EP 220 – Leadership Lessons Learned on the NASCAR Track with Shaun Peet
This week I have the honor to sit down with friend Shaun Peet. Shaun is the Pit Crew Coach for Trackhouse Racing (NASCAR) and Co-Founder of Deck Leadership.
A chance meeting while serving a suspension as a pro hockey player led Peet into a career in NASCAR.
Today he coaches one of the top pit crew teams on the circuit, while running DECK Leadership with his co-founder and colleague, Mike Metcalfe.
In this episode we talk about what it takes to build the fastest teams on the planet. You’ll learn how to take lessons from the racetrack and apply to your business.
Connect with Shaun Peet here: LinkedIn Instagram
Grab a copy of Shaun’s book, 12 Second Culture: deckleadership.com
Resources:
- Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyneary/
- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andy_neary/
Video Transcript:
This transcript was auto-generated. Please excuse any typos or grammatical errors.
Shaun Peet
We were in Darlington a couple of years ago, led the race almost and then came in first, went out first the entire night. Okay. Last pit stop of the race. Our Jackman comes in and has a micro turn on the tires. So it costs us about 2/10 of a second, maybe 3/10 of a second. We go from first to second.
We lose the race. People in our building didn’t talk to us for two months.
Andy
All right. Welcome back to this week’s episode. I’m excited to have a gentleman that I had the chance to meet. What, last October, Shaun?
Shaun Peet
Yup.
Andy
Shaun Peet, who is co co-captain of the Chip Ganassi coaching team of the Chip Ganassi Race Department. And I’m excited to have Shaun because not only did I get a chance to meet Shaun last October when we took a tour of the Chip Ganassi headquarters, but he and his colleague, his co partner, his co captain Mike Metcalf, also have come out with this fabulous book, 12 Second Culture, which we’re going to dive into as well.
Andy
And Shaun, I got the hat on as well.
Shaun Peet
That looks.
Andy
Great. Number 42 racing team. So I’m excited to have you. Shaun. We’re going to talk about little about your early career in hockey and then chapter two of your life, which is been NASCAR racing, which people are like, wait, what? Hockey, NASCAR, what? We’ll definitely get into that. So, Shaun, for the folks listening in who are like, okay, Shaun Peet, who the heck is this guy?
Andy
Give us a little feedback. Where are you from? Where were you born? What was life like growing up?
Shaun Peet
Yeah, so everyone that’s listening is like, who the heck is Shaun Peet? So, yeah, I was I was born on Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Like every Canadian kid, you either play hockey or you’re a social outcast back then. So I decided to play hockey and I was fortunate enough to get out of town on a scholarship and come to the States where I played for years and college hockey at Dartmouth.
Andy
Awesome. And growing up, you know, you made the comment in Canada, you either play hockey, you’re an outcast for a lot of guys your age, you know, thinking about going back to your high school days. Was that the ticket out?
Shaun Peet
It was, you know, like there’s that old adage, you know, you you graduate high school, you work in the mill, and then you get laid in the ground. And, you know, there’s only a few ways out of town. And for me, I knew what that was and it was with the game. And I just you know, I was really lucky I made a decision.
Shaun Peet
I remember just being like, I’m going to outwork everybody when I was in the 10th grade. And that’s where it really started to turn for me. And I was just relentless in my pursuit of it. And and I had no reason to be. I was always the worst player on the team, the worst skater the way I had, not like I didn’t get invited to any of the B.C. best ever camps or any of the things that are tracking players on a trajectory to the National Hockey League.
Shaun Peet
I wasn’t involved in any of them, but I just I was I knew what I knew and I was willing to give up Friday night parties and I was willing to give up the steady girlfriend, all always things to go after it. I just was so adamant that I was not going to make peace with mediocrity and stay in town.
Shaun Peet
I was I was getting out and it was going to be through hockey.
Andy
And I know you said early in this episode already how you it afforded you the opportunity to land a scholarship or land an opportunity to play hockey at Dartmouth, which is way over in New England. You know, I’m sure a question that popped in a lot of people’s heads listening in. So here you are on Vancouver Island, as far west as you can go in the in the North American continent.
Andy
How did you end up with an offer from Dartmouth?
Shaun Peet
Well, you know, it was interesting. I was I was traded as a 17 year old and I was traded to a team that had two really dynamic French players. And basically I was traded to that team to make sure no one put their hands on these two guys. Right. And if you touch them, you’re going to deal with me.
And they were so outstanding. You know, the first 15 games of the season, I got 16 goals and a bunch of assists and, you know, 80 penalty minutes in British Columbia because it is so far from New England. All the scouts come on a big run at the start of the year. So here I am, 6 to 15 games in.
I have 30 points and I was I look pretty alluring on paper. However, you take those two French kids away from me, I’m not quite the get that they probably thought they’re getting. But no. So it you know what really served me well and was that like I said the relentless pursuit in the off season. This was long before offseason training programs, but I was mountain climbing and riding my mountain bike and lifting weights.
And so when I came at the start of the season, I had everybody covered because what I lacked in ability I’m more than made up for and work ethic. So I was prepared. I rolled into that season and I looked like I was out skating people because simply I was just in better shape. It meant more to me, you know.
Andy
You already dropped the nugget in this interview about, you know, if you if you don’t have the same amount of talent, you can outwork people. What advice would you give that athlete, whether it’s hockey, baseball, basketball, football, kid right now in high school who may be not the most talented. And it’s easy to feel like there’s no chance I could play at the next level.
I can play in college. What advice would you give that kid right now?
Shaun Peet
I would say that, first of all, that someone else’s opinion of you is none of your business because that’s what knocks people off the path is, no, you’re not good enough. You’re not this, you’re not that. And that’s when we laid the ax down and we’re like, okay, maybe I’m not. If you believe it in your heart, you go after it.
Because what 45 years on this planet has given me a little bit of wisdom and it’s this is that when I put my hockey career away and I fell short of making it to the National Hockey League, you know, I got to the American League, which is triple A, that when I put my skates up for the last time, I knew that there was nothing else, nothing else I could have done to make it any further.
And there is a peace that comes with that that is more valuable than anything I have in my life. And so what I would say to a young kid, if you believe in your heart that you need to go there, then go you.
Andy
You just dug into my soul and pulled out a very, very sort of subject for me because I talk about a lot on my baseball career. You know, I had a chance to play some pro baseball and people would say, Man, you were lucky. You know, you you were five, ten. You weren’t a big pitcher. You had the chance to play.
And I tell them at the end of the day, when I got there, though, I didn’t live up to my full potential. I know that. And there’s still days it bothers me. And to your point, the fact you were to be at peace, like, you know what? I maximized my full potential, right? Is what? It’s so cool to hear that part of your story.
I think for a lot of athletes, especially, their careers are over before they they truly realize their full potential.
Shaun Peet
No, no, you’re totally right. And but to even to your point, like when people tell you you’re lucky, right? They go to Friday night, you just said pounding baseballs, you know, a backstop. Right. That’s not luck. There’s very there’s very little luck about making it all the way, right? Yeah, I did that. I fell short of it. But it’s some you know, it’s all these things, it’s intention, it’s work ethic.
It’s an indomitable will to see it through. And, you know, like you said, played college athletics. There’s nothing harder College athletics will will show you if you love your sport or not.
Andy
I talk about that all the time. Sean I couldn’t agree more where when I played baseball, UW Milwaukee, there were so many other guys more talented than me. But what separates the kid that excels in college and the one that fizzles out regardless of talent coming in is work ethic. Because in college you have more time on your hands, right in high school are structured for you.
You go from class to class to class to practice to home, to do your homework and college. You have time. And the guys that could not manage their time and their work ethic fizzled out really quickly.
Shaun Peet
You’re right.
Andy
So now let’s go to your college career at Dartmouth. Tell us a little bit about that. What was it like playing?
Shaun Peet
It was great was it was interesting. Like I said, I had no problem dropping the Mets when I played hockey. And in college there was no fighting. So I was recruited as a forward my sophomore year. They turn me into a defenseman, so my first game in college is a really fast game. So my first game ever in a organized hockey game at the sense we were playing the University of Vermont and at the time they had Martin Saint Louis who who since went on won the Stanley Cup was NHL MVP.
So my first shift at Defense was against him. Needless to say, it didn’t go well.
Andy
Welcome to the NCAA Nation.
Shaun Peet
Exactly. You played with another guy who is, you know, equally as talented. And I remember those two came down on my defense partner I it was a two on two. And remember that scene in Top Gun where, you know, they’re asking like, you know, Joshua, this where do you go? And the guy’s like, where do you go? I was my defense partner and these two were just carving us off.
It was it was brutal. So it was a pretty auspicious beginning. Like I said, I was not a very good player. I won most improved player twice in four years. That kind of shows you how bad it was, but it was good, you know, It was growth the entire time and it was really hard. You know, nothing nothing came easy in college.
But I left really proud of of of where I got to. But by the time I left.
Andy
Quick question. You mentioned earlier, you’re six two. What is the average height for a hockey player?
Shaun Peet
Oh, it’s getting bigger now. I mean, I was pretty big when I played, but like six two, six, three, six, four. But these kids can skate like a lot of times, you know, Connor McDavid, the guy is a lightning bolt. NAGY six three. Wow. Yeah.
Andy
Wow. So you told me offline that, you know, you weren’t the star at Dartmouth. And I think a lot of people think those hockey players that go on to play in the NHL or even just minor league hockey are the inherent stars of their teams. Right? You said you weren’t the star, but you still gave yourself the chance to play minor league hockey.
How did that happen?
Shaun Peet
It was, you know, one thing besides an opportunity for an education. One thing that Dartmouth provided for me was a look behind the curtain of what matters in life, right? So I come from a logging town on the west coast of Vancouver Island, very blue collar roots, you know, mid to lower socioeconomic class. So you get to Dartmouth, right?
Fresh from parents weekend, it’s a contest to see who has the most expensive car. Right. And I’ve never been around such affluence as that before. And I think what totally caught me off guard was how many of those kids were were unhappy, how many how many had like really awful relationships with their parents. Like, I think all these things.
And after four years of that, you know, I had a chance to do Dartmouth’s a big banking school, and I could have done corporate recruiting and gone and worked at like a Price Waterhouse or something like that. And I was like, You know what, man? I’m going to pursue joy in my life and I’m going to go I’m going to go play in the minors.
So instead of going to Wall Street for 60 grand, I went to Corpus Christi, Texas for 350 bucks a week because I thought that, you know, it was a moment in life that I was never going to get back. So let’s let’s go after it.
Andy
That is phenomenal. And, you know, you’ve brought up a couple of times, you are a you keep mentioning penalty minutes. So we’re going to talk about that in a second. What one of your major roles was in the minor leagues? It’s you remind me, I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin, and we didn’t have a hockey program when I was in high school.
They have since built a hockey program. But it reminds me there was a guy I grew up with just slightly older, actually probably your age. His name was Gunnar Carlsberg. Never played high school hockey because we didn’t have a program. He played his entire high school career down on the lake, the frozen lake with the kids rec league that he had gave.
He somehow found his way into minor league hockey. And I thought it was such a cool story about, like you that you had to create a lot of your opportunities. And I think what you said earlier can’t be overlooked where you one most improved at Dartmouth twice. I know you said, Well, I’ll tell you how bad I was, but that also says how far how hard you work to win that award twice.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
In one four innings, which, you know, I can I can sit here and describe minor league life in.
Shaun Peet
Baseball looking for those guys.
Andy
What what is the minor league life in hockey like?
Shaun Peet
Well, I mean you think about I so I graduate Dartmouth and I play my first year in Corpus Christi Texas right in fledgling league. And we’re playing in old rodeo barns. So like, we will play in Austin for two weeks and then we’re the first game in Austin. It’s because the rodeo is there. Will you go to the locker room and there’s fly tape all over the place and flies and just it was crazy.
But it’s it’s Texas, right? So if you put air conditioning, beer and flights in the same place, it’s going to be a big deal. So, you know, it was it was crazy like we were in South Texas. We were basically treated like the Vancouver Canucks, like a pro team. And it was really interesting. But I just I remember making a deal with myself because I felt like like there’s some characters which I’m sure you can attest to in the minors, right?
People that, yeah, you know, I don’t need to read books or I don’t need to. So I never like making a book list. And I was like, I’ve got to read this many books just to stay the same level on the other side of this. But you know, it was it was great. Played in Corpus Christi, Texas, played a year in Charleston, South Carolina, which was phenomenal, played for a team in Georgia named the Making Whoopee and a make for Joe.
I got called up the American League, played the Calder Cup finals from there. And then, you know, all my downward as I started to go down the other side of Career hill, I picked the last place on my list. I was like, I’m going to go somewhere where I can. After practice, I can rock climb and I can mount Mike.
And so my last two years I played out in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and loved it.
Andy
That’s awesome. I think you just gave the best marketing pitch ever to get a bunch of Texans to come to a hockey game, air conditioning, beer and fights. We’ll talk about that for a second because in in minor league hockey you were you know they use the phrase goon the hire the guy who’s the enforcer, the guy who’s come in.
You even brought it back to your high school days. The two French players you played with your job was to protect them.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
What is life like as that guy who’s who’s sometimes is job got on the ice and create some havoc?
Shaun Peet
Yeah, it’s some you know, it’s funny. I was not a guy that went looking for it too often, but I never turned it down. And I always stick up for my teammates. So, like, a lot of times the goons get mischaracterized as, you know, these idiots that are chained to the bench. And but often they’re the most selfless guy on the team.
They’re like, I’m not going to get my teeth beaten for me. I’m going to do it. Because that guy, I took the liberty with my my teammates. So, you know, it’s it’s a lot of fun when you play on like my first team in Corpus Christi, you know, And I think I’m a pretty tough guy. I bet I was the 10th or 11th toughest guy on the team.
So it was fun cause we would go to other rinks and just throw down. It was awesome. Now, when I was in Macon, I was on the other side of the coin. I was one of two. So you’re fighting way more often. You’re fighting just about every night and you don’t have there’s no cavalry coming. You are the cavalry.
I mean, so it’s so it’s nerve wracking. You know, you’re thinking about you know, playing Memphis the next night and they got six killers on their team, guys who can cave your face in and you’re like, okay, how is this going to go? So with some, you know, obviously my mom never liked it, but, you know, I was I was lucky.
I never got any serious. I got a couple of concussions, but there’s serious injury and there’s I’ll tell you what, there’s no higher high than winning a fight in front of 8000 people. But there is no lower low. They get knocked out and 3000 people. So I’ve experienced both of them.
Andy
Well, you’re brilliant as a kid who watched hockey at in Play, you’re bringing back memories of Ty Douma and Marty McSorley and yeah, some of the big enforcers of the NHL. Yeah. Well, let’s talk about this, if you don’t mind sharing a story. I’ve heard you talk about a couple of times. And I think it’s it’s a it’s a lesson of going through the lowest of lows.
But also the highest of highs, because what came out of this low, which was that fight that kind of could have ended your career.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
But it led to you playing in a in a in a place where ultimately you met a fan that drew you to where you are today at NASCAR.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
So if you don’t mind sharing that story at all.
Shaun Peet
Sorry. Not at all. So like I said, I was lucky enough to make it up to the American Hockey League, went back to camp and made opening day roster for camp. And it’s the Wednesday before the home opener Friday and we’re all eating lunch after practice and under the ticker on ESPN it says the Pittsburgh Penguins trade for these two defenseman out of Florida and I was the only undrafted defenseman there so I knew exactly what was going to happen.
So I went to bed that night, got to the rink before Glenn Patrick, who was the coach, started packing all my stuff. And when he came in, because these are the guy who got there early, he’s like, I’m sorry, can I just knew. So they sent me to Greensboro, North Carolina. It’s opening night down there, and it was kind of a perfect storm.
I had just been demoted. The other team had a kid I had played against for four years in college. And like I said, there’s no fighting in college. But you can stick people and run your mouth and you don’t you’re not held to any type of account for it. So you can be really tough because you don’t have to pay for it.
Well, that kid was on this team. So, you know, the game starts and it’s chippy right from the start and our coach is kind of losing his mind. Well, this guy cross-checked one of our guys right before the end of the second period, and our coach is losing his mind. And, you know, he looks down the bench. He’s like, is anyone going to do anything?
And I just said, I got it, hopped over the boards. I line up with this guy and I’m like, Hey, man, since the pork chops were going and, you know, you run his mouth at me and stuff like that. So I just shut up. Susan thought drop. I grabbed him with my right to start in with less. He goes to the ground and there’s gentleman’s rules that govern hockey, right?
So I stop hitting him when he goes to the ground. But a five on five brawl breaks out and they had a guy who was a heavyweight from the Montreal Canadiens. His name was Ryan Flynn. And I look over my shoulder and he’s pounding away on our guy. So I looked down the guy I got, I’m like, Let go my hand.
And he just lets go of me. And I take about five strides and wind up and hit this Flynn guy as hard as I can, which is not one of my brighter moments, right? I was a pretty clean player for the most part. He goes to the ground and the guy was reasonably fighting tackles me, but when he tackles me, he ends up on the bottom is, you know, you think of the demotion in four years of this guy running his mouth to be in college.
You know, when you pull your lawnmower out of the shed, when you haven’t used it all winter. Yes, it was like that. I just I didn’t stop until I had to throw up on him. And I, I cut him pretty bad. I covered for like 60 stitches and I’m getting escorted off the ice and I look back and someone’s challenging our bench.
So I stripped off all my upper gear, escape from the linesmen, and I almost got to the guy and, you know, I leaned over him and just kind of ran my thumb across my throat and said, Well, we played him all night. I’m going to I’ll get you tomorrow night and made a throw fast as a throat slashing gesture.
So I didn’t even I didn’t even think anything of it. But when I was leaving the ice, our team idiot had already been kicked out. And when I got through the door seat, you know, he’s there in the street clothes. He looks me dead in the eyes. He’s like, You are in serious trouble, you know? I mean. And I was like, Right.
Then it dawned on me. So, you know, I got six games for starting it, six games for joining a second altercation and six games for making a throat slashing gesture. So I was it was the it’s been characterized as the worst brawling East Coast League history. You know, not a record that my parents are super proud of. But but like you said, I didn’t know what it was going to lead to.
Yeah. You know, I end up meeting a fan in the stands from NASCAR and he knew, you know what, I’m sitting on suspension and he knew my dad was at a gradual Manc Rylan So he’s like, Look, when your dad comes down, I’ll show you around the ratio and so, you know, my dad comes out a couple of months later and this guy makes good on his word.
We’re touring around the race shop and this is back when mechanics used to pit the cars, not athletes, and practice was going terrible. So the crew chief was like, Get the hockey player in here. And I was like, No, no, no. I’m just show my my cops around. And he was insistent. So I went and was almost as fast as a guy who’s been jacked in the car for five years.
And they’re like, You should do this. And I thought, They’re joking around. And sure enough, I’m halfway through the hockey season. I get a call from them, right? No, no, we’re serious. We want you to come jack a racecar. And I thought I would do that for one year. And that was six years ago. You know, and the amazing thing about the story is so many of us are so pessimistic.
So many of us don’t understand what life has in store for us to be so pessimistic when something doesn’t go our way.
Andy
Yep. Right. And what happened to you there with I mean, that could have derailed not only your hockey career, but what happened. Just that could have left a huge stain.
Shaun Peet
Oh, totally.
Andy
Could you? In life in general. But you use it as an opportunity for growth. That’s what I.
Shaun Peet
Mean. I think, like I said, we talk about kids that may not have the talent. Not having the talent prepared me for that. Because one thing when you don’t have talent and you got to fight for everything, one thing that I lived by was that never put a period where life intended a comma because you run into all these things that should stop you and you get to you get to choose the punctuation in your life.
So I could have been like, you know what? I’m suspended for 25% of the season. I’m going to pack my stuff and I’m headed back to Vancouver Island, right?
Andy
I’m a big quote user for my content, Shaun, and I’m going to give you full 100% credit, but that one’s going in a post of mine.
Shaun Peet
Well, looking up to his name, I’ve heard that from him.
Andy
But that was beautiful. Put don’t put a period where there should be a comma, Right. That is that is awesome. I have never heard that. That is unbelievable. Well, here you are, man. Chapter two. Now you’re now you’re in NASCAR. You’ve been there for 16 years. You’re the co-captain, the co coach of the Chip Ganassi Race Department with your colleague, who I’ve had the fortune to meet as well.
Mike Metcalf, let’s talk about this first. I think people you know, when you think of NASCAR back in back in the day, you think of the gearheads, the mechanics, the you know, so much has changed, correct. In the sport of NASCAR. Talk about when it comes to pit crews, because you again, you coach the pit crew department there at at Chip.
Kasey, what is the appeal now about getting athletes to come in on the pit crews versus mechanics?
Shaun Peet
Well, I think, you know, as as the NASCAR rulebook has thickened, these cars have become more and more similar on the racetrack. So there is very little advantage that you can gain on the racetrack now. So what teams understood was that, okay, well, if we can create an advantage on the racetrack, what if we did it on pit lane?
Right. Like you said, it was just mechanics pit in the car. So these teams started reaching out to athletes and like I said, I was a B minus C plus athlete. Right. But I was the only athlete. So when I came in, you know, I joke, I spent 25 years trying to get to the National Hockey League. I mean, it’s NASCAR in six weeks.
But that was the landscape right now. If you look at our team, it’s not C-plus athletes anymore. It’s A-plus athletes. Right. You had Marshall McFadden on your podcast, former linebacker from the Steelers. We have a kid that Dabo Swinney built Clemson around. Right. Led them in tackles, is junior and senior year. We have Olympic swimmers. We’ve had two United States Navy SEALs.
So the athletic acumen of these guys keeps ratcheting up to the point where when we got the kid from Clemson, he ran around the car. The first time and I looked at Mike Metcalf, it was like, Oh my God, I don’t know if I can coach that. I’ve never seen that, you know, just because they become so much more dynamic, right?
Their rotational strength, you know, their explosion, it just it’s getting to a point where, you know, when I first started, a good pit stop was 16 seconds. We can run them in 10 seconds now, four tires, two cans of fuel in 10 seconds.
Andy
Well, you know, I have to say, Sean, I’m a former baseball pro baseball player, so I check that box. And, you know, we did the we did the pitting the car exercise. And I thought I started to get pretty good with the lug nuts. You know, you I don’t know. I don’t know if there’s an opportunity there, but I’m I’m more than happy to come down for a trial.
Shaun Peet
You absolutely did then. And then there’s that hand. The baseball guys, as far as changing tires, have been some of our best I just because you guys your hand-eye coordination is just so far superior to a lot of people.
Andy
Well, even Mike Metcalf, if I if I remember played college football at Appalachian State.
Shaun Peet
Right. He did. He was a running back in upstate. Absolutely.
Andy
Yeah. So, I mean, just a and let’s talk about this quickly. We’re going to dive in the book here in a second. So I definitely want to promote the 12 second culture. It’s a great book. You talked about how the time of hitting a car is has plummeted from 16 seconds to 12 seconds. And just for anybody giving who’s who has never done this before, I actually was part of a team exercise team building exercise to do this.
Our best time was 30 seconds. So to give you an idea of what it was like to do this in 12 seconds just blows my mind. But you made a comment while we were visiting the headquarters there. From a money perspective, what is the difference in NASCAR between first and ninth?
Shaun Peet
It’s one lap, not right like our aren’t our tire changers are tasked with hitting five lug nuts in under a second. So if you go ahead and blink your eyes, that’s about 2/10 of a second right now. If you look at what that what that costs us in real world is a million bucks. And now I’m sure your listeners are like, well, there’s no way that can be true.
But if you look at the race car map, these cars are moving at 190 feet per second. So 2/10 of a second equates to about 5060. If you go look at the finishing order from the Daytona 500, the difference between 56 feet is a difference between first and six first place, $1.7 million sorry, $1.5 million. Sixth place is $500,000.
A million both tenths of a second. Yep.
Andy
Now the other thing that absolutely fascinates me is if you’ve watched a race, these guys are pitting this car in 12 seconds. Mind you, that the guys who have to run around the car, whether you’re jacking it, lug nuts, not grabbing the tires, you’re also doing it, especially when you’re on the outside of the car with cars coming past you at 180 miles an hour.
Like one, wrong move. It gets really bad really quickly. What mindset do you have to have as a member of a pit crew in the middle, in the heat of the action?
Shaun Peet
You have to you have to understand that the car comes to a stop every single time. So basically what we ask is for you to perform the same skill every single time. And that’s where regardless if you’re running 30th or first, Right. What’s so different? One of the hardest things that Mike and I have to coach against is, you know, we get football players in here and they want to headbutt each other and just, you know, get fired up and take Red Bull.
And, you know, I mean, and that is counterproductive for us. We want you to execute a skill. So, you know, the biggest thing is, is making these guys so fundamental only sound like we don’t practice to get it right. We practice so we can’t get it wrong because the thing is, is there’s so many things are going to happen to the racetrack that if that isn’t innate in you, we’re going to miss it.
Andy
So talk about this for a second. Sorry. Sorry. I don’t mean to cut you off there. You talked about how you get these football guys to come in and they want to drink the Red Bulls and Headbutts and again, so many have this perspective of the mechanics, the gearheads. What is it week look like for a member of the pit crew when they’re not We’re not talking race station, right?
We’re talking Monday through Friday. What does that week look like? It’s not.
Shaun Peet
Easy. It’s not. So basically, they flew it at 10:00 last night. They had to be in the building at 9 a.m. for a blood flow workout. After that, they had a one hour yoga class at 1015. And then, you know, some of them will watch film today and then they’re out of the building probably around noon tomorrow. We get them in at 730.
Each team will sit down and watch film and then we have a team for specific practice of stuff that we saw on the weekend that we think we can do better. After that, they have a position specific workout and then they’re done for the day. They come back in Wednesday morning, 7:30 a.m.. We have a competition practice and then we have our hardest workout of the week.
Thursday they come back in. We have race specific practice, so we put obstacles in their way. What they’ll see the racetrack this coming weekend and then we play like a high school game. We’ll play kickball or, you know, dodgeball or something like that just to bring the guys together. They get Friday off and then they go pit the race car Saturday, Sunday.
Andy
And they’re not just pit in the NASCAR. How many different races actually occur throughout a weekend?
Shaun Peet
There’s three series. There’s trucks extended and then the Cup series and our guys pit all three series. So they’ll get about 96 races this year.
Andy
Wow. And I was fascinated. I was looking at the Chip Ganassi website. Did I see Jimmie Johnson’s now racing, but not at not a.
Shaun Peet
NASCAR in IndyCar. So you know what’s neat about Chip Ganassi Racing is that basically if you if it has four tires and you put fuel in it, we race it. We’re one of the biggest race teams in the world. Right? We’re not the biggest NASCAR team, but we’re one of the biggest race teams in the world. So it’s super exciting because you get to kind of cross-departmental collaboration with the Indy guys and then the Formula E guys, they’re run by a former Navy SEAL.
So you get to pull ideas from all these different places and it’s really a cool resource to have that. You know, you can fly to India and see all the championships they’ve won and you know, their culture and their building and what we can learn to better ourselves down near Concord.
Andy
That’s awesome. That’s awesome. Well, we’ve talked about pitting a car for once in 12 seconds, which still blows my mind that guys have watched them do it. And it’s it’s a sight to behold. Let’s dive into your book, 12 Second Culture. You and Mike are co partners, co-founders in a program called Deck Leadership. Before we dive into the book and the principles in it, talk about DECK, the acronym.
What does DECK stand for?
Shaun Peet
So DECK stands for Diversity Efficiency Culture and Kindness. And Mike and I, we always just thought we were just pit crew coaches, right? We didn’t think we had a whole lot to say. And we had an opportunity to speak at the NFL Combine. So we go up there, do a 30 minute talk. We didn’t think it went very well and but the end of it, there’s about 30 NFL trainers and doctors hanging around.
They ask us questions. Well, we’re leaving the conference hall and this guy tracks us down the hallway. And he said, Hey, guys, I took more notes in your 30 minutes than I have the first two days of this conference. And we get into this really great talk. And at the end of it, I’m like, Well, who are you with?
And he’s like, I’m with the New England Patriots and Andy, right there. We knew that maybe we had something to give to the world. So as we started talking to people and looking how we rebuilt our own department, those are kind of like the four horsemen of the American workplace. They’re one of those four things we’re getting wrong, and that’s what’s affecting our culture.
Andy
Well, let’s dive into this because there’s 12 principles, essentially 12 philosophies that go into the deck leadership, the 12 second culture. First one is the Department of unrealistic expectations. I like this one because I have a lot of people in my life sometimes that I think, Man, your expectations are holding you back because they’re out of control. What is the Department of unrealistic expectations?
Shaun Peet
Me Department of unrealistic and realistic Expectations is expecting. We operate right on the verge of what’s humanly possible. Right To expect that to be perfect every single time is just not based in reality and the only people that understand that seem to be the people in the picture department. So, you know, we’ve had you know, Mike tells a story.
We were in Darlington a couple of years ago, led the race almost, you know, and came in first, went out first the entire night. Okay. Last pit stop of the race. Our Jackman comes in and has a micro turn on the tire. So it costs us about 2/10 of a second, maybe 3/10 of a second. We go from first to second.
We lose the race. People in our building didn’t talk to us for two months. That’s what the Department of unrealistic.
Andy
That’s pressure.
Shaun Peet
Like. Wow.
Andy
Which leads to our next great segway into the second philosophy which is it’s it’s what you guys I think it was your mike I can’t remember when you autographed my book you guys wrote fail quickly.
Shaun Peet
Correct?
Andy
Correct. That’s a quick way to fail. The way you just described.
Shaun Peet
It is it is in any you know, you look at Tom, you look at, you know, yourself, all the pressure that was on you, you know, whether the game was tied and you’re in there or, you know, all this all that stuff that you come up against, you know, going after this thing and pro sports, Right? One thing that we know is we are going to fail and our days are determined, successful, not by whether we fail or not.
We know we’re going to fail. It’s how quickly we can overcome that failure. Extract the teaching moments and the positives and scrap the rest and move on. Right. We can handle failure. What we can’t handle is compounding failure. I can’t have you fail on the right rear of the car and then run around to the left rear and then fail there again because you’re still on the right rear, Right.
So what we try to offer our guys is basically it’s almost like a cognitive cradle to relieve some of the pressure. So, look, we know you’re going to fail, fail quickly. You know, we talk about pressure. You know, here’s another great baseball guy, Tommy Lasorda, Right. He used to say that the only time you feel pressure is when you think of failure.
Okay. So if we allow these guys to fail, it takes pressure out of it. And if there is any pressure, what we talk about here all the time is it pressure is a privilege, right? If you feel pressure in your life, it’s because you’re in a big spot. Yeah, right. You’re not just, you know, closing down the gas station for the evening or, you know, you’re in a big spot.
So you should embrace that. Pressure is a privilege. And I think a lot of the mental health stuff that’s going on right now is because we don’t allow these people there’s no there’s no relief valve, Rachel. We want our guys have a relief valve. We want you to go out there and be brilliant. And if we fall short, we got you on the backside.
Andy
Well, and I think of about my pitching career, you know, the failure wasn’t giving up the homerun. The failure was allowing that home run to impact how you pitch to the next guy. Right. Because you had as a pitcher, you give up a run, a home run, you had to forget it and get back focused on the next guy.
And to your point, the failure, the act itself that didn’t work is isn’t the failure continuously making that mistake or letting it impact your day or week? That’s the failure, Right.
Shaun Peet
And when you feel you’re wrong, you’re right. Yeah. Successful people think never fail and.
Andy
Every.
Shaun Peet
Day you got it. And we look up to them because they stand on a mountain of failures. They just do two things better than us. They don’t let stop them and they don’t let it define them. And I think if you can do that, then failure failures can be your best teacher you ever had.
Andy
Exactly. And I love your third principal here. Arrival mindset. You know, I think it to me, it just simply means show up. What what is that a rival mindset you expect your guys to have?
Shaun Peet
It’s just being intentional, like you said, intentional, not the way you show up. What we ask our guys is that when you put your hand on the door in the leading into work, we want the very best version of you. We want the version that’s the most collaborative the hardest we’re estimate, you know, so we talk about all the time in our program and is it thoughts are things.
And the view that you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way that you live your life. Right. And if I were to ask you, the example we uses think of was the last time you bought a new car, right? What was it?
Andy
We just bought one a Jeep Wrangler.
Shaun Peet
What color?
Andy
White.
Shaun Peet
When you decide on a white Jeep Wrangler, what starts happening?
Andy
You start seeing them everywhere.
Shaun Peet
You start everywhere, right? So if your brain works like that for something as simple as a car buying experience, what do you think it does to you when you show up and think Monday is going to suck or the practice is going to be awful tonight? Or that right, it affects you? What if instead you showed up and said, you know, I’m going to kick this day’s ass, I’m going to be the best engineer I can be?
Right. Your rival mindset sets you up for success or failure. It starts the second you put your hand on the door.
Andy
Yeah, I could tell you. And I coach insurance advisor Sean and it. It’s not uncommon to have the conversation with an advisor who’s on the precipice of winning a big piece of business. But before they even want it, they already are talking about the fear of what it would be like if they lost it.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
What if I write it and then I lose it? It’s like, guys, you. If that’s where your mindset is right now, that is exactly what’s going to happen. And you have to just show up and do your best and the chips will fall where they may. And I love you know, this dives right into the next two principles and it’s something honestly, I don’t know if I’ve shared this with you.
You I put a quote out there and it’s actually something I started do every Friday on my social media. I call it catching great people, doing great things. And it was after talking to you and I had an interview with a guy by the name of Andre Young, who is a former college and professional football player, about, you know you talk about prove people right?
Shaun Peet
Yeah.
Andy
Win with good people.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
What is it you know tell me about what your philosophy around prove people right. I love that.
Shaun Peet
So what’s interesting is it can Canarsie we’re expected to compete with the big teams with half the budget right so in order to do that, you have to build guys in-house or you take a team. You take guys that had been cast off from other teams. And one of the first things they always do when they get here and we sign a new contract is they’re like, Thanks, coach, I’m going to I’m going to prove my old team wrong.
We don’t allow that here. You’re only allowed to prove people right, you know, because all of us are guilty of some point in our life. We’ve tried to prove someone wrong. Right. But if you really stop and think about that for a second, when you get that opportunity right, it’s in some summit moment in your life, Right? Winning, you know, winning a baseball series or a promotion or it’s some great moment.
Right. And think about that for a second. Some brilliant moment. You’re going to prove someone wrong. So what we ask people do is think about think of the nicest sunset you’ve ever seen, right? Whether that’s a beach or a mountain. And take yourself right there. It’s probably with someone that you love. Okay, well, now that you’re sitting in from that sunset and you get that feeling, I want you to invite into that picture someone that’s stabbed in the back, someone that never believed in you, someone that lied about you.
It starts changing the picture and the feeling of the sunset right? That’s exactly what you do when you prove people wrong. What if instead you prove people right? You know what? If you know, we all have, you know, people that have poured their love and their time and their respect into us, whether that’s coaches or parents or grandparents, you know, I mean, managers, what if you did it for them?
You know, one of the one of the things that goes on in Chip Ganassi Racing is we have a task force that goes around the shop and they’re looking to unburden the cars of weight, right? So they’re looking for grams that they can shave hood pins and use thinner metal than basically all those grams add up to pounds.
And a lighter race car is the better chance you have to win a race. So essentially what you’re doing is you’re unburdening the race car weight. Yeah, that’s exactly what you do when you go from proving people wrong to proving people right. You unburden yourself of all the people that don’t deserve to be in your life in the first place.
Andy
I love that. I love that. Yeah. It’s oh, it’s far. And I think right now, Sean, with the environment we are in and just in this country, there’s there’s far too many people out there trying to prove the others wrong. And and no one, no one wins. I think you feel in the moment like you got a victory over somebody.
But at the end of the day, nobody wins at that time.
Shaun Peet
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.
Andy
You know, I’m thinking about the next few. I think so much of culture, you know, you talk about the next chapter in the book is diversity isn’t just a black and white thing as an obviously a very hot topic today. It is. And then you talk about creating environment, right? So what is your view as a team? You know, as a pit crew team around diversity?
What does that mean to you? Yeah, and what is how how important is it for you to create a culture, a winning culture, and an environment for your pit crew team members?
Shaun Peet
So diversity to us is simply strength, right? When Mike Metcalf and I took this program over, we we were pit crew members, not pit crew coaches. And we understood that there were going to be things that came up in questions that we did not have the key to unlock. Like the answer to. And by going after diversity, we had a better chance that someone would be at the table with the answer to that question.
So in our place we used a team acronym diversity of thought, diversity of experience, diversity of age and diversity of motor. That’s the diversity that we go after. Now, it turns out when we built our program, we had the most racially diverse pit crew in the history of NASCAR, but it was brought together on one basic recruiting principle, and that’s that we put nothing above being a world class human being.
If you’re that I can teach you how to pit race cars and we started getting all these like minded people right, Like we diversity is not a black and white thing, right? But we see with our eyes the mere fraction of a human being. So why would we set our team up like that? Right? We wanted true diversity, different socioeconomic classes because those offered different experiences, right?
Guys that have that have been in a long time because they have wisdom, guys that have been in a short time because they’re seeing everything with new eyes. Right. And diversity of motor. You’ve been in those locker rooms, Andy. You know, there’s always guys that you look forward to see, right? They were just a great experience. They were big energy guys.
And you also need the ones that are stoic and well-thought out. And by crafting that, you know, the culture in this building was a dumpster fire, to put it lightly. Right. And it wasn’t because we weren’t talented. We were super talented, but we were lazy, we were entitled and we were selfish, and we didn’t want to win with those people.
So, you know, we went about our bosses thought we’re crazy when we let some of these guys go. But we were very intentional about the way we wanted to build our culture and by setting forth standards, we went after standards. We didn’t go after goals, right? Like one thing that drives Mike and I crazy is for so many years our boss would stand up from the company and be like, Our goal is to get two cars at the championship race in Homestead.
That’s happened zero times. Do you know what the repercussions of those goals were? Nothing. Very often goals have zero repercussions if you don’t agree with them. Standards are where it’s at. I love that we set standards and by adhering to the standards, we have a chance to reach the goal and that’s what we did in the program. But it starts with intention.
Andy
Yeah. You got a few more minutes. Yeah, I just want to I want to wrap this up because I think this book, if you haven’t had a chance to get this guy’s 12 second culture, if you if you’re a leader within your organization, small companies, small business or large corporation, get this book it’s it’s fascinating. It’s it’s spot on Shaun for for the stuff everybody’s going through today.
You finish I want you to talk quickly about there’s two formulas in here. You talk about I call them formulas. You’ve got the P equals W divided by t, v over T, and you also have vertical thinking.
Shaun Peet
Right.
Andy
Let’s talk about what is vertical thinking.
Shaun Peet
So so vertical thinking is to put it simply, vertical thinking is working on your business versus working in your business. Right? Like you think about a typical work workday for a lot of people. You come in Monday morning, what’s the first thing you do?
Andy
You open the inbox.
Shaun Peet
New hires, right? Okay. So we go in the inbox, we answer emails till nine, we have a meeting at nine, and then we have another one stacked in there at ten. We get out of it, 1130. We have lunch, we go to lunch, we come back, we have an insulin, right? We have two more meetings in the afternoon and by the time it’s time to go, you didn’t get to level up your company.
You simply got one day closer to Friday, right? Well, if you do that on Tuesday. Right. Again, you didn’t level up your company. You just got one day closer to Friday, Right? Vertical thinking is allowing yourself the space to think right. One of the things that Mike and I did after our third year, it was just so crazy with traveling over teams that we were curating.
And one day we just had a conversation. We were like, When do we give ourselves the chance to think? Because we don’t, right? So we came up with that for actually was a formula that David Cutcliffe used when he was at Duke. And the formula is power equals work over time, right? So many of us are guilty of looking at people’s hours in the business.
Oh, well, this person gets here at six and they stay till ten, and this personally gets here at 830 and they stay. That has nothing to do with it. What was accomplished in that time? Right. That’s efficiency. Right. What the you know, what Coach Coughlin was talking about was that so many of these football teams have beds in their office because they expect their staff to stay there 16, 18 hours a day.
He’s like, look, here’s the volume of work. Dive into it. And when you’re done, I want you in bed at your dinner table with your family. Now, some days that might take you 12 or 14 hours, but there’s other days it would take you six. So it’s again, it’s about being intentional about what you’re doing. It’s not, you know, working at your computer and then checking your Instagram and, you know, it’s not bad at all.
So we set up blocks of work for our guys. When the work’s accomplished, they’re gone.
Andy
Yeah, and I think it’s so apropos that we end the book, you know, guy that was known as an enforcer, a guy that was a leading, leading teams in penalty minutes in the minor league hockey system to end the book with kindness wins. Right. I think I think I think you know that’s a word that we all can see on a quote Shaun be kind spread kindness.
What does that mean to you?
Shaun Peet
Kindness is simply meeting people where they’re at, Right? If they’re struggling, you know, you have the empathy to meet them, where they’re at and try to help them take take them through that. For us, we use kindness as a recruiting tool. Right. Well, one of the things that I’m most proud of is our pit crew is the only picker in the history of NASCAR to win NASCAR’s version of the Walter Payton Award for their service in the community.
And it shows when you take our guys to the Berrien Springs Orphanage or you take him to the Christian mission and you watch them dive in and help people, you know, that are having a rough patch in life, your heart swells, but it also shows you if you have the right guys in the program or not, because the ones that don’t jump into that work make us question.
Hey, you know, it’s you know, and one of the things and like like you said, we don’t pay the most on pit road, right? So doing the stuff in the community us, it is twofold. It creates purpose and it creates perspective. It’s pretty hard to complain about making six figures when we’re delivering, you know, two cartons of milk and a tray sandwiches to a person.
That’s their meals for the next two days. Yeah, right. And again, it’s and now there are some hilarious stories that have come out of some of those some of those like we do Meals on Wheels. We had guys pulled over by the cops every single time we do it because it’s like a cannonball run trying to kind of get through the thing.
But again, we the world needs more kindness, right? We’re we’re born to be kind to each other. We’ve just lost our way.
Andy
Yeah. Now you can wrap this up for this whole book in a bowl for if there’s that H.R. Director SEO, CFO, listening in right now, how does somebody take this? What advice would you give that business executive to apply? How does someone apply the 12 second culture.
Shaun Peet
To their business? Basically, it’s this is that you’re going to call us and you’re going to think we can come in there with a process to help your team operate a pit crew and operating like a pit crew is elevating people over process. If you do that, your team can operate like think.
Andy
That’s awesome. Before I get into the Rapid Fire to end this episode, what is the best way? I know you and Mike do a lot of speaking. You guys do a lot of workshops, a lot of leadership work with with organizations. What’s the easiest way for somebody to get a hold of you?
Shaun Peet
Easiest way is probably just W WW dot deck leadership dot com we’re both on Instagram makes it Mr. Metcalf Jr I’m a S.W. peat deck leadership is also on Instagram, so we’re very passionate about it. And you know, there are more heart attacks in the United States on Monday morning than any other time during the week. And we want to see leadership done better.
And if anyone has any questions, please reach out to us. We said we want to our hearts in this.
Andy
So it’s obvious and and I’m going to put all of your contact information in the show notes. I just I’m fascinated. I’m excited. I get the chance to hang out with Sean here in a few weeks. So I’m excited about that shot. So let’s end up end up with some quick rapid fire. You ready?
Shaun Peet
Yeah, we’ll go. Okay. But I brought a bunch of concussions so much here.
Andy
Don’t even think. Just give the first answer that comes to your head. Right? First and foremost, growing up on Vancouver Island as a kid playing hockey, who was your team growing up?
Shaun Peet
Oh, the Philadelphia fliers.
Andy
Not the Canucks, huh?
Shaun Peet
Noxon I.
Andy
Say Pavel Bure back then, like.
Shaun Peet
Oh, that would be a big deal.
Andy
Philadelphia fliers. All right, Best race track you’ve ever hit a vehicle at.
Shaun Peet
Oh, gosh.
Andy
Oh, favorite race track.
Shaun Peet
Bristol Motor Speedway, 160,000 people around a track the size of your high school running track.
Andy
Wow. And I think they actually Tennessee might have played a college football game there.
Shaun Peet
What they did, it’s an unbelievable place.
Andy
Likewise, Flipside, toughest racetrack to pit a car at.
Shaun Peet
Martinsville, Virginia. You’re going to come a bunch and pit road has all these crazy angles. So sometimes you can’t even see the car because you’re coming around the corner. You can even see the car till it’s right in front of you. So wow. And it’s really narrow. So every time I was hit, I was hit at Martinsville.
Andy
Okay, left turn, right, turn left. And my last question, I think this is not rapid fire, but it’s a really important one, Shaun, If you never got that chance, if you never got out of Vancouver Island and went and played at Dartmouth, what would you be doing today?
Shaun Peet
I’d be a firefighter, no question. That was all I ever wanted to be was a hockey player and a firefighter and yeah.
Andy
That’s awesome. Well, Shaun, I can’t thank you enough for the time you gave today to do this episode. It was filled with a MA and a massive amount of golden nuggets and now my dogs barking. So she’s even excited. Shaun, thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your time. This was this was fascinating.
Shaun Peet
My pleasure. Always enjoyed any. Thank you.
Andy
And if you’re listening, guys, I hope I mean, massive amounts of notes, guys, you know what happens? I hope Shaun gave you that clarity you need because, you know, when you get clarity, guess what? You get confidence. And when those two collide, you take massive action to go make it happen. Today.