Chris Judd Mark Howard Nathan Brown Self Awareness In A Changing World

A Listener Production.

G'day, it's Luke Darson.

The idea of self-improvement and leadership both on and off the field

has been a lifelong passion of mine.

With one of my oldest friends, we created a leader collective

and have had the privilege of working with thousands of leaders

in education, sport, industry and the arts

that have helped shift to what we see as the 21st century style of leadership

where everyone has a voice.

In this podcast, we hear stories from these iconic leaders.

Well, in this special episode, I sat down with some old friends,

Mark Howard, Chris Judd and Nathan Brown,

who came together under the banner of the Friday Huddle

to broadcast AFL to millions of Australians

with a show that has often pushed the boundaries.

As we sat down, this was a different tone,

a reflective and meaningful conversation

touching on when we draw the line, leadership and family

and why growth as a collective is so important.

Well, this is going to be, I think, a unique experience

for the Empowering Leaders podcast

because I'm surrounded by old friends,

people I've worked with for an extended period of time

and I'll introduce them with a semi-serious heading to start with

and I'm looking at one of my old mates, Nathan Brown,

who came to the Western Bulldogs, picked 10 in 1996,

ended up playing 219 games, kicked 349 goals

with two clubs, the Bulldogs and Richmond,

an All-Australian twice, married to the beautiful Christina,

father of four, so thanks, Nathan, for joining us.

And Chris Judd's opposite me, he was picked three in 2001,

went on to become one of the all-time greats,

a six-time All-Australian, five-time best and fairer,

a premiership captain, a couple of Brownlows, Juddy,

a Hall of Famer on every level as well.

Good to see you, Juddy.

Thank you, Duke. Very good to be you.

I'm a bit nervous that Nate didn't bring his conversation wedges today,

that he's rocked up nude, but it's exciting nonetheless.

I think we will need to discuss the conversation wedges

and what that means around Nate.

Mark Howard is someone I've known for a long time.

He's been a lifetime sports journalist.

He broadcast the Howie Games,

he's the biggest podcast in the world,

and he's been an incredible success over many mediums.

So welcome to you, Howie.

Thank you, mate.

I'm not sure I know much about leadership,

but I'll be interested to see what Chris has,

and I'll be really interested to see what Nathan has to say about leadership.

So, well, over a period of time,

and some of you I've known for over 20 years,

and essentially what brought us together was broadcasting AFL football,

for those that aren't aware.

And the banner that we ran under was the Friday Huddle

for an extended period of time.

So if I can get something semi-serious out of this group,

because our style of broadcasting wasn't particularly highbrow,

and so if you're listening to this podcast and you think,

what was the style of broadcasting with the Friday Huddle?

What did it sound like?

What was the sort of vibe?

Well, this is a bit of a snapshot from 2021.

Jaddy wasn't with us this year,

but just have a listen to a little bit of the way

that we have tended to broadcast AFL football.

Even when you're a surfer, you go to the beach a lot.

I couldn't even guess how many times you've had sand kicked in your face.

Maybe a bit of an idea of the sort of nickname.

When I came in tonight, I thought it was Chief.

Are you unhappy about something, Piggy?

That was Melbourne.

What's your story?

You're the journalist.

And I know you haven't broken a story for a while,

but you are the journalist.

That is our man, Howie.

He is genuine, and he is a genuine tosser.

I'm seeing the Chief on the Greco-Roman wrestling pad.

Don't they do sumo?

Are you comfortable to admit that you've become a tool, Howie?

You're an imbecile of a man.

The depths of your stupidity have yet to be discovered.

Well, apparently.

Damo breaks news as well, but that hasn't happened for about three years.

But anyway, Damo.

I tried, though.

I've already told you I'd beat three of the four of you in a fight.

Me and Damo, yes.

Yeah.

So which of the other one?

I'm not going anywhere near Chief.

So you're beating Darce in a scrap.

Tell you what.

Darce is a vegetarian.

If you had your time again, would you have Darce or someone with personality?

Oh, you're warming up, are you, Chief?

He is now.

Come out of your slumber.

So, as I said, real highbrow stuff is the way we've tempted you.

We've tended to roll in the past.

And if I can set the tone for this conversation, Howie, Juddy and Nate,

it is around discussion around leadership.

And to me, that is the natural form that we revert to.

That is what we knew playing footy and that is the idea of it.

But, Juddy, when you first joined us,

we convinced you to join us out of the world of AFL football.

I think we did have some serious discussions around,

were you entirely comfortable with the way that we broadcast you as a player?

I remember you had some reservations around the style,

the style of what we did on Triple M.

If you reflect back on that, do you reckon that was well-founded?

As a player that generally just wanted to concentrate on footy,

I was probably uncomfortable with any sort of broadcasting.

I just wanted to play my footy and stay out of the limelight.

So, it's different for different personalities.

But, yeah, I think going back, I think it's unhealthy

how much certain elements in media sweat on mistakes.

And I think that's got deleterious impacts

on society because we see that happening across social media

and all sorts of different avenues at the minute.

And the net result of that is you get more people

that don't try and do something.

They sit around and become trolls in their parents' basement

instead of out there actually making mistakes

because to achieve anything, that's something that needs to happen.

I love that Juddy's introduced a word called deleterious.

Deleterious.

And that has blown our group away almost immediately.

And I said, we're going to try and keep this at a level

that is of interest.

So, Nate, I want to play you.

A bit of a grab that was a bit confronting, I reckon,

for all of us this year.

And Juddy wasn't part of this.

You probably haven't heard it.

But Triple M historically came up with an idea,

Sam Newman and Gary Lyon and the guys that started Triple M football

around the idea that we'll award the worst on ground

as well as the best on ground.

Now, I remember being a player,

how when I've spoken about this before,

you've come off the ground and you had an idea

that you had a shocker.

And you're thinking, do I turn on to Triple M

and see if they thought I was as bad as I was?

I found out that Triple M was the worst on ground.

I found that funny.

I remember tuning in and Spud's giving me the three worst on ground.

Same.

And it was that combination between I'm really shitty

how badly I played, but I can't help but see the humour in it.

Because to me, it was aiming up.

It wasn't aiming at first-year players.

And I found the humour in it.

But we had Fraser Geary join us this year,

who's an extraordinary AFL player.

He's kicked 100 goals in a season, a two-time Commonwealth medal winner.

He was very much at the front of a lot of the banter on Triple M.

So I was a bit stunned.

He refused to come on to Triple M.

But he came on and he expressed this in a pretty emotional way.

Have a listen.

Triple M, to be honest, in their heyday,

and I'm not being rude saying this,

but when you did your 3-2-1 worst players on ground,

I think it had an effect on things like depression.

And a lot of the guys that were doing those calls

have had depression in their lives, and I don't think it helped.

I think we've seen depression over the years get bigger and bigger,

and we've all had it.

Probably everyone in this room's had it.

And those sorts of things don't help.

And I haven't listened to Triple M for a long time.

I hope you don't do it.

So I've never done anything, Jodie, where you thought,

aim to harm or upset anyone.

That's never been humour to me.

That is the line crossed.

So you're sitting there.

I think we're all a bit stunned.

I certainly was with that being something that he'd reflected on

as causing a bit of harm.

I used to love Fraser, and I love the humour of him being the carpet python

and was he on today or was he not on.

But do you reckon that line had been crossed in the past?

I think so.

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't have been comfortable giving someone

worse on ground votes.

Really?

Yeah.

But that doesn't mean it's wrong.

Yeah.

But I wouldn't have been comfortable doing it.

And in a way, I reckon it is a little bit disrespectful to the –

as a broadcaster, you're a second iteration of the players

are putting on the game.

They're risking their body, risking their reputations.

And by doing that, they provide a job for a whole heap of people

that are in secondary positions, if you like.

Not lesser positions, but there's no broadcast

without the players putting it on.

So I think you've got to tread a bit of a line between treating

those players with respect.

Because without that, there's no jobs for journos.

You know, there's no TV rights.

There's this huge industry that we all have benefited from.

So it's not something I would have been comfortable.

But it's not wrong.

You know, that doesn't mean I'm right and other people

that were comfortable doing it is wrong.

But just in my guts doing that at the end of the game,

I wouldn't have felt comfortable doing it.

So I'll be accused of hypocrisy here, Howie Browning,

because I've got a real issue with the way our senior coaches

in particular get smashed by our industry in an unfair way.

And I think it's creating –

I think it's creating a whole heap of issues.

But my view was that was past players in the in-joke.

I found that in the in-joke, Juddy, that when you're a part of that,

it was that you were part of this community and we did respect you

and it was done through humour, Howie.

But, you know, clearly that's not something that we all necessarily share.

There's a couple of things to note there.

We discussed before we get to it that Juddy was no good on TV.

He wasn't bad on radio.

He's a podcaster.

The words he is using this evening and this afternoon are quite extraordinary.

Very, very good in podcasting.

So I think we've found his space there.

The thing – because I commentate on the game or host the call,

which I'm really lucky, I don't have to make comment.

I haven't played football, so I'm never going to be in that position.

There's no way I could go on air and be that negative about someone.

So I can completely understand.

It comes back to what we were saying before.

If it's within our group, I think it's okay.

Once you start giving it to other people, then you can upset people.

The thing that really took me aback, and I don't know about you, Nate,

and I know it took the Chief back.

In the conversation was when Fraser said, you know,

we all suffer from depression.

Everyone in this room will have suffered from depression.

And my immediate thought was, actually, mate, that's not me.

I've never suffered from depression.

And in that time and space, because you're so, in the modern media,

careful about what you say, the immediate thought in my head was to pop up

and say, listen, I know it's a problem for a lot of people in the community,

but it's not everybody in the community, and I haven't suffered that way,

and I didn't say anything.

And I look back and think, was it the right thing or not the wrong thing to say?

Because if you say it and it comes out wrong,

then you're on the front page of the paper again for making comments

about mental health.

So it is a fine line, Nate, isn't it?

That's what took me back in that conversation as well.

I felt the same, Howie, and obviously Chief did,

and us three have had a conversation about it, that I haven't had depression,

but out of respect to Fraser on that night because he was airing a lot of things,

things that have happened in his past.

And respect to him for coming on and fronting up and saying,

I'm prepared to eyeball you guys, and so that was my experience.

Nate, coming back to you, I mean, it's interesting, you're a father of four now.

I want to talk about parenting with all of you.

Your responsibilities are, I've got to look after four kids.

You married the beautiful Christina, probably your greatest achievement ever,

Nate, as we often say.

But I remember you as a 17-year-old and think your development

and where you've come and being sincere as your own person is the greatest growth

I think I've seen in any of my life.

So there's a lot to lose, isn't there, Nate, by doing something that you regret?

Well, you'd want to hope that over time you do mature

and you do things a little bit different than what you did when you were 17.

But, I mean, as everybody always knows, you spend a lifetime building up

some sort of cachet in the business and it can be undone in a couple of seconds.

But being a father of four has made me realise that I'm not on my own anymore

and I've got to provide for these kids for probably well after they're 18.

And I feel like I'm a better life.

I feel like I'm a better leader of my own four kids than I ever was at a football club.

And I think everybody knows what their shortcomings are.

Sometimes it's pointed out to you.

Sometimes it's not.

You let go to your own devices.

But I think I'm clearly a better leader and show more leadership to my kids

than what I did as a footballer.

Yeah, and that's an interesting conversation.

There's 14 kids between the four of us sitting in this conversation now.

Jodie's got four.

Brandon's got four.

I've got four.

So how he's got a couple.

And, Jodie, I think, you know,

you said males maybe is an evolutionary thing.

We sit around.

We love to sledge each other.

We get the banter in it.

But we don't often sit around and say,

hey, man, what are you doing on the home front parenting-wise?

And I think there's a missed opportunity in that because, to me,

it's this thing I want to be better at than anything in my life.

There's no playbook on it that works.

You don't tend to share information.

How do you approach leadership on the family front?

No, if you get some good things, I'll be keen to hear them.

How hard is it?

Do you find it tests you in ways that you can't?

I can't possibly imagine.

Is that how you find it?

Very hard, Duke.

Very hard.

Can I just interject for a moment?

Jodie has more trouble organising his staff that look after his children

than actual children.

That's what I was talking about.

You were talking about the actual kids, weren't you?

So I don't think you're asking the right bloke because he only pops in,

sees them an hour a day, and then he gets the cleaner, the cook,

the fitness bloke, the pool cleaner to take charge.

He's got a lot of staff, our man.

So it's like the Von Trapp family.

They get presented to Chris for an hour in their –

They wear their name tags, too, just so I don't –

Don't mix it up because that's an uncomfortable thing when you do mix it up.

Well, we've all spent more time with them than we could ever have possibly

imagined in the last couple of years.

How about you, Howie, from a leadership point with your kids?

Do you think about it?

Do you and Eric – again, I think the greatest thing in your life is Eric,

likewise for all of us.

Yes.

Do you guys discuss parenting?

Do you have a philosophy?

Yeah, we do.

We've got various philosophies.

I think with my son, much more than my father would have been to me,

is I'm constantly pushing with.

I'm constantly pushing with him respect to women because it's become such a big

part of our community.

So when he will say – he might say at dinner, such and such girl came up to me

and said she liked me and I just sort of walked off.

I said, mate, even at your age, you need to say thank you.

I appreciate that.

That's very kind of you and really understand that respect to women.

I think as far as parenting goes, we have – Erica and I lived quite

adventurous lives.

We've travelled a lot.

We're trying to bring that into our kids' lives.

The thing that I'm really trying and Erica really tries – and you've got to be

careful when you reflect on the school system, but I think at the public school

system, certainly for both our young kids, there's so many discussions about

resilience, but they never get the opportunity to learn resilience tasks

because – and we joke about it on the show – everybody gets a medal,

everybody does well, and the teacher never says you can do better.

So we've really tried to push that with our kids.

One, that it's okay to make mistakes and fail, but you can't learn.

You can't learn resilience until you do fail in their situation.

So that's a big one, that be prepared to fail, accept failure, learn from failure,

don't be afraid of it, and therefore build up your resilience.

Because the bit I don't understand about the modern world, all three of you as fathers,

I don't understand what happens when Sky or Mac gets to the end of school

and doesn't get the marks they want or doesn't get into the university role

they want or the TAFE or doesn't get the first job they go to.

Some way I feel we're bringing up kids that that is the first time

they experience failure.

And then I'm worried that they don't know how to deal with that situation

because for the first 18 years everyone said you came eighth, well done,

good effort, good job.

Yeah, it's an interesting thought, isn't it, that everyone gets a prize now

and what that does to a generation of kids.

I had a friend of mine who's a father of five and he shared this quote with me

and I think about it a lot through parenting.

It's Daniel Patrick Moynihan,

the richest inheritance any child can have is a stable, loving, disciplined,

family life and it resonated with me more than anything.

It's like trying to get that balance right between stability in your house,

clearly there's got to be some love but there's also got to be that boundaries

and discipline which to me I find the hardest part of parenting is to here's

the rules and here's the parameters which we've got to because to me

it doesn't work without it.

Is there a philosophy that you take, Nate, to the parenting side of your house or not?

There is, Duke, and it's obviously to do with Christina who it's pointed out

many, many times on a daily basis by you guys.

I've really landed on my tippy toes with Christina.

Have you ever, Nate?

But we are a tight unit and we are in love and I'm happy to say that we're in love

and we present this unified front to our kids because that's what I want my kids

to look up and see every day that we love each other, we're affectionate with each other,

we don't argue in front of them.

Everybody has arguments and we try and do that away from them

but just that they have two adults who they can look up to and aspire

to because you're not always going to get it right.

I had an argument with my 10-year-old girl yesterday who said,

you'll never understand and you feel anger at that point.

You tell me why I wouldn't understand and then you have to just bring it back

a little bit and then I go to my wife and ask her to help out with that sort of stuff.

So being a single parent, I'm not sure how hard that would be.

I'd never want to have to go through that.

My heart goes out to everybody who is a single parent but I feel like if we're stable

at the top, like any organisation, the kids are going to follow.

Do you know what I love is that when Nate beautifully expressed how much he loves his wife,

the awkwardness for the other three of us was palpable.

You could feel Juddy just recoiled in his chair and I love that about my old mate Nate

is that he's absolutely out there and proud with him and his wife.

On that, when I'm a little bit flat, I must admit I jump on Instagram, NathanBrown07

and I just look at some of the pictures of him and his wife and the fact that they discuss openly

they're in love and look at my beautiful wife and they're holding hands.

It's a beautiful thing, Nathan.

I've never had that.

I've never had the opportunity to tell you before when I'm a little bit flat,

I go on there and I see the love between you and Christina and it just gives me a lift, mate.

It just gives me a lift.

Now, we're drifting back to Friday Huddle territory here.

I'm going to straighten this shit back up again.

Hey, Juddy, I had this experience where I'm parenting for a moment where we're away at a holiday.

I grew up in a fairly humble environment.

We used to have one holiday.

I think we had one holiday my whole childhood.

It was down to Glenelg Beach, 10 minutes from our house.

I thought it was the best thing ever for four days.

And we've had this great luxurious lifestyle, really, to be able to go and visit places.

And down at the coast, one of the kids was trying to pause live TV on the house by the beach.

And it was an old TV that didn't – and threw the remote at the TV and was like,

this TV is bullshit.

It doesn't work.

Now, I lost it, Juddy.

I was like, are you kidding?

Do you have any perspective at all of just how lucky you – and I realized then that you can't teach perspective.

If that's what you've grown up with and you've been fortunate enough to travel –

I mean, how do you find that?

How do you find that, Juddy?

Because clearly, you know, your kids have experienced stuff that, you know, is elite and great opportunities.

Is that something that you think about or not?

It's like more of a back basket than mine, Duke, if I'm being brutally honest.

But you make some good points.

I mean, I try to keep it simple.

Most of parenting, I think, is rocking up, really.

If you're rocking up, you're 95% of the way there.

Each kid's different.

You know, I've got – you know, one of my kids probably needs to be more assertive.

And I worry they're going to grow up getting ripped off by people.

Another one of my kids, I worry they're going to grow up ripping off people because they're too assertive.

So you're tailoring for each kid.

But I think as long as you're rocking up there and giving them as much love as you can,

that's sort of as simple as I try and keep it.

And providing kids that can think for themselves.

I mean, that's the only thing I'm overtly passionate about because none of us know what the future looks like in 20 years.

But I do know that people that can't think for themselves and just swallow anything they get fed,

they're going to have a tough time of making it.

So outside of that, providing with love, I won't go into my relationship status as heavily as Nate.

But it was beautiful how he did that and does that regularly on Instagram.

Do the kids have to go down to the Olympic pool to get a good stretch out?

Because you're the world's biggest house and the world's smallest pool.

It gives us great joy, Jodie, being at your house.

And it's been a common theme for those who listen to the Friday Huddle that Jodie's got.

A wonderful house, but a really, really tiny pool.

And whether that's true or not, it's provided us with a lot of joy.

I had a chat to Steve Biddulph, who's the author, best-selling author of kids' books, Raising Boys, Raising Girls.

It's interesting, almost to the word Jodie said, but if you're there and you're around, that is the key.

Because the reality is, you know, most kids experience stuff that is suboptimal, to use one of your terms, Jodie,

in the 70% of kids that don't get that environment.

So I think your wisdom is on the mark there.

Changing gears slightly, Jodie.

On this podcast, we're talking about the shift in leadership from the old hierarchy in command and control leadership

to this more collaborative and self-reflective type of leadership.

You invest for a living.

You invest in businesses for a living and you analyze them strategically.

How important to you is the leadership of a business that you're about to put your money in?

The most important thing by my whole.

Yeah.

Number one?

Number one.

Yeah, that's the – yeah, but even if you get a crappy business at the start,

but the guy running it or the girl running it is a star, well, they pivot and they change the business, you know?

Yeah.

So that's the most important thing and daylight second.

So, yeah, that's the main sort of thing.

I mean, I think there's some heuristics I'll use.

I've found that people that talk about their mistakes are generally much more competent than people that pretend that they're perfect.

Yeah.

You know, I'll often look at a CEO if I'm having a chat to them about their business

and they're saying, you know, I'm not going to do that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So there's a lot of sort of cues about, you know, just the way they shift in their seat

or touch their face when they're saying something.

I think that's going to be a stretch for you to do.

Really?

So there's a lot of body language things that you pick up as an investor.

But the leadership, the best leaders I see are the ones that know themselves.

That's really where it starts.

People that really have a clear understanding of what they are, what their strengths are,

make the best leaders regardless of whether they look like the leader in a Harvard textbook or not.

That really helps.

Having a clear understanding of self, I think, is by far and away the most important step in effective leaders.

That's fascinating insight for me that you're actually, you know, looking at body language of CEOs,

checking out their mistakes is a really interesting insight.

There's a famous book, Good to Great by Jim Collins.

I know you're a voracious reader and you may or may not have read that.

But he has a category where he talks about level five leaders and that's what creates these great iconic businesses.

It's a category that he's put himself and describes them in your way that they are more often humble,

often prepared to give more credit to others in the business for stuff that's gone on,

self-reflective, great sense of themselves, really understand who they are,

don't need to prove and don't need to bang the desk.

And that's interesting.

So they're the sort of leaders that you're finding are the ones that you want to back in.

They are.

And they're leaders that they build a business or an outfit with a competitive advantage.

And they build a culture that's really aligned with that.

And when you see those three things come together,

it's often a good sign that you've got a pretty serious organization.

I'm really concerned that there's going to be a window of attention span that I'm going to get.

Nate looks like he's drifting off here.

And so, Howie, I've got many other things that I'd like to go.

But in the interest of time, what we have been doing is identifying a handful of qualities that we think makes up great leadership

and different categories and then trying to just cross-reference that with a range of different people,

which has been interesting.

Well, I found it interesting anyway.

You guys may well not.

But there are a handful of dimensions of leadership.

So jump in.

I'm going to ask all of you.

And then I've got a couple of questions to finish on.

Self-leadership to me is one category we're talking about.

What does it mean to you, Nate?

Self-leadership.

Self-leadership is, for me, if you take it back to a football term as being a self-startup,

you don't need anybody else to help you.

You don't need anybody else to do anything for you.

So you're a self-leader.

And hopefully the people below you or next to you or even with you,

or even above you, see what you're doing.

Do you think about self-leadership, Danny?

Yeah, I do.

You know, if you expect people to follow, you need to make sure your own room's clean first.

But I think there's a difference between I think people like seeing leaders that make mistakes

and are human and have areas where they're weak.

I think they actually like that.

But they hate hypocrisy.

And so I think leaders don't need to try and pretend that they're perfect.

They should embrace their shortcomings.

But they can't be hypocritical.

And that's what that's self-leadership.

That's what self-leadership speaks of to me.

How about you, Howie?

Self-leadership.

Positivity.

I like to be led by really positive people.

So if I'm in a situation where I'm being cast as the leader, I am as positive as I can.

You understand that there are going to be issues along the way.

But just get up, dust yourself off, keep going.

But yeah, to me, it's all about positivity, putting some positivity out there.

I think it pretty much comes back your way tenfold.

So leadership to me is positivity.

And in fairness to you, Howie,

I can't remember seeing you ever walk into an environment and be flat.

So I think, in fact, you're always up, always in that space, just genuinely got an energy about you.

And that's probably the other category of talking.

Positively impacting people in the environment is something that we see as a dimension of leadership for great leaders.

And is that the same for you, Howie?

That's your one word, going to positivity is how you impact the environment?

Yeah, absolutely.

Because I think I was reading something the other day, a book by a guy called,

I don't even know how to pronounce his name.

It's Jesse Itzler.

Anyway, he got a seal to come and live with him for a month, like a Navy seal, and train him.

And this bloke kept saying to him, no matter how hard the workout is, keep going because you know it is going to end.

It always ends.

So I look at it like that.

When things are hard, there will be an end point.

So when you get to the end point, you can look at it and think, gee, I bitched and moaned the whole way through, but I got there.

Or I was positive the whole way through.

And everybody said.

They saw me being positive, and I had a positive impact on the group.

And we still got there.

I want to be the one that gets to the finish line being positive rather than the one that really moaned and whinged the whole way.

Jody, you've been a premiership captain and a captain of two clubs.

Did you think about your impact positively on others in the environment?

Yeah, I did.

And certainly, modelling behaviours was something I thought a heap about.

But certainly, internally, I just had a lot more knowledge about myself that I needed to get.

To be the type of leader I would have liked.

What do you mean by that?

You wish you had more knowledge of yourself looking back?

Looking back, yeah.

I mean, I just had no idea where I sat personality-wise until after footy.

You know, I'm a real outlier in certain areas of my personality.

Oh, you think?

Yeah, I can be very obsessive and, you know, there's some shortcomings there and whatnot, which are good for some things.

But really poor for others.

And I just had no understanding of that until, I think until I was about 31, 32, which was a shame.

So, if you look back and, I mean, you couldn't have had a more successful AFL career.

I mean, it's full of trophies, as you used to remind us regularly.

But you think if you had a better understanding of yourself, you could have impacted others better just by knowing your personality type?

I think so.

When I look back on my career, I was just so highly strung, so obsessive around performance and maximising out.

And I just never really understood that other people weren't wired the same way as that, you know, or not to that same level.

So, to impact people and just understanding that they were driven by different things and different emotions and a different personality type would have been something I wished I had had more knowledge around at the time.

Did that take the joy out of a little bit when you look back, you being so obsessive about performance?

Did you ever enjoy it?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, I found it really rewarding, but I'm surprised that looking back now that I'm just not nearly as stressed and uptight, just how tightly strung I was as a player, I'm really surprised now over such a long period.

I used to comment, Brownie, the war is over, I used to say.

Clearly didn't play at a level with Jodie.

Did very few.

Did.

But I used to feel like I don't have to be at war anymore.

I used to have to be as angry, Brownie, which might surprise you once I'd finished.

But one of the other dimensions we talk about is creating and sharing a vision.

You've got a business with your beautiful wife, Christina.

You've transitioned out of footy as well as just about anyone could hope for.

Do you think about the vision for you and your family and your life and how you create it?

Yeah, I do.

And where we've been, and I guess I go back to self-reflection and realizing where I was poor as a leader.

And I was poor as a leader to other people at my football club who probably weren't as talented.

Or who weren't as gifted.

So I sort of dropped off them a bit quick.

And I probably focused on myself as a leader far too much.

And if I had one regret and I could go back and play footy again, I'd bring as many people on the ride that I could.

Because I feel like I did influence people and maybe I didn't influence them enough or influence the right way.

So when I look at my kids and my business now, I've got that in mind to say, I didn't do it that well there.

I'd love it.

I shot at it.

It's never going to happen.

So I've got to take what I've learned.

And probably my shortcomings there and put it into A, my family.

B, my business in that order.

And I reckon that vision just takes care of itself if you do it in that order.

I've often described Brownie, Juddy and Howie, and we haven't had this discussion openly before,

as like a genuine freak at almost everything that he does in a way that, I mean, clearly as an AFL footballer,

and we have had a lot of fun at your expense,

it's describing yourself as the best player in the game for 10 games has amused us greatly.

But in all fairness, you know, that's hard to probably dispute.

And two-time All-Australian, it's a wonderful career.

But you have a game of tennis against Brownie.

He's elite.

You ask him to try and bowl a leg break.

It's extreme.

You know, you play a game of table tennis a little bit later on.

You can't get near it.

Throw a rock at a pole.

Your innate ability to do that, mate, was next level.

It is something.

Have you noticed that about him?

I mean, Juddy, that across a few disciplines, he's pretty capable.

I heard the stories, but I'm here to witness it.

Was it Peter Lucek he took down?

6'3", 6'4".

I have heard the stories, Duke, but I take your word for it.

The word needs to be there.

What about for you, Juddy, in terms of creating a vision?

I mean, I feel like you do that for your life in such a unique way.

Maybe that is the outlier thinking of you.

I find it remarkable that you've got the courage to invest your own money for a living and back yourself in.

To me, that just takes extraordinary courage.

And then to say, you know what?

I don't need these other mediums.

I'm going to focus on what makes me happy.

That's a pretty unique vision that you've got.

Is it something that you and Beck share together?

It is.

We're different.

Like Beck's really good.

I'd describe bottom up, like really detail orientated, really hardworking.

I spend most of my time thinking top down.

So as a macro investor, you're looking at global economic events.

But yeah, I spend a lot of time thinking about, I don't want to just bumble through life.

Yeah.

And just spend my time doing things because someone wants me to do them.

And, you know, I look at the way people analyze an investment decision and how they'll part with their money

and the amount of due diligence they'll do on that.

Knowing full well that when that same person gets to 80, they'd swap all the money in the world for more time.

Yeah.

Yet they're not doing much due diligence on how they spent their time when they're young and fit

and their kids are young and they're healthy.

And, you know, being in the finance industry,

I was just gobsmacked by the people that had more money than they could ever know what to do with,

but didn't spend any diligence on their time.

So that's the way I view the world.

You know, work back from what's most precious and time being number one, Bitcoin,

a close second, Brownie, and go from there.

So, yeah, I spend a lot of time thinking about those sorts of things.

And do you feel like money buys you time?

Is that?

Yeah, I do.

Yeah.

So, I mean, it's easy to say, you know,

I sound like a dick talking about this to someone that's working three,

three jobs and is still struggling to put food on the table.

So not everyone's in a position to have those thoughts.

But a lot of people are and choose not to do it.

And so we're in a fortunate position where we've worked our clacker off

and we can have those thoughts and buy time.

And more importantly, spend time on things that interest you the most.

And that's what we do.

But interestingly, yeah, how you listen to Jodie, I find that fascinating.

I've had that conversation with Jodie before.

And you try and get off that treadmill yourself and go,

and I've run around and done five different jobs.

And you're trying to balance being a father of four.

And what, you know, is enough?

You know, we're all sort of faced with school fees and that balance of life.

When's enough money, enough money?

But how do you work your way through that?

But to actually execute that and say, here's what I'm going to do.

But we've all met people that have got tens and tens and tens and hundreds

of millions of dollars who are still on this treadmill

and still pushing themselves.

So they're some of the most unhappy people I've met.

So I find this topic as interesting as you can get for me.

I want to be careful what I say here because I'm thinking we're

on your Serious Leadership podcast.

Whatever I could say could be replayed on the Friday Huddled

around one next season.

Let it go, mate.

Let it go.

Just be yourself, Ali.

I'm torn.

So it's a constant battle for me.

My beautiful, intelligent, wonderful wife is really good at structure,

structure.

Process, hard work, school fees, making sure that I'm doing what I need

to be doing at work and she's providing an environment where I can be doing

what I want to do at work.

And it's going well at the moment.

And as things go well, you get offered more and more work and you take it on

and you get paid more and more money.

So that is fantastic, that side of our relationship.

But me, personally me, I battle every day as someone that traveled a lot

as a kid.

And a lot of me.

I would like to get on a plane when we're allowed with the kids

and Erica, but you can't with schooling.

But to school on the road, to see two years of the world and travel

and not worry about Fox Cricket and Fox Footy and Triple M and the podcast,

go and see the world and have the kids learn about resilience

and get in adventures and climb volcanoes and hike through jungles

and learn languages and drag them along on the ride of their life.

And they'll go back and say,

geez, dad was a bit loose and mum was involved as well.

We had an unbelievable 12 to 14.

We saw the whole world.

That is what really weighs on me every day.

I love the people I work for.

I think I've got the best job in the world.

I'm so grateful for the way it provides an opportunity for the family

through the financial side of it.

And it's the best gig going around.

But a lot of me would just love to pack it up, get on a boat or in a combi van

and attack the world.

And that's where Erica and I are lucky to be a good combination

because she keeps.

I managed to get some of that happening with long holidays,

but she also keeps us grounded so the kids are getting educated

and the bills are being paid.

One of my great mates in life, he's a great man of brownies as well,

is Craig Ellis who went on and founded Triangle and I had a chat to him

on this podcast and he went on a trip.

His parents were both schoolteachers.

I took the three boys, his two brothers and him,

and they went around Australia for about 18 months.

I have heard for the last 35 years still stories from that.

It formed him.

It shaped him.

It shaped him.

It shaped him.

When he was what age, G?

He would have been, I'll have a guess, but they were about 8, 10 and 12.

Okay.

And it just completely changed his outlook on the world.

Still is to this day.

You can't see him sit still because he's looking for the next adventure

and the thirst for knowledge.

He's got a curious mind on that basis.

But, you know, again, Steve Biddle for you saying to me as the great author

of kids' books, if you can, as you said, that's buying time, isn't it, Jay?

That's saying, you know, of course, everyone can almost do that, can't they?

But you've got to pick what you're going to regret.

Yeah.

I can't have everything.

So there's going to be a cost somewhere and you've just got to try and forecast

when you're 80, you're going to have missed out in some bucket.

Which bucket do you want it to be?

Yeah.

Good point, Judge.

Good point.

That's worth a pause, Brownie.

I'm going to push on.

Yeah, that's right.

Because that is, no one on their deathbed, as that famous quote is, you know,

thinks they wish they put more time in at work or bought more things

or had more possessions.

But how do we think about?

How do we think about that right now?

Curiosity is a big part of the modern leader.

We're establishing Brownie and then through curiosity,

learning and continuing to grow.

Do you think about curiosity as part of leadership?

Probably not as much as I should.

Curiosity, I wouldn't spend a lot of time thinking about it.

What about learning and your approach to learning and developing yourself?

What do you do in that space?

Well, it's just, for me, it's research.

So I started looking at cryptocurrency.

Currency, was it four years ago now?

And our great mate, Craig Ellis, got me into it.

He took me up to Sydney and he said, I've been doing this, been doing really well.

I'd like to educate you about it.

And I walked away always knowing what Bitcoin was.

And I didn't understand what it did.

Made some mistakes, invested a lot of money into it and almost lost a whole lot.

But over time, I've researched it.

And it's a foreign world to some that you can lose money really quickly.

But if you do your research like anything,

I've found a nice way to do it.

I've found a nice niche in being able to protect your capital and then grow it.

Sometimes you lose a little bit here and there.

But like anything, if you're prepared to do the time, you'll be able to figure it out.

It's a good mate, isn't it, Jodie?

Literally flew all these mates up one by one and said, I'm passionate about this.

I see an opportunity for you guys to improve your financial situation.

And I know I can talk to you, but the only way to do it is to give you some.

And it gave everyone a significant chunk enough to get you interested and then learn.

And I bet you.

Yeah, most of them lost it.

Well, it'd be interesting to go back and check because, you know,

I haven't spoken as much about Brandy about it,

but I'm fascinated by the world of that now and where it's going,

digital currency and what it means.

And exactly as you said it would, now you'll listen to it.

Now it's your world, Jodie,

but I'm obsessed now with listening to experts talking about cryptocurrency,

where it's heading, different types of cryptocurrency.

So certainly, I don't know whether everyone's lost it.

I think a few have made some money out of it, Jodie.

Yeah, well, that's good.

That's good.

There's a big...

I've spoken to a lot of people and that was a significant sum.

Most people, when they give someone Bitcoin, particularly back in the day,

the people would just go, this is ridiculous, this thing,

and they'd lose it.

But, yeah, it's a great story and generous on a number of levels

because it is, A, the money, but to invest that time

and really go out on a limb because it could have failed

and people could have put their own money in and it could have failed.

So he's taking a significant personal risk to do that.

And what a gift.

Howie, communicating with clarity is one of the dimensions we talk about.

And in all seriousness, mate, you've done an incredible job

creating the Howie Games and you communicate that regularly

and you communicate it well.

Is that something that you've thought about?

I mean, it's a great success story.

Have you got a strategy with that and how you communicate it?

Yeah, I think there's two things in the modern media

or anything in life I've learned about any product.

I knew nothing about marketing.

One, the product has to be good.

Right.

Howie Games' content needs to be good.

Now that box has been well and truly ticked.

Elite content.

The other part of it that I have learned is it doesn't matter

how good your content or your product is if people don't know about it.

So you have to quickly begin to understand the chances

and the opportunities you have to spread the word, tell the message.

And it started for me.

Well, people wouldn't know this story, but the boss of Channel 10 at the time,

David Barham, when the podcast was starting,

we were doing the Big Bash and there was 1.3 million people a night watching.

And I said, am I allowed to mention the podcast?

He said, you can't because sponsors are paying enormous amounts of money here.

But he said, and Dave wouldn't mind me saying this,

it was three or four times a year.

He said, when you have a guest that you think is relevant to the coverage,

get one of the boys to bring it up.

So Ricky or Punter or Gilly or Junior would make a comment saying,

gee, I heard you had Damien Martin on the Howie Games.

Or Gilly would say, hey, that was a great story.

Rick told you on the Howie Games and talk briefly about it.

And at that point, the podcast exploded.

And I realized I used to get this little graph and it'd be like the Yu Yangs,

Yu Yangs, Yu Yangs, and then bang, it'd be on the Big Bash

and it'd be like Mount Everest.

And that's where I understood the power of the media organizations

that I work for that if you can bring it up or if you can get it in conversation,

it's a constant battle to bring it to people.

So that's why I do mention it five or six times on the Friday Huddle every week,

the Howie Games Australia's number one sports podcast.

But there's no point having these amazing conversations.

This is what I think is a fantastic product if people aren't aware of it.

So, yeah, sometimes it goes a bit over the top with the merchandise,

probably lost you boys a little bit there with the Howie Games T-shirts,

but it's all part of because I'm so passionate about it.

It doesn't make, compared to the time I spend on the other parts of my job,

it's a massive loss leader.

It's not making you money.

Compared to what you're getting paid.

But I love it when people hear it and their kids hear it and say,

oh, I heard this story about Chris Judd and it made me want to do this

and it made me go and run 10K and it helped me with this situation in my life.

That fills me with joy.

So that's pretty much why I push it as often as I can.

And I love the story of collaboration in that, isn't it?

And people would understand.

That's your mates, you're working with the Big Bash.

How can we help you out?

Prepare to do that, Howie.

And as we all are, and I think, you know,

that's a misunderstood part, I think, about the groups we're working in media.

And collaboration is the other final part of the dimensional leadership,

Juddy, we talk about.

And you mentioned you are a bit of an outlier because you essentially work on your own.

I think you might have put an assistant on in recent times.

But do you value collaboration as part of what you do, Juddy?

I do, yeah, I do.

I was an individual investor for a few years and I started to get really lonely.

So I've got an employee now who works as an analyst for me.

He's great.

He's a young guy.

He's really smart.

And that's helped in a number of levels.

But I also share an office with a fund manager who's a friend and smart as well.

So I really like that balance.

I don't want a heap of people in my ear giving me ideas because I don't want to think like

every other fund manager or institution on Collins Street.

I think there's an advantage in thinking differently, being non-consensus.

But having that level of collaboration and sharing idea flow, it's,

it's really important and just a way to cover more ground because if it's just you,

you just can't cover enough, enough things well.

So I think that's a really important aspect.

But just, again, it comes back to knowing yourself and whether or not you're someone

that wants to be working with a thousand people or a small group.

And I'm in the small group category.

Chris, just it saddens me to hear that you were lonely and I wish you'd sort of reached

out about that.

Do you feel that you became lonely after you left your mates in the lurch on the Friday

huddle?

And didn't get that time to spend with them?

And basically we built you up and then you left us in the lurch.

Do you think if you'd stuck with us, you wouldn't have those lonely feelings, my friend?

That's not the way I'm framing it, Howard.

Great leaders, they build something and then they pass it on and outlast themselves.

And that's really what I saw with the Friday huddle, Howie.

I set the foundation, the foundation of blocks and seeing you go from strength to strength

makes me very proud, Howard.

Can I ask you a question, Howie?

Mentioned before about your leadership when you took on Daniel Andrews and it was, it

was articulated well.

It was researched well.

And nobody else was doing it.

You were the only one, it felt like, who had any sort of media presence going after the

government asking for a different theory.

So I can't see anybody else like you.

Did you feel like you're a lone wolf going after?

Did you feel like there was nobody else coming on for the ride with you?

And if you had have had other voices, could you have made a difference?

Well, it's a, look, yes, yes and no, Brownie, because I think if people would listen, you

know, I did 11 years of Breakfast Radio.

That was the final year.

Yeah.

Last year, it was just Eddie McGuire and I, and everyone, you know, who understands

Melman would understand, he's got a big presence.

He's an extraordinary debater and he probably had a fairly different view of the world than

I did on those topics.

So across the course of that year, anyone who listened to the show would not have been

surprised in any way, shape or form by the questions I asked Daniel Andrews.

So it didn't come out of nowhere.

I'd been wanting to debate those issues.

And I think we all should, in my mind, if you lock down a population for an extended period,

it's on.

So you'd want to think there'd be great debate on all of that.

I wasn't pretending to moonlight as an expert or epidemiologist or a doctor, but I was frustrated

by some of the political journos not asking questions I think were, and I hope that I

presented it in a respectful way to say, hey, you're a guest on our show, I'm not trying

to be a smart aleck here, but what about this?

And it took off because one of the arguments has been, if you're debating lockdown in Melbourne,

you don't care about old people and you're prepared for old people, and I just found

that such an unreasonable rebuttal.

Yeah.

It's a rebuttal to a reasonable question.

And so I referenced my dad who passed away and I said, look, I actually, Premier, with

all due respect, I've been through that.

I've just had my father, who was probably struggling with loneliness and being in his

apartment on his own and his business being closed more than he was with the actuality

of what's going on.

And so that, as always, mainstream media, Luke Darcy complains about his dad.

It really wasn't the point at all.

So that became-

It was a cheap shot.

Well, it was a little bit and it became a sideline.

And for the first time, the kids then sort of had a bit of a fight.

Yeah.

They sort of had a bit of, a lot of people online, which I hadn't experienced before

because I'd never had social media.

So I don't regret it.

I regret that we've shut down debate in this town at the most crucial time in the history

of a city.

As you guys would know, there's a stubbornness to me that gets me in trouble sometimes that

I can't help but want to debate stuff without perhaps being as concerned about the consequences

after it.

And that's been a concern-

So how did it finish?

How did it finish?

Well-

When the interview finishes and they go to the ad break and there's Eddie, who's a, a,

very much, I would say, be fair to say, is a Daniel Andrews supporter, would that be

a fair comment?

They're close.

I don't think that would, and Eddie's close with everyone in leadership, so that's not

saying-

So how was it when you go to the ad break?

Frosty?

Nate and I love this stuff, the behind the scenes stuff.

But I think we're now, we're interested.

Well, the interesting part about that was that we were both in our respective houses.

So Ed was broadcasting from his house and I was in my room.

And that, unfortunately, I much more would have preferred that to be in person because

I would have done the exact same thing had we all been the same.

Then you get the chance to go and get a coffee and walk away from the screen.

And so it was Frosty, I've got no doubt about it.

I wasn't trying to grandstand and think, here's a moment for me to put myself in.

I couldn't be true to myself without asking those questions.

But I knew Ed was not going to be comfortable with the questions I was going to ask.

But two very quick questions to ask the three of you, questions without notice.

Firstly starting with you, who is the best, who is the greatest leader in your life, Nate?

The greatest leader in my life, I don't want to make Juddy feel uncomfortable, but the

greatest leader in my life is my wife.

Juddy, greatest leader in your life?

Go to Howie.

I like the pregnant pause, mate.

It is a question that needs a bit of thought.

Howie?

Erica is by far and away the greatest leader in my life, the greatest leader I've been

involved with.

And you blokes always give me a hard time about name dropping, but I've seen this bloke

galvanize groups in a broadcast sense that I've never seen before, is Ricky Ponting.

I remember two or three years into the Big Bash, I'll keep it short for you.

But it was flying and we had a pre-season dinner and Ricky got up.

And when Ricky gets up, it's, well, it's Ricky Ponting.

And there was a group of 20 of us on air, off air, production staff, the boss.

And Ricky told us for three minutes, you can't rest on your laurels.

If we want to get better, we need to be 20% better this season than we were last season.

And I walked away from it energized, pumped, enthused, amazed.

That's the best five minutes of leadership I've seen in my life.

Juddy?

I'll go with some of the people I read.

So probably Jeff Booth, Jeff Booth, Luke Grohman or Kirill Sokolov, there you go.

And all three of those names, I have no idea.

Can I ask Jeff Booth?

I've got to ask you, who's Jeff Booth?

Jeff Booth wrote a brilliant book, The Price of Tomorrow.

Really about the economy.

He does a lot of work trying to educate people.

And I've learned a lot from him and I think he's brilliant.

So I'll go with him.

The other two?

I mean, they're both...

Luke Grohman's a macroeconomic...

Yeah.

...analyst that's brilliant, based out of America, and Kirill Sokolov's out of Switzerland.

Again, a macroeconomic guy.

And they're all brilliant and I'm lucky to have them in my life.

You are an outlier.

I'm not surprised that you look back and-

Because you must sleep well, Judge.

You can read a couple of pages of that at night.

Just bang, out you go.

I love it.

I love it.

The final question is, if you could collaborate with anyone in your life, if there was anyone

you could collaborate with, I'll start back with you, Howard, who would you collaborate

with?

In what sense?

In life, in whatever you wanted to do, whether it be on the Howie Games, whether it be start

a business with someone, whether it be to meet someone.

Collaboration we see as the new face of leadership, who would you collaborate with?

Adam Gilchrist.

There you go.

I'll go with Luke Grohman.

Luke Grohman, the first guy that was inspired?

He was the second guy.

He's out of the US, yeah.

Okay.

Who would you collaborate with?

I had a chance many years ago to collaborate with Craig Ellis and I let that

go.

He turned it to about 50 mils, so that ship's passed, but there's a guy who runs a fragrance

company called Boreto and I like how he goes about it.

If we do a collaboration between the two companies, I think him.

What's the name?

Soho Candles?

SOH, yeah.

SOH Candles.

So check them out.

Where do you find SOH Candles?

Everywhere, Jim.

Okay.

Yeah.

It has been a lot of fun.

Howie, Juddy, and Brownie, I feel privileged to call you all friends.

I've enjoyed our time together.

We haven't had a conversation like this, but it was unique and it has been a lot of fun,

so thanks for joining us on the Empowering Leaders Podcast.

I really appreciate it.

Thank you, Luke.

Do you think, Darce, this makes your other episodes pile into insignificance?

Do you think we're the best you've had?

Well, now we're going back to Friday Huddle territory.

We're going to the top five.

Don't we get the top five so far?

I think so.

Number one starts with Justin.

That's right.

That's right.

Number one starts with Justin.

This is going to come in sixth.

A very unlucky sixth, I think, so far on the Empowering Leaders.

You are idiots.

There's no doubt about it, but I've enjoyed all of our time together.

Thank you for joining us on the Empowering Leaders Podcast.

Nathan Brown, Chris Judd, Mark Howard, appreciate it.

Right on, Jake.

Cheers.

Empowering Leaders was presented by me, Luke Darcy, produced by Matt Dwyer, with audio

production by Darcy Thompson.

To start your leadership journey, I encourage you to go to elitercollective.com, take our

Empowering Leaders Indicator tool, and understand the impact you have on your environment.

Join us at Elitr to learn, lead, and collaborate.

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