Jason Pearl: All right. All right. Welcome to another episode of The Company We Keep podcast. I'm Jason Pearl. I am super excited to be here with my good friend and brother Michael McGreevy. This is first episode of season two. In season two, we're going to be introducing you to a number of folks in my network and none better than my very good friend, Michael McGreevey. Michael is a professionally trained leadership coach. He is working with some of the areas in some of the nation's best leaders. He helps them find a deeper sense of confidence, both personally and professionally, and he has seen success with over a hundred individuals in his coaching practice.

So, Michael welcome. Thank you for joining.

Michael McGreevy: Jason, I'm so pumped to be here. Speaking of the company we keep, I am in good company today. So thank you so much for having me, Jason.

Jason Pearl: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So excited to have you with us and and also to introduce you to our listeners. In episode nine of our first season, I introduced my audience to you and talked about how we came to know each other. So just to kind of give everybody a refresher course on that I spent one day, it was one afternoon. I can remember exactly where it was. I was scrolling on my phone, through LinkedIn. And in a, in a post came up and it was from this guy, Michael McGreevey.

Now, most people may not know this, but you and I grew up in the same town and live in the greater Western New York area. Uh, we did not know each other until a few years ago. And as I was scrolling through LinkedIn, I just saw your, I saw this post. It was the post you made when you went to a, you went to a Blue Jays game in Toronto.

And you, you made a comment about you were, you were in an elevator and you started talking to a gentleman in there and then all of a sudden he like gave you tickets to the game or something like that. Right? Uh, if I, if I'm telling that story properly, is that,

Michael McGreevy: Yeah, you're pretty close. It was right here in Buffalo, it was a Bison's Game. My entire family was with me and we didn't have any tickets yet. So there was five of us total and we were about to buy five tickets. Tickets. Yeah. Yeah. And this guy approaches us. So it's Hey, I have five tickets. You want them? We're just like, yes. Take them. Yeah.

Jason Pearl: That's awesome. Yeah. So in the, the, the thing that caught me in this LinkedIn post was the fact that you had, you were just talking about being a human being, right.

And you were talking about how, you know, No one else is looking at this guy, no one else talking to this guy. And you just kind of like have a smile on your face. And you're just being the way I know you to be now. And, uh, you just said, you know, just be human, just talk to people and you engage people. Good things happen.

So I started looking at some of your other posts and I started reading your messaging and I'm like, man, like. This is a guy I need to know. Like, and, and I am especially three or four years ago, I was not the type of person to randomly cold, like reach out to another guy and be like, Hey, I like what you're saying, we should, we should talk. And that's what I did. I LinkedIn messaged you. And I said, Hey, I've been reading your posts. I'm local to you. I would love to take you out to lunch and learn more about you. And you're like, yeah, let's, let's do it.

Sometimes you just have to step out. If you see you like something, you see somebody that's doing something great, like cheer them on, encourage them and just say, Hey, I need more of that in my life. And that's what I did with you. And we became fast friends, we like to say we're doing life together and I couldn't be more proud or more excited to, uh, to introduce you to my audience, because you are somebody that I hold in such high regard. So, yeah.

Michael McGreevy: Thanks, Jason. I remember that day at Acropolis, you walked in with your fresh blazer on, you're looking all professional. I was kind of intimidated by actually when I first saw it. I'm like, man, this guy is like a serious business guy, I better get my act together here. Anyway, it's been so cool to get to know you because we walk to the same drum beat, man.

We, you know, we want to go big in business for sure. But we're not going to do that at the expense of our family, right? Or the expense of our marriage. In fact, we're going to make sure we're holding those things higher than our business. That's what I love about you. You don't just talk about that. I've seen you do that and it's inspiring, man. Keep up the great work on that.

Jason Pearl: Yeah. I appreciate that. Well, that brings up a good point. Not, not only are you a leadership coach, your most important job is a husband and a father, right? So you've got Lydia, your wife and your three kids. How old are they? Your three kids. Not Liddy. You don't have to tell you.

Don't have to tell anybody how old she is. I don't want to get in trouble, right?

Michael McGreevy: Yeah. I can't keep up with them. They're growing so fast, but six, five and three are my kids. Yeah. We're about to go on a very long road trip. Pray for us. Certainly. Certainly, as you know, you just need to have a lot of good snacks.

Jason Pearl: That's right. That's right.

(07:28)

Jason Pearl: Well, as, as we kind of move forward, um, you know, really interested to kind of learn about and hear about McGreevey Leadership. That's your leadership company, the company you run, you tell me a little bit about, you know, what McGreevy leadership is all about.

Michael McGreevy: Yes, I will. And it's been such a fascinating journey. There's, there's two different ways. I've worked with people one-on-one and I've also worked with teams, and I found through my own journey that it can be very lonely as a leader, as a business owner.

And, uh, having someone that you trust in your corner to really journey with you and go through the ups and downs of business, and to have that perspective, to have somebody to bounce ideas off of, to filter ideas with that's really been invaluable to me. And so, um, that's really what I try to do for leaders too, is to really step into their world on a consistent basis and give them that person, that person who can offer perspective, clarity that can remind them of who they are, what they're strong at, and to help them see that maybe some of their deficiencies don't need to hold them back. So it's, um, every, every leader struggles with something.

Every person struggles with something. And so to have someone in their corner to walk through some of those challenges along the way for myself has been so valuable. And, uh, so that's what I try to offer with what I do with McGreevey Leadership.

Jason Pearl: You know, and, and, and, and it's funny because. Again, in the, in the transition and the path that I've taken, um, five years ago, 10 years ago as a high-level executive in a business, I probably would've said I don't, who needs a leadership coach, right? Like, what is a leadership guy? I like I'm in this position because I know what I'm doing. Right. And now I know how wrong I was.

Cause I've hired multiple coaches myself and you yourself have a coach. Is that correct?

Michael McGreevy: Absolutely. Yes. Yeah, I don't think I'll ever go without a coach, just because of the value that I've seen. And because growth is, there's not an endpoint to your growth journey, right? It's kinda like golf. Like you have to keep working at it and working at it as long as you're going to play. And one thing I've realized in my own journey is that I'm the ceiling, my, or my business in my business I'm the ceiling. I can only go as far and as forward as I am willing to go. And that's, that's good news and bad news, right?

That means. It's bad news. If we think that, and that's just going to happen organically. It's good news because that's, that's under our control. We can invest in ourselves. We can continue to grow and, and that growth is going to show up in our business and our relationships in multiple areas of life as we commit to growth ourselves.

Jason Pearl: So with, with the, with the leaders that you work with, is there any level of like commonality, um, that you find in the leaders that want to work with you or the leaders that want to hire a coach, or is it, is it kind of a hodgepodge of all sorts of different folks?

Michael McGreevy: Yeah, it is a bit of a hodgepodge, but there are a lot of common themes. Um, I think one of them is identity: truly knowing who you are, understanding yourself, what you're really strong at, and what some of your struggles are. That's a common challenge that an individual has. As you are a leader, as you are over several other people, it's difficult to see the full picture or to see yourself objectively.

So to have another person in your corner that doesn't have any other agenda other than to help you see what you're not seeing is tremendously valuable. And there's a lot of different struggles that leaders have. And I mean, there's, there's a, there's a whole lot of them and I can share a couple of here.

One of those being, you know, oftentimes a person forgets why they started a business or why they became a leader. You know, sometimes they jump in because they want more flexibility or they want more control over their schedule or control over their life. And fast forward a couple of years, as they've been in the weeds of their business, they realize that they have less flexibility than they did when they had when they were fully employed. Right. Or maybe they've gotten away from it, the vision that they set out to create when they started their business. So sometimes it's going back and redefining what your vision is. Why are you doing this? Why do you, why are you struggling day in and day out or building day in and day out for what? Is that really achieving the life that you set out to achieve from the beginning?

Jason Pearl: You know, everybody seems to get to a level where they think if I get to the top or the top job or the highest paying job, everything's going to be great.

Right. Or if I just make more money, everything's going to be great. And what you and I both know in our professions is actually that's where more challenges come, right? There's so many, there's so much more weight and there are so many more challenges that happen. The higher you climb up the ladder, whether it's corporate, whether it's entrepreneurial, it doesn't matter. There's stress that comes on and being able to have somebody speak good into your life on a consistent basis both personally and professionally is, is so important. And that's one of the reasons that you do what you do. It's, it's really the core reason why I decided to start this podcast is because, you know, you need to continue to put those good things out there and you need to be able to point people to resources like you, that can help these leaders really figure out what's most important to them and why they're doing what they do.

Michael McGreevy: Yeah, absolutely. Can I go a little bit deeper here for a second, for sure. This might make you a little uncomfortable if you're listening, but oftentimes we are striving for success for unhealthy reasons. And this is something that I see a lot with leaders too, is sometimes there's an insecurity buried deep down that you are trying to out-earn or out create or out built. And that is, that's like a stair climber. There's, there's no end to that either. You will just, it'll just be magnified the more you build and the more you grow. So sometimes it's taken a look at, okay. What insecurity is, am I trying to outrun here? Is there a hole that I'm trying to fill by going bigger by building more? Is there something I'm trying to avoid here? The cool thing that happens when you are willing to take a look at what's really going on instead of trying to avoid it and push it away.

That's really catapults you forward as a leader that can help you get to that next level because you're building it for the right reasons. You're not trying to make somebody proud of your, make somebody like you or whatever that might be for you. You're doing it because you want to make a positive difference in the world.

Or maybe you want to do everything you can with the gifts that you've been given. So that's what I would challenge anyone listening today. Examine your reasons, examine your reasons for wanting to be successful. What's underneath that, make sure that's not something empty. Like you feeling fulfilled.

(11:49)

Jason Pearl: You have a really interesting story too. And I know this because we're friends, but, um, I know that you've had some really important growth moments in your life, um, that have really shaped you as an individual.

And, uh, you don't have to give us the whole background, but if there's anything that kind of points, uh, you know, that sticks out that you think would be worth kind of sharing with the group. I, I I'd love to hear it.

Michael McGreevy: Yeah, I think my own failure, I'll call it a failure, but it was actually exactly what needed to happen for me to get to where I am today. But I really struggled with finding clarity in my own life and who I was, what I was made to do, what I was made to accomplish. What should I pursue? I struggled for over a decade trying to figure that out and going in every wrong direction. And I think because I've felt what that feels like to be totally lost and feel like I'm spinning my wheels. It helps me gain some insight and perspective on how, what that's like for people who are in that place.

But for me, it was a tragedy that kind of led me to an even worse position and closer to the end of myself, that really led to my breakthrough and my, um, my mind opening up to new possibilities. So a friend of mine was killed on a construction site and that really just transformed my perspective. You know, what it did is it, it woke me up to the reality. That life is incredibly brief. Even if you get the full run of it, even if you get 80, 90 years, it's still incredibly brief. And so while we live while we have the opportunity to serve others, to help others, to go for it. With the strengths that we've been given with the passions that we've been given, we better do it, right?

Because you talk to anyone who is in their later years of life. The first thing that they will tell you about regrets is that man, I wish I was more true to what I wanted to pursue. I wish I would have gone for it. I wish I would have laid it all on the line and made it happen. And I do not want to be that guy in any way.

When I'm sitting in my rocking chair, I want to feel like man, I've laid it all out on the field. And I did everything I could to make the most of my life.

Jason Pearl: For sure. Uh, I mean, you've shared that story with me and I just think it's so powerful and what's interesting is there's so much, many people that are in that spot right now.

(14:15)

What, what advice would you give. To a younger version of yourself or somebody like you, that's kind of coming up that maybe is struggling in that same way, because they're not their story's individual, right? Everyone's got their own individual story. God's got a plan individually for everyone. So what, what practical advice would you have to somebody kind of walking through something like that right now?

Michael McGreevy:Yeah, there's a lot. There's a lot to that picture, but I'll, I'll give you a couple things here. First of all, you're who you are right now is not a fixed state. So if you find yourself speaking over yourself, I'm not this, I can't be good at this. I can't be good at that, but maybe I could be good at this.

Like, those are pretty concrete things to say about yourself that doesn't have to be fixed. So I would encourage you to dream wide open and not be governed by your own self-imposed limitations, dream wide open. And if the dream is, is not an escape from something else, if it's truly stems from who you are and who you're meant to be.

There's a way to become the person who can live that dream out. And that's going to take time and it's going to take surrounding yourself with right people. It's going to take reading the right books. It's going to take listen to the right podcasts. Like this one right here. It's going to take, going to conferences.

Um, it's going to take failing and overcoming failure and failing again. So that's, that's going to be, it's going to be a crooked road, but it is worth it. Ask anyone who's been through that? You don't hear an entrepreneur who's failing multiple times. Who's eventually found success saying, I don't know if I could go back.

I think I would just kinda go with the status quo, right? Oh yeah. Totally. Dive in and get yourself dirty and realize that who you are today is not going to be the same person you are in five years if you commit to your own self-development.

Jason Pearl: There's no silver bullet and there's no quick fix. But the fact of the matter is it's a commitment. Right. It's a commitment to being the best version of yourself and the way that you want to be in the success that you want individually and not what everyone else tells you, you should be. So it's a commitment. If you really want success, you want to improve. It's a long-term thing.

Michael McGreevy: That's right. And don't wish the failures and obstacles away. Right. Because I mean, Jason, you know, this, you look back on any of those challenges you've had as you built your business. Those are the things that really helped you grow and really helped you become a new person and get to the next level. So if you're, if you wish, oh God, I hope you don't have to experience any failures or any obstacles.

You're wishing that you, you won't grow. Basically. You have to embrace those and realize those are a gift along the way. And they're part of it. They're not an unfortunate circumstance that comes along with building a business. No. They are essential pieces to who you are becoming in this process.

Jason Pearl: And it's getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, right? So whether you're paying for a mastermind or whether you're paying for a leadership coach or whatever else, sometimes you have to be comfortable with being uncomfortable. And, uh, I think that's a really important lesson that I know I learned. And it was, it was the lesson that you helped teach me.

Michael McGreevy: So I appreciate that. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. There's another thing I want to mention here too. Um, you know, we all get beat up by life along the way, whether that's personally in relationships or in business failures, financial failures, whatever that looks like, and it's easy to be defined by that. So maybe you got wrecked by a situation in your own life and that record player’s turning and turning in your head of, yeah, see, you're a failure in this area. This you're just bad in this area. And, and you're walking around with that. So sometimes we have to realize that we've adopted ways of thinking about ourselves that are hanging around and continuing to have a voice in our life. And we can't allow that to continue.

That's why it's so crucial to surround yourself with people like you, Jason, and, and, um, other people. Want the best for you and want to see you succeed because they'll, they'll remind me, they'll remind you of that. They'll say, Hey, that's not who you are. I know who you are. And this is who you're becoming.

That is not you. And so, uh, there's sometimes, uh, some stepping back and maybe even sitting down and writing some of these things down. What do I think about myself? Am I are all the ways that I speak in my mind about myself helpful? Do they move me forward or are they keeping me back in this limited place who I don't even want to be in the first place?

So that's something you really want to focus on too, in this journey of stepping out, taking a look back and really taking a hard look at your thinking.

And I like your example, Jason, of you came across me and you just, you reached out, you were proactive about that. So don't, don't sit on your hands and wait for somebody to dial up your phone, right? If you recognize that you need that in your life, start to look around you and see, okay, who are the people that maybe I'm connected with that I didn't even realize who I need to be around that are going to help me move forward in life and be proactive about making a connection there, buying them a coffee, buying them a lunch, or even dialing them up on the phone or having a zoom call with them.

(19:40)

Jason Pearl: Well, I've got two questions, one on advice, and I have a follow-up question. What piece of advice do you find yourself giving to leaders very often right now that the leaders that you're coaching or the people that you're coming in contact with, is there, is there a common piece of advice that you're giving out a lot?

Michael McGreevy: Yeah, there, there is. I try not to give too much advice because what I find is most people have the answers within them. So what I try to do more than tell them what I think they should do is I help draw out what is already within them. And so in that as a piece of advice of you have to allow for enough space to look within, to really to, to be quiet enough, to hear.

Your own thoughts or to think about the vision you have for your life. So, uh, you know, as a leader, as a business owner, it's always go, go, go, because there's always the next thing that has to be done. So even in the midst of the busy-ness, you have to be fierce about protecting some of that time where you can just be quiet and introspective and to think.

To think wide open. So that's what I would tell most leaders is they don't have enough time for that.

That's so true spaces space and time, like times the one thing you can't ever buy back right? And, and, and it's really important to, to create that space and to have that time to reflect. So really good.

(20:58)

Jason Pearl: What are you doing right now that you're super excited about? Um, you know, it could be business or life. What, what is really exciting, Michael McGreevey these days?

Michael McGreevy: I am thrilled. And I was just talking to you about this before we started recording, but we are, uh, um, finishing up our dream house.

Um, so we've been working on that for the past two years, completely gutted it and put it back together. My wife and I have been working on planning it out and picking all the different finishes and all that sort of thing. And we are excited to be able to move into it this summer. So. It's been a lot of hard work and a lot of decisions to make, but we cannot wait to be out in that new, that is awesome.

Jason Pearl: And, and what a labor of love, right? Two years, you're doing a lot of the work yourself. Subbing some out doing a lot of the work yourself, managing three kids, trying to keep your relationship, you know, on the right level with your wife and then run a leadership business, right? Have, have multiple book coaching clients. So you, you know, you must be a master at planning. That's for sure.

Michael McGreevy: I'm really not. I've learned the hard way. And I'll give you an example, Jason, of how extreme I am with flexibility and you know this about me, but. I value time and flexibility so much so I can invest in my family and really enjoy them that I've, I've committed to an every other week work schedule.

It doesn't mean I don't ever do any work on those off weeks. Um, it just means that I don't have any appointments on those off weeks. So if on a. Wednesday at 2:00 PM. I want to go to the playground with my three kids and run around like a maniac. I can do that. And so I it's that important to me and that it wasn't easy to build that it took a long time to get to that point where I could do it, but I had a very clear vision of, I knew I wanted a lot of flexibility and it would be worth the sacrifice to get there.

So I've been working on that for the past six years. And finally, I'm in a place where that's working really well.

Jason Pearl: [00:22:57] Wow. There are a lot of jealous people for you, Michael right now. But, but you made a really important point. You've been working to get to this point for six years, right? That is a lot of months of working.

Hard to get to this point because you had a vision and you realized it was going to take time and you couldn't sacrifice Joe, those off weeks, you know, without building the business, building the respect, building the following, building the clientele to be able to get there. But now you're doing it now.

You're you have the space and the time with what you value most, which is your family. And that is so, so admirable and something that I think so many people need to hear is that if you want something. It may take time, but you can get it. You just have to build it.

Michael McGreevy: Yeah. And I do this to Jason, but it's also a piece of advice that we so often overestimate what we can accomplish in three to six months, we give something a hard shot.

And in a couple months later it's just not working. Like, I guess it wasn't meant to be. Really? You know, we underestimate is what's possible when we commit to a long-term vision and maybe it's five years, maybe it's 10 years. We've got to think a little bit more long-term about our vision, if it's important enough to us. Because we do underestimate what's possible in a longer period of time.

And I would ask you this, if you had to wait five years, if you had to wait even 10 years to be able to live out the ultimate vision you had for your life, what would that be worth it? And, and for most people that's a big, yes. Yeah, of course. I had to wait that long and I could live this way. I mean, for goodness sake, most people wait 50, 60 years to retire to think that they're going to have that.

Jason Pearl: What is five to 10 years, right? Yeah. So true. So true now it's, it's, uh, I admire you so much for doing that. And I just think you're such a great example and I appreciate you sharing because that is, that is something that I know a lot of people, a lot of people dream, right. Green takes action and, and you've done it.

(24:58)

So, so well done. Thank you. Um, before we close up here, Michael, a couple of lighthearted questions that I think will be fun. We've been going pretty deep, so we'll lighten it up a little bit here, but, um, One of the things that, um, that I always get a kick out of is when you have a podcast and it's on multiple platforms, specifically, Spotify, you have the opportunity to see what your listeners, what are the top five artists that you're, that the people listening to your podcast are listening to.

Michael McGreevy: So when they, when your listeners follow on Spotify, who do you think is one or two musical artists that are going to show up in my, in my backend data?

I think people are going to be confused because I love such a wide variety of music, but I can tell you a couple that I've loved just recently, a song by Blue October called Home. It is. You're going to love that song. Jason, it's all about family, but it's, it's super fun. I love me some George Strait and Alan Jackson.

So I like some of that country. I know people either love or hate country. I'm one of those guys that loves country. Um, maybe there's some gangster rap in there too. And some classical.

Jason Pearl: I love it all over the board. It'd be all over the board. I can't wait to see it. I know that. Within the first couple episodes of my podcast that I launched.

Uh, I had a few Spotify listeners, I think I had maybe a dozen or so, but Bieber was, was, was made a big push in there. And then so did Nickelback, which I don't know how I feel about that. Right. But, um, you know, there's, there's somebody that loves my podcast that loves Nickelback and you know, what. I ain't mad at ya.

We're just going to keep rolling with it. It's amazing. It's so good. It's so good.

(26:35)

Um, as you know, you know, we're both family, men, I've got, I've got two girls, uh, Isabella and Julianna and, and they, they have this thing where they, instead of call me dad, they call me Deeds, right? Like D E E D S. But my youngest and, and really my oldest, they both, they, they say, I like to use big words.

[And they said, “Dad, on your podcast, you have to have a segment that's called ‘Big Words with Deeds.’” And you have to ask the people that you're interviewing if they use big words like you do. So I don't even know. I didn't even, legitimately is one of the words that they think is a big word that I use often, which I don't really think is a big word, but they think it's hilarious and they count the times I say the word legitimately.

So is there a word that you say often that, that you, that maybe people think his is too big for the vocabulary or are you a pretty straight shooter when it comes to being a direct communicator?

Michael McGreevy: Yeah. Yeah. You know, my kids are really little too, so I use adult words all the time with them. I just speak normally, like I would to an adult and, uh, consequently, they use all the adult words as well.

One of the funny things is, um, my son gunner can't quite pronounce. Interesting. So he has, he says interesting. And every, actually every time I go somewhere, whether it's out the door into my office, Um, either my three-year-old five-year-old or six-year-old will say, oh, do you have a coaching call Papa, you have one of your coaching call.

Oh, that sounds interesting. So was just kind of funny wherever I'm going. I think I have a coaching call or I'm talking to a coaching client.

(28:09)

Jason Pearl: So last question, um, on the lighthearted side is. Is there a guilty pleasure that Mike McGreevy has?

Michael McGreevy: I'm a seven on the Enneagram. Okay. So if you know the seven, yeah.

There's a lot. That is my weakness is Michael. Okay. I want all the pleasures of life. That's who I am, but I think my guilty pleasure is probably the combination of hot sauce and blue cheese in some form or fashion. I'm a Buffalo Western New Yorker through and through. Yeah, absolutely. Man, if it's, if it has those two things I'm in, it's probably good.

Jason Pearl: Yeah, I've spent so since the Buffalo Bills season ended, I've spent the last like 60, some odd days taking off all the weight that I put on during the Bills season, because I would make homemade chicken wings and have a mess up hot sauce and blue cheese. And. Uh, you know, there's different story for a different day, but I, but I've really enjoyed having you on this podcast. I know my audience is going to love learning about you and hearing about all the wonderful advice and knowledge that you have to kind of share. I know you don't like calling it advice, but in some way, shape or form. Um, so, so tell my audience, how can, how can they find you? How can they keep up with you? What's the easiest way to get in touch with you?

Michael McGreevy: [00:29:32] I'm pretty accessible. Um, uh, You know, if you want to have a conversation at anytime you can call me, you can email me.

(29:38)

My email address is michael@mcgreevyleadership.com.

Jason Pearl: Look at that. The man of the people, Michael McGreevey. I love it. I love it. Well, listen, brother, I've, I've had so much fun chatting with you. Uh, we could do this for hours.

We're going to do this again. This won't be the last time you're on The Company We keep podcast, but I just want to say, I appreciate you. Appreciate everything you've shared today and, uh, just you man.

Michael McGreevy: Well, thank you so much, Jason. It's been awesome today. Thanks for having me take care guys. Bye bye.