Nobody Cares Until You Do: The Power of Accountability - Robert J. Hunt

What happens when you finally take full ownership of your life? Robert J. Hunt, accountability coach and author of "Nobody Cares Until You Do," shares the transformative power of genuine accountability in this candid conversation.

Growing up with an angry father, Robert had no blueprint for healthy manhood or relationships. Through years of mistakes and growth, he discovered a profound truth: life dramatically improves when you own it completely. This realization led him to coach CEOs and business owners for over 13 years, creating spaces where these leaders—who typically answer to no one—can experience the freedom that comes with accountability.

Robert challenges common misconceptions about accountability, explaining that true accountability isn't about someone else holding your feet to the fire. "Nobody can make you do anything," he emphasizes. "The ability to be accountable is totally up to you." This shift in perspective transforms accountability from an external burden to an internal choice that liberates rather than constrains.

Through personal stories, including how he and his wife confronted $90,000 of debt by selling their home and starting fresh, Robert illustrates how accountability creates peace and possibility. He distinguishes between merely being responsible (fixing problems after they arise) and being truly accountable (proactively anticipating and planning for challenges).

Robert also shares the five essential traits of successful CEOs—continuous learning, decision-making capability, ownership of results, investing in others, and driving results—qualities that apply equally to leading an organization or your personal life. After all, as he points out, "You're the CEO of your own life."

Ready to stop playing the victim and become the victor in your own story? Take the first step toward the life you really want by visiting nobodycaresbook.com and taking the satisfaction assessment today.

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Chapters

• 0:38 Welcome and Introduction
• 2:01 Growing Up and Finding Direction
• 5:01 Creating CEO Accountability
• 8:23 Debt Crisis to Financial Freedom
• 17:45 Five Essential CEO Traits
• 24:19 Signs of Lacking Accountability
• 28:35 Living Faith at Work

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:17

Welcome back to one on one with Mr you. Of course I'm your host, mr you, in the studio with us, robert J Hunt, the author of the book Nobody Cares Until you Do, and accountability coach Robert's in the house. Brother, how are you man?

Speaker 2: 0:30

Fantastic, fantastic. Thanks for having me on your show.

Speaker 1: 0:34

My pleasure, man, my pleasure. I'm glad to get into some common with you, man. Our talk was fantastic. We talked a lot about things that I love accountability and coaching. Dirty words to some people, but to me it's kind of like iron sharpens iron, and I love to hear about it because it helps me be better. So I want to get into some of that with you, but in the time that we have. First, if you don't mind, share with us some of your upbringing, some of your childhood. How did you get from there to where you are right now?

Speaker 2: 1:00

Share that with us today. I grew up in Southern California and pretty simple life Just two brothers, two sisters, so a family of five and a very angry father, and so when I grew up, I didn't really know what it was like to be a man, or to love my God, or to love my wife, or to raise my kids with anything that was other than confusion. So it was a bit of a long road to get to where I was today, but I've been thankful for how God continued to guide me along that path. And then, I think, I made a lot of mistakes along the way, but we learn from our mistakes, and one of the things I have learned is that life is better when you own it, and so that's what we're doing these days.

Speaker 1: 1:37

I love it, man. I love this. You mentioned about how you're leading some CEO groups.

Speaker 2: 1:43

Yeah, what you mentioned about how you lead in some CEO groups. Yeah, what's happening there? That sounds like it's been. Oh, it's awesome.

Speaker 1: 1:47

It's awesome.

Speaker 2: 1:48

I've been doing it for 13 years now and I have members who have been in the group since the very beginning and basically we get together once a month and we create the world for the opportunity of accountability. Again, it's back to accountability, because if you're a CEO and you're in charge, you make decisions. I mean, who's going to challenge you? You're in charge, so sometimes you don't do the right thing, sometimes you don't do anything at all, and so having a group of other people who know you well enough to go hey, didn't you say you were going to spend more time with your family? Or didn't you say you weren't going to start a new business All these things that we we sometimes let ourselves off the hook when we shouldn't and I think that's the benefit of being in a CEO peer group is you have the opportunity to create a world of accountability with people who are doing the same journey you are.

Speaker 1: 2:32

Tell me now, speaking to everybody probably watching and listening today, I'm sure that they have an idea of what they think a CEO is. And don't let TV and media help, because it'll give you an even more dramatic picture. Tell me how you were able to teach successfully accountability to a CEO. You probably think you know what you said. Nobody above me, I do what I want, I'm the chief decision maker, but it all tickles back down. Why should I listen to you about accountability? What did you learn and experience in that time?

Speaker 2: 3:03

One of the things we've learned is that no one can hold anyone else accountable, and so I don't hold them accountable. I create the opportunity for them to hold themselves accountable. The thing is that most business owners already know what to do. They're just not doing it. You know you're supposed to plan ahead. You know you're supposed to put a certain amount of money ahead. You know you're supposed to invest in the business. You know you're supposed to listen to your employees all these things you know, but you don't do it. And you don't do it because you're not accountable.

Speaker 2: 3:29

And so what I asked them is look, what do you want your life to look like and are you living it? How's your business? Is it the way you want it? Okay, I don't. I don't tell them how to run their business or how to live their life, but if they're telling me I don't like my business, I don't like the results, I don't like my life, I don't like the results, great, what don't you like about it? And then we look at that and go so, what do you want to do? And that's where accountability steps in. You decide what you want to do. I'm just there to walk the journey with you and go. How's that going? Are you enjoying it, is it working, or maybe we should try something else?

Speaker 1: 4:00

No, I loved it. I loved that, and you've been finding that to be successful, what you've been seeing right yeah, they're reaching their goals because they create what they want to do.

Speaker 2: 4:09

They ask for help. One of the things you require for accountability is vulnerability, and if you're not honest and say, look, I'm struggling with this, I don't know what to do, I've never done this before. We all went through COVID together. No one knew what to do with COVID. We all had things that we dealt with before, but no one had had COVID before, so no one can know everything about everything. But if you're willing to listen and learn from other people, you can shorten the learning curve and make life a lot better.

Speaker 1: 4:35

I love that. I love that. Speaking of that, tell us when was your aha moment that you weren't walking in accountability?

Speaker 2: 4:43

Well, for me, it was in 2019, my beautiful wife, kathy and I got to a place in our lives. We have $90,000 in debt, and it was a federal government debt, this credit card debt and it didn't start overnight. It was bit by bit. Every year, we kept thinking well, next year things will get better, let's just kick it down the road a little longer. And we weren't willing to make changes. We weren't willing to own the responsibility of how we spend our money or to proactively make changes. So, year after year, it kept getting worse and in 2019, when we started the year, we said look, this is ridiculous. We're not living the life we want. We need to own this and do something about it. We need to make tough decisions.

Speaker 2: 5:19

And so we decided that we'd sell our house and start over. We sold our house and we closed in March of 2020, took all the money from the sale of the house, paid off all the debt and moved into this house that we live in today as a rental. And the peace that we had in our lives because we took out the burden of debt was remarkable. And what it did is it fueled the awareness that, man, we can have the life we want. We just need to make some changes. We just need to make some changes. We just need to own the process. But we can have anything we want, including a good marriage, including peace in our lives, including fun with our kids. And so we just looked at everything in our life that we didn't like the way it was and we made a plan to go work on it, and it took us a long time to get there. But I think I'd rather be working hard towards having the life I really want than to suffer under the crappy one I ended up with.

Speaker 1: 6:06

Oh, I totally get that man. I don't think people realize and I love for you to try to help the listeners and viewers kind of catch this, because I feel like in my circles people don't see the freedom and the power in accountability. For them accountability is like you know what, you're holding me to hold my feet to the fire or you're almost making me do something I'm not comfortable with, but there's freedom and power in it, I think under the right circumstances. Can you break that down for the people who are watching?

Speaker 2: 6:33

Absolutely Nobody can make you do anything Nobody, I mean really literally. So when you say I'm going to hold you accountable or I want someone to hold me accountable, they can't because you could lie. I used to be in a men's accountability group at my church and I was with these guys. We met every week for years and then, out of the blue one guys like yeah, I'm getting divorced. Like hey, what the heck, where'd that come from? You never said a word about having any marital problems. Yeah, we haven't got along for years. Oh, my gosh, I've been in this group with you for years and you've never said a word. So so the ability to be accountable is totally up to you. However, if you want the life you really want and you're willing to be honest about where you are and your satisfaction with it or not, and what you're willing to be, if I own it that's the simplest definition of accountability is you own it, and that gives you the power and the freedom to do whatever you want to do because you own it.

Speaker 1: 7:32

I love this. I love this man. So tell me I want to get your idea of, because for me I see some value in the title of your book. I haven't read the book, but the title is so catchy. It says Nobody Cares Until you Do. Yeah, I love that. Tell me what was the impetus for why you wrote that book and I guess what a huge takeaway for you as the author of the book from what you wrote.

Speaker 2: 8:02

Yeah, we came to a point in our own lives where that phrase meant a lot to us, because we realized that we could blame and make excuses and complain and say there was nothing we could do about it, or just wait and hope year after year. But when we got to the place we said look, wait, nobody cares. Nobody cares. I'm fat, broke, unhappy in my marriage, angry at God, hate my clients. Nobody cares. And they can't care because everyone is so loaded up with their own problems, with their own junk, with their own head trash. They just don't have the capacity to step up and carry your junk for you.

Speaker 2: 8:34

And so the truth is nobody cares until you do. And when you care, then there's a world full of people who come out and say how do I help? What can I do? Because you've been vulnerable, you've been honest about your struggle and you've invited them in to support you and care for you. Then at that point they can rally around you. But you had to first care enough about it to be honest and real and to deal with it.

Speaker 1: 8:58

Love that man. If you can be transparent with us, what would you say is the biggest challenge you've seen in somebody being accountable through a Christian lens? If you would?

Speaker 2: 11:50

Well, the only person we're ever really truly going to be accountable to is God, and so I think that, sadly, we have begun to forget that there's accountability in the world. We don't live like there's accountability. We know we're supposed to put away money for retirement. We know we're supposed to plan ahead, but we don't. We know that God has commanded us to take the Sabbath seriously, but we don't. It's not an option You're supposed to. It's important to him. We know that God wants us to care for the widows and the orphans and the people who are suffering. He's directed us to do that. So we're ignoring all these things that we will be truly accountable for for someday, and then what we do is we just do stuff that's responsible, so we feel good about ourselves.

Speaker 2: 12:32

I go to church. Sometimes I tithe like if it's Christmas or something you know. Sometimes I'll help out, like you know, do parking duty or something, and so we're doing something. So we feel like, look, I'm being a good Christian. But a Christian is to be like Jesus. Jesus said take my yoke, it's light. Come walk with me, come hang out with me, let me be a part of your life every day, and that's what God's called us. He's redeemed us to that life. But we're not choosing that life. We're choosing the one where we visit him once a week, on a Sunday maybe, and then we just kind of try not to be too bad. So we've diminished what God's called us to be like and just because a lightning bolt hasn't hit us, for the life we live and we think it's okay. But we will truly be accountable to God for the life we live and the things we do or don't do. I love it.

Speaker 1: 13:22

I love this. You mentioned about your work with CEOs, and I love that, especially for the sake of those that are watching and listening today, because they probably see CEOs as, I guess, the pinnacle of success. It's like most people who and I've I've known this guy more formal cubicle worker, so I know that this feeling is pervasive. Everybody. Everybody gets what I'm about to say, but when you sit in the next cubicle going through all of the jokes you got to go through and all of the hierarchy and all the nonsense that happens in corporations, even with the government I'm familiar with both put it like that, the one thing that we think about.

Speaker 1: 14:00

Joe, if I had my own, I wouldn't even think about entrepreneurship at the time. I would be thinking about being at the top of the chain and being able to make all the decisions and not have to deal with all this nonsense. I can go golfing every once in a while. I can't play golf, but just theoretically being able to do my own thing, set my own schedule, that kind of thing. Tell me what you think are the five greatest traits that a CEO has. I want to see if it compares to the kind of thing that we think about, because if it's something that they're doing that we could be doing, it almost says you know what. You can be there. That's your aspiration, that's your goal. You can be there as well.

Speaker 2: 14:36

What are the top five traits you've seen? So everyone who thinks whoever's whatever you're not having someone else has it better. It's just the fear of missing out, it's the jealousy of things. If you're truly a CEO, you live with a level of burden and worry that nobody will ever understand. You have all these lives that are under your responsibility, and if you don't do things right and the company goes bankrupt, all these people lose their job. That's just the worst end of it. In between, the worst end and the current situation is you have all these people you're supposed to care about and you're exhausted because some people are really hard to care about, because they show up at work with all their brokenness that we all have, but some people don't do as good.

Speaker 2: 15:12

A is going to job hiding in his others, and so the burden a CEO or business owner carries is remarkable. But if you're going to be a CEO and you're going to carry that responsibility, there are five things you need to do really well. You always need to be learning. The world is constantly changing. By the way, this applies to everyone. You're the CEO of your own life. You run your own company, your own business. Robert Hunt Incorporated. You are running that business. So what you should do is what a CEO is doing. A great CEO is doing Always learning.

Speaker 2: 15:40

The world's constantly changing. If you're not learning, you're falling behind, and then you need to make decisions. Now, you may not always make the right decision, but you need to make decisions, because not making a decision is making a decision, but then it's by default, and so great CEOs are willing to make the decisions, and then, when they make decisions, they own it. They're accountable for the things they're doing. They're going to own the process and own the results that come with it.

Speaker 2: 16:04

The other thing is, number four is they pour into other people, which, again, you can be doing as a CEO of your own life pouring into others, because a great CEO is not trying to be the most important person. The CEO is trying to build a team that will drive the business and be able to help it grow, because, you cap out, there's only so much you can do. However, the fifth thing to do is they drive results. So they need to stay focused. They need to know what's going on with the business, the health of the business. They need to look for key things that are quickly identified to say we are not getting the results we want. What's going? I love this.

Speaker 1: 16:42

You've been called the accountability coach. When I hear that I think I told you this in our pre-interview that I have so many probably 90% of my guests that come in are a leader of some sort, or developer of leaders, mentor or coach, I'm not against that, but I just see it's watered down so much out there that sometimes it makes me cringe. But I want to ask you, as the accountability coach, who coaches you, who keeps you accountable, and how's that?

Speaker 2: 17:12

been going. Yeah, I have a coach I meet with every Friday, have for years. I believe every coach needs a coach, because if I'm going to be my best, I got to have someone sharpen me. I create the world of accountability by being transparent with my coach, with my business partner, who's my wife, and with three other men that I've invited in to ask me questions, to maintain the relationship, to seek me For a living.

Speaker 2: 17:36

I go and care for everybody else and every once in a while I get a little burned out, and so I've asked these three guys to purposely chase me and call me and care about me. It was a little awkward at first, like you know be my friend, you know but I really needed to have somebody who would be as intentional about caring for me as I care about for my clients, and so that would fuel me and help me stay focused. So I create KPIs, I create measurements and goals and actions that I'm going to do. I share them with my coach, I share them with my business partner and then I'm giving myself the opportunity to go do that because they know what I'm working on. They're going to ask, but they're not going to hold me accountable. Again, nobody can hold you accountable. But I have to report in, I have to show the progress, I have to show my efforts and the results and through that kind of transparency I allow myself to create a world of accountability. Love that man.

Speaker 1: 18:29

Tell me how the thought process goes. I believe this is something that I know we deal with in our men's podcast, but I think I see it dealt with in other places too. How do you get to the place where you are able to ask somebody to step into those roles that those men are stepping into? What's your criteria for that? Do they have to the place where you are able to ask somebody to step into those roles that those men are stepping into? What's your criteria for that? Do they have to be older than you? Do they have to have a same kind of professional level as you, or is there another criteria that?

Speaker 2: 18:56

how's that work? Yeah, nobody's perfect, so I'm not going to find anybody who's got their act together. What I had to do is reach out to people who were willing to ask me and to follow me and work and chase me to invest in me. These were. These were men who I found over the years, who love their wives. They're not perfect, they love their kids and they're people of integrity. Beyond that, they make decisions that I wouldn't agree with. They make mistakes. They're not perfect, they don't always call me, but, but they are. Between the three of them. I've got enough inputs in my life on a regular basis that it feeds my soul and I think, if you're transparent and you're willing to invite someone in, really all you need to have is the opportunity for accountability with other people. I'm not looking for them to teach me or mentor me or to do my work for me, but I think, just knowing that someone's going to ask hey, you told me you were going to spend more time with Kathy, how are you doing at this quarter?

Speaker 2: 19:50

And then I'm setting a goal and expectation, and they're able to walk with me in that journey More of a willingness than a skill set.

Speaker 1: 19:57

I love that. I love that. Just a few more questions. The last two will probably be the toughest questions I ask you all day, but here's one that should be a little bit simpler. What do you think are signs of a lack of accountability? How do you know that that's what's happening?

Speaker 2: 20:13

Yeah, usually I see a lot of bitterness. I see a lot of complaining. Every time you're with them, something's happening to them. Traffic is always bad for them. The stupid government, the stupid government, the, the stupid employees, the stupid co-workers super cuz, everyone's stupid. Everyone's bugging them. You know. You ask them how's your day? Oh man, today's just horrible.

Speaker 2: 20:36

So I think that the negativity that I see from someone because they're a victim in in life, you are either a victim or a victor, and when you're accountable, you own it. You have the opportunity to change it. Therefore, you're going to be victorious. It'll take time, but you're pressing on towards owning that. You're the victor. When you're not accountable, you're a victim. Everything happens to you, and so they're just pretty much pissed off at the world and everything they see is just on the negative side. That's one of the signs that's probably the most pervasive sign I can see where someone's not accountable. There's other ones, like you're not getting things done. They're constantly saying they're going to do something and they're not, and that is showing a lack of accountability. Those are two good signs.

Speaker 1: 21:17

Okay, I think it's important.

Speaker 2: 21:20

I point out the difference between responsible and accountable. Now, responsible is when something goes wrong, I fix. It's important. I point out the difference between responsible and accountable. Now, responsible is when something goes wrong, I fix it. Accountable is I know something's going to go wrong, so how am I going to plan for that? See, as owner of your company, you have to think ahead. You don't just wait till an employee comes in and says, hey, I got an offer for $10,000 more to go over this company, so I'm going to take this job. Oh, no, wait, we want to keep you.

Speaker 2: 21:44

Okay, you need to know that people are getting offers to go work somewhere else, especially since we have jerk bosses. Everyone in the world has jerk bosses. It's just the brokenness of humanity, and how you define jerk is up to the person who's in the middle of it. But you know you've got potential that people are going to be stole by your competitors and you're not're not on a regular basis listening, supporting, caring, challenging training, giving them a voice, helping them grow. If you're not doing that, don't be surprised that they leave. And then, when they decide to leave, you can be responsible and go find someone else.

Speaker 2: 22:17

But if you were truly accountable, you would have created a world where the person who you don't want to lose is constantly feeling valued, is constantly growing, is constantly having a place to contribute. That person wouldn't want to go. Most people leave because they have a bad boss, not just because someone's waving some extra money at them, because it's a hassle Excuse me, it's a hassle to go to another company. You got to start all over, and they can be jerks too, so you might as well just stay where you know this person is that jerk, right, and so I think, if we create the opportunity for them to want to stay, that that is accountability. It's proactive in nature and responsibility is just responding to stuff. That's the difference between the two, that's good man, Perfect.

Speaker 1: 22:54

I'm glad you added that in. That's a very stoop point. There is a big difference between the two of those. All right, this is my last two questions, man. This All right, this is my last two questions, man. This one's going to be tough. We talked about it in the pre-interview. I can see how you reacted, but I brought it up. So I'm like, here we go. I'm going to ask about it, Living in Texas. Now, I know that football is huge in Texas, but you're from California Rams, Chargers, Raiders, Niners what's going on with teams in California, man? You have a lot of thoughts about that. I'm going to give you a little bit to share about it. Man. Go ahead. Man, Floor is yours brother.

Speaker 2: 23:28

California has been so consistently broken for so long. That's why we left there in 2019. No wait, 2010. 2010, we left. You know, it was a great state at one point, beautiful, with great people who really wanted to make things happen, care for one another, grow business, raise their families, worship God all the things that I believed in. And then, over the last 10 years, before I moved in 2010, starting in 2000,. Just one thing after another. They took away the rights of people. They continue to make really bad decisions, financially, culturally, and so evident by the way that they crush the soul of their sports teams that people just want to get out. We had the Rams, we had the Raiders, the Chargers, everything just wants to get out of California, and I don't blame them.

Speaker 1: 24:22

Oh, my goodness, I'm surprised that you didn't explode it. I'm so proud of you for holding it in, because that's not what happened during the pre-interview.

Speaker 2: 24:29

So thank you I got over it since then.

Speaker 1: 24:34

Did you really? I'm not sure. Are you being accountable?

Speaker 2: 24:38

Maybe I processed it better, maybe that was what it was.

Speaker 1: 24:40

Yeah, yeah, I'm pushing something like that because that would make me go nuts too. My dad he's from where I'm from, from New York, but when he moved to California he was in the Oakland-San Fran area and he's a big Raiders fan. That man was stressed. I think that team drove him to drink, to be honest with you, but it was stressful. Non-topic here, but my final question for you, man. We talked about it in our pre-interview. Every guest gets this question. Nobody's exempt from this. It's not to diminish any work you've done up to this point, but theoretically I'm taking a big eraser and wiping away everything you've ever done. It was a hobby, a career, a mission. You had a vocation temporarily erased. What is Robert J Hunt doing today that he has not done yet? What do you think that?

Speaker 2: 25:32

is.

Speaker 1: 25:32

Not done yet. You have not done it. You can't use anything you've already done. Don't count.

Speaker 2: 25:37

Yeah, I'm on a big quest to help people understand what it looks like to live out your faith at work. I started this earlier this year because I've always lived out my faith through my work. I don't have a problem with that. It's something I really adopted way back in 94. But I see that people feel for some reason that your work should be here and your faith should be here, and I don't know why you would separate it. I don't go to work and forget that I'm married. I don't go to work and forget that I'm married. I don't go to work and forget that I have kids. But I think for some reason people have self-regulated the idea that you can live out your faith at work. It's a part of who you are. Just like we talk about football, we talk about Jesus and I don't know why people hold back, other than the fact that so many Christians have been such a bad example of a relationship with Christ that people don't want to go there. Because I don't want to be associated with that guy and I get it, but listen, we still need to.

Speaker 2: 26:33

There's a lot of people who've never heard of Jesus, don't know it. You could be the one example of Christ in their life, and so I am trying to encourage the leaders in my world to live out their faith boldly. Be one person everywhere. Don't walk around handing out tracts or put a Bible on your desk to look religious man. Just love people, serve people, listen to people, care for people, make time for people, like Jesus did. And it's not that complicated. If you want to, you can clearly do it, and that's my focus these days.

Speaker 1: 27:04

I love that, man. Thanks for being in here, man. This has been a fantastic quick chat, man. I'm pretty sure it's going to be the last time, man. Let everybody know where they can find your work.

Speaker 2: 27:11

Robert. Well, we have a website called nobodycaresbookcom. We'd love to have you go there, take the satisfaction assessment and declare to yourself whether or not you're living the life you really want to live and then, if you're not, do something about it. That's my passion. That's helping people understand where to find the book Nobodycaresbookcom.

Speaker 1: 27:31

Thank you very much, sir. He's the accountability coach and the author of Nobody Cares Until you Do Robert J Hunt. Thank you, sir, for being here, man, we appreciate it. For you guys watching and listening. We're already live on all the social media platforms. This episode is already available for you in about an hour or so. We're doing all the listening platforms. For those of you guys who don't watch YouTube, you can find this episode no matter what. Follow Robert J Hunt at nobodycaresbookcom and refdallascom. Thanks again for watching and listening. We're out of here. Have a great day.