Exploring Leadership Secrets with Atlas Altman: Lessons from Pirates and Military Strategies on The Patrick Bass Show

What if the secret to effective leadership could be found in the world of pirates? Join us on the Patrick Bass Show as we explore this intriguing idea with our special guest, Atlas Altman, a celebrated leadership speaker and decorated military veteran. Atlas shares his unique insights on decision-making, enriched by personal experiences and military strategies. We'll also make some exciting announcements about our upcoming live shows and encourage you to become part of the conversation through call-ins and social media.

Ever wondered why the number three holds so much power in decision-making and communication? Discover the psychological and practical significance of this number, from childhood stories to impactful sales strategies. We'll discuss how presenting information in threes can make it more memorable and why offering four benefits can enhance your sales opportunities. Additionally, we dive into the importance of surrounding yourself with individuals who embody the qualities you aspire to achieve, both in your physical network and online.

Finally, we break down military-inspired strategies, such as Courses of Action (COAs), and how these can enhance problem-solving and leadership within teams. Learn about the different dynamics of team members and the roles they play in achieving success. We'll also discuss the concept of simplifying leadership using pirate tactics, promoting shared goals, and freedom. Stay tuned for Atlas' inspiring journey, including his call sign ceremony in Afghanistan, and gain insights into the evolving nature of masculinity in today's society. This episode promises to be a thought-provoking and inspiring conversation you won't want to miss!

Chapters

• 0:00 The Patrick Bass Show
• 10:48 Power of the Rule of Three
• 19:31 Maximizing Decision-Making and Team Dynamics
• 28:31 Simplifying Leadership Through Pirate Tactics
• 44:02 The Atlas Call Sign Ceremony
• 53:03 Men's Challenges in Today's Society

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Okay, cue everybody. We're going live in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. And now live from Fort Smith, arkansas. This is a Planet Wide Broadcast courtesy of the World Wide Web and affiliate radio stations across the globe. It's the Patrick Bass Show with your host. Patrick Bass Bass Show with your host Patrick Bass.

Speaker 3: 0:28

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Patrick Bass Show on this August 2nd. Oh my gosh, where has the time gone. This is the home of bold conversations, unfiltered insights and undiluted truth. It all reigns supreme right here at the Patrick Bass Show. We're here to bring you the very best guests from various fields, ensuring that you get unparalleled perspectives and riveting discussions you won't find anywhere else. We're all about combining deep, thought-provoking discussions with a fearless approach to tackle tough topics. We've got a great show lined out tomorrow.

Speaker 3: 1:05

I want to bring it to your attention that we're going to have two live shows tomorrow, one at 9 am and then another at 2 pm. Two great shows, two great guests. You won't want to miss it, so be sure you can check those out. If you can't catch them live, just go on any of the podcast networks, wherever you get your podcasts. I want to mention a couple of things.

Speaker 3: 1:27

This is a live show and you can call in. You can talk to me or my guest. Our number for call-in is 855-605-TALK, that's 605-8255, toll-free number. Questions, comments just to say hi. Also, if you can follow us on Facebook and YouTube at RealPatrickBass, hit that Like button, subscribe all that good stuff. Your support means everything to us. Plus, we love giving shout-outs to interact with us on social media. You never know, you might be Internet famous. Also, I've got my Weight Loss Journey blog at pwbasscom. Check that out. I'm keeping it real and relevant. All the ups and downs are definite ups and downs, so check that out. We're going to take a quick break, pay a couple of bills and when we come back I'm going to introduce you to my amazing guest, atlas Altman.

Speaker 4: 2:19

We'll be right back on the Patrick Bass Show. Don't forget to hit our website at wwwpwbasscom. More of the Patrick Bass Show coming up.

Speaker 2: 2:28

On the battlefield. There's a saying America's military men and women live by never leave a fallen warrior behind ever Off the battlefield. Wounded Warrior Project operates with the same goal. Wounded Warrior Project was created to help our men and women returning home with the scars of war, whether those scars are physical or mental. Wounded Warrior Project, we never leave a fallen warrior behind Ever. Learn more about what we do at WoundedWarriorProjectorg.

Speaker 4: 2:59

Have we forgotten the art of being a gentleman? The Modern Gentleman a guide to Essential Manhood by Patrick W Bass. It's a powerful and illuminating read that offers a fresh perspective on what it means to be a true gentleman in today's rapidly evolving world. Crafted with the understanding that true character is forged through both trials and triumphs, this book challenges men to elevate their lives by embracing the virtues of integrity, responsibility, resilience and respect. If you're a man, it's a must-have guide. Pick up the Modern Gentleman A Guide to Essential Manhood by Patrick Bass, available at pwbasscom or on Amazon. In your face, unfiltered and raw. We're back to it on the Patrick Bass Show. This is the Vanguard Radio Network.

Speaker 3: 4:02

This is the Vanguard Radio Network, Atlas. I don't know. I love Cypress Hill on a Friday. I don't know what to tell you, man. It's the best.

Speaker 3: 4:15

Hey, welcome back to the show. Man Atlas Allman is here with me. He is a celebrated leadership speaker. He's the number one best-selling author in 13 categories, including leadership, personal transformation and motivation. He's been featured on basically all the major networks. If you watch TV, there's a good chance you've seen this guy. He's a decorated military veteran. He was honored as a top 40, under 40 in tech and innovation, white House Junior Officer of the Year and he's got two Bronze, bronze star medals for his leadership in combat zones. He's known for leading elite communities. He shares his unique insights through a concept he calls professional mutiny. He's presented on stages like tedx and south lake tahoe and various global events. Please welcome to the show, atlas altman. Hey, atlas, how you doing, man?

Speaker 5: 5:03

hey, patrick man, thanks for having me. I love your show, all the things that go on. At the beginning they just set me up to be excited and now I've got that heart flutter that everyone talks about, but it's not nervousness, it's just excitement, I'm like yeah, let's do this.

Speaker 3: 5:20

Yeah, yeah, let's do this. Well, welcome to the show. Happy Friday, man. Happy August 2nd.

Speaker 5: 5:28

Yeah, yeah, I mean the 2nd of August. It is crazy. I can't believe all the decisions that I had to make to get here, and one of them was this crazy plaid shirt that I'm wearing, and I'm looking at the screen right now and I'm thinking, man, should I have wore this or should I wear something a little bit? Anyways, I wanted to talk to your audience about decision making. If I can, you think we could do that today?

Speaker 3: 5:55

I think they'd love that Atlas. And just as a real quick aside, I used to tell my kids when they were growing up if I was writing a book called Bad Ideas, they'd be the first five chapters on bad decisions that I've made. But you know, yeah.

Speaker 5: 6:12

And that came from a place of love. It did, didn't it? Yeah, yeah, it was definitely loving words.

Speaker 3: 6:17

Parenting through fear and intimidation, just like I was raised, yeah let's talk decision making.

Speaker 5: 6:24

Yeah, man, I love decision making. Yeah, man, I love decision making Ever since I was a kid and my dad the guy I call my dad decided he wanted to be my dad and I got adopted into a family. I started looking at how the world works from a smaller lens, where there was a lot of decisions being made, and I didn't really understand it in my kid brain. So today, with all the things we got going on, the statistics say that we make about 33 to 35,000 decisions a day and that's like what you're going to wear, like I talked about, if you're going to listen to the show, some of the things you're going to talk about on the show. Whatever you're talking about, 35,000 decisions. Wow.

Speaker 5: 7:04

So Steve Jobs and a lot of famous people started writing books about decision making and one of the things that everything comes back to tech for me, because that's where our leadership cycle is today in today's world. And Steve Jobs talked about taking that number down and one of the things you always saw him in was that black shirt that he was famous for wearing. I think somebody else copied it and got a deeper voice and everything. The decision cycle there was if I don't have to decide what I'm going to wear, it's one less decision and I can make that decision spend somewhere else. I started really looking at that and I spent a lifetime studying it and that's what I put on my TEDx South Lake Tahoe stage. It's got 110,000 views right now, so it's doing really well. People apparently like decision making. But yeah, that one there. It always gets me, it gets me going. It's one of those things that wakes me up in the morning.

Speaker 5: 8:07

I'm like hmm, am I going to hit snooze or not? First decision of the day.

Speaker 3: 8:14

Yeah, sometimes you have to hit snooze.

Speaker 5: 8:17

Yeah, well, yeah, there's a lot of science behind that right. Some of it's probably fake. There's a lot of science behind that right. Some of it's probably fake. Sometimes you do have to hit snooze because you just had a rough night or a rough day that you didn't get any sleep. But often that sleep cycle that you have going on in your life, that decision to make a snooze button choice it disrupts your whole day. There's a lot of different studies where numbers are involved.

Speaker 5: 8:49

One of my favorites that I like to talk about is the 10-10-10 decision cycle, and it's not really well known, but Susie Welch. She wrote a book in 2009 and she put some things in there and said the decisions that you make in a day could be referred to in one of the tens. Is this going to affect me in the next 10 minutes? Is it going to affect me in the next 10 months, or is it going to affect me in the next 10 years? And when you start looking at which alligator is closest to the boat, you start getting bit a lot less and it's a lot less scary to go through the swamp. So she talks about that application going to professionals and students and even entrepreneurs. And if you look at all the decisions that you make and you cycle it through that little funnel, well, it's fun, but it still doesn't get the job done.

Speaker 5: 9:39

So I started there in college, went down to another decision cycle when I started working for a four-star general after we made some big changes and I applied something I learned as a kid and that's the five W's, because who, what, where, when, why and if you're really fancy how that sixth thing, it decides by itself, whenever you get all the information, what's the best option a lot of times, but you can't always get all that information. So I started looking at how generals do it and these major corporations managing billions of dollars, how they do it, and they started focusing on just three things. So I applied that to my career and what's really interesting about that is people usually can't handle more than three things, and if you give people three things, they'll get at least one of them done, but if you give them four things, it overloads them. So the psychology of this whole thing ended up being a book for me. And that's rule three, and if you give three things three times, it's kind of a magic little cycle that goes on.

Speaker 5: 10:48

We're conditioned to be like that. From childhood, your mom and dad probably read you a story where a kid lied three times about a crying wolf and then the fourth time he got eaten by a wolf. There's three little pigs that battle a fierce wolf to keep their house up Goldilocks right. She made three decisions three times before three bears showed up. And then sports goes into the rule three. The magic number for math is 3.14. There's a whole cycle around three. Yet whenever we give somebody more than three things and expect them to do it, they think that's too much.

Speaker 5: 11:27

The opposite side of that is crazy, but I'm going to stop there because I don't want to expose that yet.

Speaker 3: 11:36

Well, I was just going to say you know, when you can tap into our psyche and begin to access things where we almost involuntarily respond in a in a programmatic way, then you really have the keys to the kingdom in a lot of ways. And so you know this rule of three. I can totally see that, um, there's a, there's a sales trick, that's kind of like that that I've heard very similar, where if I can get you to agree with me two times, then on the third time, basically no matter what I ask you, you're going to agree with me on that too. So I'm down with the number three, yeah.

Speaker 5: 12:15

Yeah, the other add to sales is if you give somebody four things Whenever you're making an offer, like for me, if I'm giving somebody an opportunity to get better and I can give them four things, that they'll improve on the chances of them working with me, they grow exponentially.

Speaker 5: 12:34

So if you give somebody four things whenever they're going to buy something from you because people really want to be helped, they just want to have the best deal and if you give them more than what someone else has given them, it's easy because they can remember one of the four things whenever their brother, sister, aunt, uncle, dog asked them why they bought whatever it is that they bought. And that's really the sales cycle that people have to make that decision cycle in. You know, I don't want to look like a chump, I want to look like a champ. So how do I do that? Then you tell them well, these four things are great and I find that to be super helpful. But I simplified it even further in the book that I'm writing now and it goes down to just one thing All of the craziest, most successful people in the world have told this different ways and there's some people that don't believe in it.

Speaker 5: 13:29

And that's okay, Because if you listen to poor people, they'll give you poor advice and the bigger you are with influence, the more you can give advice that actually works, and so the rephrasing of this was show me your network and I'll show you your net worth. You become who you hang around and actually add to that. You become who's in your phone, who you actually follow. You can actually pull something from them and show me your friends and I'll show you your future. It continues, but the cycle looks like this the number one thing that everyone needs to focus on to make the best decision is who. For the longest time, everyone started it with who, what, where, when, why, or who where, when, whatever. They always started with who for a reason, and that was passed down to us generation to generation, and it was done that. Who for a reason, and that was passed down to us generation to generation, and it was done that way for a reason. That first thing should always be the who. Who can do this the best? And that magic who is the one that I use to hit all those different things that I've told you about With another process that we'll explore a little bit later in the show. But the process of who is the expert saves time, and this is the cycle everyone uses.

Speaker 5: 14:51

Whenever, faced with the decision. They say how much is it going to cost? When can it go away? And then, who can do it, instead of flipping it like everyone who's very successful, who can do it? And then you ask them how much time and money they need. Who can do it? Then you ask them how much time and money they need. I've found in my 30 years of research that every time I ask that question to an expert, they save me time and they save me money. I'm broadcasting that to the world. If you want to change your life, find different people that give you the qualities that you want, that are experts in the things you want to be experts in. You don't go to a karate dojo and learn how to type. That's just not how that works, right. But people are always like I don't want to pay that much to get karate lessons, so I'm going to pay this person who doesn't know what they're doing to teach me karate, which that's a whole nother topic in itself, which that's a whole other topic in itself.

Speaker 3: 15:45

Alice, I love your little systems of remembering things. We had 10, 10, 10, the five W's, and then we have the rule of three and that really distills down to who. So everything that I've ever read about self-improvement and decision making, there's some common themes, and the one that really resonated with me is when you were talking about you know, show me your network and I'll show you your net worth. I've often heard and I would like to get your thought on this we're kind of the sum total of the five people we hang around the most.

Speaker 5: 16:25

Yeah, yeah. So Jim Rohn is the one that made that famous, and I would add today, with 61% of the world having access to the Internet, that you're the sum total of the five people that you hang out with and the top five people that you're looking at on your phone. If you add that technology element which you can change at any moment, by the way you'll find yourself gravitating towards whatever it is that you're putting in your life. It's what's in your heart that comes out whenever things get hard. It's what's in your head that comes out whenever things need to work in an actionable process, and those are all controllable by your environment, because everything that you consume comes out of you eventually, and that is something you control more now than ever before.

Speaker 3: 17:21

So let's talk about your book and, if I'm not mistaken correct me if I'm wrong it's the Rule of Three how Elite Leaders Win right.

Speaker 5: 17:28

Yeah, that's the one.

Speaker 3: 17:29

Yeah, that's my last book.

Speaker 5: 17:31

Yeah, and that one is a capstone of all the things that I learned working in the White House military office, various special operations, leadership jobs for the community of very elite people. I was never an operator like a SEAL or a Green Beret or a Ranger like that. All those guys relied on my teams, though, to make sure that we were better than everyone else, and we got to deliver that. That was crazy, being a technical leader in a world that is led by people who are famous for being technical experts and innovative in that manner. So that was fun.

Speaker 5: 18:13

And then looking at leadership differently, because everyone looks for a tool or a tech system or a software package to fix their problem, and it all comes back to who's using it. So you can have the best system in the world, and if you don't know how to use it, it's not going to work, it's not going to save your life, it's not going to do what it's supposed to do, and people are always looking to pay for something to go away instead of asking somebody how they can fix it. So I got to dive into that world a lot, put my leadership lessons into that book. It was a fun little read, but it started off way bigger. I know you've written books and whenever you write them the first time you're like, wow, that's a lot. Let me make sure this is smaller so people can read it.

Speaker 3: 18:59

Yeah, I wondered if we could talk about maybe a practical example, because in your book you mentioned how the rule of three really does simplify decision making and leadership. I was wondering can you explain how leaders can apply this rule effectively in their teams?

Speaker 5: 19:14

Yeah, right now I'll give you a military example, because one of the common questions I get whenever I'm asked to go on to a stage that's not military aware is how does your military experience translate to me? And this is my number one go-to answer. We have these things called COAs and they're courses of action. So there's different paths to a solution and what happens is we give up to three it's usually three, three courses of actions or three COAs to the decision maker and we say this is what we suggest. These are other viable solutions, what would you like to do? And it includes who's going to do it, when it's going to be done, how much money it's going to cost any additional resources. All that stuff gets put onto a plan and then the driver, whoever makes the decision, gets to drive. And they always do this, Always. I want to do a hybrid solution so they never pick one, they always listen to all of the options and then make their own. And that, to me, is leadership, Because if it was management, you could just straight up pick one and then you would blanket go into that next direction, which is fine in some cases. If you have an expert that does things all the time, then go. But the COA process is something people don't really understand outside of the military. But if you ever tell somebody who's been in a military brief to higher ranking individuals, hey, what COA did you go with, they're going to know exactly what you're talking about, and so that little acronym is easily transferable into your life Whenever you're looking at your daily commute.

Speaker 5: 21:05

I'm going to give you three things right now that are going to change your life. How are you driving right now? Is it you get in a car and then you appear at work and you space out because your brain went into a mode where it's always driving the same way? Don't do that, because you're taking yourself through a lazy process that's going to translate into more laziness if you continue to not activate your brain. So change when you leave, change your route and then change the location. Get coffee one day, but change it to where you can't become comfortable. And therefore that 33,000 decisions will go down to 32,000, because you'll already make the decision to do odd things, increasing your brain activity to do great things later. So that's one You'll want to do. That the COA brief itself.

Speaker 5: 21:58

You're looking at different solutions. Most people don't. They find the first thing on Google as the solution that they're looking for. My car is broke. Google a mechanic in my area, this guy you know look at the other mechanics. Are you looking at who they are, how they are rated? You know, those COA decisions right there will save you a lot of heartbreak by not hiring the person who paid Google the most. And then the third thing that COA solution does is it involves more people. Whenever you try to face a problem by yourself, you can go fast, and you can go fast into a problem. A problem by yourself, you can go fast and you can go fast into a problem. But whenever you start involving more people, the brain power increases. And then it's allowed whenever you're trying to experiment, not come up with, experiment with a potential solution. So those three things will help you in anything you're doing in life. It doesn't have to be written down. Preferably it should be, because if you can get it out of your head, then it becomes real. That's a whole nother topic.

Speaker 3: 22:59

But yeah that's one of the things I like it's just a philosophy, kind of pivoting on typical decision making, like the very thing that you said uh, finding who first when you're when you're going to price a project, for example, because, yeah, you know somebody who's really skilled can generally do it faster. Uh, what's that old adage? You can do it, uh, cheap and fast, or I forget what the. You know what I'm talking about things, that that pyramid.

Speaker 5: 23:29

It's uh cheap, fast or or good, we're really well right yeah, quality, uh, yeah, yeah. So it's quality, cheap or fast.

Speaker 3: 23:39

Pick two yeah, you only get two ever. Yeah, you're not going to get all three. So I really like this approach. Uh, now, there was something in your book I thought it was hilarious, uh, but it was, and I want you to say it before I do. But how do you identify team members?

Speaker 5: 23:56

Oh, yeah, yeah, okay. So there's. The longer the word, the more problematic it is. We have an asset, an asshat or an a-hole.

Speaker 5: 24:13

The longer the word the worse it is off for your team. And if you don't know who the a-hole is, it's you. But the asset is the one that does all the work. Everyone goes to them. Two percent, five percent of the people fix a hundred percent of the problems. Those assets, they climb the ladder fast and they get put into key positions and everybody wants them. What I put in the book is if you can figure out where they belong because a lot of times they're hired to do jobs that they'll work well at but they're passionate about something else If you can find their passion and put them in that passion, they will explode with results, because those people are just waiting to go.

Speaker 5: 24:58

The asshat is the person who's always clowning around. That person is not really focused on what they're doing all the time, but they bring an entertainment value and a comic relief to often a stressed situation. So they have value of sorts. But a lot of times they're doing all the talking to make sure that people are thinking and they'll bring out some comedy, which is great in some cases, but not 100% driven. And that a-hole man, that person's always going to be the devil's advocate. They're always going to tell you why it's not going to work, they're always going to have the wrong attitude. They're going to say this is not going to work and you're going to be like not. With that attitude, they're really easy to spot, yeah.

Speaker 3: 25:48

And, like you said, if you don't know who it is, maybe it's you, yeah.

Speaker 5: 25:54

There is a spot for those guys though it's been cycled through a lot of leadership elements where they'll have somebody that's really trying to be friends with the team, and then the next person is really focused on whatever it is that the team's supposed to be doing, and then the next person is just I'm going to put my foot down. This is the standard. You need to obey it. There's a time and place for that, that standard.

Speaker 3: 26:25

Atlas. But don't you think every team needs assets and a-holes? I mean, they're all kind of a vital component, right?

Speaker 5: 26:35

Yeah, yeah. I think what you're doing is hurrying me up to that point that I'm making. You're always going to find them on there. They'll find their spots in the team and if there isn't an a-hole on the team, somebody will become the a-hole. That's usually how it works. Yeah, how it works.

Speaker 3: 26:57

So also there's another chapter, I think it's chapter 5, talking about the platinum process.

Speaker 5: 27:06

What is that? Yeah, the platinum process is exactly what I described with the process of the rule of three going down into a prioritized mode, where you're starting to look for experts more than you would ever before. So the golden rule is you treat people like you want to be treated right. And then money rules the world. Those are the two ideals that they circle around people's heads and they say these are the things I need to focus on, and they forget that the people around them should be the focus areas, not money and not time. So whenever you start to shift all the gold and the money into its prioritized bucket, you'll get something better than both, and that's platinum and platinum people. Those people are the ones that will elevate you, your life, your business, Because having a small business is great, Having a bigger business way better.

Speaker 5: 28:06

Having a small following is great, Having a large following way better. Having a big difference is always awesome Whenever you see the impacts flowing over on other people's lives and their livelihoods. And we seem to self-select that that whole process is skewed right now. So the platinum process is making sure people are first, and that doesn't happen, unfortunately. All the time. I get invited to a lot of places, and professional mutiny is one of those things that I like to do. I'm the person asking them what are the stupid rules that you have to follow? And there's always an answer to that.

Speaker 3: 28:48

So this professional mutiny, it's kind of no one's talking to people, it's kind of and this professional mutiny has really transformed your approach to personal growth and leadership then, hasn't it?

Speaker 5: 29:02

Yeah, yeah. It's an amazing journey to take the golden age of piracy and then show that pirates were excellent leaders. And then show that pirates were excellent leaders. They were leading criminals into an uncertain death or an uncertain life, and these people weren't the best people in the world to be around.

Speaker 5: 29:29

Cuss Like a Sailor started with the golden age of piracy. People weren't the brightest of the population yet they were led into a world that was extremely dangerous and it was not conforming to anything else that was going on, or be part of a crew or part of a Navy in some cases, and you would perform a portion of your job and give your life to the betterment of something under a black flag. And these black flags, they're actually flags of freedom. If you swore an allegiance under a black flag, whenever that black flag was raised, everything under that black flag was equally shared. It had rules and regulations, the captains, they gave the orders that were followed, and those orders were often very dangerous, but you only had to do it a couple times in order for people to realize it's the people on the boat that make everything happen and they can either be scary, funny or just super productive.

Speaker 5: 30:43

And the different pirate models from Blackbeard, which is the common one. Everyone knows Blackbeard. His end was getting shot and stabbed multiple times and he was still giving orders when he when they went to cut off his head. Uh and yeah, to this day he is revered as one of those people that just would not give up just a lot of tenacity, just a tremendous amount.

Speaker 3: 31:14

So I want to give you an opportunity here because you have had this just incredible journey through life, a lot of varied experiences. I wonder if you can and I saw in the short show notes will not answer anything classified, so we're not asking you to divulge any secrets by any means but I wonder if you can give us an instance from your career where you know a crucial decision had a really significant impact. Uh, and I mean, just tell us anything you want to share, any kind of story you might want to relate that can illustrate your decision making approach and its impact yeah, all right.

Speaker 5: 31:53

One of the things that I apply now that I really started applying 15, 20 years ago, was a command decision that I made. To look at things in reverse, refer to goals. People will say, hey, here's our mission statement and our vision statement. That's all phooey. Nobody cares about your mission statement and your vision statement. You got to have one because that's the rules, right. But no one really cares about it. So they make these long, elaborate BS claims and it's not taken home to mom Whenever you're going home on Christmas and they say hey, johnny, hey Sue, what do you do? They're not answering with the mission statement or the vision statement. They're not answering with goals.

Speaker 5: 32:42

So I started looking at what could be the simplest way that everyone could understand. This is what pirates did and I had no idea until I started correlating him 20 years later. But I started looking at it at the most simplistic form. So very commonly you'll hear people say you got to set goals. That's stupid. That is the stupidest thing in the world. So they'll quote Harvard or a Yale study 50s, 60s and 70s this is a common thing. You'll hear it all over the internet. 50s, 60s and 70s this is a common thing. You'll hear it all over the internet.

Speaker 5: 33:21

In the 1950s, harvard did a study with graduate students saying do you have goals? 60% of them said they don't and then 17% said they do and 3% wrote them down. And the 3%, they made 10 times the amount of money as everyone else. In impact Yale was two times. And it's all made up, because that is not true. Uh, a HBR Harvard ask. A historian actually went deep into the archives trying to find this study that everyone's quoting. Doesn't exist. So the other thing that they they beat into our heads is smart, right.

Speaker 5: 33:54

So so let me go through this whole route. We're telling people to be super complicated with the most simplistic things and then we're asking them to deliver results after we confuse the crap out of them. And it never really resonated with me. So I started looking at it simply Smart, specific, measurable, achievable, whatever. It doesn't matter what the acronym stands for, it's stupid, it's too much.

Speaker 5: 34:21

So I started looking what could I do? That would be in simple form, and I started reverting to targets. Because in the military, shooting a target Every year, you're're gonna get in front of some paper, you're gonna put holes in it, you're gonna make gunpowder and a noise. You touch the target, you put it up. There is one target. If you don't shoot it, you adjust until you shoot it and then you have the option do I want to hit the bullseye or the head, depending on the target you're looking at? But you have options now that you didn't have before.

Speaker 5: 34:58

Whenever you're trying to bring a cannon to shoot a piece of paper Because you just created this complex system to shoot a piece of paper people get agitated, confused and frustrated. So I started looking at that in my command cycles and I started breaking it down to the simplest level. And whenever you give somebody one thing or three things and they're simple things they get knocked out every day and then you start compounding that and momentum starts to happen. That's real, that's science. Like it snowballs into something huge and, before you know it, people are asking you how did you do this? It's one step at a time. The common phrase for this one is how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

Speaker 5: 35:45

That's how you do it If you break it down into bite-sized chunks. People will do it every time. So I did that. Then I disposed the Eisenhower matrix. I pulled that down into something Eisenhower matrix. For people who may not be familiar with project management, that is, whenever you're given a task, there are four things you can do with it. You can either do it, you can delay it, you can delegate it or you can dump it, and that's Eisenhower matrix 101. You can delegate it or you can dump it, and that's Eisenhower Matrix 101. That's how people manage their day.

Speaker 5: 36:20

I don't believe in deleting anything. I don't believe in delaying anything. You either do or you delegate, and if you have experts, it gets done. If you don't need to do it, why are you talking about it? If you don't need to do it right now, put it on a piece of paper. Someone's got a job to do that. If it's not, you don't worry about it. But if you can make things down into what I'm going to do, amazing things happen. You start to put holes in paper or you start to burn trails open and people are like how did you do that? And then they'll follow you and whenever you build something great, you don't have to worry about the network. It comes to you. It's amazing how that works whenever you have something amazing. But that's just something that I pulled out of my military hat whenever I started looking back through the multiple notebooks of things that I used to write down. I used to write down because I used to call myself a student and professor of awesomeness, Because whenever I saw something that was amazing.

Speaker 5: 37:23

I'd just write it down. And people were like what are you doing? I'm like that was pretty good. And they were like, why are you writing it down? I'm like, so I don't forget. And then I started compiling all these things and coming up with a cycle and then comparing it to history, and that's what I get on stages and do. Now I'm like, hey, let me tell you about these pirates and how they did it and these rules that they had that no one will claim. It's a fun thing that I get to do, because I did the things that I did earlier, making it more simple.

Speaker 5: 37:50

So, great question. I hope I answered it.

Speaker 3: 37:53

Well, let me ask you this, and I heard what you were saying about targets versus goals If you don't hit your target, adjust until you hit it and then decide where you're going to hit it. I get that, but what is really the practical difference between a target versus a goal, and why is the target more effective?

Speaker 5: 38:12

Yeah, all right. So a goal is usually like a New Year's resolution it's huge and it doesn't have anything but the end state stated. So Brian Tracy is great with goals. He wrote a lot of books on this. He's kind of the expert. Now he says write your goal as if you already had it, meaning, if my goal is to make a million dollars, I'm going to write the goal I am a millionaire. That is actual factual, that even rhymed. That's how good it is. But the problem with that is if I write that and it's not true, my subconscious doesn't know the difference whenever I write it down. So my subconscious starts to make decisions like I'm a millionaire, meaning I'm going to eat out more, I'm going to buy an expensive car, I'm going to go in debt. Sound like America today.

Speaker 5: 39:06

Because we've created these goal cycles that have an end state where you start tricking yourself in your RAS, your reticulator activating system, the part of your brain that recognizes what's important in your life. It's programmable by the things you write down. So that's goals. If you start to write the goals as if you already have them, you're going to find yourself in trouble and you're going to have to figure out how you're going to get out of that trouble and you're going to get put into a class like mine where I'm going to be like, let's break this down into baby steps. What do you need to do? You need to work, you need to provide value, you need to change lives. That will equate to a new person that you will become. That is, a millionaire. Being a millionaire is a goal that's stupid. You shouldn't want. You should do, and then it'll happen or it won't. That is the result of an end state that is wrongly justified in your mind and then your brain starts to process that.

Speaker 5: 40:07

So for me, targets. I look at my calendar and I put targets on my calendar. So today I had in my calendar that I was going to talk to you and before the calendar, I reviewed the things that I needed to review, like are my numbers still good? Are the research things that I'm about to share with this audience still valid? Is there newer research? All of that happened and that way I can provide value right now for the people that are listening, because they're spending their precious time with me in their ear right now. How am I going to use that? How am I going to benefit that? I'm not asking for money. I don't care if I get money or not, but if I can make value happen, that will equate for me into a larger target that I'll be able to hit later, or a smaller target, depending on how you look at it.

Speaker 5: 41:00

So the difference is the scale. Targets are small, goals are big. New Year's resolutions are big. They never happen, or they do and people are like wow, that was overnight success, not seeing the little things that they had to do to accomplish the goal. So people will look at goals and say you need to be able to see them, you need to be able to feel them, you understand them. I just say write it down. And then what is the process? Those are your targets for the day and then, after those get hit, you can move on to the next targets and you can also adjust when you're doing something at a smaller scale. It allows mobility to happen and you might end up in a larger spot than you would have if you just set a goal. So the difference between goals and targets it's night and day, but it's small, bite-sized chunks for the small, bite-sized attention spans that we have for today thanks, atlas.

Speaker 3: 41:59

I'm talking to atlas allman, who's an expert in flipping decisions on their head and really approaching it in a new and radical way than most people are accustomed to. We've just been talking about the difference, really, between a goal and a target, and you know, basically what I'm getting is that a target is a small, actionable step that you can achieve and do. We're going to take a quick break. When we come right back, I want to find out you know, alice, you can be thinking about this what's next for you? And make sure you share all of your websites and programs and services so all of our listeners can check those out. But we'll catch that on the flip side. We'll be right back.

Speaker 4: 42:38

We're just getting started. More real and raw takes that the rest of the media are scared to admit Coming up next on the Patrick Bass Show. If you're listening to this message, then you, then you are the resistance, the resistance Vanguard.

Speaker 3: 43:11

Radio Network. All right, welcome back to the program Atlas Altman with me, and we're talking about how you can make better decisions by setting goals aside and focus on targets and other actual things that will help you make a better decision, like the rule of tens and fours, the rule of threes and the five W's. He's got a lot of cool acronyms and we've been talking all about him still processing all this new information, atlas. But I'm sure you've got some programs. I know you've got your book and you've got a new book that you're working on. You want to tell us about that?

Speaker 5: 43:53

Yeah, yeah, it's Start With who it comes off of my TEDx stage. I didn't expect it to be as popular as it has been. I thought my friends and family would watch it and be like that was cool, you talked about some things you did. Yeah great, you're not Forrest Gump. Then they would move on with their lives and realize there would be comments and they're like well, I agree with this. I'm surprised that I didn't think about the people in my life until now. And there's amazing comments on there and I read them all, even the bad ones. They're like this guy, this guy I'm like yeah, this guy.

Speaker 5: 44:28

Where's your TED talk? You don't have one.

Speaker 5: 44:30

Oh cool, let's talk about that. So I started working on the book and I started to really pare it down and I go into how I got called Atlas. That's my call sign and that's now what I've moved into Into the next stage of my life. Everyone who knows me now they know me as Atlas. But my mom called me Joshua when I was born and Joshua and Michael were my first two names. That she used to tell me it's a biblical meaning and she used to tell me that stands. It's a biblical, uh meaning and it stands for leader of warriors. Because, unlike a lot of moms, she wanted me to be in the military. She wanted me to be on the battlefield because my grandpa was doing that in Vietnam my great grandpa and we had police, all of those people. So she's like I want you to have that. It's in your blood, go. And now I don't do that anymore.

Speaker 5: 45:20

But in Afghanistan they pulled me in for my last call sign ceremony and those are sacred events. So when they pulled me in I had no idea I was getting ready to leave. The commanding general for special operations in Afghanistan calls me in the office and he's like hey, you crushed it. I'm like I didn't crush it. My guys are amazing and awesome. And he's like, yeah, I agree, go tell them. And I'm not sure if they married that up on purpose or not. But when I went back I said, hey guys, the commanding general said you're amazing and I agree. And they said, yeah, cool, come in here, colonel, I got something for you and I opened the door. It was all the people that I'd worked with, the closest people that I'd worked with, from everywhere around Afghanistan, and they pulled me into what we do as a call sign ceremony, and a call sign is given to someone after they deem you as somebody who they would go to war with. So I was pretty honored because I was at war. I was like I'm glad you guys approve of me, but I usually they don't give call signs to people who aren't fighter pilots or all that crap. So I was like, all right, I'll listen and I'm not going to take it. But then they started telling me you know, you started looking at who we were from day one. You told us who you were and that's not something we usually get and then we started getting these crazy amounts of work.

Speaker 5: 46:42

And this was after President Trump at the time had announced hey, we're going to leave. So we started processing stuff to get it out of the country as fast as possible and I dealt with a lot of stuff that we didn't leave there. We can't leave there. It just couldn't stay. So we started moving really fast, visiting the seals and the rangers and the green berets, all the people out there and making it happen. And at the time COVID was going on, so people weren't paying my rent for all the properties that I had.

Speaker 5: 47:14

My wife at the time was like, hey, I don't want to be married. I was like this is an amazing time in history for me. Want to be married. I was like this is an amazing time in history for me. And, uh, I just didn't tell anybody. I just put, put my head down and grinded and, uh, I put everything on my, on my backpack and, uh, just kept moving. And they, they noticed it. So they said, hey, uh, we move really fast, but we, uh, we noticed that you kept putting things on your back and we kept moving, so it's only fitting that we call you Atlas.

Speaker 5: 47:46

And I was like guys, I've never taken a call sign. I've gotten this one before, actually, and I've never taken it, but I'm going to now and ever since then I started moving forward with that. So all of that equated into how I make decisions and how we did that. And when I started paring that down like why did I get called that? It was because I was focused on people and we were winning. We were winning so much because I was focused on putting people in the right places and finding out what their passions were and then fueling their passions and just making sure the people aspect of it was the most important thing we were doing. And it was not only my team, it was the teams we touched. And that's turning into a book. That process. It's better than platinum.

Speaker 5: 48:35

I'm not sure how we can do that, but I started looking at that and comparing it to other spots in history and I started looking at Roman legions I got a whole thing on that and the military coin. I started looking at pirates, which I told you a little bit about before. I started looking at war generals that we all know. Like here's one ground truth. People use that phrase all the time. That's actually a Pattonism. General Patton used to get updates from his generals and he would say that sounds like crap Because it was processed through multiple rounds of people who played the telephone game with the update that they were giving to the general.

Speaker 5: 49:15

So the general would say, alright, guys, stop the meeting. And he would hop in a jeep and go down to the battleground to get the truth Ground truth and the people that were sitting on the front lines would tell him exactly what they needed, how it was going, and amazing things happen when you have the truth, but people are so afraid to get it now. So I took all of that and I'm putting that into the book. That is anti-Simon Sinek. I like Simon Sinek, he takes a lot of good stuff and puts it in the book. But I think 14 years ago now he confused the world with start with why? Because my kids ask why all the time? Why are we going out? Why are we doing this? Why do I have to do my chores?

Speaker 5: 49:56

I'm like stop Simon Sinek-ing me, I'm like stop Simon, sinek and me, but the whole process. It was reversed and now I'm trying to bring it back to. Hey, you need to start looking at who's on your team and who's going to go there.

Speaker 3: 50:16

So, yeah, all of that has been fun. Then, going back to the call sign ceremony, that must have been an extreme. I think we're having a little bit of network lag and I do apologize for that Atlas.

Speaker 5: 50:33

Thinking back to your call sign ceremony, that must have been an extremely humbling experience for you. Yeah, it was. The guys that you experience that kind of hardship with it changes you. Every time I've gone out has been a different experience. The first time I ever thought I was going to die, the people that were in that circle were real small and I was doing a smaller job. The second time, third time, fourth time, I went to Iraq.

Speaker 5: 51:03

All of those people I still talk to them and they've seen me almost get picked off by a sniper. They've seen me in places that the technical guys, the technicians I'm a tech guy, right, but I'm not your standard tech guy. I go out and talk to everybody, so that was not something the other tech guys understood. They're like what do you mean you about got shot out of a helicopter? I'm like, yeah, I about got shot out of a helicopter. How are you in a helicopter getting shot at? Well, it is a war zone and people are trying to kill me. Or the other thing is why do you think you can go downtown with just one person? There are multiple people trying to kill you right now because you're helping a country that's not supposed to be getting helped. I'm like, oh, that's good to know, let's put that in my pack.

Speaker 5: 51:48

So the last cycle, the last time I got to go out in Afghanistan with my family's legacy my whole family worked in the special forces community growing up, family worked in the special forces community growing up and to be in that community for the last time, I went to a combat zone and know that I'm going to impact not only today but in the future of whatever we're doing as elite warriors. It was amazing to be with that specific group of team and those specific people and watch them develop solutions that I know are still in use today and are going to help us if we ever God forbid get into another world war. Because they have things that Russia doesn't have. They have things that China doesn't have. They're way more advanced than a lot of society would even think and I can't talk about any of it. So for them to come up and give me the name, it was not only an honor. Yeah, it was very humbling to think that these guys and girls were thinking of me while they were making a difference.

Speaker 3: 53:01

Wow, that is so cool. Make sure you share your website with us. And then also I want to ask you kind of unrelated to everything we've been talking to just based on your military background and everything that you know, everything that you've seen and everything that you can share with us, how close to the next world war do you think we are really?

Speaker 5: 53:24

Yeah, I think the veil is really thin and people are stupid. So, when it comes to people being in control of the world and the world powers, I think it's really, really. I think we're danger close to the next world war, and I don't want to make any political assumptions or political. I don't have a political agenda, but I know there are certain countries that still look at America as the example to be like and I'm just glad we're living here than other countries. I'll say it that way.

Speaker 3: 54:07

Isn't that the truth? Yeah, uh, what's your website, atlas, that you want to share with us?

Speaker 5: 54:12

Yeah, my website is, uh, wwwleaderstackkitcom. That's a little dash sign if you're not in the military Leaders-kitcom, all of the shows that I do are slash shows or you'll see the link on there. Started a podcast recently. I'm not doing standard. I'm going to do something like what you've got going on, because I like the feel of actually providing value and having a TV quality meeting a whole bunch of different needs at the same time. I like the way you're doing it. I'm going to do that, but I'm going to do it in seasons, so I'm not going to release one after another. I'm going to do a chunk and then I'm going to release them all so that you could binge it if you want. I don't care. You know people need something to do on Friday and Saturday.

Speaker 5: 54:57

Yeah, and Saturday I'm hoping that they'll watch my show. What's the name of the podcast or have you picked it out yet? Yeah, the podcast name is Targeted and it's for men who are just unfortunately targeted by society to think different, act different, be different and the responsibilities that have been levied on men. It's crazy. So I'm bringing on men who have overcome those obstacles. My first guest was Don Fry, two-time UFC champion, and he talks about how he could have done better and how he would have changed his life Other common things that guys will talk about.

Speaker 5: 55:38

Like I asked him has he ever been pulled off of the ground by the cops or out of a fight? He's like, yeah, I got pulled out of a fight by the cops and he tells a story. I think those are interesting stories that you're not going to hear too much anymore because people just don't fight like they used to, and that's an interesting mindset that people unfortunately don't hear too much anymore. So I have that. I got a general friend of mine is in charge of intelligence for the Air Force, the Air National Guard, and he has been elected. So he's the Honorable Reid Novotny. So he's doing his general job right now and I brought him in to talk about politics and how he did the roller coaster on that. And that's always a fun game whenever you're trying to serve people and people are thinking of you as a politician, and then you go into office and you prove them wrong.

Speaker 5: 56:31

So all of that mindset and my next guest is a retired police officer who stood up after grabbing a perpetrator only to find out that he was going to be crippled for life and how he thought about that and how he's going to walk into my studio. It's an amazing story that I've heard him tell on a couple national level stages. So having him come on is great. And then I have a pro UFC fighting coach that's my coach for ground fighting and MMA. I'm going to bring him on and tell his story.

Speaker 5: 57:13

So it's more how men can work together and get over these humps that we all get into as men and kind of gravitate towards what somebody else did, but do it in your own way. And the thing that I love to talk about whenever people bring me in for leadership talks is how everyone's leadership style is different, and one of the things I plan to share with the show is how that works for men. Your voice changed throughout your life. You started off with one voice and then it cracked and it turned into your man voice. It's the same thing with anything. The process is going to be crazy before it turns into something smooth and silky Like a Patrick Bass voice.

Speaker 3: 58:05

Oh, my Alice, I love the show you're putting together. I'm definitely going to be listening to it, targeted on the podcast networks, because you know it's really it's become increasingly difficult for men in this world. I mean, basically, you know, being told it's bad to be a man and you know the whole concept of an alpha male anymore seems like it's a bad thing and from my perspective there's just too many. I call them beta men. You know, metro guys, whatever you know, be whatever you want to be, but allow those that want to be men and act like men, allow us the freedom to do that. And actually we're not asking for your permission, we're just going to stand up and do it. So you know, here we are, deal with it.

Speaker 5: 58:55

Yeah, yeah, oh, not every fight is worth it. Yeah, oh, not every fight is worth it. I talk about one of the fights in my book where I went to Indonesia and my background as a as a bouncer and combatives instructor was to answer violence with violence. And I was approached by somebody of their security team and I was told, while I was there, while I was doing the job for the office of the president of the United States, I am not to fight anyone. So when this guy straight up clocked, me in the face.

Speaker 5: 59:28

I had to figure out how to process that and, as a man being challenged, that was the first time I had to grow into something that society now expects everyone to do, and it was not easy and it was not something I enjoyed at all. But uh, yeah, you should have the ability, especially in your own domain, to become violent if needed and control that violence. So where you will be able to be an alpha male, the uh, the new and sigma or whatever they're calling it. I don't like it. There's alpha and there's beta no, and alpha changes sometimes and that's okay.

Speaker 3: 1:00:10

There's no room for this other confusion we're, we're on the same page there, atlas on the same page. Listen. Hey, thank you so much for being on the program. We're going to have to wrap things up now. We're going to, of course, link all of Atlas' resources on our guest resource page, so be sure to check that out. Make sure you listen to his podcast, targeted, and his website and check out his books, atlas. It's truly been a pleasure chatting with you today and learning about your system of decision making. Any final thoughts you want to share with us?

Speaker 5: 1:00:50

You only get one life to live. If you're sitting on the couch trying to figure out what to do with it, go with whatever your heart's telling.

Speaker 3: 1:00:59

Thanks so much, atlas. Check us out tomorrow. We've got two live shows, at 9 and at 2. Thanks for listening. We'll catch you next time.

Speaker 4: 1:01:05

Thanks for listening to the Patrick Bass Show. The Patrick Bass Show is copyright 2024, all rights reserved. Patrick's passion is to open up any and all conversations because in this day and age, the snowflakes are scared to get real. We'll fly that flag till the very end, that we can promise you. Keep updated by liking our Facebook page at Real Patrick Bass. For more information, visit us on the web at wwwpwbasscom. Thanks for listening and tune in next time for more real talk on the Patrick Bass Show.