The Human Elements of Creativity, Popularity, and Parenthood Description: 

Paul Daly  0:55  

Morning Okay, we are coming in ridiculously ridiculously ridiculously ridiculously hot, we may actually have a spoken word performance about the remix event on May 9. But today we're talking about the human element. The people really want to know who it is. And I don't know about you. But sometimes, sometimes I go through the morning news. And I think all I hear is billions lost billions gained in inventory down, inventory up, things are good things are bad again and again and again. And I just get a little sick. Yeah, you're like, that's the difference.

Kyle Mountsier  1:42  

This person wrote this story. And this person wrote this story on the same day about the same thing. And they say totally opposite things. And I don't know where I land in the middle, huh.

Paul Daly  1:51  

I feel like every story has an equal and opposite story these days. Yeah, it doesn't feel like that. There's like we say every expert has an equal and opposite expert. Well, this expert says that expert says. But the one thing that is the common thread between all of these things are human things, right? The human element is this, this industry is intrinsically human, which is I think, why you and I just gravitate toward automotive, and so many other people do too, right? I mean,

Kyle Mountsier  2:18  

absolutely. Yeah. I think yeah, the the, and here's the thing I could do without all the rest of the junk. And this is, if all we if all it was about was like maintaining relationships with people really, really well. Right. And the rest of the junk kind of just fades to the background. It's

Paul Daly  2:38  

kind of like my perspective on broccoli. You're like, where is this going? It really is just a great delivery device for butter and sugar. I mean, salt, no sugar, butter and salt. Right? The auto industry is just a great delivery device for those human elements that we love so much. Yeah. And money. Delivery too much for money.

Kyle Mountsier  3:07  

The auto industry is a great delivery device for a lot of things. And for me, I mean, I'm going to get a little sentimental right now. The what it has meant for my family, right? I mean, I came out of college as a music major. And I mean, got married and had like 10 bucks in the bank one day. And we were wondering if we were going to overdraft and stuff like that, right. Let's do this. And I remember when the automotive industry, I was already in it, right. But there was there was someone in the automotive industry, a gentleman that took me under his wing, and showed me what it was like to be a professional in the automotive industry. And that has what has what has both accelerated my career, but also made me so passionate about this industry because I got an opportunity to see the whole industry in a different light, and then support my family. Build a family. I've got three kids that are growing up within the industry that all love automotive, they're like that my son one day was like that. You mean you can work underneath cars? Yeah, it was mine, right? Yeah, dude, you could roll that way. Oh, my daughter's like, I could sell a car right? She's an absolute like firecrackers. Yes, she could so she just like she can sell any she can sell a car now. i Oh, without a doubt I actually used to use that in training when I would lead training classes. I'm like, I could teach my daughter to do this. Why is everyone struggling? Come on now,

what's so beautiful about this industry is because like when you connect it to humans, which I hope that I've been able to do and want to continue to do further and what we're trying to do, like kids get excited about it. Your friends and family members get excited about it. All of a sudden everyone's asking you questions leaning in and that's what we're calling the rest of the industry to is like how do we get the people even just your your nucleus your Are the people that you're touching, touching base with on a daily, weekly basis to be excited about the industry because we've got 2.1 million people that have the opportunity to affect three to five pizza people each. And all of a sudden, we're at four to 5 million people overnight that think, hey, this, that is a great industry.

Paul Daly  5:20  

So today is bring your kids today work, I bring your kids to work day. Neither of us did that. Because that doesn't isn't very conducive things live streaming, right, whatever they like. And so I bet there are some, there are some some kids rolling around the dealership that aren't usually there. But the one thing about bring your kids to work today, it's like the auto industry automatically caters to that. I mean, it's a very generational business in general. And not only that, it is like a business that is really dedicated and focused on mentoring. Because we talked about this, the industry has no ceiling, but it also has no floor. So it really just lends itself to being an industry that allows people to come in, right, there's a really big wide door at the front of the auto industry. And everybody is welcome to come in, and has the same level of have the same level of upside, if they want to focus and pay attention. They're examples of that all over this country. So today's bring your kids to work day. So today for the show, we didn't want to focus on news, dollars and stock prices and supply chains, what we actually wanted to focus on a few things that really have to do with the human element of the auto industry and how we believe that is the core of why it has been successful, and especially why it will be successful now and generations in the future. And remember, we don't mean the automotive industry at large, we mean, franchise retail automotive dealers are the thing that we fall in love with right cars, or I'm not a big car

Kyle Mountsier  6:51  

guy. And the reason why we talk about the human element is that as the you the biggest and highest most valuable, unique selling point to every dealer, actually we talk about this a lot, we coach some dealers and do some consulting on the side, right. But when we talk about USPS right unique selling propositions of the dealership, it's like, okay, instead of looking at, you know, the free things you give away, right, instead of looking at, you know, oh, we can do online delivery, and all of these things that everybody's shouting from the rooftops like we can do from a technology or process perspective. What if you went in and said, Oh, because we're uniquely equipped to manage these relationships, because of these people internally, we that's our unique selling proposition. Because we have this element, this core people, this type of people, this, this, this generation, this, whatever it may be, that actually our people, if you emphasize that as your unique selling point, it becomes a lot easier because then your people get attached to it. That's right. You know, we

Paul Daly  7:53  

talk ed about dealers pushing back, right? And there's, there's always questions around that phrase, and we decide we're gonna talk about it more. But it really is this element of like, there are barbarians at the gate threatening and pushing, in trying to kick in the gate of all these things we're talking about that had been cultivated over generations and generations of building community and building family and giving, taking people from the bottom to the top in this industry. And so we say pushing back, we mean, the people banding together to say no, no, no, this is worth fighting for. Right? So when that gate gets pushed in, it's like, we're not just pushing back against the barbarians, but we're pushing through the door. And we're gonna go out there and show them how it's done. So we have,

Kyle Mountsier  8:32  

I'm gonna clarify real quick one thing, because we never do that. Sorry, I know, we've got some things about, but I'm all energized this morning. Right? When we say barbarians, that's an overarching term. And we're not just talking about like, a lot of people are like, Oh, they're just talking about Carvana. Or they're just talking about Tesla. And that's not the case. Actually, there are some really, really great things about that. Well, there there are some things that are barbaric about that, that part of the industry coming in, and what what it has the capacity to do to the retail franchise, but the other part of barbarians at the door or other market forces, right. Things like pandemic things like chip shortage, things like the way that the stock market is interacting the way that OEMs are looking at the direct to consumer. All of those things compile to be

Paul Daly  9:19  

the Oracle barbarians. Exactly. Good clarification. We haven't ever talked about that good clarification, and you know, barbarians, one of the real key elements of a barbarian like, they don't care at all about what you've built over generations, they don't care. But there's a lot to learn from barbarians. Like look at that trivia. Che we need one of those?

Kyle Mountsier  9:36  

Absolutely. There's a lot to learn from barbarians. Actually, probably if you pay close enough attention to them. You can learn the most from them because there's a sharp iterative, they're the most entrepreneurial, right? Whether it be if they're the most real time because the the market forces are acting right now instead of like on historical data,

Paul Daly  9:57  

right? And they're typically the most creative because they're playing with a different skill set, speaking of being creative,

Kyle Mountsier  10:03  

Come on stop segue.

Paul Daly  10:09  

Man, I just it just came to me. That's how we're gonna get into the article that was strong. That was right. So a study was just released in the Journal of the journalist called nature and very respected human behavior journal, that video meetings versus in person meetings actually cramp creativity. And this might not sound like a big surprise, like, oh, you can be more creative if you're in person. But the reason that you're more creative, when you're in person versus being virtual is not what everyone expected. So, basically, I'm reading from the article, a Wall Street Journal article, video meetings, dampened brainstorming, because we're so hyper focused on the face, in the box on the screen that we don't let our eyes or our minds wander. You know, when you're in person, it's rude. You and I just lacked eye contact all the time. Right? It'd be awkward. It'd be rude. Like, what are you looking at me for? Right? But the reality is, when you're in a meeting, and now I started thinking about creative meetings. And even when you and I are on Zoom calls, like when we start getting creative, we start like, like,

Kyle Mountsier  11:08  

over here. All right down. Yeah, we're starting to write some stuff. Yes.

Paul Daly  11:14  

We're very familiar with what like we're used to being you and I were on Google meet called pretty much all day. And so we're used to just like, there's no like, like norms like, oh, well, because think about it when you're a zoom call, like the eye contact with the camera, or with the other face is something that shows that you're paying attention and respect a what they found out is that crushes creativity.

Kyle Mountsier  11:34  

Yeah, like everyone is listening to the podcast today. Like, Oh, great. Now I can look at my second screen. No, that's not what we're talking about.

Paul Daly  11:42  

No, right? No, no, no, because it's like, what your eyes are focused. That's where your mind is focused, and think we're being creative. You're trying to think of something that isn't being fed to you. So basically, the study was this, they had 745 pairs of engineers from different countries, right? They tried to keep it very, very, you know, on identifiable, like where the issue is coming from. And, and so they gave them some things like a Frisbee, and bubble wrapping. They had them come up with creative ideas around these things. And almost 20% more creative ideas came from the groups that were not on Zoom calls. Wow. Right. And, and I wonder like, that's a quantitative measurement. I wonder what the qualitative datas? Yes, right. What were those? What were the qualitative measurements to that? Because they just counted creative ideas. But when it's like, Well, what I think

Kyle Mountsier  12:31  

about I think about an in person meeting, right? Someone's got a piece of paper, there's a whiteboard, and maybe there's an element like, especially if the bubble wrap in them. And so you start to get to play with space, right? You and you and I use our hands when we talk a lot. But I see a lot of people that are on Zoom meetings and stuff like that, and their hands are just down. Yeah, right. And so there's no, there's no usage of space, like Paul and I will be like, will write something and be like throwing it in people's faces, right? And I think that's an element where you're like, hey, what about this, and then you show it to the room, or you go up to the whiteboard, and you throw it up there or your hands are moving in space, because you're more interactive. And so I don't think virtual meetings are going away. And maybe the encouragement is just understand that that's the reality, and that you have to work that much harder to lean into the creative aspect of being in a meeting.

Paul Daly  13:16  

So there's hopes, hope and some suggestions and in this industry in the automotive, right. Most dealership work, unfortunately, we get to do in person. And in the same team, however, you and I work with dealers all over the country, right? And we can rarely be there in person, as one and a lot of our industry vendor partners, right? A lot of our family there. They're always virtual right within their own companies. And they're rarely in person anymore with the dealers. So the suggestion that they gave is to actually when you get into creative mode, like hey, we're trying to brainstorm and we're trying to think of new ideas, turn the cameras off crazy. The cameras off. And if you think about it's just like being on a conference call. And I thought about I was like, Yeah, that one right. You can stand up, you can move round, you can kind of think you don't have to you can do one of these, you know, you're not you're not paying attention to like what yourself residents. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And so there you go, turn the camera off and brainstorming see if that spurs new ideas. We're excited because when we're in Tampa on May 9, by the way, we're having an event in Tampa in May, and I fit it pump it, it was the video before this. But tickets are selling sponsors are all lined out. We're locked in. And we're going to have an amazing time. And this is going to be we're going to be together for the first time with some of the people on the asotu team. So we're really excited about that, too. All right, that's so there's a little quick tips how to make brainstorming better. Let's talk about f1.

Kyle Mountsier  14:33  

Yeah, let's do it. Let's do it. And luckily you saved it to the end so I can't talk for 18 minutes. Oh, there's

Paul Daly  14:39  

one there's one more there's one more thing but no

Kyle Mountsier  14:42  

f1 is awesome. Yeah. So they're coming to Miami. There's it's there's a lot of excitement around it. Uh, you know, from the f1 lovers, which I've only been that for a couple years now that drive to survive if I by the

Paul Daly  14:53  

way. f1 stands for Formula One. And actually, if you don't know about it, it's like the race cars with really big tires on the side. All right, they sit really low, and you've usually see them in like Italy in Europe. Yep. Yeah. Quiet sound. Yeah, just hey, I'm not even assuming people know what f1 is?

Kyle Mountsier  15:09  

Yeah, no, absolutely. And yeah, I mean, it is a sport that is coming into America. But the main reason why it came to America as as eerie as a big piece is because of this Netflix series drive to survive, which is really cool. And there's a whole element of like, doing a brand build around a sport, that Netflix is basically given f1 Some accelerant, but they're coming to Miami, and tickets are five cents right now. So expensive, which is really crazy. Because for the people that really no f1, everyone is saying like the track isn't the thing. It's not a great track. But it's the excitement of being in Miami, being in the US having the energy around the event, right? It's actually it's part a big part of f1 is actually the experience, like three of the biggest races in the world, are actually the least fun actual racing races to watch. Because there's not a lot of position changes, essentially what position you start in unless you mess up you and then but the experience around it, right, maybe it's you're on the boats, or you're in the the arena, whatever that space is, whatever that city is. And so they've done a really good job at doing that in Miami is just like fodder for that type of experience at that premier level.

Paul Daly  16:29  

I mean, they're expecting 300,000 People at the venue, they're going to be hosting it at hard rock Stadium, which is about 80,000 capacity inside, but the grounds, the cars are going to run through the streets, right. That's how the f1 races work. The human element of this is, this was an irrelevant sport to the United States, just by and large, just a few years ago. And what happened was, is that Netflix built a series around the people in the industry, not about the mechanics. And I mean, they talked about that, not about the tires, and not about the engines, or not about how it's been great in Europe, but they the people, right, it became a human story. And all of a sudden that taught people how to care about this sport. And yeah, it's crazy, actually, like the one of the one of the principles who's like the kind of the, on the street manager of one of the worst teams in f1, which is Haas racing, is guy named Gunther. And he's become so popular out of the show, because of like, just his antics personality, right. He's got a massive personality. Avant Garde, right. And so people love him. And he's a part of this terrible team, which they're doing a lot better this year. But it's really interesting. It's funny how that that typically will go, right, like people start to get in love. And people start to have a passion for it. And all of a sudden, you start to perform better. Yeah, right. And there's something about that. And so, why we think that's important is because we think that we need to teach people about the humans inside the retail auto industry that is a mission of ours. And so to me, this f1 series shows us like it is so possible, now that this sport is an actual sport with a fanatical fan base and just a few years because someone showed them the human side of the sport. And we think that as the more we can show people, the human side of retail automotive, the more people will also fall in love with it. So that's why that story got us excited. One last story from your hometown, Cincinnati. Bring your kids to workday. So there was a young dad 26 years old at a reds game. In Cincinnati, they were playing the Padres and they were sitting like 15 rows in the back. And the Mrs. King, Miss Kingsley. His wife was very concerned. He's like, I'll protect the baby because they're sitting close. So what happens a pop up of course, over the net. He's sitting there baby strapped to his chest, feet, one hand, his left hand is holding a bottle in the 11 month olds face and he reaches up and he catches the foul ball with his right hand. Oh, we have a clip of it. If you're watching a souvenir then there's

Kyle Mountsier  19:02  

grabs it saves saves everybody's life. He's just on

Paul Daly  19:08  

the mom's face. The mom's face in that clip is priceless. She is like dead shock horror, as she's watching this ball calm and looking. And then he catches it and the moment you realize he catches it, it goes to sheer delight life like you just did an amazing thing. So obviously the clip went viral. You know he's gonna obviously frame the ball the Reds bought and bought them tickets to the next game, they're probably going to treat them like a king or queen. And let me just say this kid is kind of destined to be a ballplayer listen to this name. Shepard Kingsley. Yes, if that isn't

Kyle Mountsier  19:42  

left handed. It's the last to be left handed left handed.

Paul Daly  19:47  

sounds it sounds like sounds like a rockstar shortstop with like a 320 batting average. Yeah, the

Kyle Mountsier  19:52  

320 like slap batting average, basically, you know, hits it down, hits down third baseline every single time like That's That's Chapter Kingsly we're calling out we'll call on the shot right there.

Paul Daly  20:05  

Ready to sign them they

Kyle Mountsier  20:06  

should sign because yeah, the Reds are struggling right now.

Paul Daly  20:09  

Oh, on that note, we just wrote that we gave you a couple smiles and a reminder more than anything that you are in the human business. This industry is based around people. She'll go care about people and teach someone else how to love it, too.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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