You Cannot Control The Change, Only Your Response

Pre-Show Setup And Laughs

Jacki Lutz 0:12

Do you feel like you're facing the wrong way? Should you turn your chair a little?

Matt Fowler 0:15

Which way am I supposed to be facing?

Jacki Lutz 0:17

Well, like towards us. I feel like you're facing like that way. Sorry.

Matt Fowler 0:21

We have to like let me move the whole table while I'm doing it. That would be ideal. All right. Start over. Yeah.

Jacki Lutz 0:27

Matt's out of frame.

Matt Fowler 0:28

You're welcome. I did everything wrong.

Jacki Lutz 0:30

The entire video is going to be like half of your.

Matt Fowler 0:32

Nothing's worse than that one video where we didn't have a table in front of us.

Jacki Lutz 0:35

Yeah. Which one?

Matt Fowler 0:38

When we did it with John Clements at the office. Oh, yeah. And my pants were a little tighter than they should have been for the angle that I was I was originally shot in. I was like, well, we're going to do a close-up. I don't think we need to do any kind of wide shots here.

Welcome And Guest Introductions

Jacki Lutz 1:00

Welcome to Auto Care on Air, a candid podcast for Curious Industry. I'm Jackie Lutz, Content Director at the Auto Care Association, and this is Carpal Conversations, where we collaborate on today's most relevant power skills. We are all headed in the same direction, so let's get there together. Welcome everybody to another Carpal Conversations. I'm Jackie Lutz, and I am here with two of our members, one of them being Matt Fowler. Welcome, Matt.

Matt Fowler 1:33

Thank you very much.

Jacki Lutz 1:33

He's a count executive at Pivotree.

Matt Fowler 1:36

Pivotree?

Jacki Lutz 1:37

Is it Pivotree or Pivot? No, it's just Pivotree. Who told me you do you say Pivotree sometimes? Somebody does. I did not make that up. And then Jeff Koviak, CEO of APSG.

Jeff Koviak 1:46

Thank you for having me. Welcome.

Jacki Lutz 1:48

Yeah. Um, you guys, uh Matt, do you want to just tell them a little bit about yourself?

Matt Fowler 1:53

Yeah. For anybody who doesn't know me, uh Matt Fowler. I am the former chairman of Yang. Uh I've worked for about three companies in the aftermarket now, starting with Snap36, where we had an exit. And then I went to a real estate company and we had an exit. Visual SKUs had an exit. And then now I'm with Pivotry just uh just as a regular account executive. When you say had an exit, so had we sold the company. So I was I kind of came in, ran sales, had a team of people, and then uh the goal was to to kind of sell the companies or exit, if you will. And then uh this company is different in the aspect of I'm just an individual contributor once again. Uh I wanted to kind of go back to my roots a little bit.

Jacki Lutz 2:30

Yeah, and um, something you're not gonna say about yourself, but I will, is that you are an impact award winner this year.

Matt Fowler 2:36

I am well deserved. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Jacki Lutz 2:39

How's it feel?

Matt Fowler 2:40

Good. Now I'm on the same plane as you, which is important. I mean, that's not you beat me by a couple of years, but I mean you're a couple years older, so it makes sense.

Jacki Lutz 2:49

Okay. Anyway, Jeff.

Jeff Koviak 2:51

Congratulations. Thank you very much.

Jacki Lutz 2:56

Moving on, um, Jeff, why don't you tell us a little bit about you?

Jeff Koviak 2:59

Yeah, just real quick. Uh I've been the CEO for APSG for about a year and a half now. APSG is the automotive um automotive services group, and that what's nice about that, it's basically the majority of the independent aftermarket warehouse distributors in North America. So there's 330 of them in Prano Network and the Alliance and Federated. So uh that's exciting to me. Uh something new over the last year and a half. Prior to that, I had a 31-year career with Drive and Teneco. So I started as a 21-year-old sales rep in Detroit selling Walker exhaust parts and worked my way through the fun and exciting organization and you know, worked my way up to where I had 2,500 employees and seven facilities. So it was a fun, exciting career, but it was kind of a natural fit to go over to APSG because we were their largest supplier. Uh, so I had strong relationships with the majority of the members, and so it worked out to be a great transition, but nothing but fun for me since graduating from Northwood.

Jacki Lutz 3:56

Yeah, and I think if anybody um has been in the aftermarket a little while knows that there was a lot of change uh to that company in those years. So we'll get to that and how you managed through that, which is the topic of our conversation today. But um, you were one of the uh profiles in leadership today. Yes. You did uh you spoke to the Yang group here at Auto Care Connect. How did that go?

Jeff Koviak 4:18

Uh everything was great. It uh was what I was open for. I just have so much respect for the Yang organization as a whole. I've been a uh sponsor of theirs and a fan of theirs since it started. I just think it's a phenomenal organization that our industry needed. And so I I just anytime they need any help from me, I'm there. Yeah. So it was good. But uh lots of questions after my uh discussion with them. So that means they were pretty engaged and it was uh I thought it was a good uh good two-way discussion.

Jacki Lutz 4:48

Yep. You know that when when I love when under 40s are in a in a conference because like it takes um it's kind of like the it feels like the cream of the crap a little bit because they're they're here because they want to learn and be better and be engaged and be a good leader someday, you know.

Jeff Koviak 5:03

Yeah, and that's really what a lot of my message was was, you know, luck has a lot to do with it, but luck is where preparation meets opportunity, and you gotta say yes more often to be involved at more places where opportunities happen, and then you need to be able to see the opportunity, and then you gotta seize the opportunity. So that was a lot of the message, is exactly what they're doing by being in that room today is doing a little extra effort to get more involved, and that's where big things can happen for them in their career path.

Jacki Lutz 5:32

Say yes more often, you might find yourself on a podcast.

Jeff Koviak 5:36

Exactly. Yeah, that's for sure.

Hiring Athletes And Motivation

Jacki Lutz 5:38

And I wanted to share a memory I have of you. One of my, I think, I think it had to be my second Yang conference. Uh, what year did we say? 2017 or something like that was what is what I mean. About 10 years ago. Yeah. About 10 years ago. About 10 years ago. Um, you spoke at Yang, and that was the first time I had heard your name. I was new-ish to the industry. I think I started in 2014. Um, but I I don't know why it stuck with me what you said, and it's not even that relevant to this conversation, but it just goes to show the impact you have on people. But and I was not a hiring manager at the time, um, but you said that you like to hire athletes.

Jeff Koviak 6:14

Yeah.

Jacki Lutz 6:15

Why do you like to hire athletes?

Jeff Koviak 6:16

Well, and uh, if I remember correctly, someone asked the question on what I look for in an interview. And so, you know, typically as I worked through, you know, my career, a lot of the resumes that made it to my desk, they were all good-looking, filtered resumes that on paper they should be hired. But the one thing for many, many decades that I shot for in an interview was to understand how motivated the individual was. Because, like in sports, you can't teach speed, you're either fast or you're not. And I say in business, you're either motivated or you're not. It's in your DNA that you have the fight to win, you have the fight to wake up every morning, you have the fight to work together and do the extra efforts. And so, you know, I always want to make sure people that were going to join our team were motivated, gonna be rowing the boat as fast as everybody else. And that I found typically that athletes in a lot of cases, especially athletes that did it for a long time and late into their life, that they were competitive people that fought to win. And so it wasn't a perfect correlation, but in general, you know, athletes excited me and in and how they competitive they were. And I thought that was important for our winning team.

Jacki Lutz 7:24

And I felt like I wanted to, I loved it because I was an athlete through high school, through well, actually, as long as I could be in sports and through college. Um, so obviously I was like, cool, I should be hired, and maybe I should highlight that on my resume a little bit. Yeah.

Matt Fowler 7:37

I remember always thinking that, and this was a mistake at the time, but I always looked for people who played team sports because I wanted you to be able to like work in a team and like understand things. And then, you know, later in my life, I've for some reason surrounded myself with marathon runners and like the focus you have to have to do those individual sports is just a whole different skill that I never considered. Like, yeah, it's just as just as important, yeah. But it was at the time because I was a team sport player, so I always just thought, well, that's learning how to play with the team and learning how to, you know, know when someone else needs to be the star and when you need to be the star was really important. But you know, even individual athletes on that plane, the focus that it takes to do that's insane.

Jacki Lutz 8:17

Yeah, and you have no one to blame, right?

Jeff Koviak 8:19

Well, and a lot of times they do have a team around them, yeah. You know, in a lot of cases or people that they run with. So I think, you know, marathon runners, uh, single sport athletes that are doing individual sports, that I think a lot of them they are very competitive, especially they do it for a long time in life. And you know what? You need a lot of in individual contributors that do big jobs that like being on their own. And you know what? There's spots for them, there's spots for the big teams. Um, but individual winners, there were certain individuals like that that I would like having on one big job because they could handle it all by themselves and they get it done. I totally agree with you.

Matt Fowler 8:58

Just heads down, and they're just I I mean, I couldn't personally I could not imagine running for four to five hours straight and just thinking to myself, this is fun. Yeah, absolutely not. I'm gonna do this voluntarily. I want to be with my thoughts for not only that, and then yeah, the only thing to not think about is how much it hurts. Yeah.

Jeff Koviak 9:17

Well, and I've always thought I don't really like driving a car for 26 miles. I'll let alone run.

Jacki Lutz 9:24

That's such a good point. So I a fun fact, I trained for a marathon twice. Um, and I trained up to 21 miles and 20 miles, and then got injured both times and never got to run the marathon. And if you run marathons, you like that's your last long distance run, and then you like rat rest for one or two weeks and then you do the run. So like I was there. And um, that was before you know Apple Music. So like you have that was like iPod days. iPod days. Oh my gosh.

Matt Fowler 9:53

You had your Walkman.

Jacki Lutz 9:54

So you have to come up with music for that much time.

Matt Fowler 9:57

I just see yourself singing to yourself as you're running.

Jacki Lutz 10:00

Yeah, you just find anything to think about. But anyway, our topic. Um,

Leading Through Acquisitions And Integration

Jacki Lutz 10:05

we were gonna talk about change management, and I feel like you're both so good for this. And I want you guys to quickly kind of run through in your career specifically, the amount of change you guys have either been through or led through.

Matt Fowler 10:20

Yeah, so for for me, it was in a couple of different places. I know when I was with Snap 36, moving from you know an individual contributor role to leading a team and ultimately being part of the executive team there, it there was a lot of change all of the time. I mean, it was a tech company, so tech was always on the move, and it was really important to kind of let everybody know what you were doing. And that was always the thing that I made sure we did. But then we had change uh at the next two companies as well as they got acquired. So, you know, once when a company gets acquired, naturally there's a lot of change, but you usually don't feel it day one, and then all of a sudden you look around, you're like, wait, none of this was the same as it was. And so those were kind of the two big experiences that I had was, you know, both from leadership perspective and then from being a part of a company that got acquired.

Jeff Koviak 11:07

Well, and I would also say by looking into your background a little bit, that the companies that you were with, they were the change to the industry, they were bringing new disruptive or opportunistic things and technologies uh to our industry. So, like as I was reading through it, I was like, You're the entire purpose of the corporations were changed to us.

Matt Fowler 11:29

Yeah, I mean, you know, especially the you know, 360 imaging was I mean, this was 2013 when I started with those guys, and nobody was doing it back then. Right. And then, you know, lo and behold, they were like, Well, you're from Michigan, so you like cars. And I went to my first automotive conference in 2014 and apparently never left.

Jeff Koviak 11:47

Yeah, and now it's the norm in the industry, and now everybody does it, which is awesome.

Matt Fowler 11:51

That's been a blast to be a part of, and you know, diving in, writing standards for different things and things of that nature is what kind of drives that along. And people just it's easy to be like, Well, I have something cool and new, everybody should do it. And then you realize, well, actually, you have to go through all of these background steps of like, we got to talk to these people, and if these guys like it, then it'll encourage this team to do it, and just kind of mapping all of that out is really tough to do. But once you do it, it's really fun to watch all the pieces kind of come together. Yeah, I bet.

Jacki Lutz 12:20

Yeah, what about you, Jeff?

Jeff Koviak 12:21

Yeah, for me, I mean, later in my career, I did deal with some big changes. I mean, as you talked about, Tenek went through a lot of changes, but I'd say the big step change uh change management activities I had to do was one when I went from being a commercial sales manager of 250 employees to the next day becoming the VPGM of 2,500 employees and shop floor manufacturing plants. Um, so that was wild and awesome, and I loved getting into the plants to understand that side of the business. Um, I did that for three years, and then we bought Federal Mogul. So, you know, when we bought Federal Mogul, that immediately took Teneco and we over doubled our size of our aftermarket business. We went from two brands to 31 brands. The complexity was drastically changing. But the integration process that I was on the team of that did that was, you know, that was an awesome process of hey, our our CEO put us in a boardroom and said, This team, you've got 90 days to basically organize the go-to-market strategy for a you know a multi-billion dollar startup company. You guys have a white paper clean sheet opportunity here to do what it's what we need to do to succeed going forward. That was probably the biggest change management process I went through. And then a few years later, Apollo bought Teneco and took us private. So then we went from a public company with public priorities and chasing the quarter to a longer term view on investment and you know ROI and things of that nature. So those were kind of the big ones in my late career that were all fun, exciting. And I always say if you uh, you know, if you look at every change opportunity as an opportunity when a lot of other people typically are naysayers about change and push back on change that you know, hopefully that's your competition that you're gonna get an advantage on.

Matt Fowler 14:15

From the sales side, I find like how crazy was it going from the chasing the quarter to being able to think long term? Because I as a salesperson, I know that they're dramatically different ways to approach sales. Yeah. So like, how did you drive that boat? Because that's got to be something that I mean, salespeople are inherently um, they liked what they're doing.

Jeff Koviak 14:36

And so yeah, and I think what what I saw was so there was a true public quarterly chase of a publicly, you know, New York stock exchange type company, and then it was exposed. It wasn't that there was less pressure on hitting sales numbers for uh our owners who were phenomenal owners and they invested in growth, and it was very appetizing for you know a sales guy to get resources that I hadn't been able to get for the prior few years while we were in the process of of selling. So, you know, it's just things change and evolve, and um there's pros and cons to everything, but it ended up being exciting, but it wasn't that the intensity slowed down.

Jacki Lutz 15:20

These are it's so good because these changes I think are very relevant today. So much acquisitions, like you know, it seems like every time you look at the you know, industry news, there's a new acquisition, and there's just so many people uh going through this kind of stuff right now, and a lot of them are the under 40 crowd. Um, and you know, this this skill I think is huge. When I was under my still under 40, but when I was under 30, when I was under 30, um, my the company I worked with got acquired. And I remember there was there was a very much a shift in people, and there was like 50% of the people were like run, you know, and then 50% of the people were like, and I was part of this 50, where it's like, this could be a huge, this could be a great opportunity. This could be, you know, it's it's kind of scary. You don't know what's gonna happen, what changes are gonna uh take place, but it could be good, you know, more like the optimistic side. Um and uh there's a lot of I don't know, a lot comes out of or a lot of what's the word, like honesty, I guess, honest um mental like the I guess you can't hide your mentality in in like a when you feel like it's like a fight or flight kind of feeling.

Jeff Koviak 16:34

Yeah, but uh it is a mindset. And I mean when you look at change as opportunity and you get to take everything that you learn in history, make be a part of the changes, which is fun and exciting, and then set yourself for a bright brighter future. I mean, how would you not want to be in that position? But I think the key thing is you just gotta communicate it well so that everybody throughout the organization understands is that gonna go back. But in general, it's uh it's exciting times, but um you know there's so many different types of change. You gotta tell me, Phil. But uh there's so many different types of change, big and small, even throughout those big changes. And it's not just one thing.

Jacki Lutz 17:18

Yeah, that's a great point. The micro and macro changes. Um, and how how uh how do how do how do you approach that as a leader, I guess? Let's start with like a leader mindset. You know your people are probably Yeah.

Matt Fowler 17:32

I mean, when we got purchased, the the the semi-differences is that we were a very small company getting purchased by a very big company. So everyone was afraid of like, well, they have these roles, they don't need us. And you kind of forget sometimes that, well, they bought the company because the company has something to offer. And in a lot of cases, it's the people is a big piece of that. And you are the experts in the that part of the business now, and they're looking to have you guys train everybody else, and it kind of puts you in a new spot if you're willing to kind of expand your mindset a little bit and understand, hey, you know, there's an opportunity here where I can be, I can now be a leader because while I knew this inside and out, these guys don't know anything about it, but they just bought us. And so when I was talking to my team, because that everyone was afraid, right? Everyone's like, well, great, we know what's gonna happen, especially because we're salespeople. It's a it's a particular skill set that salespeople have. And it's like, well, yeah, but you guys know so much more about what we're doing than they do, that you guys can work together. And if you learn from each other, the best are gonna rise to the top every time. And it's gonna be, it was, you know, encouraging people to work with the new people and work with their new peers as opposed to kind of seeing them as who's gonna replace me. And you know, that's that's the first mindset that I felt like a lot of people went to. And so it's important to kind of step back from that and be like, instead, where do I get to go? How can I make my mark here as fast as possible? You know, you always want to be as indispensable as quickly as you can whenever you're getting into a new company, whether it's being acquired or you're just starting, right? So that was always my big encouragement for people, was just like pay attention. There a lot of announcements are coming out. Take the time to read them because this is, you know, when a big corporation comes in, a lot of times, mass communication is the only way to talk when you've got thousands of people to say something to. So getting used to that versus like a one-on-one conversation was uh definitely a challenge for people. But over time, I can see that.

Jeff Koviak 19:24

Yeah, and it's got to be organizational. So, I mean, on a big change like us, you know, buying Federal Mogul and integrating the two companies, it was very purposeful that I thought was genius by our CEO at the time, Brian Kessler. But he he said, hey, he said to this integration team, this is a merger, this is not an acquisition. Like the goal out of this thing, you can do whatever you want from a staff and structure perspective, but 50% of the people on the go forward organization are gonna be from one side of the business, and 50% are gonna be by the other side of the business. So that answered some of those fears on who's gonna take my job, where yeah, we ended up having to cut more from one side of the house than the other to get it to 50-50. But going forward, everybody felt pretty equal in that there were so many tribal knowledge best practices opportunities. They were both good companies, and it wasn't big or small, you know, big versus small. It was hey, these are two big organizations that do a lot of things really well. How can we take the best practices from each and be that much better going forward? So, but then you got to communicate it because I think the hardest thing, what I found through some of these change management things is hey, you know, the the leadership teams are are very up to speed on the plan and why and um where we're going. The issue is getting it downstream and that it is difficult to communicate through thousands of people where everybody's comfortable and they have an opportunity to ask questions because that's really where you solve the big issues. But if it's a corporate approach to it, it you you can pull it off.

Communication That Beats Us Vs Them

Jacki Lutz 21:01

It's tough because um there it's it's very easy to develop kind of an us versus them mentality when it's a giant company and they kind of refer to it as corporate, right? Like they're corporate, we're not, um, so everything's coming from corporate, right? So how do you avoid how do you avoid that kind of attitude? Because in in my experience, that's that's a very toxic uh way. And like honestly, I think companies are gonna be looking for the employees that are on board, right? And if they do have to make some decisions, they're not gonna treat the toxic ones.

Jeff Koviak 21:37

There's a lot of humans out there that love to live life off, worst case scenario. And I like to live in optimism, it's just a different place, and so I'm not saying we just weed those people out, but in general, over time they find out they're not really a part of the mindset that we're looking for for the winning culture that we want this organization to become. So they either weed themselves out or you know, you end up getting people that fit in with uh the the go forward plan. But it's it's it's too bad that there's so much of society that lives off worst case scenario. But it's optimism and happy places is just such a better place to go to work. And it's like, why would you want to make things feel worse when you go to work every day when you have so many bright things to be happy with uh and look forward to that it makes it not even feel like a job.

Jacki Lutz 22:30

Yeah. Absolutely.

Matt Fowler 22:32

I mean, that's one of the four agreements. If you if you guys ever read that book, it's just always assume positive intent. Just if you just assume people are trying to help, you know, and even if you're on the lower end and you are getting told, like, well, this is what corporate says, continue to ask questions. Because there's sometimes where the management does also doesn't know and they didn't think to ask the question because it didn't affect their day-to-day as much as it does yours. And don't feel like you can't ask questions. You know, you're always allowed to ask more and continue to be curious because that's what's going to help you to be more informed than the next person and to continue to grow. And then if you are in those middle management positions where you've got a team of like, we don't know where we're going, avoiding saying this is coming from corporate and being like, This is a team, we're working together. Here's where we're going, here's where the ship's trying to get to, as opposed to that part of the ship wants to go there. And so the people that are in those positions end up being extremely important because they're the ones who communicate to the masses more so than the guys on very top. Those guys set the stage, but like it's the people that have the teams of 10 and 15, and all of a sudden they've got to spread it out into those individuals and get them on board. And you know, coming at it from a well, this is what they told me I had to do kind of perspective is never going to get the team to be like rally behind you.

Jacki Lutz 23:44

Right.

Matt Fowler 23:44

And if your team's not rallied behind you, then who is?

Jacki Lutz 23:47

Yeah.

Jeff Koviak 23:47

Yeah. And you know, two things on that. One is some of these smaller teams throughout the organization are the ones that are communicating to the customer. So that's why they're extremely critical on clearly understanding the message and the strategy. But it it's it's interesting when when you think about that whole uh process of of change management that communication's key and it's hard to do, but it it can be done because if you don't do it, the person communicating your message and strategy is the negative one. And so that's why if you don't own it, you're gonna lose it.

Matt Fowler 24:24

Yeah, I mean, and it'll be it'll be the companies that manage that process that continue to succeed because if you can't if you're trying to merge two teams together and you can't clearly tell them both where you're trying to get to and get them to believe it, then it's gonna be really hard to make that happen. Yeah, absolutely.

Why Uncertainty Hits Hardest

Jacki Lutz 24:43

Yeah, so you guys know I did a survey um on LinkedIn with our membership, and uh I asked, when your company or the industry suddenly makes a change, what's hardest to adapt to? And the four choices were learning new tools or skills, which I feel I remember when we got acquired, it was like a new HR platform, a new, you know, way to do your expenses, a new like just like you had to learn all this software at once, or you know, do a new, you know, skill set, things like that. Shifting responsibilities. So you used to be in charge of this, now you're in charge of this. Uncertainty about the future, and then moving targets and goals. So which one do you guys think was ended up being the top?

Matt Fowler 25:58

I would have to assume it would be moving your targets and goals.

Jacki Lutz 26:04

Okay.

Matt Fowler 26:04

And I think that's the uncertainty of the future.

Jacki Lutz 26:07

Yeah, it was well, they were both very close. So uncertainty of the future was the biggest, but 39% moving targets was 36%. But what you guys are saying is like this communication piece, right? And it's funny because we just heard Jay Bear talk and he talked about uncertainty and how that is so much harder for us to deal with these days than it was right several decades ago before Google. Yeah. Um, so I just think that that's so relevant. And there was a couple people that commented that I wanted to share what they said. So Randy Buller, um, he's the chairman of the board of the Parts Authority, he said, Great topic. I sometimes say I'd rather have the certainty of pain than the pain of uncertainty.

Jeff Koviak 26:46

I like that. I thought that was pretty good. And he would know because he's done so many acquisitions as such a consolidator that he's had to deal with change for the teams he's acquiring. And he's done a phenomenal job at it.

Jacki Lutz 26:58

So Yeah.

Jeff Koviak 26:59

Yeah, he would know.

Jacki Lutz 27:00

I think it's I think it's it's kind of like what you I mean, I was thinking about it when you were talking earlier. And in um, you know, I would rather know, like, yes, there are gonna be changes down the road, and it could be personnel. I'd rather know that that is the case than for that to happen one day and nobody knew about it and it just took everybody by surprise.

Jeff Koviak 27:19

That's how you earn credibility. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Jacki Lutz 27:22

And a little like instills a little bit more trust. Um, Darcy Kieran, uh CEO of Highline Warren, we've also done quite a few mergers and acquisitions. Um, it's never the change that gets people, it's the uncertainty, lack of communication, and not having clearly defined rollout.

Jeff Koviak 27:39

Exclamation point.

Jacki Lutz 27:41

So there was a lot of really good comments on that. And it just seems like the the common denominator could really come down to um a little bit of empathy for the people going through the change, you know, and that aren't in the big board meetings and don't see the future. There's something about communicating the vision, yeah. You know, helping people see where we're trying to get to, um, kind of making them more like cheerleaders behind it.

Jeff Koviak 28:09

Yeah. And and I mean, we're doing a lot of talking about like big drastic changes, but you know, I think probably something that people live with every day and don't even know it is all the little changes that they manage through on a daily basis. And, you know, it could come from anywhere, personally, professionally, but you got still need to deal with it. But, you know, I we just can't forget when the world is moving so fast, there's changes every day that we need to navigate. And it really, again, comes down to a mindset that hey, what change is coming today and how am I going to make tomorrow better? And uh sometimes they're quick decisions and sometimes they only involve you. It might not be a big team, but you know, this whole change management is uh important to get it right.

Matt Fowler 28:53

Well, I think that we've two have been talking a lot about what the people making the changes can do. But you know, on the flip side, there's an entire group of people that are having to go through it. Yeah. And so that's where it's, you know, continuing to encourage people. If you're not getting any communication or you're uncertain, it's always fair to ask. Like it's never unfair to ask, especially when big changes, small changes, when things are changing and you don't know for sure where you're going, ask because there could be a way they think they're telling you exactly what like in their minds, they've explained everything perfectly and you should understand it. Everything's good. And if you don't understand and you don't ask the question, you're gonna be like, I have no idea what's going on. Right. But it is what it is, and you know, having that mentality of like I'm allowed to ask the questions, you know, everyone has that right as those changes happen, and it's important to keep that in mind, I think.

Jeff Koviak 29:43

And having an environment that encourages that. Yeah, you know, that's critical. Open door policy, and you know, if something's on your mind, let's talk about it. It's that simple.

Jacki Lutz 29:52

It's such a good point. So when we say change management, you know, you might automatically think like, oh, how does a leader manage change,

Extreme Ownership And Player Coaches

Jacki Lutz 29:59

right, within a team? When really it's, you know, the only thing you really have control of over at the end of the day is yourself, right? So there's so many people, especially in the you know, under 40 audience who aren't necessarily in those management roles and they can only control themselves. So staying calm and really trying to think optimistically and and you know, asking the questions and and things like that, being being the person that's on board, yeah, you know, and trying to, you know, get everybody else on board, being that person on the team, that's really good practical takeaways.

Jeff Koviak 30:31

And it goes along with a big debate when some of these changes were going on on uh trying to manage it, you know, through a pandemic and when there's people are not together in person. Yeah. I mean, there's certain things that are very effective online, there's certain things that are very not effective, you know, like a strategy sessions or something where you're trying to instill culture. So it was just other things you gotta balance. You gotta make the best of it, but it it it made a difference.

Jacki Lutz 30:59

Yeah. Yeah, well said.

Matt Fowler 31:01

Yeah, and definitely, you know, like you said, the there was another book. I always turn book to books, but extreme ownership was one that I really liked. And that was that kind of like if you don't know, it's on you, go figure it out and kind of don't wait for everybody to kind of carry you along. And it's gonna be the people who step up and try to push people and try to get going that are gonna stand out the most in these times. Because if you're just waiting and you don't know, then that's on you at that point. And if you just think of it that way as opposed to it's their job to inform me, um, I feel like you're gonna set yourself up for a lot more success. And it's another way to stay positive because you are getting informed. You are, you know, there isn't uncertainty. Even if you don't get the answer you wanted, at least you know. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the known is much better. Yeah, yeah, it's always better to know something. Yeah.

Jacki Lutz 31:47

Extreme ownership is a great book. I do recommend it. I destroyed it with like notes and like I usually fold corners and things. That book was like destroyed by the end because it was really, really good.

Matt Fowler 31:56

I'm just picturing you just shredding it, just painting the pages around a wall.

Jacki Lutz 32:03

Um, believe it or not, I know it goes by fast. Uh, but let's just kind of wrap it up and kind of go around the room and give, you know, if if people could take away one thing from this conversation, what do each of us hope that that is, Jeff?

Jeff Koviak 32:16

Yeah, I just think change is good, you know, having an open mind and an opportunistic mind. I just uh you only get so many times in life on certain things like this to hit the reset button and again take history, evaluate it. How do you make the future brighter, especially when you can do it for many people in an organization that I just think those that embrace change in a strategic and optimistic way are gonna be that much farther ahead of the competition? And you know, winning is fun to do as a team, and that's a good way to start, especially with expecting that change is gonna keep coming faster and harder than ever before.

Jacki Lutz 32:53

Yep.

Matt Fowler 32:55

Yeah, and just be ready for it. I mean, the big thing for me is always, you know, back to the extreme ownership side of it is like you're the only the only person we talked about earlier, the only person you can control is you at the end of the day and the attitude that you bring to the table and how you react to things. You can't control what happens to you, but you can control how you react. And so making sure that when these things do happen, you're stepping up and not stepping back, and you're kind of making sure that you're pushing forward because change is inevitable. So you you might as well roll with it and see what, see what fun you can have with it because you're gonna go through it anyway, so you might as well have fun doing it.

Jacki Lutz 33:29

Yeah.

Matt Fowler 33:30

100%.

Jacki Lutz 33:31

Yeah, and and mine, I think, is really just um, it's just I think from the theme of today, it just feels like with the, you know, working with Jay Bear a little bit today and listening to his keynote, um, he talked a lot about human skills and how with everything with AI, it's just gonna become more and more important to have the right humans on your team, right? And this is an area where I think young um leaders can really stand out when there's you know turbulence at work or something happens and there's just a lot of change. Being the person who's, you know, you don't have to lead to be influenced, right? You can like lead the people around you by showing them that optimism is a choice. Yeah. And that if you're excited about, you know, the changes that are happening, maybe other people will be excited too. And that is the person that is gonna win in this new world that we're living with in, you know, the person that can I totally agree.

Jeff Koviak 34:26

And I I think people underestimate the value of player coaches, you know, like when you think of a Michael Jordan or a Tom Brady, they were on the field, they had a coach, they had a leader, but it was the ones that held the team accountable on the field that helped them be dynasties, basically. And that's what you're referencing there is being a strong player coach in the middle of a team that holds people accountable and can helps control the attitude. And that's where they are critical, and that's where they're gonna get noticed.

Jacki Lutz 34:56

Yeah. And I love that you just ended with an another athlete uh, because now we can bring it full circle. Yeah, there we go. That was perfect. Well, thank you guys so much for this conversation and sharing your guys' insights. This was incredible.

Matt Fowler 35:08

Thanks for having me. Thank you for having us, Jax. Appreciate it.

Jacki Lutz 35:11

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Auto Care on Air. Make sure to subscribe to our podcast so that you never miss an episode. And don't forget

Final Takeaways And How To Subscribe

Jacki Lutz 35:18

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