James Rhee: A Red Helicopter and the Human Element of Success

Transcript

WEBVTT

00:00:00.240 --> 00:00:02.309
Coming up on Better Place Project.

00:00:02.759 --> 00:00:06.331
How about just also societal slash, collateral impact?

00:00:06.331 --> 00:00:12.172
There are a lot of ways in which our society today is better than it was 50-something years ago.

00:00:12.172 --> 00:00:17.974
Right, I'm 53, and the book sort of looks at 1971 to 2024.

00:00:17.974 --> 00:00:31.925
Are we better off in other ways Suicide, mental health, loneliness, national debt, stock ownership, distribution, home ownership, distribution, hate.

00:00:31.925 --> 00:00:34.329
Are we better off?

00:00:34.329 --> 00:00:36.895
And how are we measuring that?

00:00:36.895 --> 00:00:39.822
Because GDP it doesn't capture that.

00:00:39.822 --> 00:00:43.024
So I just know, speaking more on a personal level.

00:00:43.024 --> 00:00:48.265
So I just know, speaking more on a personal level, the type of life that I want to have.

00:00:48.265 --> 00:00:55.067
I buried both my parents, and this is not profound, I mean, we all know this.

00:00:55.067 --> 00:00:57.207
I've seen the end of life.

00:00:57.207 --> 00:01:13.974
I've seen it and I don't want to die in a way that is embarrassing to my children, like I want my children to experience what I did, which was for them to say you know my dad, he was a decent man.

00:01:13.974 --> 00:01:17.689
Make the world a better place.

00:01:18.721 --> 00:01:20.974
Make the world a better place.

00:01:20.974 --> 00:01:23.126
Hey, hey, I'm Steve Norris.

00:01:23.126 --> 00:01:27.180
Hey, hey, I'm Steve Norris.

00:01:27.180 --> 00:01:40.703
Welcome to Better Place Project, where each week, we shine a light on amazing humans from every corner of the planet who are doing extraordinary things to help make the world a better place, including sharing their knowledge with us on how we can be living healthier, happier, more purposeful lives.

00:01:40.703 --> 00:01:45.430
Hey everybody, welcome to episode 187.

00:01:45.430 --> 00:01:48.355
I'm going to just come out and say it.

00:01:48.355 --> 00:02:01.826
This is going to go down as one of my favorite conversations of all time with just an extraordinary human who's written an extraordinary book.

00:02:01.826 --> 00:02:07.094
That absolutely just blew me away.

00:02:08.181 --> 00:02:21.990
But before we jump into that, a quick reminder that we are bringing you this episode ad-free no ads in the beginning, no ads in the middle and no ads in the end Completely ad-free and uninterrupted.

00:02:21.990 --> 00:02:31.174
In return, we would really appreciate it if you would please just follow us and subscribe to make sure you get new episodes each week.

00:02:31.174 --> 00:02:42.426
And if you like what we're doing, please give us a five-star rating and consider giving us even a one-sentence review, as that helps us get the word out to more good humans.

00:02:42.426 --> 00:02:51.991
If you're on an iPhone listening on Apple Podcasts, simply go to our homepage, scroll down about eight or nine episodes and you'll see five stars.

00:02:51.991 --> 00:02:56.388
Click on the star on the right and boom, you've given us a five-star review.

00:02:56.388 --> 00:03:00.764
If you scroll down just an inch or two further, you'll see write a review.

00:03:00.764 --> 00:03:04.371
Click on that and enter your review and click send.

00:03:04.371 --> 00:03:11.008
That's, it Only takes a second, and that second that you take to do that means the world to us.

00:03:11.008 --> 00:03:12.953
Okay, back to it.

00:03:12.953 --> 00:03:17.205
Wow, do we have a special episode today?

00:03:17.205 --> 00:03:47.461
In fact, this conversation was so incredible that we ran out of time recording it and we hopped on the phone a few days later and we completed the conversation at that time and, rather than just edit this down to a normal length episode, it's just so full of many good nuggets, some information, that I didn't want to slice any of that out that we decided to break it into a two-part series this week and next week.

00:03:47.461 --> 00:03:53.713
And who is this special guest I could not be more honored to bring you today?

00:03:53.713 --> 00:03:55.704
Mr James Rhee.

00:03:58.409 --> 00:04:08.025
James Rhee is a former high school teacher and Harvard Law School graduate who became a private equity investor and, unexpectedly, an acclaimed CEO.

00:04:08.025 --> 00:04:16.766
He bridges math with emotions by marrying capital with purpose, while composing systems that bridge people's disciplines and ideas.

00:04:16.766 --> 00:04:22.927
His transformational leadership has been recognized by leading civic and business organizations.

00:04:22.927 --> 00:04:30.971
His brand new book that is out today, by the way, is entitled Red Helicopter A Parable for Our Times.

00:04:30.971 --> 00:04:35.071
Lead Change with Kindness Plus a Little Math.

00:04:35.071 --> 00:04:40.086
James is working on related film, music and television projects as well.

00:04:40.086 --> 00:04:46.329
His TED Talk and Dare to Lead interview with Brene Brown have captured the imagination of millions.

00:04:47.100 --> 00:05:01.552
James' leadership grabbed global attention during his unlikely seven-year tenure as chairman and first-time CEO at Ashley Stewart, a fashion retailer with deep historical roots in the Black American community.

00:05:01.552 --> 00:05:21.305
After the financial community turned its back on this twice bankrupt company, james left the world of private equity and led the creation of a reimagined ecosystem that blurred boundaries and centered kindness and math, a combination that fueled an unprecedented transformation and transcendent success story.

00:05:21.305 --> 00:05:39.081
Core to the reinvention was the deep friendship and shared values between the son of Korean immigrants and a predominantly black female employee group, who placed their mutual trust in each other, learned from one another and then proceeded to quietly shock the world.

00:05:39.081 --> 00:05:50.836
This episode has been about a year in the making and with this just freakishly different, unique, inspiring book.

00:05:50.836 --> 00:05:56.512
Guys, I shed some tears reading this book and it's just come out.

00:05:56.512 --> 00:05:57.201
It's out now.

00:05:57.201 --> 00:06:00.985
Like I said, comes out today, if you're listening to this on the day.

00:06:01.024 --> 00:06:15.055
This episode published on April 9th, but it just made sense for James and I to have this conversation now, a conversation and a book that we both just feel is so needed right now.

00:06:15.055 --> 00:06:41.571
Guys, I truly hope that this episode just gets you thinking thinking about how you do your job, how you run your company, how you treat the people closest to you in your life, how you show up in the world, because it sure got me thinking, and just so much more that I got out of this book and from this conversation.

00:06:41.571 --> 00:06:54.511
So, without further ado, now I bring you part one of my conversation with the one and only James Rhee.

00:06:54.511 --> 00:06:56.553
Welcome to the show, james.

00:06:56.553 --> 00:06:57.696
Thanks so much for being here.

00:06:58.060 --> 00:06:59.163
I love being here, Steve.

00:06:59.163 --> 00:07:02.432
I've been looking forward to this for like a year now, right.

00:07:03.420 --> 00:07:09.504
Yeah, we have been talking about knocking this out and I'm just so excited we're finally doing it.

00:07:09.504 --> 00:07:16.370
In fact, the first thing I would say is I'd like to set an intention and we can co-set this.

00:07:16.370 --> 00:07:21.423
You let me know any alterations, but I'd like to set an intention that we co-create something.

00:07:21.423 --> 00:07:38.471
If we go on a tangent, we do it, but really in the spirit of this book, to just put out a ripple of kindness and hopefully some inspiration because I know I was so inspired from reading this book and just throw it out into the ether and have some fun today.

00:07:38.791 --> 00:07:39.560
How does that sound Totally?

00:07:39.560 --> 00:07:42.447
I know you're a music guy, so let's just sing a duet.

00:07:42.447 --> 00:07:43.389
It's a piece of music.

00:07:43.670 --> 00:07:47.283
As are you Perfect, I love it, we will sing a proverbial duet.

00:07:47.283 --> 00:07:50.949
So, with that said, can we kick it off with?

00:07:50.949 --> 00:08:06.432
Your mom and dad, as you talk about in this book, are first generation Korean Americans, and they were baffled one day to learn that you were given a toy at school and they didn't quite understand why.

00:08:06.432 --> 00:08:13.144
Can you talk a little bit about what that toy was, which is also the name of this book that we're going to be talking about today?

00:08:13.144 --> 00:08:15.110
And I believe you were five years old, correct?

00:08:15.519 --> 00:08:24.990
Yeah, so yeah, for me it was a literal red helicopter and for you and your listeners it's a metaphoric red helicopter because I think we all have one.

00:08:24.990 --> 00:08:31.692
It might not be an actual red helicopter, but, yeah, I came home from school public school, long Island bowl cut.

00:08:31.692 --> 00:08:41.133
You know you have to picture big dimples and sort of holding this like analog toy red helicopter that you used to get in like a five and dime with the plastic wrapping.

00:08:41.133 --> 00:08:42.534
You know that sort of thing.

00:08:42.534 --> 00:08:44.745
And they were confused why I got it.

00:08:44.745 --> 00:08:51.753
And it was just a series, uh sequence of like misunderstandings, of somehow thinking something was wrong.

00:08:51.753 --> 00:08:53.943
So did you take it from school?

00:08:53.943 --> 00:09:03.106
No, did we screw up and not understand american customs and you should have given toys to all your five-year-old public school kids.

00:09:03.106 --> 00:09:07.894
No, mom and dad, you didn't screw up this one, but we're all right.

00:09:07.894 --> 00:09:09.743
And they got sort of.

00:09:10.104 --> 00:09:13.633
I think my dad in particular was a little bit frustrated that I didn't know why this.

00:09:13.633 --> 00:09:15.988
I kept saying a family came in to give it to me.

00:09:15.988 --> 00:09:26.158
A family came in to give Came into your school, yeah, and just, they came into school that morning and I just kept saying that and I was five right, so I was nervous.

00:09:26.158 --> 00:09:29.306
I'm like a family came in a family came in.

00:09:29.365 --> 00:09:33.134
I kept saying that and anyway they found out why I got it.

00:09:33.134 --> 00:09:35.384
I didn't know how to articulate why.

00:09:35.384 --> 00:09:36.326
They gave me the toy.

00:09:36.326 --> 00:09:46.850
Um and uh, they found out later that I had been sharing you know, my mom's like meticulously crafted lunch with this boy.

00:09:46.850 --> 00:09:54.331
And they called me in and told me that and I said and they asked me why, why are you sharing your lunch?

00:09:54.331 --> 00:10:00.270
And I thought I was in trouble again and it turned out I wasn't in trouble, it's.

00:10:00.471 --> 00:10:07.212
I didn't know this, but my friend didn't have lunch oftentimes because his mom had died that summer and I didn't know that.

00:10:07.212 --> 00:10:10.303
I mean, I was five and anyway.

00:10:10.303 --> 00:10:20.971
So the dad had come in, it wasn't the whole family, it was the dad and a few of his siblings and they just handed me the red helicopter and they didn't say anything.

00:10:20.971 --> 00:10:28.384
It was more, it was like an act of appreciation, without belaboring the point.

00:10:28.384 --> 00:10:32.054
And I was again, and they just did it very in a classy way.

00:10:32.154 --> 00:11:01.139
I just remember, and I remember being kind of an idiot and running around the classroom excited I got a toy, yeah, but the meaning of it you know, as the book you know talks about just it stuck with me as such, a moment of not just kindness which kindness is part of what I'm about to say it's intuitive wisdom that's beyond education, beyond learning, it just is in us, and that such simple things.

00:11:01.139 --> 00:11:05.988
As you get older, it can be so hard and you start rationalizing things that are so obvious.

00:11:05.988 --> 00:11:06.889
He didn't have lunch.

00:11:06.889 --> 00:11:07.789
He was my friend.

00:11:07.789 --> 00:11:08.792
I had enough.

00:11:08.792 --> 00:11:12.577
We're good, yeah.

00:11:13.700 --> 00:11:15.423
Yeah, and you talked about that.

00:11:15.423 --> 00:11:20.932
You're even worried that, my gosh, did you offend your mom, that you gave away this wonderful lunch.

00:11:20.932 --> 00:11:22.995
That was she upset with you as well.

00:11:22.995 --> 00:11:25.860
It's amazing what goes through a five-year-old's head.

00:11:26.221 --> 00:11:41.144
Yeah, and like and yeah, it's like a, it was an abundance mindset, right like now we use that term and like fancy talk and say, wow, you had such an abundant mindset even though there was, you know, a little bit of scarcity at home.

00:11:41.144 --> 00:11:46.394
It wasn't easy for the Ree family in 1976.

00:11:46.394 --> 00:11:54.251
But yeah, even though we didn't have a lot, I just felt very abundant.

00:11:54.613 --> 00:12:04.227
I don't know, and we're going to talk a little bit later about how that red helicopter kind of flies back into your life, so to speak, later on in your career.

00:12:04.227 --> 00:12:06.630
So let's jump forward.

00:12:06.630 --> 00:12:23.206
You graduate college, you go off to Harvard, go to law school and you end up in investment banking, flying private jets, living a good life, but way off in the memory.

00:12:23.206 --> 00:12:23.927
Is this proverbial or literal?

00:12:23.947 --> 00:12:24.668
red helicopter.

00:12:25.909 --> 00:12:28.934
Can you talk a little bit about that part of your life?

00:12:28.934 --> 00:12:36.985
So here you're now having financial success, but there was a but there.

00:12:36.985 --> 00:12:38.748
Can you share a little bit about that?

00:12:38.988 --> 00:12:40.750
Yeah, I'll riff off of what you just said.

00:12:40.750 --> 00:12:44.475
I'm not necessarily sure it was quote a good life.

00:12:44.475 --> 00:12:55.548
There were parts of it that were, you know, conventionally defined good life, like I finally was out from underneath a large six figure student debt load.

00:12:55.548 --> 00:13:13.331
Yeah, um, you know I had quote uh, prestige, my resume was fancy and like, yeah, private jets they can be cool sometimes I guess I was learning the hard way about the systems of money.

00:13:13.370 --> 00:13:34.302
It's like, not like I grew up with money, I didn't know how money worked and so, yeah, I was in private equity here in Boston in a pretty tall building doing some pretty cool things, but inside I was learning, right, I'm like, ah, this is the environment of some of the highest echelons of money, and I was there.

00:13:34.302 --> 00:13:38.692
Right, this is the culture of money, these are the goals of this money.

00:13:38.692 --> 00:13:40.682
And I'm a student of systems.

00:13:40.682 --> 00:13:42.889
So I was like, ah, the way money is organized.

00:13:42.889 --> 00:13:47.914
I'm like, ah, it provides these type of incentives for people who control money to make certain decisions.

00:13:47.914 --> 00:13:52.626
And you have to remember before that I was a after college.

00:13:52.626 --> 00:13:55.493
I taught high school for $12,600 a year.

00:13:55.820 --> 00:13:59.471
Yeah, we were going to circle back to that, but yeah, for a couple of years, correct?

00:13:59.700 --> 00:14:14.519
Yeah, for two years I went to law school thinking I would be a public defender yeah, and in college I studied civics basically right, like how people behave, and ethics and philosophy and the classics, and so it was just for me, a learning experience.

00:14:14.519 --> 00:14:24.205
I really enjoy investing money because it is you're making wagers on opinions about the future and I like doing that.

00:14:24.205 --> 00:14:29.424
Sure, and I loved private equity parts of it because you're creating companies.

00:14:29.424 --> 00:14:36.225
I loved helping inflection point companies, like when people are stuck lots of people you have to eat.

00:14:36.225 --> 00:14:37.589
You earn a living.

00:14:37.589 --> 00:14:46.379
I didn't like some of the other parts of private equity and the industry has obviously evolved a lot even more since I was doing it full time.

00:14:48.104 --> 00:15:18.741
So if we could jump now to the book for a moment and I would like to, if I could read a quick passage from the book early on, and you wrote quote through the pages of this book I hope you give yourself permission to look at the business of life and the life of business in a different way, to perhaps rediscover or rethink a few of your perceptions and perspectives, to find comfort in our shared connectedness and reassurance about its potential for positivity and growth.

00:15:18.741 --> 00:15:24.774
This isn't a self-help book and it isn't a business book, and at the same time it's both.

00:15:24.774 --> 00:15:35.166
Nor is a book about music or philosophy or leadership or the meaning of loyalty or what it means to lose your parents, though we will brush up against all those subjects and more.

00:15:35.166 --> 00:15:41.923
Maybe this book is best described as a celebration of humanity, and you went on to write.

00:15:41.923 --> 00:15:43.284
I love that passage.

00:15:43.284 --> 00:16:09.605
You went on to write, but at its core, this is a story of how the simplest truths that we knew as children can change the trajectory of our lives and, yes, even our business, and how, for maybe both life and business, true success centers around balance, balancing life, money and joy through the creation and measurement of goodwill and all the connectedness that comes with it.

00:16:11.288 --> 00:16:17.264
Now, when you wrote this book, did you know, because I'm just going to throw this out there?

00:16:17.264 --> 00:16:27.094
This is a special, special book and, as we talked about before I hit recording, I'm a student of business books and I'm an entrepreneur.

00:16:27.094 --> 00:16:44.533
I started two companies from scratch and built them up into multi-million dollar companies, and so I've lived and breathed for a better part of my 20s, 30s, early 40s of how to grow companies and how to increase your EBITDA and all the things about business.

00:16:44.533 --> 00:16:55.583
But what I never really was doing and don't get me wrong, I loved my teams and I always believed in treating people really well.

00:16:55.583 --> 00:17:16.449
But the humanity and to go in with kind of that attitude first and foremost is something that I wish I had had this book when I was 25 years old and learned this early on, especially when you talk about how this is just good for business and we're going to talk about the Ashley Stewart story.

00:17:17.359 --> 00:17:19.086
So this book hasn't even come out.

00:17:19.086 --> 00:17:20.285
Well, it's going to come out.

00:17:20.285 --> 00:17:22.909
It will be out for those listeners listening.

00:17:22.909 --> 00:17:29.940
It's coming out April 9th and we're publishing this episode on April 9th, but James and I are talking to you from the past a couple weeks before that.

00:17:29.940 --> 00:17:37.094
So what are your thoughts now on having written this book and throwing it out there?

00:17:37.094 --> 00:17:38.983
Are you scared, are you excited?

00:17:38.983 --> 00:17:41.751
Do you feel like this is something really special?

00:17:47.819 --> 00:17:48.961
like this is something really special.

00:17:48.961 --> 00:17:51.728
I think after going through this book writing process, it's more a feeling of beleaguerment.

00:17:51.728 --> 00:17:53.392
It's hard to write a book.

00:17:53.392 --> 00:18:00.711
It really has been hard, because it's a lot of soul search and you have to be really honest about yourself and about your life.

00:18:00.711 --> 00:18:04.727
I write that In this book.

00:18:04.727 --> 00:18:07.073
I am not the protagonist of this book.

00:18:07.073 --> 00:18:08.743
There it's my mother.

00:18:08.743 --> 00:18:12.615
It's the women that reminded me of who she was.

00:18:12.615 --> 00:18:13.880
It's those women.

00:18:14.059 --> 00:18:22.240
And it's all of these friends who made sure that I showed up as the better form of me more often than not.

00:18:22.240 --> 00:18:23.944
Like those are the protagonists.

00:18:23.944 --> 00:18:54.773
I'm sort of like the stumbling Odysseus a little bit and trying to find his way, and so I'm excited because I think the way it's written, I hope that it will be relatable to anyone who's lost a parent, who is at an inflection point in their life, who is starting a business, who's at a point where they are wondering what the meaning of all this is.

00:18:54.773 --> 00:19:08.742
There are plenty of people in this country and the world who are scared right now and unsettled, worried, and the tone of the book it's not one of prescription or you know, you have to learn these things.

00:19:08.742 --> 00:19:20.148
The tone is how I like to be spoken to is sort of just, I think you know more than you think actually, and you're better than you think.

00:19:20.148 --> 00:19:29.779
You're being told that you're not as good by comparing yourself to all the ridiculous things on instagram and right, like we're being told that you're not as good by comparing yourself to all the ridiculous things on Instagram and right, like we're being told you don't know.

00:19:29.779 --> 00:19:31.865
Here are the five things you have to know.

00:19:31.865 --> 00:19:44.845
You don't know and I'm saying I think that you know it more intuitively than you think and I can see you doing it in different parts of your life already.

00:19:44.845 --> 00:19:49.902
So those parts of your life that are the best, why not apply them in your work life too?

00:19:49.902 --> 00:19:51.284
They would work.

00:19:53.307 --> 00:19:54.645
So I'm excited, you know.

00:19:54.645 --> 00:19:55.951
I hope that it helps people.

00:19:55.951 --> 00:19:59.055
And thank you for saying what you said about being 25 years old.

00:19:59.055 --> 00:20:15.382
You know that I'm spending a significant amount of my time right now in classrooms at college, business school and law schools, because I said to myself I have no business writing this book if I can't also teach it in an academic setting.

00:20:15.382 --> 00:20:19.945
Also teach it in an academic setting.

00:20:19.945 --> 00:20:21.628
I know I can teach in the private sector, in real life business.

00:20:21.628 --> 00:20:27.680
That I've done but it's not scalable if you can't teach it pedagogically in a classroom.

00:20:27.680 --> 00:20:35.750
And so I'm excited for the younger people because I wish I had this book too, and I wish I had it well before I lost both my parents, actually.

00:20:36.050 --> 00:20:45.355
Well, well, yeah, and we're going to talk about that in a little while and I know that your dad had Parkinson's as well and you talk very openly throughout the book about that.

00:20:45.355 --> 00:21:00.328
Before we jump to that, because you were just talking about that, you want this, having come up through Harvard, but you want this book to be able to be teachable, not only in the private world and to business and to individuals, but in the classroom as well.

00:21:00.328 --> 00:21:21.590
But you talk in the book that you don't want to be defined by Harvard and at your graduation you saw a sign that said in fact, tell us about that story where you saw a sign that said welcome to the fellowship of educated men and women, and what was your reaction to that sign?

00:21:21.611 --> 00:21:25.584
Yeah, and it's not a sign, it's actually what they say, like it's almost oh, is that right?

00:21:25.604 --> 00:21:29.355
Okay, I thought it was a sign, as you're coming into your graduation ceremony.

00:21:29.464 --> 00:21:31.352
No, that would be even worse, but it was bad.

00:21:31.352 --> 00:21:33.326
Oh, okay, they said that's funny.

00:21:33.326 --> 00:21:39.712
But they would say, you know, sort of that expression welcome to the society of educated men and women.

00:21:39.712 --> 00:21:45.880
I'm sure I'm positive that a long time ago it was just educated men, right, but so they added women.

00:21:45.880 --> 00:21:53.192
Sure, yeah, I just, I don't know Like I it was, it's.

00:21:53.192 --> 00:21:55.718
It strikes me as elitist.

00:21:56.619 --> 00:21:57.286
Yeah, I just.

00:21:57.888 --> 00:21:58.592
I don't like it.

00:21:58.592 --> 00:22:05.598
I think the whole point of life is that you get more informed so you develop agency.

00:22:05.598 --> 00:22:16.874
But there is a wisdom that cannot be taught other than through life experience, practical experience, and a lot of Buddhist monks talk about a layer of that wisdom that are beyond.

00:22:16.874 --> 00:22:18.498
Quote wisdom it's like innate.

00:22:18.498 --> 00:22:21.953
It's innate wisdom, it's a knowing.

00:22:21.953 --> 00:22:28.173
It's like prana right, it's like that knowing you just know, and that's why I wrote in the book.

00:22:28.173 --> 00:22:32.005
It's like the only thing I know that I'm confident in anymore.

00:22:32.204 --> 00:22:39.234
After 53 years of doing a lot of crazy things in different countries, meeting so many incredible people in different cultures.

00:22:39.234 --> 00:22:44.830
I know what kindness is, which I try to explain in the book, and I know what math is.

00:22:44.830 --> 00:22:53.416
Those two things are always, always right and they're always the same, like in any culture, any age group.

00:22:53.416 --> 00:22:54.470
We all know what they are.

00:22:54.470 --> 00:22:56.869
So, yeah, I didn't love it.

00:22:56.869 --> 00:23:08.228
And because up until then, you know, up until the age 18, I was a public school kid from Long Island, first person in his family born in this country.

00:23:08.228 --> 00:23:16.249
I had very little expectations or I was happy, actually, like I was learning a lot.

00:23:16.249 --> 00:23:32.615
Public school, love playing sports, love music, love going to school, had tons of friends and you know Harvard, that brand, that credential, it was a tough thing for an 18 year old boy like me to wield.

00:23:33.256 --> 00:23:39.385
Correctly, it was heavy right it was almost overwhelming a little bit, just, and I was like so what?

00:23:39.385 --> 00:23:40.788
I got into the school?

00:23:40.788 --> 00:23:50.276
I got some good grades, I did well on a stupid standardized test and I got some good recs right Great, does this define me for the rest of my life?

00:23:50.276 --> 00:23:57.459
And, by the way, so what you know, what I do with this in my life is what matters.

00:23:57.459 --> 00:23:59.564
So what you know, what I do with this in my life is what matters.

00:23:59.584 --> 00:23:59.724
So what?

00:23:59.724 --> 00:23:59.825
Sure.

00:23:59.825 --> 00:24:13.240
So you graduate and rather than like so many of your peers and your friends, rather than go off and get some high profile, high paying job, you decide to go be a school teacher.

00:24:13.240 --> 00:24:19.977
And so can you talk about that little two-year window in your life.

00:24:20.605 --> 00:24:31.638
Yeah, looking back, I think it was a little bit of an act of resistance to sort of being channeled into a preordained path and becoming a cog.

00:24:32.645 --> 00:24:33.790
A little bit of a rubble in you.

00:24:34.164 --> 00:24:34.546
Yeah, a little.

00:24:34.546 --> 00:24:35.589
Bartleby the Scrivener.

00:24:35.589 --> 00:24:37.355
I'm like you know, herman Melville, I prefer not to.

00:24:37.355 --> 00:24:38.450
I'm like you know, I'm going to go.

00:24:38.450 --> 00:24:43.895
I don't want to be a monkey in a cubicle doing, I just don't.

00:24:44.317 --> 00:24:44.718
Not now.

00:24:44.718 --> 00:24:51.752
And I think, james, this was the intuition that was inside of you that felt called, just like the five-year-old that felt called to.

00:24:51.752 --> 00:24:54.375
I'm going to boy my sandwich If I called to.

00:24:54.375 --> 00:24:57.720
No, I don't want to go do what everyone else is doing.

00:24:57.720 --> 00:24:58.421
I want to.

00:24:58.421 --> 00:25:04.646
This feels right to me.

00:25:04.646 --> 00:25:05.730
You maybe didn't know why, maybe you thought.

00:25:05.750 --> 00:25:09.061
I want to give back a little bit and I don't need to go make a six figure salary, you know.

00:25:09.061 --> 00:25:11.307
But um, yeah, how was that experience for you?

00:25:11.307 --> 00:25:11.407
What?

00:25:11.407 --> 00:25:12.450
What level were you teaching?

00:25:12.450 --> 00:25:13.451
It was high school, high school.

00:25:13.451 --> 00:25:14.974
What level were you teaching it?

00:25:15.015 --> 00:25:17.526
was high school, I believe High school and it was.

00:25:17.526 --> 00:25:24.439
You know, I'm intentionally not a quote fancy like well, well, big endowment school.

00:25:24.439 --> 00:25:31.095
It was a struggling school and it was a mix of people.

00:25:31.095 --> 00:25:39.575
And I wrote in the book that our baseball team, like I think our uniforms may have been, they must have been like 15 years old, yeah.

00:25:40.165 --> 00:25:41.048
You talk about that.

00:25:41.088 --> 00:25:44.509
And they were like this remember the heavy, like you know, the potato sack.

00:25:45.586 --> 00:25:47.357
That's what I wore in the league, by the way.

00:25:47.357 --> 00:25:49.049
Yeah, it was like burlap almost.

00:25:49.089 --> 00:25:50.093
No, I couldn't come up with it.

00:25:50.093 --> 00:25:52.788
Yeah, yeah.

00:25:52.828 --> 00:26:00.347
I grew up in Illinois where it's humid and you're out there trying to play in that burlap sack, yeah and like it slows you down, you can't like anyway.

00:26:02.184 --> 00:26:02.826
And so it was.

00:26:02.826 --> 00:26:09.378
I just, it's been a pattern in my life where it's related to the question you asked me about the Harvard commencement.

00:26:09.378 --> 00:26:11.932
I tend to figure things out.

00:26:11.932 --> 00:26:15.874
I'm like, oh, got it, it wasn't as hard as people said it was.

00:26:15.874 --> 00:26:19.047
It's meant to intimidate people, it's meant to scare people off.

00:26:19.047 --> 00:26:28.371
And so I do something, I decipher it, I deconstruct it, and then I say, why didn't you just tell people and teach it this way?

00:26:28.371 --> 00:26:29.272
It's so simple.

00:26:29.272 --> 00:26:30.616
It's even by this.

00:26:30.616 --> 00:26:35.188
It's been a pattern and so that was part of why I chose that school.

00:26:35.307 --> 00:26:39.411
I'm sure that factored in that he found me and he wrote on.

00:26:39.411 --> 00:26:59.207
You know, mr Rhee, it's been.

00:26:59.207 --> 00:27:07.079
You know, it's been whatever was for 30 years, 35 years, since I was in your class.

00:27:07.079 --> 00:27:14.479
But anytime I am procrastinating or feeling like I'm not doing my best, I think of you.

00:27:14.479 --> 00:27:19.844
Wow, and he just said anytime you come on the west coast, look me up.

00:27:19.844 --> 00:27:21.648
I would love to reconnect which I'm going to.

00:27:21.648 --> 00:27:29.048
His name is josh and I saw that post and um, I'm grateful and it.

00:27:29.048 --> 00:27:33.144
You know, and I'm grateful for my teachers, my public school teachers in particular.

00:27:33.144 --> 00:27:35.952
They took very good care of me.

00:27:35.992 --> 00:27:44.549
They really yeah, I come from a family of school teachers.

00:27:44.549 --> 00:28:01.362
My mom was a school teacher, four or five of my siblings are school teachers or were, and and that's one thing that school teachers, perhaps more than any other profession have such have have have so many opportunities to change the life forever.

00:28:01.362 --> 00:28:15.252
One little word spoken in a classroom to a teacher or to a student that can make them feel and believe themselves and can burn an imprint into their psyche.

00:28:15.252 --> 00:28:20.326
What a beautiful thing, 30, 35 years later, to have him think of you when.

00:28:20.326 --> 00:28:31.597
So you probably don't remember even what you may have said to him all those years ago, but you motivated him to be disciplined, to not be lazy to you know, and it stuck with him.

00:28:31.597 --> 00:28:33.445
So, wow, no, that's exciting.

00:28:33.445 --> 00:28:36.990
I look forward to hearing how that goes when you reconnect with them.

00:28:38.211 --> 00:28:52.605
Yeah, I think that's part of the best teachers I write about, like some people sometimes ask me, like you know, give us an example of kindness, real kindness, not random acts and the YouTube stuff.

00:28:52.605 --> 00:28:59.672
It's really, to me, the best example is it's teachers, because you are the best teachers.

00:28:59.672 --> 00:29:18.308
You're asking people to be the best versions of themselves, not you and not unrealistic things, just the best version of them, and that is a very high standard and there are very few people who want that for you.

00:29:18.308 --> 00:29:28.161
And when you meet those people, you often say I used to say this, I didn't want to disappoint that teacher or that coach.

00:29:28.161 --> 00:29:29.001
Sure.

00:29:29.001 --> 00:29:31.006
And then they say to you as did I, yeah.

00:29:31.066 --> 00:29:45.137
I really want the coach and the teacher to like us and that we want to please Sure yeah and they say to you there's like you shouldn't be pleasing me, like don't disappoint yourself, and I think that's what leadership is in its highest form.

00:29:45.137 --> 00:29:47.531
That is what leadership is, I would agree.

00:29:47.531 --> 00:29:55.998
I think the only the other person that I speak about a lot about exemplifying that was obviously my like the letters that my patients wrote to my father.

00:29:57.042 --> 00:29:59.771
My dad was tremendous, wow that's a very powerful part of the book.

00:29:59.771 --> 00:30:06.153
Yeah, yep, and your father was a pediatrician as well and we talked about him a moment ago.

00:30:06.153 --> 00:30:29.611
And so here was somebody that gave his life of service and the kindness that you talk about that he showed throughout the book, james, that on a Saturday or Sunday running into the office to help somebody, and that if a family couldn't afford to pay, that was okay, he still treated them, but he would always make it home in time for dinner.

00:30:29.611 --> 00:30:33.739
And then you talk about Parkinson's.

00:30:33.739 --> 00:30:36.587
Can you share a little bit about what that was like?

00:30:36.587 --> 00:30:47.221
Going through that journey with him as his son and seeing your dad you know who is this powerful, you know figure in your life and then see a disease like that?

00:30:48.586 --> 00:31:26.490
Just I can't imagine how that must have been for your entire family was difficult because my dad and I as I think a lot of men do we didn't have the language of expressing emotion as developed as it could have been, and I hope that this book actually helps some readers, particularly, I think, male readers, that to have a language of what it, just what you feel, which is, if we don't have that, we will continue to see very unhappy mental statistics and loneliness for men, which we're all seeing right now, it's sad.

00:31:26.530 --> 00:31:27.073
For sure.

00:31:28.346 --> 00:31:31.571
Yeah, my dad, you know my dad.

00:31:31.571 --> 00:31:39.446
He took care of people, like he just had very high standards about how you were supposed to treat people and he was had very high standards about how you are supposed to treat people.

00:31:39.446 --> 00:31:52.652
And he was very hard on me at times, right, because he would say, I don't care about your grades, achievements and things which he did, by the way, as well because he wanted me to have a better life than he did.

00:31:52.652 --> 00:31:54.237
He struggled a lot in this country.

00:31:54.237 --> 00:32:01.231
He did, he struggled a lot in this country, and he wanted me to sort of create positive externalities.

00:32:01.231 --> 00:32:02.517
To use an economics term for society.

00:32:02.596 --> 00:32:08.595
Just said how much value are you really creating, james, in private equity, are you?

00:32:08.595 --> 00:32:13.006
And so those are the two things I really struggled to reconcile.

00:32:13.006 --> 00:32:18.796
It's like money is part of a way to affect change and create value.

00:32:18.796 --> 00:32:21.079
And and how do you do it?

00:32:21.079 --> 00:32:25.993
With the lens of a high school teacher, can you do both?

00:32:25.993 --> 00:32:46.308
And I think that you know sadly I'm not, I think, ashley stewart what I did there with the women there, um, was I was able to finally reconcile both and, sadly, my dad was in a condition where he was not cognitively able to understand that.

00:32:46.308 --> 00:32:51.365
That's what this was, after 40-something years at the time, to be able to say to my father.

00:32:51.365 --> 00:32:56.757
Dad, I really listened and I watched and I think I figured it out.

00:32:56.757 --> 00:32:57.519
What do you think?

00:33:00.593 --> 00:33:01.074
Like, are you?

00:33:01.255 --> 00:33:12.576
proud of this and I included a few things in the book, not to spoil the book, because it's an emotional part of the book, but just because you asked me about Josh and the former high school student.

00:33:12.576 --> 00:33:18.790
But just if you think about the parallels, you know, like I'm 42 years old, this is after my father died.

00:33:18.790 --> 00:33:27.855
I'm 42 years old and 3,000 miles away and I can still smell Dr Rhee and feel his soft face while hugging me.

00:33:27.855 --> 00:33:31.432
Wow, you know, he brought calm and grace into the room.

00:33:31.432 --> 00:33:32.871
I've never met his equal.

00:33:32.871 --> 00:33:34.371
He was very loved.

00:33:34.371 --> 00:33:40.617
And then you know, no finer man was ever born and no finer doctor.

00:33:40.904 --> 00:33:42.511
My dad was also an entrepreneur.

00:33:42.571 --> 00:33:57.875
He set up a small business with a shingle without speaking the language, and he created so much goodwill in his private practice when a lot of the practices were unsellable because medicines changed, his practice actually sold.

00:33:58.796 --> 00:34:04.176
So I know that you have listeners who are also entrepreneurs and small business owners.

00:34:04.176 --> 00:34:16.440
Sure they were very few practices that sold in 2006 other than my father's and people bought his practice.

00:34:16.440 --> 00:34:18.543
So the going concern, value.

00:34:18.543 --> 00:35:05.936
There was going concern, value and these quotes like this my dad did not separate who he was as a man and who he was as a doctor running a small practice, and that's the lesson that he imparted upon me and it was very hard for me to wreck to to do that and then I think I think I got close to doing that in my 40s, you know, to understanding yeah yeah, well, both your dad and your mom are, and you really, in the book you really tie the connection of of the lessons from your mom and the lessons that you learn working with these amazing women at Ashley Stewart and we're going to talk a lot more about that in a moment as well.

00:35:06.646 --> 00:35:11.972
But can we take a pause and go back and I apologize, I know we're jumping all over my actual.

00:35:11.972 --> 00:35:14.753
You do a way better job in the book than I do.

00:35:14.753 --> 00:35:19.157
My notes are actually in chronological order of the book and I thought you know what.

00:35:19.157 --> 00:35:32.273
I'm just going to keep them in that order rather than but you do a wonderful job of jumping back to your past and tying it into the particular chapter or topic that you're speaking of in the book.

00:35:32.273 --> 00:35:48.322
But you mentioned in your childhood you had a nearing incident at your friend Joel's house, at his pool, and in this incident you mentioned the word palania.

00:35:48.322 --> 00:35:58.903
Yeah, can you share with us what is palania, as you use it as a metaphor throughout the entire book and it's been a metaphor throughout your life.

00:35:58.923 --> 00:36:04.293
Yeah, and you may be right on the pronunciation I say Polinia, but oh, polinia.

00:36:04.293 --> 00:36:06.869
No, you say Polinia I wasn't sure.

00:36:06.889 --> 00:36:09.038
I wasn't sure, so I Googled it.

00:36:09.483 --> 00:36:09.583
Yeah.

00:36:10.407 --> 00:36:19.202
And just to see, and I found like four or five YouTube videos that had Polinia, yeah, like four or five, uh, like you know, youtube videos that had palenya, yeah, cool, who knows.

00:36:19.202 --> 00:36:19.626
But that's the only.

00:36:19.626 --> 00:36:21.391
Because I had no clue either, james.

00:36:21.391 --> 00:36:28.494
So I so I googled it and that's what what I what I found, but I could be right so palenya is what it is.

00:36:28.635 --> 00:36:40.871
It's like uh, it's a russian word, it's a picture visually, uh, a sea of completely frozen over water, of ice, and that palinia is like that.

00:36:40.871 --> 00:36:46.989
In the center there's a little, sometimes not little, but a circle of water.

00:36:46.989 --> 00:37:02.097
It's the unfrozen water surrounded by ice, and it's where you fish, or perhaps, if you're submerged underneath the ice, it's your way out.

00:37:02.097 --> 00:37:27.617
It's an aperture to freedom, actually, and I think about that a lot, and I think a lot of people right now in the world and in all of us, at various points in our lives, you feel like you're drowning For many reasons personal, professional, your own expectations, others.

00:37:27.617 --> 00:37:37.195
And it's ironic because water is very nurturing, right, like we need it, it's the lifeblood of our existence.

00:37:37.195 --> 00:37:41.371
Very nurturing, right, like we needed it, the lifeblood of our existence.

00:37:41.371 --> 00:37:46.668
It just shows you that sometimes, like the most important assets are real liabilities too, you can drown in water same way like that.

00:37:46.949 --> 00:37:57.737
It's a symbol of freedom to live, but yeah it's a symbol of like freedom, of clarity and sort of a way out that's, you took the words right out of my mouth.

00:37:58.105 --> 00:38:04.097
Sort of like a passageway, a light in the darkness to guide you out.

00:38:04.097 --> 00:38:04.599
Portal.

00:38:04.599 --> 00:38:06.088
I thought that was a beautiful metaphor.

00:38:06.269 --> 00:38:07.032
Yeah, like a portal.

00:38:07.534 --> 00:38:08.135
Exactly.

00:38:08.405 --> 00:38:21.846
It's like the wardrobe in Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, I think, for me, in many ways, red Helicopter for me, tangibly, it's been my portal, it's a.

00:38:21.846 --> 00:38:29.969
I think about it when I am feeling perplexed, confused, when I'm maybe not making the best decisions, when I'm mad, right, unnecessarily.

00:38:29.969 --> 00:38:42.260
I'm not, I'm just, it's the emotions, are your reactions to things right, like people will behave in certain ways and like your decision about how to react to that that's yours, that's agent, right.

00:38:42.260 --> 00:38:48.353
So I think about the red helicopter in those contexts when I'm like, am I making the best decision?

00:38:48.353 --> 00:39:03.518
You know it's, and oftentimes the right decision is not to make any decision, like, just to just be can you talk about the korean word nunchi?

00:39:03.898 --> 00:39:06.581
yeah, did I pronounce that right, by the way?

00:39:06.844 --> 00:39:11.054
this one, I'm this one, I'm definitive this one's nunchi oh, nunchi, thank you.

00:39:11.335 --> 00:39:12.786
Okay, I'm over two so far.

00:39:12.887 --> 00:39:18.626
No, no, no, I can prove my record yeah, there's no reason why you should be fluent in korean, because I'm not either.

00:39:18.626 --> 00:39:23.317
Um, nunchi is uh, it's a distinctly korean term.

00:39:23.317 --> 00:39:24.358
It's literally meant.

00:39:24.358 --> 00:40:01.172
It literally means eye speed, and so what nunchi is is it's high speed, rapid, intuitive processing that you can walk into a room and you can say something like this Like two weeks ago people had an argument in here, I can feel it or you can go into a room and sort of say, oh, those two people are don't like each other, those three people have a quiet alliance and that person is the trustworthy one, and it's sort of just, it's that sort of intuition yeah, my dog's going nuts.

00:40:01.572 --> 00:40:32.016
Um, so that's what nunchi is like, I think, what's happening in our world, uh, and you have to be careful right, you can be wrong, intuition can be wrong sure it sort of the same balance between wisdom and education that I think, though sometimes now we are over relying on deduction, particularly, I think, in like Western society, where everything has to be quantified, everything If it's not quantifiable, it's not true.

00:40:32.016 --> 00:40:35.190
Right Zero or one has to be zero, one, and we've taken it to an extreme right.

00:40:35.190 --> 00:40:40.708
Zero or one has to be zero, or one and we've taken it to an extreme right, Like the way you behave at work or in life.

00:40:40.708 --> 00:40:42.311
Is it quantifiably good?

00:40:42.311 --> 00:40:50.094
Okay, well, I don't think so, then that's not provable, you can't do it, we're heading into that place.

00:40:50.094 --> 00:40:59.777
So I think the book is a call to action, about also reminding people there are certain things in life you know it's right, do it.

00:41:00.458 --> 00:41:20.177
So that's what nunchi is, it's intuition I love that, and you told some some really beautiful and heartfelt stories about circling back to your parents right now for a moment, being korean immigrants not speaking much english, and just everything they had to go through for you know, you and the family.

00:41:20.177 --> 00:41:31.423
But a story that I love that made me laugh out loud in the book was when you tell the story about that you had been saving your money up to buy a denim jacket.

00:41:32.025 --> 00:41:32.125
Yeah.

00:41:34.690 --> 00:41:38.217
And what your mom disclosed to you after you had bought the jacket.

00:41:38.724 --> 00:41:44.893
Yeah, she thought I was saying I want a damn jacket, mom, you know, and I'm like oh, no, mom.

00:41:44.893 --> 00:41:49.356
And then when she saw the denim jacket, she was like oh, that's what you meant.

00:41:50.105 --> 00:41:51.451
That's what you've been saying.

00:41:51.451 --> 00:41:56.791
But yeah, you talk in the book about like for weeks leading up to it yeah, mom, I'm saving my money, I just want a denim jacket.

00:41:56.791 --> 00:42:02.086
And she's like wow, he's just.

00:42:02.086 --> 00:42:02.288
You know.

00:42:02.288 --> 00:42:03.893
But she but she was disappointed in you, but didn't say anything.

00:42:03.893 --> 00:42:04.414
She was disappointed.

00:42:04.414 --> 00:42:04.775
That why is james?

00:42:04.795 --> 00:42:04.956
swearing.

00:42:04.956 --> 00:42:05.237
Exactly.

00:42:05.237 --> 00:42:06.059
Never do that.

00:42:06.059 --> 00:42:07.690
I just would never do that.

00:42:07.690 --> 00:42:10.505
She's like why is he so passionate about this freaking jacket?

00:42:10.505 --> 00:42:14.094
And we used to laugh and laugh and laugh about it.

00:42:14.094 --> 00:42:21.472
But like a lot of things in life and you know, like joy and suffering, it's bitter, it's a bittersweet story, it's even though it's funny.

00:42:21.472 --> 00:42:37.856
It shows you the there was lots of subtlety of miscommunication that I had growing up and I I had to over like compensate actually for it and I think in the run it's like a lot of our struggles.

00:42:37.856 --> 00:42:46.313
It made me a better communicator in the long term because I watch people about how they receive what I'm saying.

00:42:46.313 --> 00:42:50.648
It's more important how it's heard than it is what I said.

00:42:50.648 --> 00:42:55.947
Right, you can say something brilliant and if it's not received well, who cares?

00:42:55.947 --> 00:43:02.514
Or you could say something like as a compliment but if someone receives it as an insult, does it matter that?

00:43:02.534 --> 00:43:03.436
you thought it's an insult.

00:43:03.436 --> 00:43:05.327
It's an insult yeah.

00:43:05.427 --> 00:43:07.512
So I think kindness is like that.

00:43:07.512 --> 00:43:10.878
It's not your, your action, it's how it's received.

00:43:10.878 --> 00:43:29.413
And if you think about it from a business perspective and we spend a lot of time using very complicated language like user experience and ux and design thinking, um, ugi and all these acronyms I'm like fundamentally, isn't it life about how people receive, isn't it?

00:43:29.413 --> 00:43:31.297
And it's the communication.

00:43:31.396 --> 00:43:46.681
So I well, yeah, and, and on that topic, this isn't in my notes, but you, I just had a flashback of another story in the book where your mom had gone to a store and she couldn't think of the word I don't remember, like anti-dust or rust.

00:43:46.681 --> 00:43:58.548
Anti-rust spray from my basketball hoop was just rude to her and you were a kid.

00:43:58.548 --> 00:43:59.813
And he said, take me to that store.

00:43:59.813 --> 00:44:02.360
And you went running in there and gave this guy a, an earful um in defense of your mom.

00:44:02.380 --> 00:44:09.597
Um, another great story I was going to a fistfight with a employee of a hardware store who was twice my size.

00:44:09.597 --> 00:44:13.449
I just I just said it was, so I just was like.

00:44:13.449 --> 00:44:14.871
I still have that in me.

00:44:14.871 --> 00:44:20.940
As you know, I don't like people who make other people feel small.

00:44:20.940 --> 00:44:24.489

James Rhee: A Red Helicopter and the Human Element of Success

Listen On

Recent Episodes