Bernie Swain on the Fast Leader Show

Bernie Swain Show Notes

Bernie Swain was facing gargantuan competition to be the lecture agency that would represent President Ronald Reagan. He was certain that he would lose out to a more experienced and larger firm. When Bernie got the call, he prepared for the worst. Listen to Bernie share his story of how wining helped him to move onward and upward faster.

Bernie was born in Riverdale, Maryland but grew up in Arlington Virginia with his younger/older brother John.

As a young boy Bernie could always be found on the baseball on the playground or listening to a New York Yankees games on the radio and cheering on his idol, Mickey Mantle.

Inspired by his high school football coach, Bernie planned on a career in college athletics. Despite the fact that no one in his family ever attended college.

Bernie earned his undergraduate and master’s degrees from George Washington University. In the last few months of graduate work, he met his lifelong partner, Paula, a special education teacher.

When Bernie was 32 years old he became the assistant athletic director at a GW. When the athletic director announced his retirement, Bernie was offered the job. It was my dream job and at 36 years old, he far exceeded the goal of that high school boy who may or may not have ever gone to college.

Then in 1979 Bernie and Paula’s friend, Harry Rhoads, sent them the note that inspired all three of them to turn their lives upside down. They quit their jobs to start a lecture agency—without experience, without a plan, and without a single client.

The trio worked from a small supply closet belonging to Chuck Hagel, who would later become Secretary of Defense. For eighteen rocky months, they sat in that closet with their savings running out, unable to compete against the dozens of established agencies up and down the east coast.

Then Bernie got his first exclusive speaker, sealing the deal with a handshake. That handshake became a “defining moment” for their company as word spread in the small town of Washington.

Bernie Swain is the author of What Made Me Who I Am and the co-founder and Chairman of Washington Speakers Bureau and today’s foremost authority on the lecture industry. Over the past 35 years, he has represented former US Presidents, American and world leaders, journalists, authors, business visionaries, and sports legends.

Today Bernie and Paula currently split residence in Nantucket, New York and Florida. They have three kids in New York City – Michael, Tim and Kelly and a grandchild on the way.

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Listen to @Swain_Bernie and get over the hump on the @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“We started our company based on handshakes.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“When an old person dies it’s like a library burning.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Each life is defined by volumes that can teach us.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Each life is a storehouse of wisdom and knowledge.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Each life is its own library stuffed to the rafters.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Sitting down and giving thought to who you are saves you a lot of time.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Success you haven’t experienced before gives you a lot of temptation.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“There are no shortcuts to success.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“We have to pay attention to the defining moments and powerful influences in our lives.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“If we face our problems and find solutions then the load is easy to carry.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“In life, it’s a step at a time and those steps are building blocks.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“It’s paying attention to other people and learning from them that’s most important.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Most of the heroes today are social media personalities that come and go.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“We don’t slow down to pay attention to our own life and learn from it.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“Young people today need heroes and examples to look up to.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“I have to stay curious about the world around me and then I can stay involved.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

“I had the passion to look for skills and develop those skills.” -Bernie Swain Click to Tweet

Hump to Get Over

Advice for others

Pay attention to the defining moments and powerful influences in your life.

Holding him back from being an even better leader

Curiosity. I have to stay curious about what’s going on around me to stay involved.

Best Leadership Advice Received

It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry the load.

Secret to Success

Passion. And the belief in myself.

Best tools that helps in Business or Life

Strategic thinking. Think ahead.

Contacting Bernie

Website: http://bernieswain.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bernie-swain-0a704b4/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Swain_Bernie

Resources and Show Mentions

54 Emotional Intelligence (EQ) Competencies List: Emotional Intelligence has proven to be the right kind of intelligence to have if you want to move onward and upward faster. Get your free list today.

Show Transcript:

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125: Bernie Swain: Ronald Reagan brought us great legitimacy

Intro: Welcome to the Fast Leader Podcast, where we explore convenient yet effective shortcuts that will help you get ahead and move forward faster by becoming a better leader. And now here’s your host, customer and employee engagement expert and certified emotional intelligent practitioner, Jim Rembach.

Need a powerful and entertaining way to ignite your next conference, retreat or team-building session? My keynote don’t include magic but they do have the power to help your attendees take a leap forward by putting emotional intelligence into their employee engagement, customer engagement and customer centric leadership practices. So bring the infotainment creativity the Fast Leader show to your next event and I’ll your attendees get over the hump now. Go to beyondmorale.com/speaking to learn more.

Jim Rembach: Okay Fast Leader legion today I’m excited because the guests that I have on the show today has some great stories to tell that are full of wisdom. Bernie Swain was born in Riverdale, Maryland but grew up in Arlington, Virginia with his younger brother John. As a young boy Bernie could always be found playing baseball on the playground or listening to the New York Yankee games on the radio and cheering on his idol Mickey Mantle. Inspired by his high school football coach, Bernie planned on a career in college athletics despite the fact that no one in his family ever attended college.

Bernie earned his undergraduate degree and master’s degree from George Washington University. In the last few months of graduate work he met his lifelong partner Paula a special education teacher. When Bernie was 32 years old he became the assistant athletic director at GW. When the athletic director announced his retirement Bernie was offered the job it was his dream job. At 36 years old he far exceeded the goal of that high school boy who may or may not have ever gone to college. Then in 1979, Bernie and Paula’s friend Harry Rhodes sent them the note that inspired all three of them to turn their lives upside down. They quit their jobs to start a lecture agency without experience, without a plan, and without a single client. The trio worked from a small supply closet belonging to Chuck Hagel who would later become the secretary of defense. For 18 rocky months they sat in the closet with their savings running out unable to compete against the dozens of established agencies up and down the East Coast.

Then Bernie got his first exclusive speaker sealing the deal with a handshake that handshake became a defining moment for their company as word spread in the small town of Washington D.C. Bernie Swain is the author of What Made Me Who I am and the co-founder and chairman of Washington speaker’s bureau, today’s foremost authority on the lecture industry. Over the past years 35 years he has represented former presidents, American and world leaders, journalists, authors, business visionaries, and sports legends.

Today Bernie and Paula currently split residence in Nantucket, New York and Florida. They have three kids all in New York City, Michael, Tim and Kelly and one grandchild on the way. Bernie Swain are you ready to help us get over the hump?

Bernie Swain: Yes. I’m looking forward to it.

Jim Rembach: I’m glad you’re here. Now I’ve given our listeners a little bit about you but can you tell us what your current passion is so that we can get to know you even better?

Bernie Swain: Well in the mid 1980’s Alex Haley kind of set me on a path to understand the people that I was representing to look at them not as clients but as people that I could learn something from, a classroom for instance. And so I’ve written a book and my passion at the moment is getting word out on that book and sharing it with young people.

Jim Rembach: I appreciate—I had the opportunities to see you as well as here you on an interview with Doc Baron who’s also a guest on the Fast Leader show and I think you guys had a really great time together and I just got so fascinated by your story and how you’ve actually overcome a lot of the hurdles that so many of us have to overcome both in an organization as well as building your own organization and I thought you’d be a great guest on the show, so thanks for coming. But when you start talking about who or what made me who I am, for you without going through and talking about the entire book what are some of the things that stand out for you?

Bernie Swain: Well, as I said we started our company as you said earlier based on handshakes and it was actually a mistake all the other lecture agencies at that time were signing people for one and two-year contracts and Steve came to us because his contract was up and they hadn’t produced for him so he says I’ll give you guys a chance and we had been in that stationery closet for 14 months when he came to us. I was so excited and went over to Steve’s office and shook his hand came back to the office’ tried to justify it to my wife Paula and our partner Harry by saying what good would it do to sign somebody to a piece of paper and that mistake on my part turned about out to be a defining moment for us because Steve went and then told other journalists that in Washington DC that if you didn’t want to tie yourself up to a written contract that you could shake hands with this new speaker’s bureau in town and walk away from them anytime you want. And what that did was establish for us the atmosphere of trust and honesty.

In 1985 Alex Haley came aboard with us and Alex used to sit with me in the office for hours at a time and talk about family relationships and he used to repeat a phrase to me, when an old person dies it’s like a library burning. And that phrase stuck with me and as the days and months passed I began to understand what he was saying to me, that each life the lives of those that are listening today and the millions of people that go uncelebrated is defined by experiences that have volumes to teach us and that each life is basically a storehouse of wisdom and knowledge its own library stuffed to the rafters. I wrote this book for two reasons one is to share these collections of stories that inspired me for many years about and taught me something about life the stories of a compelling an eclectic group of my friends who were guided by their powerful influences and the defining moments and by recounting these stories to give others a better picture and understanding of their own life and the importance of the turning points on the process.

Jim Rembach: Thank you for sharing that. There’s a couple things that stood out to me as you were talking about that and also one of the things that I didn’t have the opportunity to share is the background of your parents. Both of them came from pretty meager means and even your father went through a lot of I guess you’d say issues associated with having a stable home, and grew up in an orphanage and all of those things kind of culminate into kind of what we are and what we have become. Oftentimes we lose sight of that because on the Fast Leader show often times it’s a little bit of an irony. In the Fast Leader show we talk about doing things faster but really the way to do things faster is to do them correctly.

Bernie Swain: Right, it puts us on the right path. We don’t off on tangents and make mistakes and have to re-correct ourselves. Sitting down and giving thought to who you are and the events and the people in your lives that have affected you and changed you in essence made you who you are saves you a lot of time and allows you to make fast decisions.

Jim Rembach: That’s a very good point. When you talked about that mistake—you talked about how it was a defining moment, however, what was the temptation for you to go to that next speaker and try to actually get them under contract and use that piece of paper versus the handshake?

Bernie Swain: Well, actually over the years—in 30 some years we have not yet re-signed anybody to a written contract. I remember in 1984, I was kind of anxious about having some success an initial success that you haven’t experienced before gives you a lot of temptation to cut corners and nobody and the industry had followed us with handshakes, we were the only people signing people with handshakes people could walk away from us anytime we weren’t tying them up. I was anxious to cut corners maybe to raise commission’s to do things to make success come quicker for us and in the process at the same time we were recruiting a football coach from the University of Minnesota who would later go to the University of Notre Dame named Lou Holtz and Lou was going to the White House to meet with Ronald Reagan and we read about in the paper and sent Lou a letter asking Lou if he’d stop by the office no one had been able ever to represent Lou, Lou had been independent and at the same time he was probably the best sports speaker in the country at the time. So, I asked Lou if he we could represent him when he came to the office and he wrote me a letter a month later saying that he needed to concentrate on football and that while he appreciated the offer he turned us down. Months later after that I get another letter from Lou and says, you know that I have two inboxes on my desk and one is for football and one is for speeches and the inbox for speeches is twice as big as the inbox for football and if I’m going to be successful in life I need to concentrate on football so if you’ll allow me I will love for you to represent me on three conditions and those three conditions were, do you care about me? Are you committed to excellence? And can I trust you? And I put that letter on my desk and left it there thinking I was going to file it away and for some reason it stayed there for a day and maybe two days or three days and finally it came to me why I couldn’t put it away. Do you care about me? Can I trust you? Are you committed to excellence? Those were the very reasons I walked away from GW and to start something on my own that I had never experienced before because I wanted to build a company that I was proud of and I was at a point where I was willing to cut corners and do anything for success and I suddenly realized there are no shortcuts to success and that totally changed my life and put us back on the correct path. If I hadn’t gotten that letter, if Lou hadn’t signed, came and shook hands with us I would have probably gone the path of other lecture agencies or done something different or maybe never been as successful as I ended up being.

Jim Rembach: And so you have to share with me too because as I was listening to you talk I started thinking about the whole fast piece and that we kind of hit as they call a tipping point or we hit a point by which exponential activity starts occurring. In other words we have like 10 speakers, 20 speakers and all of a sudden boom! We have like 200 that we’re representing. So, to me I’m thinking that that slow growth actually did help with the acceleration to get to where you are today. Am I wrong in that thinking?

Bernie Swain: No, you’re really right. In 1988 in the fall we got a letter from the White House asking if we would be one of 30 agencies to interview to represent Ronald Reagan. The idea was that they would take—and these were not just the big lecture agencies up and down the East Coast but their Hollywood agencies because he was from Hollywood and so the idea was that you would take the 30 agencies have an interview whittle it down to 15 then another interview down to 7 and they would present the top two choices to the President and Mrs. Reagan for them to select it. You heard nothing for two months nobody knew what was going on and Washington is a very gossipy town so if you need to know something all you have to do is pick up the phone call somebody and they can find out what’s going on but there was nothing. Suddenly in the middle of February, two and a half months after the last interview, I get a call from Fred Ryan, who’s now publisher of The Washington Post, and he was the chief of staff for Ronald Reagan and I braced myself for the bad news because I kind of envisioned what he was going to say—Bernie, you’ve done a great job you should be proud of the accomplishments you’ve done in nine years and you did a great job with the interviews but I hope you understand we have to go with a more experienced agency. And so I picked up the phone bracing myself for that bad news and he got right to the point and says, President and Mrs. Reagan have selected you to represent them. I didn’t know what to say so I promised that we would do a good job, told him that we’d be in touch soon and hung up the phone. I remember sitting at my desk that day thinking how totally amazing it was that a President of the United States would select a fledgling agency and a group of totally inexperienced people to represent him and risk his legacy and I came to understand it after I got to know him that he was really a small-town boy who believed in entrepreneur-ism in the little guy and he wanted to give us a chance. It was exactly what years earlier Alex Haley has said to me that we have to pay attention to the defining moments and the powerful influences in our lives and that’s exactly what Ronald Reagan did. If I had that slow start, if I hadn’t paid attention to the experiences and the lessons that I was being taught for the people I represented maybe I would have never represented Ronald Reagan. Soon as that took place we were representing Margaret Thatcher and ended up representing the last six Prime Ministers of Great Britain, five secretaries of state and three out of the last four Presidents.

Jim Rembach: That’s absolutely amazing. So, I know now you’re sitting here with a whole slew and cadre of all of these folks who have been part of your life and that obviously you’ve been part of theirs because you said of the way that you do business you get to know them and you care about them so there’s personal interactions that are there. So, I can only imagine that there’s a whole lot of inspiration that you’ve received along the way. And one of the things that we look at on the show are quotes to help find inspiration. Is there a quote or two for you that you can share?

Bernie Swain: Lou Holtz who has been a big influence in my life, I’m still very close to Lou, I just went to his 80th birthday party. He’s made the kind of life he’s lived. He has made a great influence on me and he gave me a quote years ago– It’s not the amount of the load we carry but how we carry that load. And what he meant was that we all have responsibilities we all have problems in life and if we allow those problems and responsibilities just to stay stagnant in where they are the load becomes heavy but if we pay attention to our responsibilities and handle them one at a time if we face our problems and find solutions for those problems then the load is easy to carry and we can carry greater loads, which we end up doing anyway.

Jim Rembach: That’s very true. And I think the whole piece for me about just the movement don’t stay and don’t be burdened to the point to where you don’t actually make some type of movement even if it’s backwards at least is movement because eventually you will get moving forward.

Bernie Swain: Right. In our business the thing you hate the most is that you schedule somebody to speak at an event and you may schedule them four months in advance and I remember at one point Ronald Reagan fell off his horse and I had three of speaking engagements for him and it’s the worst thing in the world to call somebody and say the person you’ve been depending on can’t come no matter how legitimate that is. I remember thinking to myself at one time I had two or three speakers that once had to cancel for very legitimate reasons but I just couldn’t bring myself to call the client and tell them right away and I was in the process of trying to find replacements so I have something ready and I let it build up and I remember that feeling of letting those problems build up without taking care of them immediately and it was an experience, I was living with Lou Holtz said not to do. People say quotes to you all the time like Lou that quote to me but sometimes you have to experience what that quote means in order to understand it and for it to work for you.

Jim Rembach: I can imagine too then when we started talking about this that may be a hump that we have to get over quite often. And we shared one of the hump as far as starting the speaker’s bureau was concerned, but is there another hump story that you can tell us that we can actually gain some more wisdom from?

Bernie Swain: I think the big hump for us was the Ronald Reagan story. Because what Ronald Reagan ended up bringing us great legitimacy. Nobody in Washington DC ever thought we would represent a Ronald Reagan and when that happened—I remember the next year Margaret Thatcher had resigned on Thanksgiving and it was hard to get a hold of people and I didn’t really know who to call to reach Margaret Thatcher and I remember getting a call from President Reagan the next day who said that I just talked to Maggie and she wants you to represent her. And so you just don’t know you build up step at a time when you build something or in life it’s a step at a time and then suddenly you find that those steps or building blocks where you build something that’s a solid foundation and that solid foundation then allows you to build a bigger house on it or have bigger opportunities in life. I remember that Ronald Reagan was the biggest hump we ever overcame in addition to the Lou Holtz story where it just changed my perspective on life.

Jim Rembach: When you start thinking about over the course of the years and where things are going from a speaker and lecturer perspective, what do you see some of the things that are most profound in regards to the future and where you’re headed?

Bernie Swain: It’s very interesting because with Donald Trump and what’s going on in the country today it’s totally different from the life and the people that I’ve experienced before. As far as our lecture industry is concerned I think it’s going to grow. Years ago they came up with an idea of teleconferencing so you would then be able to tell a conference to an event and for us the important thing is for people to be there in person and to touch and allow you to feel the experience that’s taking place. So I don’t see a great deal of change in our industry. I think it’s an industry that’s just going to grow because I think today we want to feel people and to understand people and to experience different experiences. More than ever today we can easily get lost in our own ideas of what we want to do and what we want to become but it’s paying attention to other people and learning from other people that’s most important.

Jim Rembach: I think that’s a very important point that we all should consider as a takeaway. Proximity and being able to have that flesh and that feel and all of that is extremely important so if we’re sitting there and we’re thinking about reaching out to somebody and making a particular contact having an important conversation. How we go about them? The way that we do that is extremely important. And I’ve always said up for face to face and whenever you can get it and everything else comes way below that and i think you just validated that for me

Bernie Swain: Right. And I think that’s what your show does. Your show shares those experiences with other people so that they can take those experiences and use them in their own life. The point of what you do is that you’re giving kind of a guideline a direction for people to go so that they can make the most of their own life.

Jim Rembach: I appreciate that. Now I know—and we talked about a grandchild on the way, we talked about splitting your residence, we talked about continuing to work as a Chairman on the

Board of the organization—the Speaker’s Bureau—what’s one of your goals?

Bernie Swain: Most of the people in the book that I wrote or people that are recognized by people that are my age, I grew up with those people, but young people today starting out in life don’t have the heroes or the examples in life that I had. Most of the heroes today are social media personalities that come and go and so my the difficult thing for me today is what I’m trying to do is to reach out and speak to schools and to classrooms and meet young people to share the experiences in this book and for them to understand the importance of finding your own turning points and own powerful influence as those turning points in their own life that can make a difference for them. Because I think today you order something one day and it comes the next day and things go so quickly that we don’t slow down as we said in our conversation, you don’t slow down to pay attention to your own life and to learn from it. And I think today young people need heroes and examples to look up to or examples to better understand their own examples in their own life. It took me, for example, how many people get to a certain age and they lose their parents and they think back—well, gee, if I’d only ask this question if I’d only known a little bit more with their grandparents and it’s the same thing wouldn’t it be better if we were in our 20’s and 30’s and we could learn the things that we would have learned when we were 50 and 60 and 70 years old and use those things.

Jim Rembach: And the Fast Leader legion wishes you the very best. Now before we move on let’s get a quick word from our sponsor:

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Alright, here we go Fast Leader legion, it’s time for the Hump Day Hoedown. Okay, Bernie, the Hump Day Hoedown is the part of our show where you give us good insights fast. I’m going to ask you several questions and your job is to give us robust yet rapid responses that are going to help us onward and upward faster. Bernie Swain are you ready to hoedown?

Bernie Swain: I’ll try all.

Jim Rembach: Alright. So, what do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader today?

Bernie Swain: I think curiosity is holding you back. I mean the fact that I have to stay curious about what’s going on in life and the world around me and the really important issues today. And if I stay curious about those issues then I can stay involved.

Jim Rembach: What is the best leadership advice you have ever received?

Bernie Swain: I think it’s Lou’s advice. It’s not the load that breaks you down it’s the way you carry the load. And I think that’s very important because things can get us down and we can lose perspective quickly because we can’t handle our own situations.

Jim Rembach: What is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?

Bernie Swain: Passion. I sat in that stationary closet for 14 months without representing a speaker. Every day I got up excited about a new day and I was facing and I would come home at night facing a lot of adversity because I’ve been disappointed that nothing had been accomplished I was virtually out of money after 14 months. I was not smart, I didn’t know what I was doing when I started this lecture agency so I think it was the passion to accomplish something and belief in myself.

Jim Rembach: What do you feel is one of your best tools that helps you lead in business or life?

Bernie Swain: Strategic thinking. The key to me when we sign well-known speakers and we’re competing with other agencies is to think ahead what the competition is going to say. I ought to know what somebody is going to say about me or what events going to take place so I have an answer to that question before it takes place. And if I think ahead—Tim Russert when he was alive, a host of Meet the Press, Tim would ask one question and then a follow-up question and his third question which nobody does today was what he knew would be the answer to the first and second question and try to get a correct answer rather than understanding what they were trying to say to us. So, I think strategic thinking is the key.

Jim Rembach: What would be one book and it could be from any genre, and of course we’ll put a link to “What Made me who I am” on your show notes page, but what would be a book from any genre that you’d recommend?

Bernie Swain: There’s a book by Angela Duckworth called Grit: The power of passion and perseverance, and it’s a terrific book. It shows that passion is much more important than talent and I think it’s a great book for anybody to read.

Jim Rembach: Okay, Fast Leader legion you can find links to that and other bonus information from today’s show by going too fastleader.net/Bernie Swain. Okay, Bernie, this is my last Hump Day Hoedown question: Imagine you were given the opportunity go back to the age of 25. And you’ve been given the opportunity to take the knowledge and skills that you have now back with you. But you can’t take everything back you can only just choose one so what skill or piece of knowledge would you take back with you and why?

Bernie Swain: That’s such an easy question because when I started out I had one single ability and nothing else. You’ve got to remember that I started a speaker’s bureau by reading an article in Fortune magazine where article was about—it said, I don’t have any competition. It turned out there was no Internet back then and because there was no Internet I had no way to tell whether he was telling the truth or not. I was six months later in starting the speaker’s bureau and discovered because I got letters from other speaker’s bureaus that there was 12 other agencies in addition to this there was Harry Walker agency which was the subject of this article and discovered that I was facing a lot of competition. So, passion is the answer to your question. Without the passion—I built on skills because I had the passion to look for those skills and to develop those skills.

Jim Rembach: Bernie it was not her to spend time with you today can you please share with the Fast Leader Legion how they can connect with you?

Bernie Swain: I’m on http://bernieswain.com. I’m on Facebook, LinkedIn. I love to connect with anybody anytime and I answer any questions that are ever sent to me so I’d love to do that.

Jim Rembach: Bernie Swain, thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom the Fast Leader Legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot! Woot!

Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader show today for recaps, links from every show, special offers, and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over the fastleader.net so we can help you move onward and word faster.

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125: Bernie Swain: Ronald Reagan brought us great legitimacy