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The Mission Fueling Exponential Mindset with Ron Minatrea
15 Plays12 days ago
In this episode, Dan Sanchez interviews Ron Minetrea to introduce the concept of the Exponential Mindset. They explore how subtle mindset shifts can unlock exponential growth for mid‑level leaders, explain “the Gap” that keeps directors from advancing, and preview the five core shifts listeners will learn throughout the show.
Timestamps
- 00:00 – 01:32 Defining the Exponential Mindset and its promise
- 01:32 – 04:18 Hitting “the Gap”: when incremental effort stops working
- 04:18 – 09:52 Unseen barriers and limiting beliefs (Brandy the puppy story)
- 09:52 – 11:55 Costs of ignoring the Gap: exhaustion, burnout, lost confidence
- 11:55 – 16:34 The Five Mindset Shifts that bridge the Gap
- 16:34 – 19:23 The transformation leaders and organizations can expect
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Exponential Mindset Podcast
00:00:01
Dan Sanchez
Hello and welcome to the Exponential Mindset Podcast. I'm Dan Sanchez and I'm flipping the script a little bit but bet with Ron Minetria because this is his podcast, yet we're kicking off this whole show with having myself interview Ron in order to unpack a little bit of your mission and the whole purpose and reason behind this podcast.
00:00:21
Dan Sanchez
So Ron, welcome to your own show.
00:00:24
Ron Minatrea
Thank you. it's great to be here.
What is 'Exponential Mindset'?
00:00:27
Dan Sanchez
Ron, I've been so impressed with the message that you have behind the exponential mindset. But for people who are listening to this for the first time, really want to unpack the term because like your podcast is named after the term that you're pioneering here around exponential mindset.
00:00:41
Dan Sanchez
I remember the first time I heard it and I was like, oh, there's a couple different ways that could be interpreted. Do you mean like having like a growth mindset that's maybe a little bit more? Or do you mean like because of ah ah this mindset you're talking about, I can have exponential results?
00:00:57
Dan Sanchez
Or is it a combination of both?
00:00:59
Ron Minatrea
It's probably a combination, but but certainly maybe leans more towards the latter, I think, because what happens is if we make these mindset shifts, it opens up exponential growth, growth as a leader, but also growth as
Incremental vs. Exponential Growth
00:01:11
Ron Minatrea
a person. Your life changes, not just in your work and the way you're leading at work, but the way you live.
00:01:18
Ron Minatrea
So we want to help people change how they think to change how they live and lead. And this set of shifts that we talk about in this mindset, if we begin to adopt that, it really does open up.
00:01:30
Ron Minatrea
It moves us from incremental growth. Because if you think about the growth path of a leader, often, you know, we start as an individual contributor. And if you're good at what you do, you're going to be asked to do more.
00:01:42
Ron Minatrea
And because you are good and you care, you will. And yet, In doing so, you're going to wind up running just a little harder and faster than you did before. And when you succeed, you'll be asked to do more again.
00:01:55
Ron Minatrea
And each time we make these incremental steps of growth and, And each time we run just a little harder and a little faster. And if we continue to try to make that path using the same old mindsets, we'll eventually reach a wall. We won't be able to grow.
00:02:14
Ron Minatrea
We reach what I call a gap between the leader we are today and the leader we need to become in order to continue that growth. And this mindset fuels that exponential growth that we need to become the leader that we really want to be and live the life that we're really trying to live.
Leadership Growth: Bridging the Gap
00:02:32
Dan Sanchez
I'm really looking forward to their teachings coming on in the show because I find myself sitting in the same seat as a lot of your audience and a lot of the people that you talk to and coach because I've been a director for about 10 years now.
00:02:40
Ron Minatrea
yeah
00:02:44
Dan Sanchez
I was a director. I was working hard, working smart, and I worked my way up to director fast. I got there at 27. It's probably a little too early to be at a director stage at a good size org.
00:02:55
Dan Sanchez
there I was, and I did really well there.
00:02:57
Ron Minatrea
Right. Mm-hmm.
00:02:58
Dan Sanchez
But I think I even found a part where I didn't get promoted beyond director. I've been in a few organizations since then. And I'm like, huh, something stopped.
00:03:06
Ron Minatrea
right
00:03:06
Dan Sanchez
Things got a little harder. And I found that there was a distance between me where I was. I was a great director. I was good at connecting things in the middle, taking things from the top, connecting it to the people below me.
00:03:18
Dan Sanchez
But there was something different about VPs. And essentially we what I've learned from you already is that there's this concept that we talk about called the gap or the thing that disconnects us from where we are and where we need to be.
00:03:31
Ron Minatrea
right
00:03:31
Dan Sanchez
Why do most directors, usually around the director level, it could probably happen that maybe even a senior manager at a large organization, but why is it like like in this point of a career, the that that gap between where I am and where I need to be, like it just widens so dramatically?
00:03:37
Ron Minatrea
Yep.
00:03:47
Dan Sanchez
Yeah.
00:03:47
Ron Minatrea
Yeah. A
Overcoming Old Leadership Styles
00:03:47
Ron Minatrea
couple of things happen. I think one is, We, like I said, tend to run harder and faster as our answer to growing responsibilities.
00:03:58
Ron Minatrea
And like you said, you can do that fast. You can rise through that quickly. But every time you do, the pace gets faster and the pressure gets more intense and the stakes get higher as you move up and try to lead at a broader level of an organization.
00:04:16
Ron Minatrea
And if your approach is to just do more of what you've always done harder and faster, you reach exactly the point you were talking about where, you know, I think my career has plateaued. I don't seem to be advancing the way I was.
00:04:30
Ron Minatrea
Or maybe you find yourself completely exhausted because you've you've, you know, you've, you are using something that is fully consumed in terms of your capacity because of the approach you're using to lead.
00:04:42
Ron Minatrea
And so that gap is, You see other people leading, you know, at more senior levels. I remember sitting one time and and I saw the people around me had more responsibility than I did.
00:04:55
Ron Minatrea
And yet they were leading almost leisurely compared to what I was doing. I was, you know, it was taking everything I had to stay above water and and they were different. So what was different about them?
00:05:07
Ron Minatrea
Well, they were thinking differently. They were leading differently. And it was understanding that that creates those shifts inside that really makes the difference. And and what what I found is this.
00:05:19
Ron Minatrea
You can't get from here to there by by doing more. Right.
00:05:24
Dan Sanchez
yeah
00:05:25
Ron Minatrea
And so I had to stop and look inside. and And I guess you could say that you have to become more of that leader because you can't you can't bridge the gap by doing more. We really need to go through the gap to become a different leader altogether.
Invisible Barriers and Limiting Beliefs
00:05:40
Dan Sanchez
When you come in contact with leaders and coach leaders, what what's the feeling they usually have inside is they they run into that gap?
00:05:48
Ron Minatrea
Yeah, I think some of it's what you described where like, wait, it it feels like, you know, things have slowed down in terms of my growth or my career to direct trajectory. I think a lot of them feel pulled in a thousand directions because as you described, there's this, you I'm leading a team, but I'm also being led. I'm on, I'm a part of another team.
00:06:09
Ron Minatrea
So now we see tension between what my boss needs and what my team needs. Right. So I feel that tension. I may feel a tension between what the customer wants and my company wants. And I'm now trying to represent both well.
00:06:23
Ron Minatrea
And the big one we feel is we feel that the tension between what our organization wants from us and we even want to give and what our family needs from us.
00:06:35
Ron Minatrea
So we always have that tension and we're doing all that amid this ever escalating, what I call relentless pressure to do more with less faster. And,
00:06:47
Ron Minatrea
We do it with a leadership style that has limitations. And so what we really try to do is identify what are those beliefs? You know, our beliefs drive our behaviors.
00:06:58
Ron Minatrea
And so if we could understand what are the beliefs that are limiting me and shift those beliefs to Now we become, ah ah we wed we come out the other side of that gap, believing differently, but also behaving differently, leading differently and living differently. And that really is what we focus on around the mindset or five key areas where we've identified that the leaders over here believe one way and the leaders over here seem to have shifted that belief and have a different way of thinking and leading.
00:07:32
Dan Sanchez
you know, it's funny because sometimes you can see it in your direct reports underneath you because there's sometimes there's like really limiting beliefs that just seem really basic. You know what i'm saying? Like, have you ever run in, you ever employed maybe like a new intern and they just show up late for work and they believe like, no, you don't understand.
00:07:50
Dan Sanchez
Like, I can't wake up from my alarm. Like there's this like weird limiting belief sometimes that's like really basic.
00:07:52
Ron Minatrea
Yeah.
00:07:54
Dan Sanchez
Like most of us got over somewhere around 2021, right?
00:07:56
Ron Minatrea
Yeah.
00:07:58
Dan Sanchez
You had to for college, right? So it's like to watch them in this limited belief of like, no, I can't show up on time. This is how I am. is It's just really silly. You're looking at it, but like we have those own we have our own limiting beliefs.
00:08:10
Ron Minatrea
Yeah.
00:08:10
Dan Sanchez
They're just deeper, a little deeper down. They're a little bit more subtle, sophisticated, yet we layer beliefs in.
00:08:13
Ron Minatrea
yeah I think they're,
00:08:16
Dan Sanchez
What stops us from having that inward focus? Like it should be obvious, but it's not.
00:08:20
Ron Minatrea
I think they're invisible barriers. And, you know, I tell the story about my dog, Brandy, years ago. She was a brand new puppy and wasn't puppy trained.
00:08:31
Ron Minatrea
So we live in this big house and there's this archway into an upstairs and a couple of bedrooms. And I'm going, i can't let this dog.
Consequences of Ignoring Barriers
00:08:38
Ron Minatrea
have free reign, I'll be finding little landmines everywhere for six months. And so instead, we got a baby gate that just snapped into place at that doorway.
00:08:49
Ron Minatrea
And we could just step right over it. So we would go upstairs. Brandy would follow us and lay down right at the threshold of the door, right in front of the baby gate. And that continued and continued.
00:09:00
Ron Minatrea
She was house trained quickly. After a few weeks, we got tired of jumping over that baby gate. So we just took it down. A funny thing happened, though. The very next time we went upstairs, I walk up, Brandy walks to the doorway and lays down.
00:09:14
Ron Minatrea
And she never walked through that doorway because in her mind, that's where she was supposed to be. And that became this invisible barrier. It had been removed and she didn't know it. So that's like you're talking about this belief, well, I'm this way.
00:09:30
Ron Minatrea
We don't even know we're thinking that way. And so what we want to do is understand what are the invisible barriers? What are the baby gates that are holding you back as a leader? And if we can identify those baby gates and help us to rethink those, to reframe them with more empowering beliefs, it's amazing what can happen.
00:09:49
Dan Sanchez
What's the cost of not dealing with these baby gates we have set up in our minds?
00:09:54
Ron Minatrea
I think exhaustion, burnout, challenges on the home front. Because if you keep running harder and faster, you know, it's a funny thing.
00:10:05
Ron Minatrea
We generally have more rigorous goals and accountability systems in our work than we do in our family. Because they're demanding things of you. And when that happens, we'll begin to answer the call of the thing that's most demanding. And if that is our job, you know, we're we're it's costing us on the home front as well because we're giving everything we have.
00:10:27
Ron Minatrea
The other thing I think that it costs us is confidence. You know, go back to what you were saying, man, I was growing fast. I was moving up quickly. I'm doing all these things. But when I hit a point and I stop, one of the things we encounter most is people who think, maybe I've been promoted beyond my ability.
00:10:47
Ron Minatrea
Maybe I've peaked. Maybe I'm not able, right? And so we begin to question ourselves, especially when our confidence has been built on each of those successes.
00:11:00
Ron Minatrea
When our confidence is rooted and in those successes, then when we're not successful, our confidence erodes. We start to question ourselves.
Focus on Being: The Key to Growth
00:11:09
Ron Minatrea
And that can, I mean, that can really be a spiral for us that not only keeps us where we were, we certainly began to lose the do lose what we had inside, lose what inspired other people around us, right? they They began to see that in us and and us questioning ourselves caused them to question us as a leader.
00:11:30
Ron Minatrea
So that's one of the shifts. In fact, it's the first of the five shifts we talk about a lot is we have to develop our confidence in who we are apart from what we do. Because if, if we think of do first, if we allow do to define who we are, then when we don't, we really are attacked on the inside.
00:11:50
Ron Minatrea
So we really work in the first, first of the shifts is to value who before do. and Because when we learn that, now we can move forward, even in the face of adversity, with confidence and strength.
00:12:03
Dan Sanchez
funny that you mentioned that there's five shifts because my next question was literally going to be like, what shift ah do you want these leaders to experience after after listening to the show as you're dropping with each episode, you know, one barrier ah common barrier that we we often have?
00:12:13
Ron Minatrea
Yeah.
00:12:18
Ron Minatrea
Yeah. Well, so the first is that, right?
Five Essential Mindset Shifts
00:12:20
Ron Minatrea
We want we want to shift to valuing who we are apart from what we do, right? Don't let do what you do define who you are Flip that around.
00:12:31
Ron Minatrea
The second one is to put we before me. And it's easy when we begin leading a team. I remember when I first led mine, the management class I was in said, you know, management is getting work done through others. And I had this picture of me and everyone on my team around me helping me get my work done.
00:12:53
Ron Minatrea
And so we want to shift that and say, actually, we is a shared identity that all of us share and everyone contributes their most valuable part to that.
00:13:05
Ron Minatrea
As a leader, I'm actually there to position them for success. I'm actually there to to help care about and bring out the best of them. So we want to put ourselves. We before me.
00:13:17
Ron Minatrea
The third one, and boy, this one is this one's big, and this is really one of those that, ah ah you know, we have a change model that that this is the third step in it where we talk about acceleration, and that's to choose influence before control.
00:13:34
Ron Minatrea
Control is limiting. My ability to control something is a finite capacity. And so if my leadership style is to control everything around me, I will reach that limit.
00:13:50
Ron Minatrea
that'll That'll take me right to the limit quickly. If, on the other hand, I can begin to understand that I lead without control, without lines, I don't even need lines of command and control because I'm leading more influentially. So we really make that shift.
00:14:07
Ron Minatrea
And so we want to choose influence before control. The fourth ship that we shift that we deal with is the idea that you need to rest before you run. And ah the the mentality here is I'll rest when I'm done.
00:14:22
Ron Minatrea
You know, we get into a project, work hard, we're running at a sprinter's pace. But unfortunately, I think what we do is we run a marathon of sprints. You know, we're running really hard all out.
00:14:35
Ron Minatrea
And just before that project ends, we're already on to another one. And so if our mindset is we'll rest when we're done, we're never going to rest. And then what happens is that begins a cycle of of exhaustion and it robs us of creativity and innovation.
00:14:51
Ron Minatrea
We've become far more effective with way less effort when we keep our tank full. And when that tank drains, we actually work harder with greater effort to get less done.
00:15:02
Ron Minatrea
So being able to put in the rhythms of rest and renewal are extremely important. And it was one of the things I noticed that the more senior leaders were really good at and I wasn't doing.
00:15:15
Ron Minatrea
And so they were they seemed fresher. They seemed more relaxed. They seemed different. And I'm like, but they're doing more than I am. I don't understand. And part of that was the way that they helped to recreate themselves and made sure that was a priority.
00:15:31
Ron Minatrea
And the last one of the five shifts is we say feed faith and not fear. Because most of us get motivated easily by I can't afford to fail.
00:15:42
Ron Minatrea
And now suddenly we're focused on failure and what you feed grows. And right. So suddenly we've began to start playing to not lose rather than to win.
00:15:55
Dan Sanchez
Yeah.
00:15:55
Ron Minatrea
And a lot of our decisions can be can be made in fear. And there's an old coach that says every decision decision made in fear is wrong.
00:16:05
Ron Minatrea
And so what you really want to do is begin to think positively about what you're moving toward, not what you're trying to avoid. So that's really it, right? to To value who before do.
00:16:17
Ron Minatrea
To put we before me, to choose influence before control, to rest before you run, and then feed faith and not fear.
Impact of Mindset Shifts on Life
00:16:26
Dan Sanchez
As listeners begin to listen to the lessons that you're sharing in this episode, what can they expect that transformation to look like on the other side? What is the outcome of applying these principles in their lives look like?
00:16:38
Ron Minatrea
and So i think I think, one, what we say is you you want to be able to perform at the highest levels in your work. be fully present at home, and enjoy a lasting success in both.
00:16:49
Ron Minatrea
And that really is our ultimate objective, right? We're trying to, one of the things we say is we want to bring life to the walking wounded in the workplace. So many people that I meet in these positions, you look at and in in the the the ravages of what they do every day have taken a toll.
00:17:08
Ron Minatrea
we want to remove that toll. we We want them to actually be like those guys I was talking about. They seem refreshed and and and they're they're enjoying, they're thriving, not just surviving.
00:17:19
Ron Minatrea
And so that's what we want to do. And you mentioned practical. I think We always want to be able to apply practically what we're doing and to practice thinking in this new way, because we're really trying to build the train tracks in our brain the that says, oh, this is how I think automatically, not not I have to think to think like this.
00:17:40
Ron Minatrea
And so when you do, you suddenly begin to notice the way you lead is differently. and the way you're living is differently. And that's really what we're trying to create for people is we want to bring life.
00:17:52
Ron Minatrea
We want people to thrive, not just in their work, but at home as well.
Transformational Potential of Exponential Mindset
00:17:56
Dan Sanchez
to So to zoom out a little bit for this last question, if we're successful at this mission, if people begin to live a life with an exponential mindset, more people begin to adopt it, how do you picture this beginning to make like a ripple effect in organizations or even across like maybe society?
00:18:16
Ron Minatrea
Yeah, I think if if we could change the mindset of the masses in the workplace, which is really what we want to do, we think cultures thrive. there we in Inside organizations, those cultures thrive.
00:18:29
Ron Minatrea
People are... no longer looking at the organization as the bad guy because they're actually feeling like they're a part of something that they're excited to be a part of. They love the work that they do and it fuels who they are at home and who they are at home fuels their work.
00:18:49
Ron Minatrea
And when, I mean, imagine a life, in fact, I have a I sat down right after i left my corporate job and I wrote three pages out of Imagine a Life. And it was all the ways that you could feel if you could believe this way, if you could lead this way.
00:19:06
Ron Minatrea
and And that's what we'll be exploring is all those different pieces of Imagine a Life if we all thought this way.
Future Episodes and Exploration
00:19:14
Dan Sanchez
Ron, thank you so much for sharing this with me. I'm so excited for the future episodes and listening to this as myself, because I think we all have those those fences in our mind, those limiting beliefs that are holding us back.
00:19:25
Ron Minatrea
yeah
00:19:27
Dan Sanchez
And so I'm looking forward to taking some of those down as I listen to you drop these lessons on this show.
00:19:32
Ron Minatrea
Awesome. I'm looking forward to it as well. so It's a wonderful journey.
00:19:36
Dan Sanchez
If you're listening now, stay tuned for the next episode where we're going to be unpacking Ron's origin story about how this mission even came under the radar.