Servant Leadership | Jon Antonucci

Matt Edmundson: Wow, hello and welcome back to Push To Be More. My name is Matt Edmundson and I'm going to jump into another exploration of what fuels this journey called life. And to do that, I am talking to Jon Antonucci from SML, S M L Consultives. We're going to be diving into his unique life experiences, the hurdles he's had to push through, the way he recharges his batteries, and what more looks like.

In other words, we're going to be talking about what it is to push to be and more. Now, don't forget, you can find all the detailed show notes and the transcripts of our conversation on our website. On the website, pushtobemore. com. Now, this episode is brought to you by the wonderful people at Podjunction.

If you're a regular to the show, you may have heard the episode that Sadaf did. We have started to co host the show, so she'll talk to people, I'll talk to people. Just means we can get more episodes out there, but Sadaf heads up. Podjunction, which is, well, it's an amazing little company that's helping people like me build businesses using podcasting.

Uh, it's doorway, actually, to meet some incredible people, like Jon. Uh, we get to chat away. We would never be doing this if it wasn't for the podcast. And so when you throw a little bit of strategy behind that. Amazing things can happen. So if you've not thought about it yet and you would like to know more about how you could use podcasting to help grow your business, well, just reach out to Sadaf.

She would love to hear from you. You can connect with her on the website at podjunction.com So let's talk about Jon, Jon Antonucci, a leadership coach with over 20 years of experiences from coaching youth sports to directing international organizations. In 2023, he launched SML Consultive to empower forgotten leaders.

In frontline and middle management, now, when he's not coaching, Jon enjoys sports, playing guitar, a man after my own heart, and soaking up the beauty of South Carolina. Uh, well, I'd be more North Carolina, but hey, tomato, tomato. Now, where Jon and his wife live. Jon, it's great to have you on the show, man.

How are you doing today? I am doing great,

Jon Antonucci: Matt. Thank you so much for having me. And Sadaf is a wonderful person as well. I got to meet her prior to the show. It's, it's really great.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, no, she's a legend, Sadaf. She keeps me on the straight and narrow. Well, allegedly. She tries. Gives her best every day.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love it. It's just one of those. Um, so you're, uh, you're in South Carolina. We were talking about this before we hit the record button. You're in South Carolina. Um, you moved over from Phoenix.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Um, what took you to South Carolina? You ever been to Phoenix? No, I've been to South Carolina, but never been to Phoenix.

If you've been to Phoenix, you'd know why I wasn't there anymore.

Jon Antonucci: I was in the Phoenix metro area for 20 years. Let me tell you, Phoenix has one thing going for it. I'll give credit where credit is due. The roads are magnificent, all gridded, very logical. You'd be there 10 minutes, you'll know exactly how to get anywhere you want to go in the city. Um, other than that, uh, I'm not sure that has a ton going for it.

And I got really tired of 120 degrees in the summer, uh, 47, 48 Celsius for my international, uh, partners there. And, uh, I, I'd had about enough. I was born and raised in Colorado, so I never really did take to the. The barren desert scape and I was eager to get back to somewhere with four seasons and these weird things.

They got them all over the place here. It's called trees. You never heard of those in Phoenix.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, brilliant. Love it. Love it, love it, love it. I don't actually need to go to Phoenix, is what you're telling me, unless I just want to see Sandon. I had a,

Jon Antonucci: I have a friend that's, uh, uh, from my church that's going to be going there in a week and a half or something like that. And he's actually going to be going to Sedona, which is much prettier than Phoenix.

And, uh, he said, you know, is there anything I should do up there? And I was like, and it's, I, I came up with some stuff, but like. The best thing I could tell them to do in Phoenix was go to Scottsdale Fashion Center, and that's just because they've got a Lucid dealership there, and they've got a Bitcoin ATM there, and most people have never seen either one of those two things, so, um, you know, it's like, well, that's, that's about the best I can do for you in the

Matt Edmundson: Phoenix area.

Wow, brilliant. Okay, well, fair play. If I want to go see a Bitcoin ATM, then that's, that's where I'll head to. Yeah, fair enough. There you

Jon Antonucci: go.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. And why would you not want to? I mean, what a tourist attraction that must be.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Well, Jon, listen, it's great to meet you. Let's get into it because I'm keen to dig into your story a little bit.

Now, um, we'd like to open this show with, uh, the question if you did, because Sadaf Podjunction, the podcast connection and all that sort of stuff. If you did have your own podcast, uh, and you could interview anybody on your show, Past or present, to someone who's had a really big influence on your life, who would you interview and why?

Jon Antonucci: You know, I think when I think of this question, I think of the same, you know, who would you want to have dinner with, or who would you want to interview, whatever, and, and, and my answer is understandably or admittedly cliche, it really is, but, but it's my honest answer. I would just love to have a long conversation with Abraham Lincoln.

And, and, and, and I, I say that not because he's Abraham Lincoln, but because of who he, who he was in his moment. Yeah. Abraham Lincoln was a leader who was not particularly well liked. He lost most of his elections. Um, He guided the United States through a period that was fraught with misalignment and unpopular moves and he had to be the leader that the United States needed, not necessarily the leader that they wanted.

And, uh, to me, that's, that's real leadership, one that works for the people, what's their best interest, not necessarily what their desire is. So I would just love to connect with him over what that experience was like and, you know, you, we obviously know the end result. He was shot over it. You know, he, he didn't, he didn't even get to finish his, his, um, His mission to an extent because it was so unpopular that people, people had him dealt with.

And so just being willing to engage in that level of leadership as somebody that aspires to be a true servant leader, uh, he's somebody that I would sure love to. To get an hour or two with and just hear from.

Matt Edmundson: That's a great, that's the first time anyone's ever said Abraham Lincoln. Really? Which surprises me actually.

Yeah, I mean we get the usual answers. I say the usual answers. The most popular answers are my dad, Jesus and Tony Robbins. Uh, they seem quite interesting. I think

Jon Antonucci: you can get the Tony Robbins one for like fifty thousand dollars. Um If you've got enough money, you can get him on the show. Yeah. As a man of faith, I think you can get to Jesus for free.

So I'm not sure. I'm not

Matt Edmundson: sure. Depending on which denomination you are, obviously. That's right. That's true. That's true. But yeah, it is good. It is the first time that we've had Abraham Lincoln mentioned and I'm curious. So I, I wondered, because we, whenever people talk about Abraham Lincoln now, Yeah. Um, certainly my, you know, my, uh, American cousins are like your good self.

It's all, he's always talked about in a positive spin, uh, in a positive light, but like you say at the time he was a bit kind of like, you know, some people loved him, some people hate him and he, he wasn't, it wasn't the, you know, a very popular chap with a lot of people as we later discovered. Yeah. Do you think we look at Lincoln now through rose tinted glasses or do you think his legacy has sort of stood the test of time?

Yeah. Absolutely.

Jon Antonucci: I think both. I think that whenever you have, so the quickest way to become a rose tinted glasses person is to die a martyr, right? That's very true. Jon Lennon would

Matt Edmundson: be another example. Say again? Jon Lennon would be a classic example of this, I think.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah, so anybody that dies a martyr, there's automatically this sense of awe that's associated with that.

And so I think that there is some of that, but I also think that. You have to be, you almost have to be doing something right to merit that level of vitriol.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah.

Jon Antonucci: Now, that's not to say that everyone who's ever been killed for what they believe was doing great things, um, but, but usually there's a, you know, if you look at the way, um, uh, Hitler or Baghdadi or something like that, where, where they were, they were dealt with, they were dealt with in a concerted effort.

Multiple national, you know, concerted efforts and whatever. Um, whereas, you know, you had to kind of sneak behind the guy and, and, and shoot him in, in the middle of a play with, with Lincoln. And so I think that there's probably some rose colored glasses, but I also think that he was putting us on a trajectory that while wildly unpopular, I don't know of anybody that would say, Hmm, well, I should say, I don't know anybody, maybe I do, I don't know very many people who would say, boy, I sure wish, uh, Lincoln hadn't come up against slavery.

I think that would put you in very unpopular light nowadays. Yeah, I'm against that. And so it would, um,

Matt Edmundson: yeah. And rightly so too. I mean, these are some of the remarkable things that came out of his presidency, wasn't it? And considering the States was actually quite a young country, uh, at the time. Um, I think, you know, when you talk about Abraham Lincoln, I can't help but think, have you ever watched the movie Bill and Ted's?

Excellent adventure. Have you seen it? Where they go and grab Abraham Lincoln and they bring him to the present to do an address at their high school. I can't tell you why that's where my brain went to, but maybe it's the time with the guitar, you know, but it's it's really interesting. He would be a really fascinating chap to talk to.

Jon Antonucci: He would, and I wonder, see, I think one of the reasons that it's so fascinating to me is it's so easy for us to look back now and really to go to your point about the rose colored glasses, to assume he had it all figured out. Yeah. The reality is, is he was in the muck of it, and I don't know what your experiences are, but I know for me, when you're in the muck of it, you're questioning everything.

Yeah. And so just to kind of get an opportunity to say, hey, We look at you now and we go, But I guarantee you that was not his perspective in that moment and would love to kind of hear about some of the insecurities that he faced and the Troubles, I'm sure there were people in his cabinet. Maybe in his family.

Mm hmm that were giving him Conflicting advice that he was trying to wade through and figure out what was the best decision

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, it's an interesting one, isn't it, when you think about that leadership, that leadership which is willing, um, to put themselves in a place where you are absolutely disliked because you are convinced it is the right thing to do.

It's not a style of leadership that I hear talked about a lot these days. You know, a lot of the leadership stuff is how to get the best from your team, you know, which basically means I need to go buy a pool table and have everyone like me and be more like Google. And I know I'm being slightly facetious, but do you know what I mean?

It's leadership. It is all about, it's that kind of, how much am I liked? You know, if I'm a good leader, I'm liked a lot where you look at Lincoln and he goes, actually, no, this is not the style of leadership that he went with.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah. And I mean, it's funny, I'm 95 percent of the way through a book where I talk about this, because what has happened is, And this is, this is an opinion, so I wouldn't die on this hill, but what I think has happened is exactly what you're describing, because it's not that we have changed the definition of leadership, it's we've changed the desired outcome.

You said it in, with your own words a second ago, it's how to get the most from my team. Well, is that leadership? Is leadership getting the most from my team, or is leadership getting the most for my team? I would challenge the status quo, and I would say that true leadership is not about getting the most from, it's about getting the most for.

And when you're trying to get the most for your team, you can't necessarily do what is most popular, you have to do what is best. Yes. And so I use the example if, you know, you've got somebody running a company. If you give everybody the wage that they ask for, You're probably going to be out of business really fast.

It's actually not in their best interest for them to be paid whatever dollar amount, you know, suits their fancy. What's in their best interest is a long term employment opportunity that can be sustained through scalable decisions that may or may not be popular, but are still what is best for the organization and communicating that in a way that says, Hey, I see you.

I hear you. I want to ascribe dignity to you, and the best way I can do that is by serving you, but that may not look exactly like you think it should.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, that's a really powerful point. I'm curious about the book. Uh, you said you're about 80 percent of the way through it. Uh, what's, what is the book?

Jon Antonucci: Yeah, so the book is a, essentially it's designed to create a juxtaposition between what has been and Almost become cliche, servant leadership as an entity and my adding of the word minded. And so adding mindfulness to leadership and how that changes the servant leadership dynamic. And so basically what we do is we go through the idea of what was servant leadership, right?

And it's been around for thousands of years. We kind of, it's made popular by Robert Greenlee in the 70s, but it's been around for thousands of years. It got made popular. And then as companies started saying, Ooh. We should offer seminars. We should offer workshops. Well, now this ROI component. Became the biggest thing and it became a, I serve my team so that I can gain from them and it became a quid pro quo, sorry, a quid pro quo arrangement and because it became a quid pro quo arrangement, I think it lost the true nature of servitude and you end up with exactly what you described and that is what can I get from my team, how can I, you know, how can I get them a pool table, if I spend 2, 000 on a pool table, will I get XYZ.

And so maybe a pool table is great, but the question that I would ask a leader is, are you getting the pool table just so that you can extract, you can squeeze a little bit more from them or are you giving them a pool table because you genuinely care about some work life balance and understand the value in being able to decompress for 10 minutes?

Because that lets me. Step into my passion with greater enthusiasm. And yes, by default, the company will get more in that scenario, but are we serving our team or are we manipulating our team? And I think that's the question that many companies and many leaders have to ask.

Matt Edmundson: And it's a fine line between the two things, isn't it?

Because I mean, listening to you talk, I'm kind of thinking, yeah, of course I, I, I err on the side of what's best for my team, which is not true at all, because, you know, inherently, we're all selfish. But yeah, it's, The desire is there, you know, what's that phrase that Paul says, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, that's right, yeah, yeah, yeah, and so it's that kind of, it sounds good in many ways, it sounds righteous, it sounds right, but it's not that easy to do, surely.

It's not.

Jon Antonucci: No, it's not easy to do it all. And I think that's one of the, one of the things that has happened is you have, you have the executive level that whether we like it or not, the executive level has to be focused on profits, whether it's because of shareholders or whether it's because of a board or whether it's simply because they need to have the The overarching vision of what does it look like to keep this company profitable and able to serve our clients.

They have to have that focus. So I'm not, I'm not faulting them for that. I think that's part of a comprehensive vision at the C suite level. Where I have a problem is when that ends up trickling its way down to the frontline leaders that are engaging with staff on a day to day basis and theirs becomes a quid pro quo arrangement.

And so then people begin to be treated like objects instead of like individuals. And that is where you start to lose dignity, and that's why I think you have so many people that end up leaving and feeling unfulfilled in their work, whereas some very simple strategies of aligning people with their passion and treating people with dignity, um, Could make a big difference.

And I'll give you, I'll give you a real world example I just faced. So I just brought on, um, based on your accent, I'm going to assume you're in the UK. Is that a? That's a

Matt Edmundson: very good assumption. I tell you what, nothing gets by me. Let me tell you why. I can see why you've got a leadership company. There we go.

Jon Antonucci: So I just brought on six, um, six interns from the UK and they're, they're part of a, part of a program there with the University of East London. And I got a very curious WhatsApp message from one of them middle of last week. And they said, Hey, uh, I put. My position with you, uh, an SML on, on LinkedIn, but one of my colleagues said, Hey, did you ask if you could do that?

And I was like, what do you mean? Did you, I mean, first of all, yes, that's fine. And second of all, why would it not be fine? Like what, what makes you concerned? Well apparently she has some colleagues that are not working for my company, um, where the company is not willing to let them put it on their LinkedIn.

They don't, they don't want to answer to me. What does that speak? I told you, you know, that's. That's lack of dignity. That's, Oh no, you're not good enough to put that. It's a banner. It's putting you on LinkedIn. Like, what does that hurt to give someone a sense of purpose and a sense of belonging? But these other apparent, these apparently, I mean, I didn't talk to the individual myself, but it sounds like some other companies are saying, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

You don't, you're not, you're not really with us. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, how does that, how does that serve

Matt Edmundson: anyone? Yeah, it's a really good question. It's and it's for these little things like this, you kind of go, I just Why? It's necessary, isn't it? In so many ways, it is. I'm curious, Jon, if, if I can, I mean, here you are, you've got, you know, your, your leadership consulting company going on, um, around servant leadership, which I, I have to be honest, is for me, it's the most desire, having read around a lot of things, it's the, the form of leadership, which makes the most sense according to my personal value set, right?

Awesome. Um, and I, and I get it and I understand it and you know, like you, I, I would say I'm a man of faith and I think I'm very influenced by that core, which says if you want to be greatest of all, you've got to be servant of all. Right? It flips the script quite a lot. I think about this kind of thing a lot.

I'm curious what got you started in it though, because is it, have you experienced bad leadership yourself? How did you, it's not like you just wake up one day and go, you know what I'm going to do, I'm going to set up a consulting business around servant leadership, because in some respects it flies in the face of a lot of things.

So I'm curious what got you to this point.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah, um, it's, let me, let me try to take a very long story and compact it into something that's a little bit more digestible. Um, I would say two things. Yes, of course I've experienced bad leadership, I would imagine most of us have, but I think I'll be more vulnerable and I'll say I was.

A bad leader. There was a period of time in my life where I had no interest in serving. And if I did, it was definitely from that manipulation perspective. Um, I've had some opportunity to lead, not including the fact that I'm the eldest of five. We won't count the sibling factor in there. Uh, but, but believe it or not, 12 years old.

And you think that's, that's very young. Well, I had started martial arts. I had a natural aptitude to it and the instructor was stuck in traffic and the parents from the class said, we think you should teach. And I was like, uh, I'm not the oldest. I'm not the highest ranking. I don't have permission to do this.

And they were like, well, we're paying for the class and we think you should teach. So why don't you go ahead and head up front. And so I did. And that was the kind of, kind of the beginning of the end for me. By the time I was 15, I was an assistant instructor. By the time I was 19, I had moved to the Phoenix area and had over 500 students around the Phoenix metro valley.

And I was working for the same company, uh, in an HR capacity and I was training up other instructors. And so I had a lot of opportunity to, uh, exhibit leadership. I was also coaching soccer, um, My father's been in ministry most of my life, so I had some level of leadership role in his church. And so, a lot of opportunities to be up front.

A lot of opportunities to say, hey, look at me. A lot of opportunities to feel important. A lot of opportunities to domineer. A lot of opportunities to call the shots. And so, from a, Leadership perspective, I was a great manager, might have even been a decent boss cause I could get things done, but, uh, in terms of real leadership, uh, I would not say that I was stepped, I had stepped into that.

And then something happened when I was 19, all of the success that I had was revealed to be very disproportionate to the amount of maturity that I had and maybe even the amount of character that I had. And so at 19 years old, while having all of these students and moving out on my own and having all the, this kind of illusion of success and influence and prestige and all those things, I made a really, really stupid decision, went with three of my friends and we had the dumb idea to light a building on fire.

And Oh, wow. Yeah, and so my best friend, who's the one who lit the match, did not make it out of that building alive. I lost my best friend, obviously lighting a fire in a building is a crime, and those two actions put together resulted in me being awarded a 14 year prison sentence in the Arizona Department of Corrections.

Obviously that was devastating to my students, my family, most myself. I think that others actually got the harder side because I did it and I knew I deserved it. And so I was dealing with that, but everybody else had to deal with the let down and the no way Jon would have done this and all of that. And so it gave me an opportunity to reflect on character flaws and to understand where things went so horribly, horribly wrong.

And it was at that time that I recognized that even though I wasn't. Gangbanging or making, you know, those types of choices. I had made a series of decisions that revealed my character to be deeply flawed. And so in the confines of incarceration, I had a lot of time to think as one does, and that gave me an awesome opportunity to kind of reestablish values, decide.

Where I actually stood with some things and address the challenges in my character that, uh, were at that, you know, now abundantly obvious. Once I did that, though, it gave me the opportunity. I'm not, and it wasn't like, okay, I'm done growing, but it was like, okay, we've made, we've made some significant pivots here.

And that gave me the opportunity to now start to help others. And so during, I spent 12 years actually in incarceration. The other two was spent on community supervision or parole or whatever you want to call it. But during those 12 years, I helped build something known as Inmate Peer Programming. And so we built a rehabilitative, peer based program that was designed to give people the tools and skills they needed to leave a life of crime and re enter the community as a contributing citizen.

I want to say by the time I left, we'd run at least 10, 000 inmates through that program, had a wonderful success rate. I had raised up about 50 other leaders within the Arizona Department of Corrections to help carry on that program. And, uh, you know, when you can lead in that setting, things change because being a servant leader in that setting will test your Distinctly recall one of the units that I was on where we built probably the most comprehensive programs department that the state had ever seen.

And we had these little, um, ID badge things that me and about I think the other eight people on my team had been awarded. And really what it was designed to do was make it to where we had access to the whole unit. Most inmates were kind of cordoned off in their areas. We had access to the whole unit to run these classes and it gave us permission to enter some of the classrooms and things like that.

Well, on the back of that card, it said, how can I serve you? Even my team had question marks around that statement. I mean, you're in a prison environment, how can I serve you? That, that just doesn't fit the hardened, masculine, testosterone filled, you know, biggest guy on the block kind of dynamic. And I said, no, that's what you're signing up for.

If that's not what you're interested in, that's fine. And I'm not going to judge you for that. But if you're going to be on this team, we're not here to look important at the front of the room. We're not here to get out whenever we want, because we have a class that we're going to pretend to teach. We're here to serve.

And that really became the foundation of it without me realizing it. The business had never entered into my mind, uh, this was not, like, something that I was working on. That just became a foundation of, you know, this, that's what leadership is. And I was reading lots of books, I read Maxwell, I read Covey, I read Carnegie, I read, you know, anybody that had something to say about these things I was probably reading.

And it started to formulate what it looked like, and I started to offer these classes, and we started to try to serve the populations, and a legacy was created, and in fact, just, just, I don't know, six months ago or so, I was on a call with somebody, and, uh, I, I, they didn't know me at that point, we'd been connected through a mentor program that I'm a mentor in, and they go, wait, you're Jon Antonucci?

And I said, yeah, and he goes, dude, I've been hearing about you for years. And that was a very heartwarming experience for me to see years later that the, you know, the legacy lives on. When I got out, I stepped into a role as training manager for an international specialty logistics company. And that's a fancy way of saying we Ship things that FedEx and UPS didn't have the capacity to ship temperature controlled, um, aircraft on ground, stuff like that.

And so, uh, I basically built their training department. They had some things that were there, but no one had ever officially been the trainer. And so I stepped in and originally it was a 90 day contract to develop some curricula for them, uh, after they'd seen some of the curricula I developed in the department.

And a couple of weeks into that, they said, all right, we want to, we want to bring you on full time. And so they made me their training manager. And it was in that role that I got to exhibit that servant leadership in a different capacity, where now it wasn't about checking a box to get somebody trained so that I could get them off my docket, it was what can I do to help you succeed.

How can this training give you the tools you need to be successful in this job? And, uh, if you were to talk to anybody that worked for that company, you, that trained under me, you'll know that they heard that a lot. My goal. is to help you succeed and that to the point that when we got audited and I had to go in front of some regulatory boards for how my training department was functioning and they said, okay, so you do this recurring on a yearly basis or how do you do this?

And I said, no, I'm not going to cheapen the training by making them do it every year if they don't need it. If there's a problem, we can engage in remediation, and if there's a federal mandate on something that has to be renewed, then we of course comply with federal requirements, but I'm not going to just require regular annual re ups so that we can get through click through training, and we can check a box and say, oh yeah, we trained them.

No, what actually helps them succeed? What helps them do their best work? What helps them serve our clients in the best way? And so that changed some things and that helped me formulate this a little bit better and it was in that time in my journey where we started to recognize that while we had done a pretty good job of empowering people operationally, we had never taken the time to empower them Relationally or leadership wise.

And through a series of events, we were able to build what at that time was just called leadership development. And, uh, which is now the SML flagship program, uh, foundational principles of leadership. Um, but we, we raised up Uh, I want to say 37 frontline leaders in that organization and gave them the tools they needed and got incredible results by simply helping them to understand that being a team leader, a supervisor is not just doing your job better than everybody else.

You've actually changed jobs from an operations mindset to a relations mindset and you're now there to serve your team. And after a couple of years of me building the training department and helping the leaders, I was asked to take a new role. And for the last year that I worked in that organization, I got to serve as the director of revenue, which put me directly responsible for four different departments.

I'm sorry, five department, five teams, three departments. I'll get the numbers right eventually. Um, five department or five teams, three departments, and uh, I don't know, 15, 20 people. And so now I got to say, all right. Here's all these principles I've been teaching you guys. Now I'm no longer in the operations side.

Operations has to take care of itself. Either I've even either I've laid the path well, and I've empowered people. Well, or I haven't, we get to see that. And now I get to come over here to. The business generation, everything from prospecting to pricing was under my responsibility. And now I get to lead these teams and I get to put all this stuff into practice.

And it gave an awesome opportunity as a, as an executive in an international company to say, okay, am I going to empower my managers? Am I going to, I had one manager, I used to do one on ones every six months, every single person in the, in my whole division. Got a one on one with me and just to hear their heart, not to, not, not, not to do a semi annual review, nothing like that.

Just, what are you thinking? How do you feel about the changes that have happened? How, what would you do differently if you were in my seat? You know, just questions that, that would hopefully spark conversation. And if they had something that they wanted to talk about for a half hour and I didn't ask a single question, perfect.

Cause that was what the point was. And one of them, I had asked what his, uh, what his three year goal was. And he said, I want to be in your chair. And I said, cool, let's, let's make it two. Let's make that work. Yep. Yeah. Let's make it two. And, and that was my heart. And, uh, I don't, I don't work for that organization anymore.

They were bought out by private equity and, and, uh, there was some, some leadership misalignment that, uh, you know, as, as sometimes happens when, when things like that occur. Um, but, uh, but yeah, my heart was to serve that team. And so then I got to put it into practice. And I, and I think the biggest testament to success in that is that one of the people that worked for me there voluntarily came and worked for me now at SML.

And so when, when you have a boss that you say, I'm going to leave the job and I'm going to follow that, that speaks to a level of leadership that I think I can be proud of. So it's been a journey. Yeah. It's, it's gone through some really tough stuff, some really fun stuff, uh, some trying things and, and now the heart is just, we believe that most frontline leaders are forgotten about.

They get promoted into these initial leadership positions. Rarely are they given the tools to truly lead and we wanna fix that.

Matt Edmundson: That's a really, uh, fascinating journey. Jon? Yeah, I'm, I'm, I mean, I have so many questions. , uh, just trying to figure out where, where to start. What would've, if I can go back to the building.

Yeah. Um, that, you know, your, your, your friend died in and that you set fire to. What would have happened to you, do you think, had you and your friend got out and not got

Jon Antonucci: caught? It's a fantastic question and, and it's one that has, I'm not going to say plagued, but, but certainly has been relevant to me, uh, for 16 years now.

Um, I had, I told you earlier in the podcast, my, my dad has been a pastor and I got really good at living a double life. And on the one hand, that double life until that point had never been criminal. On the other hand, it had always been subversive. It had always been a very me focused. I can't, I don't know.

I don't know what would have happened, but I, but I can't help but think that if I had gotten away with it. I mean, that's, that's a significant devastating act, right? And if we get out and we get away with it, what does that embolden me to do? What does that tell Jon in his subconscious psyche? That already at 19 thinks that, you know, yeah, death, you know, death is not for me and that I rule the world and I'm the best thing since sliced bread and you know, I, I had, I still struggle with ego, but I really had ego issues then.

And so if that, if that doesn't happen, I don't know what the trajectory would have been, but I just can't imagine it would have been good.

Matt Edmundson: It's interesting isn't it, and you're right, you can't predict what would have, and I think about, you know, various turning points in life, and what would have happened, just as interesting thought exercise, not because of regret, you know, I'm not a big fan of living there, but just what can I learn from it, and I'm listening to your story, and you are inspiring.

In a position quite early on in, I mean, 19, obviously, we know everything when we're 19, but it turns out we don't really know a whole great deal when we're 19. Yeah. Um, having a great, just as a total side note, having a great conversation with a friend of mine who was, who's moaning about his 18 year old son not listening to him.

And I'm like, What, what part of you is surprised by, by this? Is that what you mean? I said, well, when you were 18, surely you knew more than your parents did. Because that's what we all think when we're 18. Because of course I thought that. I'm like, so why do you think your son's going to be any different to the way you were?

Uh, it's just a really fascinating sort of thought exercise. But, at quite a young age, your, your life Through your, admittedly through your own actions, has tumbled to a, a point you had known, it's a very low point, isn't it? And at this point, as I'm listening to your story, now you decide to work on character.

Yeah. Um, and this is something again that I, I wish we would talk about more, how character is, So foundational to leadership. Do you know what I mean? You can read the textbooks. You can do this, do that. But if, unless there is character underneath.

Jon Antonucci: Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Um, I remember a few years ago, a chap asked me to go do some, uh, to work for him.

Um, and I instantly refused on the spot. And he's like, but I'll offer you a great salary. I'm like, yeah, but you don't remember the conversation we had six months ago where, You were telling me how on a trip to Thailand, you got connected with a prostitute over there, and you're married, and you think all of this is good.

But what that tells me is you have no depth of character. And so why am I going to go do business on that kind of level? Yeah, definitely not working for you. It's like, well, that's a bit judgmental. I'm like, call it what you like. But but for me, it was a character thing. Right, and it, and how important, and this is for me, listening to your story, this is the crux, this is the turning point, is you decide to work on character.

Yes. What, why?

Jon Antonucci: At 19, as you so succinctly said, I knew it all. I was at that point a triple black belt. I had 500 students. I could say basically anything I wanted and they were going to listen to me. Um, I had prestige. I was the golden child. I had the best retention rates in the organization. I mean, everything was pointing at Jon and Jon was, oh, and then handcuffs clicked around my wrist.

A metal door slammed behind me. And it was really hard to think that I knew it all. Now, don't get me wrong. I still tried for a period of time. I continued to lie. I continued to try to get out of it. I continued to try to escape my, the consequences of my actions. It wasn't a day one is arrest and day two is character.

Um, it, I wish it was, but it was not. But as the reality of my actions began to sink in, I'll tell you this, the first conversation my court appointed attorney and I had. It was on a Saturday evening and as I looked at him through the, uh, the plate glass window that separated us, he said to, to me, he said, Hello, Mr.

Antonucci, my name is, and he gave me his name. He said, I'm your court appointed attorney. I will be your court appointed, or I will be your attorney through the duration of your pretrial proceedings unless the state chooses to seek the death penalty, at which point I will no longer be your court appointed attorney and you will be assigned another.

Holy moly. And those conversations, and I still lied to him, oh, I didn't do it, I don't know what you're talking about, I wasn't even there, um, you know, but those types of conversations will wake a 19 year old up eventually, when you start realizing that you're, you're looking at 25 to life potentially, you're looking at, you're hoping to get a plea bargain that will get you down below 20, um, and, and you start to, to realize, you know, maybe, Just maybe I don't have it all figured out.

And that's where it started. Okay. I'm going to start listening. And I started going to some Bible studies and I started reading some books and I started opening up more to the idea that maybe somebody else had some ideas that I didn't have. And, and part of that journey for me, being a man of faith was that I had to actually let go of my Previous faith, I'll call it.

And I don't mean a denomination. I just mean that I knew what my parents believed and I knew what I'd been raised with all my life, but I didn't, I'd never done any personal research on it. And so I kind of had to say, you know what, I'm not going to so much. Pay attention to what I have been taught, but I am going to be teachable.

And I'm going to learn and I'm going to see what it is that I truly believe in and going through some of that. And so it was a journey. I mean, I would say it was probably at least five years before I even recognized the reality. That not only did I deserve imprisonment, but I actually probably deserved more imprisonment than the other two people that were also in prison.

And it wasn't because I did more, it was because I held more perceived authority in the group. Now, the news said it was my idea. That was patently false. But the reality is, is as a natural born leader, as one that just carried himself with authority. If I had said, no, I'm not doing this. What are the chances that everyone else would have followed?

Yeah. The chances are pretty good. I feel like, and so I remember that moment clicking like, oh my goodness, I don't deserve the same thing that everybody else got. The other one person got four years, one person got seven, I got 14. And it was like, No, no, I don't deserve four or seven. I do deserve more than they got because I carried more opportunity and responsibility as an individual, even if my actions were commensurate.

And so that was a journey. But as that journey progressed, character is the only thing you can look at, or you can choose to go the other direction. That is blame everybody else and become a victim. And I'm thankful to be able to say that that was, that was just never an attractive option to me. Um, and I think that's the best thing.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, there was, victimhood culture is obviously a big thing at the moment. It's not my fault, it's somebody else's fault. Yeah. Um, and I remember reading Stephen Covey's book, you know, The 7 Habits, and talking about responsibility. Indeed. Um, and reading books like Extreme Ownership by, you know, Jocko, And you just kind of think, yeah, I mean, it's again, it's the overarching point of scriptures, and you've got to take responsibility and, and, and fess up, and if you can do that, You, that's the beginnings, actually, of a remarkable leader, I think.

Um,

Jon Antonucci: 100%. I I did a podcast, interestingly, I was on the podcast with a, uh, with that, the, the mentee that I was telling you about a minute ago. He, he has a podcast and I was in Phoenix a few months ago and, and he was like, dude, you gotta, you gotta be a guest of my podcast, please. Yeah, no doubt. And, and that's exactly what I talked about.

I, I said, you can't be an advocate. His, his podcast is called, called Outlaws to Advocates. And, and I said, you can't be an advocate. Until you take ownership, because until you take ownership, you can't even advocate for yourself, let alone for anybody else. And, and I, I couldn't agree with you more, Matt.

Matt Edmundson: Jon, listen, I'm aware of time and this has been a phenomenal conversation. And I've, I've so many more questions. We should probably do a part two. Uh, that'd be awesome, man. If people want to reach out to you, if they want to connect with you, if they want to find out more about, you know, the leadership training that you do, maybe even get a book, uh, when it's out, what's the best way to do that?

Jon Antonucci: Yeah, I'm all over LinkedIn. I'd say if you look up Jon Antonucci on LinkedIn, uh, I think there's only one of me. Um, excuse me, but yeah, all over LinkedIn. Uh, you can also visit my website, www. servantmindedleadership. com. Um, and I think we might throw something in the show notes that'll give them access to everything else as well.

But yeah, LinkedIn, I'm very active on LinkedIn and LinkedIn and YouTube are probably the two places that I have the most, uh, most content and stuff. Um, Be happy to serve in any way. What

Matt Edmundson: sort of stuff are you doing on YouTube?

Jon Antonucci: So I've got, we've got the Servant Minded Leadership channel on YouTube and uh, every week we put out like a five ish minute video and like a 60 second ish video on the same topic.

So this week's video is all about what kind of leader are you? I think we're closing out almost 300 videos on the channel now. It's gonna be over the next couple of years. But so looking for kind of bite size, leadership stuff. Part of the journey of getting SML started was me looking for videos and finding just absolute trash out there and thinking, I don't even know what I'm doing, but surely I can do something better than that and uh, trying to offer my gift to the world by sharing some of the thoughts that I have on leadership.

Matt Edmundson: I'm going to check it out. I'm a big youtube fan, so I'll go and check that out. We will of course link to all of that in the show notes as well. Um, so yeah, This Scroll down on your podcast app, look at the description on YouTube and you'll find all of the links to Jon. You can also find them on the website, pushtobemore.

com. Jon, listen, man, totally, totally love the conversation. Really appreciate you coming on, um, and sharing your story. And I'm aware that there's so many things that we didn't get to, uh, but I was thoroughly engrossed. And so thank you, man. It was phenomenal. And I, and I, I just love the challenge around leadership, around ownership and around character.

Um, and I think as leaders and entrepreneurs, it's good to think about those things. So thank you. Thank you, Matt. It's

Jon Antonucci: been an absolute privilege being with

Matt Edmundson: you today. Phenomenal. Well, what a massively brilliant conversation. Huge thanks to Jon for coming on today and again, of course, huge thanks to Podjunction for making this show possible.

So do check them out at podjunction. com. Make sure you keep following the podcast wherever you get your shows from because we've got some more amazing conversations just like this one, uh, coming up and I don't want you to miss any of them. And in case no one has told you yet. Today, let me be the first.

You are awesome. Yes, you are. Created awesome. It's just a burden you have to bear. Jon has to bear it. I've got to bear it. You've got to bear it as well. Now, Push To Be More is brought to life by Podjunction. For the transcript, show notes, head on to the website, pushtobemore. com. And a big kudos to the Podjunction team that makes this show possible.

But that's it from me. That's it from Jon. Thank you so much for joining us. Have a phenomenal week wherever you are in the world. I'll see you next time. Bye for now.