders to really understand we started carpet bombing

Speaker 2 [00:26:56] Vietnam and

Speaker 3 [00:26:58] 12 or 15 years ago,

Speaker 2 [00:27:00] we just went through this right. And had no effect. Right. In fact, I don’t think the U.S. lost one battle.

Speaker 3 [00:27:10] I may be wrong, you know, whether it’s Ted or whatever. We never lost

Speaker 2 [00:27:14] one battle in Vietnam.

Speaker 3 [00:27:16] We lost the war. Right. Never lost a battle. Right. And we tried a carpet bomb didn’t work. It just strengthened the resolve of the North Vietnamese army. But what was the right answer? Right. I mean, you had communist aggression. I think we can all agree that

Speaker 2 [00:27:33] communism,

Speaker 3 [00:27:35] for the most part,

Speaker 2 [00:27:36] want to get into any political things. But communism is the and tith assists are not the antithesis. Is the is the is the other side of

Speaker 3 [00:27:47] the is polar opposite

Speaker 2 [00:27:49] to capitalism,

Speaker 3 [00:27:51] regardless of

Speaker 2 [00:27:52] right. But back in the day, people know you have Mao.

Speaker 3 [00:27:56] Mao probably killed 40 or 60, killed, murdered 40 or 60 million people.

Speaker 2 [00:28:01] Right. In the name of quote unquote socialism.

Speaker 3 [00:28:04] Yeah right. There is no free will.

Speaker 2 [00:28:07] Yeah. In China. Right.

Speaker 3 [00:28:09] You did what you were told to do and if you were a subversive, you were killed.

Speaker 2 [00:28:15] Look at

Speaker 3 [00:28:15] Stalin. Right. Another huge communist power. I don’t know how many he killed. Ten million. You really don’t

Speaker 2 [00:28:22] know because it’s a closed society. Right. But what we do know is it’s not a good thing. And we had to stop it. And how the U.S. viewed it as like an existential threat.

Speaker 3 [00:28:34] Right. So you have this one, things like where do you draw the line?

Speaker 2 [00:28:37] You have this other things like you can’t win a battle. And so there’s no there’s no. So that’s kind of the you know, just that

Speaker 3 [00:28:45] that human struggle.

Speaker 2 [00:28:47] Right. If you will. Yeah. And the thing that just it just I just eat that stuff up.

Speaker 1 [00:28:52] I see that. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:28:53] Reading about it. Yeah. It’s just it’s just crazy.

Speaker 3 [00:28:58] So I just figured I’d

Speaker 2 [00:28:59] give you a little perspective and kind of what would I do and what I think about kind of

Speaker 3 [00:29:05] outside of work. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:29:07] Maybe a little bit too much for.

Speaker 3 [00:29:09] No, no I

Speaker 1 [00:29:10] understand but

Speaker 2 [00:29:10] yeah I’d,

Speaker 3 [00:29:11] I’d love reading about it.

Speaker 2 [00:29:13] Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:29:14] I try to

Speaker 2 [00:29:15] use that and think about that in my life so.

Speaker 1 [00:29:27] Like what you’re hearing on the go at John show, please share it with your friends, they can sign up at Go with John Dotcom.

Speaker 2 [00:29:45] So I grew up, we

Speaker 3 [00:29:50] were talking, all I did was play lacrosse. I from an early age, I wanted to play lacrosse in college

Speaker 2 [00:30:00] and I was

Speaker 3 [00:30:02] faster than lightning.

Speaker 2 [00:30:04] I had good

Speaker 3 [00:30:05] stickwork and stickwork meaning.

Speaker 2 [00:30:07] Yeah, but I worked at that game sunup to sundown. That was my

Speaker 3 [00:30:14] dream. And my dream eventually came true. Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:30:19] So I. I go to college and I’m going through college. So where do you go to college? At University of Maryland. OK, so go to college

Speaker 3 [00:30:29] going for an engineering degree. Right. Guy doesn’t love to read.

Speaker 2 [00:30:33] I go into English. Not that I can’t read isn’t my passion at the time. Yeah, but I love math.

Speaker 3 [00:30:40] Right. Yeah. So I go into engineering

Speaker 2 [00:30:43] not

Speaker 3 [00:30:43] because really

Speaker 2 [00:30:44] I knew I wanted to be

Speaker 3 [00:30:45] in engineering, I knew I like math. And I had a friend who was a year ahead of me and he

Speaker 2 [00:30:49] was an engineer like, okay, I’ll go and engineer it. Right. So I mean that’s how I became an engineer and then

Speaker 3 [00:30:55] or graduate with an engineering degree. And I remember after my first couple of years, I’m like, oh, well, the engineering programs like one hundred and forty four credits to graduate and normal B.S. degrees like 120.

Speaker 2 [00:31:11] Right. Oh like oh man,

Speaker 3 [00:31:13] this just isn’t sitting right with me. I am not going to school for more than four years.

Speaker 2 [00:31:17] So all of a sudden this. Almost model Linamar with the sole

Speaker 3 [00:31:26] passion about playing lacrosse, I took it totally evaporated

Speaker 2 [00:31:30] and all I wanted to do is now graduate on time, get to the next level. Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:31:36] So I dropped lacrosse.

Speaker 2 [00:31:37] I played I could care less about it. So what

Speaker 1 [00:31:39] year was that in school as a second year

Speaker 2 [00:31:42] know like third year. OK, and make

Speaker 3 [00:31:46] sure I graduated

Speaker 2 [00:31:48] on time.

Speaker 3 [00:31:49] So graduated and went to work at Westinghouse and Radar Systems

Speaker 2 [00:31:56] and I’m looking around say, you know what, I hate this. I there’s no way I can stay working with these. You know, I see a guy who’s got like a pocket protector. Yeah. Working with doing a math guy like, oh my God, man, this is absolutely devastating. So how long did you do this? I lasted, I think three years. I was going back to school getting a Masters. I was like, I have to hit the eject.

Speaker 3 [00:32:21] This is not for me. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:32:24] So I had my luckily

Speaker 3 [00:32:26] my father, you

Speaker 2 [00:32:27] know, had a business and the money. And I said to my father. I think I’m going to go into building. Mm hmm. Yeah, I don’t even know why maybe was I was sketching as a little kid, I don’t know, a close friend of mine. And I, we built

Speaker 3 [00:32:46] a tree for

Speaker 2 [00:32:48] tree, so I have no idea.

Speaker 3 [00:32:51] So I find an architect in the Baltimore area had a really good name.

Speaker 2 [00:32:55] And I said, you know, let’s start a building business

Speaker 3 [00:32:59] and I’ll have my father back me. So we started building

Speaker 2 [00:33:03] houses, you know, and obviously I have an engineer here, so I understand

Speaker 1 [00:33:07] putting the parts of pieces together.

Speaker 2 [00:33:08] Yeah, yeah. But I don’t know. Building from Schmieding. Right. It’s just nice, you know. You know how you schedule. I do a heck of a job.

Speaker 3 [00:33:17] So after maybe the third or fourth house,

Speaker 2 [00:33:22] the the

Speaker 3 [00:33:23] architect who’s really leading the charge. Right. I was more of like going to the job sites or whatever, just like just wasn’t wasn’t really a business person. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:33:33] So I finished up the two projects that we had, you know, leave

Speaker 3 [00:33:39] my father’s money just sitting it right.

Speaker 2 [00:33:41] And said, you know what, if I’m going to go into this,

Speaker 3 [00:33:44] I better really understand

Speaker 2 [00:33:47] the business

Speaker 3 [00:33:48] from the ground up. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:33:50] So I quote unquote, took a step back, move down into the D.C.

Speaker 3 [00:33:56] metro area, worked for a large builder and started, you know, from the I don’t say the ground up, but, you know, as a superintendent,

Speaker 2 [00:34:05] you know, learning all facets of

Speaker 3 [00:34:07] the business, whether it’s construction

Speaker 2 [00:34:09] or land development

Speaker 3 [00:34:11] or purchase or whatever,

Speaker 2 [00:34:13] and kind of ascended through all positions. And, you know, and and, you know, it’s interesting. But so which builder was that? Oh, back in the day, it was the Milton Company.

Speaker 3 [00:34:28] OK, Milton Shneiderman really had a large homebuilding

Speaker 2 [00:34:34] business, so this would have been back in the 80s. OK, and

Speaker 3 [00:34:40] long story short,

Speaker 2 [00:34:44] you know, thinking back to

Speaker 3 [00:34:45] my father, my grandfather used to wake up four thirty in the morning.

Speaker 2 [00:34:49] You know what?

Speaker 3 [00:34:50] Get up before the sons work late. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:34:55] Put in. You know, I think

Speaker 3 [00:34:58] I worked seven days

Speaker 2 [00:34:59] a week, you know, maybe six days in the in the field and the office, blah, blah, blah. And so I had

Speaker 3 [00:35:06] this great determination, singular determination

Speaker 2 [00:35:10] to succeed and look at the

Speaker 3 [00:35:14] dumb luck. Right. So I got this engineering degree practiced engineering.

Speaker 2 [00:35:20] You did it right. But I can utilize some of the. Courses in in in my manufacturing business, I used to love the sketch. Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 [00:35:34] Right. Who else is like

Speaker 2 [00:35:35] what in the heck? Right. Who would have thought that? And, you know, my my, my,

Speaker 3 [00:35:41] my, my mother’s side, my mother artists that I really had

Speaker 2 [00:35:45] this talent to sketch houses.

Speaker 3 [00:35:49] I could really I viscerally

Speaker 2 [00:35:52] know as I’m sketching what’s going to look good and what’s not and seeing things in three space. So I had this kind of like this one off thing as a kid that kind of comes back to me in spades, if you will write based on how this little niche that I found myself in. Yeah. And I always like my family to define this. So luck

Speaker 3 [00:36:17] is where preparation meets

Speaker 1 [00:36:20] opportunity. Yeah, well, you and I talk about that actually quite a bit.

Speaker 2 [00:36:24] You’re just completely

Speaker 3 [00:36:26] lucky. Yeah, because I was prepared. Yeah, I had the opportunity.

Speaker 2 [00:36:31] Yeah. And you know, and I look at myself now and I say, you know, I’m a complete enigma. I can’t I don’t even understand what

Speaker 3 [00:36:40] makes me tick. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:36:42] So I know I’m

Speaker 3 [00:36:43] an introvert at my core. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:36:46] And how do you define that?

Speaker 3 [00:36:48] If someone were to say to me or

Speaker 2 [00:36:50] John, say to you, hey, let’s go

Speaker 3 [00:36:52] out and party every night, I would literally break down

Speaker 2 [00:36:56] like literally

Speaker 3 [00:36:57] the proverbial wheels

Speaker 2 [00:36:58] would fall off my bus. I would be in

Speaker 3 [00:37:00] an emotional wreck. Right. It’s just

Speaker 2 [00:37:02] not me. Right. But yet I go to work and I love being an extrovert.

Speaker 3 [00:37:08] Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:37:08] What is that?

Speaker 3 [00:37:10] Yeah, I can’t figure it out.

Speaker 2 [00:37:11] Yeah, right. I just like. How do you change, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:37:16] did I just change a horse into a zebra or did I make a horse just run faster. I’m almost thinking it’s a horse to a zebra. Right. Do you think about it. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:37:29] Because a

Speaker 3 [00:37:30] total extrovert. Yeah. Total introvert. Yeah. So what

Speaker 2 [00:37:34] am I. Yeah I love analysis and John, you know. Yes, I love to and it’s probably the engineering side. Get in the weeds.

Speaker 3 [00:37:44] Yeah. Which is great as a manufacturer. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:37:46] Because what we

Speaker 3 [00:37:47] manufacture there’s hundreds of thousands of parts and pieces and unless you’re

Speaker 2 [00:37:52] diligent about detail you’re not going to be successful.

Speaker 3 [00:37:56] Right. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:37:57] But I love the sketch houses. Yeah. So I fill this need that’s

Speaker 3 [00:38:02] more creative

Speaker 2 [00:38:04] with sketching. I filled this kind of more of analytical side with the detail, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:38:14] this extrovert who’s an introvert. So when am I right? It’s almost like

Speaker 2 [00:38:18] I should be like on some game show

Speaker 3 [00:38:20] because nobody would ever be able to figure me out. I can’t figure myself out.

Speaker 1 [00:38:23] Yeah, well, I think I think part of it is you you intimately understand the detail and I think you enjoy educating the consumer. Yeah. About what is is being created,

Speaker 2 [00:38:37] you know, so maybe there’s you know, maybe you hit something in that. Maybe I’m an introvert that gets so excited.

Speaker 3 [00:38:45] Yeah. I turn into an extra.

Speaker 1 [00:38:46] Exactly.

Speaker 2 [00:38:47] But why don’t and I’m saying this rhetorically. Why don’t the wheels fall off my bus. Yeah, I don’t know. Yeah. Whereas if I was home in a social scene, don’t

Speaker 3 [00:38:57] put me in a party every night I will absolutely

Speaker 1 [00:39:00] meltdown. Yeah. Well, there’s no there’s there’s there’s no defined topic and there’s no rules at a party. At a party. They got to walk in and wing it. Right. So so I’m

Speaker 2 [00:39:10] walking

Speaker 3 [00:39:10] in here

Speaker 2 [00:39:11] like. Yeah. Walked in and winged it.

Speaker 1 [00:39:12] Yeah. So I don’t know really. You got notes. I mean

Speaker 2 [00:39:15] I was I

Speaker 3 [00:39:16] woke up this morning, wrote a

Speaker 2 [00:39:17] couple of notes later like what am I even going to talk about. Yeah exactly. But so it’s just it’s a very it’s, it’s almost like I’m a dichotomy, an enigma and I have yet to be able

Speaker 3 [00:39:33] to figure myself out.

Speaker 1 [00:39:34] I cannot figure myself out. Well, I’ll I’ll say it’s really amazing to watch you work and I mean that sincerely the the the gift that you have. And it’s a gift. And I tell people all the time, I tell our customers all the time what a gift it is. The the the the way you hear what the customers say and how you convert that into a sketch and then eventually into a home is amazing. When when our buyers say things, I hear the same thing you’re hearing, but you run it through your processor of all of the data that you have, all the historical data you have from having designed and built and you know, you say go from toothpaste to dimensional to three dimensional. And, you know, somebody can say, you know, I want certain things in a home and you kind of already know what they want. It’s it’s. It’s really amazing how it translates and, well, there’s luck again.

Speaker 2 [00:40:30] Yeah, really the definition, right.

Speaker 3 [00:40:32] So I’m prepared because pretty much everything.

Speaker 1 [00:40:36] Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:40:37] And the opportunity the customer walks in our proverbial door. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:40:41] And I just listen to them like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I can see that. And then I start just just right. You know, winging it. But so I was thinking from a business side,

Speaker 3 [00:40:56] everybody has strengths and everybody has weaknesses. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:41:00] So I was thinking, OK, what are

Speaker 3 [00:41:02] my two greatest opportunities. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:41:05] So one

Speaker 3 [00:41:06] you already hit on,

Speaker 2 [00:41:07] which is I have to live in the details in

Speaker 3 [00:41:10] order to make sure the business is successful at the ground level.

Speaker 2 [00:41:17] Right.

Speaker 3 [00:41:18] But, boy, I better get from the ground level

Speaker 2 [00:41:21] to a thousand to 10000 to a mile high using kind of the. Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:41:27] The the airplane added term. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:41:31] Because I can’t lead a company. In the weeds, right? Right, so what are the objectives? And then have the team

Speaker 3 [00:41:40] help figure out the

Speaker 2 [00:41:42] details, don’t spoon feed them the details. Right, right, right. Give them objective and listen to what they have to say. So that’s always an

Speaker 3 [00:41:52] internal struggle with me

Speaker 2 [00:41:54] that I think

Speaker 3 [00:41:55] over the years I’ve gotten better and better where I’ve got to live in the

Speaker 2 [00:41:59] details so that we get the

Speaker 3 [00:42:01] house right.

Speaker 2 [00:42:02] I better live at a mile high, especially when it comes to

Speaker 3 [00:42:07] where are we driving the company? What are key metrics, things of that nature? We got to.

Speaker 2 [00:42:14] So that’s one thing. And then the other thing is that I found

Speaker 3 [00:42:21] it in my nature is

Speaker 2 [00:42:23] to tack this is self the right. So sailboat I’m not a sailor wants to find the wind, picked that wind and left that tack. Right. Well, think about what that

Speaker 3 [00:42:34] does to your organization. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:42:36] It creates complete chaos, correct?

Speaker 3 [00:42:40] It is probably the worst thing that a leader can do. And I’ve recognized that for years and years.

Speaker 2 [00:42:48] I know to this day if unless the buildings

Speaker 3 [00:42:52] on fire, there is nothing so important that

Speaker 2 [00:42:56] I need to

Speaker 3 [00:42:58] respond to that can’t wait a day or two.

Speaker 2 [00:43:02] So there may be something going on that kind of gets my hair to stand up. Right. I may write an email. I’ll never send it right. And I’ll go back a

Speaker 3 [00:43:11] day or two later and like, good lord, I would really maybe this was 30

Speaker 2 [00:43:16] years ago. Send that email. Yeah, it makes no sense. And so perspective just time and letting yourself kind of calm

Speaker 3 [00:43:25] down and really understand.

Speaker 2 [00:43:27] Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:43:28] And seek to understand. Yes. Words you love to use.

Speaker 2 [00:43:32] Yeah. I found that to be you know, what I found to be one

Speaker 3 [00:43:37] of my greatest

Speaker 2 [00:43:38] weaknesses I hope. Interesting to ask. The team has turned

Speaker 3 [00:43:44] into a strength because

Speaker 2 [00:43:45] I think about that every day. Yeah. And I don’t let

Speaker 3 [00:43:50] that interfere because I realize the

Speaker 2 [00:43:52] consequences are

Speaker 1 [00:43:54] absolutely terrible. Right. I agree with that wholeheartedly. And I think a lot of that comes with age and maturity as well. An experience because I find myself the older I get, the more experience I get, the more I trust the folks that are around me, you know, to do the right thing and not have to micromanage as much as I did when I was younger.

Speaker 3 [00:44:16] So it’s yeah, we’re just we’re even respond.

Speaker 1 [00:44:18] Yeah, well, exactly. And I’ll tell you that, boy, I’ll tell you, probably you and me both. I go back 20 or 30 years ago, some of the things that came out of my mouth and went out of my office. Right. Right. You know, I didn’t need to go. You’re exactly right. And it’s hard

Speaker 3 [00:44:35] to contain yourself. Well, especially when you’re younger. You don’t have the. The perspective,

Speaker 1 [00:44:40] yeah. Well, I think when I was younger, I lived in a position of of believing that if I didn’t firmly go after all of the problems around me, people would take advantage of me. They would see me as weak. So I probably overdid it when I was younger, out of out of self protection to to to maintain control in my business world, you know, so but but it is yet it is hard. And then I also think the older you get in, the more successful you get, the more people around you trust you and you don’t have to fight so hard to have your vision fulfilled is another part of me.

Speaker 3 [00:45:25] That’s a point very well taken. Yeah, right.

Speaker 2 [00:45:28] Because you have nothing. Not that you don’t have something to prove.

Speaker 1 [00:45:32] Right.

Speaker 3 [00:45:32] But you’re not trying to voice yourself so loudly. Exactly.

Speaker 2 [00:45:41] Exactly. But you know, you hit on something that as a in terms of running a business, you have to let people.

Speaker 1 [00:45:52] Fail.

Speaker 2 [00:45:53] Yes, and you have to build

Speaker 3 [00:45:55] a framework

Speaker 2 [00:45:57] around that, because if if people aren’t failing, what does that mean in

Speaker 3 [00:46:02] business? It means they’re not growing. And if they’re not growing, they’re not learning. And so whether you’re setting a framework of a financial amount. Right. How many thousands of dollars per widget.

Speaker 2 [00:46:18] Right. Or maybe how many cents per widget. Right. Am I willing to lose to

Speaker 3 [00:46:24] allow my people to learn? Mm hmm. And I think I’ve gotten very good at that. Right. Like, I.

Speaker 2 [00:46:31] So you

Speaker 3 [00:46:32] want to learn from your mistakes

Speaker 2 [00:46:34] and not and and not.

Speaker 3 [00:46:41] What’s the word? Belittle somebody.

Speaker 2 [00:46:44] Right.

Speaker 3 [00:46:44] Because all you’re trying to do this is their learning curve. Right. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:46:48] So if you belittle them, they’ll stop learning because they won’t want if they want

Speaker 3 [00:46:54] to take risks.

Speaker 2 [00:46:55] Yeah. And but you got to know what’s the what’s the box that that they can take risks in. Right. I mean, that is huge. Yeah. I would say and I know you and I talk about this runway.

Speaker 3 [00:47:10] Mm hmm. Right. So how much runway does a person have. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:47:16] And how do you think about

Speaker 3 [00:47:20] a person’s runway? In terms of a new hire mm versus a person who has less runway. Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 [00:47:30] You know, maybe it’s X

Speaker 3 [00:47:32] divided by two like half the runway. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:47:34] Right. And knowing depending on

Speaker 3 [00:47:37] the market conditions, you know, in our in our market, you know, the unemployment rate is

Speaker 2 [00:47:43] typically low because we, you know, government agencies and whatever. Yeah. And, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:47:50] how do you make the right hire? Is it and I’m not saying that there’s a right or wrong, but, you know, everything being equal, you would rather train

Speaker 2 [00:47:59] someone who had less knowledge. Right. Who had a huge runway because that’s going to pay dividends. Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:48:08] Then very little training on

Speaker 2 [00:48:10] someone

Speaker 3 [00:48:11] who’s out a runway. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Speaker 1 [00:48:14] And so try to define your runway analogy a little better. So a longer runway means what they have more bandwidth got more.

Speaker 3 [00:48:22] So this is really more capacity to learn.

Speaker 1 [00:48:25] Right. So my airplane analogy, I’m thinking a longer runway. They need more, they need more effort to get the plane off the ground. So I’m with you. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:48:34] I mean, and that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:48:36] But I’m looking at runway is have they run out of runway where they regardless they’re never going to take off.

Speaker 1 [00:48:42] Exactly. OK, I got

Speaker 2 [00:48:44] so you know that is huge. Giving the people the space to make mistakes

Speaker 3 [00:48:54] to grow right.

Speaker 2 [00:48:55] Is huge. Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:48:58] To for me

Speaker 2 [00:49:01] not to tack.

Speaker 3 [00:49:02] Mm hmm. Right. And for me

Speaker 2 [00:49:05] to come out of the weeds

Speaker 3 [00:49:07] and try to for a portion of the day, spend time at a mile high or maybe it’s 10000 feet high. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:49:15] You know, and that’s

Speaker 3 [00:49:16] along with perseverence because I think perseverance. Determination. Mm hmm. Almost usurps everything else. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:49:26] So I’ve got to have some intellect without that. You’re you’re done. Right. But I would take

Speaker 3 [00:49:32] a person who has runway and hat and maybe the runway is only

Speaker 2 [00:49:39] X long. Yeah. But has so much perseverance. It’s, you know, the

Speaker 3 [00:49:45] ability to overcome you going back to history and looking at great leaders.

Speaker 2 [00:49:50] If you look at overcoming things, I always think about this. You know, we all have

Speaker 3 [00:49:55] bad days, right?

Speaker 2 [00:49:56] Yeah. And sometimes in this business we could have a bad week or bad maybe not months, but.

Speaker 1 [00:50:01] Well, yeah, 2007, 2008. I’d say that was a bad

Speaker 2 [00:50:05] that was a bad year. Right. So we get these periods which really.

Speaker 1 [00:50:11] It sucks. It does. Yeah. And then

Speaker 2 [00:50:13] you say, OK, well let me get

Speaker 3 [00:50:14] some perspective.

Speaker 2 [00:50:15] Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:50:16] I wasn’t in the trenches in World War One.

Speaker 2 [00:50:19] Right. I didn’t have the anguish of

Speaker 3 [00:50:22] George Marshall

Speaker 2 [00:50:23] or Dwight Eisenhower,

Speaker 3 [00:50:27] wherever you want to go with these great leaders, FDR, wherever you want to go. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:50:34] So why am I even in the word isn’t complain? Because I’m not complaining. Right. But how is this in perspective, a struggle anywhere close

Speaker 3 [00:50:43] to being a struggle. Right. Yet I think it’s a struggle. But when I start looking at

Speaker 2 [00:50:47] it in the long arc of time in history, like this is nothing. Right? That’s true. I know I’m going

Speaker 3 [00:50:52] to come out the other

Speaker 2 [00:50:53] end. That’s true. And I’m going to put a minuscule

Speaker 3 [00:50:57] effort, relatively speaking.

Speaker 2 [00:50:59] Yeah.

Speaker 3 [00:51:00] To get to that other end. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:51:01] And that’s kind of what I think makes me tick and get when you get these, like, you know, the peaks and valleys of business as you know, what is it. This is nothing. Yeah. I’m still living right. It’s right. And John, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:51:18] like in terms of struggle.

Speaker 2 [00:51:21] So my wife had a I was just thinking about this. So she had these my kids

Speaker 3 [00:51:28] were I think my

Speaker 2 [00:51:29] son at the time may have been two. She had this

Speaker 3 [00:51:32] tumor that wrapped her spine from her bottom. Yeah. To her neck.

Speaker 1 [00:51:36] Yes.

Speaker 3 [00:51:37] So and there were, you know, initially times

Speaker 2 [00:51:41] we didn’t think she was going to live. Right. She went through about

Speaker 3 [00:51:45] ten surgeries over 12 years. My kids were young through their their teenage years. And there were times where I’m like, OK, I’m not even sure we’re going to make it through this. Right. Right.

Speaker 1 [00:51:55] Yeah, well, back to right. And I went through something similar with my mom. Yeah. So. So you

Speaker 2 [00:52:01] get it. Yeah. So I’m taking care of the kids by myself because my wife is in and out of the hospital. She was living with pain. Right. It was it was terrible.

Speaker 3 [00:52:09] Right.

Speaker 2 [00:52:09] And and and you know, still working my, you know, self to not to death,

Speaker 3 [00:52:16] but just in terms of term. Working hard. Yeah.

Speaker 2 [00:52:19] Taking care of the kids. Going down, visit my wife at the hospital for months on end. Well, and, you know, I look back when I say, you know, it

Speaker 3 [00:52:30] it was terrible,

Speaker 2 [00:52:32] but

Speaker 3 [00:52:33] I wasn’t in the trenches. Yeah, right.

Speaker 2 [00:52:35] I was in the

Speaker 3 [00:52:37] Bataan Death March. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:52:39] I just it wasn’t I

Speaker 3 [00:52:41] wasn’t in a concentration camp.

Speaker 2 [00:52:43] Right. Right.

Speaker 3 [00:52:44] So it’s all perspective.

Speaker 2 [00:52:46] And I think that’s what makes me get

Speaker 3 [00:52:49] through things is just. You know, just kind of the reflecting back on history and great people and what they suffered.

Speaker 1 [00:52:58] People suffer. It’s an interesting it’s an interesting perspective. It really is.

Speaker 2 [00:53:03] Yeah, I think about it all the time. So it’s kind of it’s interesting to think about that. So that’s kind of long and short. Just a

Speaker 3 [00:53:11] little kid growing up in Baltimore ended up down

Speaker 2 [00:53:14] in the D.C. metro area. You know, I would say relatively successful. Would I do things

Speaker 3 [00:53:24] differently, maybe?

Speaker 2 [00:53:25] Mm hmm. How would I would do it differently? I have no idea. Yeah. You know, kind of just

Speaker 3 [00:53:31] the twists and turns of

Speaker 2 [00:53:33] of life and. Yeah. Taking advantage of things that come at you.

Speaker 1 [00:53:36] Yeah, good deal. So, Mike, that was a lot of really interesting information. Enjoyed listening to all that. So in closing. Yeah. What what what did what do you want for your kids. Right. So you’ve studied history. You’re living in the present. You’ve been through just like I have. We’ve been through 9/11. We’ve been through the financial crash of 07 08. We’ve been through covid. What do you see in the world and what do you want for your kids? And.

Speaker 2 [00:54:10] Yeah. Well, it’s especially in the time we live in. So what irks me is people that

Speaker 3 [00:54:25] really don’t understand history. So they make these

Speaker 2 [00:54:29] statements and they really have no idea. Right. So they’ll opine about

Speaker 3 [00:54:36] something from the eighteen hundreds or whatever. Oh my God. How did that happen.

Speaker 2 [00:54:39] Right. Right. They didn’t live in that time period. So, you know,

Speaker 3 [00:54:44] first I would say my

Speaker 2 [00:54:45] kids become knowledgeable. Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 [00:54:48] And form your own opinions before them

Speaker 2 [00:54:50] based on facts

Speaker 3 [00:54:52] and understanding the arc of time.

Speaker 2 [00:54:55] Right. Enjoy your kids while they’re young. Yeah. I the

Speaker 3 [00:55:01] one great thing my wife

Speaker 2 [00:55:03] says, you have got to make

Speaker 3 [00:55:05] time for the kids. Rexall is always working. Yeah. And so probably a little more so with my son. But you know, I coached lacrosse and I coached football. I had no idea how I

Speaker 2 [00:55:15] found the time. Yeah. But I knew it was important.

Speaker 3 [00:55:19] And if I didn’t, my father never did that. My father could not do it right. I could not do it just

Speaker 2 [00:55:24] because it was just at that,

Speaker 3 [00:55:26] you know, he was running a family

Speaker 2 [00:55:28] business that’s very large at the time. Sure. And, you know, I guess the way he and my uncle manage

Speaker 3 [00:55:34] was just different. So try to find time for your family. You live a short life.

Speaker 2 [00:55:41] Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 [00:55:42] And they’re going to be struggles and you’re going to have to work through it. You know, we all want our kids not to go through struggles. But, you know,

Speaker 2 [00:55:52] here’s give you an interesting thing. I was thinking about this a while back. Like, so

Speaker 3 [00:55:57] my grandfather comes from nothing. Right? Right. My father this is in the early 50s. Turn sixteen was my grandfather. Do buy him a car, right?

Speaker 2 [00:56:06] Yeah. I mean, who who gets a new car? And my uncle my aunt got the same thing right. As soon as they

Speaker 3 [00:56:11] turn 16 in the early 50s. Right. Just maybe even the 40s you know.

Speaker 2 [00:56:15] So then I grow up. Does my father buy me a car when I’m sixty. No right

Speaker 3 [00:56:24] to product. Right.

Speaker 2 [00:56:25] So when my son and daughter turn sixteen, what did I do. Yeah. Oh, I didn’t get a car around sixteen. I bought them a car when there were sixteen because I felt bad. Right now my father put me through so I kind of says like, I wonder what my kids will really be like. I have got grandkids now. Yeah I see. My son had

Speaker 3 [00:56:44] my granddaughter before my my daughter had had had hurt her child. Yeah. And I my

Speaker 2 [00:56:51] brother, my son’s going to be probably a

Speaker 3 [00:56:53] little bit more stern

Speaker 2 [00:56:55] than I write, you know that I am. Yeah. And so it’s just kind of interesting.

Speaker 3 [00:57:00] But everybody’s got to go through it thrown at their own course

Speaker 2 [00:57:06] and hopefully they’ll be successful and just hopefully they’ll listen to some of the things I know if they’ll ever listen to this podcast. But if they do, hopefully they’ll take some of the things that I that I say to heart.

Speaker 1 [00:57:18] I predict they will both listen to this.

Speaker 2 [00:57:21] They may. Yes, I hope so. So so I was thinking, how would I end this? Yes.

Speaker 3 [00:57:28] And since I’m such a history guy. Yeah. And love Churchill,

Speaker 2 [00:57:34] I thought maybe one of his

Speaker 3 [00:57:36] inspiring phrases

Speaker 2 [00:57:40] and he was such

Speaker 3 [00:57:41] a wordsmith,

Speaker 2 [00:57:42] he said this. Is not the end, this is not the beginning of the end, but this is the end of the beginning. I just think of that, you know, how he put

Speaker 3 [00:57:58] those words together. Yeah, amazing. Or he said,

Speaker 2 [00:58:02] here’s the last one. So the

Speaker 3 [00:58:04] RAAF was trying to

Speaker 2 [00:58:06] hold off the WAFA

Speaker 3 [00:58:10] during the Blitz and pre blitz.

Speaker 2 [00:58:14] And he goes something like,

Speaker 3 [00:58:16] never in the course

Speaker 2 [00:58:18] of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few. So he’s talking

Speaker 3 [00:58:27] about the area, just

Speaker 2 [00:58:28] his, you know, just a short

Speaker 3 [00:58:30] little

Speaker 2 [00:58:31] pithy

Speaker 3 [00:58:31] things that for some reason for me,

Speaker 2 [00:58:33] just stuck with me. Right.

Speaker 3 [00:58:35] I still want to leave your audience

Speaker 2 [00:58:36] with

Speaker 1 [00:58:36] fantastic anchors. Exactly. Thank you, Michael, for coming in.

Speaker 3 [00:58:41] Great. Talk to you later. Bye bye.

Speaker 1 [00:58:48] Hey, I hope you’ve enjoyed this episode of the Go with John Show. Please subscribe on the podcast platform of your choice and keep up with our latest episodes and what’s going on with the show at Go with John Dotcom. That’s go with John Dotcom.