Lee Cockerell LeeCockerell.com

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1 Lee Cockerell LeeCockerell.com During Lee Cockerell's career at Disney as the Senior Operating Executive of Walt Disney World Resort, he led a team of 40,000 Cast Members (employees) and was responsible for the operations of 20 resort hotels, 4 theme parks, 2 water parks, and the ESPN Sports Complex. As you can imagine, Lee had to become a time management expert, first as a means of survival and then as a way to help others make the best use of their time. Caitlin: Well, hey, everybody, welcome back to the Work-At-Home Summit. I'm your host Caitlyn Pyle. I'm here with Lee Cockerell. Now Lee Cockerell retired as the Executive Vice President of Disney World, a position that he held for 10 years. Before that, Lee spent eight years in executive position with Hilton Hotels, and 17 years with Marriott International before joining Disney to open Disneyland in Paris. Today, Lee speaks to organizations around the world on leadership, management, world-class customer service, and of course, managing your time. Which is exactly why we invited him here to speak with us today. Welcome, welcome, Lee. Lee: Well, thank you. It's great to be with you. Caitlin: Yeah, so you have no idea how excited that I am to have you here with us today. Our listeners watching at home are in for a real treat, because who doesn't love Disney, and so that's what you're very well known for, is having had a huge hand in running Disney, basically, for 10 years, and so this is a chance for us to just really get inside your head. You spent 10 years there, what all did you do? What were you responsible for? We know you set up Disneyland Paris and opened that, but what was your life like while you were working with Disney? Lee: Well, going to Paris was something. I even got a French daughter-in-law out of it. My son got out of college, came over there, and fell in love and got married. But I would say working at Disney was where I really learned that everything matters. The attention to detail there, I mean it was great at Marriott, but this was even over the moon. I mean it was, I really had to learn to pay attention to all the detail. It's not only the service, but it's the environment, the cleanliness, friendliness, lots of attention to detail. Because as we say at Disney, fantasy is real, and reality is fantastic. That's how we think about it. Caitlin: Yeah, and that's true in everyday life, too. You showed up for this video interview. I'm wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt; you're wearing a tie. The details definitely matter. I'm very impressed by that. What is it about Disney and their way of doing customer service that we can learn as we're starting out in our work-at-home businesses? How is it that Disney teaches customer service and interacting with the people whom we serve that we can use in our businesses here in our homes?

2 Lee: Well, the three things Disney does better than anybody else is we hire better. We have better people. We're very careful who we hire. Even today you've got to answer 136 questions about yourself before we'll give you an interview. And we want to know if you have energy, stamina, discipline, are you gonna be to work on time, and if you get through that, you get to go fill out an application. But before that, and I think this is something anybody can do, you have to watch a film about Disney expectations. And it talks about professionalism, being on time to work, attire, no visible tattoos, no visible piercings, no purple hair at work. You can have all these things, but we're putting on a show, and we know that and our goal is to produce a hit show every day, and consistency is what we're looking for, from the way you're treated, the way you're approached, how the cast members take care of you, and we keep our promises, and we do what we say we're gonna do. So second thing is training. I mean, our people really know what they're doing. We train 'em, we test 'em, and then we enforce the training. So I'd say in private business, you have to know what you want to deliver, and you gotta do it consistently. And if you say it's gonna be every Tuesday at nine o'clock, you gotta be on time, you've gotta have it all professionally done, and it's gotta be right. But I think the last thing we do best is we create an environment where everybody matters and they know they matter. We really do a good job of making sure people understand that they're special, no matter what their role is. They've contributed to the show. Whether you're backstage or never see a guest, still you play a part in the show. As you saw in Broadway, somebody's gotta open the curtain and close it, and the bathrooms have to be clean. Even Walt Disney said before he died, he said keep it clean and friendly and everything will be great. And so those are three things we focus on. But I think this reliability's a big deal. Our guests save up their money for years to come down there, and so we go out of our way to make sure we do it right. Caitlin: I think there's a lot to that. I think that as service providers, we're starting work-at-home businesses, and we adopt the Disney mindset of the people we're serving are special, and we need to reliably give them the service and become known. Disney has become known for reliable service, and I can't remember even a single time I've been to Disney where I wasn't greeted with a smile. It's a very consistent level of satisfaction that I experience every time I go to Disney. And I have my annual pass magic band right here on my desk, and so I'm a Disney fan. I live in Orlando. You could say I actually live in Disney World, and so to me it's really important to know what I'm getting when I go to Disney. And so as service providers I think it's important to emulate that level of service, where even if you're having a bad day, you still treat your clients like gold. Even if you just have one client, and I mean there's days where Disney employees, they're not, they don't get paid a ton all the time, depending on what their job is and whatever, and so they might be having a bad day, but they still have a smile on their face, and it's very consistent, and you can ask anybody anything. Somebody who's working in the bathroom, where's the nearest place to get a soft pretzel, and they'll be able to tell you with a smile on their face. And so, as service providers, I think that's really important that we emulate that level of just humanity, knowing that the people that we're working with are people, too.

3 And, yeah, I think communication and reliability, if you say you're gonna have the work done by 9:00 a.m. on a Tuesday, it's the same thing; you need to actually deliver on that. And then having a great attitude is really important, and I can tell you in my own experience in hiring people that even if somebody doesn't do the best work, if they do it reliably, and they do it with really great communication and style, then I'm more than happy to kind of guide them and give them a little bit more hand-holding, feedback, or whatever to help them improve on their service because they have a great attitude. So we talked a little bit about your work with Disney, but I want to know what you're doing to spread the Disney magic around today, even though you're technically retired. Lee: Yeah, well, I worked for 42 years, so I thought it was a good time to do something else about 10 years ago, and I still do some work for Disney. But I speak all over the world. I just came back from Australia and Hong Kong, went to Portugal for a speech, and Spain. So everybody wants to know about Disney, and they say, Lee, can you tell us the secrets of Disney? And I say Sure, if you pay me, I'd be happy to. Just like everybody! I have a lot of fun, too. My wife travels with me when she wants, if she likes where I'm going. I meet so many nice people. I find businesses that hire me that I didn't even know there was such a business. There's big businesses out there we don't know about. I just did one for a Jewish private school here in Boca Raton. I learned a lot. I spent the whole day with them. it was really enriching for me. Today I'm speaking to a public school in Miami, and teachers and faculty, 'cause I'm trying to get more of this thinking about training, planning, teaching kids how to organize themselves, all those kind of things. Schools don't do a very good job with that. So I don't charge for those. I don't charge the military, law enforcement, or public school systems. I like to do it. Somebody said, Lee, why do you go out and speak when you're retired like this? Why are you running all over the world? And I said because I wanna be loved. I wasn't hugged enough as a child. People clap; they don't clap when I play golf. It's a lot of fun. And I actually hear back from people that you told 'em something that helped 'em. Caitlin: Yeah, and I think you really got it down. Life and your purpose in the world is about more than money, and so it's a message that we have at Work-At-Home School, and during this whole summit, is that you have to come at it from a perspective of it's about more than making money. And you've really got what really matters in life down, and so what I want to know from you, Lee, is what have you determined really matters in life, if it's not money? What matters most to you? Lee: I finally figured out that you can't take your money with you, but you can take your legacy with you. So that's what I'm thinking about. I wanted to influence my own family, my son, my grandchildren, so that even three or four generations from now they'll still remember me and talk about it. And I mean, you know, it's you can leave a job or you can leave a legacy. You can leave this life; you can leave a legacy. And I even think while you're living to know that you're doing good things makes me have a better day. I feel better about what I'm doing, and not just out there for money, money, money. Because how much money do you need in life? I mean, legacy's important after you're gone.

4 Caitlin: Absolutely, and I think that deep down, everybody listening to this right now, they want to leave a legacy behind. They have a family, they have a circle of influence in some way, whether they have kids yet or not. I don't have kids yet. I have a dog, and I have a husband, but I have people in my sphere of influence that I want to make sure that I'm doing what I can to make a difference in their lives. And so it is about so much more than money, and initially we can kind of get ourselves wrapped up into thinking that my biggest problem is I gotta make money because I have to do this with the money and I have to do that with the money, but what we really want is to create something in our lives that matter. You mention that you go around and you speak worldwide to all kinds of audiences about organization, and you said that the school system doesn't do a very good job of teaching organization. And I was just joking with someone about the school system yesterday, and how we learned more about parallelograms and how to prove proofs in geometry than we did about tax season, and I'm like, Oh, the parallelogram thing is gonna come in handy when we're filing our parallelograms, right? And so you said that schools don't do a very good job with teaching organization. And that is absolutely true, I know everyone joining us today needs to know what you know about organization. Everything that we're busy with in life, and you know what matters to you most in life, how do you help other people figure out what really matters most to them in their lives? Lee: When I speak to them or if they take my time management course online, or they read the book on time management, I really teach them all the things I've learned in my life. I was born pretty self-disciplined, but I didn't have a system for keeping up with everything when life got more complicated. You know, when you're born, there's no issues. When you get married and then have children, and then there's a soccer game and your boss wants something done by five o'clock Friday, and your mother-in-law's flying in on this weekend, and you're gonna pick her up, and these things just keep piling up. I would say the average person does not know the three or four most important things they should get done every day before they do anything else. When I was at Disney, I focused mainly on making sure we were hiring the right people, that everybody was getting training, and that I was setting a good example and being a good role model for creating an environment and a culture where everybody mattered, and knew they mattered. If I got those three things done, it was pretty powerful. And now today, since I've retired, my wife gave me three new things. She said, Lee, your first priority is take care of yourself, so you can take care of us. Then you can take care of your family, and then you can take care of your business, and then you can help Kim Kardashian with her problems, if you have time. But until you get the real things done, don't be wasting your time. Money, we spend money; we spend time. I guarantee you that where you spend your time's where your life's gonna lead you. If you don't take the time to plan the life you want, you're gonna spend a lot of time living the life you don't want. A lot of people are there right now, they're not healthy; they have bad relationships, divorces. Kids are not doing well. I guarantee you can track it right back to at home, the parents, and in business, the leader. If you're having bad results in your business, well, it's your fault. Now think about it, never too late to get better. You can learn these things, time management is learned just like any course you take, math or

5 science or English. It's just most people don't do well in it because they don't want to, because they've never thought about it; they've never been taught. And so they just try to figure it out as they go through life, and life passes by pretty quick, and then you look back and have regrets. I wish I'd spent my time smarter. I wish I'd exercised. I wish I had gotten my retirement planned better, 'cause now I see I can't retire, and I wish and I hope and I pray, and no, no, no. That's not the way to do it. That doesn't work. Caitlin: I like to say that hope is not a strategy, and you made a very good point that time management is a skill that you learn just like anything else, and the mistake that I see most people making is, yeah, they just don't realize that that's a skill. And it's not even just with time management, in my field of expertise, which is working at home and learning skills, people come to me and they're like, Well, I want to work at home, but I don't know how to do anything. And I'm like, Do you realize that your brain is this living thing that you can put new things into? You can learn new skills, and it's never too late. And you are an excellent example of that. You have been retired for 10 years, but you're still working. You're still doing things that matter, and it's keeping you young, man. You're doing a really good job with that. And you have really narrowed down what matters in your life, and you're helping others do the same. And you mentioned a system, a time management system, can you give us a snapshot of what that system looks like, maybe the first one, two, or three steps of getting your time management down and into focus? Lee: Yeah, and I'll say to your listeners right off, time management's worked for me. I don't have a college degree. I had a very dysfunctional family growing up. I went in the army, started as a waiter, and then I started figuring out how to manage my time, be the best little waiter they ever had, then I started taking courses and reading and implementing what I read on leadership and management and started paying more attention. So I ended up running Disney World 35 years later. Now what's the chances of that? I mean, it's absurd. Because filling in a knowledge gap today is easy. You've got it in your phone; you've got it on your laptop. If there's something you don't know, I tell people if you don't know the definition of a word at 10 o'clock and at 10:30 you still don't, that's your fault. You can look it up; you can find out; you can be curious. So time management's about -- Caitlin: Yeah, you don't even have to know how to spell it anymore, you can just say it -- Lee: No, you don't Caitlin: -- into your phone and it'll tell you. Lee: And maybe a lot of people know how to paraphrase a sentence, but they can't really get anything done and don't know how to do it. But time management's like this. You get yourself a planner. Every day there's three steps I do. First of all, I think about yesterday, what I didn't do as well as I should have. That conversation I had with somebody, that meeting, that document I did, that , am I ready for, and when I find something I didn't do as well as I should have, it's called reflection. Most people don't reflect, they just keep making the same mistakes over and over and going forward. So reflection helps me. The next time it comes up, I do it better 'cause

6 I've thought about it. Even with a conversation with my wife, I think about now how could I have said that better? And next time we have a little spat, I do say it better, and then she has decided to stay with me. Second thing you do is think about the responsibilities you have in your life. If you're married, you've gotta be thinking about that person. If you have children, you've gotta be thinking what do you need to do for them this week, this month. Get them signed up for camp, get their college fund opened, get in for their physicals. Other things, I mean many things, but we don't think about them. Your retirement, have you talked to an expert? Don't try to do it yourself. Get experts surrounding you to help you with things you're not very good at. Because that's -- not that you have to do it, but you've gotta get it done. And then your aging parents and grandparents, have you met with them? Have you sat down and talked with them about the will, and have documents signed before dementia sets in, if it does. Or your own career, what are you gonna do this year to go to seminars, learn more, get back, take a finance course, marketing, go back to school, get your MBA? Those things won't pay off for 5, 10, 15 years maybe, but if you don't do 'em now, they won't pay off at all and you'll be disappointed. And the other one is exercise. I ask people do you think you're responsible for your health? Oh, yeah, but most people, look at people, they're not doing a very good job. What is more important, really? My wife said nothing, 'cause if you're gone, you can't take care of us. And so I work out every day. I have strength training twice a week to build bone density 'cause I don't want to fall and break a hip. I'm at that age now. I'm in the O-zone, I tell people, the obituary zone. You know I'm gonna be 74 in two months, and I don't want to fall and break a hip; that's the beginning of the end. So I do this. And my wife and I named it prehab, so we don't have to go to rehab. This is things people knock off. Then at 51 you're not in good health. You have bypass surgery, diabetes, and it's coming. You own it, and you could avoid it, mostly, but people don't have time, they think. Caitlin: You have to make time for your prehab now, or you're gonna have to make time for rehab later, so you just have to pick what one is gonna be, pick your hard, right? It's hard to get into an exercise routine, it's hard. Lee: Do the hard thing. Caitlin: But it's way harder to die. Lee: Most people don't do the hard thing. Easy always wins. Caitlin: Well, so you said reflection is the first thing. So looking at what you need to do, and then responsibility is the second thing, and then what would you say is the third step that people can take when they are looking at their planner and planning their days? Lee: What I do is I think anticipation. You know, reflection's looking back, and anticipation's looking ahead. I think about, what happens if I don't do this? What happens if I don't spend time with my children? What happens if I don't exercise? What all happens if I don't keep my skills up and learn more and stay on top of technology and those things? And so most people don't want

7 to look too forward 'cause it's a little scary, and the things they're not doing, it's because they're hard. And doubts wins. You know, it's easy to run up credit card debt; it's hard to save your money. It's easy to lay on the couch; it's hard to exercise. It's easy to not have a hard conversation with somebody because it's gonna be emotional, and I always tell people manage like a mother. Mothers don't care if you're happy; they care if you're successful, so they have the hard discussions with you, they do the hard things, and most, more people need to take that on. I mean, when you do the hard things, life gets easier. I mean, it just gets easier. When you keep doing easy things, life is gonna bite you. It's gonna bite you hard, and nobody's gonna care, and you put yourself in that situation. So don't blame it on your mother, don't blame your mother for situations you put yourself in. You have the ability to step out and get out and get up and it's just, we've heard this all our life. We always hear this inspirational stuff, and people, yeah, but, but, but, and yeah, is exercise hard, yeah! I hate my trainer. The guy works me hard. But I feel like a million dollars. I'm stronger now than I was when I was 20. I weigh exactly what I weighed when I got out of high school. Why? 'Cause I want to. 'Cause I don't wanna die this quick. My grandkids adore me; they're not ready for me to go yet. Caitlin: Yeah, you have a lot. Lee: They want me to buy an iphone Caitlin: Yeah, you have a lot more to do, you still have a long to-do list in your planner, and you reminded me, so we're talking about anticipation and you said to think about what happens if you don't do the hard things. And I think that you said that people like to do the easy things 'cause they're easy, but by not doing the hard things, they make their lives harder. You reminded me of, a few years ago when I was trying to knock off a few pounds, I'd just gotten back from a whole year traveling in South America, and I wanted to lose some weight. And I had that same kind of revelation, to write down what happens if I don't, and to reflect on the painful consequences of not achieving the goal I'd set for myself. And so I brought that up from my Evernote, I have it on my screen right now and was gonna read them out. Not achieving my goal: I'm gonna stay uncomfortable. I'm gonna feel underconfident. I'll probably end up spending more money to do, to buy more clothes 'cause my clothes don't fit. I'll live a shorter and less vibrant life. I have a higher risk of cancer. I'll feel depressed more often. I'll feel defeated and powerless. I'll have lower self-esteem, and I'll have more of a tendency to be angry and blame other people for my problems. And so I was reading through that list and it's funny that I wrote that probably a year and a half ago, two years ago, but when you said, reflecting on what happens, or anticipating what happens if I don't do those things, and so a call to action I want to give everyone watching right now. Lee, you said you're turning 74 in two months, yeah? Lee: Yeah, I was born in World War II. Caitlin: It's amazing, and so I wanna encourage everybody watching right now to consider, if you're thinking about starting a work-at-home career, if you're watching Work-At-Home Summit right now, and you're watching this interview or watching any of the talks that we have on any of these topics, including time management, think about -- you're reflecting on what you could do better. You know that you want to make more money. You know what your responsibilities are. These three things that we're going through that Lee just said, reflection, responsibility, and

8 anticipation. You know that you can seek help from experts. You know you don't know it all. You don't want to use I don't know how as an excuse to get things done anymore, 'cause you know there's people out there who know and who can teach you. And we talked about exercise, of course, and so the third -- Lee: And this podcast is a good example of that. Caitlin: Yeah, exactly, and so the third thing is anticipation. What happens if you don't? Where are you gonna be in a year from now? Where are you gonna be when you're 74? Are you gonna be happy with the way you spent your time, and just realizing, Lee, you've really been an inspiration, realizing that you have more control than you've given yourself credit for, and you can either choose your hard of struggling through life not being happy where you are. You can choose to blame yourself for that, blame other people for that, use your energy to blame or be unhappy, or you can use your energy to do the hard things and see what happens. I mean, you can see what Lee's accomplished in his life. When I started my work-at-home business back in 2011, I got fired and that was really hard, but I chose the hard of building a freelance business, and fast-forward to the time of this recording, it's been over -- um, I can't do math -- seven years, and my life has changed. I used to say I don't know how. I can't start a blog. I don't know how to do a website. I can't do this. But I realized that I'm not stuck where I am, and I can change things, and that learning really will change your life. And so if you're sitting at home right now thinking I can't do this, then I want to tell you that you can. So, Lee, if there's somebody at home right now who's listening to this and they're fearful -- they're fearful of what will happen if they start managing their time better, and maybe they see some success, or they can't handle it, or people make fun of them, or anything like that, what advice do you have for circumventing those roadblocks that people are gonna come, 'cause we're all gonna have those roadblocks, right? Lee: Yeah, you know I teach this stuff all over the world, when I tell people, your phone is great, but get a paper planner and put it in your back pocket, I get a lot of harassment. My grandkids think I'm a dinosaur, but it works. Most people use a phone. Caitlin: I have a paper planner! Lee: Yeah, it doesn't work! For this, it works for everything else. And I say, don't underestimate what you can do. Don't underestimate the influence you have on other people. Go find somebody to help you, people like to help. There's a lot of places out there can help you. And I would just tell your listeners pick just one thing, one hard thing you've been putting off in your life for years. You know what it is, a relationship, going back to school, takin' a course, getting in shape, losing weight. Pick one thing and prove to yourself over the next few months, by March 15th you're gonna resolve that. And put the effort into it, and quit wasting your time watching the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. And get with it! Come on, man. We've all got 168 hours. Are you really using it right, really? If you write 'em down, would you be embarrassed if people knew how you spent your time? Yeah, you would. Yeah, is it scary? A little bit, maybe, but how you feel after you've accomplished something, it's unbelievable. I mean, then you know you can do it, and then you can start knocking out other hard things. And most of it's lack of self-confidence.

9 We grew up that way, we may, the way we were raised, the environment we grew up in. People always told us we were nobody, we don't have a college degree, blah blah blah. Forget all that! Just go. As Luke said recently, don't look to the past. You're not going there. Look to the future 'cause that's wide open. That road is open. And get help. Listen to podcasts like yours, listen to mine, take courses, get to know people and ask them for your help, your parents, your friends, the lawyer in the family, whatever. People are great. Sometimes you might have to pay 'em; most of the time you won't. It's just a mindset. Marriott told me once if you have flies in your restaurant, you like flies. It's up to you to get rid of the flies in your life. Caitlin: They say if it's to be, it's up to me, and I know there's a quote by Jim Rohn who says that you're the sum of the five people you hang out with most. Lee: Oh, yeah! Caitlin: Yeah, if the people you're hanging out with are not encouraging you, then find other people to hang out with. In Work-At-Home Heroes Facebook group, listening to -- going and listening to talks by Lee or other experts and taking courses and getting involved in communities, like Work-At-Home School community is an example. It doesn't even have to be our community. A lot of our instructors have their own communities. You can go get involved in any of their communities and surround yourself with people who are doing things and going places. If you're just hanging out at the bus stop waiting for things to happen, you're gonna be waitin' for a long time. 'Cause like I always say, the ready bus is not coming, and I love what you said, Lee, about don't think about the past 'cause we're not going there. Lee, I just want to say thank you so much for sharing your story and your expertise on prioritizing and managing time, and really just considering what's important. And I love the three steps on reflection, responsibility, and anticipation to really get at the core of what's important in our lives. And I think we just all need that encouragement to consider that, and then really take those steps to use our time wisely. I think it's the best way to get ahead in life, and stop using excuses like we don't know how or we don't have time, because we do have time, and we can make anything happen. Guys, if you're watching this right now, Lee is an instructor at the Work- At-Home School, and he mentioned his Time Management Magic course earlier in this interview. It is inside the Committed Level curriculum package. Now Lee doesn't just tell you how to control your time; he shows you exactly how to live life more fully while staying organized and prioritized. Links to that are below this video. Thanks for joining me today, guys, and, Lee, thank you again for your time. Lee: Yep, thank you.