David Novak: Take Charge of You

David Novak is Co-Founder, retired Chairman and CEO of Yum! Brands, the world’s largest restaurant company with over 45,000 restaurants in more than 135 countries and territories. During his tenure as CEO, Yum! Brands became a global powerhouse, growing from $4 billion in revenue to over $32 billion. After retiring in 2016, he became Founder and CEO of David Novak Leadership, dedicated to developing leaders at every stage of life. David is also the host of the top-ranked podcast, How Leaders Lead and founder of the leadership development platform of the same name.

An expert on leadership and recognition culture, David is also a New York Times bestselling author. His books include Taking People With You: The Only Way to Make Big Things Happen, O GREAT ONE! A Little Story About the Awesome Power of Recognition, and his latest book with Jason Goldsmith, Take Charge of You: How Self Coaching Can Transform Your Life and Career*.

In this conversation, David and I discuss the importance of finding joy in our careers. David highlights several of the key questions that he utilizes when helping others to uncover how joy can show up their work. He encourages us to surface the single biggest thing that’s important right now in order to get immediate traction.

Key Points

Sometimes your best (and only) coach is yourself.

Use joy as your destination finder.

Find your joy blockers by asking yourself: what’s getting in the way of my joy? Your worst days often provide insight on this.

Discover your joy builders by asking yourself: what would grow your joy personal and professionally? Your most memorable days are starting points for answers here.

Your goal is to surface your single biggest thing. This changes over time, but ideally is only one thing, one at a time. That’s how you gain traction.

Resources Mentioned

Take Charge of You: How Self Coaching Can Transform Your Life and Career* by David Novak and Jason Goldsmith

Interview Notes

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How to Find Your Calling, with Ken Coleman (episode 352)

Align Your Work With Your Why, with Kwame Marfo (episode 542)

How to Nail a Job Transition, with Sukhinder Singh Cassidy (episode 555)

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