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The Mike Litton Experience

Tom Kennedy on Burying the Hatchet, Leading with Vision & Saving Millions

The Mike Litton Experience

Mike Litton

Business, Kids & Family, Parenting, Careers

5.01.2K Ratings

🗓️ 16 June 2025

⏱️ 60 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this inspiring episode of The Mike Litton Experience, we sit down with Tom Kennedy, a visionary leader who turned regional conflict into cooperation—and ultimately saved local residents millions of dollars.

From literally burying the hatchet to forging partnerships with former adversaries, Tom’s story is a masterclass in leadership, conflict resolution, and long-term vision. Discover how he and his team aligned with the Fallbrook Public Utility District to create a breakthrough in water supply savings, slashing costs for 10,000 customers and redefining what it means to serve a community.

Whether you’re building a business, managing a team, or navigating tough relationships, this episode delivers real-life tools and unforgettable insights that will help you lead with purpose and impact.

💡 Key Takeaways:

  • How to turn enemies into allies for long-term success

  • The power of symbolic leadership moments

  • Why emotional intelligence matters in high-stakes negotiations

  • How to keep the end goal in mind—despite personal differences

  • Saving communities $10M+ through visionary decisions

🎯 This episode isn’t just a story. It’s a strategy session for entrepreneurs, civic leaders, and anyone committed to achieving massive impact.

🔔 Subscribe for More Inspiration!

If you found this episode valuable, LIKE, COMMENT, and SUBSCRIBE to The Mike Litton Experience for more interviews with business leaders, entrepreneurs, and changemakers who are shaping the future. Don’t miss the next game-changing conversation!

Transcript

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0:00.0

And I said, everybody, we're going to get our aggressions out right here.

0:04.5

And, uh, there was like, yeah.

0:06.3

And I said, but wait, another thing, I'd gone down to Home Depot and bottled a little

0:09.6

hatchet and painted it white, had one of my guys get it back going dig a big hole right over

0:14.3

the next to the park a lot.

0:15.4

So anybody wants to whack this thing.

0:17.0

You've got to sign your name on this.

0:18.3

Yeah. thing. You've got to sign your name on this. And the lesson here is that even if you have an

0:22.4

enemy today, they might be your strongest ally tomorrow. So you never want to burn that bridge.

0:27.6

You always got to make sure that whatever the outcome is, you're going to leave your options open.

0:32.7

Because if we had done what David wanted to do and never spoke those guys again. We never would have succeeded.

0:38.8

That process for Rainbow's customers is going to save them $10 to $12 million this

0:44.5

calendar year over what they would pay if they had still been in.

0:47.7

It's about what we're trying to accomplish.

0:49.9

It's not about how you feel about that person, right?

0:57.8

It's with me? I mean, that's exactly what you did. That was, and literally doing it, doing it the way that you did it, literally burying the hatchet,

1:03.3

okay, and making them sign it, the whole thing. That was physically important and it was

1:09.2

mentally important and you got it done.

1:11.6

But, you know, as you're sitting there doing it, you start worrying about,

1:15.6

hey, you know, this is kind of a lousy thing to do.

1:17.6

And then when you look at a lot of the jobs that are in the aerospace industry,

1:21.6

I remember another friend of ours, we were at a, I forget where we were,

...

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