Leadership Espresso with Stefan Götz
In a world of constant change and complexity, true leadership isn’t about control— it’s about curiosity, clarity, and courage. Join Executive Coach Stefan Götz - www.stefan-goetz.com, as he helps accomplished leaders unlock their authentic leadership compass, inspire peak team performance, and achieve sustainable success—without sacrificing life beyond work. Whether you’re a seasoned executive or an emerging leader, this podcast will equip you with the mindset, strategies, and tools to lead with confidence, purpose, and impact.
Leadership Espresso with Stefan Götz
The Next Wave in Business Requires Partnership, Not Competition ⎪ feat. Dr Spezzano, CEO & Founder of Pschology of Vision
What if the greatest crisis of our lifetime is actually the catalyst for the transformation we've been waiting for? Dr. Chuck Spezzano, author of over 50 psychology books and global business leader, reveals how COVID-19 presents a pivotal moment for visionary leadership.
"When a big wave is coming, turn your ship into the wave instead of getting hit broadside," Dr. Spezzano advises. This powerful metaphor frames our conversation about the fundamental shift in business – moving from competitive independence to cooperative interdependence. While many leaders respond to crises by doubling down on old strategies, true visionaries recognize this moment as an opportunity to birth something entirely new.
The path forward requires more than strategic planning. Dr. Spezzano shares a practical meditation technique for clearing mental clutter to access genuine vision and creative solutions. "In about 15 to 20 minutes, your mind will be like this quiet, placid lake, and then that's when you ask: let my purpose be given, let the way forward be shown."
Surprisingly, personal relationships emerge as crucial to business success. "At the heart of every problem you have, there's a relationship problem," Dr. Spezzano reveals, citing a study showing Fortune 500 CEOs share three traits: good personal partnerships, belief in a higher power, and time for regeneration. This understanding extends beyond personal relationships to how businesses relate to communities and the world.
Throughout our conversation, Dr. Spezzano interweaves powerful stories – from the Japanese CEO whose company performed best when he stepped away, to the Taiwanese businessman who refused to accept "impossible" limitations during a crisis. These examples illuminate what's possible when leaders embrace partnership, generosity, and unwavering confidence that "there must be a better way."
Join us for this profound exploration of leadership during global upheaval. Subscribe to Leadership Espresso for more conversations that challenge conventional thinking and inspire transformative action.
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https://www.youtube.com/@Stefangoetz_Global_Leadership/videos
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https://www.linkedin.com/in/stefangoetz/
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https://www.stefan-goetz.com/
Welcome everyone to another episode of the Leadership Espresso podcast, and this time I'm actually thrilled to have a mastermind on the show. It is Dr Chuck Spitzano. He is author of over 50 books around psychology and a deep understanding how the human mind and brain and the heart works and, above all, he runs a huge business, a global business, on things that really truly matter to everyone out there. He met billionaires, so he is the person to talk about the current situation of COVID-19. And thank you, chuck, for taking your time and sharing your energy, your wisdom, which is a vast wisdom, and a big hi to Hawaii.
Speaker 2:Aloha it's good to be here with you.
Speaker 1:Yes, I really, really appreciate that and I think from this podcast, people all over the place in business can take away a lot. So I'm promising a lot and let's start right away your first book, or any of the books, somehow, of the books that somehow start with what happens when shit happens, or what do we do, or you know, and we are in such a situation right now. So, chuck, where are we and where we do we go from here?
Speaker 2:so. So the first thing to know is that this is a big wave coming at us and a lot of businesses are right on the edge. And it's important, when a big wave is coming, to turn your ship into the wave instead of get getting hit broadside. And so it's like having that positive attitude about going through this, trusting yourself, having confidence in yourself and the unfolding, and giving it all right into the heart of this wave that's coming at us.
Speaker 2:Jung once said the only way to get through something is to go right into it, otherwise it holds on to us. And you know, I've been predicting for years that what our generation came for was to move from exaggerated independent, from exaggerated independent. This is a whole new way of doing business, because basically, many companies are just built for success and money and things like this. But now we need to take a look at a ecologic point of view and I don't mean just the environment, though I do mean that also but to take into account, you know, the, the owners, the workers, that everyone and to move to a different form of business that would be interdependent.
Speaker 1:Now, yeah, you know, um, I take your metaphor with the ship, you know, and that we put the ship into the right direction and you know, it looks like we have either COVID behind us or we're in the midst of COVID COVID. So the metaphor with the ship is most captains, most CEOs, would believe they put their ship in the right direction, and yet we all know that's not true, because we wouldn't have this crisis if it was in the right direction.
Speaker 2:No, it's like this crisis is something that, collectively, we have come to deal with. If we made a collective promise to get to partnership and we've been lagging sadly behind, then this is actually a way of forcing us to see a different way of doing things, to do things from a cooperative point of view rather than just competitive point of view, and that's a major shift, because we all grew up competitively, even from our very first families, so it's like how to graduate, and so when you have a collective issue that contains the whole earth, it's like now it's time to really reflect on what's going to work. Stefan, if I asked you, what if COVID is here at the same level or worse, in a year? What happens to business?
Speaker 1:I guess in a year's time, if we have a second wave, like we did in Germany. We had a lockdown for a couple of months and it was devastating to most businesses, but having a second lockdown, this would be the end. I mean serious.
Speaker 2:In the States they say we haven't even finished the first.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you have a different president, yes, we do.
Speaker 2:Sorry for that. Yeah, you know, it's like he's. He seems to be really gung ho for business and business leaders, but the problem is he's trying to do it the old way and that's not going to work. What happens if, covid, in two years, we have a?
Speaker 1:global breakdown and wars are going to start. Civil wars will start. I don't want to even think about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, how about three years?
Speaker 1:Big wars are starting. Many people are losing.
Speaker 2:So let me tell you a quick story. I had a promoter of mine in London about 20 years ago actually 30 years ago and she also brought in someone who would hypnotize a whole group of people and take them into the future. And 250 years from now, the headlines were catastrophic, almost cataclysmic, almost cataclysmic, and the earth was just disintegrating. And so I said you know, this can all change. Even though everybody was coming back with the same headlines, I said, just, you know, have him do some healing. You know, have him do some. He's a, you know, he's a change agent. But it's not all dark. So he went, so she went in, suggested that to him. He did a simple healing exercise in the present for the future. Then he hypnotized people, took them into the future and all the headlines had changed. They were all positive headlines. They were all positive headlines. So we're working now, and we're working not only for ourselves, but we're working for everyone, especially as business leaders. Absolutely true.
Speaker 1:And how do, how do we make this wave, this movement, this change, sustainable? I don't if most people you talk to they say yeah, yeah, I understand we need to shift, and then the next day they do exactly the opposite. So how do we? Is this the political leaders? Is this the bottom up change? Is this a grassroots movement? Or I mean, everybody knows it's going to be catastrophic if we don't change.
Speaker 2:So, yes, and as leaders, as business leaders, we're called to be change agents. But if we're unwilling to change ourselves and change the way we think, change our relationships, then our ship is sunk. The way we think, change our relationships, then our ship is sunk. 20 years ago, I predicted that if the world is to be saved in this century, it will be done through business. So we have a very important part, and I predicted that in 40 years so 20 more years the world would be run not by national governments, but and not the huge, you know businesses that are spanning the earth and can be more repressive even than our governments. So we need, you know, visionary business business.
Speaker 2:Um I, the next week I talked to a friend of mine who was in a think tank, a real prestigious think tank in london, and she said what we got is that business will be running things in 30 years. So that's 10 more years. So it's time to either get ready and be that visionary change agent or change our underwear, because it's going to be one or the other. Yeah, so the first step yeah.
Speaker 2:The first step is letting go of what we're holding on to, the old way of thinking how our businesses used to be six months ago. It's a much different world and if we don't let go, we'll be holding on, and it's like trying to hold sand in your hands. The tighter you grab it, the more it runs out.
Speaker 1:I fully agree, chuck, and my perception about the situation is that most business leaders at least in Germany they haven't learned the lesson, because what they do now is, every year before they just put an extra 10% in their excel sheet, in 10% by revenue. That was their strategic planning. Now this year, I thought the CEOs would rethink the business model entirely. No, what they do is rescaling. They double down by 10%. They do the same exercise, they just double down. So how can we inspire?
Speaker 2:what does it take that people have the vision or the courage or whatever is necessary to say okay, I'll stop the reflex of doing things the same way and we change, I change so if we're willing to let go of how business has been and open our mind, then what happens is new ways of thinking, new ways even for the transition to go from how we are now to how it's going to be. One thing that seems for sure is that it's going to need a lot more cooperation. Cooperation, true. You know, one of the founding fathers of the US, when there was the American Revolution, said you know, if we don't hang together, we'll certainly hang separately, we'll hang apart.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And this is what's called for. It's like how to change how it's been to what it's going to be, that is, that deals with the people that work for us, that deals with our community. That actually is basically working together with our communities and working worldwide. You know, contribute locally, think globally, but people, if you're holding on to the old ways, it's like you could just let that go. You could just let that go.
Speaker 2:It's like, from what I've seen and this whole sociological, this whole social shift that's going on, it's like if we don't go with the wave and we could surf, in Hawaii we say the waves never stop, so you might as well learn to surf. Of course. In Hawaii we say the waves never stop, so you might as well learn to surf. Of course the surfers also say if it swells, ride it. That's the way a true businessman thinks. Right, you know, just. So. It's what this is. It will be something that the whole community supports and the worker will support to get to the, so that the company would be like a, a football team. You know, everybody's working together because our lives depend on it, because our lives depend on it, because our children depend on it. So how to go from a change agent which is what, as leaders, we're called to be to a visionary.
Speaker 1:Now, what it would mean is that you're willing to go through emotional births yourself, and to realize, like, if you woke up, stefan, in the middle of the night and you were giving birth to a baby, what would you think is happening to you? I'd be overwhelmed, right, I'd be freaking out Right.
Speaker 2:All of a sudden there's all this pain and what's happening to me? You know? You think somebody had come in to change your transmission probably more than that but actually it's a place where this is a birth.
Speaker 2:But if you don't see it as a birth, it's a death part of our mind, the destructive part of our mind, that the repressive part of our mind might as well give up. There's no hope. But that's not the way of our creative mind, which is actually in touch with heaven. And heaven wants us to succeed and leap forward, and that's what vision produces the positive future, comes into the present and shows the way forward.
Speaker 1:So, Chuck, how can we inspire our leaders to open up to that visionary state, to open up to what wants to emerge, to what wants to unfold? How do we get from here to the other place?
Speaker 2:there 20 years ago. There there was a multi-billionaire who ran a company in Japan and what he would do? He would come into work, he would put the do not disturb sign on his door, he would put his feet up on his desk and he would just kind of wait for inspiration, even vision. And when his company did the best is when he went away. Now, he never wanted to go away because he was the CEO. He wanted to ride that horse, he wanted to ride that ship, and but when he came to a workshop was when his company did the best, and it was that he took his hands off and he let his team run the show and they were happy to perform, they were happy to do their best. What he was doing, he was healing, he was changing. That helped everything.
Speaker 1:I get the picture. My point is someone who has not had that experience. It's like driving a car. Tesla has built a car that's supposed to drive on its own, but it doesn't yet. And now, if you're the driver and somebody tells you, you just put off your hands, the car drives itself. They go nuts, they go crazy. So what are the steps that we can build in between? To inspire, to motivate, to seduce, to tell them listen, if you had this experience once, you'd be never missing it again.
Speaker 2:Okay. So there is one way, first of all, to clear the mind and imagine you didn't have these thousand thoughts going on in your mind, these worries, these cares, and actually worry is a place of self-attack. Okay, so you're attacking yourself, you're attacking your business, you're attacking the people you worry about. Who would guess that? Right, we think that's our job. I'm the CEO. I have to worry about everything. Nine.
Speaker 2:It's like what you're called for is to see the way forward in the midst of this typhoon, and the one way to do that is to sit quietly. It helps with your eyes closed, but it's not necessary. And every thought that goes through your mind you go. This thought reflects a goal that's keeping me from my purpose Now. My purpose as a business leader is vision. It's seeing a positive way forward. This thought, and now you'll have a thousand thoughts go through your mind, but each time you say that, it grabs onto the thought and it falls away. Now the same thought may come up, worse, because the worst thought was already there. So you just do it again. In about 15 to 20 minutes, your mind will be like this quiet, placid lake, and then that's when you ask on this clean mind, let my purpose be given, let the way forward be shown. It doesn't matter what the words are, it's that desire to find a better way for yourself, your family, your company, those you love. So it's like, and if you did that every day, your mind would get clear of the debris. Because all of those thoughts are from personalities and they're saying to succeed, go this way or that way or that way.
Speaker 2:And you know, you might have five great ideas out of 100, ideas that would look good but don't work. And that's where the world is now. And in some places, like some places in the US, it's much further back. But this is a place where we can take responsibility. We can clear our mind to see the way forward and guess what you know, to close your eyes and deal with your own mind. That can be anxious, but it gives you back your power. And I'm sure there's hundreds of ways, but this is one way I know to get your mind clear. So the creative ideas the creator created us creative. So we have that heritage, we have that within us. And so, as we clear our mind, that great, the great truths within us, the courage to give a birth. I mean it's like, yeah, we men, you know we're soldiers, but the women give birth. Which one do you think is scarier?
Speaker 2:giving birth yeah, would you want to put a? You take a uniform every day to giving birth. Now, this is a birth time for the planet and the more we as CEOs, the more we give birth to the future. It's to ourselves actually to find a better way, and it's crucial that our relationships be partnership with our wife or husband at home, because otherwise, you know, that's our ego. Whether you're fighting with your partner, because every fight has a delay, every fight is based on fear and you could just step beyond the fight and both of you get the answer. But most people, they want to be right and being right just hides where you feel wrong. The more people act like they're right we won't mention a few presidents like that but the more you act like you're right, the more guilt you feel and that's completely self punishing and self attacking and and all you get into is your ego's way of doing things and it doesn't want partnership. So, get your families in order, get your relationships in order, because let me tell you another quick story.
Speaker 2:Uh, it was five years ago in London doing a workshop that was mostly business leaders and at the end we had a panel of a woman whose husband had. There was the man they had running the company was trying to take over their company. And then there was another whose wife and her husband's company was going bankrupt. And then we had another business leader who had just lost 20 million pounds. So as we got talking with the panel, we found out that the women's husbands had been bad dogs. They've been out having affairs, things like this, and it came out that their wish was to punish their company in what their husband really held dear, which was his company, his baby, his thing. And this was their way of saying you've been a bad dog. And it was so evident to everybody in the room that their partner held the power and they needed that partnership to succeed. Now, within 10 minutes of the guy who'd lost 20 million pounds, it's like he had pissed off every woman in the room.
Speaker 1:I guess he would yeah.
Speaker 2:So you can guess Now, he wasn't having an affair, but he was so adamant about his way he wasn't listening, he didn't get it. So it's like, and the women were just the way he was acting and treating the women in general. They could imagine what his wife was like was feeling. Anyhow, he had lost 20 million pounds. He had lost 20 million pounds, so he got it. He got his mistake and in the next month he earned 30 million pounds. So your partnership is crucial.
Speaker 1:And that's where it starts.
Speaker 2:Now this could be good or bad news for some of the CEOs, but it's time to clean up your act. So I worked with one of the wealthiest men in China about 30 years ago and he was in the workshop and he was bragging about, you know, he had his wife, his main wife, and they had a couple other main wives, and then he had hundreds of girlfriends you know, all around China. And he was bragging because he could afford it. And I was smiling and I said you know, you're holding yourself back because you're wasting your creative energy. And he goes what he says I have one of the biggest companies in China. He said you know, everything's really successful. What else could I want? I said what you were meant for is to be one of the biggest companies in the world. You were meant for is to be one of the biggest companies in the world and by indulging yourself, you're wasting your energy. Your sexual energy is your creative energy. Your sexual energy can also be miracle energy, but willful people use it just for sex. So it's realizing. What's the difference when you know I'm using that sexual energy as a form of love rather than indulgence, and I can build with my partner. That's what happens with partnership? You build with it.
Speaker 2:A surprising thing that I share in my business workshops is the importance of their partner. 30 years ago, they did an interview with Fortune 500 CEOs and all 500 said these three things that were similar. One is that they had a good relationship with their partner, whether it was a husband or a wife, they had a really good relationship. The second one was that they believed in a higher power. Now, this higher power whatever you call it is working for you Too bad. You're not listening. You know heaven's, you know will. For you is total happiness. That means total success. That means you get the answer and you lead the way.
Speaker 2:So the next aspect is that it's take time for yourself exercise, sport, you know something. That's that's kind of need time to regenerate, cause if you're going all all out all the time, then what happens is you, you know you'll burn out and that's dead zone. That's not leadership. That's dead zone. That's not leadership. So how to get to this place of having this great relationship and using your partnership? Now, this is a time where a lot of partnerships not just companies, but a lot of partnerships are at risk, but there's ways to get through that. It's like I've written 14 books on relationships and it's how, at the heart of every problem you have, there's a relationship problem. You can't have a problem without a grievance. So it's like being able to change these things so that you naturally step forward. Change these things so that you naturally step forward. You don't take your way to your willingness. That brings the future to you and that cuts through this tremendous fear that's shackling the world to.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, I keep losing things. I'm really sensing a lot of wisdom and I'm feeling very peaceful. So this typically means that there's a lot of truth in what you say and I acknowledge that tremendously and I open up to. How can I, can we be of help to those leaders to get the turning point? But that's one way of putting it.
Speaker 1:But the other way I found and maybe you can give your observation on this up until a couple of months I thought, oh, covid-19, that's the worst that could happen. Then I found and I was complaining about it because the revenue drops and blah, blah, blah. But then I found isn't that exactly the time I am born for? Isn't that the truth? I wanted to be here because I wanted to shift. I wanted to chip for myself, for my fire, for my family, for my kids, for my company. I wrote a book about it the next wave in business. You know I waited for all that time. So I was, I shifted and said no, it's not the worst time, that's about the time. So how can we help people relate to shift the perspective and and bringing back the camera onto their own purpose, onto their destiny, onto why are they here now?
Speaker 2:It's not by mistake, it's by design. 22 years ago, working deep in people's minds and getting into the unconscious, the deepest part of the mind that's not spirit I found that we had all made this promise. Our generation had made this promise that we would take the world from this dissociated independence, competitive independence, into partnership and cooperation. So that was something that I saw 22 years ago. Now, what can you do? You can reinforce, learn how to strengthen your relationships, because your relationship, let's say, your wife, your relationship with your wife, that's the closest person to you and that will reflect the worst traps, but some of the best qualities also. So it's how to strengthen that, how to strengthen with your children. Remember you know they will choose the old age home you go into. So treat them well, be their partner, you know, have faith in them. And the second part is it's like in this world, besides strengthening partnership, it's being generous, being cooperative. It's like what could you do to give? In general, I got the message to give to the whole world. So once a month, I am doing just a two-hour webinar, free webinar for the world, so that people can move forward, and it's really kind for people in Asia, timing-wise, and Europe Not so good for North America, but it's like. You know, how could I be more generous? Who are the people around me that need help? Who are the people that need a word of encouragement to see a better way?
Speaker 2:One of the things that is now accelerating is I had set up a coaching service for executives, so I'm in the planning stages of providing that worldwide for families, for couples, but for business leaders, because they're the ones leading the way. A hundred years from now, it'll be Aboriginal people who have their relationships with nature and with all others, like in the Haida tribe in North America, they end every prayer with all my relations, meaning all people, all four-legged animals and nature itself, as well as the creator. So they recognize that. But we'll need that 80, 100 years from now. Right now, we need business to find the way. You're meant to be the, the, the, the cover, the cover girl for for business. Right now, stefan, you willing to be the cover girl? Yeah, Okay.
Speaker 2:How about, how about? Are you willing to be the centerfold, yeah, yeah, and to go? Here it is. Let's go, let's lead the way, let's find the way together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is the path I really enjoy. You know, maybe 20 years ago I thought it was all about me, I had to know the way, but the path let's play together and find out together. This is the part where I feel all the pressure kind of disappears and it's opening up and putting myself at service, you know. And well, jack, we could talk for hours.
Speaker 2:I want to tell you one more story, and it's the power of giving it all, because when you give it all, you receive it all, and that opens your mind to business. It's like you put it all on the line. 17 years ago I was doing a business workshop in Honolulu and there was a fellow from Taiwan and he talked about. In the flood that happened in Taiwan, his whole company had been flooded and his aluminum furnaces had been flooded and they stopped working. He called all the experts in the world and every expert said you can never restart an aluminum furnace. They're gone. You've lost it. Now he had 300 people working for him, 300 families depending on this company. So he decided there has to be a better way. I will not settle for this. This is not heaven's plan and it's not my true plan. I want the answer. And he stayed at his office and he slept at his office and he worked on this problem. He worked in spite of what all the experts says. In 30 days he had a way to restart the furnaces that everybody else had said was impossible.
Speaker 2:Vision is going. You know everybody says it's impossible, but you know there has to be a better way. It's like they they said. I remember when I was a kid they said nobody would. They scientifically proved nobody would ever run a four minute mile. We have all kinds of people running the four minute mile. We have all kinds of people running the four minute mile it's like.
Speaker 2:But you have that sense, that that rock hard confidence that heaven is working with you. So you know, if you know, if you knew who walked beside you, you wouldn't be afraid. And at the root of every problem there's a number of roots. But at the root of every problem there's a number of roots. But at the root of every problem there's fear. So heal the fear and the next step comes to you. And one way is to remember who walks with you. So it's like you know your angel is always there. I mean, psychology of vision is a transpersonal psychology. So we work with non-denominational spirituality. Your angels trying to guide you, trying to protect you, trying to help you. You know, and every time you know you listen to them, they get another feather in their wings. Right now, most of your angels look like supermarket chickens. You know, give them a break. You know they're. They're really embarrassed. So you know their their job is you. You know, listen up and and humor. You know it's, it's a time to really get the joke absolutely you know they're the.
Speaker 2:You know the humor creates flow and it and it's really necessary right now.
Speaker 1:Chuck, I really enjoyed every single minute of our dialogue, of our conversation. I know there's so much wisdom and experience with that and I'm so delighted that you open up so much on free webinars and that you plan on this executive coaching thing. I can highly recommend anyone. One hour of Chuck will be probably worth one year of business gained, even probably more. So I put it in the in the comment section I put your company website so people can contact you. And and you just nailed it to me in many ways, but one way I always remember remember there must be a better way, and I truly believe a lot.
Speaker 1:I and you know we have all our greater powers and higher minds with us this time. And thank you for being such a great lighthouse all the years I've known you now for 20 years or more. So, as it is a Leadership Espresso podcast, be inspired everyone what else? And comment, ask questions. I make sure they get sent over or we do another episode on all the questions that may arise. And next time, Chuck, I talk to Elizabeth McCourt about female leadership. She lives in New York and we will continue the path that we were actually taking because basically we were talking a lot about feminine energy. That's the receiving part, so I will continue that journey with a little bit. So thank you for today. Really appreciate it. You're such a great lighthouse to me and to lots of people out there my pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2:Thank you, stefan.