Inside the Mind of Jamie Dimon, JP Morgan CEO: Lessons on Leadership and Success

0:00 a lot of businesses you've seen this you know you if you have a a a second rate execution you're in trouble you know if you have a first- rate execution you can run a pretty good business whether or not you have a perfect [Music] strategy you know some leaders talk a big game others they just deliver big results if you want to know what separates the two keep listening welcome the how leaders lead I'm David Novak and every week I have conversations with the very best leaders in the world to help you become the best leader that you can be my guest today is Jamie Diamond he hardly needs an introduction but since 2006 Jamie has served as the chairman

0:46 and CEO of JP Morgan Chase the largest and most profitable Bank in the world and in this conversation you're going to get the full Jamie Diamond experience he's got so much insight into what it takes to cut through the BS and execute big changes in your business I love that about Jamie he has a real allergy to anything that's going to gum up the works with too much bureaucracy or over strategizing the great leaders know and Jamie knows it for sure that you get results when you get to work if you want to cultivate a bias towards action you're in the right place here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours Jamie Diamond [Music]

1:33 you know Jamie you've done a million interviews okay and I I'd kind of like this one to be a little bit different maybe even different than anything I've ever done on on this show but I want I know you're a master story teller basically we're going to try to share the stories of your life and the learnings that you had along the way and uh you know I know it's going to be a lot of fun for me because I've I've been a part of a at least a good deal of your your your business career I know your father was a stock broker and we've talked a little bit about him but I've never really heard you talk a lot about your mother C could you tell us a story about your mom and and and and a leadership lesson that you you picked up from her yeah let me I'll do both a

2:18 little bit you know my parents died in 2016 and if you'd ask me before that about you know credit for what you did and how you grew and stuff like that I probably didn't talk about a lot but now I'm looking back and you realize that very fundamental values you have you know come from them and the values were pretty basic and I I call them Greek but they probably were just values that a lot of you know uh folks have one is uh uh you do the best you can and whatever you do you do the best you can it wasn't about how you did it was simply that did you do did you give it your best uh the second was you treat everyone well like you know if you mistreated uh anyone like a waiter or taxi cab driver that was unacceptable and as a codicil to that is you didn't allow other people to be bullies you

3:05 know which sometimes got you in trouble a little bit uh and the third was is do do something with your life you know but it about purpose so my dad was a stock broker but he was much more interested in philosophy than being a stock broker and and the purpose could be so my older brother became a physicist a real physicist MIT Chicago nebor Institute my twin brother became an educator but it was doing something with purpose you know you know draw draw your Picasso and and make the world a better place through that purpose and you could be art it could be science it could be teaching it could be it could be being a parent it wasn't you know anything than just do it well and have a purpose and uh and they were pretty strict about that both both of them you know my mom my mom was a Spartan when I say that I really mean that I mean she was a beautiful woman but she was pretty tough

3:52 like I never I saw her the only time I saw her cry was when JF Kennedy got killed and I got home that day and she was crying other than that not not even when we told her she had pancreatic cancer or you know and she said I've had a great life and um uh so she was I would say kind of stoic she became very early on a woman's Liber and she also uh went back to college when I went to college so she hadn't finished college she had gone for a year to a Brooklyn College or something like that and then stopped to to be a mother though she always did things like uh oh yeah I'll tell you a quick little story about my mother my mother's we must be 12 or 13 years old and my parents are having a glass of wine in the living room and my father says to my mother something about

4:38 uh her name was themus which means Justice in Greek by the way I believe the the the goddess of Justice uh and he used the word you're acting hysterical and I don't know remember those books about the second Mystique or the second The Second Sex and she said I told you not to say that Ted he said well when you're acting hysterical you're acting hysterical and she said I told you not to say that and she said he said it one more time and she walked up to him and took her wine in his face and left the room and he was in shock and the three boys we've never seen anything like that not in my house and now of course the three of us were like the revolution has begun because he was he was the boss like just you and it was like we're gonna overthrow the king and um um to his credit when we all sat down for

5:23 dinner a little bit later he came back and said I just want you all to know your mom was right so that's s SS like the Jamie Diamond I know today the the other thing about mother you got to understand my mother was a was a was a Freudian so my father kind of was but my father's much was more like us you like what did they do but she was like why did they do it so I was like so you you end these conversations I don't care why they did it you know it's what they did and so uh but because of that I read a lot of Freud before I finished College I mean I read almost all of it before I finished College just to how you know how people think and of course lot of Freud was wrong but it is a real insight into trying to figure out how the mind works yeah how much do you think that really helped you as you started working

6:09 with people quite a bit you know I always try to be I think both sides you know trying to act and do something but also try to figure out people and their you know their motivations all those EQ things you're talking about are they real are they authentic what motivates and why treating people respectfully uh so yeah I do think it helps in part of your life you're always thinking how the world works but also how people work and though and both as you know both those things could be very complicated and we still spend most of our time trying to figure that stuff out you know how did the fact that your dad was in finance and and you know was totally indoctrinated in that world you know how did that impact you know where you headed and and and when you think

6:55 about your dad what was the biggest thing you you learned learn from him that you took into the business world so of the three boys uh I was the only one who took a interest in finance I worked from the Su you know basically like doing mailings and answering phones and stuff like that when I was 14 or 15 uh but I was interested I I was always I always read the papers I always read the business section I read the sports section I read the uh uh so he nurtured that you know he he didn't make anyone do it like I said my older brother became a physicist my other brother educator but which my parents enormously respected but I was interested in that part of the world and so he'd give me stuff to read I remember reading a book that Merl Lynch had done like how to read an income statement in a balance sheet I read uh Graham and DOD there's a

7:42 big thick one but there's a one called the intelligent investor I probably read it when I was 15 and I bought my first stock I was about 14 or 15 and so that my interest was peaked I wasn't heading to be a stock Broger in fact my father didn't want me to his his view what you know a lot of people like they grass is green on the other side he didn't think it was what I should be doing or stuff like that but and I didn't had to be a stock broker but yeah of course it nurt my interest and you know I wrote a couple of papers in college about business and stuff like that so I was interested and but the interest was more about building something building something great you know I I would read the stories about companies that had really done interesting stuff and built things and bought things and you know made you know made more employees and

8:27 stuff like that so uh so yeah it nurtured it gave me stuff to read I remember a very humbling thing he came home one day a couple of times remember young brand take a business you think you would understand like a restaurants you know and and you can understand what the profits are and know you actually eat there as opposed to like you know chips which is hard for a kid but he would he would take back then annual reports were much shorter and he would rip out the page that had the price they say read this thing and tell me you would pay for it and for anyone out there I don't care how smart you are or how good I think you are you would be humbled by that exercise and so really becomes a discipline about what makes you think about things and how you think about values and and uh that's so cool that's

9:13 so great and so you grow up in this Rough and Tumble uh neighborhood you get into the street fights and here you end up going to Harvard okay I don't really see you as a Harvard guy I know you can definitely you know you know do well there but you know that had to be a different kind of place for you so I uh so I went to tough University I got I was one of those deferred admits so you know you're gonna go but back then you had to work for two years I worked at a a consulting company that doesn't exist anymore and I and I I you know I get did well at school and I was I didn't go in very nervous like that but my wife tells the story because I met my wife in the second year there as you know that you know I was the guy in the class like wearing the uh leather jacket a T-shirt and jeans you know not

10:00 you know and I hadn't gotone to Harvard undergrad or Yale or Princeton or you know a lot of that but I I loved it because the Socratic method you know for those who don't know you sit in a class with 80 people you read cases and then the real world is messy so this is not like Theory anymore even when they talk about Capital markets it isn't like you know the supply demand curves it's like why do things trade this way and why do people do those things and why do so many business ventures succeed and so many fail and and um you learn that in even today if you and I went there and sat through a good case as your friend Andy Pearson taught and I went there uh when he was there you learn a lot from listening to other people and that is a great I still do that you sit around the table why what when you went to other companies things and so I I liked it I

10:46 it wasn't you know people were afraid of public speaking had a hard time uh people who weren't a little proficient in numbers might have had a hard time but I I kind of kind of loved it made some great friends there who I still speak to you know you know Steve Burke yeah uh my wife wasn't that happy with it you know it made some people kind of nervous but you know when you settle in once you see the people you get to know them and having fun every day it's it's uh it's pretty good so you you you meet your wife Judy at at at Harvard when was that aha moment you knew that she was the one so she was introduced to us by a friend uh Mandel who you may actually have met at one one point along the way uh and you know I I've she pointed out to me and Judy was very pretty you know

11:32 very smart and I was so I was interested intrigued right off the bat she had asked to meet me you know and she thought I was just I don't know kind of cool or something like that I she talked about wearing sunglasses and t-shirts and I really really wear sunglass I'm not quite sure what she was talking about but I called up her house she lived with like six other women one of them was the president of the finance Club I was a vice president of the finance club uh and and I was speaking to her about some event we were doing and then Judy got in the phone and said hey do you want to play some tennis I said well sure we hit it off right away she says went to have a moled shake or whatever that day she says I made her pay which I don't think is true but and then we she had she had a boyfriend by the way who wasn't at har business school but we started seeing each other

12:17 almost every day for dinner after that and and that that was that story fantastic and how long you been married now been married uh 43 42 years what would you say are are are the biggest learning you've had on how to make a marriage work for that length of time and and have the success you guys have had as partners you I mean when you give advice in this you know that you you learn a lot you just do it well like all the time and so I'll tell you some of the things I think we did well first of we were devoted to each other and kids so we we want to have kids we want to have a family she had a professional career but but for anyone out there the younger people who listen to this that's when when you have a job and kids and you're still like 28 years old that's when you're kind of burning the candle at both ends and you now you have a real

13:04 obligations to family your wife your kids and stuff like that and I always tell people so the lessons and I didn't always do these right uh is you need to make sure that you take care of your mind your body your spirit your soul your friends your family it doesn't happen automatically and you and I I've seen a lot of people professionally in any profession and maybe not a profession they start to neglect that stuff and you're you know is bad it's bad for your health it's bad for your family you end up getting divorced so it takes time and it takes attention and that's the most probably the most important thing I think we never did this but I think it's very smart for you know I was working so hard that we took family vacations we my wife and I very RAR took a vacation as the two of us which is now like a standard

13:49 thing you know people now like they have the there has a name for it I forgot the name for it is my kids do it I think it's just great which you know then we also get the grandkids a little bit but uh I think people should do that Focus you know spend time at the end of the day it's going to be time and quality and so so you know you meet your your your your wife at Harvard you get you know that that education that everybody craves for and you loved every B tell tell us the story of how you how you landed your your your first job out of out of Harvard when I graduated Harvard I was I was going to Wall Street you know not necessar I want to be an investment banker but they pay a lot and you learn a lot you know and I just figured that first couple jobs just learn as much as you can and I had offers from Goldman Sachs Morgan Stanley

14:34 and Leman Brothers which are are three of the best but Sandy W ran the firm that my father was at and I knew him a little bit I met I'd worked there in one summer when I was in college you know remember the old days data entry I basically did data entry for budgets and uh uh I had written a paper on the merge of sherson and sheers and Hayden Stone my mother sent it to him and he sent me a letter saying this is a great paper he you know uh would you come would you want to come talk to me so I went to talk to him and he offered me a job working he just sold cherson Hayden stone to American Express uh and get a job in the investment bank and I told him no because I you know gold I mean Goldman is basically pay me a lot more and I and and you but more important than that is you get a lot more experience and I thought why would I

15:21 give up you know great experience Goldman and higher pay and uh and then he called me back I'd become a baker scholar at Harvard bical which was important to him he likes that kind of stature and Status which is you know the top three or four percent of the kids at the school and uh he then he said you know what I just saw the company he to American Express he was very down toe back then I don't remember if you knew him way back then and you know American Express was more of a bureaucratic you know company they said I don't know how it's going to turn out uh but I would I would love to have you here as my assistant you learn a lot you'll see a lot you know you can always go back to Wall Street and that really intrigued me because I'd never been in I'd really never seen a big Corporation i' never uh I I thought you know he was an interesting he was very different than

16:06 Corporate America fun he's more like a jack Wells type at the time and uh I did figure you know if it didn't work out I could always go back to Wall Street or something so uh and I can tell you my interest was in building something it wasn't necessarily being an investment banker and he had built shearon Hayden Stone and then he had these big dreams about what he what might happen to the American Express and financial services so I took the crapshoot and joined him for a lot less pay I mean a lot less pay but I didn't really care that much about that I really cared about the experience tell us a story about where you think you picked up and gleaned the the the the biggest Insight you you learned from Sandy wild and he he was iconic he was very much like a jack Walch you know so I go to America it wasn't the president he became the president shortly after

16:52 that so Sandy Sandy uh he he was down to earth he you know he didn't he he worked all the time for the company I mean he'd had breakfast lunch dinner you know selling buying hiring recruiting I always thinking about mergers always what we can buy what we can buy we so like a lot of the mergers we did over the next 20 years were because relationship he had built up over a long period of time he hated the bureaucracy at American Express and you know one of the things that we all learn in life is when you like when you work at certain types of things you don't like you also learn very good things with not to do they were hugely bureaucratic so they had uh they had the board and they literally everyone prepared for the board meeting and then they had the pre-board prep and

17:38 the pre- pre-board prep and it took it took every month and you remember Bob lip who's still doing great I speak to him every now and then Bob lip hated that stuff a lot of the big Banks had it was just bureaucratic a lot of politics inside and people didn't share information and who's up and who's down and and uh internally it was less of a americ ocracy more of a who do you know and where did you go to school at least early on and he just he just hated all that stuff in that Bob Liv of course you may remember he when we did got to Travelers when he joined us at Commercial Credit it like you couldn't make a presentation the board with the PowerPoint like he just said we're not doing it and you're not prepared so I've never prepared a presentation for the board ever not once I've done it for big deals we did and stuff like that and so uh so so Sandy was always hustling that

18:25 stuff always wanted to know the facts and the be and the bureaucracy and you know was a fanatic about expenses and growing and you know we bought Le when we were there he's always out with the sales people shaking hands doing the dinners you have a lot of CEOs who just wouldn't do that you know they just are too busy to actually hang out with their own people and uh uh so you learned all those lessons do you think uh leadership has has evolved in terms of what really makes a a leader today versus in those days and and do you see a difference there is definitely a difference uh and I you know I when you you ask questions like that I always think about what CH what is the same and what changed so let me just do what's the same okay because I think you got be very careful about it like it's totally different I think in all these things

19:13 you know like Andy Pearson was was one of the great cosos of all time he was Jack Wells before Jack Wells but the the the mind power the analytics the detail the repeat the rinse to go out to the store they observe what's going on to listen to people to do it again Branch by Branch product by product service by service a lot of companies don't do that you know and they literally and and then even politics inside a company stops you know a full addressing of your own performance like how are we actually doing why you know if you're if you're in Pizza Hut you know not why is just Taco Bell may be doing better you know why is McDonald's doing better this company overseas doing better and if you don't do that it's very hard to become a great company so I don't think that's changed uh I think some companies rely too much on outside advisors and all

19:58 that another thing that has not changed is I'm gonna say great Administration meaning you know you look at and you've seen it where some people who run companies they're they're a hot mess people don't know what their jobs are meetings don't start in time they don't return their phone calls they're too busy you know and I I was Ed as an example a military example but Ike Eisenhower you know during uh Normandy and D Day 150,000 troops 7,000 ships hundreds of aircraft 30,000 paratroopers food guns bullets timing planning and you know you got to run stuff so you may you may not be the greatest analy analyst in the world but you got to run it and the people have to know where their jobs are and how you're doing it and the last part's changed a bit okay and not for everybody but and I think

20:44 it's the most important part and you you know you were part of this too but when when I started working there was a lot of the you know the pounding the table and you know the politics and but I think what really makes a great leader is this part which is heart and care curiosity know you you recognition I want to explain to your your listeners a little bit about how I see recognition and what I learned from you your heart is you actually give a damn it makes you authentic you're not trying to be perfect you make lots of mistakes but they see people know you are or they aren't how you treat people what you say you do what you say you follow up and for everyone on the podcast you've all seen the bsers out there people they think they're getting away with it they generally aren't and you know people don't want to work for those people and and you know you can read all these leaders whether it's military or history

21:31 or business you earn trust and respect you earn it by by every day showing that you're gonna work as hard as they do you care as much you you're trying to do the right thing you're not trying to be right you're the first person to say I made a mistake you're the first person to Share Credit uh you're not the first person to blame the other person hang people high make an example of someone unless it's they're doing some unethical uh and curiosity is the same thing but you're always learning so you know I used to go to some branches you know some stores with you every now in the restaurants and you're always learning you can go to any I can go to any branch at J wear in chase today and sit down with the tellers I'm gonna learn something about what systems we have what bank America does better why do we do this why does it take much how come we can't do this in the branch and but

22:16 but there's a humility to that there's a humility to being curious and learning and I still see here a lot of people don't want to get in the road they don't want to go they don't go to a call center they don't because they don't want to hear about the mistakes they're making and what they can do better from someone who you know is Junior and doesn't have the same pressure they have but as you know you know the only reason you have these corporate executive floors I love what Home Depot does they for those you who don't know in the podcast Home Depot calls corporate headquarters they don't call it Global headquarters they don't call it corporate headquarters they call it store Support Center that's why they're there because it's a store and in that store you have people coming in and and then you know how you treat people not just the customers but how the employees are treated reflects to how the customers can be treated so it's that whole combination of heart curiosity giving a damn which makes you

23:02 authentic which is why people want to work for you um and you you have much more of that today in in general in the workplace which I think is a very good thing you know a little more empathy a little more thought something gets over done but and then you you're you always talked about recognition but do you remember me telling you what I learned from you about what recognition really is recognition is really telling someone else what they did acknowledging that you didn't do it they did it it's acknowledging to recognize someone else you have to acknowledge you have to be curious you have to understand that you're you're constantly trying to figure out where you can do better and the the the boss's job is to do help the everyone do the best they can and recognition is this whole kind of part I was never good at it early on in my career but this whole part about the

23:48 recognition that thank you you know by sending a note to an employee who's you know customer sent a great letter about her so it's constant learning constant recognition uh uh and people like it early on in my career when I particular was on Wall Street I always thought recognition meant that people would be pounding the table for more compensation but with in even with investment bankers it was not true they actually wanted to be appreciated for the job they did it made them feel better as human beings and they you're acknowledging that they did something for client that was great you know it made them feel important it wasn't going to you know feed May feed their ego a little bit but it wasn't it's just Tre people respect remember you wrote that book oh great one yeah so the the guy's trying to learn from everybody and as he's learning and making mistakes but that's how you do it

24:33 and is that humility and recognition I remember one year I decided to ask the senior investment bankers what they should get paid and you know I thought it might be a terrible idea because at the end of the year you all these terrible fights about stuff like that and I said don't put in memo just sit down with me tell me did you have a good year what do you think what do you do well what did you do well just verbal conversation it's amazing that most of them were much more honest that way they literally said you know you know I did this I think this and I think my comp should be around a b and c and it was when you didn't do that that they came with high demands you know and so I think just showing respect to people goes a hell of a long way like those you watch Ted lasso yeah know that Ted lasso the beauty of that story is that Ted lasso

25:20 was he didn't know anything about soccer but he can get them to football get them to play as a team get rid of the Demons each one have get getting to respect each other more getting have fun doing it as you were moving up with and and and taking on you know new companies with Sandy W you and lip you know Travelers Commercial Credit you Commercial Credit you you were always you know buying these companies and then turning them around you know you know what did you learn is are the basics of a fundamental turnaround what do you have to do yeah so if you look what we did we were quite successful but it was not strategic it was more opportunistic so you're right we bought companies they had nothing to do with each other sometimes and C all cultures are very different so

26:06 the first thing I did was got to literally would sit down with the management team like dinner get to know them what do you read what do you look at how do you run your joint what reports do you have like you know what do what did people you can see instantly that a lot of people step up right away and they want to build a great company and they tell you what's wrong and a lot of people they defend themselves they they're block they they're they they won't look at the numbers the right way they look at them the way that makes them look better which of course is you know is a disaster for any business and uh who's open but the first thing is walk in their shoes so and go to the belly of the Beast so when I remember Travelers the insurance company I went to go get to know all the actuaries and all the underwriters you know when we when we bought Salon Brothers I put an office on the trading floor the fixed

26:53 income training floor the belly of the Beast right there they were shocked I started to go through all their train and all their positions and take them to dinner and and uh and then and then start fixing it I never we never I'm looking back we never said we're g to do a transformation we just sat down with the business heads and and and said what do you do what are you doing what are we going to build what are we G to grow how come we not grow in the Salesforce how come we're not doing this how come this company is doing better should we should we fix the technology our expenses too high you know bureaucracy slowing us down and then then just start working it man just over and over and over and and of course you know strategy is important but execution often is more important these already existing companies that usually were doing something poorly and we got

27:38 to buy them rather cheaply and we basically fixed them it doesn't mean we did the best in strategy you know we tried to do that but uh uh and and you learn you learn that cultures are different you learn you you shouldn't you should ever go into another place and just impose the way you do stuff on them you know uh because there there's they exist for different reasons you know and they're different regulations and laws and requirements and you're hiring different types of people and uh but one thing that I learned all companies a lot of companies have bureaucracy bureaucracy is always growing there's always politicians they're always making it worse and and they're always waiting to see are you gonna be one of those or the politicians gonna own you so a lot of those companies this the corporate staff tried

28:25 to own the bosses in the floor oh we'll take care of that don't where you're pretty little head there's no reason you go to the sales conference you know I remember I got to bank one you know I I when I found out they were having some major sales conferences they didn't even tell me about it I mean I was livid I had to go you know and so you learned the cultures are quite different and then you start working it and then also when you build things like you know if you if you decide that their systems are terrible in some area you don't go in and say your system is terrible how can you put them that stupid I'm gonna redo this for you and get Mackenzie or someone to come and rewrite it you form a team inside to do it you're bring in some outside people so by the time it's built for the stores the restaurants they built it you just you just nurtured it and it came out a way that everyone thought was the best way and and then

29:10 you you and I have learned all the tricks along the way to figure out the politicians and the bsers it's the meeting after the meeting you know it's coming and presenting numbers in a different way than the company presents the numbers is you know backing out allocated expense when that includes rent or basic stuff it's the people who who you can see in the room no one will disagree with them it's the people when they go on the road you know and you start asking the loan officers or salese or branch managers hey what can we do better and they're kind of Twisted in their chair they don't like the fact that Branch man is saying well you know why can't I change set my own hours why can't I do this and why can't I do that and they they get upset and so you're seeing this all the time these not good

29:55 managers some are bad some are political some are just rigid and um so you learn along the way how to do all those things how to get get the numbers right you know report it right share it with all the management team uh so a lot of lessons I got from doing that I mean I used to go you know literally sign checks some of these companies I i' look at every vendor thing for a month or two to see how they're spending money and then you'd be shocked they're buying stuff they have no do what they're buying you know agreeing they're they're signing okay okay with me but they don't even know what it is and meanwhile the person responsible for is not getting the bill you know and I go on and on and on about the things you learn by going through these hey everyone it's Kola we'll get back to the interview in just a second before we do though I have a question for you have you downloaded the

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31:27 performance standards but you you you you have a ton of heart I mean you know and you're right that's why people basically do want to work with you and and and stay with you and you said you know as you were building you know all these companies with Sandy wild you said he didn't really Mentor you you you learned a lot by watching him and then applying what you saw to to how you would go about leading but you put a lot of heart into into those businesses and then Sandy ends up you know terminating you you know you get fired by the guy you know and uh that had to be traumatic especially when youve given so much of your heart to those companies you know what sticks you with you the most about that experience that that you've tried to take forward in in the way how you

32:14 you you you lead so our relation deteriorate from 1994 to 1998 when we did City uh he set up a thing which I vehemently disagreed with uh which was you know well they gave me the president which I didn't ask for and he had told uh John Reed Jamie's pushing me f which I never did I don't believe in fake titles I was goingon to run the global investment bank and then they changed it to be Triads of the global Investment Bank so this is a global complex business I was like trads are you kidding me so they had Tri Co Triads and co-heads of almost every division reporting to c-head Sandy and John so just think of the complexity of that and I told them this is going to destroy the company I said you guys and John Reed wasn't

33:00 used to being talked to like this by so so he he liked me but he thought it was a little too aggressive I said this will destroy the company and and the second we announced this people be digging trenches stock plying ammunition to see who's going to win these battles Sandy John Jamie this this one this I said and by the time you joke is figured out we're gonna lose a lot of good people and I actually was the first casualty Sandy called me up uh we we have I had 100 kids at my house recruiting know for Solus M bourney and these you know we had imag me a four he said can you come at 12 I said no I'm having a big buffet breakfast for these people he said that's important so I go up there I go to a room like this Sandy and John are there and they say make a bunch of changes and they listed change a change B and change the we want you to resign

33:46 to which I said okay so I knew the game they already talked to the board they already lined it up uh I was actually shocked about A and B I was not shocked about C and I should have known that you know and Sandy you know I look you got to ask him the motivation that John Reed wanted to leave I was going to be I was the natural successor that's one of the reasons John wanted me at the company Sandy convinced John that if you know he it's more important these two guys get along uh and I think a lot of people think a lot of the board members told me because I knew them all a lot of them is that you know he that if you stayed Sandy would had to go and he didn't want to go and um and obviously I think the board made a mistake and this is where board should do the right thing and not the thing that makes the boss happen Lessons Learned our relations have gone South a lot before that I called him up

34:33 after a year he didn't call me I called him up after a year and said you know same time we got together uh he treated me treat they treated me terribly in the way out literally they threw me on the street like they gave me an office and then called me up right before Christmas you gotta leave the office he said well why they said well we're not gonna give presidents of the company offices anymore I said yeah but you already have five ex presidents and vice chairman of the offices they said well this moment going forward not you I said ' really they said yeah you have to leave by December 30th anyway I saw C A year later and I walked in and he wanted to do it the Four Seasons he was nervous I was not I said to him s I'm gonna talk just a minute about the past I don't think you did the right thing for City Bank but I want you to know that I made

35:18 a lot of mistakes and whether it was 6040 or 460 doesn't really matter and I listed some of my mistakes and some of my mistakes were lessons you know forever like I I acted some of the things I did I acted out of anger I was so angry about some of the stupid things it just flew out of me sometimes and you as you know that that almost always backfires it doesn't matter whether you're right or wrong and so so that you know you learn that some and you've seen this too where some people it just enough isn't enough and and it's not about being proud of the beautiful thing you built it's being about you know what does it mean for you how does it look for you and and um and you ultimately it destroyed the company after you got terminated I remember you picked up boxing and you know what' that do for

36:04 you so what happened was I went they asked me would you want to do press that night and I said yeah I want to do that from home would you want to see the Press I said yes I met the senior team I wish them all the best that night maybe 50 or 100 people came to my home you know and they they said don't tell Sandy and they were it was like going to your own wake they were toasting me and my net worth not my selfworth that was involved so I never I never felt bad and some people outside treated me like a leper like stay away from this guy and other people like literally I'd be running through the park yay Diamond you showed them I was like got myself fired is what I did and and um but I immediately they kicked me out right away so all of a sudden you're working 80 hours a week to zero so I was like what the hell am I gonna do so I made a list of stuff so I

36:51 bought like literally I literally went to the bookstore and bought like 30 or 40 books and I read instead of reading the paper the morning for hour and 15 minutes it was two and a half uh and then I made a list of those things I want to do visit my brother in Denmark I drove cross country by myself I took I had a friend doing boxing at a hall in the wall gym downtown and so I did all those things you know the only thing that was on the list I think I did not do is climb kilman jaro I took my family on a long trip to Europe you know luxury Leisure type of trip uh took them on RV trips and and I was thinking about what I wanted to do you know I wasn't as you know I mean I was on your board it was always was fun for me yeah well I remember you know that that at that time uh you agreed to go on the young board and I remember Andy Pearson who we've talked about a little bit he he he was

37:37 talking about putting this board together and he said you know you got to get this young whipper snapper you know Jamie Diamond to come on the board you're going to be around for a long time you and him would be a great team and boy was he right and what did you learn just serving on the young board because it's so such a different business than than than the the Finance world yeah well so first of all I think it's great to see how someone else runs I love talking to C how do you run your joint because a lot of SE run it differently and they're all good some are terrible but like how do you run it what do you do what do you spend your day how much fun do you have you know like um and it's the same with the board like boards are like juries man they they they could be I've dealt with tons of boards and they could be bureaucratic they could be politicized but Andy as you know put together like one of the

38:24 best Boards of all time you know kenl Goan on the board and Bob from Target who you know was a great company um John Weinberg would run Goldman Sachs and Bob Holland uh and and he ran it I mean I I Andy Andy was I still would say the best to watch of anyone I've ever seen about how he just ran the meeting all your guys would come present and how they're doing here and he was and he always had a very good way of saying uh that's not exactly the way it works I forgot how he exactly did it but it wasn't waste of time got right to the point was never rude tough but never rude uh always evaluting the people how they thought about a problem how they thought about an issue how they attacked a problem know you guys had tons of problems when we were there and you know each one how you attacked it you know you had the uh

39:10 GM the the GMS problem then the distributor went bankrupt and uh you know all these things but the real you learn Life how did people deal with problems the board was completely open it was a lot of fun we went to taste your foods and you always took us to branches to restaurants and and you just learn how people think you know and even if you don't join another board I'm not any other board now I tell people it's a really good thing to see how other people do things because I go to anything I go to where other cosos are there or you know you know the business round table or Business Council stuff that you've done I'm I'm taking notes when I hear someone did X said um that's a neat idea yeah know why don't we do matter of fact at my board I still do since we last met so you did it every board meeting and I've been doing it

39:56 every board meeting since Bank was I I still do it today and it was your idea like how you and for those on the podcast it was telling the board honestly everything and po since you last met good bad ugly it could be the product the food the tasting the profits the China business the uh an honest assessment from the CEO the like I said the good the bad the ugly it's a great tool I still type it out you know and I still keep it and in fact I was speaking today about having some of my the people run the business here do it themselves since we last met as opposed to a presentation you know and uh so I still learned things from tons of other people how to do things better and so you you you you were on the beach as they say in finance terms when you didn't have the job you come to the Yum board you're

40:41 working on that what what process did you use and and what did you learn from it as you as you worked your way into the CEO job at uh bank one I was very deliberate okay so I was fired in December uh but I had to negotiate out it took me to March or April so decided I'm G to take the summer off take the kids around the world and uh and start kind of really thinking about September but I did take a lot of phone calls I gave I I took everyone respectfully some were you could call almost insulting what they were offering me uh I made sure the head hunters knew I wanted to work you know the major folks out there when I came back in September and I was always polite and responsive to everyone uh I had an office I started seeing people all the time and I had ideas I'm

41:27 to start my own Merchant Bank I wrote up documents I spoke to people I so about working with people getting Partners kind of wild in that idea didn't love it I start I could have just been my own investor started talking people I went to see Kone about what is it like I I didn't love it I went to um I thought about just teaching and writing uh you know fundamentally and you know I I realized I was ready I wasn't done with the big game yet and I and I had a lot of offers some were CEO some was I was offered to run the global investment Bank of one of the big European uh investment Banks I went there to see the people in London and had dinner with a bunch of and after do I said there's no way I'd work for these guys I mean Hank Greenberg called me up at AIG you know and I said going from Sandy wild to Hank

42:13 Greenberg you have to have your head examined um and Jeff Bezos who I HD it off with in 1999 looking for president and he and I hit it off I still talked to him he's an outstanding guy uh I just it was just a bridge too far for me me I didn't necessarily fully understand the business I had to move a c family to Seattle I love the idea of never putting a suit on again you know getting a house boat somewhere and there are tons of others that people actually spoke to me about but it came down at the time to Home Depot and bank one and Home Depot I love those people I thought Bernie Marcus Arthur Blank I went down there I running with blank and and uh uh and and kenang gone did the need bees but I when I first met them I said just just so you

42:59 guys know because I want you to know this until you called me I'd never been in a Home Depot I said so it's not this it's not my natural habitat Merchant and and they were very much like we don't care about that you'll learn we want the guy with the heart and the soul and you know you know the way they think uh and I went to stores with them and stuff like that and I actually shopped houses in Atlanta I mean you know we were taken it seriously uh looked at school for the kids and then bank one was there and bank one as you know as you know was a troubled Midwest W bank and probably would have surprised people I went to it but it was my natural habitat you know I when I look at a trading book or a loan book I mean I'm used to I wasn't used to all the business they had uh moving to Chicago is going to be hard uh but I wasn't done yet and you know they offered me chairman CEO and I decided I

43:46 put half my net worth into at the time I was kind of I tied my my uh my shoes to it I was gonna go with the ship or not and very much like we did with Sandy wild back at commercial MC Credit in Prim America build it make it what you can build something great don't cry spilled milk you know I still I still deal with a lot of CEOs who they complain about their own companies endlessly you know and I always like you know you know put your pants on I mean just grow up the world was never perfect you would no one ever said they're gonna hand you you know everything in a silver platter business is tough people disappoint you you know and uh so I decided to go for that they made me chairman Co I put half my money in moved the family uh I called you up got you on the board I needed some fresh Blood on the board that was that was a lot of fun

44:33 watching what you did there it was great and and and then you know you you turned around bank one uh it was a great success story and JP Morgan Chase decides to to come and acquire uh Bank One what what what did you learn orchestrating that with uh uh with the JP Morgan Chase CE at the time Bill Harrison I how' you how' you bring it all together yeah so Bill Harrison had been not my direct Banker but it would I knew him from way way back and as you know Bill's a real quality guy and so we did that deal at the end of in the summer of uh of 04 2004 but he and I had started talking in 02 or 03 and I go see

45:20 him regularly and I told you guys in the board that that there are two or three very natural merges for us one was Fleet and one was JP Morgan Chase and and JP Morgan Chase fell by the wayside because he gotten too big and they bought Chase and but because bank one did better and better and they were having some tough times it kind of came in that target range again and so I went to see Bill and Bill and I kept on talking he said to me at one point hey you know I can't do a deal now my Cheryl's will kill me but it's so natural I don't have a successor really um you know would you promise me that you will call me if you ever going to do something and I told him bill I cannot promise that but I understand about the industrial logic and he and I started talking about the industrial Logic the people uh now in

46:06 reality it was it what it was called he called it a merge of equals we got the premium but we also got the control if remember correctly the I was ordained to be the CEO literally from Daye one so I wasn't the CEO from day one but the board was gonna be 5050 uh and I was going to be the Co in two years unless 80 unless 75% of the board said no so that meant four of my directors have to vote against me and you may remember the last minute there was a little fight at the bo our board you guys were at dinner at my house in Chicago and you know we had oh I was a big part of that fight as a matter of fact yeah like but some people like don't do the deal you can't trust these New Yorkers well you can't if Jamie can't be the CEO day one we can't do the well that was a good reason to keep the B keep keep keep it in Chicago I that was they were coming

46:53 up with all kinds of reasons you know and I said I said look if Jamie can't work with uh Bill Harrison for two years and there's something wrong with Jamie Diamond that's correct and uh they said well you you remember I for I'm not going to mention his name he said but well you've never been in a boardroom you know like that you you're you're missing something here I said well I do have a hell of a lot of common sense and you know there's a big fight but anyway the rest is history yeah you you you're absolutely correct and you make a judgment call in life and that we all thought we could I knew I could trust Bill Harrison and he wants to leave they needed a successor and they needed someone who's going to run it and so the come neither bank one had just gone from being a terrible company to a mediocre company you know Chase jbw Chase was

47:39 part of it a lot of deals taken place but it never completely performed so in reality we're putting but the industrial logic was perfect two notr credit card companies and credit card enormous economy scale put together we had a great retail system they didn't but they had great branches in New York you know we both had Middle Market businesses they had a Investment Bank we didn't but we could bring those products and services to the clients around the United States they were Global we were not we just started working it like literally just been and I remember stting these like you've had the business reviews by business payments systems Ops uh uh by country by Investment Banking Middle Market banking consumer banking credit card and never said we're going to transform just went to work at making it a better company be an honest assessment setting real

48:25 targets for ourselves about what we should be performing removing the management that was political and bureaucratic but Bill and I spoke all the time like I I was running most that stuff but he was completely supportive in fact there was one time that a at a meeting of someone said you know Jamie was very rude to this meeting we had I was criticized them for the insurance Deals they thought they were doing to protect the company from auto warranties uh and he went on and on that Jamie did this J and Bill said uh excuse me uh that did not happen he said well I you you weren't there and he said I was I was in the back of the room and he was asking a lot of very good and smart and tough questions and you know bill was a little surprised the how deep I went to all these businesses

49:11 at one point he said to me are you gonna do this all the time I yeah I said pretty much I leave you know you know very often he didn't always agree with this up I was do him he say hey it's your company you know you're gonna be CEO in a couple months whatever but then it came to one guy that I wanted to ask leave who I thought was is a great politician but a complete selfs server uh you know took care of his you know the Buddies of this and was kind of a hatchet man for Bill himself and I went to see Bill I said he's got to go and Bill said well I totally disagree with you he's been a key here blah blah blah and and I went home that night and I came back in the next day and I said bill I am we've done everything together here I'm really uncomfortably completely disagreed I would feel much more

49:57 comfortable if you go ask some of the our other Senior Management people about what I said is he trusted is this is that and Bill was credit went out and spoke to four or five people and came back and said you were right and I should have known and uh so we were kind of locked step every step of the way he did and even you know since even since he left which is now you know almost 20 years ago you know he's been anything he could do to help and even guys like the guy who ran um Dennis Weatherstone I don't know if you knew him had been a former CEO of of JP Morgan itself you know called me up an attb boy every quarter you know I mean there's some very sweet guys out there John B McCoy yeah know the older guy who started bank one and start L went from one branch to

50:42 whatever thousand he would come see me every now and then just to say you're doing a great job kid that's great you know one of the things that you know being on the board and watching you in action you know you you established gold standards not within the financial industry but also other other other categories that might be better at processing or you you pick whatever measure that you're you going after and you really drove those gold standards home and you talk about working it you know if somebody asked you about strategy in those days you'd say I don't really care about that strategy you know I'm not you know I'm our strategy is always changing the strategy changes basis what we we see but you've never been one or maybe you've changed you know you were never one back then to be talking about your Five-Year Plan your 10 year you know you didn't spend a lot

51:28 of time on that you spent a lot of time working the business up against gold standards is how do you how do you think about strategy yeah so the first thing I I always do the first thing when I and you've seen this before some of these big companies they always talking about I call it strategery so instead of like are you doing a good job running your business you know remember Bob liop you say about strategy it works just do more like don't know and they had outside Consultants I got rid of all that kind of stuff and so my first goal is just run the place well consolidate the systems Branch by Branch then you you develop plans they were strategies these things work do more of these branches close these things down take all the products and services JP Morgan you know like into the middle market like the Middle

52:14 Market does 35% of our us domestic Investment Banking now and that was a strategy you you have the engine and just get more products across this you know this very costly Enterprise uh uh that it got rid of I got rid of lots of the company that didn't fit and you may so I sold this Clos this down but every part of the company fits and they feed each other know private bank and Middle Market use the consumer branches the Investment Bank uh you is hugely benefited by the private bank and by uh uh Middle Market banking you know uh payment systems are hugely benefited by being in the consumer business and the wholesale business and so there are these large strategies but you know didn't let people spend that much time bsing about it like we set the strategy and now we

53:00 have a plan so you know even like you know we started building the chase wealth this and they have to do this any we have a lot of Skunk Works going on we always have that so like one which probably started when you were there was you know we had these branches in the wealthiest parts of the world but we didn't do very much money management like wealth management and I had wanted to do a test in White Plains one of the wealthiest you know ZIP codes in the country uh and we did the test and it didn't work and then people here you got clal you're wasting money I was like well let's try again did the test didn't work you know and sometimes you have just keep modifying it like just keep turning the dials a little bit okay that that business now manages a trillion dollars okay and and so once we got the strategy right but that this was by testing so sometimes you should kill these hobbies and sometimes you should but there's like 10 of those like how we

53:48 built you we're in all 50 states now you know building branches how we when we bought WAMU which is all consumer we put on top of that private banking Middle Market small business so the cost the branch system was all of a sudden fee and license other businesses so there are these big strategies but I I think the problem with strategy when people overdo it is they they spend a lot of time making excuses for why they're not running a good business it's sort of like the way I would describe what you've just described is you work you keep working on what's working and then you work on what isn't and it just keep evolving that as you you go forward yeah I'm always very cautious when I see you know we have to transform the business because you are doing that over time but you're but you're doing it you have to do it at a very detailed level and a strategic level yeah and uh but you know

54:33 in a lot a lot of businesses you've seen this you know you if you have a a a second rade execution you're in trouble you know if you have a first rade execution you can run a pretty good business whether or not you have a perfect strategy we'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Jamie Diamond in just a moment you know talking about his college days Jamie mentioned Steve Burke who was the chairman CEO of NBC Universal and Steve episode of how leaders lead he talks about the same ideals of humility and curiosity that Jamie does including this concept I love about seeing your team as a symphony what we have tried to do is make sure that our Executives don't have big OS and that our Executives don't run around saying it's all about me or I'm indispensable or you know I did this and

55:18 did that and and what we have a philosophy that we call Symphony which is I don't like the word Synergy I think Synergy become almost a you know an MBA you know catchphrase we call our effort of working together Symphony and one of the advantages our company has for someone with a good idea is if you bring a movie to us and we think it's a great movie we will make sure that it gets supported on USA sci-fi E entertainment in the Olympics and when we identify the priorities and we go to our Executives it's non-negotiable everybody's going to get behind these uh big events and what we found is we have 22% of all television viewing in America when we get behind promoting a new theme park ride or the

56:04 Olympics or a new movie it works and one of the interesting side benefits of the symphony program it was a message cultural message to everybody in the company that no individual business is important more important than the company as a whole and teams do better than individual performers and I think one of the ways that you you you get really creative people to work with you and for you and bring you great ideas is is if they feel like what you're going to be doing is going to be about their idea not about you so I'm very much on the watch for people inside our company who get too carried away with themselves and forget the reason why we're here which is bringing great ideas to America

56:49 and people go back and listen to my entire conversation with Steve episode 18 here on how leaders lead you know Jamie you're famous for a lot of things but you're I think most famous for how you navigated our country and JP Morgan Chase through the the Great Recession of 2008 what was your big takeaway from all

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